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The Detroit Artist's Workshop: Roots And Branches A Tenth Anniversary

The Detroit Artist's Workshop: Roots And Branches A Tenth Anniversary image The Detroit Artist's Workshop: Roots And Branches A Tenth Anniversary image
Parent Issue
Day
8
Month
November
Year
1974
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On November 1st, the Detroit Artist's Workshop, now defunct, celebrated its tenth anniversary . Not exactly an earth-shattering event, this anniversary, but one with great significance for those of us whose daily cultural practice sterns largely from that which developed during the post -beat. pre-hippie days of the early 1960s. Back before the 1967 Summer of Love/mass cultural explosion, which forever changed the face of this nation, there were only a few meccas of alternative consciousness in the midst of Ike Easyhower America. Most EVERYBODY back then was straight, immersed in the P.R. of Bob Hope and JFK, using Brylcreem, and certain that what was good for General Motors was good for the USA.

Being a freek back then was REALLY being an oddity, the object of mixed amusement, scorn and often dangerous hostility. There weren't any gathering places for those like yourself, you couldn't cop marijuana in your high school lunchroom (if you had ever even heard of the weed), there was no In Concert to watch on tv, no anti-war demonstrations, and nobody had hair longer than John Wayne's (except some women, most of whom spent life working to emulate Liz Taylor).

But even in the midst of all that conformity the seeds had been sewn for the culture that has become so widespread, so accepted, and in some cases so co-opted today in 1974. Seeds like Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, Diane DiPrima, William Burroughs, Little Richard, beats, poets, reeferheads, and jazz musicians. In Detroit there was the Artist's Workshop co-operative, which eventually grew to six houses on a block near Wayne State University, where lived, wrote, smoked, fucked and played a variety of artists and, for back then that is, utter weirdoes.

The Workshop was founded on November 1st, 1964, by John and Leni Sinclair, Charles Moore, Robin Eichele, George Tysh and about 11 others, who together pooled their resources to the tune of $5 each, which was put up as the first month's rent on the first house. There began regular poetry/jazz programs every Sunday, a place to be together that hadn't existed before except in the homes of a small group of conscious people, and the Artist's Workshop Press.

The Press first published the writings and poetry which we are reprinting here in commemoration of the ten years I which have passed since. At first the "Press" consisted of stolen supplies and a borrowed mimeo machine at Wayne State, which spewed forth inspired editions of pamphlets and books in print runs of 500 copies.

Activities at the Workshop thrived for some time, but eventually the spectrum of organized inter-racial weirdoes proved extremely intimidating to the forces of law and morality in Detroit. The first reefer busts started coming down in 1966 t on the community, under the watchful eyes of Lieutenant Warner Stringfellow of the "Narcotics" Squad. John Sinclair was busted and spent six months in the Detroit House of Corrections. The busts and general despair atmosphere of Detroit drove some of the more creative people to the east or west coasts, and the Workshop eventually was no more.

But nothing ever dies; rather, everything becomes transformed. About the time Sinclair was released from the clink the new cultural seeds that sprouted with the Workshop and places like it were spread across the land by the likes of Bob Dylan, the Beatles, the Jefferson Airplane, Jimi Hendrix and the San Francisco acid revolution. The culture was no longer  an "in" group, an isolated phenomenon; it was every where the radio could reach.

With the poems, pieces and reviews printed here we celebrate the Artist's Workshop of Detroit, one of the first alternative institutions of America's new age. where "changing your politics" became defined as actually changing how ; you lived your life. In these days when our cultural practice is, especially in an easy-going and highly tolerant place like Ann Arbor, so much taken for granted, we feel there is much use in examining the roots and branches, the sacrifices and I the struggles which have brought us to where we are today, and which can guide us further along our collective journey.

STATEMENT It is our belief that jazz musical forms must be extended I to meet an entirely new set of artistic, social, cultural and economic circumstances. It might seem strange to some to see the word jazz mentioned in context with such cold W hard realities as society and economics; yet it is undeniable fact that the very origins of the music itself and all its subsequent development was rooted in societal forms. The field holler, the spiritual, the blues, each served a definite function and grew out of very real, very painful ' experiences. We know today that the lyrics of the spiritual sometimes served as an alarm, a call to arms, or an angry cry to be done with suffering and rid of the oppressor. Much of the blues is an extension of this argument.

Later on as musical instruments replaced the human voice, poetic directness and social commentary began to give way to a "purer" musical form. This musical form developed at a much faster pace than the lyric. It was due in large part to the plasticity and ambiguity of notes over words that a folk art became transformed into a national art and later into a universal art. It was now possible for a listener to hear just the music without the ambivalence that words elicit. One could identify with whatever one chose and reject whatever one chose. Thus the Negro (through jazz) has lent America a somewhat uneasy reprieve and, in the bargain, developed an art form which it could be said is more nearly "american" than any other. It is a knowledge of the past and a precarious nationality which is the crux of our consciousness. For us, music is functional as well as aesthetic. The artist presumes to judge life, to assess it for all people, to accept it, to reject it. Both as people and artists in a complex, oftentimes grievously unjust world we accept the challenge this society poses and we project an answer through our music, one which sings a New America. We take our place beside those poets of the field. Only the nuances of language have changed. The same essential longing for dignity over despair is still with us.

