Amebix - Spare - Two Great Artists - No Gods No Masters

 

Amebix

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Amebix
Also known as	The Band with No Name
Origin	England
Genres	Anarcho-punk, crust punk, heavy metal
Years active	1978 - 1987 2008 - present
Labels	Spiderleg Records Heavy Metal Records Alternative Tentacles Moshpit Tragedy Records
Associated acts	Zygote, Nausea, Stone Sour
Website	amebix.net
Members
Rob "The Baron" Miller Stig Roy Mayorga
Former members
Andy Billy Jug Martin Virus Ric Gadsby Norman Clive George Jenghiz A. Droid Spider

Amebix are an English crust punk/heavy metal band. Formed as "The Band with No Name," Amebix's original run was from 1978 to 1987, during which time they released three EPs and two full-length LPs. The group has reunited as of 2008.

By being one of the first bands to blend anarcho-punk and heavy metal music, Amebix are often cited as one of the key bands that helped to create the crust punk style.^[1][2] Such notable bands as Sepultura, Neurosis and Deviated Instinct have paid homage to the band.^[3]

Contents [hide] 1 History 2 Influences 3 Members 3.1 Current lineup 3.2 Past members 4 Discography 4.1 Studio albums 4.2 EPs 4.3 Live albums 4.4 Compilation albums 4.5 Singles 4.6 Demos 5 References 6 External links

[edit] History

Amebix was initially formed by Rob Miller (a.k.a. 'The Baron') along with his brother Stig, Andy Billy Jug and Clive while in school in Devon in 1978. Initially referring to themselves as "The Band with No Name" the band played extensively around the local area, during which time they recorded a six-track demo tape. Using his role as part-time columnist in a local paper Rob Miller gave a tape to Crass when they played in Plymouth. The track "University Challenged" from this demo was then featured on the first Crass Records Bullshit Detector compilation LP.^[4]

After this the band replaced drummer Andy Billy Jug with Martin, whose parents' manor house in Dartmoor was then used to practice in. It was around this time that the band began to refer to themselves as 'Amebix'. According to an interview with lead singer and bassist Rob Miller, Amebix refers to the amoeba. However, Martin was removed by his parents from the band and relocated to London where he suffered a breakdown and was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. The song "Largactyl" was written about Martin's experience.^[5]

The band then recruited Norm (Screaming Heads, Phantasmagoria, NormYard) as a synth player and decided to relocate to Bristol, living in a number of squats. They recruited Disorder drummer Virus to play drums and finally had a semi-stable line-up.^[6] This line-up would record the first 2 7"s (Who's the Enemy EP and "Winter") and the 12" (No Sanctuary). A fill-in synth player would appear on the 12" EP No Sanctuary, and in 1984 they would acquire a new synth player, George.^[7] While recording the No Sanctuary EP at Southern Studios they met Jello Biafra of American punk band Dead Kennedys and punk label Alternative Tentacles. They became Tentacles' first UK signing with the Arise! album in 1985. The final line-up would come together in 1985 with the addition of Spider on drums.^[7] They signed to Heavy Metal Records for the release of 1987's Monolith, whose release/distribution difficulties led to the band eventually splitting, although they were to continue touring, their final tour ending in Sarejevo before the collapse of Yugoslavia.

Spider, George, and Stig went on to perform in Zygote.^[6] Vocalist Rob Miller now lives on the Isle of Skye where he works as a self-taught swordsmith.

According to The Baron's myspace page, Amebix have reformed as of February 2008. On March 9, 2008 Amebix reissued their last album Monolith as a sliding scale download through Moshpit Tragedy Records.

