Click here to view the embedded video.

In this – the first ever- episode of SittingNow TV, we present the first of four lectures from the ‘Summer of Love’ event put on by Scarlet Imprint back in August.

Ulysses Black is not a name known to the occult community, despite having generated, under different guises, considerable interest through much sought after publications and artwork. As Ulysses Black he assails the issue of identity through performance art and ritual action. From influences such as Joseph Beuys and Hermann Nitsch as well as the Western Magical Tradition he plots a return to mythical Ithaca.

Ken Eakins

]]> http://sittingnow.co.uk/2011/11/22/sittingnow-tv-episode-01-the-voyage-of-ulysses-black/feed/ 6 AA,Aleister Crowley,Identity,Jack Macbeth,Magick,Magick in theory and practise,Occult,Orlando Britts,performance art,Peter Grey,Red Goddess,scarlet imprint In this - the first ever- episode of SittingNow TV, we present the first of four lectures from the 'Summer of Love' event put on by Scarlet Imprint back in August. Ulysses Black is not a name known to the occult community, despite having generated, In this - the first ever- episode of SittingNow TV, we present the first of four lectures from the 'Summer of Love' event put on by Scarlet Imprint back in August. Ulysses Black is not a name known to the occult community, despite having generated, under different guises, considerable interest through much sought after publications and artwork. As Ulysses Black he assails the issue of identity through performance art and ritual action. From influences such as Joseph Beuys and Hermann Nitsch as well as the Western Magical Tradition he plots a return to mythical Ithaca. Ken Eakins Right Where You Are Sitting Now no http://sittingnow.co.uk/2011/10/02/sittingnow-tv-begins-this-month-with-the-summer-of-love/ http://sittingnow.co.uk/2011/10/02/sittingnow-tv-begins-this-month-with-the-summer-of-love/#comments Sun, 02 Oct 2011 21:17:55 +0000 Ken Eakins http://sittingnow.co.uk/?p=4153 Click here to view the embedded video.

SittingNow.co.uk were invited to film the events of the first ‘Summer of Love’ event in Brighton by the excellent Scarlet Imprint.

A veritable Summer of Love distilled into one brimful cup of intoxication, illumination and revelation.

Speakers, dancers, performance art, and ritual combine to create a truly magical happening in a secret, central and spectacular location

The first four episodes will consist of full-length lectures from four of the speakers at the event (seen in the trailer above), and will begin later this month.

I know, I know…we took our sweet time…worth the wait, trust us.

Ken Eakins 

I’ve been looking forward to Antero Alli’s new film for a while now. His last flick – The Invisble Forest – was an exploration of psychology, surrealism, and the theatric method, filmed on multiple types of camera to throw the viewer into altered states throughout it’s viewing.

Alli’s latest offering – To Dream of Falling Upwards – has a more linear narrative approach than it’s predecessor. Not that it doesn’t take the viewer through a surreal minefield of visuals and expositions, it just happens to have a beginning, a middle, and an end. But enough of the comparisons, lets talk about the story.

A sex-magickian – Jack Mason – is the next in line to become the new head magus of  the Temple of Horus, a offshoot of its more official – OTO-like – sister the ‘Thelemic Temple of Anubis’. However, just as he is about to claim his leadership, the current Temple-Master’s son intervenes at his fathers death-bed, and claims the commercial rights to the order. Mason discovers that the son is planning to commercialise the order, and so begins a tale of murder, mysticism, sex, and comedy.

Along the way we meet some intriguing characters: A professor seeking mystical wisdom from a shamanic witch in the Californian desert, a Russian hit-man, lawyers with a fetish for S&M, and Mason’s Scarlet Lady (played by the Invisible Forest’s Clody Cates).

What is interesting about Alli’s approach to making a film about ‘occultists’ is, rather than dwelling too heavily on the ‘scandalous’ elements of the craft, he has instead chosen to highlight the more social aspects of being an occultist, drawing on the comparison of urban ritual, and rural. This is highlighted most clearly in his ‘Neophyte’ characters, two Thelamites of lower grades who are tasked with the ego-corrosive ritual of going into business together as clowns, and the professor seeking wisdom in the desert.

The film itself leaves you feeling somewhat transformed at the end. Ideas, normally communicated in text, are rendered visually to great effect. I don’t want to ruin any plot points, but Mason’s journey is particularly interesting, it’s final outcome both surprising, and impressively told.

