Beelzebub Hamiltonian Fly

As in many of Kurt's flights of fancy, this excerpt from an early draft of Omasters begins with a story and ends in a cascading maelstrom of associative ideas and images. Kurt did not think, and therefore did not write, in a strictly linear fashion. His mind packed with references and information, like James Joyce in Finnegans Wake, Kurt seamlessly jumped from one point in space (mind) to another. "BHF deserves a personalized introduction, like St. Puce, the flea under the armpit of Christ as He hung on the Cross: the first communicant. BHF is the first to pass through the Black Hole of the inner man." The excerpt introduces a number of Omaster characters by name.

Sabbatical Leave Request - 1998

A a fully-tenured professor at Sacramento State University, Kurt took advantage of the opportunity he was given after each seven years of teaching for a year off at reduced salary--a sabbatical. Being granted a sabbatical required submitting an application one year in advance, and this request was submitted in 1997 for the fall of 1998. His intention, as outlined in his request, was ambitious; "Historians are beset by vexing problems about any roles Alchemy may have played in prompting the goldsmith Johann Gutenberg's metallurgical innovation of casting moveable type. Yet, conventional art history is virtually silent about this, as about the nature of the ink used by early Western printers."

The Revolution of Popular Art

This article from 1968 was published in the pages of artscanada, a magazine in which Kurt frequently appeared. He explores the events and figures leading up to what he terms a "revolution of Popular art" wherein past distinctions, categories and criticism no longer apply. "A more finely-focused view discovers that neither is there any longer a precise sense of differentiation between the various "media" within the realm of fine arts. Nor, in terms of a much more general view, have the clear-cut separations be­tween art and life been able to function with quite the same surety as they did, say, before the beginning of the century."

Booley and Rosie go to NCC

In this short parable, Kurt playfully indulges his imagination while combining it, in his customary fashion, with the insights of esoteric traditions of knowledge. Booley, a baboon logician (his name most likely derived from Boolean mathematics) and Rosie, a Rosette Spoonbill librarian, form an unlikely alliance, resulting in Booley's sudden awakening. "...what Booley had previously experienced serially, nacheinander, he now saw all at once, nebeneinander," Kurt writes, echoing a important theme in his teaching and his life about enlightenment and seeing all appearances as divine. As to the meaning of NCC in the title; insights are welcome.

Canned Heat

For the opening of an exhibition at UCLA of sculptor Harold Paris' work, Kurt organized the appearance of five musical groups, including Frank Zappa and a re-constituted Canned Heat. Canned Heat had attracted Kurt's attention at a concert, and not long there after he drafted this article in 1967 about the group and its blues music. A white group playing black blues, and playing it very well, was not the only story; "It ain't all good. There are, in fact, some tragic drawbacks to the fading of American Black culture--whether it is the result of being sold-out, flooded out and appropriated, or merely loved to death," Kurt penned. It's unclear if this article was ever published; the LA Free Press often printed articles by von Meier, but no record of its publication appears in Kurt's archives.

Building a New Critical Foundation

As an art historian and writer of critical essays, Kurt found himself challenged by the inadequacy of past conceptions of the methodology of art criticism. "...the truly relevant and exciting art of the "recent present" can no longer be contained by the exclusive concept of precious-object-in-­a-scarcity-economy. Nor is it any longer possible to make sense writing about art as a commodity," he offers, adding "Attempting to understand even some of the most basic postulates of contemporary art with a mentality conditioned by exclusively pre-1960s experience is like trying to repair a computer with ham­mer and nails and a roll of bailing wire." This essay is from the Christmas 1967 edition of Art International.

Utilizing Esoteric Traditions of Knowledge

In this paper, clearly intended for presentation as a lecture, Kurt makes his case that art history demands the incorporation of the knowledge of esoteric traditions. Using Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel frescoes as his jumping off point, and by identifying the figures and symbols Michelangelo incorporated into his work, Kurt is able to navigate towards early Greek influences and derivations. He writes, "A recurrent theme in much of my teaching and research is the notion of renavatio or Renaissance, not exclusively in the technical sense of art historians, but rather as the principle of rebirth or renewal, distinguished function of ours own psyche, and a fundamental, indeed, necessary experience for the human spirit."

Artistic Melancholy

Kurt's lectures at UCLA began as rather traditional ones in 1966. This lecture delivered in his class Art 1C traces the incorporation of temperament within art history. His concerns with non-traditional forms are, nonetheless evident. "It is the misunderstandings in the history of anything in the humanities that is as interesting, if not more interesting, than something that has been understood correctly," he states, and later, "To ignore astrology would be to do so at the peril of our history, for we are involved in all the humanities. It involves human beings, and we have an intellectual obligation to question and be skeptical about everything human beings believe in."

Six Statements with Extrapolations for the Underground Press Service

In June of 1967 Israel conducted its six-day war against its Arab neighbors. Earlier, in April, The Experimental Arts Festival at UCLA featured a controversial "auto da fe" book-burning by Kurt von Meier as "stand-in" for supposed revolutionary artist Jose Que. Discontent in the black community was high, the Vietnam War was ramping up and anti-war activism was on the rise as well. Kurt von Meier, UCLA's unconventional art professor, was getting a lot of press attention, and writing for several underground newspapers, like the LA Free Press. This document was sent by Kurt to the Underground Press Service.

Architecture: Paradigm and Outline

Kurt had visions of writing a book about architecture, "A book designed as a text for teaching the understanding of architecture, intended for a wide general readership and for use at the university level for instruction in Arts and Humanities courses." As was true for many, though by all means not all, of his grander visions, he began but did not finish; his mind was often too active to settle down for long into one project. Here, however, is the way he began on this particular effort.

