Sanford Pelz

I was Paris’s College Guidance counselor, and we bonded through an interdisciplinary course I taught that was right up his alley. At the Browning Holiday Party in December, we talked about an author I had introduced him to and I gave him a copy of his recent book. He said he had ordered a book for me that he thought I would appreciate. He told me he was pursuing a doctorate in the history and philosophy of science, and I told him “You are living my dream!”

A week later he was gone.

I would like to read something I wrote 11 years ago.
It was intended for a different audience, but it is how I will remember Paris.

Paris Alexander Ionescu    Fall 2004

How do we capture such a profoundly gifted and unconventional thinker? Someone who writes, for example:

I make phone calls to what are for me the most obscure, remote and foreign regions of the Earth (Antarctic research bases, outposts in the Siberian tundra, nightclubs in Jakarta, hardware stores in the suburbs of Canberra, expensive restaurants in Cape Town, futuristic penthouses in Daiba, Tokyo), conversing with and learning from the anonymous concepts on the other end of the line.

How does one reconcile such mediocre English grades from a student who writes, of his passion for rock climbing: “growing up in a concrete jungle, there is nothing like the lonely dance of crimping through the crux of an overhanging shield of schist”? 

Perhaps we turn to his classmates, who characterize him as “inquisitive,” “self-aware,” “brilliant,” “a boiling pot of creativity,” “always ticking never done,” and “so smart and clever I want to cry.” 

Perhaps you recognize the intensely creative and intellectual upbringing, with a British mother trained in the dramatic arts and a Romanian father schooled in architecture. You note that his primary years were spent at the New York City Lab School for Gifted Education. 

The deeper one looks, the more apparent it becomes that Paris is a young man of intense and eclectic passions. Even his volunteer activities are characteristically out of the ordinary: in the summer of 2003, for example, he was a production assistant for “Colours of Ritual,” a “multimedia performance event” presented by the International House of Trances. The event’s description reads: “From tribalism to technology through the trance music of the African and Jewish Diaspora.” 

Exceptionally bright, eccentric, creative, and engaging, Paris is possessed of an uncanny insight into reading and an ability to “wow” his teachers and classmates with the remarkable acuity of his vision into difficult problems. He reads voraciously and can speak clearly and eloquently on a wide range of topics. 

Paris’s creative writing talents are immense, and his love for and understanding of the sound and subtleties of language are outstanding. His English VI teacher writes: “Paris’s original stories demonstrate a vivid imagination and an almost volcanic approach to language. The energy and imagery of his compositions have been impressive.” Sometimes, however, the connection between the writing and the assignment is so fleeting or nebulous as to render it impossible to adequately assess; hence the disparity between his grades and his intellect. 

Paris is something of a “stealth” scholar; he tends to circle just below a teacher’s radar screen until he’s ready to swoop in! The effect can be quite dramatic! In Media and Reality, an interdisciplinary course in science, technology, and society, the teacher writes:

Paris is my enigma; quite likely, the most intellectually gifted student I have had in thirty years of teaching. He monitors every moment of class with the most intriguingly detached engagement, letting others voice their perspectives, and then entering the intellectual fray by making a profound statement or posing a keen query that strikes to the very heart of the discussion. He digests the reading assignments, preferring, it seems, the meatier, philosophical tomes to the lightweight fiction! Recently, he sent me an essay with the disclaimer: “I am not sure I did exactly what was intended.” It was an intensely personal reflection that had virtually nothing to do with the assignment but was, nonetheless, the most breathtakingly beautiful piece of prose I have ever received from a student.

In our admittedly traditional pedagogical setting, therefore, Paris is a fish out of water. His immensely creative mind yearns for a freer, more worldly setting.
He is an intellectual eagle, hopping about in a cage, waiting for the opportunity to soar. And soar, he will! 

Perhaps, in the end, the only words that will do Paris justice are his own, for they come from his heart, his soul:

And so I’m hoping that I’ve managed to leave enough of an impression of myself, whether it be perplexing, maddening, whimsical, perhaps a touch melancholy, that my academic image becomes less of a dicey enterprise and more of a leap of logic and faith, something that, when read slightly in-between the lines, exposes itself as full of possibility.

Andrew Fanelli

Inward: Paris: I love you. We love you. And I want to start by thanking you for all of the gifts that you have given us.

We all had the great fortune, pleasure and privilege of knowing you. I know I became better because I knew you. At a time when I wasn't very cool you invited me into your home. And you turned me onto such wild stuff.