[edit] Influences

Amebix took inspiration from Motörhead (and to a lesser extent Lemmy-era Hawkwind), Black Sabbath, and combined with an ethos and worldview akin to Crass. They were also influenced by various post-punk and gothic rock bands, including Public Image Ltd., Bauhaus, Joy Division, and especially Killing Joke.^[5]

[edit] Members

[edit] Current lineup

• Rob "The Baron" Miller – vocals, bass (1978–1987, 2008–present)
• Stig – guitar, backing vocals (1978–1987, 2008–present)
• Roy Mayorga – drums, percussion, keyboards (2008–present)

[edit] Past members

• Ric Gadsby – bass (1978–1979)
• Andy Billy Jug – drums (1978–1981)
• Clive – bass (1979)
• Martin – drums (1981)
• Norm – keyboards (1981–1984)
• Virus – drums (1981–1985)
• Jenghiz – keyboards (1984)
• George – keyboards (1984–1987)
• A. Droid – keyboards (1984–1987)
• Spider – drums (1985–1987)

[edit] Discography

[edit] Studio albums

• Arise! (1985, LP/CD, Alternative Tentacles)
• Monolith (1987, LP/CD, Heavy Metal Records)

[edit] EPs

• Who's the Enemy (1982, 7", Spiderleg Records)
• No Sanctuary (1984, 12", Spiderleg Records)
• Redux (2010, 12", CD, DD, Profane Existence)

[edit] Live albums

• No Gods (1985)
• No Masters (1986)
• Make Some Fucking Noise (1997)

[edit] Compilation albums

• The Power Remains (1993, LP, Skuld Releases)
• No Sanctuary: The Spiderleg Recordings (2008, LP+7"/CD, Alternative Tentacles)

[edit] Singles

• Winter (1983, 7", Spiderleg Records)

[edit] Demos

• Amebix (1979, self-released)
• Right to Ride (1987, self-released)

[edit] References

1. ^ Von Havoc, Felix (1984-01-01). "Rise of Crust". Profane Existence. http://www.havocrex.com/press/article/3/83. Retrieved 2008-06-16. 
2. ^ Peter Jandreus, The Encyclopedia of Swedish Punk 1977-1987, Stockholm: Premium Publishing, 2008, p. 11.
3. ^ Amebix biography @ Allmusic
4. ^ Metal Archives
5. ^ ^{a b} Ian Glasper, The day the country died: A History of Anarcho Punk 1980 to 1984, London, Cherry Red Books, 2006 (ISBN 1-901447-70-7), p. 200.
6. ^ ^{a b} MusicMight
7. ^ ^{a b} Yahoo! Music

[edit] External links

• Amebix official website
• One of the most extensive Amebix pages ever
• Amebix Story
• Amebix page on Allmusic
• Rob "The Baron" Miller interview @ Metalfan.ro - English
• Roy Mayorga interview @ Metalfan.ro - English

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amebix"

Categories: 1970s music groups | 1980s music groups | Anarcho-punk groups | English punk rock groups | English heavy metal musical groups | British hardcore punk musical groups | Crust and d-beat groups | Punk rock groups | English musical groups | Musical groups established in 1978 | Musical groups disestablished in 1987 | Musical groups reestablished in 2008

 

 

 

Amebix-Monolith

1. Monolith
2. Nobody's Driving
3. The Power Remains
4. Time Bomb
5. Last Will and Testament
6. I.C.B.M.
7. Chain Reaction
8. Fallen From Grace
9. Coming Home
Length: 44:05

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Austin Osman Spare

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Austin Osman Spare
Born	31 December 1886(1886-12-31) Snow Hill, near Smithfield Market London
Died	15 May 1956 (aged 69) London
Occupation	artist, painter and magician

Detail of a drawing from one of Spare's sketchbooks.

Austin Osman Spare (30 December 1886 – 15 May 1956) was an English artist who developed idiosyncratic magical techniques including automatic writing, automatic drawing and sigilization based on his theories of the relationship between the conscious and unconscious self. His artistic work is characterized by skilled draughtsmanship exhibiting a complete mastery of the use of the line,^[1] and often employs monstrous or fantastic magical and sexual imagery.^[2]

Contents [hide] 1 Biography 2 Spare the artist 3 Spare the magician 4 Influence on Chaos magic 5 Some known exhibitions 6 Bibliography 7 References 8 External links

[edit] Biography

Spare was born in Snow Hill, near Smithfield Market, London on 30 December 1886, the son of Philip Newton Spare, a City of London policeman who retired after 25 years of service, and Eliza Ann Adelaide Osman. He was the fifth of six children.^[3]
According to his mother Spare first began to show signs of his talent (and of his well known lack of interest in selling his work) at the age of four:^[4]

All day long he would have a pencil in his hand, drawing anything that was placed before him - his parents, his sisters, or brothers. Nothing seemed to come amiss and we made up our minds that if it was at all possible he should be allowed to follow what was evidently his vocation. Of course it has been expensive to buy his board and paints, and all else that he requires, for, curiously enough, he can never be persuaded to sell any of his work. He is even averse to showing it to any one.

