[unclear: Cum togetha]

Bruce Robinson reports on the 1973 Student's Arts Festival held in Christchurch last week and called.

'Cumtogetha' like most Arts Festivals was a cross between a musical feast-cum-orgy and a hare-brained attempt to achieve total knowledge 100 years after Coleridge, the last to try, gave up the same quest. It was celebrated by a yearning mass of unpracticed 'participants', and was completely divorced from nonstudents who are unable to take a week off in order to 'Cumtogetha'. Arts Festival and hundreds of traipsing students in town create a fair bit of outside interest. Yet the 'no badge - no show' rule meant that unless the full enrolment fee of $5 was paid then nothing, nothing at all could be joined in by an interested party. This principle ignores both the noble aims of a Festival and the possibilities of getting extra money for single admissions and generating some good will among the locals.

The Festival itself was sparse in content and dull in form. A few major events such as rock concerts-jams, films and mask-making workshops were fairly well planned. But most other events were organised between the 'teachers' and 'learners' by filling in cards with names and telephone numbers at the Learning Exchange and ringing each other up etc. The festival would have needed to be about a month long to sort this out.

With astrology, diverse variations of yoga, drugs as vision, and various other feudal enterprises being discussed the organisers probably wanted gurus to emerge and shine the right light at the right time. But phone numbers rely on the person being at home which ideally shouldn't be the case during an Arts Festival.

It all started with the deputy-mayor officially opening the Festival in Hagley Park on Sunday afternoon. His voice, advancing and retreating with the gusts of wind, left the message that he'd like to see them (students) taking part in "our local councils" in the future. And having grasped votes out of thinnish air he left. Sometimes a pretentious fool calling himself "The Wizard" spoke but it was all very tedious. Then a young lady volunteered to start the artistic bit of the festival off. A poem. A 'right to life' poem A 'foetus flushed down the loo' poem. An 'I'm along with the Jesus Freaks and their professionally sign written psycho-delic bus' poem. It was a bit bad with all these Jesus Freaks about the place until somebody said he had seen a star over Invercargill that was moving south and they all disappeared.

For the first few days everyone sat back for a while waiting for 'things to get going'. After all the concept was new and experimental — Participation.

On the Wednesday Neil Reithmuller and Margaret Matheson were further remanded in custody in connection with the alleged bombing of the US Consulate. Their next appearance is on

On Thursday Mike Murphy after receiving some gigantic fines in Wellington earlier in the week for political offences received a further $160 fine and a year's probation for charges going back to the Harewood demonstration in March.

By this stage Cumtogetha had come together slightly more or at least sorted itself out into cliques — with substantial and consistent crowds at rock concerts, late-night films, the permanent Stein in the town union, and sensitivity/movement/encounter groups. As usual the crowds mostly went to the least demanding events. Not that the choice of possibilities were outstanding. Any way the end of the week loomed up and things after nearly getting going organizationally lulled again.

Safe away from home students worked hard at the perilously important sexual conquests of the day but in crowded flats full of crashers got little room for free play with them. Safe away from home they could forget that there was nothing really at Arts Festival that wasn't on at some time or another on their own campuses. Its just that most lack the guts to break free of their hang-ups at home.

But then there was the 'spirit'. Each year it returns like a cat with nine lives, a ghost of a ghost, each time a bit paler and flimsier (if you're into terminlogy it translates as 'more ethereal man').

So that's what an estimated $6,000 loss was lost on. The general feeling before Cumtogetha was that many were going to stay away including many artistic groups. The failure by the organisers to realize that they wouldn't get 3,000 people meant that the financial loss incurred will probably make this the last Universities Arts Festival ever.