Editing Situationist International (section)

===Formation (1956–1957)===

In 1956, Guy Debord, a member of the [[Lettrist International]], and [[Asger Jorn]] of the [[International Movement for an Imaginist Bauhaus]], brought together a group of artistic collectives for the ''First World Congress of Free Artists'' in [[Alba, Piedmont|Alba]], Italy.<ref name="Horn07p5-7">Horn (2007), pp. 5–7, 42</ref> The meeting established the foundation for the development of the Situationist International, which was officially formed in July 1957 at a meeting in [[Cosio di Arroscia]], Italy.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Beach Beneath the Street: The Everyday Life and Glorious Times of the Situationist International |author-last=Wark |author-first=McKenzie |date=20 June 2011 |publisher=Verso Books |isbn=9781844677207 |edition=1 |pages=67 |language=en}}</ref> The resulting International was a fusion of these extremely small [[avant-garde]] collectives: the [[Lettrist International]], the [[International Movement for an Imaginist Bauhaus]] (an offshoot of [[COBRA (avant-garde movement)|COBRA]]), and the [[London Psychogeographical Association]] (though, Anselm Jappe has argued that the group pivoted around Jorn and Debord for the first four years).<ref name="Jappe99DebordJorn">[[Anselm Jappe]], 1999, p. 65 quotation: "For the first four years of the SI's existence, the pivot of the group was the collaboration between Debord and Asger Jorn, who complemented each other well precisely because they were so different".</ref> Later, the Situationist International drew ideas from other groups such as [[Socialisme ou Barbarie]].<ref>{{cite thesis |last=Hayes |first=Anthony |year=2017 |title=How the Situationist International became what it was |section=Appendix three: Whose spectacle? |url=https://openresearch-repository.anu.edu.au/handle/1885/132358 |access-date=3 May 2022 |archive-date=2 May 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220502044930/https://openresearch-repository.anu.edu.au/handle/1885/132358 |url-status=live }}</ref>

The most prominent member of the group, [[Guy Debord]], generally became considered the organization's de facto leader and most distinguished theorist. Other members included theorist [[Raoul Vaneigem]], the Dutch painter [[Constant Nieuwenhuys]], the Italo-Scottish writer [[Alexander Trocchi]], the English artist [[Ralph Rumney]] (sole member of the London Psychogeographical Association, Rumney suffered expulsion relatively soon after the formation), the Danish artist [[Asger Jorn]] (who after parting with the SI also founded the [[Scandinavian Institute of Comparative Vandalism]]), the architect and veteran of the [[Hungarian Revolution of 1956|Hungarian Uprising]] [[Attila Kotanyi]], and the French writer [[Michèle Bernstein]]. Debord and Bernstein later married.

In June 1957, Debord wrote the [[manifesto]] of the Situationist International, titled ''[[Report on the Construction of Situations]]''. This manifesto plans a rereading of [[Karl Marx]]'s ''[[Das Kapital]]'' and advocates a cultural revolution in [[western countries]].<ref name="Debord1957Report">Guy Debord (1957) ''[http://www.cddc.vt.edu/sionline/si/report.html Report on the Construction of Situations and on the International Situationist Tendency's Conditions of Organization and Action] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110514125701/http://www.cddc.vt.edu/sionline/si/report.html |date=14 May 2011 }}''. (Paris, June 1957). Translated by Ken Knabb.</ref>