FoolishPeople

Photographs from the End of the Earth

The photographs of 'Terra:Extremitas' taken by the talented Cecile Mella can now be viewed in our Online Gallery. They capture the unique experience of the End of the Earth for everyone who attended, participated and created art.

Featuring 'The Nursery' installation by Ilse Versluijs

Performer: Lucy Allin

Featuring 'The Heteroclite' by Jonas Ranson

Featuring 'The Secret School' installation by Christina Mitrentse

Performer: Tereza Kamenicka

Terra:Extremitas- Albo Helm

Albo Helm has been professionally involved in making comics, cartoons, illustrations and graphic designs for 3/5 of his life. His work is mainly published in magazines and publications in the cultural, educational, political and special concerns sector. Every now and then he makes his own book or magazine or has an exhibition of his work. Apart from that, he's fine, thanks. You can see his stuff at: www.albohelm.nl

About Albo's work:

"Why I draw comics is a hard one to answer. Being more than 30 years in 'bisnis', it has literally grown to be a part of daily (and nightly) life. So normal I don't think about it anymore. During this time I did a lot of different stuff, from short newspaper gags, biographical documentaries, infographics, SF-series and extremist political agitprop to booklength senseless train-of-thought meanderings. I prefer working for existing printed media over bringing out my stories as autonomous work, because that way I can reach many different audiences. I love participating with other artists in adventurous settings to learn from them and chase each other to greater heights."

'Pure Vernunft Darf Niemals Siegen' Preview, created for 'Terra:Extremitas'

About Terra:Extremitas: "Reality clashing with fantasy is something every creative mind likes to chew upon, and being a SF-buff the End of the World is well known territory to me. It was only natural to step into T:E when it popped up. In my comic strip contribution I focused on the process of creation itself and the deeper question what is real about reality, without getting too abstract I hope. Starting point was a great song by the German rock band Tocotronic (Pure Vernunft darf niemals siegen), a plea for fantasy and madness, which I tried to put 1-on-1 into pictures. Doing so the whole thing got out of hand, as it was supposed to do..."

Terra:Extremitas- Wes Unruh

Wes Unruh is the current Executive Editor of the blog at Alterati.com. He is producer behind Philip K Nixon, and editor @ large for Aelturnity Audio, as well as co-author of the non-fiction reality hacking guide The Art of Memetics. He was also the creative director behind Unquiet Mind, and is currently working on a graphic novel with Ray Carney, as well as the fiction Memwar based on the sigil shown.

 

Matthew 6:22-23 (Private Translation)

The light of the body is the pineal gland: if therefore thine pineal
gland be united in focus, thy whole body shall be enlightened.  But if
thine pineal gland be divided, thy whole body shall be full of
darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how
great is that darkness!

 
“Approaching Terra:Extremitas I am recognizing how the underlying myth resonates with work I've kept under wraps for over a decade. Portions of this work have moved into visibility, often through the mechanisms of poetry.  The pieces I bring out of hiding now are elements of a larger, multi-media work at the heart of which is the text Memwar.

The first statement of intent was the album TEOTWAWKI composed within the framework of Unquiet Mind and the associated chapbook released privately on 10-23-04, publicly on that Halloween of that year.

Since then I have sought to reflect the fiction by research as performance, using the tools available to reflect back the very elements which are privately being woven into a tapestry of change. Writing as talismantic evocation, weaving sound as collage, and treating the visual iconographic tropes of sigil magick as it's own alphabet, within spheres of emotional gradiance, these are the pieces of meaning I seek deform, transform, or discard as I move forward through the ripples sent back from the singularity that approaches.”

About Terra:Extremitas:

In 2012 there is an apocalyptic event, revelatory and encompassing all fiction.

This event is a singularity, beyond which none have successfully scryed.  For a thousand years we have been looping along a timequake between 1991 and 2001 - on the hundredth iteration we broke free, hurtling toward this white-hot space and time.

Kilgore Trout is chanting '...there's work to be done.  You were sick, now you're better, there's work to be done.  You were sick, now you're better, there's work to be done.  You were sick, now you're better...' Hagbard Celine, Harry Coin, and Howard Campbell face down the Snaggerbum Fnord live on ECW.  Television relects sands of desolation.

Now what? & When?  WHere & Why? These demands grow loud in the void left behind by 'How.' Those Heteroclites whose eye be single and filled with light sing meaning into existence, transform the fabric of matter by speaking with the demons at the atom's core. Spirit reactive as all attain quickness with one weave of the Queen of Fiction.

We who harmonize become louder, a web of we, the feedback cycle of we, the blistering edge of nothing melted and there each lamp of the soul now reflects as a web, and deep below the hair of Indra.

The Great Year ends and begins anew; individuality is both sacrificed and christened.  This mad blood world shakes itself awake after 13,000 years of galactic darkness and we hear it in our cells--dark dreamless pillars stand waiting on new worlds, and each of us becomes attuned as stamped on our souls the mark of our archetype the mythological being to which we are born aches--and even now the harmonizing is taking hold.  The whisper of time with its ripples moving back through the fabric of our own experience leaves a maker's mark on our collective shadows.

