LITHIUM FOR BIPOLAR DISORDER | Fabrice Michel / murmurs / day one… the window / the room / the Pacific… lying in bed (night falls)
[...] shrill sounds on top of other sounds of different tones [...] I go out into the streets of Antofagasta… to the sound of the country’s cooking pots [...] / awake / after the ravages of the dictatorship [...] the military-law enforcement complex [...] neoliberalism [...] is no longer tolerated / 14 October 2019/ metro fares go up / the people / break / a long silence / what had been buried (abruptly surfaces) / marches / steel shutters > < glass windows / the graffiti all over the city / massive protests / «Killer cops just like Pinochet» / bitter chants / «No More Sename» (places of confinement) / early childhood abandoned / «No More AFP» . . . about money manipulated by high finance / familiarity: violence against women / dignity / fiscal / social equality / revaluing those who are invisible [...] statues of generals and decorated soldiers torn down / covered in paint / a uniform / coersion / is banned / front line / as soon as night falls / no more mr nice guy (families with children return home) [...] front line><armored vehicles / wearing improvised masks + knee pads + heavy boots + molotov cocktails / there are women and family men / the smell of tear gas [...] the city / the poverty of political systems / the failure of social dialog / the violent repression of the protests [...] are an indication of the inevitability and legitimacy of a certain kind of violence [...] economically speaking: those with whom they are clashing are from the same level / working class / is leading the revolution>< a working class that defends the regime / / archives / chance meeting with don Pepe in a bookstore [...] I start a conversation / they tell me he doesn’t miss a single cultural event / he has a ton of newspapers at home / a variety of publications / he makes copies and writes it all down [...] I ask if I can see his archives / he agrees / there is no roof on his house / almost no walls / he takes out his notebooks / a mountain of paper: pages and pages (where everything is hand-written) / reviews of exhibitions / articles about theater / medical theses / don Pepe is a conceptual artist (art brut) / he doesn’t know / living on nothing> he remains standing > dignified > underneath the sky / without any protection> thanks to his notes that keep him busy until nightfall (as he has no electricity) / he endures / scar / museum of Antofagasta / models / photographs of early mining operations / nitrates / later it would give way to copper and then lithium / a functioning railroad still running through the city / scar / on one side the most wealthy; on the other side slums / the train still transporting materials / in dust > therefore legible: «this building and its inhabitants are contaminated / garbage / I wanted to see 194