1st circle: Paris is the only true genius I have ever known. I’ve said that countless times since meeting him back in the 6th grade at Browning. And that was 1998-1999, in case anybody was wondering… We were both in Mr. Jones’ homeroom, or Mr. J as, well everyone, called him. Paris really is the only genius I have ever known. I want to stress that. Because we throw words around. “Love.” “Hate.” “Genius.” Paris wasn’t a genius in the way we tend to casually use words, as if we know what we’re saying. Paris Ionescu is a true genius. He had gifts, and he was a gift to us all.

Paris was exciting. He was complex. Paris was so well rounded, he was the new wheel. He had the closest thing I have ever known to original thought. Paris’ brilliance was tempered by an astounding and exhilarating absurdity.

We were both in our school’s public speaking competition in the 8th grade. I chose to recite and act out excerpts from Sheamus Heaney’s translation of Beowulf. I even recited some Old English from the original text (which I still know to this day… quite the party trick). But Paris performed “The Path of the Righteous Man.” And not because he was a biblical scholar — he thought Pulp Fiction was a bad ass movie.

Paris didn’t need to perform or telegraph his brilliance. Every single thought of his was a pearl, a pearl he effortlessly cast before us. You couldn’t fault a fool for not recognizing Paris’ genius at first; he didn’t beat you over the head with it.

2nd circle:  I will always remember one simple beautiful weekend at my grandparents’ home in Amityville, Long Island. It was me, Enrique and Paris. I remember we walked up Ocean Avenue to the end of the road. There was a stretch of land contested by local government. It was across from the local Amityville swimming and sailing club call the Unqua Corinthian Yacht Club. It was open, expansive, close to the water and nobody knew what to do with it. Well, this stretch of land was… not barren, but it wasn’t blooming either. The three of us were wandering along, and all of a sudden, we saw a flower. One single solitary little flower. And Paris, like no other person could, began to speak about this flower. He exalted this flower. He found a way to speak about life in terms of this flower. And in that childish half serious half joking way, we all agreed that this flower was life — a perfect, pure and poetic representation of life.

The last night we shared together was Friday, December 11th. We met at Browning's holiday party, and proceeded to have one of the most memorable and purely enjoyable nights I can remember. Moments into meeting each other, he mentioned the story I just shared with you. I was overwhelmed to learn how that moment stuck with him.

Paris is that flower. And while I don’t want to say the world around him was a barren field, I will say: he stood out for a reason.

Paris is exceptional.

But I’m not here to simply tell you he was a genius — because we know that. Everyone here knows how staggeringly and shatteringly brilliant Paris was — and I mean shatteringly. His thoughts were so clear, so defined — his understanding of our world and reality was so sharp and precise… He could shatter — absolutely shatter — everything you thought you knew about being. And then when you put the pieces back together, and understood what he understood, you had the clearest lens of your life through which you can view your world. My lens, through which I view my world, is as clear as it is because of my time with Paris. With that said, there is no way I can fully or adequately communicate who Paris is. But, I can speak to how monumental and tremendous he is. I can speak to that because I owe so much of myself to Paris.

The room/world: I have been asking myself, “What is the measure of a man?” A lot of people have a lot of answers to that question. But for me, and for my understanding of this world, it is influence. We do what we can to cobble together a personality. We cling to signs and symbols — statements, proclamations and protestations — to communicate something about who we are to everyone else. It is easy to claim you’ve been influenced by well-known and well-regarded people whom you have never actually met. There’s even some pride in it. You are contextualizing yourself through terms you know people will like. It is easy for me to say Robert Smith and David Bowie changed my life. What isn’t easy, is to acknowledge how your peers have shaped you. Because in doing so you admit to your equality as living breathing things.

Well, Paris: you gave me the gift of my personality. You influenced me. We shared truly formative years with each other. Years where we learned how to be ourselves. We had private, honest, inspiring and seminal moments together.

If you know me, you know my love for music, and you also know my challenging sense of humor. I owe so much of that to Paris. From Weezer to Pixies to Modest Mouse to Four Tet to Os Mutantes — Paris introduced me to sounds I had never heard before. He introduced me to sounds that shaped what I wanted to create with my band, SHAPES. Paris was my first musical partner. He played drums in my Weezer cover band, which eventually became SHAPES. And if you know me, you know my band is how I defined myself for the better part of 10 years.

