Professional Documents
Culture Documents
com
london tokyo beijing
artist oscar murillo
VOLUME 2
NUMBER 7
goincase.com/clarerojas
LITTLE JOE
The last time I was in Berlin I stumbled upon a small, London-based, film magazine called Little Joe. At
first I was attracted to the way it was printed, using a Risograph, which is a vintage photocopy machine
that prints in multiple colors. It is rare to see any publication done this way now. However it was
only after opening it up that I decided this was going to become one of my favorite contemporary film
magazines. Inside the issue of Little Joe that I picked up were articles titled, Hollywood Hallucinations:
Parker Tyler, Myra Breckenridge and Mae West, a video library by John Cameron Mitchell, as well as
a set of inserts containing a short essay called Modernism Watchin’, a concise addendum to Evil People
in Modernist Homes in Popular Films, all printed on bookmarks. Upon further reading I came to realize
that not only was this a wonderfully researched and beautifully crafted publication, but that it is, as far
as I know, the first modern film publication that comes from a gay point of view. However, where many
magazines might play this up, Little Joe weaves its politics quite organically into its pages. The articles
are interesting to anyone with a love of both new and old cinema, Hollywood scandal, and pretty much by Aaron Rose
anything esoteric and transgressive. Kenneth Anger should be very proud. Images courtesy Little Joe
ANP: Where did the title Little Joe screenings and old texts. We also create a perfectly exemplified. Risograph is also more
come from and why did the idea come connection with our various contributors and environmentally friendly so we use it for all
to make a magazine about cinema from trust them to pitch and research topics that our other print work including posters, flyers
a queer point of view? interest them. and the recent Clubhouse reader.
Sam Ashby: I had always wanted to run a ANP: While you do write about ANP: Speaking of that, besides
magazine but for whatever reason never modern filmmakers, you tend to have publishing you also run a small
quite made it beyond the idea phase. Then, a distinct fascination with films from clubhouse and film club. Can you tell us
one drunken night a few years ago, I watched Hollywood’s heyday. Where does this about these projects?
Andy Warhol and Paul Morrissey’s Flesh, come from? MP: As a film magazine, it made sense to
starring ‘Little Joe’ Dallesandro. It was one MP: For me, Little Joe is about turning away try and exhibit some of the more obscure
of those incredible moments when a piece from the fetishisation of the new, and instead films we discuss, especially as some are not
of art breaks your head open and alters your placing the emphasis on what we share and commercially available. At the start of this
perception. It was the sight of seeing him connect with in the past, without overdosing year, we were lucky to be awarded Film
laying face down, naked on the bed and the on nostalgia. In this sense, universally we London’s Community Pilot Fund, which
realization that there was no other magazine all share some kind of inherited, response started our A Little Film Club screening
out there discussing these kinds of films. to the classic Hollywood era: the iconic film programme. We hold monthly screenings
From that point on, I set about trying to craft stars, the lifestyles and the locations, but at two fantastic London venues, the Rio
a magazine that would inspire the deep (and we, as a society, are also fascinated when it in Dalston and the Cinema Museum in
not so deep) personal connections with films, is subverted through the pre-Code films and Kennington. In April, we created a Clubhouse,
a queer response to most magazines focusing expose texts like Kenneth Anger’s Hollywood a temporary screening structure, in a gallery
on what’s new and upcoming. Babylon. It’s like unearthing some secret as part of the Fringe! gay film festival, inviting
ANP: Do you come from a cinema history, uncovering the real lives behind this previous contributors to select films for us to
background? Critics? Filmmakers? heavily orchestrated facade. show. We also created the Clubhouse reader
Fans? ANP: What are the differences in your to give each film a context and is available to
SA: I’m a graphic designer by trade and have opinion between films made today purchase on our website.
been designing film posters for about 6 years. and films from the past? Both positive ANP: What are your future dreams for
Michael Pierce: My background is in and negative. Little Joe?
exhibition, starting out in festivals, becoming SA: Most stuff we get to see at the cinema now SA: Obviously, we are working towards
a projectionist, before running my own events is shit. We get fed so much crap by the big making all our projects fully sustainable
including midnight movie screenings. But studios, but if you look around you can find and continuing with the magazine but since
I’d say we are both frustrated filmmakers at some amazing alternative programmes, often organizing the screening programme and
heart! Isn’t everyone? discovering films from the past that feel fresh building the Clubhouse, we have realized
ANP: While there is definitely a and still have a contemporary resonance. the need for the publication to actively build
through line in your publication that MP: I think it is too hard to generalize communities, bringing people together in a
deals in homosexual topics, the films between old and new films because there shared space. We hope to build on this in
you write about are not necessarily gay are just too many titles that will remain the future.
films. How do you choose which films unseen, but what I think has changed is the MP: After finding out that many of the
and directors to write about? exhibition landscape, and the lack of diversity films we discuss are not available on DVD,
SA: When I thought up the subheading “a in cinemas. It’s fine if you live in a big city, but we have often thought about moving into
magazine about queers and cinema, mostly” there are many places that you’ll have to drive distribution, but for now, we want to focus on
to describe our focus, I was using the term for miles to see a decent film in the cinema. local activities to help build a community of
“queer” in the more archaic sense, a way ANP: The first thing that I noticed readers and supporters.
to describe someone that did not fit in, about your magazine was that it is
was different somehow, as well as nodding printed on a Risograph. This is a www.littlejoemagazine.com
towards the more appropriate contemporary painstaking process. Why did you make
meaning which is more plural. Neither does this decision?
it necessarily have to relate to sexuality. I find SA: I wouldn’t say it’s painstaking, but
so many of these other definitions around depending on the print run, it can be a
sexuality restrictive, but using “queer” is a laborious and therefore more expensive
way to celebrate that dissidence. process. We actually printed the third issue
MP: I think the magazine has always with a normal paperback printer but the
attempted to avoid the simple tick box style aesthetic of risograph suited the feel of the
definitions of sexual orientation. In terms first two magazines, which dealt with slightly
of choosing the content, we often have a more underground topics. We wanted to
haphazard approach, stumbling across marry the feel of a professional journal with
directors we haven’t heard of through the vitality of a fanzine, which risograph
RVCA .COM / 7
ANP: How did Castle Face start?
Brian Lee Hughes: I started Castle Face Records with my
friend John Dwyer. He’s basically my favorite artist and we
met when I was filming Rock Star Scars back in 2003 in San
Francisco. He was in the film and gave me music for it from
Coachwhips, his band at the time. I loved that band and I
filmed some live performances for the Coachwhips for their
film Double Death. I was super bummed when they called it
quits. He was experimenting with lots of bands before and
after that. My fave of those is Thee Oh Sees (aka OCS). We
then collaborated again when he gave me Oh Sees songs for the
skate film I co-directed with Ada Bligaard Søby in Denmark
for a Faile collaboration called Lavender Or Danish Skater
Perfect Fantasy Death. His music made the film special and we
liked how it came out so we kept looking for more stuff to do
together.
John Dwyer: I asked Brian to fund an Oh Sees record because a
certain mid-to-big size label had strung me along with possibly
putting out Sucks Blood (the first CF release). When the time
CASTLE
came and they flaked we had no one to release the record.
Castle Face was born out of frustration with labels who want
you to sign over all your rights to them and then turn their
back on bands when they aren’t willing to sign over everything.
BLH: Basically I was dreading the thought of The Oh Sees
going the way of Coachwhips so I offered up so we just started
a label to put out records for them. We put out Thee Oh Sees’
Sucks Blood record and we were off.
FACE
JD: The label just grew from there. San Francisco is a miasma
of creative energy and at the time a lot of our friends were
making fantastic sounds and we facilitated the release of these
tunes. It’s been an interesting project, but I can safely say
that the label has derived equal strengths from all three of us
working together. I love it.
Matt Jones: Around 2006 John and I met at a party and we
started talking about records. My day job since 2005 has been
RECORDS
in sales for a vinyl manufacturing company called Pirates
Press. I told him he could come by and scan his art and get
it set up, and I’d help him put the whole thing together. Sort
of voluntarily, I ended up doing all the layout, painstakingly
photo shopping the labels for “Sucks Blood” so that the A
side and the B side said different things, but in the same
handwriting, laying out the type, that kind of thing. John and I
became closer and closer friends and from that point forward
I was the go-to guy as far as getting things made. I think I’ve
cracked Photoshop on every Castle Face release so far. Later
on John dug the Blasted Canyons stuff I was doing and put out
the record. I guess it was about a year ago that Brian and John
asked me to officially be a part of the label but I was already
pretty much there.
ANP: How did you guys come up with the name for
your label?
JD: “Castleface-ing” was a term Patrick Mullins and I used to
describe a person’s face when they got too high….hence
Castle Face.
BLH: The alternate advancement of the Castle Face meaning
came, for me, from when we we’re editing the 40+ hours of
live footage and endlessly amazing stories that we filmed in
between locations for the LP/DVD Thee Hounds Of Foggy
Notion. It was a mind-bending avalanche of non-stop Dwyer
comic gold, and original drummer Patrick Mullins never, ever
cracked a smile. He maintained the most magically numbing
straight face. When you’re editing, you notice. That to me is
Castle Face.
ANP: Is there any kind of philosophy behind
the project?
JD: I like to think that we get to put out a young band’s early
work locally, and if the relationship continues from there then
that’s great. We are friends with all the people we work with
and they are mostly Bay Area (with the exception of Total
Control). We love homegrown.
MJ: I’m just here to facilitate John’s vision and make it
possible, and that’s an honor. Someone said “FUBU for
stoners” once and I’ve always liked that.
BLH: John cooks up most of it in his head. For me it’s a DIY
rally cry to fight boredom, which I have to thank him for. My
first John Dwyer meeting came in 2003 when I just landed in
SF from Denmark where I was living and occasionally working
with Lars von Trier. The darkness of divorce was looming
for me and I was hunting for distractions. After a hot tip that
Coachwhips were going to perform at the serene, scenic San
Francisco Twin Peaks overlook on Flag Day, I was hooked.
It was the most amazing thing I’d ever seen. Powered by a
generator in an out-of-commission ambulance, they destroyed
my mind and the minds of dozens of Chinese tourists, the
Mexican vendors and the North Beach wedding photo crowd.
They had this art joke crew Double Dutchess in fake pregnant
outfits jumping rope while drinking water from gallon-sized
Popov bottles and their pitbull was shredding plastic baby dolls
and a stroller. It was a life-saver. I wanted more of that. I try
to keep that Flag Day in mind whenever we make anything. So
yes, Fight Boredom.
ANP: I see that Castle Face is really a multi-media
project. Incorporating records, books and videos. Was
that always the idea from the beginning?
MJ: Dwyer’s always cooking up something fresh and out-there,
we’re just trying to keep up...
by Clark Rayburn Castle Face Records is John Dwyer, BLH: We all do arty stuff and I’ve done vids for Thee Oh Sees
PhotoGRAPHy BY matt jones Brian Lee Hughes and Matt Jones. and Ty Segall but I don’t think any of it has been Castle Face
specific. We make vinyl and sell vinyl.
JD: Really it just started out as a way to put out LP’s and CD’s,
but the growth is very, very welcome and very satisfying.
RVCA .COM / 9
FULTON
RYDER
by NORA ATAPOL
Photography by Fabiola Alondra / Fulton Ryder
For the last few months I can’t tell you how many people
have told me about this new space in New York City
called Fulton Ryder. Part gallery, part bookstore, part
publishing house, rumor has it that within its walls
contains the best collection of exclusive publications,
ephemera, and objet d’art in the city. The store is
essentially a collector’s dream. But there’s a catch. The
location of Fulton Ryder is kept completely secret and it
is not open to the public. It is one of those places that is
shrouded in mystery, and as a result of course becomes a
heavy topic of conversation. So in the interest of trying to
uncover this mystery, us here at ANP decided to do some
independent research. Well readers, you are in luck. Our
efforts paid off. Unfortunately we are not able to disclose
the location, and reading this article won’t necessarily get
you into the store, but at least one layer of the onion has
been peeled away. Also, on a further note, Fulton Ryder
recently published, “Notes From A Revolution” about
the legendary 1960s activist group The Diggers. We were
able to obtain a short interview which follows here:
ANP: How did the concept for Fulton Ryder come about?
Fulton Ryder: Context is content
ANP: Would you consider it a bookstore? A gallery? A cabinet
of curiosities?
FR: Boundaries overlap and unify, combining the high and the low, “the
sacred and the profane,” as John McWhinnie would have said. From
sexy pulp paperbacks to unique artists’ books and top shelf literature
to Malcolm X air fresheners, Dan Colen whoopee cushions, Wallace
Berman collages. All of these things live together, harmoniously, as
cultural artifacts of our time.
ANP: Is there an overarching theme to the curation?
FR: Not exactly, but we do have one wall with only paperbacks on
display: naughty nurses and librarians, lesbians, orgies, drugs, rock
n roll and film. And our literature section is organized alphabetically,
but for the most part we arrange and move things around in all sorts of
ways, always juxtaposing opposites.
ANP: What separates Fulton Ryder from other
establishments in the city?
FR: One of the things that makes Fulton Ryder unique are the pieces
that we have hanging on our walls. These are called “Untitled Originals”
by Richard Prince. The pieces reunite the original illustrations used
for paperback covers, framing these illustrations side by side with the
original publications. It is fascinating to think that behind every pulp
paperback there was a painting first..It elevates a low form of art to a
higher one. And it also frames a painting side by side with the book, as
two inseparable art forms.
ANP: How do you think an establishment like Fulton Ryder
fits into the overall creative landscape of New York City?
FR: Our location is secret and always will be. Without mystery there’s
no need for imagination.
ANP: Can you tell us your top five favorite things that are on
offer in the store?
FR: “The Pope’s Butler” by Howard Johnson and “Bob Crane: He Got
It Coming,” by John Dogg both published by Fulton Ryder. A beautiful
first edition copy of Flannery O’Connor’s book “A Good Man is Hard to
Find.” “New York Is” by Robert Frank, a beautiful supplement he did
for the New York Times in 1958. And an anonymous French scrapbook
from the 1940s-50s of black and white pornographic photographs.
ANP: Why do you think people have such an intense desire
for 20th Century nostalgia?
FR: Nostalgia, a longing for something that no longer exists ..I’d like
to believe that is simply part of human nature to have this sort of
longing…It is also a desire and curiosity for something that we didn’t
experience firsthand and wish we had…It’s a very romantic notion, a
fantasy of our own making. However, places like Fulton Ryder preserve
objects, such as the paperbacks from the 1940s and 50s…which awakes
this kind of desire for 20th century nostalgia. Walter Benjamin: “Every
passion borders on the chaotic, but the collector’s passion borders on
the chaos of memories.”
ANP: Why did you opt against having regular business hours?