Wesunruh.info
philiPKNixon.com
wesunruh.googlepages.com/teotwawki

 

Terra:Extremitas- John Harrigan

John Harrigan (a.k.a. asmadai) is a writer, director, performer, founder of FoolishPeople and the Weaponized Art Movement, but beyond anything is a Magus.

Past productions and events have been shown in central London, across England and America. Most recently at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London, where 'Dead Language' was featured in the Times and The London Paper's top events and included in London Lates season of cultural events. He has also been awarded the Magi of Trygonia by the Dionysion Underground for his outstanding work in 'Dark Nights of the Soul', a thirteen month long performance ritual which was manifested at the Horse Hospital.

John lectures part time for the University of Hertfordshire and has run workshops in myth and magick for BBC Blast, Treadwells  and the ICA.

John is working on his first feature film which shoots in Prague in 2009.

Director's notes:

"Terra: Extremitas is an evolving Open Source Myth that uses human fiction as fuel to run its immense engines of change. The mechanics of this story are also a living puzzle box constructed from the purest element of magick:

Art.

Its structure is hidden, yet it invites you to shift and move within the eternal mind, falling ever deeper, becoming part of this myth. Terra:Extremitas is the second annual TERRA Meta Event, the first occured in London March 2007. Terra:Extremitas takes that initial seed and expands on it in every way.

The core story of Terra:Extremitas focuses upon Fiction; the life blood of the human race. It sticks to everything we are. Over the Aeons we have learnt to use it to create the superstructures of our reality. We have permitted other people's experiences both real and unreal to replace our own.

Fiction permeates through all of our relationships. We use our history to protect ourselves from amnesiac time. Forging moments with one another that are strong enough to outlast our individual lives.

The Fiction forces us to slough off our old and dead selves. It comes for these sacrifices wearing our freshly skinned imaginations. Opening up serrated tears in the fabric of the universe, revealing immense entwined beings. Copulating divinity manifested on the other side of never. I have lost myself to art and fiction over and over again. I no longer see who I once was. It has forced me to become something else, ruthlessly adapting and restructuring every version of myself to create a being capable of birthing the eternal Fictions that live forever within.

I hope that the Terra:Extremitas puzzle box can reveal the love and danger contained within all of the Fiction."

John Lawrence Harrigan
888
04:12- 28/07/08

"Fiction is the road to Heaven.The above place, where we all become a hyper-dimensional art work. Watching the page turn below us; flat and minute. Yet so perfect. Eternal vision of a new thing of us and outside of us. Far inside, deep away in the light of glory.

Forever World. Forever Universe. Forever Fiction.

This is how we live."

John Harrigan, 'Terra:Extremitas' August 2008

Terra:Extremitas- Lucy Allin

Lucy graduated from the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts, where she majored in dancing and acting, and had a fascination with choreographing dances using Ancient Greek mythology and literature as inspiration. As she grew up, she performed in too many productions, ballets and musicals to mention, though found her home and became a permanent member of FoolishPeople at the start of 2006.

Her debut performance with FoolishPeople was in 'Dark Nights of the Soul: Cycle III- Emergence' and shortly after she started producing and co-curating FP events and performances. Since then, she has assisted John in facilitating workshops for different clients, whilst developing and performing in all their current and future projects and writing her own poetry.

''For me, 'Terra:Extremitas' has been one of our most challenging productions yet, in terms of balancing the producing, performance and my own art within the piece. It is the first time I have used my choreography and dancing skills within an FP performance; which is ironic as dancing was always my strength before I started working with John as a director, and now I feel it is the opposite way round. I feel extremely privileged that John writes me such incredible roles, commits so much energy into getting me there and has chosen to share his life with me. He has taught me such a unique approach to performance and life; one rehearsal period for example taught me more than years of acting lessons. Don't be mistaken that he writes me such roles because he shares his life with me- it took more than blood, sweat and tears to get to this place and no-one else apart from John has poured more into FP than myself.

For 'Terra: Extremitas', I manifest the Queen of Fiction. I have to say, I've enjoyed working with our group of performers the most of any previous production, and I love the fact our roles shift and change every run, while still retaining such a deep connection to each other. The biggest challenge for me has been exploring dancing skills that have been dormant for three years in a safe way. This has been somewhat successful apart from falling on my head last night on a concrete floor! However, I found a new dimension to the Queen in this state, which had far greater rewards than pain endured!"

Terra:Extremitas- Mattt Baay

Somewhere in the dark time before internet, Mattt Baay was born. When he found out you could die a horrible death being a fireman, he decided he'd rather be a writer - but the drawback in this fantastic plan was that he needed linguistic skills for it. He settled for four years of Art Academy, after which he received a piece of paper that said he could tell stories with pictures. Nowadays there are occasionally people who will pay him money to draw or animate pictures. And sometimes there aren't. In which case he eats dry bread.

For strange stories without letters by Matt, go to www.bunbun.eu.