-Archie Shepp

CHANGE/1

Fall/Winter 1965

dear Uncle Sam,

We fucked on the American flag tonight. There wasn't any sheets and the mattress weren't none too clean, neither. I hope it's okay with you. Because if it isn't all hell is going to break loose, sure as shooting, and you'll be the one with the badge and the gun.

Love,

Tom and Grace

-Torn Mitchell

YUP IT IS

Workshop Books/19

Summer 1967

"E.B" (a C. T. song)

A meat song, for every body's meat. That we can feel the body, as energy, 500 micrograms chant through the meat I have been blessed with. Why do my friends need to deny it? That they can "make it" with the spirit only, that their bodies are unfortunate flesh only, & to be "transcended," got rid of, this is bad enough, but that we all have to

feel it the same, oh

No you don't baby, I mean I am my self,

just feel me,

I am here

as meat energy & bone, the force of the universe moves through me, AS me, I mean we are not 'Two," & the language will not let me say it, goddammit, I mean what "I" am is my body & breath, & I am here right now in front of you to say this, with my meat, that there is no way words will say it all, not with the language we all have as common to us all, as our bodies are common, as we live & breathe, the poet IS the fucking poem

& speaks to you as

EVERYBODY would speak - gesture & grace are our natural state, our bodies live there as they are born, our selves

ARE our selves, I mean just

LOOK at me now, meat & energy activated, by the force that is ours in common, O

FUCK IT scream & dance, the body is the self, Every Body

is Every Body, all song moves through us, we come together in the dance of flesh, flesh is spirit,

take enough acid & the self decomposes into live meat charged with love energy sustained right here on earth in its rightful place. Every Body is right where it belongs, The earth

is the term we share in common. Ah yes, the earth. AND the body -

Every Body

for Cecil Taylor &

for a new year

December 31, 1966

Detroit

John Sinclair, in

WORK/4

Summer/Fall/Winter

1966

Photos From left to right: Archie Shepp; Some of the old Crew; The First Workshop House; John Sinclair & Charles Moore.

Photos: Leni Sinclair

POEM #1 we're here! the celestial city the shining light is here, right here on earth, inside us the some and daughter of men and women, the flesh and

blood,

the moving gods.

& we do move, move as we must thru the changes in fear and delight, we come and go. the moon comes up every night, she comes when she must she comes when I 'm able

when. I'm cain. it's all all right there is no wrong.

joy is the fruit of the garden of love pain is the flesh that feeds it. thru the valley of the shadow of death runs a river of light. the sun the moon the valley the

river -

they are pieces of us we

are part of them. not particle - wave. no rest but piece by peace flowing in a sea of light life IS the universe, YAH

WEH, & it beats

systole diastole rhythm FLUX is the word.

if you don 't like the weather wait a minute, if you don't like your self dissolve and make it again.

all dissolution prepares, fear is the friction of change. love the lubricant.

april in the first year of acid dissolves.

-Mike Lytle

THE JOURNAL,

Summer 1967

FUCKN A MAN.. CIA MAN

Who can kill a general in his bed Overthrow dictators if they're Red

Fuckn A Man

CIA MAN

Who can counter counter agents quick Specially the ones themselves have

picked

Fuckn A Man

CIA MAN

Who can plan a riot Viet Nam Who can have the troops

restore the calm

Fuckn A Man. . .CIA Man 

Who can buy a government so cheap Change a cabinet without a squeak

Fuckn A Man . . . CIA Man

Who can get a budget that's so great Who will be the fifty-first state

Fuckn A Man . . . CIA Man 

Who has got the greatest secret service The one that makes the other services nervous

Fuckn A Man . . . CIA Man

Who can cipher anything to zeroes Not well known but simply well-paid heroes

Fuckn A Man . . . CIA Man

Who can take the sugar from its sack Pour in LSD and put it back

Fuckn A Man . . . CIA Man

Who can train guerrillas by the dozen Send em out to kill their untrained cousins

Fuckn A Man . . . CIA Man

Who's the agency well known to God Who copped his staff & copped his rod

Fuckn A Man . . . CIA MAN

(C)1965 Tuli Kupferberg

FUGS SONG BOOK, September 1966

SLAVERY A Dutch slave ship sailed up the quiet James River to anchor at the new English settlement of Jamestown, Virginia. It had on board twenty strong negroes who had been stolen from their homes in western Africa and were for sale.

The owner's house sits like a latent poll tax. It is hidden behind heavy trees that shake a little. The slave shacks are below & off to the left. Then are the acres of cotton. Then is the cotton baling press and the cotton ginning mill. Then is the boy hauling baled cotton to shipping points on the River King Cotton is continued on page 12