Spare's parents enrolled him in evening classes at Lambeth Art School in 1899, where he developed his skills under the guidance of Phillip Connard. At 14, he won a county council scholarship for ₤10 and one of his drawings was selected for inclusion in the British Art Section of the Paris International Exhibition. At fifteen he left school and began to work designing posters (briefly, at Causton's, producers of posters and other kinds of commercial art) and stained glass (at James Powell & Sons, Whitefriars Street). A promising stained glass design led to his being recommended for a free scholarship at The Royal College of Art, where he subsequently began formal study. His designs for stained glass undertaken for fellow employee Thomas Cowell are now in the Victoria and Albert Museum. Shortly thereafter, his father pressured him to send two drawings to the Royal Academy for consideration, with the result that one, an allegorical drawing was accepted.^[5] At the age of only sixteen or seventeen, Spare had his work exhibited by the Royal Academy, creating something of a sensation. At this young age he was already deeply involved in the development of his esoteric ideas. In a 1904 article he is quoted as saying, regarding religion:^[6]

I have practically none. I go anywhere. This life is but a reasonable development. All faiths are to me the same. I go to the Church in which I was born - the Established - but without the slightest faith. In fact, I am devising a religion of my own which embodies my conception of what we were, are, and shall be in the future.

In October 1907 Spare had his first major exhibition at Bruton Gallery in London's West End. The content of this exhibition was striking, arcane and grotesque, causing controversy. These elements appealed to avant-garde London intellectuals, and perhaps brought him to the attention of Aleister Crowley, the infamous English mountaineer, magician and poet.^[7] However they met, the two men certainly knew each other. Their interaction appears to have begun some time around 1907 or 1908, as a copy of the 1907 edition of A Book of Satyrs with an inscription (dated 1908) from Spare to Crowley is said to exist in a private collection.^[8] The two also engaged in written correspondence.^[9] Spare almost certainly became a 'probationer' in the order A∴A∴ or Argenteum Astrum (Latin for "Silver Star"), founded by Crowley and George Cecil Jones. Spare also contributed four small drawings to Crowley's periodical publication The Equinox^[10], and a photograph exists which shows a young Spare with his hands at the sides of his face in the same pose which Crowley himself adopted in the famous 1910 photo with book, robe and hat.^[11]
Whatever the nature of the relationship between Crowley and Spare it appears to have been short-lived, and a passage in Spare's The Book of Pleasure leaves no doubt that he did not hold a favorable view of ceremonial magic or magicians:^[12]

Others praise ceremonial Magic, and are supposed to suffer much Ecstasy! Our asylums are crowded, the stage is over-run! Is it by symbolising we become the symbolised? Were I to crown myself King, should I be King? Rather should I be an object of disgust or pity. These Magicians, whose insincerity is their safety, are but the unemployed dandies of the Brothels.