I remember when he first played Weezer’s Only In Dreams for me. He prefaced it by saying, “I listen to this song alone and cry.” What a thing for one young boy to admit to another. I fell in love with him in that moment. Now for those who don’t know the song, the back half of it is rather epic. It’s an atmospheric and evocative blend of feedback, overtones, undertones and more musical theory I don’t understand as well as Paris did. The atmosphere builds, and through the cloud of sounds you hear individual notes bubbling up and peaking out. It leads to a crescendo which explodes into an epic outro of dueling guitars. It sounds like lovers who have been kept apart for years, who have finally found each other and are now pulling at one another in a moment of rapture. It is epic and breathtaking. Paris had me convinced, for years, that this was an impossible bit of music to learn or recreate. He told me people have tried, and failed miserably. It was only years later, after becoming better at guitar myself — and the advent of YouTube — when I learned it simply wasn’t true. It’s a bit of music, and a bit of music that can be played by anyone who is good enough and cares enough to learn it. Paris knew that. But Paris also knew that magic is important. And he sold me on the emotion and magic behind that recording. And, sure, maybe the song isn’t as impossible as he had me believing, but the magic was real. The magic is real.

Pairs introduced me to ideas, avenues of thought and paths of logic I would never have found without him.

Paris: I loved and still do love you. You influenced and inspired me. Every conversation with you was illuminating and ended up with me being smarter than I was before. So many great ideas of mine were lesser versions of thoughts or bits of music I heard from you.

Paris saw the world for what it is. He understood what we do not, and cannot. Paris taught me that while life may be real, nothing is true and everything can be what we want it to be.

I love you, Paris.

Mitch Swensen

Paris. Oh, Paris... What would I have done without you. Your gentle diplomacy, your quirky dry wit, your patience, your gumption, your advice. In so many ways you were the sage that this city so desperately needed. That we all needed. 

Frequently, Paris and I would write next to each other in his bedroom. Sometimes we worked together, sometimes we worked alone. But after a few hours of draining silence, while clicking and clacking at our computers, Paris would always be the one to give us both new life. 

On one such occasion I remember him showing me a drawing. As many of you know Paris was a brilliant artist. An artist in the truest sense of the word, really. His drawings, his music, his writing, all of it had a panache that was almost other-worldly. It made you say “how on earth did you think of that?” And this drawing was no different. 

The piece of paper he held up depicted a heraldic underwater battle. There on the page a posse of scuba divers were in the midst of harpooning a whale shark, a whale shark who was feverishly protecting a glittery chest of sunken treasure. What distinguished this drawing from your average doodle, however, was the fact that this whale shark was wearing a specific article of clothing. That article was a sweater-vest, and knit across its chest was written one word: SCHOPENHAUER.

Schopenhauer, the 19th century German philosopher, revived as a treasure-guarding whale shark assaulted by a bevy of harpoonsmen. 

Does it get any better than that? Dissertations could be written about the cartoon, books even. And yet, Paris seemed to whip it up out of thin air, as if it were nothing. He made it look so easy. Everything so easy.

Paris was the only person I’ve ever seen play “Smells like Teen Spirit” upside down on a guitar. As a lefty, he taught himself to command the instrument from both sides. How he did this I still have no idea. Honestly, I have no idea how Paris did a lot of the things he did. Like how he could comment on a Youtube video and manage to win over the angry trolls. If you’ve never experienced it, the comment section of Youtube is basically the nuclear minefield of the internet. Everyone is always livid about something. But Paris had this rare ability to come in, post a few intelligently-crafted sentences, and disarm the torch and pitchfork-wielding townsfolk. If you get a chance, he often wrote under the username “Dental Appointment,” one word. 

If you can find him, it will be well worth your time. I promise.

It was this congeniality, the one which eased the anger of the internet, that Paris also brought to the real world. He was my confidante, the person I gave my manuscripts to, the person whose opinion mattered most to me. 

These are just a handful of the little things I remember about Paris everyday, the inspiring moments that make me laugh and cry on the inside. But more than anything, Paris was the person who saved my life. 

Five years ago, the two of us were rockclimbing upstate, along the Shawangunk Ridge in the Catskill mountains. We were doing a certain type of climbing called “bouldering” which, for safety, involves placing a foam pad on the ground instead of using ropes and harnesses. The idea is that one person spots the other person, guiding them to the crash pad if the climber happens to fall. Bouldering is meant to be performed low to the ground, going no higher than 10 or 12 feet. This was the mistake I made. 

After struggling for a hold, I slipped at about 20 feet and started to fall, back-first, towards the jagged and sharp landing. I had veered off to the right and was going to miss the crash pad. Instantly, both of us were in a panic. But thanks to Paris’ quick thinking, I’m still here today.