FR: Because we are not a regular business.
ANP: If a person were to want to visit Fulton Ryder what
would they have to do?
FR: We would have to meet by chance, strike up a conversation, bring
up Fulton Ryder and eventually give you my card to invite you over for
a visit.
www.fultonryder.com
POUPI WHOOPY by Clark Rayburn / Images courtesy Poupi Whoopy
There is definitely something new in the air when it comes to erotic photography, yet somehow it’s been a bit hard to define.
We’ve been thinking about this quite a bit over here at ANPQ. We’re constantly doing research, looking at all these new
approaches and trying to define exactly what it all means. It was during one of these searches that we came across Poupi
Whoopy magazine from Belgium. The publication is really like no other we’ve seen. Entirely handmade and combining
multiple printing techniques in one publication, we really thought it was something to be celebrated. We got a chance to speak
with the editors and to learn a bit more about how this particular collaboration came to be.
ANP: Who are the main editors of your magazine? everybody wanted to be Bettie Page with a dice tattoo. We of you, and it will not come out without contractions, blood,
Jan Lemaire: I’m a photographer and printer. I created the thought we could try to do something a little different, with sweat, tears and laughter! When it’s finally there, you hold it,
magazine with my then-girlfriend, Sky van der Hoek, who witty humor and through different print techniques in one name it, show it around, and feel really proud. Or do I sound
does wonders with hairdos and is also a professional magazine lift it above your average glossy magazine. really lame right now?
make-up artist. UB: After three editions Jill came up with the idea to do a JM: Haha, I guess the putting-the-book-together part is
Ulrike Biets: I’m a photographer. male issue. Jan was a bit uncomfortable to stand in front of comparable: we quarantine ourselves in a damp little room
Jill Mathieu: And I guess I kind of function as the glue naked guys, shooting their packages, so that’s when I joined manically performing the same actions over and over again.
between all the artistic impulses. I help where I can fixing the crew as a photographer. After that, we stayed together and We fold pages, cut pages, stack pages and staple pages until
models, applying eyeliner, DJ’ing at our release parties with continued making new issues. we’re all cramped up and covered in paper cuts. And when
Ulrike and writing press releases. ANP: Is there a mission statement behind we’re done, we boast about it on Facebook.
ANP: Can you tell us a bit about your backgrounds? Poupi Whoopy? ANP: You are part of what seems a whole new
What did you do before starting your magazine? JL: We love boobs? Haha. movement in erotic magazines. There seems to be a
JL: I have a masters degree in graphic design and free UB: That includes man boobs. changing of the tides. How do you feel about this?
arts, and I studied art history and art critique. But mostly ANP: Your visual content is so visually diverse. Do JL: That it was about fucking time! I try to keep looking for
I’m a print and photography enthusiast who loves screen you work with many collaborators or do you do it all alternative erotic magazines, I don’t know about the U.S., but
printing, stencil printing, offset, xeroxing, collages and in-house? here in Europe they are still spread thinly.
graphic design. I make artwork for small record labels like JL: I come from a DIY punk and hardcore scene in Antwerp UB: It’s a real trend these days to shoot naked people. As
Conspiracy Records, and I often roadie for bands such as where you do everything yourself within the limited budget if clothes are the new taboo. I think what distinguishes us
Earth, Isis, Keelhaul, Knut or Alabama Thunderpussy. I was you get. So we do everything ourselves: concepts, scouting from lots of other photographers and publications is that we
part of art collectives like Rotkop (underground publications of models, styling, location hunting, hair and make-up, welcome every one. You don’t have to look like a model, you
with Dennis Tyfus, Kati Heck, Michèle Matyn) and Building photography, photoshopping, printing, the actual fabricating don’t have to have great skin or perfect sizes. Far from! For
Transmissions sound performances/architectures at Haus der of the books, selling and distributing, bookkeeping... us, you have to have personality. We want to show people that
Kunst Munich, Venice Biennale, and Porto Alegre Brasil (with everything. The visual diversity is something we aim for, we’d feel good about themselves.
Nico Dockx, Peter Verwimp and Kris Delacourt) hate to repeat/rehash the same thing over and over again, it ANP: Each issue has a very handmade element to it.
UB: After I graduated university as a master in philosophy, can’t become a drag. It has to stay fresh and innovative and How do you think this adds to the overall experience
I started working on film sets as a production manager for fun to do. of the magazine?
full-length movies. But quickly after that, I rolled into being a UB: By now, we’ve gathered a great fan base. Amongst them JL: I think it’s key. You can tell a lot of love went in the
photographer on a professional level. I’ve been taking photos are a lot of creative people we can count on to work with on a creation of every issue. We all handled each issue at least ten
for as long as I can remember, so I guess it was inevitable regular basis. It sometimes feels like one big family. times in the process of its creation through folding, stapling,
that one day this would become my ‘job’. Besides my personal JM: Models often come along with great ideas too, or with screen-printing or whatever. The downside is that we can
photography work, I’m also collaborating with different crazy costumes they want to wear. Meanwhile, we jot down only realistically make about 500 copies max of each issue. To
magazines and publications. our dream photo shoots in a Google doc, and we’re pretty make more would be a logistical nightmare.
JM: I’ve been spending most of my days writing all sorts of good at actually realizing those ideas too, even if they involve UB: You need to feel it to really read it! Half of the experience
things that somehow involve young people and all kinds of public nudity in tourist-crowded areas. of Poupi Whoopy is the touch,
culture. I was the editor in chief of Vice Magazine in Belgium ANP: How does an issue of Poupi Whoopy the textile, the ink on your hands after glancing through it.
and now I organize retro themed parties and burlesque revues come together? That’s also why we call it a really dirty magazine!
all over the country. JL: One shoot at a time, we come up with an idea, find a JM: Unlike naked girls on a screen, you can actually touch
ANP: How did the concept to start a magazine about model, do the shoot and repeat the process until we reckon naked girls in print!
sex/sexuality begin? we have enough for a book. Or sometimes we come up with a ANP: How did you come up with the name
JL: I was looking to do a project together with my then concept for an entire issue, like the Casting Issue, for which Poupi Whoopy?
girlfriend and mother of my son Louis. She is a hair and we did a nude model casting and photographed everybody JL: Poupi is like a cuddle name I called my ex-girlfriend and
make-up artist, I was doing some photography but mainly that showed up and signed a waver. 34 people showed up that Whoopy is as you know a cheesy exclamation of joy. It just
print. We both had a great interest in old pin-up images day, anything in between 18-year-old girls to 65-year-old men, sounds funny and it gets misspelled all the time, which is
but thought that the whole aesthetic of modern pin-up or which makes for a funny and pretty diverse magazine/book. always funny too...
burlesque was just a cheap rehash of ‘50s-styled images UB: I’m not going to speak about a book as if it’s a baby, but I
combined with rockabilly and tattoo parlour influences. Like do think you can compare it with giving birth. It grows inside www.poupiwhoopy.com
RVCA .COM / 11
BURGER
RECORDS
INTERVIEW & PhotoGRAPHy by Kyle Thomas
One night in the winter of 2009, in the middle of band practice, I received a phone call from Burger Records. I’d never heard of the label
before and my band mates were really pissed at me for picking up the phone in the middle of a song. Whatever. I didn’t know it at the
time, but it was a life changing phone call. They wanted to put out my album, King Tuff Was Dead on cassette. Seemed like it couldn’t
hurt so I said, “Fuck yes, do it.”
I didn’t end up meeting them in person until about a year later, at SXSW. I was instantly charmed by their good looks and enthusiasm,
and I felt my world opening up. Here were all these cartoonish rock n roll characters from California, with goofy smiles and cassette
tapes spilling out of every pocket. The two masterminds appeared to be Sean Bohrman, a long blonde blue-eyed beauty of a man, and
Lee Rickard, whom I’ve described more than once as a perfect piece of spaghetti. These were my kind of dudes.
Nowadays you can’t throw a rock without hitting someone wearing one of those big ass Burger Records buttons proclaiming anything
from “I’m A Burger Babe” to “I’m A Burger Punk” or “Fuck Burger Records”. Their positive energy, compassion, creativity, and prolific
work ethic is something to be admired, releasing hundreds of cassettes a year with no sense of stopping any time soon. Burger Records
is truly a family and I’m extremely thankful to be a part of it. Thank God I picked up my phone in the middle of stupid band practice.
Kyle Thomas: To start things off in a normal interview kinda way, can you give KT: Insane. Why do you guys think foods like burgers, pizza, ice cream, etc.
me a quick backstory of Burger? play such a prominent role in the rock ‘n’ roll scene of today?
Lee Rickard: Well I recently put on a normal pair of pants cuz my backstory was falling LR: ‘Cuz it’s like simple food for simple people, I mean it’s like handheld...
out. (laughter) But as far Burger, in the 2000s we started writing Burger productions and SB: ...and it’s FUN. Rock ‘n’ roll is fun and those are fun foods. They taste good and...
Burger Inc. on everything and eventually we started Burger Records. Our first release was LR: ...and you can still rock out while you’re holding them!
a single for our own band, Thee Makeout Party, in 2007. We just thought, you know, The SB: And when you have a party you eat pizza and ice cream and...
Beach Boys had Brother Records, the Beatles had Apple, and the Kinks had Konk, and we LR: SWEET STUFF. For dessert. And the good stuff for dinnertime.
were Burger Boys till the day we die so we started Burger Records. SB: And no vegetables.
Sean Bohrman: And for our second release we did the Audacity LP. (Audacity are a local KT: Oh yeah do you hate vegetables?
band that Burger started working with when they were still in high school.) SB: Vegetables are not rock ‘n’ roll.
KT: How many releases are you at now? KT: TRUE. You two are definitely a dynamic duo, kind of a yin and yang. Can
SB: We are at #255 right now. you describe the roles each of you play in the business?
KT: How many did you release last year? LR: Ike and Tina baby.
SB: About 100. This year we’ll probably do 200. SB: I deal with the internet, all the multi media, emailing, talking on the phone to
KT: BOOYAH. business people...
LR: Burger believe it. LR: The tangled web of the inter-land. And I’m like the freak on the streets, the cosmic
SB: This month alone we’ve released 20 tapes and two LPs. mind wanderer...
RVCA .COM / 13
SARAH SOPHIE FLICKER
& MAXIMILLA LUKACS
ANP: How did you both get into making films? that the more I “am” as far as a label goes, the better my do an original score for us whenever possible. It really
Sarah Sophie Flicker: Maximilla and I had been circling work is. Film is inspiring to me because you can truly is the final stage of bringing an idea to life. Film to me
each other for years before we met. We both had create an out-of-time, never-never land, magical realist is basically a perfect marriage of everything I love.
been working independently in film, me as an actor, explosion. Only in film can I create the worlds that exist That is why I feel so grateful to get to do what I do for
photographer and experimental filmmaker. As a kid I in my head. In theater I can come close, but film allows a living.
was a serious dancer and did a lot of acting in theater you to control a world and really become immersed in ANP: How did your collaboration come about?
and film, these were the building blocks of my work it. Then in post, with editing, color correction, sound SSF: It was in the stars! Truly! Maximilla and I were
now. We officially began to work together in New York design, etc., you can sink deeper into that world and two panthers circling each other in a cage for years. I
City in 2001. Our first film was a meditation on love flesh it out further. I love that about film. I am always can’t count the number of times people said we should
entitled Kill Your Darlings. We worked out of Times curious about filmmakers who show a realistic version meet before we actually did. I remember one friend
Square and insisted on wearing white lace throughout of the world as it is so far from what I lean towards. I saying, “Maximilla and you exist in the same magic
the process. We made quite an impact on the want to get as far away from reality as possible when we world. You need to know each other.” At this point,
unsuspecting tourists. Since then, we’ve become only are shooting. 11 years down the pike, we read each other’s minds
slightly more practical in our work attire. Maximilla ML: I have always thought that films were like magic and finish each other’s sentences. I walked into a
usually ends up directing in anything from a swimsuit spells and you can certainly feel them working on you Lower East Side bar in late 2001 (Sweet and Vicious...
to a rainbow cape and sparkly turban. when you see an especially good one. So to me the idea remember that one?) and Maximilla was on the floor
Maximilla Lukacs: I originally started out as a painter. I of being a director was always essentially becoming wrestling some guy. By the end of the night we were
went to the San Francisco Art Institute where I started a magician. Film really gives you the opportunity to working together and formed our production company
taking experimental film classes from the likes of Larry take the visions that you have within you and give The Belles Of The Black Diamond Field (named after
Jordan and George Kuchar. So my introduction to life to them. I think that is super magical. My favorite the first female coal miners).
film was very much from an experimental viewpoint. filmmakers create worlds that you simply do not want ML: Haha! Sweet and Viscious. Yes…that is the fated
Basically from an attempt at creating moving paintings to leave. And once you have had the chance to enter moment where it all came together.That was a super
(to some extent I still try to think about it that way). those worlds you see everything in a slightly different fun time in New York and I feel like it was the birth
When I met Sarah I had begun to build a small body way. You have been put under their spell! I am total of a lot collaborative projects. Sarah and I met and
of experimental films but I had never attempted to do film nerd. I love Tarkovsky and Woody Allen and started working together and I remember shooting one
anything narrative. I had also gotten pretty good at Antonioni, Maya Deren, Vera Chytilova, early Milos of our first scenes together and looking at the footage
editing because to me that was always the funnest part. Forman, Cassavettes, Bergman, Kustirica, Jodorowsky together and her saying “You are the only person that
It still held a connection to painting and drawing. Very so many master magicians all working spells in their has ever been able to make things look like the way I
hands on. Sarah went to law school and was amazing own very specific way. I think at this moment in time see them in my head.” So I guess the glue that holds our
with research and was incredibly well read and had we really need to have a prismatic world-view. We need collaboration together is simply that we see the world
more of a performing arts background. We were a great to let in visions from every possible culture and try on in a similar way. Or rather that we see the things that
match for each other. many different sets of eyes. Film is a huge part of that. we want to bring into existence through the language of
ANP: What is it about the medium of film that And we have never had more access! My two loves film in a similar way. It really is a magical collaboration
inspires you? Why do you think you didn’t throughout my life were music and painting so in a way and I feel like our strengths and weaknesses really
follow the path of another kind of artist? As a film really brings those two elements together. Music complement each other. My eyes are more trained
painter or dancer for instance? has always been so inspiring throughout my life. I grew for the visual story telling elements and Sarah has a
SSF: I think I have been every kind of artist...never up in a very DIY music scene and even played in a few great background in acting and theatre and dance so
a painter though. I find that having even a modest bands when I was younger. And for me it really plays a she is super great with the performance aspects. It is
vocabulary in dance, film, acting, music, fashion, huge part in the filmmaking process. A piece of music a great marriage of a very special sort. We started our
photography, writing, aerial arts, make-up, theater, can inspire a whole film or completely change the tone collaboration with a manifesto about feminizing the
informs everything I do. It’s interesting how limited we of it in an edit. It is so essential to how you feel as you language of film. There are so few female directors to
are asked to be in our definitions of ourselves. I find are watching a film. Sarah and I always have someone look to for inspiration but each one I can think of really
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Sandy Toes, 2009, Film stills
I think has evolved. Art and life in general has gotten way
crazier. We are exposed to so much more visually. So yes, I
think it’s an exciting time for film in general. More people
have access to the tools to make films than ever before so I
think we will be seeing some exciting stuff probably from
the most unexpected places.