Spare married the actress and dancer Eily Gertrude Shaw on the 4th of September 1911. The two had met some years before. Whatever influence she may have had upon Spare's work the marriage was short-lived, though never formally dissolved. The two separated around 1918-19.^[13] One known work of Spare's, inscribed, signed and dated as "Portrait of the Artist & His Wife March 26th 1912 AOS" is known. It shows the head of Spare executed in colored chalks and pencil. To one side, executed with only a few ghostly lines, we see the face of a woman with fine features, her head turned down and to the side, her eyes closed.^[14]
The Book of Pleasure, published by Spare himself in autumn of 1913, most likely with the assistance of private patrons, is the most complete exposition of his esoteric ideas. "Conceived initially as a pictorial allegory the book quickly evolved into a much deeper work, drawing inspiration from Taoism and Buddhism, but primarily from his experiences as an artist."^[15]
In 1917, during World War I, Spare was conscripted into the British army, serving as a medical orderly of the Royal Army Medical Corps in London hospitals, and was commissioned as an official War Artist in 1919. In this capacity he visited the battlefields of France to record the work of the R.A.M.C.^[16] Spare himself recalled, "When the war broke out, I joined the Army. When I left the Forces, the world was a very different place. Lots of things had changed. I found it very difficult to keep going on with what I had been doing. That pushed me into the abstract world - and there I have more or less remained."^[17]
By 1927 Spare had certainly taken a public stance indicating disgust with contemporary society. Perhaps the time he spent documenting images of the horrors of war, followed by a period of financial instability and failing ventures, combined with often hostile reviews of his work and ideas led to this state of affairs. Whatever the cause, Spare's loathing was clearly expressed in his work Anathema of Zos - Sermon To The Hypocrites, which was published in that year. It was to be his last published book.

Dogs, devouring your own vomit! Cursed are ye all! Throwbacks, adulterers, sycophants, corpse devourers, pilferers and medicine swallowers! Think ye Heaven is an infirmary?^[18]

Hannen Swaffer, the British journalist, reports that in 1936 Spare wilfully rejected a chance for international fame. He relates that a member of the German Embassy, buying one of Spare's self-portraits, sent it to Hitler. According to Swaffer, the Fuehrer was so impressed (according to this account because the eyes and the moustache were somewhat like his own) that he invited Spare to go to Germany to paint him. Spare, instead, made a copy of it, which came into Swaffer's possession. Swaffer indicates that written at the top of the portrait is the reply that Spare "sent to the man who wanted to master Europe and dominate mankind". Swaffer reports the reply read as follows: “Only from negations can I wholesomely conceive you. For I know of no courage sufficient to stomach your aspirations and ultimates. If you are superman, let me be for ever animal.” ^[19] This story is not the most incredible of the accounts which were (and are) in circulation regarding Spare. A number of anecdotes concerning Spare and his life have been recorded, many which include descriptions of magical occurrences, accurate divination or foreknowledge, and sorcerous manifestations. It should be said that whatever opinion one may hold regarding the truth of these tales, they are entirely in keeping with claims Spare himself is known to have made.
In 1941, fire and high explosive totally obliterated Spare's studio flat, depriving him of his home, his health and his equipment. For three years he struggled to regain the use of his arms until finally, in 1946, in a cramped basement in Brixton, he began to make pictures again, surrounded by stray cats. At the time he had no bed and worked in an old army shirt and tattered jacket. Yet he still charged only an average of £5 per picture. Clifford Bax, a friend of Spare's and a one-time collaborator recalled:^[20]

Spare knew the taste of life as it is for people to whom a penny and a ha'penny are very different coins, and he lived in a high bleak barrack-like tenement block, among men and women in whose life elegance and the arts had no place, and surrounded by their washing and their cats. He said to me once 'Don't put 'esquire' on your letters. We've only one other esquire in my block, and they think we're giving ourselves airs.' His attractive simplicity came out, too, when he said 'If you are ever passing my place, do drop in'; for it is seldom that anybody happens to be passing The Borough unless he lives there.

Spare was quoted as saying, “I have had a hard life, but I blame nobody but myself. I am responsible for my own misfortunes. I am rather apt to butt at a brick wall at times, and find, in the end, I cannot do any good about it. I cannot change things, so I give it my best.”^[21] He died in London on 15 May 1956, at the age of 69.