In a flash he hurtled himself at me, arms outstretched, sacrificing his body to save mine. And miraculously, he hit me with enough force that most of my body made it onto the foam mat. I ended up breaking my foot from the fall, but it could have easily have been my neck... if it weren’t for Paris. 

This was the selfless and adventurous Paris who separated himself from everyone else. The person who, a month ago, applied to the Royal Marines because he sought to be of greater service to the world. The person who delivered food to the hungry. The person who couldn’t help but help out a friend. The person who saved my life.

Paris was the person who saved my life. I just wish I could have returned the favor.

Jonathan Sutak

For the past couple weeks, I've been trying to remember as much as possible. Between emails, texts, photos, and my brain, there's a lot to dig through. And I'm starting to wonder why I keep digging. Am I trying to remember Paris, or am I not willing to admit that he's gone, and still trying to engage with him on some level.

I've also been trying to figure out what to write about. Paris was the most complex, impressive individual I ever met. It feels inconceivable to analyze him, and superfluous to praise him. The moments that defined him were so subtle, or so out-there, that they're difficult to put into words. And I worry that to write about Paris, I'd have to write like Paris, which is something I can't do.

The only concrete thing I've been able to latch onto, is that exactly ten years ago, Paris and I, and two other friends at Bard, made a website together. So I'm gonna set aside my reservations, and talk a bit about that.

I met Paris at Bard freshman year. The semester hadn't actually started yet. We were part of a month long orientation, cleverly designed to coerce new students into “breaking the ice” by discussing Kierkegaard.

 I remember thinking he'd accidentally shown up at the wrong school. He wore khakis, a button down shirt, and the kind of rectangular-framed glasses a tech guru would wear. He introduced himself to me as “Paris,” which seemed totally appropriate. 

We took art history classes together, and would talk about how the internet was taking over everything but art. Many dorm room desk drawers of cigarette butts were filled over this, and other thoughts, parties, occasional tiffs. Paris had the unique quality of being at once bold and taciturn, which resulted in unpredictable, often hilarious behavior. He wouldn't just friend girls on facebook, he'd write them two paragraph hellos. One week, our friend Jesse and I watched Apocalypse Now like five times, while Paris read in the background. He never complained to us, but later, when Jesse and I were at class, he cracked the DVD in half. This was classic Paris.

I wouldn't call him ambitious - more like curious, and really proactive. When the three of us, and our friend Theo, thought up selfportrait.net, I was as excited about making billions of dollars as Paris was about dismantling the art world. Here's an excerpt from an email he wrote to Bard president Leon Botstein freshman year:

"I personally think the emergence of user-created content technologies of Internet 2 has vast implications for the art world, a central one being the ability to consider and critique art in a transparent, democratic and consensus-based manner, freed from what I see as the increasingly antiquated, hegemonic methodologies of traditional art institutions. The internet, globalized media, and all of postmodernity if you wish, have effectively invalidated distinctions between high art and low art, and thus a recontextualization of "what is good?", or even "what does good mean?" is in order."

Selfportrait had all the qualities of a successful internet business, without actually being a successful internet business. We had an office on 28th Street, cool business cards, an espresso machine. We spoke on panels at reputable art institutions, and curated art shows at disreputable, non-art institutions. We didn't pay our interns, but one time we brought Maggie to my backyard in Cobble Hill and let her shoot us with paintballs. We deserved it. 

The website, which the four of us meticulously planned with no coding experience whatsoever, was terrible - but only objectively terrible. The quality of an artist was evaluated based on profile views, and there was no option to delete your account. Paris viewed the site as disruptive, critical, groundbreaking. We took cues from French sociologist Henri Lefebvre. We'd pace around the dorm at 3am yelling “what if we put a chat room on the profile page!” and one of us would say “yea, whatever happened to chat rooms?” and then we'd email the programmer. 

We bled cash. What started as a glamorous venture, ended with me, Paris, and our new partner Eddie, pitching the site to a famous hedge fund manager while he attended his kid's soccer game. We were in suits, even though the meeting took place over speakerphone.

I don't think Paris or I were particularly bummed when we gave up on the site. The saddest part was that we had one less excuse to hang out. 

Anyone who knew Paris understood that he was liable to flake. In fact, he flaked so often, you could rely on him flaking, so I'm not even sure you could call it that. This went on well before he suffered from addiction. You'd see him, and both have an awesome time, and then he'd disappear for days to write something brilliant or binge watch Ted talks. But you wouldn't be angry. You'd just want to see him again, and when he did finally get back to you it would be all the more exciting. This was part of his mystique. I'd like to believe that he is now collectively flaking on all of us.