ANP: Can you tell us a bit about your process?
How do you conceive and execute ideas start to
finish on a project?
SSF: We usually start with just one image and build from
there. I love to research images and drum up fantasy
worlds. Maximilla is great at fantasy but also with order
and structure. We lean on those strengths and often send
ideas back and forth. She lives in L.A. and I live in NYC.
We have a great team that we work with that speak in
our “Belles” language as well. After we have finished a
treatment or shooting script we open it up to the team for
more ideas.
ML: Yes that is basically how it works. Sarah and I usually
start by sending images back and forth, which is how
we communicate best, out of which arises a story and
characters. Once we arrive at a treatment we are happy
with we open it up to our Dream Team. We are lucky
enough to have put together a Dream Team in both New
York and L.A., which allows us to work in either place. On
set I focus more on the cameras, lighting and story telling
aspects and Sarah works more with the actors, styling
and art direction. We are both involved with every decision
but we usually divide and conquer on set. Since all of it
has usually been illustrated with painstaking detail in
our treatments it usually flows pretty seamlessly. I also
edit all of our films so that is the part where it returns to
my painting roots and I get to do the Wizard of Oz job of
putting it all together. Sarah and I sometimes send cuts
across the world to each other so she can be involved with
the edit even if I am in another country. Gotta love all the
new technology for that!
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PER-
SONAL
UTOPIAS
For proof that humans have an innate desire to create their own environment, look no further than
a teenager’s bedroom. Walls are scrawled upon and collaged, collections are hoarded, and with an
explosion of dirty laundry, even the floor is camouflaged. The room becomes an external representation
of the internal spirit, and the more those two match up, the better the angsty mind feels.
But as most of us get older, our desire to create our own world gets buried in the face of having to
survive and thrive in the one created for us. We decide that it is easier to change ourselves to fit the
world than to change the world to fit us. It’s a rare kind of person who can set all of this aside. Usually
these people are called artists. When they’re not called artists, usually they are called crazy.
In a 1965 New Yorker article about the Watts Towers, Calvin Trillin wrote “If a man who has not
labeled himself an artist happens to produce a work of art, he is likely to cause a lot of confusion and
inconvenience.” Simon Rodia, an immigrant tile setter, labored for more than 30 years to create the
Watts Towers. He worked in his spare time, and he worked alone. Once the towers were completed, he
moved away and never came back. And thus, we are confused.
Works like Rodia’s—where someone has endeavored to create their own personal utopia—exist outside
of the value system that we as a society have agreed upon. They don’t offer money or prestige, and the
gratification of a job well done is far from immediate. Most of us can’t understand this, even if we wish
we could. Around the world, there are many places that are similar to the Watts Towers in spirit, spots
of wonder where an individual endeavored to create something entirely unique for reasons entirely
their own—often in the face of opposition and setbacks, and with few resources.
These places, and these people, seem to tap into something pure and almost innocent, and represent an
outpouring of creativity of the most honest kind. “The great revelation of vernacular art environments
is that when artists have the space and freedom and time to creatively explore art entirely on their
own terms, they create encompassing works of art that are truly transformative and utterly original,”
says Leslie Umberger, a senior curator at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center in Sheboygan, WI, who
wrote a book on the subject, called Sublime Spaces and Visionary Worlds. “Art environments convey
the validity of being a unique individual, and convey the reality that it does not take a pedigree to
transform the lives of others.”
Recently, I was in the California desert for Coachella, and woke early one morning to go out to
Salvation Mountain. The Salton Sea landscape there is bleak and harsh. It’s so dry that your lips parch
and your mouth cottons, and everything you see is colorless, as if the sky, the sand and the people have
been bleached by the sun.
But then, coming around a curve, Salvation Mountain suddenly pops into view in a rush of reds and
greens and stripes and flowers. Leonard Knight built the mountain with donated paint, and as I
climbed his handmade ‘yellow brick road’ staircase up to the top, I couldn’t help but think about how
much paint a $400 ticket to a music festival could have bought. It didn’t seem like I was just seeing the
mountain, but that I was feeling it, too. It was human ingenuity, determination, creativity and devotion
in its truest form. And it was free, unregulated, and in the middle of nowhere.
Later, in Indio, as I waited in line to scan my wristband to get inside and wait in more lines with
thousands of other people, all of us paying to be a part of something that we had been told was
important, I kept flashing back to the colors of the Mountain and thinking about how this was so pale
in comparison.
by Kate Williams
Salvation
Mountain
photography by cali thornhill-dewitt
One of the only things visible, aside from and coats of paint to make it stronger. At
miles and miles of dusty parched first he would scavenge the dump for paint,
landscape, from the top of Salvation but as word of the Mountain spread,
Mountain is Slab City, a transient town of people began donating paint. Knight would
mostly homeless drifters that has dubbed use the drab colors for underneath, and
itself “The Last Free Place in America.” It save the brighter, prettier ones for the top.
was Slab City that initially brought He liked to coat the flowers in high-gloss.
Salvation Mountain creator Leonard Salvation Mountain stretches more than
Knight to the area, because Knight figured 100 feet wide and four stories high, and
the last free place in America would be a Knight has used more than 100,000
good place to launch his hot air balloon. galloons of paint on it. He worked on the
A Korean War veteran who had been born Mountain for almost 30 years, well into
and raised in Vermont, Leonard Knight his seventies, all the while living in the
never had much interest in God until a trip back of a truck parked at its base. The
to San Diego at age 35. Knight was there truck didn’t run, and Knight gathered
visiting his sister, a devout Christian, and materials on a moped.
one morning, while sitting in his van, In 1994, the county government labeled
Knight began repeating a sinner’s prayer Salvation Mountain an environmental
that went “Jesus, I am a sinner, please hazard, citing a fear of what lead paint was
come upon my body and into my heart,” doing to the soil, and wanted to destroy it.
over and over. Suddenly, he was saved. But people rallied around Knight, and
He began to think about a way to show his independent soil test revealed that the
devotion to God, and when he witnessed a Mountain wasn’t toxic, so Knight kept on
hot air balloon pass overhead in 1970, he building. In a 2004 documentary called
decided this was the perfect way. Knight Plagues & Pleasures on the Salton Sea,
worked on his hot air balloon, including Knight talks about his life’s work. “I just
building his own inflation furnace, for 14 believe that God really built this mountain,
years, relocating to Slab City in the process. I didn’t,” he says. “I’m not really capable of
The balloon eventually stretched 10 stories being an artist. I’m just not capable of
high, but never sailed, and Knight finally
admitted defeat.
doing anything, but God almighty can do
anything. I talk to God a lot, and I keep “I painted the
mountain
Frustrated, he began to use cement and saying almost every morning ‘God, use me
paint to construct a small hill, on which he if you can. I want to work for you, God.’
painted his sinner’s prayer and the words And look at the Mountain: It’s going better
“God is Love.” He planned to stay a week
and finish it, then take off, but what he
than 10 churches put together.”
Leonard Knight is now in a nursing home,
because I love
soon began to call a mountain kept
growing, and Knight stayed for four years.
and thus the future of Salvation Mountain
is uncertain. Currently, volunteers and God and I love
people.”
Then, the mountain collapsed. Slab City residents protect it from vandals.
Rather than getting discouraged, Knight Many church groups have approached
instead viewed the mountain’s collapse as Knight over the years, offering to ‘adopt’
God’s way of telling him that it wasn’t safe,
and he simply started again, determined to
the Mountain, provided they could also use
it for their own purposes. But God must
—Leonard Knight
make it stronger this time. He did so with a have not liked this idea, because Knight
mix of adobe and straw, layering in coats always refused.
“You got to do In 1957, the City of Los Angeles declared the Towers a public safety
hazard, built as they were without following construction codes, and
something they announced plans to destroy them. But supporters rallied, and the city
conceded to a stress test. If the towers, built with their chicken wire,
—Simon Rodia
RVCA .COM / 21
“If the Garden
of Eden is not
right, Moses
is to blame. He
wrote it up
and I built it.”
— S. P. Dinsmoor
GARDEN
OF
EDEN
A Civil War veteran who served in 18 battles, Dinsmoor was surprisingly delicate in
including the one that lead to the capture his concrete work. He fashioned cement
of Robert E. Lee, Samuel Perry Dinsmoor flags that were molded to look like they
settled in Lucas, Kansas, in 1891, when were fluttering, and mounted them on ball
he was 48 years old. Sixteen years later, bearings so they would turn in the wind. He
he finished his first major architectural built cement trees that were 30 to 40 feet tall,
achievement, his notorious log cabin home. and draped them with leaves and vines. He
Dinsmoor had a fondness for tromp l’oeil, fashioned Adam in his own image, and when
and therefore log cabin wasn’t actually the townspeople of Lucas complained about
made of logs at all, but massive 27-foot-long Adam’s prominently displayed genitalia,
carved pieces of limestone which Dinsmoor Dinsmoor added an apron to cover him up.
dovetailed so that they would fit together “I think some of the interactions between
and look like wood. The cabin had 11 rooms, the townspeople and Dinsmoor shaped the
with no two doors or windows of the same narrative, and may have sparked a little bit
size, and once it was completed, he filled it of his belligerent nature,” Erika Nelson says.
with furniture also of his own design, and “The initial Garden of Eden section was in
more than 3,000 feet of oak, redwood and direct reaction to the culture of the time—
walnut molding. After completing his house, railroads acting as land developers in the
Dinsmoor turned his attention to the yard, New West, promising groups of immigrants
and began erecting concrete sculptures that Kansas was the new Garden of Eden.
that illustrated his beliefs in the populist Dinsmoor was a part of the local debate
movement and the Bible. By the time he society, ran for office on the Populist ticket,
finished, almost 20 years later, Dinsmoor and I’m sure the conversations in and around
had created more than 200 sculptures that these topics greatly shaped his desire to
he believed to illustrate the entire history express his views in concrete form.”
of mankind. Dinsmoor advertised the Garden as “The
The west side of the house was what most unique home, for living or dead, on
Dinsmoor believed to be a literal depiction the earth,” and he built his own limestone-
of the Garden of Eden, and the north side log mausoleum in a corner of it. In 1917, he
represented modern life, which included interred his first wife there, after causing
Union soldiers, girls, big business, the a scandal by digging her corpse up from
food chain and the government. “Message- the Lucas cemetery. His own death was
wise, you can see a narrative grow and something he regarded with a wink and a
evolve throughout the environment. This smile. He made souvenir postcards from a
3-D political cartooning seems a little double-exposed photograph that showed
overwhelming or bizarre at first, until you him standing next to a coffin in which he was
see that there’s a linear narrative going on also lying, and for a small fee, he would let
that leads you through,” says Erika Nelson, visitors photograph him in either position.
a Garden of Eden board member who also He joked that once he did kick the bucket, he
happens to live in the house right next door planned to slip out of the coffin at night to
to it. “Some of the inspiration that happens at watch over his strawberry beds.
the garden comes from the initial recognition But Dinsmoor did not become so obsessed
of scale and form, some inspiration happens with death that he ceased to enjoy life: At the
after the realization of the timeline and age of 81, he married a 20-year-old and they
narrative. Drive-wise, Dinsmoor’s scope had two children. Nor was he particularly
and vision are amazing—inspiring not just concerned with where he would end up in the
artists, but any visitor who starts to mentally afterlife. “Some people know they are going
calculate both the time and the sheer weight to heaven and those they do not like are
of the environment. Literal tons of cement, going to hell,” he wrote. “I am going where
all put in place by a retired person!” the Boss puts me. If I get to go up, I have
Dinsmoor documented his work in his self- a cement angel outside, above the door, to
published Pictorial History of the Cabin take me…If I have to go below, I’ll grab my
Home in Garden of Eden, Lucas, Kansas: jug and fill it with water…I think I am well
“The porches, side walks, fence, strawberry prepared for the good old orthodox future.”
and flower beds, fish pool, grape-arbor, three
U. S. flags, Adam and Eve, the devil, coffin,
jug, visitors’ dining hall, labor crucified, two
bird and animal cages, and wash house are
all made with cement,” he wrote. “Up to this
date, July 1, 1927, over 113 tons, or 2,273
sacks of cement has been used.”
RVCA .COM / 25
Las Pozas
Unlike the other artists mentioned here, who built paradisal worlds with their
own two hands and materials that other people threw away, Edward James spent
millions of dollars, and enlisted 40 full-time laborers, to create his world.
James was the only son of an American railroad baron and a Scottish socialite,
and thus, he was born very, very rich. When Edward James was only four, his
father died, and James therefore inherited the family’s 8,000-acre estate, West
Dean House. James attended the best schools England had to offer, and as an
adult, became an author, poet and ardent supporter of the arts who hobnobbed
with the likes of the Mitford sisters, Sigmund Freud and Aldous Huxley.
James published books of poetry (including some of his own), commissioned
Balanchine productions when he fell in love with a dancer, and became a friend
and patron of surrealist artists such as Picasso, Magritte and Noguchi. West Dean
House, which James decorated in a Surrealist manner, was the first home of
Dali’s Mae West Lips Sofa and Lobster Telephone, and Dali liked to proclaim that
Edward James was crazier than all the other surrealists combined.
In the 1940s, after his messy divorce rankled English society, James made his
way to Mexico, specifically in the jungle in Xilitla. He settled on a particular spot
there one day when, while sunbathing after a swim, a swarm of blue butterflies
descended and covered his naked body. James took this as a sign that he was in
the right place to freely nurture his passion for orchids and exotic animals—of
which he had everything from parrots and flamingos to monkeys and ocelets.
He traveled with his pet boa constrictors, only staying in the nicest hotels where
they were permitted, and according to legend, once hired a composer to write a “I built this
requiem for his dying crocodile.
