|
Tinsquo's curatorial project, Adjacent To Life, presents 20th Century Artifacts...from another timeline by John Tebeau.
John Tebeau presents a selection of newspapers, magazines, paperbacks, concert posters, T-shirts, brochures and children’s books acquired from a thrift store residing in an alternate timeline of the 20th century.
The artist explains the emergence of this parallel narrative:
“In a nutshell, here’s how that timeline diverged from ours: President Dwight D. Eisenhower underwent safe, professionally administered and 100% legal psychedelic therapy for trauma following his 1955 heart attack. (See NYT-1956.) After all, psychiatrists in the ‘50s effectively used LSD to treat anxiety, depression and addiction with minimal risk. Once his ticker was healed up, Ike went for it, and in three sessions confronted his innermost challenges and, at the height of his (and the nation’s) power, came through “a better man.”
“Eisenhower’s vision of himself and the world was forever altered, and as Ike went, so went the nation, including his bundle-of-neuroses vice president Richard M. Nixon. At his boss’s urging, Nixon gave psychedelic therapy a whirl, and, lo and behold, he too came out a better man. He whupped JFK in 1960 (the cool, self-assured “New Nixon” mopped up the floor with him in the debates) and became the best version of himself. No paranoia, no loser-boy, chip on his shoulder, no sweat-drenched upper lip. He took Ike’s aggressively enlightened agenda and ran with it. Read the stories in NYT-1963. (Happily, JFK had a much better November 22, 1963 in that timeline, and lived to the ripe old age of 88, dying in bed –- natch – in 2005.)
“In short, the psychedelic revolution was officially condoned, medically normalized, and ubiquitous.”
The exhibition is on view through November 2 at the Adjacent to Life pop-up gallery housed in Ninth Street Espresso (341 E. 10th Street at Ave B, New York City).
