Iain Boal sitting on the mound in front of a replica of the SF Mime Yes, Parks Commission No, protest sign from the 1965 protest in Golden Gate Park, to the right is Ronnie Davis with Mime Troupe photographs.

On October 11, 2008 Iain Boal sat on the grass mound and gave a talk entitled “Conflicts On The Common”. This lecture was basically concerned with the history of enclosure, emparkment and it’s relationship with art, one in which Iain, a historian with exhaustive knowledge on the body and the commons, spoke about many, many things. This talk spanned from Thomas Moore, to Wordsworth, to Gerard Winstanly and the Diggers, to 60’s experiments with communal living, to Utopian endeavors and the problematics of Utopian vision. It was a way to mark a path through these histories of resistance taking place in the common open air, as a preamble for a question which Iain asked to Ronnie Davis, founder of the San Francisco Mime Troupe (SFMT); ‘what was the SFMT trying to do in the late 60’s when they brought their political theater outside into the open air of the park?’ This talk was the fifth of six event that I produced as part of A Grass Mound (With Kind Regards to Utopia).
More… »