100 Ideas Eno, the book that disseminates the traces of a mutant artist's thoughts

Next Saturday, the Séptimo Arte video library and bookstore will host and participate in an event that takes thought as its starting point. And not just any thought, but that of a very special figure in the history of English-speaking pop music: Brian Eno.

The multifaceted musician and artist, who was part of Roxy Music and later distinguished himself as an unconventional creator and producer of industry staples (David Bowie, Talking Heads, U2, and Coldplay, among others), is a very distinctive figure. Special both for the music he created (he's one of the key names in ambient , for example) and for the ideas he arrived at during that process of nearly five decades and counting.

This is the starting point of 100 Eno Ideas , a book jointly published by two central cultural agents for the city of Rosario: the publishing house Mal de Archivo and the musical collective Planeta X.

Published in 2024, this volume is the result of the work of Aníbal Pérez, Franco Ingrassia, Manuel Schillagi, and Emiliano Boero, four friends who are enthusiasts of music and cultural debate. Fans not only of the British creator's sonic materiality, but also of his diverse discursive interventions.

“Eno is not, strictly speaking, an intellectual. He doesn't seek to challenge others with eloquence or project his thoughts toward a mass audience. He's not interested in occupying that position. Rather, he operates as a mutant, transdisciplinary artist, whose work and thought feed off each other in a recursive relationship,” explains Aníbal Pérez.

Together with his three colleagues, they compiled a hundred of the Englishman's concepts and expositions and compiled them into a book that is as endearing as it is thought-provoking. "In this sense, his figure is reminiscent of those who dissolved the boundaries between doing and thinking: (Marcel) Duchamp, (John) Cage, (Kazimir) Malevich. But also of other, more radical forms of intervention, such as those of Perón or Lenin," notes the designer of this small and vibrant volume.

“There are times when theory is no longer enough, or when it becomes too narrow a framework. When someone produces more than just ideas, the title of ‘intellectual’ no longer suffices. Eno renounces it without making it explicit. His thought is a flow: it doesn't stop, it doesn't crystallize. It manifests itself in movement itself,” Pérez then emphasizes.

"That makes a substantial difference from those who think from a stable platform. With Eno, every idea is a figure in transit," the editor acknowledges. For him, in fact, one of the central ingredients in the development of this project was the availability of a vast collection of interviews and testimonies from different situations.

“Eno made the interview a form of artistic expression. He doesn't treat it as a means of dissemination, but rather as an active part of his work. What for others is promotion, for him is integration. There's an expression he uses—'integration art'—that struck us as particularly accurate: everything an artist broadcasts to the public must be part of a single constellation. A meta-work,” he then concludes, in a definition that draws on Daniel Melero's local reference in the background.

“From that perspective, every conversation, every interview, is an aesthetic and conceptual intervention,” Pérez points out. “That's why, in his words, there's always something to discover. Nothing is superfluous,” insists the Rosario native, who, along with his three colleagues, was tasked with selecting and organizing 100 text capsules that synthesize and represent the way the British artist processes his surroundings.

“We share a deep respect for Eno,” explains Pérez, who asserts that “it's not just about studying what he says, but resonating with the way he says it.” In this regard, he highlights the curated work he did with his colleagues: “There are hundreds of interviews, spread across decades, spanning different languages, contexts, and media. This wealth enabled a fine, patient curation.”

"Several years passed between the initial idea and the publication of the book. We read literally hundreds of interviews, dating from the 1970s to the present," notes Franco Ingrassia, another of the editors.

“The digital archive moredarkthanshark.org was fundamental to this. We divided the interviews between the four of us and uploaded the ideas we identified to a Drive. We then categorized and translated them,” he adds, referring to the patient and collective selection of the 100 selected testimonies.

Furthermore, the “choose your own adventure” aspect of the reading experience proposed by 100 Ideas Eno stands out: “In relation to the ordering of the fragments, we decided that the sequential order of the book would be random. And then we proposed a series of 'reading itineraries' (on art, complexity, culture, listening, synthesizers, etc.) that weave together different ideas that appear in the book, enabling non-linear readings.”

In this regard, Ingrassia emphasizes the possibility of "opening the book randomly to any page." In fact, he provides a fact: idea 91 included in this volume engages with the chosen format and Eno's own quest to "overcome linearity."

“Eno talks about a publication he was planning in the early 1980s,” one of the curators notes. He quotes: “He says, ‘The idea of ​​the book is that, rather than going through it from beginning to end, you can follow any path that interests you. On one page, you might encounter echoes of past events. Let's say you're interested in exploring a different idea, then you go to another part of the book. What I like is that you can continually cross the same paths again after having gone through other ideas, so presumably this new reading will produce a different inflection. You'll be able to read the book from beginning to end, but you won't be forced to do so.'”

Ingrassia continues: “We thought it was so in tune with the form that Eno's 100 Ideas was taking that we decided to use that fragment to print on the bookmarks that accompany the edition.”

“Our greatest expectation and enthusiasm was always to be able to complete the book and put its ideas into circulation. We never thought about selling a lot of books; we operate with an amateur mentality, a love of disseminating the critical ideas it contains,” affirms Manuel Schillagi, the third of the editors involved in the process and owner of Mal de Archivo, the bookstore and publishing house behind this small treasure.

"We're surprised by the wide circulation it's having," the editor notes, "although, despite being modest, we knew we were bringing to light material that would be of interest and that could resonate with people from different walks of life and ages, and not just those who already knew Eno," he immediately notes, referring to the refined content of this book, which arrives in Córdoba today to continue expanding its reach.

Regarding the event with which the publication will launch in Córdoba, Schillagi anticipates: "We hope to have a great time with the audience, present Eno's ideas and, why not, in light of them, critically reflect on our own cultural present." He, along with Ingrassia and Pérez, will be present this Saturday at the corner of Campillo and Roque Sáenz Peña. They will be joined by journalist Germán Arrascaeta, a spokesperson who promises to get the most out of these three fans of a unique creator.

Meanwhile, for Eno , "everything is still going according to plan." This object, which summarizes Eno's vision in a hundred "traces" of his thought, makes its way through uncertainty and apathy. In a far from simple context, this romantic homage achieves what it initially set out to do: open the door to play with thought.

100 Ideas Eno will be presented in Córdoba this Saturday, July 5th, at 8:00 PM. At the Séptimo Arte video library and bookstore (Roque Sáenz Peña 1423), journalist Germán Arrascaeta will speak with three of the publication's editors: Aníbal Pérez, Manuel Schillagi, and Franco Ingrassia. Free admission. Copies will be available.