An evening with Yoko Ono

January 15, 9:39 AMBeatles ExaminerSteve Marinucci

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  Yoko Ono speaks to the crowd at Stanford University.
  (Photo by Steve Marinucci)

You either appreciate Yoko Ono or you don't.  Her unique view of the world, her art events and her political campaigns have been praised and criticized through the years. For most, though, those appraisals generally come at a distance from third-person accounts. It's rare that people get the chance to experience her first hand. For about roughly 500 people at Stanford's Dinkelspiel Auditorium on Jan. 14, they got to do just that.

The crowd waiting outside had been told that Yoko had been delayed slightly. But it wasn't too long before two cars, one containing Yoko Ono, rolled up to the driveway. They were met by a man with a replica of a "War Is Over If You Want It" sign and slight applause was heard as they drove in.

  At the end of Yoko Ono's lecture, the crowd was
  invited to take home a piece of a broken vase. She
  said it was for when we all get back together in 10
  years time. (Photo by Steve Marinucci)

Upon entering the building, visitors saw tables with literature, including posters of the event and Onochord handbills. Visitors were also handed Onochord flashlights for use during the lecture.

After a lengthy introduction by Prof. Gordon Chang, Ono, who'll turn 76 on Feb. 18, came out and greeted the crowd, walking to the center of the stage and raising her arms. She then walked back behind the podium and began speaking, telling the crowd she was happy to be back in the San Francisco area because San Francisco had been an important part of her early life. Her family brought her to the city from Japan at an early age and some of her earliest memories were from there.

Those early memories were relived in a very personal black-and-white home movie film she showed to begin the lecture. The earliest shots were from Japan, then the United States. Ono talked boyantly during the film about her childhood, discussing her family life and smiling and laughing as the home movies played. One scene, that showed the city's Golden Gate Bridge still under construction, brought a murmur through the crowd since most there had only seen the bridge in its completed state and were too young to have seen it built.

  A woman ties a wish to one of the two wish trees in
  the Stanford University installation. The wishes will
  be sent to Iceland after the installation ends
  on Friday. (Photo by Steve Marinucci)

The films continued featuring subjects of her art and her activism.  "Passages of Light" demonstrated the Onochord flashlights the crowd had been handed, using a Morse chord with one flash meaning "I", followed by two flashes meaning "love" and three flashes meaning "you". The crowd was instructed to do this to spread a message of love. 

One film, "Freedom," showed a woman, presumably Ono, manipulating a woman's brassiere. The film credits included "Sound By John Lennon." The sound was sort of a drone, not the type of music usually associated with John. But it showed Lennon's interest in the avant-garde, something he demonstrated often during his marriage to Ono. Two short clips of Ono's "Cut Piece" were also shown. One was filmed by the Maysles brothers in 1965, the other was filmed in Paris in 2003.

In conjunction with the lecture, two Wish Trees, where people could post wishes that would be sent to the Imagine Peace Tower in Iceland, were installed in the Stanford courtyard, one next to the bookstore, the other at Tressider Student Union, across from the auditorium. Both trees, which will remain until Friday, were covered in wishes.

Though the evening wasn't a Beatle event, the Beatles were in evidence. One film that certainly should have perked up the ears of any Beatle fans in the audience used just the backing track of "Imagine" as a soundtrack. The dedication of the Imagine Peace Tower, with Yoko, Ringo Starr and Olivia Harrison in attendance, was also shown. The film images of the tower in the cold Iceland air are stark, but also quite powerful.

 At one point, Ono gave a demonstration by acting out a relationship with a chair. The result was a combination of acting and symbolic gestures that proved both amusing and interesting.