[edit] Spare the artist

Spare's work is remarkable for its variety, including paintings, a vast number of drawings, work with pastel, a few etchings, published books combining text with imagery, and even bizarre bookplates. He was productive from his earliest years until his death. According to Haydn Mackay, "rhythmic ornament grew from his hand seemingly without conscious effort."
Spare was regarded as an artist of considerable talent and good prospects, but his style was apparently controversial. Critical reaction to his work in period ranged from baffled but impressed, to patronizing and dismissive. An anonymous review of The Book of Satyrs published in December 1909, which must have appeared around the time of Spare's 23rd birthday, is by turns condescending and grudgingly respectful, "Mr. Spare's work is evidently that of young man of talent." However, "What is more important is the personality lying behind these various influences. And here we must credit Mr. Spare with a considerable fund of fancy and invention, although the activities of his mind still find vent through somewhat tortuous channels. Like most young men he seems to take himself somewhat too seriously". Our critic ends his review with the observation that Spare's "drawing is often more shapeless and confused than we trust it will be when he has assimilated better the excellent influences upon which he has formed his style."^[22]
Two years later another anonymous review (this time of The Starlit Mire, for which Spare provided ten drawings) suggests, "When Mr. Spare was first heard of six or seven years ago he was hailed in some quarters as the new Beardsley, and as the work of a young man of seventeen his drawings had a certain amount of vigour and originality. But the years have not dealt kindly with Mr. Spare, and he must not be content with producing in his majority what passed muster in his nonage. However, his designs are not inappropriate for the crude paradoxes that form the text of this book. It is far easier to imitate an epigram than to invent one."^[23]
In a 1914 review of The Book of Pleasure, the critic (again anonymous) seems resigned to bewilderment, "It is impossible for me to regard Mr. Spare's drawings otherwise than as diagrams of ideas which I have quite failed to unravel; I can only regret that a good draughtsman limits the scope of his appeal".^[24]
From October 1922 to July 1924 Spare edited, jointly with Clifford Bax, the quarterly, Golden Hind for Chapman and Hall publishers. This was a short-lived project, but during its brief career it reproduced impressive figure drawing and lithographs by Spare and others. In 1925 Spare, Alan Odle, John Austen, and Harry Clarke showed together at the St George's Gallery, and in 1930 at the Godfrey Philips Galleries. The 1930 show was the last West End show Spare would have for 17 years.
Spare's obituary printed in The Times of May 16, 1956 states:

"Thereafter Spare was rarely found in the purlieus of Bond St. He would teach a little from January to June, then up to the end of October, would finish various works, and from the beginning of November to Christmas would hang his products in the living-room, bedroom, and kitchen of his flat in the Borough. There he kept open house; critics and purchasers would go down, ring the bell, be admitted, and inspect the pictures, often in the company of some of the models - working women of the neighbourhood. Spare was convinced that there was a great potential demand for pictures at 2 or 3 guineas each, and condemned the practice of asking ₤20 for "amateurish stuff'. He worked chiefly in pastel or pencil, drawing rapidly, often taking no more than two hours over a picture. He was especially interested in delineating the old, and had various models over 70 and one as old as 93."

But Spare did not entirely disappear. During the late 30s he developed and exhibited a style of painting based on a logarithmic form of anamorphic projection which he called "siderealism". This work appears to have been well received. In 1947 he exhibited at the Archer Gallery, producing over 200 works for the show. It was a very successful show and led to something of a post-war renaissance of interest.
Public awareness of Spare seems to have declined somewhat in the 1960s before the slow but steady revival of interest in his work beginning in the mid 70s. The following passage in a discussion of an exhibit including Spare's work in the summer of 1965 suggests some critics had hoped he would disappear into obscurity forever. The critic writes that the curator of the exhibit

"has resurrected an unknown English artist named Austin Osman Spare, who imitates etchings in pen and ink in the manner of Beardsley but really harks back to the macabre German romanticism. He tortured himself before the first war and would have inspired the surrealist movement had he been discovered early enough. He has come back in time to play a belated part in the revival of taste for art nouveau."^[25]

Robert Ansell summarized Spare's artistic contributions as follows:

During his lifetime, Spare left critics unable to place his work comfortably. Ithell Colquhoun supported his claim to have been a proto-Surrealist and posthumously the critic Mario Amaya made the case for Spare as a Pop Artist. Typically, he was both of these - and neither. A superb figurative artist in the mystical tradition, Spare may be regarded as one of the last English Symbolists, following closely his great influence George Frederick Watts. The recurrent motifs of androgyny, death, masks, dreams, vampires, satyrs and religious themes, so typical of the art of the French and Belgian Symbolists, find full expression in Spare's early work, along with a desire to shock the bourgeois.^[26]