In the 1960s, after a frost had killed his orchids, James traveled to Los Angeles, sanctuary to
be inhabited by
where he visited Simon Rodia’s Watts Towers. He returned to Mexico with a
new idea—he would rebuild his garden, this time out of cement. Over the next
25 years, in a 50-acre jungle landscape 2,000 feet up in the mountains, James
would create more than 200 concrete sculptures, each of which he would carefully
design on his sketch-pad before hiring workers to build them. He gave many of
my ideas and my
his sculptures surrealist names, such as The House With Three Stories That Might
Be Five, The Stegosaurus Colt, The Temple of the Ducks, and The House Destined
fantasies.”
to be a Cinema. He dubbed the garden Las Pozas, after its centerpiece of nine-
concrete pools fed by a natural waterfall, and the garden is filled with walk-ways, —Edward James
animal shapes, towering columns, flying buttresses, and a stairway that ascends
straight to heaven. This was a signature of James’: doors, gates, and stairways
that lead to nothing.
Many people seem to interpret many of James’ acts and behaviors as motivated
by his desire to be not just a patron of the arts, but as an artist himself, and with
Las Pozas, he finally achieved this. Though James he had devoted his wealth
to Las Pozas in life, even selling his collection of Surrealist works to pay for its
construction, when he died in 1984, he failed to leave behind proper funding to
pay for its upkeep. What a typical artist.
SUZANNE CIANI
To drop the needle on Suzanne Ciani’s retrospective
LP collection Lixiviation is to be suspended in time.
circuit board, follow a certain pattern. There’s the
archetypal late ‘50s/early ‘60s image of the bookish
the sounds of Atari and Coca Cola—her entirely
synth-fabricated sounds of a Coke bottle fizzing
Soft tones beckon, synthesizers cascade, all looping gentleman in his ‘40s or ‘50s, likely bespectacled, in a carbonated mist were realer than real—and
gently but persistently like streams of analog rain. undoubtedly in a white Lab coat. The Cosmic sprinkled her sound effect wizardry on top of Meco’s
These are the sounds that would preface what Traveler: the long hair who turned on in the early cheeky, chart-topping disco version of the Star Wars
would come to be called New Age music, that often ‘70s, conjuring the black hit of Space with his 30– theme. These were iconic sounds of the era and
maligned genre which, in the name of Spiritual plus minute excursions onto the Astral Plane. And of made Ciani the go-to for logotones of the time and
Well-Being, led to some of the most insipid sounds course there’s the asymmetrical New Wave dandy, to earned her five Grammy nominations.
ever committed to wax. But this is not your Yoga umbrella the various waves of the era (the brutalist
instructor’s New Age. As endless arpeggios fold futurism of Cold Wave, the out-and-out refutation But Ciani wasn’t simply responsible for the sonics
into one another, Ciani conjures future worlds: that was No Wave, and the Synthesizer as symbol of of adverts, impressive though they were. She
transparent grids, infinite desert scapes, blinking Post–Rock Pop, i.e., New Wave). Though this last also had a foot in the Avant Garde. Most often
lights, visions of otherworldly possibility. One example did include a feministic strain, women’s using Buchla synthesizers—Ciani, in fact, worked
thinks of the far out sounds of David Behrman, contributions (Mathematiques Modernes, Antena, et with Don Buchla’s synths almost exclusively at the
Franco Battiato and Terry Riley, the imagery of al.) were, as usual, overshadowed. Mills College Center for Contemporary Music—
Italian utopianists SUPERSTUDIO, that heightened these extended pieces had more in common with
cultural moment when philosophy, science and Even today, as synths drive not only the Gruppo NPS, Luc Ferrari or Vangelis (with whom
mysticism merged for a few peak years. Underground but the Overground—from so-called she would collaborate on 1984’s The Velocity of
Hypnagogic Pop to Radio R&B, House, Techno and Love). Her 1982 album Seven Waves, recently
Shortly thereafter, a voice enters the room. “Atari just about everything else going—history is only reissued by Finders Keepers subsidiary Bird upon
video games,” a woman’s kind but authoritative beginning to reappraise itself. Thankfully, through its 30th anniversary, was a defining moment of early
voice announces, matter of factly. A lovely, the benefit of reissues, which in the best hands New Age music, before the genre turned to sallow
optimistic assortment of sparkling sounds cast an eye forward as they look back, Ciani and a caricature. Other recent reissues, such as Voices for
suggesting an early 80s jingle follows, evoking that small but select group of women—the BBC’s Delia Packaged Souls (Dead Cert), her collaborative sound
moment when the word digital was new and alien. Derbyshire and Daphne Oram, Italian producer sculpture with sculptor Harold Paris, originally
We learn this piece soundtracked a short advert Doris Norton, New Yorker Laurie Spiegel, and the released in a private press run of 50, illuminate
for a ‘”Chip facility” showing men in spacesuits’, more academically minded Eliane Radigue and Ciani’s work in ways that have been up to now
introducing the world to what has become the norm: Pauline Oliveros—are getting their just due as overlooked. Taken together, these three recent
a world animated by computers. essential Electronic pioneers. reissues—collecting pure synth experimentation,
brief commercial vignettes and long form, far out
As in most realms, the world of Electronic Music, Ciani is undoubtedly the most upbeat and endearing synthscapes, create a newly minted portrait of a true
and more specifically, synthesizer-based music— synth nerd of the lot. Take a look at her appearance innovator for a new generation that will, like her
whether it be as composer, programmer or on Letterman where, to a stupefied Letterman, own, find it difficult to resist her charms.
instrument builder/inventor—has been typically she delights in a sound world she might joyously
seen as a man’s world: Bob Moog, Stockhausen, describe as ‘simply wondrous’. You get the sense
Eno, Pierre Henry, Raymond Scott, Manuel she’d be the perfect person to teach children to use
Göttsching, Kraftwerk, et al. The archetypes synths. Meanwhile, Letterman, eyes big as walnuts,
of the synthesizer maven tend to, not unlike a looks like he’s just dropped acid. Ciani defined
RVCA .COM / 29
so complex that it made the academic fascination with complexity seem
simplistic. I was always more fascinated with the way notes could move as
opposed to a static timbre of sound.
ANP: Was your first time playing a synthesizer at Mills College?
Is it true you could pay $5 to play a Buchla synthesizer by
the hour?
SC: Yes. Mills College housed the San Francisco Tape Music Center,
which had moved from the city and was funded in part by the Ford
Foundation. One could rent time to play a Buchla 100 series, a Moog, or
experiment with military surplus parts. I spent many a night there, playing
by candlelight. But because I went to work in Don Buchla’s “factory” right
after graduate school, I also got to play in his gigantic studio, which had a
towering number of modules and a swing hanging from the ceiling where
you could take a break and listen to the sonic space.
ANP: Your first teacher was Max Matthews, the person to
essentially invent digital synthesis. Quaint as it may seem
now, his computer version of “Bicycle Built For Two” was
revolutionary.
SC: I was very fortunate to take a course at the Stanford Artificial
Intelligence Labs with both Max Matthews and John Chowning, who was
soon to “discover” the FM techniques that Yamaha made famous. Max
had a childlike excitement about his work: his passion and energy were
extraordinary and continued unabated until he died just last year. We
designed modular tone generators on paper and then fed punched cards to
be processed for the PDP-10 computer and, voila, the next day out would
come a short musical recording. In other words, the process was not “real
time.” It was all a wonderful education in understanding the fundamentals
of sound and separating out the individual parameters that contributed to
a sound.
ANP: Were you or Max privy to what Delia Derybshire or
Daphne Oram were up to at the BBC? I think (Finders Keepers
head) Andy Votel referring to you as the “Delia Derbyshire of the
Atari generation” is quite appropriate.
SC: Actually, I had never heard of Delia or Daphne until a couple of months
ago…oddly. I am absolutely thrilled to discover them, though, since I have
always felt that women are naturally suited to the refinements of electronic
music. I love seeing the gracefulness and delicacy of their hands on the
machines. I have no idea whether Max was aware…and now I cannot ask
him, sadly.
ANP: They, along with Eliane Radigue, Laurie Spiegel, Doris
Norton and a post-Op Wendy Carlos—as Votel mentions in
his Lixiviation essay—make up the very small group of women
in the field. That must have crossed your mind at some point...
SC: I don’t think about the gender of music very much, unless I am
specifically investigating and then I am shocked at the paucity of women. I
do think that the electronic medium does allow more opportunity
for women, since the politics of traditional performance are male-
dominated. When I first looked for record label support, it was assumed
that I was a singer. In the film world, I am credited with being the first
woman to be hired to score a major Hollywood feature, and for that
film and my subsequent big films I was always hired by women, a small
minority in the film world.
ANP: Did you feel that you wanted to incorporate things that the
primarily male field was omitting?
SC: The male studio engineers in New York City, for example, already
had fixed ideas about sound and tried to fit electronics into that history.
I preferred working with female engineers: Leslie Mona and Vicki Fabry,
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RVCA /A NP QUA RT E RLY / 32
ANP: When I hear you started doing educational films, I imagine and we learned to think of sound in all of its separate parameters, whereas
shaggy-haired kids in corduroy flying kites and doing voice-overs younger musical technophiles have grown up in a “preset” world and
about what it feels like to make a kite stay up in the air. perhaps alter the presets, but rarely, if ever, have the experience of building
SC: The project I did was called “Towns and Cities” and introduced me to a sound from scratch. I do think Europe is leading the way in this revival.
the concept that I could make a living in music! I think that was the first ANP: I think analog synthesizers appeal to players and listeners
time I was paid. on many levels but what one can add to those now is a sense
ANP: You did sound effects for the original Stepford Wives? Did of cultural memory—one that draws on Classical Minimalism,
you care for any of the soundtrack work that you heard around Cosmic Synth Music, German Synth Pop, John Carpenter films,
that time? what have you. There is certainly a trend toward nostalgia—
SC: I was not much of a film buff at that time—I was busy just surviving sometimes with an ironic glint, sometimes with an earnest
in New York City. But historically, I’ve always loved the scores of fascination with the process and the sound. What do you think
Bernard Hermann. of contemporary producers pursuing the sound/approach to
ANP: Had you been familiar with Finders Keepers? One of my synthesis you were working with 30 years ago?
favorite pieces from Lixiviation, “Clean Room,” reminds me of SC: I think it’s wonderful and I hope that this time around the full promise
some Sound Library music of the era. Did you always work by of electronic music is not “short-circuited” again. I remember that once
commission with particular companies or did you ever make a black and white keyboard was made part of the instruments, in order
recordings for Sound Library labels? to make the machines seem more familiar and “musical,” the future was
SC: It was a great surprise for me to be contacted by B-Music/Finders lost. And we also suffered the demise of quadraphonic sound, which was
Keepers Records. I was not familiar with them, but soon realized that they perfect for electronic music, but otherwise made little sense. So hopefully
occupy a unique niche. They are very passionate about discovering lost this time around spatial control will come back and new interfaces will
worlds and it has been a privilege to work with them, which happily lead make “playing” the machines more organic. But we do need women in
me to discover long-abandoned, though not forgotten, tapes in my vaults. this endeavor. Really! Women can bypass the obvious and find the true
I have always worked by commission. I do vaguely recall in the early 1970s, sensuality of this medium.
when I first arrived in Los Angeles, being locked in someone’s studio with
my Buchla to create a syndicated radio ID package for a Philadelphia Radio
station. I did background music for good weather, bad weather, heavy
traffic, news, etc. But basically I was a gun for hire in the advertising world,
where I worked as a mercenary artist to make the money to produce my
artistic albums.
ANP: Didn’t you create some crazy sounds for a Kung Fu Film?
SC: That does trigger some vague memory, but too vague to be able to
amplify upon!
ANP: How did you first link up with Atari?
SC: My company in New York, Ciani-Musica, Inc., became the number
one hi-tech music production house. The Atari agency was Young &
Rubicam and the music director, Hunter Murtaugh, was a big fan and
hired us for many major campaigns, including Merrill Lynch and Lincoln
Mercury. Atari provided us with one of their games and from that I took the
“vocabulary” of the sounds, recreating them into a track for the TV spots.
I also was featured in an educational film Atari made for schools called
“Computers: Expressway to Tomorrow,” in which I demonstrated sound
design techniques. I was never very good at playing the games, though.
ANP: In your description of the piece “Second Breath” you
say you always referred to a synthesizer as “the machine” not
“the synthesizer” because “it had strange and inappropriate
connotations.” Can you explain what you meant?
SC: The term “synthesizer” was unfortunate, because it had connotations
of “synthetic” or “imitation.” Many people thought the purpose of such
a machine was to replicate existing acoustic instruments, like flutes
or strings, etc. This was definitely nothing I wanted to do. In fact, the
musician’s union in New York was so wary of “synthesizers” that they were
not allowed in the union, the fear being that “real” musicians would be
replaced and made obsolete. To discourage the use of these evil machines,
the union required that synth players be paid double scale and paid again
with each overdub. This, of course, benefitted me. Don Buchla had first
made me aware of the inappropriateness of the synthesizer term: he never
ever called his instruments synthesizers, but “electronic music boxes.” It
was important to establish the instrument as a new and independent
possibility and not something derivative.
ANP: In 1979, you started recording what would be Seven
Waves and you became one of New Age music’s early success
stories. Certain elements of Seven Waves remind me of
Vangelis, who you knew, right? Were you privy to the “Cosmic
Synth” music coming from Germany and Japan and elsewhere
in the 1970s—I’m thinking of Popol Vuh, Cluster, Eno, Deuter,
Tangerine Dream, Kitaro and the many smaller label artists.
SC: I met Vangelis during the recording of my second album, The Velocity
of Love. I met him first in London and then in New York. He overdubbed
percussion and CS-80 melodies on three of the cuts. He was larger than life
and so amazingly musical. Oh my. And yes, I knew of Tangerine Dream and
Kitaro and Tomita and Eno but did not know Popol Vul or Deuter.
ANP: Have you caught wind of the renewed interest in this
music over the past few years, with increasing numbers of young
people making music with synths and sequencers?
SC: Yes, I’m actually just becoming aware of this and I think it is because
there is a new generation of kids that are just beginning to realize that there
was an analog world prior to the digital world. Analog was very hands on
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Shakespeare
and Company Lisa Rovner
images COURTESY SHAKESPEARE AND COMPANY
Jerry Seinfeld says, “A bookstore is one of the only pieces of evidence we have that people a saint among his books, lending them, housing penniless friends upstairs, not eager to sell,
are still thinking.” in the back of the store, in a small overcrowded room, with a desk, a small stove. All those
who come for books remain to talk, while George tries to write letters, to open his mail,
The Kate Tempest poetry reading I recently attended at the Shakespeare and Company order books. A tiny, unbelievable staircase, circular, leads to his bedroom, or the communal
bookstore in Paris supports this position. The bookshop was jam-packed with people bedroom, where he expected Henry Miller and other visitors to stay.”
who seemed utterly consumed by thought. Outside, a speaker amplified the young British Readings and meetings would take place regularly in the back room of the store. Legend has
poet’s voice. It was full of resonance. A group of us stood silently still, listening carefully it that it was at Le Mistral that William Burroughs’ Naked Lunch was “written,” sourcing
as Tempest declared: material from Whitman’s personal library. It was also where the book was first read in
“Look, we’re not flesh, public. From its inception and still to this day, the bookshop has hosted countless readings,
We’re all energy courses and debates. Back in the day, these were often followed by a communal meal
I care about genius prepared by Whitman himself.
