The Coatpuller

I keep stressing the LOCAL in this column because it is precisely what we all have to work with—what is in front of us. Our lives are here, at this instant, and we should make the most of our local possibilities. People spend too much time waiting to go somewhere else, getting there, and then more time feeling out the new terrain, so that half their time is spent dreaming and scheming instead of DOING.

And most of these people are terribly disgruntled wherever they are, and most likely will be whenever they get to where it is they’re going. But it’s easier to bitch about what a drag Detroit is, etc., and how fast I’m getting out of here to split for the Coast, etc., then it is to do anything about the scene right here where you are. I mean we DO live here, and might as well LIVE here, as long as we’re HERE.

For example: I was in Pittsburgh earlier this fall to take part in a panel discussion with Frank Kofsky and Cecil Taylor at the University of Pittsburgh, and had the occasion to talk with a lot of young writers and musicians there, all of whom spent their time with me bitching about Pittsburgh and how it was such a bring down and they were just waiting to get out of school and make it to New York or San Francisco.

None of them seemed to know each other, or more then one or two of the others at best, but all of them talked the same way—“Yeah, man, there ain’t NOTHING happening here, nobody doin’ nothin’, etc.” And the point I wanted to make with them was that they should find each other out and get together, form a cooperative, perform concerts and readings in public, and try to unite the like-minded people there so they could enjoy their stay in Pittsburgh, even if they WERE moving on in a few months, and maybe turn on a few new people too. All I got was, “Aw, man, it’s easy for you to say that—you live in Detroit and it’s happening there, etc.”

But when the Workshop was started here in 1964, there was NOTHING happening here, nothing at least that any of us had any interest in. We were lucky—we could invent our own reality and live it as we could make it. But we had to do it ourselves, just a few of us, in the middle of an almost totally apathetic scene—alienated hippies, a prevailing provincial consciousness, short-sightedness, and overwhelming hostile vibrations from many of the people around us. And we still aren’t really making it, but do the best we can with what we’ve got. It sure as hell ain’t no paradise, but it’s what we got.

I get the same thing from other areas, too—friends in San Francisco write asking the Workshop to send people out there to help organize things, and I’m ashamed to admit that we can’t even get things together enough here to leave. Friends in New York write asking for advice in forming an artists’ cooperative, and all I can tell them is (do what you can—no more and no less.” That’s all anyone can do, and it’s a hell of a job to do just that. Things are bad all over, the saying goes, and the only hope is people getting together with other people for the good of all the people—not to sound too simplistic, optimistic, or naive, but that IS what’s happening, and its the most beautiful thing in the world.

SO, to carry on from last week’s rant, what I want to talk about here is the new Artists’ Workshop, a re-grouping and expansion that is reviving and uniting the experienced energies here in Detroit and taking in the newer, fresher energies and spreading the wealth of information and equipment that has been gathered over the past two years throughout the Workshop, among more and more people. New projects are being started, and anyone who’s at all interested and ready to commit himself to an action program is welcome to take part. (Even you, Sam Cohen.

The biggest news is GUERRILLA, a national monthly newspaper of contemporary kulcher published at the Artists’ Workshop Press, and which you can read about elsewhere in this issue of the paper. GUERRILLA will need secretaries, advertising managers, editorial assistants, etc., and has started gathering them. Anyone interested in working in any of those capacities can call Allen Van Newkirk or myself, at 831–6840, or stop by the Workshop (4857–63 John Lodge, near Warren) some afternoon or evening.

There is always a ‘lot of printing work to be done, very simple work like running a mimeograph machine and helping put books and magazines together, and anyone who has eyes for learning about the little-magazine publishing business can pick up a lot of information and experience this way.

All of this is happening now, and you can take part in it if you want to. All you have to do is come around. You can start by making the Tuesday night membership and planning meetings at 8:00 p.m. at the Workshop...