Which he is, in a sense. And it's cause for optimism. In true Paris fashion, the pain of his absence will be abruptly eclipsed - by the irrepressible appreciation of having been his friend.

LOLA KRAMER

Our Imaginary Compendium
Collected emails and notes in memory of Paris Ionescu
Brussels, January 2016

December 7, 2013
“Read nietzsche's bio on my break today ­ realized our thought trajectories have a lot in common. i'm pretty sure now that i'm destined to make a mark with my ideas.
all the things, all the things.”
Paris

—
“Look at us, blunderers. All our industry, all our magnitude, the erotic the poetic and the dumb; all naught for the stellar fact that none of us has control over what we are. Nor can we guess at what we are not, or say with scout's honor that done again we'd do any different. The sky so sprent with ancient beacons, yet there is our lodestar. And that's not the rub. Here's the rub: to transcend all illusions, all fabrications that make tolerable and let us survive the most unsavory facts­­, to have absolute control, would untether us from the moorings of our self­limited selves. [According to Italian philosopher Carlo] Michelstaedter just before his [death] he said (...) “Let us love our limitations, for without them nobody would be left to be somebody.”

This was written by Paris Ionescu, December 2012

My name is Lola and I loved Paris very much. The moment I met him I knew he was a prince.

At the end of my first date with Paris on Avenue A, he walked me to the train and when he heard so had no plans for Thanksgiving, invited me to eat with him and his parents at the National Arts Club. Before we parted, I remember feeling surprised when he gave me a kiss on the cheek, but the funny expression on his face showed that he was surprised he had done it too. I remember thinking, wow, who is this guy. He is like no one I have ever known. He is a prince. He told his parents that we were going to head out early after dinner to go on a walk.

Once we were outside, walking towards Union Square he held my hand and said he needed to tell me something. I remember my heart stopped and I thought, this guy, who I don't even know, is about to tell me something that will be painful to hear. I asked him, "What's going on?" and remember him staring straight ahead unable to look at me but still squeezing my hand. He finally looked into my eyes and told me, that he did not think he would tell me this, but decided that it wouldn't be fair if I didn't know. He told me that he was in recovery from drug addiction, and that he understood if I could not continue seeing him anymore. I felt like a rug was pulled out from under my feet.

I went home and once I was alone, I began to cry. I was crying because I understood that I had already signed up. The thing is, sometimes we do things even though we know it will bring us extreme pain because we have the foresight to see that it will forever change us.

Paris was one of the greatest minds I have ever known. If he had stuck around longer, he would have figured out a way to share his work in a very profound way. Paris had an incredible gift to catch strands of intrigue from many different contexts and weave them together into something very acute. The morning after I met him, I began writing feverishly and what came out was astoundingly unlike anything I had ever written before, it was as if this golden glittering way of conception that he had, had, rubbed off onto me through our conversations the night before. It’s possible many of you here today have experienced something like this too. Being with Paris was like having some wondrous mentor who recognized something special in me. He brought something very brilliant out of all of his friends. We would read to one another daily, share big plans and fears.

Once, we even snuck into the MoMA Gala from a stuffy opening on the other side of the Museum. He was the prince of New York. He taught me how to rock climb on Central Park schist and once it became a habit to go on runs from his house through the park, to the Met ­ even when it was snowing. We would run all the way to the entrance where we would pay a quarter to enter in our jogging gear and wet hair, we would stretch amongst the busts in the Ancient Greek and Roman sculpture garden, and head back out through the Temple of Dendur, and pick up our run again once back on Fifth Avenue, down the street and back to his room where we would talk and write about organizing exhibitions and making reading groups together. At one point, we decided to make it a part of our routine to go to Brad Troemel’s reading group at the Bruce High Quality Foundation. Those of us who participated in these discussions, knew that when he spoke, he was adding something very unique to the conversation. In this way, he gave me confidence to share my ideas with others. It is thanks to Paris that I have many of the thoughtful and intellectually challenging relationships that I do today. I will never forget how he would bring me tea and play me compositions he wrote on the piano as I was getting ready for work in the morning. That’s one of the greatest gifts.

In a way, he was alienated by his intelligence and he never quite found the right moment to put it all together. If he had lived, I would have liked to tell him how brilliant he was, and how every word he wrote was a gossamer strand of thought, how divine it was to read and how it made me want to write more. I would have like to tell him how much I admired him and how important he has been to me, in this life.