I don’t care about celebrity In 1964, Whitman renamed the bookshop Shakespeare and Company, in celebration of
We only build them up Sylvia Beach’s legendary bookstore and lending library with the same name. Beach, an
To burn their effigies expatriate from New Jersey, had befriended, guided, supported, and lent books to the first
And there’s more generation of expat writers, among them Ernest Hemingway, Ezra Pound, and James Joyce.
And I can feel it so raw She famously published Joyce’s Ulysses in 1922, when no one else would. Her store became
And it’s calling me back to before.” the home of literary culture and modernism in Paris. These writers, also known as the
“Lost Generation,” had come to Paris in search of beauty, culture and permissive attitudes,
In the ‘60s, at this very same location, Allen Ginsberg had recited his infamous poem and had found refuge at Beach’s Shakespeare and Company. When the Second World War
Howl. I imagined the audience then, I wondered if they too had felt like privileged hit Paris, Beach was forced to close down, and despite the rumor that Hemingway had
witnesses, as I did now? I noticed the blooming cherry blossom tree in front of the shop “liberated” the bookstore at the end of the war, she never reopened.
was already loosing its petals. “Wait,” I told the tree. Behind it, just across the river, the Beach’s literary oasis was the inspiration and model to Whitman’s “rag and bone shop of the
Notre Dame Cathedral towered as Tempest’s voice continued to provoke: heart” as he called it, and so when she died, he renamed the bookstore after hers. Whitman
“…I don’t care about the surface would later describe the bookstore›s name as “a novel in three words.” I always liked the
I care about the infinite sound of that.
I carve a niche
And I hide within it
I lay down in the garden of your spirit
Asking pardon from the elders
They tell me, Kate,
Every minute is the minute to begin it…”
Shakespeare and Company was opened in 1951 by an American, George Whitman, but
originally under a different name: Le Mistral. Le mistral is a French regional wind but
the bookstore was in fact named after Whitman’s first French love. A conversation with
Lawrence Ferlinghetti about the importance of free-thinking bookshops and a 500 dollar
inheritance prompted Whitman, who was studying in Paris thanks to the GI Bill, to buy a
bankrupt grocery on the Left Bank at 37 rue de la Bucherie, meters away from kilometer
zero, the official center of Paris. As Whitman explained: “Like many of my compatriots
I am something of a tumbleweed drifting in the wind. I drifted into bookselling for no
better reason than a passion for books except for the classical reason of all booksellers
who are self employed because they doubt if anyone else would employ them.”
Very quickly, the English language bookstore became the nucleus for Anglophone literary
culture in bohemian Paris, attracting many expat writers from Henry Miller to James
Baldwin to the Beat Generation writers, Allen Ginsberg, Gregory Corso, and William
S. Burroughs. As Anaïs Nin recorded in her Paris diaries of the 1950s: “And there by
the Seine was the bookshop... an Utrillo house, not too steady on its foundations, small
windows, wrinkled shutters. And there was George Whitman, undernourished, bearded,
The bookstore is of course many novels in 3 words. The shop’s walls are entirely apartment above the bookshop. He had suffered a stroke two months earlier. According to
covered from floor to ceiling in books. Downstairs, on the main floor, you have all the bookstore’s website, he “showed incredible strength and determination up to the end,
the new and used books that are for sale. Science, French history, philosophy, fiction, continuing to read every day in the company of his daughter, Sylvia, his friends and his
non fiction, art, cooking, science fiction, mysteries, world history, biography and all cat and dog.” While he is no longer seen, his spirit remains, thanks to Sylvia, who has been
the way in the back, next to the music and cinema section, in it’s very own room, presiding over the bookshop since 2004. While she has brought the place some modernity,
lies the poetry section. A wooden staircase leads up to the children’s section and 2 repair and polish, she has managed to do so without altering any of its charm or character.
more rooms, filled with books that are not for sale, but for reading. The library is a Sylvia was born in 1981 and spent her early years in the bookshop with her father. She
collection of Whitman’s books. Many are them are first editions, many of them are remembers the bookstore being theatrical and the beautiful pictures of her as a child,
signed, and all of them are interesting. A typewriter hidden in a small alcove invites dispersed throughout the shop, capture a time full of laughter, light and books. After
visitors to write, and leave a poem. A piano in the other room wishes for nothing university, where she studied drama, in an attempt to reconnect with her estranged father,
more than to be played by all, regardless of talent, but most of all, upstairs in the she returned to Paris and started working beside him in the bookshop. While she had no
library rooms, you find readers browsing, reading and writing. intention to stay longer than a summer, sure enough, she fell in love with the bookstore
Beyond just selling books, the bookstore’s history is punctuated with publications. and is now gracefully running the show. George Whitman is quoted on the outside of the
The first was an avant-garde literary magazine called Merlin that published 7 issues, shop: ”In the year 1600 our whole building was a monastery called la Maison du Mustier.
between 1952 and 1954. Merlin was the first to bring light to Samuel Beckett’s In medieval times each monastery had a frère lumpier whose duty was to light the lamps
writing. The second, the Paris Magazine, which Whitman dubbed “The Poor Man’s at nightfall. I have been doing this for fifty years now it’s my daughter’s turn.”
Paris Review”, was first published in 1967 when the bookshop was closed down by She is dedicated to keeping the bookshop’s philosophy intact and also importantly,
the French authorities because the store’s papers were not in order. The first issue to making it relevant again. Since she’s taken hold of the torch, she has created a
included works by Laurence Durrell, Allen Ginsberg, Jean Paul Sartre, an interview literary festival, a literary prize, all the while continuing to host Monday night readings,
with Marguerite Duras and pictures of Vietnam at war. Only 3 issues were to see the Wednesday night performances, Saturday workshops for writers and Sunday tea with the
light under his direction. As Whitman remarked ”I am ready to admit I may have no Mad Hatter, Pam. It’s bustling more than ever and with the right kind of electricity.
more vocation as an editor than as a bookseller and will gracefully resign if someone Shakespeare and Company is a place that reminds you of the power of dreams and
like Mary McCarty would like to be it’s editor and financier.” In June 2010, more generosity. People now come from around the world to bath in the Whitman family
than 40 years after the first issue was published, Sylvia Beach Whitman, George magic, leaving their mark with love notes and poems that completely cover the wall in the
Whitman’s daughter, and Fatema Ahmed, the former editor of Granta magazine, children’s section, also known as “the mirror of love”.
published the 4th edition. The new issue’s theme is storytelling and politics, and In 1997, the French Ministry of culture declared Shakespeare and Company as one of the
includes works from Luc Sante, Michel Houellebecq, Rivka Galchen and many historic monuments of Paris. It’s not only a monument but also “a monastery of the word,”
others, and is illustrated with memorabilia from the bookshop as well as drawings as one tumbleweed poet put it. It has become, as George Whitman had always wanted, an
from Daniel Arsham, Nigel Peake and Gregory Blackstock. institution. And thanks to Sylvia, the sanctuary is here to stay.
Over the decades, thousands of writers have lived in the shop. As Sylvia recounts George, bless your soul. And Sylvia, thank you for hiring me when I needed work and most
“George always welcomed traveling writers or tumbleweeds as he affectionately importantly, thank you for keeping the dream alive for all of us to experience. Shakespeare
called them to bunk up between the rows of books.” The bookstore website boasts and Company is open every day of the year, even on Christmas, from 10am to 11pm on
that more than 40,000 writers have lived in the shop, some staying for just one weekdays and 11am to11pm on weekends.
night, others for as long 6 years, evidence gathered by the one page biographies each
visitor is asked to write. On the 2d floor, if you look carefully, you’ll see the writers’
makeshift “beds” that double as benches during business hours. As one journalist
“The bookstore
put it, “The deal then is the deal now: sleep in the shop, on tiny beds hidden among
the book stacks; work for two hours a day helping out with the running of the place;
and, crucially, read a book a day, whatever you like, but all the way through, unless
in which dreams
maybe it’s War and Peace, in which case you can take two days.” To this day, the
Tumbleweed Hotel’s creed remains: “Give what you can, take what you need.” And
as the writing on the bookshop wall proclaims: “Be not inhospitable to strangers, lest
come true.”
they be angels in disguise.”
Whitman described his bookshop as “a socialist utopia masquerading as a bookstore”.
On one of the walls in the bookshop, a drawing insists: “My country is the world, my
religion is humanity.” While Whitman often said he was a communist, in reality he
was a humanist, in other words, an optimist who believed in people. On December
14th, 2011, two days after his 98th birthday, Whitman passed away at home in the
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MARK COHEN by AARON ROSE
IMAGES COURTESY THE ARTIST AND ROSE GALLERY, SANTA MONICA
(opposite)
Mark Cohen in Flash Tee Shirt,
Photograph by Harold Jones,
Tucson, Arizona,1977
The world of contemporary photography can be so purse-snatcher than that of a contemporary photographer
predictable at times that it is always an honor to be able to and his style is immediately evident in the final images.
explore the work of a legend. That excitement is exaggerated In the photographs, his subjects often turn their heads,
when it is the work of someone whose oeuvre is not as run away or throw their hands up in self-defense. The end
widely known as others in their field. You can imagine my result is a completely unique take on the human condition.
elation then, when Mark Cohen agreed to participate in The reluctance, shyness, and sometimes fear in the faces of
this feature. It’s not that Cohen hasn’t has his fair share of those he shoots give us a glimpse into their inner lives. It is
acclaim in photography circles, it’s just that due to his unique interesting to note, however, that even though the means to
approach to image-making and his refusal to live in a large the end may be obtrusive to personal space, there is a subtle
cosmopolitan city, he has somehow managed to maintain poetry in his final images that rarely illustrate this violence.
certain a purity in his image-making that others from his Cohen is simply catching people on the sly, at times slightly
generation have not. Mark Cohen was born in 1943 in Wilkes- voyeuristic, but always extremely honest. In all of my years
Barre, Pennsylvania and with the exception of a small stint of following photography I have never seen a photographer
in Europe, he has continued to live there his whole life. The who shoots like Cohen. Often using a wide-angle lens and
majority of the work for which Cohen is known has been shot flash, he frequently crops the subjects’ heads from the
in the neighborhoods of this and surrounding towns, bringing frame. He concentrates his lens instead on small details and
a highly unique backdrop to the works of a photographer moments. In the process he has created a signature look
who spares no intimacy in order to capture his pictures. Like that is unmistakably his. Though quite beautiful, Cohen’s
other photographers from his generation, Cohen worked for pictures are often unsettling. They show us a world filled
many years as a portrait photographer. His days were spent with anxieties, fears, dreams and desires. There is a sense
shooting catalogues, portraits and children at his studio in of humor in his work, but it is always subtle and though his
Wilkes-Barre. However, his approach to his personal work shooting methods might be intrusive, it is obvious that he
could not be more different from the slick commercialism has enormous respect for his subjects. Yes, Cohen invades
of the studio. Out in the streets, Cohen becomes a one-man what would otherwise be considered people’s private worlds.
documentary machine. He can be seen out walking for hours However the results of this invasion act like secret glimpses
in search of the truth of the human story. His technique is into moments that are not unlike those of our own. They are
also completely original in street photography. Part thief, archetypical images of the human condition as seen through
part dancer, characteristically Cohen shoots in close up. He the eyes of the most common man. Like a mirror they reflect
approaches his subjects quickly, racing forward, coming in back at us the things we may all be seeing anyway, but with
very tight and then in the blink of an eye, snaps his picture a sense of style, grace and downright chutzpah that we could
and exits the scene. His shooting method is more akin to a only dream to possess.
RVCA .COM / 37
Aaron Rose: When did you first pick a portfolio to IIT in Chicago and was going to Spain and so I stayed in Wilkes- Three Boys Posing,1975
up a camera? accepted but it was very expensive so Barre and in that way I made, almost
(opposite & clockwise from top left)
Mark Cohen: When I was about twelve, instead I studied engineering at Penn State. unconsciously, a very unusual body of Girl with Bat and Ball,1977
my cousin Sylvia gave me a black plastic There I took some great art history classes, work. I went out to take pictures almost
Boy in Yellow Shirt Smoking, 1977
camera. It took 127 film. I had trouble, which were important because they made everyday. I went into the “projects” part of
at first, loading the tank, so I got the film art a more visible thing. That combined this little city and made an original kind People on Porch: 65, 63, 1977
developed at the drug store. Then the with the little I knew about Cartier-Bresson of picture there. I kept getting closer and
Legs and Boy in Pool, 1977
enlarging was done in the cellar. My father resulted in a mix that set photography closer to the subjects. Then I was in my
helped me make a darkroom there and my high in my mind. Street photography first museum show called, “Vision and Shirtless Boy with Chain, 1975
uncle showed me how to use the enlarger. and symbolism working together to trip Expression” in Rochester in 1968. That
AR: What was it about photography the unconscious. led to my being in the first group of
that initially hooked you? AR: What are the pros and cons of photographers to exhibit in the LIGHT
MC: I was hooked on it right away. teaching yourself? gallery. This was in the early days of
Everyday. When I was young I jumped MC: The main con was that there was no “Photography in New York.” There were
off my grandmother’s back porch and supporting cast of professors to establish only three galleries showing photography
took pictures as I went down, just to see a credential. An Ivy-league MFA is still at the time. If I had figured out a way to
what those looked like. Maybe it was the taken pretty seriously in Chelsea. The main live there I think I would have been in
darkroom? The sense of magic in the “pro” was that I could go very fast alone. some state of hyper-distractedness! There
dark or in the orange light. The pictures There was no politic to endure. I taught is so much going on. Out here there is
emerging from the blank paper must have some grad level courses for a while and the nothing. I work in an isolated situation
had an effect on me too and then there critique time, the discussions, the built- but see a lot of the work. If I lived in Paris
was the feeling of positioning myself in in audience, formed the basis of a whole or New York I can’t imagine that I would
the world. I made the picture, I was the tricked out aesthetic for each student have made these same pictures. It is as if I
actual focal point. By the time I could and teacher. Photos are put up and an am working in a studio the size of Luzerne
drive I was taking pictures for the local amazing defensiveness sets in. All kinds of County and Lackawanna County (Scranton,
newspaper and under each one was a theories are then attached to each student’s PA) and I can stop the car in alignment
credit line. Then, while I was still in high pictures. It’s color-roll film one semester with my mood. The pictures can only take
school, I saw The Decisive Moment (Henri and black and white 35mm the next. So a on a certain psychological depth if they
Cartier-Bresson’s highly influential 1952 distinct personality gets lost in format and are made at hand; it is not travel
book of photographs) and understood it. media changes. photography. In New York and Paris
It was very important to have that book AR: Why have you stayed in Wilkes- every sight is so fresh. Here I know where
as a model. I got a Leica M-3 and then Barre? Do you think you would be a each dog is barking.
had some of the pictures published in a different photographer if you lived AR: Who are your biggest
local magazine. Then I went to Penn State somewhere like New York or Paris? photographic influences?
and was the yearbook photographer and MC: I like New York City but never could MC: Cartier-Bresson, William Klein,
exhibited there and then I went to Spain. see how to live there. So I started a photo Robert Frank, Kodulka and Winogrand.
