Monty Cantsin is a

multiple-use name A multiple-use name or anonymity pseudonym is a name used by many different people to protect anonymity. It is a strategy that has been adopted by many unconnected radical and cultural groups, where the construct of personal identity has been crit ...

that anyone can adopt, but has close ties to

Neoism Neoism is a parodistic -ism. It refers both to a specific subcultural network of artistic performance and media experimentalists, and, more generally, to a practical underground philosophy. It operates with collectively shared pseudonyms and ide ...

. Monty Cantsin was originally conceived as an "open pop star." In a philosophy anticipating that of

free software Free software or libre software is computer software distributed under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, and distribute it and any adapted versions. Free software is a matter of liberty, no ...

and

open source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized sof ...

, anyone could perform in his name and thus contribute to and participate in his fame and achievements.

History

The name was coined in 1978 by the critic, prankster and

Mail Art Mail art, also known as postal art and correspondence art, is an artistic movement centered on sending small-scale works through the postal service. It initially developed out of what eventually became Ray Johnson's New York Correspondence Schoo ...

ist David Zack as a

pen name A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen na ...

for the

Latvia Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of ...

n-born poet and singer Maris Kundzins. It further alludes to: * Martial Canterel, the wizard-hero of

Raymond Roussel Raymond Roussel (; 20 January 1877 – 14 July 1933) was a French poet, novelist, playwright, musician, and chess enthusiast. Through his novels, poems, and plays he exerted a profound influence on certain groups within 20th century French litera ...

's novel ''

Locus Solus ''Locus Solus'' is a 1914 French novel by Raymond Roussel. Plot summary John Ashbery summarizes ''Locus Solus'' thus in his introduction to Michel Foucault's ''Death and the Labyrinth'': "A prominent scientist and inventor, Martial Canterel, ...

''; * Monte Capanno, a Northern

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional Ita ...

villa near Perugia where Zack had taught a San Jose State College study and living community in 1970; *

Monte Cazazza Monte Cazazza is an American artist and composer best known for his seminal role in helping shape industrial music through recordings with the London-based Industrial Records in the mid-1970s. Career Cazazza, based primarily in San Francisco du ...

, a Californian

performance A performance is an act of staging or presenting a play, concert, or other form of entertainment. It is also defined as the action or process of carrying out or accomplishing an action, task, or function. Management science In the work place ...

artist and

industrial music Industrial music is a genre of music that draws on harsh, mechanical, transgressive or provocative sounds and themes. AllMusic defines industrial music as the "most abrasive and aggressive fusion of rock and electronic music" that was "initiall ...

performer; *

Istvan Kantor Istvan Kantor (aka "Monty Cantsin", and "Amen!") ( hu, Kántor István; born August 27, 1949, Hungary) is a Canadian performance and video artist, industrial music and electropop singer, and one of the early members of Neoism. Life Kantor was bo ...

, the second bearer of the name; * "Monty can't sing"; * "Monty can't sin", a reference to religious free spirit movements which collectively adopted the names of

Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...

saint In religious belief, a saint is a person who is recognized as having an exceptional degree of Q-D-Š, holiness, likeness, or closeness to God. However, the use of the term ''saint'' depends on the context and Christian denomination, denominat ...

s. Zack called upon his correspondents to adopt the name Monty Cantsin. His suggestion was taken up in 1979 by the

Hungarian-Canadian Hungarian Canadians ( hu, kanadai magyarok) are persons in Canada of Hungarian ancestry. According to the 2016 Census, there are 348,085 Canadians of Hungarian ancestry. The Hungarian minority is the 24th largest ethnic group of Canada. The b ...

performance artist

, who amalgamated the name into

. As the shared identity of all Neoists, Monty Cantsin was transformed from a "pop star" to a radical identity experiment occupying the everyday life of Neoists and culminating in frequently extremist ways at Neoist Apartment Festivals ("APTs"). The "open pop star" concept lived on in a series of

electropop Electropop is a hybrid music genre combining elements of electronic and pop genres. Writer Hollin Jones has described it as a variant of synth-pop with heavy emphasis on its electronic sound. The genre was developed in the 1980s and saw a re ...

and

albums and performances of, mainly,

Influences

Later multiple names like

Karen Eliot Karen Eliot is a multiple identity, a shared pen name that anyone is welcome to use for activist and artistic endeavours. It is a manifestation of the "open pop star" idea within the Neoist movement. The name was developed in order to counter t ...

and

Luther Blissett Luther Loide Blissett (born 1 February 1958) is a former professional footballer and manager who played for the England national team during the 1980s. Born in Jamaica, Blissett played as a striker, and is best known for his time at Watford, ...

drew inspiration from Monty Cantsin and

, but intentionally avoided association with physical persons, being conceived either as mere signatures (Eliot), collective media phantoms (Blissett) or multiple single collective experiments.

Publications

* (as editor): ''Neoist Book'', Canada, 1984.http://www.neoism.info/neoist_book.pdf. URL last accessed 2014-04-07.

References

{{Authority control Cantsin, Monty Neoism