I remember one night shortly after we met when we shared our fears of dying with one another. I was leaving for a month long trip to India and we had just fallen in love. The day after he sent me an email that I will share with you now.

December 17, 2012
“Dear Lola,
i'm glad you were honest with me last night about some of your fears.
i have had the same fears in fluctuating intensities since i was a
kid, and they always fulminate when something you really want to hold
onto comes along. For me, it's then that the irrevocable pull of
time, the necessity of change, and the fallibility of memory seem to
form a vexing, hopeless retort to that desire for stillness.
but, if we accept this dilemma as the very same set of conditions which
brought along the person or thing that captures the attention and
heart in the first place, it may be bittersweet, but can at least
remind us to savour every moment and sensation.
and for right now (...) and beyond, everything i know of
points to the fact that there is nothing to worry about. at least not
for us. there will be an end to all things, but it won't be for a
long time, and it won't be in one fell swoop, and i do believe we have
enough of a degree of power over how and when those ends come to term,
that we have a good reason to keep our heads, and not give in to
cynicism or absolutes or pure self preservation.
i think we (...) work hard, try to commune with the beautiful, the
mysterious, and the challenging, and all the while try to be good
people, and that can be lonely sometimes... but i think that as a
result, people like us are subtly drawn to each other.
glad you were drawn to me the same as i was to you.”
Paris

When anyone would ask Paris about his approach to life as a philosopher, and his life's quest to explore notions of the Absolute, he would say, "Being a philosopher is about learning how to live, and learning how to die." Paris Ionescu, you certainly left a mark on me.

—
June 21, 2013
love conquers all (omnia vincit amor) ­ virgil, eclogues (37 b.c.) book x, line 69

time flies (tempus fugit) ­ virgil, georgics (29 b.c.), book iii, line 284

—
I recently returned to an email that Paris sent to me. The subject line reads:

“love letter ­ henry miller to anais nin ­ 1932.”

Paris added the note, “to add to our imaginary compendium.” As I return to the quotes, pictures and notes we sent back and forth to one another, and as I read this to you all now, the “imaginary compendium” becomes real. The “compendium” of Paris’s life, and anyone’s for that matter is always being added to and in a sense, will always be incomplete. Because you are here, you have also contributed to the awesome compendium that is Paris’s life, and I would like to thank you for that.

It is difficult to imagine a world in which Paris is not walking about, writing feverishly until morning and sharing ideas with us all. My name is Lola Kramer and I loved Paris very much.

I will never forget how on our very first date, he invited me to his family’s Thanksgiving dinner at the National Arts Club. I always thought of Paris as some reincarnated Prince and when he showed up to the National Arts Club that Thanksgiving day, he looked more handsome than Alexander the Great.

­­ —
Some months earlier Paris sent me an email sharing thoughts about a text that he had read regarding the Human Will, and our choice to persevere when confronting a difficult moment:

December 10, 2012
Paris writes, “Had some beautiful insights on the plane trip while reading from my book, Joyful Cruelty. [Here is] a line from Hesiod's “Works and Days:”

"the gods keep hidden what keeps men alive."

Paris explains, “He’s talking about the inexplicable zest for life one feels after an [extreme] situation of “deus ex machina.” [...] Amidst insufferable odds, once in a while the weakest cause wins. The subject isn’t left with any more or less knowledge than he or she had before, no greater understanding of why things do or don’t happen in life, yet some instinctual sense of a desire to prolong and continue the mysterious journey sets in.”

Paris continues, ”A proper meaning of life is presupposed by this shift in metaphysical attitude, even in the absence of greater evidence for its cause. Enigmatic, but bearing on truth I think.”

­­ —
Paris Ionescu.
M.A. in Media Philosophy at the European
Graduate School (EGS), in Saas­Fee, Switzerland. Studied with Alain Badiou, Giorgio Agamben, and Alenka Zupancic. His thesis considered the role of 'the absolute' and 'absolutes' in the context of recent realist philosophies of nature, and in fact made substantial use of a seminar I had taken with Alenka Zupancic, in which she discussed Lacanian 'science' and 'fantasy' in her critique of Meillassoux's ongoing rationalist project.