[edit] Spare the magician

It has been argued that Spare's magic depended (at least in part) upon psychological repression^[27]. According to one author, Spare's magical rationale was as follows, "If the psyche represses certain impulses, desires, fears, and so on, and these then have the power to become so effective that they can mold or even determine entirely the entire conscious personality of a person right down to the most subtle detail, this means nothing more than the fact that through repression ("forgetting") many impulses, desires, etc. have the ability to create a reality to which they are denied access as long as they are either kept alive in the conscious mind or recalled into it. Under certain conditions, that which is repressed can become even more powerful than that which is held in the conscious mind."^[28]

Spare believed that intentionally repressed material would become enormously effective in the same way that "unwanted" (since not consciously provoked) repressions and complexes have tremendous power over the person and his or her shaping of reality. It was a logical conclusion to view the subconscious mind as the source of all magical power, which Spare soon did. In his opinion, a magical desire cannot become truly effective until it has become an organic part of the subconscious mind.

Spare "elaborated his sigils by condensing letters of the alphabet into diagrammatic glyphs of desire, which were to be integrated into postural (yogalike) practices—"monograms of thought, for the government of energy." Spare's work is contemporaneous with Hugo Ball's attempts "to rediscover the evangelical concept of the 'word' (logos) as a magical complex image"—as well as with Walter Benjamin's thesis that "Meditation, which is the immediacy of all mental communication, is the fundamental problem of linguistic theory, and if one chooses to call this immediacy magic, then the primary problem of language is its magic. Spare's 'sentient symbols' and his 'alphabet of desire' situate this mediatory magic in a libidinal framework of Tantric—which is to say cosmological—proportions." ^[29]

A sample of sigils created by Austin Osman Spare

[edit] Influence on Chaos magic

Some of Spare's techniques, particularly the use of sigils and the creation of an "alphabet of desire" were adopted, adapted and popularized by Peter J. Carroll in the work Liber Null & Psychonaut.^[30] Carroll and other writers such as Ray Sherwin are seen as key figures in the emergence of some of Spare's ideas and techniques as a part of a magical movement loosely referred to as Chaos magic.

[edit] Some known exhibitions

• Bruton Galleries, London, October 1907
• The Baillie Gallery, London, 11-31 October 1911
• The Baillie Gallery, London, 10-31 October 1912
• The Ryder Gallery, London, 17 April - 7 May 1912
• The Baillie Gallery, London, July 1914
• St. George’s Gallery, London, March 1927
• The Lefevre Galleries, London, April 1929
• Godfrey Phillips Galleries, London, November 1930
• Artist's studio, 56A Walworth Road, Elephant, London, Autumn, 1937
• Artist's studio, 56a Walworth Road, Elephant, London, Autumn, 1938
• Archer Gallery, London, July 3-30 November 1947
• The Temple Bar (Doctors), 286 Walworth Rd. London, 28 October – 29 November 1949
• The Mansion House Tavern, 12 June – 12 July 1952
• The White Bear, London, 19 November – 1 December 1953
• Archer Gallery, London, 25 October – 26 November 1955
• The Greenwich Gallery, London, 23 July – 12 August 1964
• Alpine Club Gallery (Group Exhibition), London, 22 June - 2 July, 1965
• The Obelisk Gallery, London, 1972
• The Taranman Gallery, London, 2-23 September 1974
• Oliver Bradbury & James Birch Fine Art, London, 17 November – 8 December 1984
• The Morley College Gallery, London, September 1987
• Henry Boxer, London, November 1992
• Arnolfini, Bristol, 2007

[edit] Bibliography

Privately printed by Spare during his lifetime

• Earth Inferno 1905
• A Book of Satyrs 1907 (reissued by John Lane 1909)
• The Book of Pleasure 1913
• The Focus of Life 1921 (issued by The Morland Press)
• Anathema of Zos 1927

