Sa-Ra-Ga - Ananda Shankar

From Sa-Ra-Ga Machan (1981)
Footage from  La Societe du  spectacle (Society of the Spectacle) 1973 film by Situationist Guy Debord on his own 1967 book of the same name.
The Situationist International (SI) was a restricted group of international revolutionaries founded in 1957, and which had its peak in its influence on the unprecedented general wildcat strikes of May 1968 in France.
With their ideas  rooted in  anti-authorianism Marxism and the 20th century European artistic avant  in particularly  Dada and Surrealism, they advocated experiences of life being alternative to those admitted by the capitalist order, for the fulfillment of human primitive desires and the pursuing of a superior  pasional quality. For this purpose  they suggested and experimented with the construction of situations, namely the setting up of environments for the fulfilment of such desires.
Using methods drawn from the arts, they developed a series of experimental fields of study for the construction of such situations, like unitary urbanism and psychogeography.
They fought against the main obstacle on the fulfilment of such superior passional living, identified by them in advanced capitalism. Their theoretical work peaked on the highly influential book ' The Society of the Spectacle ' by Guy Debord. Debord argued in 1967 that spectacular features like mass media and advertising have a central role in advanced capitalist society, which is to show a fake reality in order to mask the real capitalist degradation of human life. To overthrow such a system, the Situationist International supported the May '68 revolts, and asked the workers to occupy the factories and to run them with direct democracy through workers councils composed by instantly revocable delegates.
After publishing in the last issue of the magazine an analysis of the May 1968 revolts, and the strategies that will be needed to be adopted in future revolutions, the SI was diisolved in 1972.

' The spectacle is the nightmare of imprisoned modern society which ultimately expresses nothing more than its desire to sleep. The spectacle is the guardian of sleep.'

'Like lost children we live our unfinished adventures.'

' The spectacle is not a collection of images, but a social relation among people mediated by images.'

- Guy Debord:-  The Society of the Spectacle