Just like Henri Cartier-Bresson. studio in Wilkes-Barre. I mostly took AR: How much is proximity
AR: You’re self-taught...did you ever portraits of children. Black and white important to you in photography?
consider school? 16X20’s were my main item and I did MC: The proximity is very important. I
MC: Yes. As a high school senior I took that for forty years. I was not able to keep can just go out the door and start to work.
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Red Fence,1987 AR: Though you have a very Is there a distinction between MC: I think art in a room with one door
original and signature style, your the ways you shoot people vs. is the best way to ‘get it.’ Something
(opposite & clockwise from top left)
Shoe and Ankle, Mexico City,1981 work is easily grouped with the inanimate objects? like an aesthetic pressure chamber.
images of William Eggleston and MC: It is much, much safer to A white room, with white mattes and
Ring, 1974
Steven Shore. Do you consider photograph an object. There is no white frames, and then in this setting
Woman Wipes Porch, 1974 them your contemporaries? harmful personal trespass. Still if you there are a series of pictures that have
MC: We are in the same time and I am make an object’s picture in the rain or at been made from a selected group of
Young Girl at Beach, 1977
grouped with them because of the color night or on the run then those elements negatives and this is the way to see the
Teens with Car, 1973 film. My color work has become a lot of atmosphere or disturbance are point of the photographer’s work. A
better known because of the dye transfer encountered in some unexplained way. simple book of the same pictures works
portfolio and its exhibition in LA. at the It is hard to imagine sneaking up on a in the same way. There is the intimacy
Rose Gallery and from the website of piece of broken glass, but if it is in an of the undistracted first sight. It has
the George Eastman House. I just don’t abandoned building it is a little like theft the same excitement of the frame in
think we make the same pictures. We are and this can give the picture a visible lift. the dark movie theater. The screen is
all driven different ways. Different levels AR: You mentioned that you the fixed part of the experience in the
of psychological heat. are a fan of William Klein. Have same way that the pictures are lined up
AR: There’s a photograph of yours you ever considered fashion on the walls or sequenced in the pages.
titled “Young Girl at the Beach.” photography? An iPhone photo moving from phone
There is something so beautiful yet MC: I always thought I could do fashion to phone or screen to screen makes a
sad about her face in that photo. photography and looked at Vogue silver print look like a Vermeer. I live in
Can you tell me a bit about that for years but it is a thing that is only a house with a darkroom and can still
image? possible in a city. Plus it is a thing that get all the materials overnight from New
MC: That picture was taken in requires lots of people cooperating York so the whole digital revolution is
Mantoloking, New Jersey. The girl is and that is just not what I am able to only alongside me. I work in exactly the
walking by and sees the camera and is understand. same way but keep a little more distant
naturally shy and maybe frightened, too, AR: You spoke about how the web from the subject. Now I use mostly a
and as she goes by I take the picture. contains billions of photographic 50mm lens.
She keeps her head and eyes down and images. It is almost as though AR: Have you ever shot a photo
this is a very natural reaction. The steps photography is slowly becoming you regretted?
on the right leading to the dark porch simply a way of exchanging MC: Yes. Once about ten years ago I took
balance this out as if it is all about a trap information...somehow devoid of a picture of a kid playing with a truck
of some kind. Punishment and guilt are artistic expression. This landscape in the dirt in his front yard. I was just
in the air. is so different from when you walking along the sidewalk. His mother
AR: In addition to images of started taking pictures. In your was on the porch, watching at the time,
people, you also focus quite often opinion, how does this affect the and she called the police. It was Kafka
on architectural details or small way our culture views the art form. for a year.
glimpses of the smaller worlds Has it influenced the way you
around us. For instance your approach your recent photography
wonderful photo of broken glass. at all?
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CLARE ROJAS
by Chris Lux / Portraits by damon way
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RVCA /A NP QUA RT E RLY / 48
(prior page)
Untitled, 2012
Oil on linen, 60x48 in.
Courtesy the artist
Untitled, 2012
Oil on linen, 60x48 in.
Courtesy the artist
Untitled, 2012
Oil on linen, 60x48 in.
Courtesy the artist
(prior page)
Untitled, 2012
Oil on linen, 60x48 in.
Courtesy the artist
Chris Lux: Your new abstract works and new portraiture works interesting experiment for me and I learned a lot. This idea manifested out of
I saw in your studio the other day seem like big departures. That the animation called “the manipulators” where I collaborated with Andrew
said, they still use a language that is present in your older paintings. Jeffery Wright while living in Philly. We animated fashion magazines, in a very
Almost like the figurative elements and the abstract elements of juvenile funny way, and this satirical laughter was one remedy to breaking
your past work have separated and demanded your full attention. the spell these images had on women and men. It was fun to take their power
How did you get to these paintings? away by just simply making someone fart. All of a sudden you were not looking
Clare Rojas: Here is an appropriate narrative from, ‘The Wisdom of No Escape at a complex advertisement that embodied manipulation and consumption
by Pema Chodron’ that seems to sum it up for me. There is a story of a woman or a model selling perfume half naked and starving. You were laughing at a
running away from tigers. She runs and runs, and the tigers are getting closer massive animated fart explosion coming from her bum. My politics were in
and closer. When she comes to the edge of a cliff, she sees some vines. Looking place, and I took it further in these paintings of just naked men. I basically
down, she sees that there are tigers below her as well. She then notices that wanted to see what it felt like to see all the ads of women in submissive stupid
a mouse is gnawing away at the vine to which she is clinging. She also sees degrading positions plastered on buses, billboards, TV ads, magazines, all
a beautiful little bunch of strawberries close to her, growing out of a clump men, naked in those positions. Would it be socially acceptable then? Would I
of grass. She looks up and she takes a strawberry, puts it in her mouth, and think less of men? The problem was, the majority of men’s vulnerability did
enjoys it thoroughly. not lie in their bodies, like it does for women. A silly drawing of them naked,
CL: How important do you feel it is for artists at every stage in their is not going to take away the fact that men run our country, are the majority
career to be able to follow new paths and reinvent themselves? on the supreme court, get paid 30% more than women. It was like fighting
Phillip Guston’s infamous 1970 show at the Marlborough Gallery fire with a flower. I found most women didn’t really want to wear the t-shirts I
has always served as big inspiration for me. He was shunned after made out of these drawings, they didn’t find my humor that funny, and if they
that show because it marked a change in his work, from abstract did, it was a select few, maybe women felt empathy, maybe the pain goes so
expressionism into more figurative approach. Your new work deep that it doesn’t matter who is in the image, what is reflected is the same. I
seems much less of a departure, but still a change. Do you ever feel was even told to try drawing from porn by a professor in graduate school.
like change in artist’s practice can be extremely difficult? But this is the entire point - this wasn’t derived from porn, from an extreme,
CR: How could someone’s lifetime not change their work or their practice? this wasn’t about sex. This was about sexuality, what it means to be a female
How could the arch of time not change your perspective, your influence, your human, or male human, a pornified mainstream, every-minute-of-everyday
growth and personal truth? I don’t know that it’s possible for change to NOT bombardment, brainwashing, social conditioning. It was a trivial response. But
be reflected in your work. Change is the only thing one can do. I also think at least it was a response. The conversation CAN NOT BE ONE-SIDED and it
most respectable galleries, support the artist no matter what manifests in their felt that way to me. Men got a kick out of it. Not one man I knew was offended
work, and if they don’t support the artists then they usually they part ways. I by these images. Yet when I saw a man wearing some stupid t-shirt of some
think that is true for any relationship. I also think that people just miss what topless woman peeing, wasted, or something, and yes I have seen this, I am
they don’t have anymore...and if someone stops making something you like, traumatized. I feel physical pain, and hurt and sadness. I can’t understand why
one feels loss. they would want to engage in that violent display of objectification, even if she
CL: From the sheer size of your work, to performing music on is doing it to her self. Did they feel this was a great way to define masculinity?
stage, not to mention the “controversial” naked men paintings, I I made myself laugh, that was it, and at the time, I needed to laugh or I was
must say you don’t seem to be afraid of much in your practice. You constantly crying. Performance, Peggy (Honeywell - Rojas’ stage name), a
seem so comfortable following your way. Have you always been stage, it was a challenge for me, still is. But the idea, the visual, of a woman in a
able to feel so comfortable? Was there anyone or work that you world she created on her terms, full of women who fight, are warriors, support
remember really strengthening your drive? each other and have the entire wisdom of the women who came before them,
CR: I think at a very early age I had a sense that what my friends were feeling, standing alone, singing narratives about pain, loss, love, resilience. That was
a carefree, experimental, innocence, I was not feeling. I had more feelings power. I wanted to own my world. I was going to stand and sing because I was
of protection, anger and frustration, and knowledge of a darker harsher fortunate enough to have a voice for us all, and I wasn’t going to take any of
reality. As I grew up into my late 20s, I watched people a lot. I was very quiet. that for granted.
My personal library expanded and I read a lot of feminist literature. I had CL: Narrative has been a big a part of your work for a long
a motivation that was about survival, and trying my best to protect myself time. From the narrative paintings, to your music career, writing
from being shut up, let down, and objectified. Being angry is very powerful, and story telling seem to be a driving force in all your work. It feels
fear, also, to say the least, can be powerful. I feel like for a brief moment in like with this new work maybe you have become the protagonist
my career I was able to harness those emotions and use them for good. But now? Can you talk about how narrative has and continues to
for now, I feel like the woman about to be eaten by the tigers, I fought a good influence you and how that factors into your abstract works?
fight, the outcome, meaning death, is inevitable. I might as well enjoy the CR: I have always been attracted to narrative. I love all forms. Everything is a
strawberries. The body of work that you refer to as “naked men” was a very story. Somewhere along the way, I developed a coping mechanism that helped
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Untitled, 2012
Oil on linen, 96x120 in.
Courtesy the artist
(opposite)
Untitled, 2012
Oil on linen, 96x120 in.
Courtesy the artist
Untitled, 2012
Oil on linen, 96x120 in.
Courtesy the artist
me navigate hard situations. When found in one, usually any social situation that then become abstracted or do you feel like they start off
for me, I pretend I am watching a T.V. show. Real people become character abstracted and then find semi-familiar forms? Can you talk about
actors and the script is already written. The shift in my painting practice your process of working abstractly and how you come up with
came after a two-year period where I just stopped painting. I couldn’t these compositions?
paint anymore. I was burned out and my story, my personal narrative was CR: My approach to every piece depends on my intention. With Red Black
destroying me, and everything around me, my marriage, my home, my Yellow for example, my intention was to express a balance, a harmony with
friendships. I rejected hair, cut mine very short, no make up, nothing that push and pull in one composition in its simplest form. Sometimes I think
made me feel like I gave in to what “they wanted me to be”. My story was, it’s like writing songs, sometimes the lyrics come first and the music follows,
the world is a dark dangerous place for women, everywhere you go, someone or sometimes the music forms the feeling I write words to. Sometimes it
wants to destroy you and de-humanize you, take away your rights. My story happens all at once.
was that I had to fight for everything. I decided to write. It started out as CL: In your painting, Blue Light C. Crop, I can’t help but be
me writing a T.V. show. I got so many books on how to do this, and became reminded of Nighthawks, by Edward Hopper. The composition
frustrated. I took a class on line from Stanford continuing studies. This was is so reminiscent of that painting, however the void is even more
the ah-ha moment for me. A turning point. I was in control of my story in a pronounced. Had you thought of that painting at all? Do you ever
different more profound way. And if I wanted to change my perspective, I use other paintings a reference points or do your compositions
could. If I wanted to have memories I could, or re-write history. It was all up come about more naturally? I find this painting to hint at absence,
to me. I know this may sound simple, and lame, especially since I thought I the way the light blue, yellow and orange bars are so boxed in.
was in control in the past, but this was finally something I understood in my However you can look at the composition in another way as well,
bones. I would sit for hours in my house, which is where I worked, alone and almost like a flag, the grey bar as the pole and the stripes of color
shut out. I became a bit of a recluse, sorting this shit out. as a flag. Is it important for people to be able to see these works in
I stopped surfing, and ran instead because I could be alone. I wrote, I wrote multiple ways?
my life out. One of the exercises the teacher had us do was to take out all CR: I don’t like to reference other paintings. The only time I do this is for
the nouns. He was illustrating how important the person place or thing portraiture to study the way the old masters handle that little puddle of
was, and how boring a story was if you did not give this enough description. light in the corner of someone’s mouth, or in their tear duct. I can’t help but
But I found that what I had left was this amazing backdrop, this abstract reference architecture though, and literature and the way space is described.
place. The spaces in between the story we tell our selves and what is left? I This piece was all about the source of light. The way your eye followed
wanted to explore this space. I explored it domestically first, politics always layered color and space to get there. I don’t even think about people seeing
start in the home, and I wasn’t comfortable giving up that yet. The domestic these works, not when I’m painting them.
space. It begins to fold in on you, the space becomes a character, sometimes CL: Many of your old works were created with house paint, acrylic
harmonious, sometimes betraying, or oppressive. I had to keep pushing and gouache. These new paintings are solely oil, can you tell us
further until I didn’t tell myself a story anymore, and I could only see shape about what its like for using oil paints and how you think has
and color. It was like a narrative cleanse. influenced these pieces?