Mattt's comic, created especially for 'Terra: Extremitas'

Terra: Extremitas- Sandra Kleine Staarman

"My name is Sandra Kleine Staarman, I am the woman behind Littlestarman. I was born in 1982 and have been scribbling and drawing ever since I could hold a pencil. I finished my studies in history last year, but after four days working as a historian I decided I wanted to pursue my passion and become a comic artist. Ever since I’ve been traveling and drawing. I currently live and work in a sqatted village in the Spanish Pyrenees. I live in a small house right under the church tower, together with a small cat and a wild self-made drawing table... and lots of inspiration!"

Preview of 'The Sleep of Reason', created by Sandra for 'Terra:Extremitas'

"I'm not even a big reader of comics. Although I have my favorites like Hilgar (Tank Girl), Frezatto (Bout du Monde) and Moebius. But most of all I like to read the work of other young Dutch comic artists like Aimee de Jongh and Floor de Goede. Together with Pepino (Pepijn Schermer) I form a small collective called the Amsterdam Comic Guerilla, that makes independent prints. I’ve been drawing a daily webcomic on Littlestarman for over two years and got a Dutch-Belgian award for this work. Right now with all my travels I mostly have to put myself down and do some speed-drawing. Usually a week or so. My first long story was ‘Il est 5 h 35 a Bagdad’, an independent print. My second longer story was called ‘Other Life’ and is published in ‘De Lijn’, a dutch comic magazine. Furthermore I drew ‘Sciappo’ in Italy and worked in Berlin on ‘Camhead’, a comic accompanying a film for the IFFR 2008. Right now, living in the Spanish mountains there are several more projects to be worked on: for Crap*, an independent magazine by Maia Machen, and for Inkt, a new Dutch comic magazine."

Preview of 'The Sleep of Reason', created by Sandra for 'Terra:Extremitas'

"The theme of Terra:Extremitas fascinated me from the first moment at the Comic Fair in Haarlem where Margreet told me about it. The setting where art or fiction comes alive to judge humanity leaves lots of space for personal interpretation. I love to ask questions in my comics, and I like them to leave the answer to the reader. In this comic the question is what is real and what is fiction? The story is circular. The end could be read as the beginning as well. I hope to confuse my audience. Provoke speculation about what the story is, and what it means. Enjoy it!!"

Terra:Extremitas- Pieter van Oudheusden

1957. Academy of Art, Rotterdam. Writer of comics and children’s books. Graphic novels: Spertijd (Curfew, art by Adri van Kooten, 2005), De grote toveraar (The great wizzard, art by Jeroen Janssen, 2007). Next book: Metromonsters (Subway monsters, children’s book with illustrations by Sebastiaan Van Doninck). Translations: French (La fille sans coeur, 2007), German, Portugese, Danish, Korean, Japanese. Publishes in Dutch comic magazine Zone 5300. Lives in Rotterdam. Wife Annette. Daughters Fay and Nana. Two old cats.

'Lilith' Preview
Story by Pieter van Oudheusden, Art by Maarten Gerritsen

Terra:Extremitas- Maarten Gerritsen

'Lilith' Preview, created for 'Terra Extremitas' Written by Pieter van Oudheusden & Illustrated by Maarten Gerritsen

Maarten Gerritsen (1977) is a Dutch illustrator and cartoonist. After graduating from Communications Studies and ready to enter the advertising industry, he started working at the Jan Kruis Studio instead. Here he sharpened his drawing skills further by working on the weekly family comic 'Jan, Jans & de kinderen'. Soon he started to do other freelance drawing assignments as well. Nowadays Maarten works entirely on a freelance basis. He's created illustrations and cartoons for various companies and magazines, as well as storyboards for small films and music videos, though his greatest passion is comics. Besides 'Jan, Jans & de kinderen', he recently drew a story for Donald Duck Magazine and frequently works on his own material such as stories for 'Bloeddorst', 'Myx Magazine' and 'Terra: Extremitas'. He prefers to work in different styles, varying from cartoonish and Disney-like to more realistic and dramatic. Always attempting to make his next drawing better than the previous one, Maarten hopes to spend many years to come exploring the many ways of 2D visualisation.

Terra:Extremitas- Sonica Storm

Born in Sweden, Victoria Karlsson graduated from Central Saint Martin with a BA (Hons) in Arts & Design in 2005. Victoria has worked as a Sound Designer for several live art events, including FoolishPeople's performance of Dead Language at the ICA and Desecration, a performance over 5 levels in the Galleries of Justice, Nottingham while also pursuing her own work. Although constantly exploring different approaches to sound art and design, Victoria finds working with live performance / art extremely challenging and rewarding. She met FoolishPeople when she collaborated with them on their first Meta Event 'Terra Incognita' in March 2007 and has since become a valued member and one of their main performers.

Sonica Storm will be creating and designing WraithLand within Terra: Extremitas.

About Vicky's work:

"Working somewhere between music and sound art, I'm interested in the emotional properties of everyday sounds, music and noise, and also in what happens when things are taken out of context, to be put into one another, or to stand on their own."

myspace.com/SonicaStorm