MOST Meeting Minutes Excerpt

via conference call 7-9 PM, 9/30/2007
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O - Wants to start a dialogue with Sam Adams' office - in re: friendship city options, why would PDX want to do that with us, why would we do that with them, what would that look like, what is at stake - Why was it so easy for us to get recognition by L. Mayor John So, vs. the government in our home city? It would be great if the city would recognize us, but what would that look like?
S - Maybe they'd recognize a city/town of Mostlandia, not the MOST, what is at stake for them is their official relationship between a city and a group of artists, vs. between the city and another place.
O- How would we approach them? Initial contact is important. Do we contact as Ambassadors, artists, residents...
M - Feels confident we could figure out how to approach them.
S - It would be different if a group of Mostlandian citizens approached them vs. a letter from inside of Mostlandia, vs artists...maybe it would be a mix of these things.
O - Would like to make the official first contact by December, well, end of November.
S - We would have to have conversations about the connection between relationships to the city and/or the SWaterfront area and/or MOST.
M - The whole idea of Mostlandia as a specific place is hard. Doesn't like being reduced to being from a "fake city". It would be hurting ourselves to limit what we are and do to that. Doesn't want to be pigeonholed.
S - Agrees with that.
M - Contacting the city as Mostlandian friendship city is difficult. Makes it harder for M to get to Mostlandia when thinking about it. There are 2 Mostlandias. One has the Flatirons, Mounts MOST, the Staticsphere, make believe. Then there's the real Mostlandia, the place not place place. Its the "New Vocabulary Mostlandia". Place by experience vs. place by location
S - An activity/action to do this fall. We should go to SWaterfront and open a portal and find out information inside of the portal, figure out if there's a relationship with the city that's not based in "micronations". There could be an experience related to Portland in the portal.
M - We have a lot of tools to make it easy to accomplish starting a relationship with the city. If other members of the group want to do it, he'll go along.
S - Doesn't want it to have to be as complex, but it is. Especially if we do poetic actions like if we do different kinds of performances . That adds to her desire to not solidify as a micronation.
M - SWaterfront asked us to do stuff, and we have our own ideas about how to do it. Do they expect us to be a service bureau? Thinking about how artists are asked to do gallery shows with old stuff instead of current stuff. We are so dynamic and wants to do dynamic work.
S - We can use this show to explicitly explore new work.
M - Likes the phrase poetic actions.
O - Would want it to be dynamic, not pigeonholed. Thinks that M is smart and clear thinking in how he doesn't want to limit us by creating a relationship wtih the city, and not wanting to be a micronation. Would want anything we do in creating a relationship to the City to accurately reflect Mostlandia as a place by experience rather than location. It would be interesting to see if there was a way to weave something poetic into the existing bureaucratic structure of the City. It seems like that would be in our vernacular. Would like to use the City as a medium for our work.
M - We could attend a City Hall meeting and announce our intentions publicly.
M - Close to end of the meeting. 2 hours.
Has 2 ideas, wild fantasies. no budget, but what if we had a 3 day Mostlandia Heritage Festival. All Mostlandian bands and artists could come out for it. Some of our citizens could help curate small shows.
S - People could wear traditional attire.
M - Ceremonial beards. We can do it in 2015, or the year after the helicopter gets fixed.