CL: Looking at the piece, Red Black Yellow I see it as CR: I wanted to capture light and shadow, and get the most saturated hues.
autobiographical, yet autonomous as a formal painting. The Nothing compares to oil. I used to paint in oils a long time ago...I am coming
colors are primary and the shapes reference folk art, are quilt-like back to something I used to know. The other thing about oil is the time you
in their placement. Upon further noticing, it moves away from have to spend with a piece. It’s a different kind of time. With oils there is
historical, folk references and fold in on itself. There is motion in less control and you can set out with a plan and the oils are more alive and
the blocks and they seem to shake, the white sliver cutting into the have a different temperament. You have to coddle the process. With acrylic
center red square gives it an uneasy tilt. The dark red “L” shape and gouache, I had a formula that worked and worked fast. Fast isn’t as
in the foreground attempts to ground the painting, yet the white important to me right now.
and grey in the center make all the other shapes hover above it. It CL: Geometric patterns and shapes have always featured pretty
flattens space while using shapes that slowly give off an unsettling heavily in your work along side powerful figurative images. With
depth. The tunnel effect created doesn’t stop at any location, the figures removed and geometry taken center stage it becomes
your eyes move all over its surface. Was your construction of the more playful and more open. Less like you have some message
shapes quickly laid out or did you come back in and make changes to convey to people and more like you are exploring your world.
to them in order to add a vibration to the whole painting? Can you With the large size of these paintings its almost as if you and the
talk about your choice of colors for this piece? viewers are the figurative elements that featured so prominently
CR: Red Black Yellow is actually a simmered down version of the pastel in your works from a few years ago. Do you ever feel like you are
piece. It’s a reduction of the pastel piece, which is derived from a domestic creating an actual space for yourself within these works at all or is
space. I like to stare at space, until everything becomes one surface, and it all more removed than that?
there is always a moment out of the corner of my eye when I see a shift, or CR: These are all about space. I remember once cleaning out our very
shake, something moving. I want to capture that life. The yellow is the light, cluttered kind of hoardy living room. I made a space that was just for space
the core and fire. There is always a source of light that is like a magnet for sake. I told my husband and daughter it was a sacred space and NOTHING
more light. I love red, black, yellow and various grays. These are the perfect WAS TO GO THERE. That space was held, and commanded respect as
colors to me. When I want to reduce a piece to its essence I rely heavily on if it was an armoire or table. I since have put some chairs there, because
this palette. But I love all colors. Squeezing a tube of paint, any color and the space was being exploited, but it’s clear of anything. It’s my space. I
mixing it to perfection is the same feeling I get when I am eating chocolate. am exploring my space, my world, without the story I had in my past. And
CL: Do you feel like these pieces are still informed by it’s wonderful. There is so much beauty I feel I have missed, just seeing
representation? Do you approach them as familiar forms things for what they are, out of my head. Changing my story, seeking out
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the strawberries, enjoying what I can when I can, changing what because they don’t have to. I am just free from my own self-
I can and not taking it personal when I can’t change something imposed rules. I am trying hard to not be concerned with other
or someone. It’s not my job. My job is to live my life in the best people’s preferences or politics, I am trying to not live in the past,
way I can. My mom said to me while making this work “Clare, an be present with every color, shape and composition. I am trying.
empowered woman, is a happy one—forgiving, empathetic, open, These works are my practice.
at peace.” CL: You have worked a lot with large-scale installation.
CL: There is this painting of yours called Lightning, It’s Your amazing show at the Craft and Folk museum in
one my favorites for sure. I don’t know why it feels really San Francisco in 2010 comes to mind as well as your
punk to me, in like a Belgian new wave kind of way. show at Prism Gallery in Los Angeles in 2011. How does
It’s so “Modernist.” It reminds me of some of the Les installation factor into your process? Do you come up
Disques du Crepuscule record covers designed by Benoit with a total idea of what the space will look like and then
Hennebert in the 1980s. It’s some of my favorite art. The create the paintings or is it more organic and use the
fluctuating green and white bars have such a great stance installation to further the depth of the individual works?
on the canvass and almost look they are standing pigeon Where do the paintings end and installation begin?
toed. The painting seems tough. Like it just came out, CR: These two spaces in particular were amazing to work with
done. The black line with grey stripe beside it gives it just architecturally. The people there were amazing to work with
the tiniest bit of depth. Can you talk about what you were also. These were at the beginnings of my transition so I still took
thinking when you painted it? Do you ever find yourself into account the space I was transforming as whole. Every space
coping an attitude at a painting you’re working on? I is so different. But usually I feel a space has a beginning, middle
always know a painting is going well for me when I just and ends that taper off. At the MOCFA in San Francisco and Prism
start cracking up, like, “Whose is painting this? What is gallery in Los Angeles, the architectural spaces really allowed me
going on?” to create connectedness through perspective if one stood at my
CR: This is one of my favorites too, and this painting took me the height. The lines of the paintings would align and connect into
longest to sketch out. I was having physical anxiety painting this one flat space. During my performance the lines on my dress
piece, like I was going to mess it up. The yellow is magnetizing connected to the lines I painted behind where I stood, everything
the other yellow because there is space to do, to attract itself and connected if you could see from my point of view. From my height.
become even more powerful. This one got a little “narrative-y”, as CL: So what are your plans for the future with painting?
if the colors are like different characters. I sometimes feel ornery In your studio it looks like you are having a lot of fun
when I’m painting, and my instinct is to hide certain pieces where with these. Where do see your work headed and do you
I feel rebellious from people because I think I did something have any projects coming up that you are excited about?
wrong. I swear by the time I am 80, if I am around that long, I will CR: I am just painting as much as possible and I am having so
be burying my paintings in my back yard. much fun. I am working on a body of work for another project
CL: You frequently talk about what it is like to be a with Prism in Los Angeles, a show at Kavi Gupta in Chicago in the
(below) woman in the art world, and in the world in general. It is Fall, and an exciting project with Incase, a bag collaboration, and
The artist’s studio, 2012
Photograph by Laura Flippen
a very important part of you work. How does that apply some music videos!!! Thank you Chris for your thought provoking
into this work? Is it still a part of it? I mean obviously you insightful questions.
(opposite) are a woman creating these works, but with a narrative
Untitled, 2012
Oil on linen, 48x60 in.
structure in your work that story seemed to take center
Courtesy the artist stage. Without the narrative now how has that changed?
CR: Again, this work is a different perspective on what it means
Untitled, 2012
Oil on linen, 48x60 in.
to me to be a woman, my sexuality, my feminine spirit. Being
Courtesy the artist empowered by being happy. None of these pieces form a narrative,
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LA PUNK GANGS
OF THE 1980s
As a young, young punker from the San Fernando Valley, one thing you didn’t of rules for you to learn. Suicidals, L.A.D.S., FFF, South Bay Skins. Apparently
yet know was that being punched in the face by grown men was going to be there were hundreds of people that you now needed to be able to identify and
common, and business as usual. Picture this, you’re 12 years old, and someone avoid. For the next few years, until the gang presence in the LA punk scene died
with a car is going to drive everyone to Fender’s Ballroom. Thrilled to leave your down you always had butterflies in your stomach on the way to shows. (It would
North Valley neighborhood, thrilled to be a part of this thing, you get to Long never occur to you not to go. Nothing could keep you away from this). Would
Beach (a world away) and all eight of you climb out of the 1964 Dodge Dart you get jumped tonight? Would this Cro-Mags show end early for you? You
beater. It seems like you hadn’t walked twenty paces through the door before never know. Now, 25 years later, you wonder what made it such a violent period.
an adult man, a man with a mustache, who seems like he’s 40 but was probably Why were Southern California’s (mostly) white young people so fucking stupid,
in reality no older than 25, saunters up to you and head-butts you right in the hateful and ready to go to war with each other? And for every gang that had
soft center of your fat baby face. What the fuck?!! You retreat to the safety of a high numbers, there were three or four more in each neighborhood, smaller but
corner, checking your face for blood, really scared. You look around the room ready to do as much damage as possible. You loved the chaos and possibly still
and take in your surroundings. The place is huge, low-ceilinged, fucked up and do. You can relate to that part of it. You will always love the sound of breaking
packed. There are clusters of skinheads, there are clusters of cholos. The vibe is glass and the heat of the fire. To wake up one day and want to burn it all down
menacing—much more so than you had imagined or are ready for at that age. is a grand tradition for young people everywhere. Hopefully everyone gets the
Over the course of that night you see one fight after another. Sometimes there privilege of waking up with that feeling some day, and that they get to hold
were four fights going on at one time, and they were brutal. Like kicked in the on to that attitude. The trick is surviving those stupid, violent years, and the
teeth, unconscious brutal. By the end of the night there were clearly a new book senselessness that comes with them. This was LA Punk in the 1980s.
RVCA .COM / 57
By Cali-Thornhill Dewitt and Aaron Rose
Southern California in the late 1970s was a suburban utopia filled to 2,000 kids. Fenders Ballroom has been described as like a weekly UFC fight in the
with mellow vibes, short shorts, roller skates and feathered haircuts. The airwaves 1980s. The gangs would all gather there and beat the shit out of each other.
were ruled by the likes of Boz Scaggs and The Captain & Tennille and the suburbs Some Punk gangs formed as early as 1977, but they really reached their peak in the
were filled to the brim with nuclear families with 2.3 kids living the Sunshine State mid-1980s. The groups partied or squatted at communal punk houses with names
dream. But behind those well-manicured lawns and beautiful sunsets, there was such as Hotel Hell, Poontang Palace and Skinhead Manor. Some say the gangs were
trouble in paradise. The fantasy lifestyles portrayed by Hollywood were often a far cry justified, as being a punk in suburban Los Angeles was a bit treacherous. Public high
from the realities on the streets of L.A.’s inner city. Suburban sprawl stretched in all schools in Los Angeles sometimes numbered over 2,000 kids and there were maybe
directions, becoming home to ghetto-fearing families who would do anything to keep about ten of fifteen punks there at the most. Former members say the gangs were
the California dream intact. It was against this backdrop that Los Angeles’ punk scene primarily a way of being anti-social but also provided safety in numbers. In the early
exploded. The LA punks were for the most part the product of failed hippy parents to mid-1980s, anyone who was punk in Los Angeles was either affiliated with or knew
who had graduated to a vapid middle life of cocaine, Quaaludes, yoga and soft rock. someone with Punk Gang ties. Most groups were fairly un-organized and by regular
They were latchkey kids who had too much time on their hands. By 1982, however, gang standards and these groups functioned much more like social groups than any
what had started out as a fairly innocent rebellion was taking a very distinct negative form of organized crime. Unlike traditional gangs, the Punk gangs did not seem to
turn. Early Los Angeles punk was centered mostly around Hollywood, and included a be defined by either neighborhood loyalty or criminal enterprise. In fact, with a few
diverse scene of men, women, homosexuals and basically any kind of freak that didn’t exceptions, other than fighting at shows, it seemed like the function of most groups
fit in with the rest of the world. However when it spread to the suburbs things changed was quite simply to intimidate other Punk gangs. But by 1985, the Los Angeles punk
dramatically. Suburban kids were not as sophisticated as the city punks, had little to gang scene had began to deteriorate. Many of the original members had discovered
no interest in art or politics, and their primary motivation for becoming involved in the drugs, and as their habits grew, so did a marked disinterest in all things unrelated
scene was to go to shows and get in fights. Punk turned into Hardcore, punk’s faster to getting high. Additionally, punk had suddenly become “popular” with the jock
and more aggressive cousin, and mosh pits at punk shows soon became a full on war. crowd mostly because it was a place to get into fights. As a result of this, local law
Reputed violence at punk concerts was featured in episodes of the popular television enforcement had taken notice of the growing “punk threat.” It got to the point where
shows CHiPs and Quincy, in which Los Angeles hardcore punks were depicted as if you had a punk band name on your shirt, you were immediately identified by police
being involved in murder and mayhem. By 1980 the Los Angeles Times had begun to as a member of the “Black Flag” or “Circle Jerks” street gang. Tales of punks getting
“expose” punk and the danger it posed to youths. In a representative article, Patrick detained by the police and threatened were common. Police even started “punk files”
Goldstein reports: “They don’t just dance anymore. They mug each other. It’s part on mostly innocent kids. The Los Angeles punk scene (along with the gangs) really
of a new ‘dance’ craze called the Slam, whose popularity, especially with organized died out though when the girls left the scene because of the violence. Venues didn’t
gangs of punk youths, has led to numerous incidents of violence at many area clubs. want to book shows anymore and what had been a massive youth revolution faded
The accounts of senseless violence, vandalism and even mutilation at some area rock out as quickly as it arrived. That said, in the interest of keeping this lost moment of Los
clubs read like reports from a war zone.” A little known fact about the scene in LA, and Angeles’ countercultural history alive, if only for the novelty, here lies a brief primer
perhaps one that separates it from any other city was the development of Punk gangs. on L.A. Punk Gangs.
For those of us that grew up in Southern California at the time, these gangs posed Note to reader: While we have done our absolute best to best to confirm information
a real threat. With names like L.A.D.S. (Los Angeles Death Squad), FFF (Fight For in this article and identify sources as much as possible, please understand that the
Freedom), Suicidals, BPO (Burbank Punk Organization) and Circle One, membership history of Los Angeles’ punk gangs from the 1980s is mostly an oral history. Beyond
sometimes numbered in the hundreds. The real Punk gang presence materialized at our personal words, we do not present any of our reporting as absolute fact. We
shows, where warring factions actually fought for control of clubs such as Fender’s prefer to paint this history with a light brush. We welcome all comments and/or
Ballroom in Long Beach or the Olympic Auditorium in L.A. Shows sometimes drew up ammendments to our texts, which we can perhaps publish in a future issue. Thanks.
Punks and Riot Police, L.A. Street Scene, 1985. Photographs by Jennifer Finch
Punk flyers, 1984. Art by Jaime Hernandez Punk Gang Drawing, (Anonymous), from Teen Angels magazine, 1984
FFF (Fight for Freedom, Tres Efes, 3fs, 666) started around 1981 and were probably the most Church. In one of them, at the Wachs Senior Citizen Center, the church building was defaced.
notorious punk gang from the San Fernando Valley. With supposedly over 300 members at its They wrote graffiti on the wall. Dumped records out onto the floor, took the fire extinguishers
peak, the group started as pure Punk gang but then by 1985, had quickly become infiltrated by and let them loose over the floor, then supposedly threw instant coffee over the water. North
jocks. The FFF guys went for the classic punk look with a Cholo twist. FFF’s leader, Richard Hollywood High School was the FFF command center, with Ranger usually holding court at a
Yapelli Jr. (otherwise known as Ranger) grew up in Sun Valley near the foothills of Northern donut shop across the street. There they would gather for marching orders and instructions.
