The Dream Machine

A True Open Forum; Share/Discuss whatever you like
User avatar
Devil's Advocate
Posts: 314
Joined: Fri Dec 19, 2014 6:52 am
Reputation: 531

The Dream Machine

Postby Devil's Advocate » Sun Sep 20, 2015 9:36 am

You can try the Dream Machine online here:

http://www.netliberty.net/dreamachine.html



A homemade dream machine, lit internally

Image

Image





The Dream Machine is a device for altering the brainwave frequency of the user and putting it into an alpha state, at which point it begins generating waking, sober hallucinations and internal “movies,” on demand.

The machine is simple: it’s a rotating cylinder with slats in the sides and a light placed inside, that creates a flicker pattern as it spins. The user of the Dream Machine sits in front of it with eyes closed, and allows the precisely-calibrated flicker pattern to play over their face, creating a strobe effect in the darkness behind their eyelids. After a short period of adjustment, the user begins to experience eidetic imagery, in the same way that one does just as passing over the threshold between wakefulness and sleep. (Due to its cylindrical nature and ability to generate internal movies, one might call it the original YouTube.)

This remarkable and overlooked object was invented in the late 1950s by artistic Renaissance man Brion Gysin and the electronics technician Ian Sommerville. Gysin was expelled from the Surrealist Group by André Breton at the age of 19; with the Dream Machine, he surpassed their previous techniques for image generation. (An example of a prior method is Salvador Dalí’s Paranoiac-Critical exercise, in which the artist would fall asleep in an armchair while holding a rock in his hand and, upon his fingers relaxing and the rock crashing to the ground and waking him, would immediately record what he had just seen.) The Dream Machine allowed for a convenient and immediate way to get at eidetic imagery without having to go to sleep or take chemicals.

Gysin had been inspired by both childhood and adult experiences with the effects of flicker, by historical accounts of its use (Nostradamus was alleged to have received his visions by closing his eyes, facing towards the sun and flickering his fingers in front of his eyes) as well as by research into medical reports of its effects. At the infamous Beat Hotel in Paris where he lived with Sommerville and Burroughs (along with Allen Ginsberg, Peter Orlovsky, Gregory Corso, the vicious crime writer Derek Raymond and others) he constructed the first prototype. (The same 78rpm record player version for which DIY instructions are freely available on the net) It quickly became a source of fascination for the Beats.

Burroughs wrote about Dream Machines extensively in his novels, where he depicted them as a weapon for the freedom of consciousness in the eternal war against Control. The author spoke highly of his friends’ invention, saying: “Subjects report dazzling lights of unearthly brilliance and color… Elaborate geometric constructions of incredible intricacy build up from multidimensional mosaic into living fireballs like the mandalas of Eastern mysticism or resolve momentarily into apparently individual images and powerfully dramatic scenes like brightly colored dreams.”

The machine was officially unveiled in 1962, at the Louvre’s Museé des Arts Decoratifs, to a fascinated public and press—but Gysin, unsatisfied with a small art audience, dreamed of mass production. Along with the cut-up method of text composition he had honed with Burroughs, Gysin considered the Dream Machine his magical message to the world.

He turned first to business magnate Helena Rubinstein, who was taken with the device and exhibited it in her shop windows, but then refused to pay for it. Next Gysin tried the Philips Corporation—a representative of the company, while visiting Gysin at the Beat Hotel, slipped on dogshit in the hall; the deal was cancelled. Later, Colombia Records wanted to market the Dream Machine as a lamp. Meeting with Colombia executives in 1965, Gysin (ever the magician) told them that vinyl records would soon be obsolete, replaced with optical discs that were read with a ray of light. He was not well received.

Gysin died in 1986, the cause of the Dream Machine having been taken up by his protégé Genesis P-Orridge and the loose occult and media subversion network the Temple ov Psychick Youth. TOPY both propagandized the Dream Machine and distributed information on how to make your own, using Gysin’s original plans. Creating your own is not hard: All one needs is a large sheet of cardboard, an X-Acto blade to cut the slats out, a light bulb on a cord and a spare turntable. There are also web pages and programs that generate the same flicker effect . You can even get a free Dream Machine iPhone app. (Your mileage may vary.)

Since the 90s, the Dream Machine has become a kind of elitist status symbol, often found in the possession of West Coast media types and young celebrities. Kurt Cobain bought one shortly before his death. David Bowie, Iggy Pop and Paul McCartney all used it. Other aficionados include Marilyn Manson, Floria Sigismondi, Bruce Labruce, Nick Zinner of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Beck and DJ Spooky. You get your own fully crafted machine for $500 + $50 shipping . Of course, you can also build your own or download the app; with so many ways to experience it, perhaps now the Dream Machine will finally get the mass attention Gysin always believed it deserved as a simple, drug-free path to altered states of consciousness.

http://www.acceler8or.com/2012/09/brion ... r-visions/

User avatar
Edge Guerrero
Posts: 8287
Joined: Tue Oct 22, 2013 7:14 am
Reputation: 3064
Location: Smackdown Hotel at "the corner of Know Your Role Blvd

Postby Edge Guerrero » Sun Sep 20, 2015 12:03 pm

- There's was a episode of the Jetsons were Leroy has a machine that chooses with type of dream he has.
In lucdy dream, there are theorys, i think Pomg posted about it, that if you get to realistic dreams and control them, they ending not being health.

A thing to think about, is that we could the time dreaming to program ourselfes, learning or studing, being trainer.(Got that idea from Azrael from Batman, Jean Paul Valley, Michal is the fake one)
- I rent this space for advertising

Don't be selfish, preserve this world for the next generations.

I'll never long for what might have been
Regret won't waste my life again
I won't look back I'll fight to remain

User avatar
Masato
Site Admin
Posts: 18304
Joined: Mon Jun 25, 2012 3:16 pm
Reputation: 8227

Postby Masato » Mon Sep 21, 2015 6:51 pm

Have you tried it, DA?

User avatar
Devil's Advocate
Posts: 314
Joined: Fri Dec 19, 2014 6:52 am
Reputation: 531

Postby Devil's Advocate » Fri Sep 25, 2015 10:25 pm

Yeah, it did have a mild effect, but I felt like it was going to take forever to start tripping. I lost interest after a few minutes but would like to try again when i'm in the right mood.

User avatar
robbstar
Posts: 374
Joined: Tue Sep 22, 2015 3:39 am
Reputation: 553

Postby robbstar » Fri Oct 30, 2015 4:57 am

Wowsers I should of read that first . I just hit play afterwards I read and "keep your eyes shut" , Pretty fucking triply. Lost in my computer screen. Wowsers. Off for another shot. Eyes wide open :)

User avatar
Devil's Advocate
Posts: 314
Joined: Fri Dec 19, 2014 6:52 am
Reputation: 531

Postby Devil's Advocate » Wed Nov 11, 2015 10:44 am

robbstar wrote:Wowsers I should of read that first . I just hit play afterwards I read and "keep your eyes shut" , Pretty fucking triply. Lost in my computer screen. Wowsers. Off for another shot. Eyes wide open :)



What happened?

User avatar
Redneck
Posts: 561
Joined: Wed Dec 02, 2015 7:44 am
Reputation: 352

Postby Redneck » Thu Jun 29, 2017 9:32 am

I think it worked, kind of, not exactly mind-blowing. Ironically, I think you need to be wasted to appreciate it's full value, but that's not the idea of it.


Return to “Anarchy Zone”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 162 guests