Matthew Abess, a second year undergraduate student at the University of Pennsylvania, poet and scholar, spent the summer of 2006 researching the work of the British poet, Bob Cobbing in the Sackner Archive. In honor of the Sackner's 50th wedding anniversary, Matthew conceived of a poetic interpretation by mining the letters R-U-T-H and M-A-R-V-I-N in Cobbing's bibliographic entries in their original positions on the page and reprocessing the letters on 50 pages on a photocopier so that the letters on the final page are completely obscured and abstract. Metaphorically, the letters take on a new beautiful life and interpretation. Also included are six pages of working notes. The poet's explantion of his process is as follows: Please see below my brief explanation of the piece. It is rather inarticulate, so please feel free to edit as you see fit! Respectfully, Matthew "Symphonic Concrete Cine-Text" Curated by: Ruth & Marvin Sackner Edited by: Matthew Abess, 24.06.2006. "Symphonic Concrete Cine-Text" is a treated found sound cine-text in celebration of Dr. and Mrs. Sackner's 50th anniversary. The catalogue for Dr. and Mrs. Sackner's Bob Cobbing and P.C. Fencott performance and exhibition catalogue (University of Miami, 1989) serves as the work's source text. For the title page, I utilized a cut-up method to rearrange images from Cobbing's works that are included in the catalogue. For the body text, I applied procedural methods to the Cobbing bibliographic text that is included in the catalogue. I typed all of the text into Microsoft Word, working from left to right along each page successively. All capitalization, punctuation, underlining and typos are kept as they appear in the original bibliography. Linear spacing within each line is kept in tact while spacing between entries is replaced by a single linear space. I set the font size to size 8 (the smallest size permitted by Word) and expanded the margins so that all of the text would fit onto a single page in font type 'American Typewriter Condensed' (an homage to Cobbing's use/abuse of the typewriter). I then divided the text into two columns of equal size along the center of the page, eliminating any space between the margins. In the left column, I identified the letters 'R-U-T-H' as they appear sequentially, beginning each new string of letters only after the previous string had been completed. In the right column, I followed the same procedure for the letters 'M-A-R-V-I-N.' I then blacked out the identified letters on a new sheet of paper, pasted this paper onto a window and marked the exact spacing on a blank sheet. Using a typewriter, I transcribed the treated text onto this sheet of paper according to the measured spacing. All punctuation and underlining were transcribed accordingly. The typewriter's single font size, uniform character spacing and standard margins allowed for aleatory processes to intercede in the creative process (much as Cobbing would have appreciated). In instances where spacing called for characters to overlap, I applied a number of keystrokes and erasures in order to generate the intended effect while maintaining some measure of legibility. The final text was then xeroxed 50 times, with each new copy serving as the basis for its successive copy (again, these methods of misusing office machinery come directly from Cobbing). The final text is a symphonic concrete cinematic production/construction/composition in which, over 50 pages, 'R-U-T-H' & 'M-A-R-V-I-N' transform, moving from separate lines into a single constellation where the names jointly occupy a single, ever-broadening cosmological space. "Working notes towards a ... Symphonic Concrete Cine-Text" is composed of the various physical elements that I utilized to produce/construct/compose the final text. It may serve as both a map to the final piece and as an individual work (or collection of works) in its (their) own light. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.