Like The Invisible Forest, this film also has great music, provided by the fantastic Sylvia Alli. The compositions’ haunting and ethereal qualities help carry the viewer along the path of the film, whilst perfectly accompanying the narrative flow.

To Dream of Falling Upwards is Antero Alli’s most accessible film to date, both visually, and narratively. If you want to go on a mystical journey tinged with Crowleyana, humour, intrigue, and Carlos Castaneda, but don’t want the usual Kenneth Anger rip-offs, this film will serve you extremely well.

Ken Eakins

If you’re in the San Francisco area tomorrow – Antero Alli will be premiering the film at the A.T.A. – Details here

If you can’t make the screening, or the upcoming tour, then you can buy the DVD here

Click here to view the embedded video.

Kenneth Grant, one of the sole remaining links to occultist Aleister Crowley has died. Like his take on Thelema or not, you cannot deny the influence of the man’s work. From Starfire:

Kenneth Grant died on 15th January 2011 after a period of illness. Our condolences go first and foremost to his family, whose privacy is something which we all wish to respect at this difficult time.

Kenneth Grant had an extraordinary life, and his work has a remarkable depth and breadth of magical and mystical insight. In particular, his monumental series of Typhonian Trilogies is creative, innovatory and inspiring, extending across thirty years from the publication of the opening volume The Magical Revival in 1972, to the appearance of the final volume The Ninth Arch in 2002. This is a substantial body of work, constituting a solid foundation for further development, widening and deepening in the years to come; his work will continue.

Michael Staley,

SittingNow would like to extend our condolences to Grant’s friends and family.

A really great project online that utilises blog software to release big magazine-style releases – Kidz R Evil – has launched it’s ‘Occult Issue’:

is an informative Blogazine with a strong focus on Art, Music & Pop Culture. E.V.i.l. is merely an acronym for E.volutionary V.isions  Gr8r than > an I.nvoluted L.ifestyle. We strive to remove the barrier between education and entertainment to provide our followers with information they can apply in their daily lives.

It’s interesting stuff, go have a peak.

One of the worlds greatest occult/hermetic resources is in big trouble. The Amsterdam based Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica - sometimes referred to as ‘The Ritman Library- could lose 60% of its contents in sell-off in the coming months.

The library houses some of the rarest Hermetic texts, and has been a Holy Grail for researchers, and practioners alike for many years now.

From The Ritman Library:

It is widely known that the Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica in Amsterdam, founded by J.R. Ritman, was in great danger in the 1990s, when the ING bank took possession of the collection and threatened to sell it. Fortunately, the Dutch government intervened: the BPH was put on the list of protected Dutch heritage, and the State eventually acquired over 40% of it. The books remained at the same physical location, integrated with the rest of the collection, and the government would eventually acquire all of it. As part of this process, there were great plans for further expansion. Largely due to the financial crisis and a change of government this was taking somewhat longer than originally anticipated, but nobody doubted that the library was safe.

Last week this turned out to be incorrect. An extremely valuable medieval manuscript owned by the BPH (The Grail of Rochefoucauld) was put on sale at Sotheby’s, and this triggered a reaction from the Friesland Bank, which took possession of the library, that had apparently been brought in as collateral, in order to get back a 15 million euro loan from mr Ritman. At present the BPH is closed, and intense negotiations are going on behind closed doors. It is impossible at this moment to predict the outcome, but there is no doubt that the situation is extremely serious. There is a very real possibility that the Friesland bank will try to sell at least the ca. 60% of the library that is still owned by mr Ritman, and nobody knows what implications this will have for the rest of the collection and the BPH as a whole, including its staff. The brand-new government of the Netherlands has announced a program of radical financial cuts in the culture section and elsewhere, which makes a renewed intervention from that side highly unlikely.

Please please, if you hold an interest in any modern strain of The Western Esoteric tradition, you owe it yourself to sign the petition, and make sure this doesn’t happen!

Ken Eakins

(Via Heterodoxology)

Vincent Gallo in 'Night of Pan'

Wow! This is quite a combo:

“Night of Pan” is a seven and a half minute film featuring film auteur Kenneth Anger and actor Vincent Gallo. The film has been screened in various versions internationally – Beijing, Lisbon, Cannes, Athens, Rome, Berlin and elsewhere, but never in Butler’s base, Los Angeles.

