"As with all my work, I begin with a primitive line or drop of sweat, or pixel cluster and then...respond to the possibilities inherent in that mark. The story knows how to tell itself."

"The mistake...the holy accident...and the moment of recognition...the intention of the universe revealed"

"Stepping in...stepping out. Exerting complete control...losing control entirely. Pulling back on the reins...being dragged through the brush."

Michael Holcomb

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The dog trots freely in the street

and sees reality

and the things he sees

are bigger than himself

and the things he sees

are his reality

Drunks in doorways

Moons on trees

The dog trots freely thru the street

and the things he sees

are smaller than himself

Fish on newsprint

Ants in holes

Chickens in Chinatown windows

their heads a block away

The dog trots freely in the street

and the things he smells

smell something like himself

The dog trots freely in the street

past puddles and babies

cats and cigars

poolrooms and policemen

He doesn’t hate cops

He merely has no use for them

and he goes past them

and past the dead cows hung up whole

in front of the San Francisco Meat Market

He would rather eat a tender cow

than a tough policeman

though either might do

And he goes past the Romeo Ravioli Factory

and past Coit’s Tower

and past Congressman Doyle

He’s afraid of Coit’s Tower

but he’s not afraid of Congressman Doyle

although what he hears is very discouraging

very depressing

very absurd

to a sad young dog like himself

to a serious dog like himself

But he has his own free world to live in

His own fleas to eat

He will not be muzzled

Congressman Doyle is just another

fire hydrant

to him

The dog trots freely in the street

and has his own dog’s life to live

and to think about

and to reflect upon

touching and tasting and testing everything

investigating everything

without benefit of perjury

a real realist

with a real tale to tell

and a real tail to tell it with

a real live

              barking

                         democratic dog

engaged in real

                      free enterprise

with something to say

                             about ontology

something to say

                        about reality

                                        and how to see it

                                                               and how to hear it

with his head cocked sideways

                                       at streetcorners

as if he is just about to have

                                       his picture taken

                                                             for Victor Records

                                  listening for

                                                   His Master’s Voice

                      and looking

                                       like a living questionmark

                                                                 into the

                                                              great gramaphone

                                                           of puzzling existence

                 with its wondrous hollow horn

                         which always seems

                     just about to spout forth

                                                      some Victorious answer

                                                              to everything

Lawrence Ferlinghetti, “Dog” from A Coney Island of the Mind: Poems. Copyright © 1958 by Lawrence Ferlinghetti.

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"Life is a process of invention and adaptation, most of it below the threshold of our ability to observe... always reaching for a more harmonious instanciation. What's left behind, if anything, are pieces of evidence, a record of a momentary state or manifestation of the process.

MH

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There is no failure. The only thing that really matters is the willingness and strength to begin again."

MH

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Chaos Theory is a mathematical sub-discipline that studies complex systems. Complex systems often appear too chaotic to recognize a pattern with the naked eye but the first Chaos theorists began to discover that complex systems often seem to run through some kind of cycle, even though the systems are rarely exactly duplicated. This tendency is called “self-similarity” and is the repetition of a shape, form or behavior on different levels of complexity- not as an identical copy, but as a variation of the same basic shape. A large number of particles will display a pattern that is near equal to the initial possibilities of a single particle.

MH

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Crowding objects together in a limited space causes formal mutations through algorithmic intelligence.

MH

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Beauty is its own reason. It may be described, analyzed and put to use but, in the end, these actions only serve to obscure what's actually there. Beauty doesn't care about intention, history or manners. It can be found in mathematics and nature, dance and cooking, science and sport or a life well-lived. It is, like a flower, the expression of something beyond simple desire, something more like an irrefutable need to exist.

MH

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The concept of “protologos” has to do with knowledge that is distinct from language. It is a form of knowing that co-exists now, in parallel with our very sophisticated systems of identifying, naming and quantifying. It is experiential rather than nominal and is the ancestor and basis for all understanding.

MH

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