Books illustrated by Spare

• Behind the Veil issued by David Nutt 1906
• Songs From The Classics published by David Nutt 1907
• The Shadow of the Ragged Stone published by Elkin Matthews 1909
• The Equinox published by Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co. Ltd. 1909
• On the Oxford Circuit published by Smith, Elder & Co. 1909
• The Starlit Mire published by John Lane 1911
• Eight Poems published by Form at The Morland Press Ltd. 1916
• Twelve Poems published by The Morland Press Ltd. 1916
• The Gold Tree published by Martin Secker 1917
• The Youth and the Sage privately printed, 1927

Magazines edited by Spare

• Form - A Quarterly Of The Arts 1916-1922
• Golden Hind 1922-1924

The majority of the books listed above are available as modern reprints. For a more complete listing see Clive Harper's Revised Notes Towards A Bibliography of Austin Osman Spare.
Significant titles published since Spare's death include Poems and Masks, A Book of Automatic Drawings, The Collected Works of Austin Osman Spare, Axiomata & The Witches' Sabbath, From The Inferno To Zos (3 Vol. Set), The Book of Ugly Ecstasy, and Zos Speaks.

[edit] References

1. ^ "In the verity of his visionary productions we find him of the company of Blake and Fuseli and their circle; but far superior to any of them in the mastery of representational craft." Haydn Mackey, commenting in a radio program broadcast shortly after Spare's death, and; "There now hang on one of my walls seven of his paintings, each so different in style and character that it is almost impossible to believe that the same hand was responsible for any two of them. And there rest on a table in my sitting-room overlooking Trafalgar Square three sketchbooks full of 'automatic drawings' unique in their mastery of line, unique, too, in their daring of conception." Hannen Swaffer, "The Mystery of an Artist" in London Mystery Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 5, Hulton Press, 1950
2. ^ "On Austin Osman Spare" in Joseph Nechvatal, "Towards an Immersive Intelligence: Essays on the Work of Art in the Age of Computer Technology and Virtual Reality (1993-2006)" Edgewise Press. 2009, pp. 40-52
3. ^ The most extensive source of biographical information available is Borough Satyr, The Life and Art of Austin Osman Spare, published by Fulgur Limited. In particular, the introduction by Robert Ansell contains much biographical information not available elsewhere. Much of the material in this section is taken from this source. However, it fails to mention Spare's eldest brother, one Phillip O. Spare. Birth, Marriage and Death Registers and indexes for the City of London show his birth in the third quarter of 1880. His death is registered in the second quarter of 1881 in the same registration district. Source: [1]
4. ^ "Boy Artist At The R.A.", in The Daily Chronicle, Tuesday, May 3rd 1904
5. ^ "Boy Artist At The R.A.", in The Daily Chronicle, Tuesday, May 3rd 1904
6. ^ "Boy Artist At The R.A.", in The Daily Chronicle, Tuesday, May 3rd 1904
7. ^ Keith Richmond, "Discord In The Garden Of Janus - Aleister Crowley and Austin Osman Spare", in Austin Osman Spare: Artist - Occultist - Sensualist, Beskin Press, 1999. Richmond's research is the most complete account of the relationship between Spare and Crowley of which I am aware, and it is the only one that shows a responsible effort to document claims and cross-reference sources.
8. ^ A document entitled "Oath of Probationer" from the Gerald Yorke Collection at the Warburg Institute indicates that Spare took the oath on July 10th, 1909.
9. ^ Spare and Crowley apparently carried on a correspondence, though its extent is uncertain. At least two letters from Spare to Crowley exist in a collection of Crowley documents held at the library of the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at the University of Texas at Austin. One of these concerns Spare's lack of money for the purchase of his probationer's robe. See the study by Richmond already cited
10. ^ The Equinox, Vol. 1, No. 2, London, September 1909. Spare contributed two drawings which were placed in an article on geomancy. He is also provided two diagrams for the same issue, numbered 33 (The Garden of Eden) and 51 (The Fall).