In the film, Anger, Gallo, and Butler depict an occult ritual that symbolizes the stage of ego death in the process of spiritual attainment.

Brian Butler is a multidisciplinary artist who creates works around dark magical themes. He had worked extensively as a producer on director Kenneth Anger’s recent work. Additionally he has written for Dazed & Confused and performs along with Anger in the band Technicolor Skull.

Click here to view the embedded video.

(Source:Brian Butler & Dangerous Minds)

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After the most month-shaped week in history, we return to game with a great new episode of SittingNowish delights. This weeks guest, the fantastic Rodney Orpheus, gives us a great interview about the infamous Aleister Crowley. Discussed: Magick, The Abbey of the Thelema, The Ordo Templi Orientis, The A∴A∴, why Crowley is still so revered, Doing thou will, and our plot for a strange Victorian porn film.

Hyde to Kim’s Jekyll, Daddytank, returns with a nostalgic, but great MySpace Heroes. This weeks Musikal weapons:

Twiggy and the K-Mesons : Preset Love
Yellow Then Blue : The Black Rose
Raleigh St Clair : Alphabet

Books recomended by Rodney:

Perdurabo: The Life of Aleister Crowley & The Eye in the Triangle: Interpretation of Aleister Crowley

Rodney’s own fantastic book:

Abrahadabra: Understanding Aleister Crowley’s Thelemic Magick

Don’t forget to give us a review on iTunes when you have a spare 2 minutes, we’d really appreciate it.

Enjoy!

Rodney Orpheus’ (impressive) Biography:

Rodney Orpheus was born in Northern Ireland, and in the past years has lived in Hamburg, Germany and Los Angeles, California. He currently lives in The Cotswolds in England.

For the past twenty years Rodney has been well-known as a musician, record producer, and author. He lectures frequently at colleges and music business events, where his ability to present highly technical matters in an entertaining, understandable style has made him very much in demand.

Rodney has acted as a consultant with many of the top companies in the music instrument industry in the past years, most notably with Steinberg and DTS, as well as writing a regular monthly column for Computer Music magazine and running the ground-breaking musicians community at mi7.com

After the release of his seminal band, The Cassandra Complex’s first records Orpheus spent several years touring Europe, originally basing himself in Aachen, Germany, where he joined Ordo Templi Orientis. Orpheus had been studying the works of Aleister Crowleyand other occult authors since his teenage years, and previously had been founder and editor of the UK occult newspaper Pagan News along with Phil Hine. While in Aachen he began work on the book Abrahadabra, published originally by Looking Glass Press in Sweden, later republished by Weiser Books. The book has been described as “a significant contribution to the field of thelemic, or Crowleyan if you will, magick.” and “one of the very few competent and readable introductory texts to Thelemic magick.”

He still also occasionally gets time to play with The Cassandra Complex on stage and in the studio. He is currently completing work on his second book.

In Enochian Vision Magic, Duquette attempts to not only document the fascinating story of Dr John Dee and Edward Kelly’s quest to make contact with spiritual entities, but also to instruct the reader in the practical application of their findings in the modern environment.

Readers not already familiar with Duquette’s writings will feel instantly at ease with this book, while regulars will appreciate his attention to detail/yet solid conveyance of the topic at hand.

What I feel separates this work from others on the subject, is the intensive research and notation of the original Dee texts. Duquette doesn’t just present the reader with a ‘how-to’ textbook, he painstakingly explains all the symbology and application of each element. At the same time he also provides the reader with a pretty concise historical document, which I think will also appeal to the more casual reader interested in simply understanding the topic.

This book is a great blueprint for those interested in becoming practitioner’s of Enochian magic, as well as being a well written, and hugely accessible text for those just wishing to study the subject at an arms-length.

5/5

Ken Eakins

Check our exclusive audio-interview with Lon Milo Duquette on episode 5 of our podcast here. Lon’s website is also a great resource for those wishing to check out the author.

In Saturdays show we quiz the mighty Raymond Wiley of Out There Radio fame, and ask him: “What the hell is the Occult?” in this, our aptly titled, ‘Occult 101′ episode.

Go check the mighty Rev. Wiley here, download all the shows…thats an order!

See you on Saturday, going to be fun!