ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on sigma, a project and network of cultural practitioners that was active roughly between 1963–1965. Including William Burroughs, Jeff Nuttall and R.D. Laing, sigma was conceived with high ambitions but its achievements were modest: its most tangible result was the sigma portfolio, an expanding, self-published collection of texts. The initiator and convener was Alexander Trocchi, the Scottish novelist, poet, Situationist and drug addict. Originally from Glasgow, Trocchi edited the English literary journal Merlin in Paris in the early 1950s before moving to New York. He enjoyed literary success with Cain’s Book; the sigma portfolio made it possible for Trocchi to abandon literature and yet keep writing. The sigma portfolio has been described as part manifesto, part manual for art activism and we explore the unfolding of an art activist logic within the programmatic texts of the portfolio.