November 11, 2013
I wrote in an email to Paris, “I looked back through some of our earliest email correspondence, and determined that our first date was November 19th of last year. Our second meeting and first realkiss at the top of the steps in the National Arts Club was November 22nd. Which shall we celebrate?! One year : )

Love you Lola”

May 20, 2013
Paris sent this love letter from Henry Miller to Anaïs Nin with the subject line: “to add to our imaginary compendium:”

August 14, 1932
Anaïs:
Don’t expect me to be sane anymore. Don’t let’s be sensible. It was a marriage at Louveciennes—you can’t dispute it. I came away with pieces of you sticking to me; I am walking about, swimming, in an ocean of blood, your Andalusian blood, distilled and poisonous [...] I saw you as the mistress of your home, a Moor with a heavy face, a negress with a white body, eyes all over your skin, woman, woman, woman. I can’t see how I can go on living away from you—these intermissions are death. How did it seem to you when Hugo came back? Was I still there? I can’t picture you moving about with him as you did with me. Legs closed. Frailty. Sweet, treacherous acquiescence. Bird docility. You became a woman with me. I was almost terrified by it. You are not just thirty years old—you are a thousand years old.
Here I am back and still smouldering with passion, like wine smoking. Not a passion any longer for flesh, but a complete hunger for you, a devouring hunger. I read the paper about suicides and murders and I understand it all thoroughly. I feel murderous, suicidal. I feel somehow that it is a disgrace to do nothing, to just bide one’s time, to take it philosophically, to be sensible. Where has gone the time when men fought, killed, died for a glove, a glance, etc? (A victrola is playing that terrible aria from Madama Butterfly—”Some day he’ll come!”)
I still hear you singing in the kitchen—a sort of inharmonic, monotonous Cuban wail. I know you’re happy in the kitchen and the meal you’re cooking is the best meal we ever ate together. I know you would scald yourself and not complain. I feel the greatest peace and joy sitting in the dining room listening to you rustling about, your dress like the goddess Indra studded with a thousand eyes.
Anais, I only thought I loved you before; it was nothing like this certainty that’s in me now. Was all this so wonderful only because it was brief and stolen? Were we acting for each other, to each other? Was I less I, or more I, and you less or more you? Is it madness to believe that this

could go on? When and where would the drab moments begin? I study you so much to discover the possible flaws, the weak points, the danger zones. I don’t find them—not any. That means I am in love, blind, blind. To be blind forever! (Now they’re singing “Heaven and Ocean” from La Gioconda.) ....

[...] While it thunders and lightnings I lie on the bed and go through wild dreams. We’re in Seville and then in Fez and then in Capri and then in Havana. We’re journeying constantly, but there is always a machine and books, and your body is always close to me and the look in your eyes never changes. People are saying we will be miserable, we will regret, but we are happy, we are laughing always, we are singing. We are talking Spanish and French and Arabic and Turkish. We are admitted everywhere and they strew our path with flowers.

I say this is a wild dream—but it is this dream I want to realize. Life and literature combined, love the dynamo, you with your chameleon’s soul giving me a thousand loves, being anchored always in no matter what storm, home wherever we are. In the mornings, continuing where we left off. Resurrection after resurrection. You asserting yourself, getting the rich varied life you desire; and the more you assert yourself the more you want me, need me. Your voice getting hoarser, deeper, your eyes blacker, your blood thicker, your body fuller. A voluptuous servility and tyrannical necessity. More cruel now than before—consciously, wilfully cruel. The insatiable delight of experience.
HVM

—————————————————

November 13, 2013
An email from Paris to my brother Derek Elmore:

“I was just reading this piece in Cabinetmagazine about the history and cultural significance of levitation as it moved between a formerly religious age of wonderment and a scientifically charged age of disenchantment. Well the author quoted Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space, as having anecdotally said something like "I see no God up here." or "I didn't see God,"... either while in flight or upon landing. I had never heard the quote before, but looked it up and found another quote by Gagarin, sort of indicating that even if he saw no God to speak of, he did find the colors and experience to be reminiscent of a Nicolas Roerich painting, full of religiosity as one might have been. Just thought it was interesting. Here's the contested quote and here's the link to the original magazine story. Hope all's well man.”

http://cabinetmagazine.org/issues/32/schuster.php

• Rays were blazing through the atmosphere of the earth, the horizon became bright orange, gradually passing into all the colors of the rainbow: from light blue to dark blue, to violet and then to black. What an indescribable gamut of colors! Just like the paintings of the artist Nicholas Roerich.

• Statement of April 1961, as quoted in Warrior of Light : The Life of Nicholas Roerich : Artist, Himalayan explorer and visionary (2002) by Colleen Messina, p. 46

• I looked and looked but I didn't see God.

