Elate on Censorship - LSD Magazine Issue 7

Censorship, simply put, is controlling the information and the ideas that are being circulated within a society. The truth about censorship is that it has truly been a hallmark for dictatorship all throughout history. Censorship is achieved in many ways, including through examining plays, books, television, films, news reports, radio programs and all other forms of communication in order to alter or otherwise suppress any ideas that were determined to be offensive or objectionable. ~MBCnet.org

To limit the press is to insult a nation; to prohibit reading.....is to declare the inhabitants to be either fools or slaves.
~Claude-Adrien Helvétius

Censorship is the tool of those who have the need to hide actualities from themselves and others. Their fear is only their inability to face what is real. ~Charles Bukowski

I've been the victim of a campaign of vicious harassment and intimidation to stop me from opening an independent gallery in Brick Lane, East London showing visionary fine painting by oldskool London train writers as well as straight-up graff and visionary art.
I had a notice pinned to my wall saying 'Art gallery not needed' then a car was driven at me at top speed outside our intended gallery one night. It nearly ran me over...that's when I knew it was serious. In this age of corruption and decadence, outsider and street art is clung on to as one of the last vestiges of purity, it is vital that it remains peoples free will to paint, show and enjoy which art they so choose, and not be subject to censorship.
~Elate LSD Issue 6
Never has tyranny and censorship been such a burden to art than when shouldered beneath the clear blue skies and fluttering false flags of anarcho-meritocracy and liberty.
~Elate LSD Issue 7 May 2011

If a company's reason-to-be is to make and increase profits, ideals such as freedom of expression and the free sharing of ideas, are by nature, a conflict with the aim of the business entity. Some ideas and some forms of expression will eventually conflict with the character, desires, and motives of the company. With the power to dictate the flow of information to some extent, why wouldn't a business direct that content to suit its own needs?
How does one know what information is missing, if it is missing? How does one know what art they are not being exposed to, if they are not exposed to it?
..the solution is as simple as cultivating awareness. Seek knowledge, discover art, listen to alternative voices. There is the freedom to choose an independent source, rather than the source that is overshadowed by corporate interests.

In our modern capitalist society, there may be many interests trying to cultivate public awareness as a means to financial gain, but accessing a wealth of art, inspiration, and information is possible.
~What is Corporate Censorship? Defining Censorship in Modern Society

All censorships exist to prevent anyone from challenging current conceptions and existing institutions. 
 
All progress is initiated by challenging current conceptions, and executed by supplanting existing institutions. Consequently, the first condition of progress is the removal of all censorships. There is the whole case against censorships in a nutshell. - ~George Bernard Shaw

We get on the bandwagon in all sorts of ways - you know minor ways and major ways ....which isn't censorship exactly, it was something sort of uglier in a way. ~Kathy Acker

We live in oppressive times. We have, as a nation, become our own thought police; but instead of calling the process by which we limit our expression of dissent and wonder "censorship," we call it "concern for commercial viability. ~David Mamet

The test of democracy is freedom of criticism. ~David Ben-Gurion

In the long run of history, the censor and inquisitor have always lost. The only weapon against bad ideas is better ideas. ~Anthony Witney Griswald

Read the full article here

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LSD Magazine Interviews ELATE

Well it’s not often that we find ourselves at a loss for words here at LSD, but having read the interview that Elate - Jon Hammer sent back to us, apart from getting straight on the blower and asking him to write for LSD, we gorged ourselves on the stunning intellectual breadth, conceptual range and lyrical wonder of his sparkling mind. Tracing a primal path between the organic and the magical, his canvasses plunge us into the fault lines between the utopian and the dystopian and hurl us out into a molten core of shimmering imagination where genesis and apocalypse close the circle of archetypal consciousness. A pure old school graffiti writer, Elate has lived witness to the artistic evolution of daubing punk slogans in ’82 to the renegade rush of bombing trains, then the explosive colour and sizzling letters of the street into the concept projects of breathtaking pieces of collaborative creativity like Mutate Britain and Arcadia. Instinctively poetic, searingly perceptive, profoundly positive and inspirationally open hearted, his art and his words hold an enchanted mirror to the ebbs and flows of decades of underground subculture and beyond into the bewitching landscapes of the collective consciousness and the ideas, emotions, complexities, corruption and towering innocence that defines the hidden Hades of the soul and the trickling mysteries of the unchained mind. Seriously though - just fucking read this. - his first ever interview

Can you tell us a little about your early life and your initial drive into art?

