The Case of the Grinning Cat

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M. Chat

chris marker continues to be super-relevant into his 80s. a nice spectacle education piece this week at the new museum on the bowery. but seriously, why don't they release these damned things on dvd. but to the movie - in november 2001, he became intrigued by the sudden appearance of grinning yellow cat paintings on Paris buildings and public surfaces, and began to document the mysterious materializations of this charming feline. purportedly looking to solve the mystery of this unknown artist, dubbed M. Chat, marker just uses it as a springboard to examine the city's changing social climate -- from the pro-american feelings generated shortly after sept. 11, to the anti-bush and iraq war demonstrations that have become so prevalent. he also looks at the demonstrations that took place during the 2002 french election that saw right-wing centrist jacques chirac defeat right-wing extremist jean-marie le pen. eventually, the creator of the grinning cats is revealed to be an art collective known as mr. cat whose members are shown painting a massive representation of their mascot on the plaza in front of the centre pompidou. marker concludes with thoughts on the vital importance of such expressions of art and imagination in our public lies, echoing the may’68 slogan that “la poésie est dans la rue”

* also tonight, henry flynt at glasslands *

Dream debris
Robert Kelly

And when there's nothing left there's you
you cast a shadow that makes me.
The dreadful two of us again, mother
and son, father and daughter, broken
down the middle like an old barn,
christ, owls and woodchucks live therein
and all the bad birds celebrate their spring

but it's australia down in here, a metal
language and faces with big pores
staring straight into the sun, where money lives
shaped like a golden phallus. But not
a man's cock. Some other kind, girl dong
or cloud prick or the pointy shadow of the moon
so bright we gasp and say The Sun,
that's where it comes from, that mist is me,

(the sun is the shadow of the moon.
meaning is the shadow of desire.)

That light suffusing mist is thee, pardner,
hot-hipped and sore all about
from Aphrodite's lucidest negotiations.
All flesh wants you because your mind.