11. ^ I've found no certain provenance for this photo, though one web caption indicates it was taken in 1913. Spare apparently also executed a portrait sketch of Crowley from memory in 1955, reproductions of which are extant.
12. ^ Austin Osman Spare, The Book of Pleasure (Self-Love), The Psychology of Ecstasy, 1913
13. ^ The only other available biographical detail relating to Spare's wife is a footnote in Borough Satyr, which states "Born in Shrewsbury on May 28th 1888, her birth certificate states her name as 'Eiley,' but throughout her life she was known as 'Eily,' and occasionally 'Lily'.
14. ^ Borough Satyr, compiled and edited by Robert Ansell, Fulgur Limited, 2005, p6
15. ^ Borough Satyr, compiled and edited by Robert Ansell, Fulgur Limited, 2005, p6
16. ^ It has been asserted here and there online that Spare visited or was stationed in Egypt during World War I. I have found no evidence to support this claim. The most extensive information I have been able to find concerning Spare's military service is in a reminiscence by Haydn Mackay, apparently a transcript of a radio program that was broadcast, or intended for broadcast, shortly after Spare's death in 1956: "In 1918 I found Spare in the Army, he had been placed in the Royal Army Medical Corps, and with the rank of Sergeant, was employed in making drawings for the medical history of the war. Thus was acquired a collection of somewhat perfunctory, but technically impeccable drawings, now in the possession of the authorities. He worked in the solitude of a studio provided by the army, and the only military convention to which he had to conform was the wearing of the uniform; and I have never seen a queerer figure in a soldier’s garb. He wore the most dilapidated uniform I have seen outside a refuse dump, and it was worn in the most negligent manner conceivable. It is not surprising that on occasion he was held by the police as a rogue wearing unauthorised badges and uniform, and only released by them on a statement of his authenticity by his commanding officer."
17. ^ Hannen Swaffer, "The Mystery of An Artist", in London Mystery Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 5, 1950 or 1951
18. ^ Austin Osman Spare, The Anathema of Zos, 1927
19. ^ Hannen Swaffer, "The Mystery of An Artist", in London Mystery Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 5, 1950 or 1951
20. ^ Clifford Bax, "Sex in Art", in Ideas and People, 1936
21. ^ Hannen Swaffer, "The Mystery of An Artist", in London Mystery Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 5, 1950 or 1951
22. ^ Review of "A Book of Satyrs" (by Austin Osman Spare) in The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs, Vol. 16, No. 81, (Dec., 1909), pp. 170-171
23. ^ Review of "The Starlit Mire" (by James Bertram and F. Russel, with ten drawings by Austin Osman Spare), in The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs, Vol. 19, No. 99 (Jun., 1911), pp. 177-177
24. ^ Review of " The Book of Pleasure (Self-Love), the Psychology of Ecstasy" (by Austin Osman Spare) in The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs, Vol. 26, No. 139, (Oct., 1914), pp. 38-39
25. ^ "Current and Forthcoming Exhibitions", in The Burlington Magazine, Vol. 107, No. 747, (Jun., 1965), p. 330
26. ^ Borough Satyr, The Life and Art of Austin Osman Spare, compiled and edited by Robert Ansell, Fulgur Limited, 2005, p19
27. ^ Frater U∴D∴, High Magic: Theory & Practice, Llewellyn Worldwide, 2005, p133
28. ^ Frater U∴D∴, High Magic: Theory & Practice, Llewellyn Worldwide, 2005, p134
29. ^ Jed Rasula, Steve McCaffery, Imagining Language: An Anthology, MIT Press, 2001, p368
30. ^ Peter J. Carroll, Liber Null & Psychonaut, Weiser, 1987

[edit] External links

• AustinSpare.co.uk: Articles, Genealogy, and Bibliography
• Fulgur Limited: Gallery, Bibliography, Biography and Articles
• Spare's illustrations for The Starlit Mire by James Bertram and F. Russell
• Artist and Familiar by Joseph Nechvatal
• A psychogeographical film of Austin Spare's London (part 1)

[hide] v • d • e Works by Austin Osman Spare Earth Inferno (1905) · A Book of Satyrs (1907) · The Book of Pleasure (1913) · The Focus of Life (1921) · Anathema of Zos (1927)

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