I have communicated your response to our friends.
We are quite in agreement on the fact that the position of the Imaginist Bauhaus is insufficient. The letter to the Triennale[2] has caused a protest by the Albares[3] (the letter was only sent to force them to act, Asger [Jorn] having judged [Piero] Simondo in Turin to be quite beyond tolerable opportunism) and the resounding resignation of [Ettore] Sottsass, whom everyone had forgotten about. Thus, we no longer have relations with the Albares, except for [Walter] Olmo. But we have [also] had a few adhesions and contacts.
We are now engaged in organizing a more advanced movement – lettrism[4] and the Bauhaus must dissolve into it. This movement must really be founded on the questions of psychogeography, the construction of ambiences, comportment, and architecture. If not, there will only be chatter about a well-known painting or [a work of] literature.
I will keep you up to date concerning the publications that we will produce in this transitional phase. We must define our objectives. If one judges from our conversations in Alba, I think that we could perhaps meet you on this new terrain. And, of course, I would like that.
Amicably,[1] Translator: Constant Nieuwenhuis, a Dutch painter and architect, and future member of the Situationist International.
[2] Translator: Lettre ouverte aux responsables de la Triennale d’art industrial a Milan, dated 1 January 1957, published in Guy Debord, Oeuvres, Gallimard, 2006, pp. 276-277.
[3] The people from Alba, Italy. [More particularly, the local participants in the Alba Conference of November 1956.]
[4] Translator: note well: not only the Lettrist International, but lettrism as a whole.
(Published in Guy Debord Correspondance, Vol "0": Septembre 1951 - Juillet 1957: Complete des "lettres retrouvees" et d l'index general des noms cites by Librairie Artheme Fayard, October 2010. Translated from the French by NOT BORED! March 2011. Footnotes by the publisher, except where noted.)