I was born in 1970, on the enchanted day of the enchanted month, according to the ‘Old Religion’, or so I’m told. I’ve always been captivated by colour, patterns, reflections and how things are affected by light and shade. My earliest memory is lying in my cot, rubbing my eyes to marvel at the crazy patterns which I could generate. When I got my own room I stared at the artexed ceiling above my bed to make vividly animated landscapes and characters, which kept me awestruck, as did my kaleidoscope, much as kids these days play video games. As I grew a little older I was similarly transported by viewing slides through our antique microscope. I could already read and write when I started school so I drew, in full perspective, in an attempt to ease the boredom and was brutally attacked by a teacher for my efforts. At this point I first realised that making art would not necessarily be easy. I came from a poor but cultured family, our working class background was lit up with amazing colour prints and books on art and music everywhere. We only had a black and white TV but Heironymous Bosch’s visions hung in almost every room which I lost myself in continually. There was always a fresh supply of paper and art materials to hand. My aunt was an amateur archaeologist, armchair historian and expert on the classics, and took me round museums, castles and churches regularly from the age of three. I loved the sacred architecture, staring at stained glass and into the cabinets. She told me what the things were and where they came from, how they were made and how they found their way to the museum and this fired my enthusiasm for art and history.

How did early experiences of sub culture and counter culture impact themselves on your developing identity?

In the early 70s the consciousness revolution that happened in the 60s, had spread from the hippy underground into broader society. My parents were clearly affected by that ethic and the self sufficiency and whole-food thing, there would always seem to be Bob Dylan and blues playing, vegetables growing, joss sticks burning and yoga going on. I remember hearing Dylan and blues songs as a very young child and making visual narratives in my head so I guess that stretched my imagination quite a lot.

We lived in Norfolk back then. A lot of the people who were involved in the London hippy scene in the 60s moved out to the West Country and East Anglia to pursue dreams of pastoral living and put on festivals. One I remember very well was Barsham Faire in ‘74 and ‘75; a medieval folk festival with entertainers, and puppeteers, horses and dogs everywhere. I remember seeing adults, playing totally innocently just like us kids, banging drums and playing flutes and singing and dancing and basking in the sun in wonderful costumes, it was like being transported into a golden age, very beautiful times. I felt at home instantly and understood what was going on. It gave me the idea that there was another way of living, a higher human purpose of imagination and fulfillment that was beyond the everyday capitalist conformity of living in a house and going to work or school.

Back in the real world I got more disillusioned with the iron fist of my teachers and became more aware of the rapid outbreak of punk from the ‘shock-horror stories’ on the news and from playground rumours. After feeling completely powerless at the hands of authority it was as if aliens had suddenly landed in our midst, and they were on our side. The significance of their presence in society was something we instantly understood, and as we got older and became brave enough to stand up to the teachers we found that punk was there for us too, it became a symbol that there really was another way of living that us kids could actually do ourselves, whether our parents liked it or not. Back then punk really adversely affected them, threatening the whole fabric of society. When we saw the punks walking down the street the adults’ powerless anger and outrage made us warm towards that and copy parts of it so that you could cause a little bit of that outrage too, it was a way to take back power, of standing up for yourself and saying no, fuck you I’m different, even if it was just a badge or a safety pin, or the name of a band on your schoolbag it showed your mindset and loyalty and really pissed authority figures off. It’s difficult to comprehend now just how shockingly different punk was, people were reacting like it was the end of society as we know it, punks were regarded with the sort of fear and loathing normally reserved for killers, as in effect they were, they were killing the broader conventions of polite society, behind which lurked all the bullshit.

READ THE FULL INTERVIEW HERE IN ISSUE 6

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Artist's Elate - Biogentic Archive

We were absolutely chuffed when after interviewing Elate for Issue 6, we discovered that not only is he seriously switched on, but he is also a wonderfully talented writer. We had a chat with him about joining the team here at LSD, and his first dispatch from the edges of consciousness was this fascinating insight into the Biogenetic Archive of human archetype and a merry dance through that shadowy world where myth, legend, symbolism, history and creativity meet. The full article is in Issue 6 - linked below.

In this age of contrived and controlled ‘Urban/New Contemporary Art’ and only slightly less contrived and controlled ‘Reality TV’ we find free expression so dumbed down that hard won skill, infused contemplation and virtuosity can be deemed irrelevant, while reflected glory, vain posturing, cronyism, manipulation, reappropriation, self aggrandisement, and hype are the highly prized and lauded attributes of the big go-getters; the result?