Joyce James in the Yucatan

This fictional account of Joyce James, correspondent for Tantradine International, takes place in the Yucatan during a hurricane. As is true of most of Kurt's fiction, it's filled with facts and observations about culture, language, mathematics, space, time and the power of intuition. And rock and roll tunes. 

Truth and Quests

The title of this essay says a lot about Kurt von Meier, for he was always seeking truth and his quest never ended. Accordingly, he takes us on an excursion through space, time and mystery, wielding his Tarot deck, American Heritage Dictionary and Brown's Laws of Form as crystal mirrors upon which to gaze at his own reflections. It becomes a mirrored room stretching to eternity, illuminated with the True, Good, Beautiful and Real.
          "Existence," writes von Meier, "is the level of the algebra, the being and doing of it, constants of the arithmetic applied to variables such as those encountered in time--although the algebra it­self is not in time, only representations of it, arrangements of tokens; the relationships are transcultural, inside Eternity still."

Doin' It By Threes

Here is another set of notes Kurt prepared in advance of his With HIdden Noise lecture at UC Davis in 1986, in which he reviews Marcel Duchamp's work within an art historical context--by threes. Context, for Kurt, was essential to the understanding of any work of art; not surprisingly, his Princeton professor art historian Erwin Panofsky developed and taught a three-part method of analysis.

Kinescope-Kaleidoscope: Dick Clark

Kurt's interest in Rock and Roll inclined him to propose a television program utilizing Dick Clark's extensive collection of Kinescopes of American Bandstand. Kurt teamed up with a fellow named Ron Koslow to pitch the idea. "...much of the evidence tracing the rise of Rock and Roll is already lost--if only because no one considered it very important at the time, or thought to preserve it for histor­ians of the future. Thus," they proposed, "the Kinescope segments preserved from the ABC-TV show, "Dick Clark's American Bandstand," or the Saturday Night "Dick Clark Beechnut Show" Provide fascinating and important documentation, of unique interest today."

VOGUE: Katherine Ross

After his article about "hippie culture" was published in Vogue magazine in 1967, Kurt followed up in 1968 with an article intended for Vogue about actress Katherine Ross. Though Ross indeed was featured on Vogue's cover,  Kurt's article did not appear inside. With it's analogy of Ross as a peridot, a chrysolite jewel, one suspects it was too erudite, too unusual, not "Hollywood" enough. Though he had published a profile of Beach Boy Brian Wilson in Eye magazine, this article/interview with Ross certainly was a departure for Kurt, and remains a charming portrait of its time.

BULLBEAR

Today's stock market is as unpredictable as that of any time in modern history. Using that as a jumping off point, Kurt goes on to explore the terminology of BULL and BEAR as applied to the stock market, in this short essay likely composed at one sitting around 1980. "It is, then, in the constellations that we see the transference from bull-orientation (Cowboy, Cowherd) to bear-orientation, which is northern (arctic)." At once informative and amusing, it's typical of Kurt's way of seeing the world as theater.

Zhikr Project

Sufism held an honored place in Kurt's heart; he could read and write some Persian, and spent years studying Sufi teachings and practices. In 1981, Kurt proposed a Zhikr Project, what is commonly called "Sufi Dancing." Contemplated as a five-evening program for 100 participants at Sac State, it was to be free of charge to the public. "The zhikr project is inspired in part by a felt need for this university to explore alternative means for the transmission of knowledge," Kurt writes. "Without sacrificing subtler insights, however, the zhikr affords a clear, objective example of effective teaching methodology." A greater understanding of Islamic and Middle Eastern culture was essential in the west, Kurt believed. Time has proven him to be correct.

C.I.R.C.A. - Center for Intermedia Research and Communication Analysis

During the late 1960s the world of Fine Arts (like much else at that time) was in a state of rapid change, in part fueled by the pervasive effects of advancing communication and imaging technology. Marshall McLuhan's ideas had a great impact on Kurt and his views about art, education, and society. In this letter intended for review by Jean de Menil, one member of the family of wealthy art patrons in Texas with whom Kurt had established a relationship (see Mixed Masters), Kurt proposes the creation of C.I.R.C.A., an Intermedia Center at the University of St. John in Houston, TX. Such centers were being established in various cities at the time.
          He writes, "The idea of an interdepartmental or interdisciplinary project provides one of the most direct and important opportunities for reintegrating education. Perhaps the brightest hopes lie in bringing together the revolutionary technology of the twentieth century with our study of the fine arts and liberal arts in the spirit of the great medieval tradition of humanistic scholarship....In a field such as art history it is fast becoming clear that truly sig­nificant research can be done now only by transcending the limiting conventions of academic departmentalization....The great promise of a center for interdisciplinary, or interdepartmental, studies lies precisely in these possibilities for a humanistic reintegration of education, which implies as its goal the enlightened individual human being, totally integrated in body, mind and spirit."

A Bruit Secret: Draft notes for a talk at UC Davis

In 1986, Kurt and UC Davis graduate student Tamara Blanken produced a replica of Duchamp's A Bruit Secret (With Hidden Noise) and planned an event at the University of California at Davis during which it would be displayed and Kurt and Tamara would each give a presentation. Kurt generated a set of notes for his talk, which included some slide presentations. Accordingly, this document is adapted from his typewritten notes, and images added corresponding to the slides he displayed. Tamara's account of creating the replica is also available. A transcript and recording of Kurt's lecture is also available.

Unwinding the Mystical Thread

This excerpt from Kurt's opus A Ball of Twine elucidates the mystical path, a path which intrigued and absorbed him. Exploring Soma (Amanita muscaria), Kurt then follows the mystical path of initiation through rituals and practices spread throughout the world. He concludes with a discussion of Benedictine, and Duchamp's references to it. He quotes and cites sources extensively, demonstrating his well-established habits of academic discipline.