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1957

January

13 Gil J. Wolman and Jacques Fillon are excluded from the Lettrist International.

February

2 to 26 First Exhibition of Psychogeography, presented by the International Movement for an Imaginist Bauhaus, the Lettrist International and the London Psychogeographical Committee at Taptoe Gallery in Brussels. The catalogue lists paintings and ceramics by G.-E Debord, Asger Jorn, Yves Klein, Ralph Rumney, Michèle Bernstein, Mohamed Dahou and a "mad psychogeographer", but only Jorn, Klein and Rumney participate.

4 Talks by Ralph Rumney (L'Art brut de vivre [The Outsider Art of Living]) and Asger Jorn (Industrie et beaux-arts, deux extrêmes de l'unité situationniste [Industry and Fine Art: The Two Extremes of Situationist Unity]), Taptoe Gallery, Brussels (a "monosonorous talk" is presented by Yves Klein two days later).

May

Fin de Copenhague by Asger Jorn, Paris.

First screening of Howls for Sade in London.

22 Potlatch #28, information bulletin of the Lettrist International, Paris.

June

Report on the Construction of Situations and the International Situationist Tendency's Conditions of Organization and Action, by Guy Debord, Paris. The verso reads: 'This report, presented to the members of the Lettrist International, the International Movement for an Imaginist Bauhaus and the London Psychogeographical Committee as a platform for discussion between these organizations and as a document for their propaganda, is not to be sold under any circumstances.'

Against Functionalism by Asger Jorn, Paris.

Exhibition by Arnal and Jorn at the Galerie Rive gauche in Paris. Publication of Jacques Prévert's Peintures de Jorn (Jorn's Paintings).

July

27 to 28 Founding Conference of the Situationist International (SI) at Cosio d'Arroscia, Italy. Participants: Michèle Bernstein, Guy-Ernest Debord (Lettrist International). Giuseppe Pinot Gallizio, Asger Jorn, Walter Olmo, Piero Simondo, Elena Verrone (International Movement for an Imaginist Bauhaus), Ralph Rumney (London Psychogeographical Committee).
'On 28 July, the Cosio d'Arroscia conference decided on the complete unification of the groups represented [...] and — by a vote of 5 to 1, with 2 abstentions — on the constitution of a Situationist International on the platform defined by the publications prepared for the conference.' (Introductory note to Potlatch #29)

September

Guy Debord begins work on Mémoires, a book 'composed entirely of prefabricated elements.'

October

15 G.-E. Debord's Remarques sur le concept d'art expérimental (Remarks on the Concept of Experimental Art), a critique of the text Pour un concept d'expérimentation musicale (Toward a Concept of Musical Experimentation) by Walter Olmo of the SI's Italian Section).

November

5 Potlatch #29, information bulletin of the Lettrist International, Paris.

This chronology has been adapted and expanded from Jean-Jacques Raspaud and Jean-Pierre Voyer, L'Internationale Situationniste: Chronologie, bibliographie, protagonistes (avec un index des noms insulté) (Paris: Champ Libre, 1972); Christophe Bourseiller, Vie et mort de Guy Debord (Paris: Plon, 1999); and Guy Debord, Correspondance (volumes 1, 2 & 3) (Paris: Arthème Fayard, 1999 , 2001 & 2003).

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