Intuitive insight is all but forgotten behind a facade of carefully PRed ‘anti-heroes’, insipid illustration, vacuous idiosyncrasy, cloying sentimentality and rebranded pop tack. This leaves only one possible choice for my first contribution to this magazine; a strong antidote to the poisonous vanity and empowered inadequacy that has dumbed down art thus; a reminder of the ever-present timeless in a sea of transience, a heroic odyssey back to the dawn of life, to infinity and beyond into that everlasting present that is the ‘Other World’.



“...nature has endowed man with "three brains", which despite their completely different structures have to function together and maintain contact. According to this view, the oldest of our brains is reptilian, the second was inherited from the lower mammals, and the third is the achievement of the higher mammals. This is the one that turned the living creature into man. So, figuratively speaking, when a doctor invites his patient to lie down on a couch, he is dealing simultaneously with a human being, a horse and a crocodile.” Dialectical Materialism (A. Spirkin)


Deep beneath the layers of consciousness we have evolved over millennia to navigate civilisation, society and identity; we have access to a timeless, astonishingly beautiful realm of jewelled splendour, comprised of geometric patterns, fantastic luminous objects and landscapes shining with supernatural light. A biogenetic archive of things that continually change into ever more beautiful things; the “landscape of such surpassing beauty that words cannot describe it”, recalled by Aldous Huxley “The D.N.A memory coiling back to the dawn of life” described by Robert Anton Wilson, the “Akashic Records” of Occult lore, and the “Non-local Frequency Domain” of Quantum Physics.


Such states of consciousness have been experienced worldwide throughout history, are described in the religious texts of every faith, and appear to have been involved in the birth and development of virtually every belief system. They have been experienced by people of every age, race and background and are consequently described in innumerable ways. Many who tell of such experiences, speak of a profound empathy with, and understanding of, the Universe; this accompanies the dissolution of the personal identity; ego death. Dramatic shifts occur in perception of space and time, both often ceasing to exist. Experience is no longer ‘separated’ by the five senses, a phenomenon known as synaesthesia. “One sees the old and familiar in a new and strange way...” writes Dr R.D. Laing, “...often as though for the first time. Ones old moorings are lost. One goes back in time. One is embarked on the oldest voyage in the world.”


It is widely accepted that such states not only {7} allow waking access to the unconscious mind, but also to the ‘collective unconscious’ or group mind “a second psychic system of a collective, universal, and impersonal nature which is identical in all individuals. This collective unconscious does not develop individually but is inherited. It consists of pre- existent forms, the archetypes, which can only become conscious secondarily and which give definite form to certain psychic contents”
Certain schools of thought believe, and empirical data would suggest, that this awareness extends beyond the archetypes into the universe itself, unlocking all experience, animal, vegetable, mineral and cosmic, even mythical; all life in fact, all the way from the consciousness of a single atom, to the consciousness of the whole of creation. Subjects sometimes produce otherwise unknowable and checkable information under laboratory conditions; the ultimate ‘information superhighway’. The discovery of DNA and its double-helix architecture by Crick while he was tripping on LSD is probably the most famous example of this. He later won a Nobel prize for his insight. This is but one way of initiating the state - there are countless others


Throughout history, those reporting experience of such states have been treated in a variety of ways, from being tortured then burned alive by the ‘Holy Inquisition’, worshipped as prophets and saints, locked away as dangerous criminals or madmen, or more recently (always overlooking such deviations), regarded as the greatest writers, scientists and recording artists and being awarded O.B.E s and other such baubles of establishment approval. So then, in our current climate of ‘scientific understanding’, in which so much can be verified and quantified, such important states, which defy many such attempts by their very nature, are overlooked and ignored by those who could gain most from the understanding that can be gained from their experience.





For millennia early man roamed the earth, nature his unchallenged master, all that met the eye its’ savage state, he had little personal control over that which met his gaze and none over the dramatic vista and elemental fury from which he scratched his survival. Thus, the first art was an act of taking possession, to lessen the huge gap separating him and nature and the according terror that confronted him. He placed thereon his mark in two main ways, the scratching or daubing of shapes onto a surface or the reappropriation of ‘found objects’ such as shells, bones, evocatively shaped sticks or stones that would have been taken from their place of discovery and given new context in a shelter or favoured space, thus giving him some small symbolic semblance of control over nature.

READ THE FULL ARTICLE IN ISSUE 6 - STAND AND DELIVER

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