loving ian campbell: hot time summer in the city

stay gold gallery, 451 grand street, williamsburg
june 20 - august 20

   

 

In a tiny room in Williamsburg, without air conditioning and on one of the hottest days of this century, in early August 2006  I sat with Ian Campbell as he prepared to ride his prescribed day's agenda of miles on his mounted bike at STAY GOLD gallery.  Beginning on June 20, Campbell had lived in this tiny adjunct room next to the gallery, riding equidistant lengths of a cross country bike trip from NYC to LA.  He had not left the gallery since that day – as a matter of fact he had hardly left his room, except for the requisite shower and pee.  In addition to his internal dedication to this project, Ian furthered his commitment by weaving hair with lengths of string into a cord that anchored him to the copper frame surrounding his mounted bike.  He finished his trip on August 13.  His head was shaved & he left the gallery on August 15.   

IT WAS HOT

We ate cold black grapes and sat on the floor, looking out the open door onto the street.  Across the way, Ian pointed out a pigeon coop on a roof that he would watch while he rode his bike.

I hadn’t any coffee yet, a radical commitment for me. I didn’t want to stop on my way there, I wanted to get there and be with him before anyone else stopped by.  I knew he opened his door to the public at around eight in the morning.

When I walked in he was crouched next to his record player, the rope that connected him to the copper housing around his bicycle laying on the floor beside him. The bicycle he rode was a regular, ordinary bike with the back wheel mounted with a counter. The room was rectangular, measuring approximately 5 x 10 feet with a door at both ends, one opening out to Grand Street, the other into the larger Stay Gold gallery space. One long wall was lined with Lps, lots of vinyl.  Against another leaned a few bags of art supplies, some handmade clothing and some fabric.  Across from the LPS was the record player and a hot plate, the makings of some food . . it looked like some granola and maybe some rice.  There is a sewing machine tucked beneath the hot plate. All very functional, nothing fancy.  Above the records is a large, hand-drawn map of the United States, where Ian charts his progress each day. We sat on milk crates between the record player and the bicycle.

Ian sleeps with the light on, in a tiny space right next to the bicycle, on a heavy black blanket with a black & white checked sheet on top.  It's really too hot for the sheet but it is easy to understand the need for something to cover you, alone at night.

His hair is growing, weaving continuously into the rope.

He is wearing cut off shorts with bike shorts underneath, penny loafers with pennies and short socks, It seems like there is a blue and green globe on his socks, but I'm not sure. He sews his own shirts out of white cotton sheets, designed with buttons at the shoulders so he can slip them down and off over his feet, as the rope attached to his hair makes most clothing removal impossible.

ISOLATION & ACCOMPLISHMENT

I had dropped by casually a few afternoons before.  Even though the room has become Ian's living space it's not exactly like dropping in. It's more formal than that.  The isolation of the room, the frame of the physical effort and discomfort makes it scary, It can't not be scary & a little intimidating.

Like a junky with no smack, I was immediately envious of the high in his eyes, the high from doing something hard, from pushing himself, from depriving himself of comfort, from saying what he is going to do and doing it, from telling the truth. 

At this point he had already been there for two weeks and he had about two weeks left to go.

I have often slept in galleries and odd commercial spaces, depriving myself of creature comforts for art.  It's uncomfortable and Spartan but it usually works to bring about the altered state necessary; one that releases a distillation of life experience – an almost opaque vapor -- into the world that is thick enough to be swallowed whole, something palpable.

I remember one time, in 1998, climbing out of a vinyl hammock, hanging 8 feet above the ground in a gallery for 4 days or so and a friend asking me why I felt like I had to punish myself for art.  I was incredulous (and slightly nauseous due to an newly discovered latex allergy) as I felt so happy & high from my isolation and accomplishment.

                         

                              

TETHERED

He was a little scary-looking, so fatigued and drenched with sweat in the heat, with the rope hanging down his back. The rope appeared almost like a poorly connected tail, the braids leaving his head like electric wiring, a little bit like those monkeys you see in the PETA ads or the prisoners at Abu Ghirab, as if he was being used for the electricity against his will -- but the slightly drugged ecstatic look on his face spoke otherwise.

The rope couldn't help but remind me of the day years ago, in my naïve art youth, when I glanced down at the floor while waitressing at the Ear Inn and noticed an odd coil of rope laying there casually between two people I was waiting on. Just a few days later I coincidentally read about Linda Montano and Tehching Hsieh's One Year Performance, Tied with a Rope, an endurance piece where the two artists, unrelated by love, blood or previous collaboration, spent a year tied together by an eight foot piece of rope. I was really lucky to see that.  Of all the art I have seen in my life, I put that one pretty close to the top. It was so real, so ordinary, so electrifying.

                                       

Looking at the tangle of the individual strings coming off Ian's head, wrapped by constant motion and sleep, now normal to him, now his constant companion, now coiled by his feet on the floor . . . it made me wonder if the coil helped protect against fear and doubt, against loneliness, if it made him feel more grounded and safe in the face of both the excitement and exhaustion of this endeavor. Or if he hardly noticed it anymore.  We get used to things so quickly in the everyday.

On the first day, the day of the quick visit, I felt that horrible feeling of being on the other side of the glass.  Of watching.  I know I am the only one I can blame for holding back.  I want to get closer. IAN asks me what I have been up to, I say I have been very quiet.  Then we are interrupted by another visitor, someone else dropping by.

DO SOMETHING NICE

I decide to reach out and do something nice.  It feels good.  I offer to buy some cold beverages and Ian seems so grateful.  It feels good to walk on the very hot street and buy something refreshing for the boy.

While I'm walking, I think to myself that maybe some people in the neighborhood have become used to Ian being around, inside his open door, and drop in regularly, bringing gifts and some refreshments, getting stoned.  Ian is very generous with his pot.

He wakes up and usually vaporizes some pot to begin his day, before he opens shop. 

He is a firm believer in getting high.  He says it enables him to forget himself.  He has visions when he is high, sees things, hears things, makes art in his mind so he can recreate it later.  There is nothing he likes better than to get stoned, play music and talk to someone else.  This is a lot of what goes on here on the road trip.

Due to a chronic throat condition, it is necessary for Ian to inhale the pot through a medical vaporizer.  The machine sits on the floor along with the other detritus of his life.  It keeps all the good stuff, even intensifies it, and eliminates the abrasive toxins.  You are not really smoking. It's like being one with the herb.  I've vaped before and I went right into hallucination.  Not unpleasant but I decline Ian's invitation.  I hate to miss out on anything but I was having a trippy enough time dealing with all that heat.

When not riding his bike, IAN vapes his visitors, if they are so inclined, and then plays them some music.  He has hundreds of records lining one wall although he was born after the birth of the CD.  He loves to touch the vinyl, the liner notes, the photographs, to feel the weight of the album cover.

There were some vague insinuations about some Brazilian girls staying late into the evening on a few occasions and another girl from SF too as well as other descriptions of late nights on the Stationary Tour, so I assumed that there had been some wild rope sex under the bike, or on it, with IAN tethered to his rickety copper construction but Ian said he was lonely more than once in our conversation.

It didn't seem sad/lonely.

It was human/lonely.

 

NEXT:
HOT TIME, SUMMER IN THE CITY, COMMITTED PART 2:
IAN CAMPBELL & THE LOVE ARTIST TALK ON FEAR OF THE DARK, GETTING HIGH, LOVE (OF COURSE) & ACTIVISM