I went to NYC during the “bomb cyclone” (sounds like something I should build), to see what got billed as SRL’s first gallery show. I did overhear Mark Pauline say they had a gallery show before, in the ’80s, but “fucked that up”. I don’t know if he meant running the show somehow, or destroyed the actual gallery.

Destroying the building is something they could do if they wanted. The video there is the Pitching Machine throwing 2x4s into a lexan bullet trap.

The thing is, they don’t seem like the sorts to destroy a building without asking first. When you first hear what SRL does (make huge machines and stage spectacles of destruction with them), you might imagine that SRL is composed of wild-eyed loonies with a a certain lack of regard for their own health and safety. Reading Kathe Koja’s “Skin”, while amusing, will not incline you to think otherwise.

Seeing them in the gallery running the machines, they seem like very sane, calm people. On thinking about it, this makes sense. People with a heavy inclination to carelessness or self-destruction just… wouldn’t last around these machines.

Also, working on things that can kill you brings perspective. When other things go wrong in your life, you can look at them and be like “Is this going to rip my arm off? No? Ain’t no thing, I can deal with this.”

Kal Spelletech, founder of SEEMEN and now doing his own thing, was also there. The difference between his work and SRL’s is interesting. SRL is deliberately inhuman and inhumane. It’s about machines as themselves, with no human performers, and seemingly little concern for what humans want. Spelletech’s earlier work was interactive with the audience. It made the experience personal and intimate (though possibly still scary). He also has an element of whimsy in his work. SRL may have a kind of humor, but the machines have zero whimsy.