Ben Schot

Ben Schot (born November 15, 1953, Zierikzee, Netherlands) is a Dutch artist, writer, and publisher.
Biography
From 1981 to 1986 Schot was trained as an artist at the art schools of Rotterdam and The Hague, The Netherlands. His activities cover various disciplines and techniques: drawings, audio and video works, installation art, and performances. As a writer Schot publishes articles and fiction in various magazines. In 2000 Schot founded the publishing house Sea Urchin Editions which publishes works from the avant-garde and counterculture, such as works by Henri Michaux, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Serge Gainsbourg, Vivian Stanshall & Ki Longfellow, and André Breton. In 2001 Ben Schot produced a free Dutch translation of Cary Loren's Songs for Holland. Together with Martine Vosmaer Schot translated into Dutch a compilation of Henri Michaux's hallucinatory prose, which was published by Sea Urchin Editions as Beroofd door de ruimte in 2004. On various occasions Schot gave lectures and presentations on Sun Ra, on whom he wrote an article as well. In 2003 Schot was awarded the Pendrecht Cultuurprijs by Chris Dercon, then director of Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam.
Some of the projects organised by Schot as a freelance curator are Oulipo (1997) about the French literary movement of the same name, Shells (1997), a project on the museum as an institute at Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen Rotterdam, Submerge (1997) on the films of surrealist-biologist Jean Painlevé, Towers Open Fire (1998) on the films of William S. Burroughs, and I rip you, you rip me (1998, in collaboration with Ronald Cornelissen) on the radical and psychedelic counterculture of Detroit in the late sixties, early seventies. As a member of the revolutionary collective The Buggers he staged a Missed Encounter between former Provo leader Roel van Duijn and former chairman of the White Panther Party John Sinclair in Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam in 2005. As part of the event Hugh Hopper, Mark Hewins, and Frank van der Kooy were invited by Schot to do a concert at the auditorium of the museum. In 2006 Schot put together an exhibition of material from the archives of the Dutch underground press Cold Turkey Press for the Historical Museum of Rotterdam. In 2008 Schot organized the project Kingdom Come about the notion utopia for the Dutch art institute TENT. The project consisted of an exhibition in which various artists, publishers, and thinkers were invited to react to the concept utopia, a book fair for independent publishers, a discussion with Roel van Duijn, and a performance of the Japanese musicians Yoshida Tatsuya of the band ' and Kawabata Makoto of Acid Mothers Temple. On several occasions Schot performed with Dutch electro-acoustic group Kapotte Muziek (Frans de Waard, Roel Meelkop, Peter Duimelinks). In 2012 the compilation CD Mole's Milk & other pieces of Schot's performances with Kapotte Muziek was released by Frans de Waard's Korm Plastics label and Sea Urchin Editions.
Pseudonyms
*Benjamin Jakobson
*H.W. Kleppe
*Teresa di Vicenzo
*Steffi Hachmer
*Jack Fletcher
*Hubert Boutoille
Publications in English (selection)
*Launched into eternity - tekst in Collect/Recollect, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen,Rotterdam, 1999
*Hare-brained/Hair-brained - comic in collaboration with Ronald Cornelissen, Wormhole #1, Rotterdam, 2000
*Astro-Black Mythology - article on Sun Ra published in Blastitude #13, Chicago, 2002
*The fire, the fire is falling! - manifesto published in Open #10, NAI publishers, Rotterdam, 2006
*The shining moon, the dead oak tree, nights like this appeal to me - essay on the phenomenon "comeback", Metropolis M, 2007

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