Abraxas, Issue 2, Summer Solstice 2011

This issue contains Jon Crabb’s “Brion Gysin: Shaman of the Beat Hotel,” pp. 13–32.  This essay includes two reproductions of works by Brion Gysin: an untitled calligraphic painting from 1960 on page 14 and an untitled drawing (in grayscale) from 1960 on page 26.

Pages 20–21 contain a photograph by Harold Chapman of Brion Gysin in front of a Dreamachine at the Beat Hotel, 9 rue Gît-le-Cœur, Paris.

Brion Gysin is also mentioned in Ian MacFadyen's essay on Ira Cohen's Mylar photographs entitled "The Far Side of the World's Mirror."

A softcover and a hardcover edition (of 250 copies) were produced, with 200 numbered pages and a compilation CD entitled Tesserae 1.0. Of the 250 hardcover copies, 50 were designated for contributors, and the remaining 200 were for sale, including a silkscreen print by Barry William Hale. Pictured is the hardcover copy in the archive.

Contents:

• Ira Cohen:
• Mylar photograph (cover image)
• Mylar photographs
• Mark Titchner: "Belief Is the Fall from the Absolute" (back cover art)
• Grevel Lindop: "The White Goddess: A Personal Account" (essay)
• Tim Motion: "Robert Graves" (photograph, 1979)
• Jon Crabb: "Brion Gysin: Shaman of the Beat Hotel" (essay)
• Brion Gysin:
• "untitled" (painting, 1960)
• "untitled" (drawing, 1960)
• Harold Chapman: "Brion Gysin with His Dreamachine in Room 25 at the Beat Hotel" (photograph, c.1960)
• Various: "In the Mylar Chamber: Essays Exploring the Mylar Photographs of Ira Cohen":
• Allan Graubard: "The Ritual Theatre of Hallucination" (essay)
• Ian MacFadyen: "The Far Side of the World's Mirror" (essay)
• Edwin Pouncey: "Remembering Ira" (essay)
• Chai Tanya: "Eye on the Etcher" (photograph of Ira Cohen, 1977)
• Ira Cohen: "With the Eyes of Heraditus" (photograph of Edwin Pouncey, 2004)
• Ira Cohen: "Lost Words" (poetry, printed on handmade paper, 2003)
• Mark Titchner: "Urban Sigils" (essay, photographs of artwork)
• Misior: "Elucidarium Zza Firanki" (painting)
• Dan Harms: "Finding the Long-Lost Friend" (essay)
• Peter Dubé: "To Raise the Dead and Enjoy Congress with Them" (prose)
• Desireé Isphording: "By Standing Stone and Twisted Tree" (artwork, 2005)
• Doreen Valiente: "Invocation of the Horned God" (poetry)
• Lauren Simonutti: "Five Studies": 
• "Veves" (photograph)
• "Chaos is a god with no reflection" (photograph)
• "Baby, bolt and the ouija board" (photograph)
• "W is its own altar (from The Devil's Alphabet" (photograph)
• "Whirligig" (photograph)
• Residue: "Out of the Zero Hours" (painting)
• Elinor McDonald: photographs of Barry William Hale, 2010
• Robert Fitzgerald and Barry William Hale: "IO:EVOE" (interview)
• Michael Strum: "NOKO: HYPERCUBE 201 / VEH" (photograph of Barry William Hale, 2010)
• Barry William Hale: 
• "Papercuts from Legion 49" (art, 2009)
• "Alphagenii from Hypercube 210" (art)
• Richard Abraxas: "NOKO: ORDER 41" (photograph of Barry William Hale, 2010)
• Ossian Brown, ed.: "Hallowe'en Children from Haunted Air" (photograph, 2010)
• Amy Hale and Joseph Max: "Portrait of a Magical Maker" (interview)
• Amy Hale: photographs
• Talon Abraxas: "Astral Flight" (painting)
• Robert Ansell and Cristina Francov: "The Metamorphic Self" (interview)
• Cristina Francov: paintings and digital works
• Peter Redgrove: "Sorceress in Mauve" (poetry)
• Shani Oates: "Pashupâti: A Cainite Trimurti" (essay)
• Arnett Taylor: illustrations
• Edward Gauntlett: "Peter Redgrove: Blood and Dreams" (essay)
• Neil Roberts: "Peter Redgrove" (photograph, c1965)
• Christopher Greenchild: "On the Always-Wandering Way" (poetry)
• Malgorzata Maj: "Spells" (photograph)
• Heather Tracy: "She's Lost Control" (essay)
• Adi Newton: 
• film stills from The Inhabitants of Nemirion
• film still from The Denizens
• film still from Meontographical Cartography
• film stills from Teratological, Pataphysical and Meontological Experiment 1
• Jack Sargeant and Adi Newton: "Endless Shifting: A Feast of Images, Swallowed by Sound" (interview)
• Ithell Colquhoun: "The Habit of Perfection" (poetry, drawing)
• T. Thorn Coyle: "Knowledge" (poetry, prose)
• Christina Oakley Harrington: "Witches' Ointment" (commentary on Giovanni Battista Della Porta, from Magia Naturalis sive De Miraculis Rerum Naturalium, Book II, Chapter XXVI (1558 AD)"
• Alan Moore: "Fossil Angels" (essay)
• Peter Dubé: "To End Uneasy Dreams" (prose poetry)
• contributors
• Gavin Semple, ed: "Tessera 1.0: An Audio Supplement" (CD)
• notes on the CD
• [Hardcover only] Barry William Hale: "Phantasm Regina" (signed and numbered screenprint)

CD Contents: 

1. Raagnagnok: "Quince Essence" (6'32")
2. Kallee: "BasMass" (2'15")
3. Arktau Eos: "Aot-Ro-Oot" (6'27")
4. Orryelle Defenestrate-Bascule ft. Orchestra-ted Chaos: "She Shall Ride He" (6'40")
5. OKOK Research Bureau: "The Sinister Pearl" (2'58")
6. Philip Legard: "Bet Sant yn Diuant abet Allawr" (6'32")
7. High Mountain Tempel: "The Goddess (Slight Return)" (5'02")
8. NOKO: ORDER 41: "The Fascinator (Abraxas Mix)" (4'55")
9. John Contreras: "Over the Treetops" (4'18")
10. The Psychogeographical Commission" (Gutterbright to the Starres" (6'21")
11. English Heretic: "240 Hours" (6'33")
12. TAGC: "The Inhabitants of Nemirion" (7'18")
13. Cyclobe: "The Unknowable Index (Extract from Sleeper)" (5'32")