• As quoted in To Rise from Earth (1996) by Wayne Lee; some websites quote him as saying "I looked and looked and looked but I didn't see God." on 14 April 1961, a couple days after his historic flight, but the authenticity of such statements have been disputed; Colonel Valentin Petrov stated in 2006 that the cosmonaut never said such words, and that the quote originated from Nikita Khrushchev's speech at the plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU about the state's anti­-religion campaign, saying "Gagarin flew into space, but didn't see any god there." Gagarin himself was a member of the Russian Orthodox Church.

• Variant: No I didn't see God. I looked and looked but I didn't see God.

• As quoted in What's Missing Inside You? (2006_ by Paul Schlieker, p. 17 

 December 7, 2013
“Read nietzsche's bio on my break today ­ realized our thought trajectories have a lot in common. i'm pretty sure now that i'm destined to make a mark with my ideas.

all the things, all the things.”
Paris

—

David Grosz

Dear Caroline,
 
I was devastated when I learned of Paris's death, and I cannot imagine how difficult it must be for you and your family. I'm so sorry.  
 
I have very fond memories of Paris. He was the first person to work with me in the early days of Artifex Press, and he was a great colleague. I think of him as both flexible (which is a great quality in the work place) and idealistic (which is a great quality in life). He was creative, passionate about art, and tremendously curious--the best sort of intellectual. I remember one day sitting with Paris in a cafe across the street from my office as he told me about the great work he was doing in grad school. I had to go back to the office after a while, but I didn't want to--I wanted to keep talking and then follow him back to school!
 
Paris was great to talk to. I'll miss our conversations. Again, I'm so sorry for your loss.
 
Warmest regards,
 
David

Paul McLean

FOR PARIS

It is nigh
impossible
for a poet, a thinker, an artist, an aesthete, an oralist, a bard, a coder
to imagine Civilization without Paris

& yet -
we must, by force of fact, enterprise, to do so & here
in the midst of furor, of cataclysm, calamity, chaos, terror
within the bloody theatre & cafe, where comedy dies
in a space of moments, a hell of bullets & shouts
body counting & cameras & objective narrative reports
we must

whether Paris is dead or not, or that famous namesake
which it is not ever easy being one in time, post-Wikipedia
withering behind the craft of destruction, the arch we
passed under, subterranean style, into an ominous haze
of smolder, collapse, wreckage and decay - the truth
is that Paris is still dreaming, and a dream and beautiful
& THAT is the reason for painting a picture, harmonious,
tasteful, well-composed, properly ordered on the wall
with others, alike or varied, colorful & gay, formally
drawn & executed, a string of notes, to be a sign
the language of the circle, presented as a square,
then a cube, then a radio transmission, then

we sat in Kittler's shadow, his unfurling course
& can we agree this was fun? next summer in the Alps
I don't recall if you attended the Badiou lectures,
the chronology is more muddled each day, the collective
show at the rooftop Chelsea-ish alt.space of Patrick's,
the beloved Reading Group #1 conference room at nYu
the gang all there & the notable guests, or strolling
through Volta, situations, the art stomps, the sparkling
dinners plus drinks with the constellation of fantastic
friends, the phone calls, the piano, your fabled bedroom
clubhouse, smoking & video games, blogs & songs
the lovers, the epic disappearances to faraway lands

you Paris colonized it all, again, with no steel & command,
a gentle person, & we only had that one cross word, you
were ready to battle for feminism - it was astonishment, yes
but sincere, & eventually resolved, in our loft, when you met my son
& maybe it made sense, who knows. You made introductions
like a sponsor, & your blessing was trusted, & maybe nothing
is more important in a life. I couldn't say.

& the ache is profound, not caused by the absence,
unresolved scripts, bugs & such, nor especially the promise
of fulfilling life, seemingly void, now, to be a website,
to be a spontaneous arrangement of fits & starts
& notes that move like oceans brimming with more
& more & more until none & not moving

we shard a little of the spinning orb's circuits & presently
the text may feel as though I am talking directly to you
Paris, but that would be mad, & the script calls for dissolve
& the film is black & white, with much granular texture plus
effects, hard to transition, from one world to the next,
with all the gravity & tension, names & numbers, a real
problem for a polysemic seminarian romantic, vested
in essays & amazing memory & the Repo-man-ish intensity
of an animated GIF scrolling through databases for the perfect
keyword to solve the Riddle, which was the love interstices
the drama of solitude & comedy of solicitation for a complete
alien, right?

haha you just got it, almost every time, except when you didn't
& my vision of you is never static & I refuse to pretend nothing
happened even if it has to be secret, by the power of this office
you are infinitely forgive haha & grief is like mixing puzzle pieces
cleaning up broken glass shuffling cards the wrong type of chance
so that the end

February, 2016
Bushwick