Los Angeles County. Sun Valley was a mostly a Hispanic, blue collar area. Soon enough, Yapelli Other hardcore guys were recruited and FFF’s reputation grew. Many members came from
was running with the local Chicanos, and he was the first non-Hispanic initiated into Sol Trese, tough, non-white areas, working class areas, and suburban neighborhoods. Even though
the area’s dominant gang. This legit street cred served him well once he gravitated towards they were mostly white, FFF had affected the posture and mannerisms of East L.A. Cholos
the rich white kids of the Valley. Through natural progression, the group of young punks and called one another by Chicano gang names. Apparently, Spanish slang and phrases were
that surrounded Ranger grew and a band was started. The band, Fight for Freedom, was a sprinkled into their conversations. This wasn’t done to mock or emulate Hispanics, but rather
hardcore band with Ranger as front man that made no bones about its Nazi beliefs. Ranger it was meant to confound authority figures like parents, teachers and police. FFF fought mostly
soon formed an inner circle of like-minded angry teenagers. In the beginning, members of against neighboring jocks and scrapes with the football teams from Notre Dame High School
FFF almost took on the persona of Ranger. They were basically young thugs, albeit with some and Grant High School were common. Rumor has it that without even throwing a punch, they
street smarts and a funny go-for-broke intelligence. They preached a strange form of white forced the North Hollywood High School football squad to back down. According to the Los
supremacy, but ironically were loosely allied with the Chicano gangs that Ranger had grown up Angeles Times, A Fight for Freedom member’s sketch that was confiscated by police showed
with. They were also the sworn enemies of other hardcore punk gangs, primarily the Suicidals, a swastika, a pistol shooting a bullet through a detached head and a punk rocker choking
Burbank Punk Organization (BPO) and L.A.D.S. (Los Angeles Death Squad). In 1985 there was someone so hard the skull pops out of its skin. By 1983, FFF had become even more notorious
a notorious brawl between FFF and the LADS at the Olympic Auditorium. In an article from a for violence and the band was banned from every venue in Los Angeles County. Police gang
1985 issue of the Los Angeles Times, some L.A. punks were quoted as saying about FFF, units had begun to hear complaints and the “gang” was under investigation. In order to throw
“What they like to do most is take drugs and the police off the scent, the gang stopped dressing in the punk/cholo look. They replaced this
get crazy. When they’re crazy, they beat up by donning by military-style flat tops, flannel shirts, khakis, and tennis shoes or heavy black
brogues. It was a deceptively clean-cut look. In August 1985, the story of FFF took a very
people on the streets, attack homosexuals distinct turn. 15 year-old Mark Miller, a high school jock who had recently been running with
in North Hollywood Park, rumble with other the gang was fatally shot after an argument outside of Hot Trax disco in Van Nuys. The murder
punk groups in Hollywood and Burbank and apparently took place after 16 year-old Tony Nguyen admired and touched the purple, punk-
go to parties where they sometimes smash style hair of Miller’s girlfriend. Miller didn’t like this and a fight ensued with Miller ending
up dead in the parking lot. Another youth on the scene wrote the letters FFF in blood next to
up the place. They call them ‘bring your own Miller’s body. The murder at Hot Tracks drew much media attention and with that increased
sledgehammer’ parties.” heat from the LAPD. The police finally sprung into action to eradicate FFF once and for all.
Whatever their motivation, in the minds of FFF, hippies, jocks, metal heads, mods, surfers, They started to methodically identify all members, the group was designated as a gang and
and homosexuals (real or suspected) became fair game for a beat down. Ranger authored every associate was now a known gang member. Ranger was arrested after he brandished a
a four-part code that they adhered to: 1. Be yourself. 2. Live your own life. 3. Fuck social gun and punched a woman in the face when he was refused admission to a private party. He
values. 4. Fight for freedom. They were said to reflect the philosophy “If it feels good, do it.” was promptly brought up on weapons charges. After this, the core members of the gang drifted
FFF also attacked property, including a series of break-ins at North Hollywood Presbyterian away, and by 1986 FFF was a memory.
The scene at Oki-Dog, Hollywood, Ca., early ‘80s. Photograph by Jennifer Finch
CIRCLE ONE
(opposite)
John Macias from Cirlce One , 1980
Photograph by Jennifer Finch
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BURBANK PUNK
Burbank Punk Organization (or BPO) was started in Burbank
junior high and high schools around 1979. The gang was
originally founded by punk transplants from Orange County
whose families relocated to Burbank around that time. Their
ORGANIZATION
headquarters was a makeshift tree house in the middle of
Forest Lawn Cemetery. At their peak they are rumored to
have had up to 500 members, with 200 active and about 30
who could be called on to fight at any time. The original BPO
uniform was very simple. Drawn from more of a punk/skate
aesthetic rather than British punk, the first dress code was
basically Converse high-tops and a hoodie. One of their other
distinguishing traits were bleached-blonde flat top haircuts
worn with pride in the summer months. That said, contrary
to other gangs coming from the San Fernando Valley area,
one of the most distinguishing factors in BPO’s membership
was the fact that they were entirely multi-cultural. They also
had a distinguishing number, “22,” which came about because
twenty-two of it’s original members all burned crosses into
their arms. Like other gangs from this time, the gang was
formed essentially for protection at shows. However, as
numbers grew the group became a major force in the Los
Angeles area and were active both at shows and in the streets.
Early on drugs didn’t play much of a part in the BPO story...
primarily because the group was very much skate-based
and drugs would interfere with their ability to skate well.
(this page) Burbank Punk Organization (BPO) Members, Burbank, Ca., 1982
Rumor has it that there was a chicken-hawk cab driver in the
Burbank/SFV area that would cruise junior high schools, pick
up young punk boys and drive them to shows. Supposedly
the spread of BPO in the early days was directly linked to this
man. Early on, Burbank Punk Organization was loosely linked
to FFF, and even shared members at times. However, as the
years went on this was not always the case, and the two gangs
were later known for very public rivalries. In a July, 1985
article from the Los Angeles Times, titled “White Punks a New
Puzzle in Gang Scene,” an FFF member says the following
regarding BPO,
“I keep a loaded gun in my
bedroom 365 days a year, I’d say
everybody in FFF owns a gun.
What’s going to keep BPO from
driving by and shooting up the
house? You don’t want somebody
hurting your mom for something
you did.”
Like other groups from the era, BPO had their own band,
ironically called Tres Flores, which bares a striking
resemblance to FFF when translated from Spanish. Around
1988 when high school football teams began to get involved
in the punk/violence scene the image of Burbank Punk
Organization became decidedly more Cholo. At this point
many of the original members fled the group. Around 1989
they changed their name to Burbank Primera, a group that
bore little association with its original punk roots.
Cuckoo’s Nest
Other Punk Gangs from Southern California in the 1980s: HB’S, MERCENARIES, SOUTH BAY SKINS, MICKEY MOUSE CLUB, SOUTH BAY SEX RATS, T/C (THE CONNECTED),
HOLLYWOOD RAT PATROL, PENI DEATH SQUAD, PIG CHILDREN, SOS (SONS OF SAMOA), THE LEAGUE, LA MIRADA PUNKS (LMP), MOTHER MALICIOUS, WHITTIER KACTIS BUNCH,
KAOS (KIDS AGAINST OUR SYSTEM), PARIAH BOYS, POSEURS, SACRED REICH, BUCKO BOYS, PKL (POOR KIDS ON LSD), PIER PUNK RATS, ESP (EAST SIDE PUNX), HRP, URBAN
PUNK ASSAULT, KFL, SEX JERX, WEST SIDE CRAYZIES, LBSB (LONG BEACH SUICIDAL PUNX), CFP (CRAZY FUCKING PUNX), VALLEY CIRCLE, HUNGRY GANG, DOG PATCH WINOS,
THE DRUNKS, THE X MEN, LA WITHDRAWNS, STB (STOP THE BULLSHIT), FULLERTON PUNKS, DUFFY BOYS, BEER NUTS, MID-CITY PUNKS, NORWALK INSANE PUNX, BEOWOLF
BOYS, LOD (LORDS OF DESTRUCTION), SOUTHBAY SKINS, NORTHSIDE FIRM.
RVCA .COM / 67
ANA
by Aaron Rose
Portrait by INGRID SOPHIE SCHRAM
ANP: I would like to ask you about growing up AK: Thank you, that sounds very nice.
in Belgrade. I think it’s a very special story. Can ANP: Do you not agree?
KRAS
you speak about what it was like there when you AK: I don’t disagree. It’s just hard to see that in your
were young, the creative scene in Belgrade and own work. I always wonder if those influences are
how that has influenced you? visible in the final result. I think that it has more to do
Ana Kras: Yes. Well I grew up in a very turbulent time with how you approach your thinking, and what keeps
of a very turbulent country and I can only assume it left your attention and how you solve problems.
some marks. I mean, it surely influenced a lot the way ANP: For you it’s more pragmatic. What you can
I think, speak, and work. The first war started when I make with what you have?
was around five and since then there has always been AK: Yes. What I can make with what I have. That is
some kind of war around, even up to today. When I was what I was taught at my university. Not by teachers,
The world of furniture design can sometimes an early teenager the borders were closed for years, and but by the circumstances and the lack of possibilities.
be perceived as separate from other artistic the country was pretty disconnected from outer world The university was there to push me to be self-taught
and influences. I was lucky enough that I was still kind because there were almost no classes and lectures
practices. Like fashion or architecture, long
of young when it changed a little for better so I could and no workshops and not a single computer in the
periods of research and development go into move and see other things, because what was around entire furniture design section. When the country is
putting a piece of furniture into production. me was very sad, deeply sad. poor, destroyed and corrupted, the universities are the
Because of this, sometimes the great works ANP: Wow. I cannot even imagine... same way. Growing up in such a place feels a bit like
never make it onto the pop culture radar. AK: I was fifteen when NATO bombed Belgrade and the having a very wise mentor. Can you imagine? Not a
Enter a young designer named Ana Kras. same year later I went to Japan. I remember I had to single computer? That sounds like a joke. It’s crazy. So
take a van to Budapest, Hungary to get a flight because everything was measured by hand but that’s why we
Though she is now living in New York, Kras planes were not flying from Belgrade. The van was had to learn ourselves. We had to teach ourselves all
grew up in Belgrade, Serbia during the height packed with people and bags, and the driver of the van the 3D programs and do all the work on our own time,
of the political turmoil there. It is quite would take some village dust roads to avoid paying the without any supervision.
special that a young person coming from fee for using a normal road. How do you call that, the ANP: All trial and error...
such a situation could grow to become such road fee? AK: Yes, but that somehow worked for me because I
ANP: The toll love to work and I love to work on my own. But there
an innovative designer. Her creations employ
AK: Ah yes. Toll. That means great in German were a lot of kids that needed that push and support,
all of the characteristics of high design, but I think? and they didn’t get it.
incorporate a fragile and organic quality that ANP: Haha. It’s not so great in the USA. ANP: Have you seen a lot of creative people in
is supremely unique and separates them from AK: When I think about how the situation in Serbia Serbia have to give up their dreams?
the norm. Perhaps her most popular creations influenced me, and also influenced my work later, AK: Hmmm. I don’t think there can be anything to
are a series of lamps she has designed called I think that the chaos and the politics were there to make you give up your dream.
teach me how the world is pretty mad and how easily ANP: Good answer.
Bonbons, which are basically a wire frame from one day to another you can lose all you have for AK: If you do, then that’s not big of a dream.
with delicate strips of yarn and other material no reason. My family was there to teach me how you ANP: Exactly. I want to talk about how you work
stretched over them. She has also designed can find a way to be happy with so little and how to use in different mediums.
tables, chairs and clothing racks. Though she those skills for whatever you do. AK: Okay.
is relatively young in her career, there is no ANP: Okay. That’s really interesting. Which I ANP: You draw. You take photographs and
can completely see in your work. There’s also design furniture. How do they all relate to
doubt that Ana Kras is going places. Over a
something very fragile in your creations. Not each other in your opinion? Do they influence
late night skype conversation between Los so much that they are breakable, but in your each other?
Angeles and Sweden we asked Ana to tell us use of materials to tell stories. They are AK: I think they are a family! To me it is all pretty much
her story. emotionally fragile... the same. I mean, it all comes from the same place in
RVCA .COM / 69
LIARS
When assessing the musical output of a generation the USA and catapulted to mid-range success, Liars saw a
sometimes we need hindsight to truly understand the different future for themselves. Just when their collective
myriad levels of innovation held within. That said, if there star could have burst onto the scene, they decided to leave
is one musical project from the last decade that should be New York and relocate to Berlin. Favoring experiments
celebrated then it is the Liars. If you know who the Liars are rather than compliments, the band embarked again on a
and are aware of their output, then this feature needs no completely new sonic journey. Their next album, Drums Not
introduction. However if this is the first time you’ve heard Dead (2006), was again a total 180-degree turn from their
of them, then get ready for a treat. Here’s a short primer. previous works. Based almost completely on experimental
The group consists of Angus Andrew (vocals/guitar), Aaron drum sounds, the record was recorded in a disused East
Hemphill (percussion, guitar, synth), and Julian Gross German broadcast center that allowed them a multitude of
(percussion, drums). Liars have had a strange and twisted different acoustic environments for recording. On Drums
path to success. The band originally formed in Valencia, Not Dead, Liars capitalized completely on the wild dance
CA (30 minutes north east of Los Angeles) where Angus energy of Berlin. While the record could never be considered
and Julian (who would join the band after their first album) a dance record, the unique energy of the city was contained
were enrolled at CalArts. They met Aaron who was then throughout the recording. Their next album, the self-
employed at the local record store. They began creating titled, Liars (2007) continued this approach. This approach
four-track recordings together, but once they had completed to music making has been key to Liars legacy. Rather
art school, they relocated to New York together. Once in then following a formula of success like most successful
New York, Liars aligned themselves with other Brooklyn acts would pursue, Liars have always trudged their own
bands and collaborators such as TV On The Radio and path. The group functions more like a conceptual art
Yeah Yeah Yeahs. They were a large part of that seminal performance piece than a typical rock act. After Berlin, Liars
movement of New York bands that defined a particular sonic relocated back to Los Angeles to record Sisterworld (2009),
aesthetic of the time. From their first album, They Threw Us a sweeping masterpiece of a record that was recorded
All In A Trench and Stuck A Monument On Top (2001), it was entirely in the forests above Los Angeles. Push ahead to
clear to those who followed that a new sound and vision 2012 and Liars released their sixth album entitled, WIXIW
was on the market. Liars’ next full-length album, They Were (pronounced ‘wish you’). The album is heavily influenced
Wrong, So We Drowned (2004), was recorded in a cabin in by electronic technology and most of the instrumentation
the woods in New Jersey, the band immersed themselves on the record was created using digital and/or electronic
in accounts of witch trials and folklore and created a instruments. Like previous recordings, it was written in
atmospheric fairy tale album. Dubbed a “story album” as an isolated cabin north of Los Angeles with the aim of
opposed to “concept album”, the record re-defined Liars as removing themselves from the distractions of extraneous
a band that was creating their own musical agenda rather stimuli. The record was then recorded in a slightly derelict
then continuing with the sounds made popular from their office block on the eastside of Los Angeles where, amongst
first record only a few years before. various pieces of strange equipment and their respective
It was clear by many that Liars were a creative force to operating manuals strewn about, the following interview
watch. However, unlike their contemporaries who stayed in took place.
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ANP: Maybe we should just start at the beginning with ANP: It’s funny because your song titles at that time we are (above)
your first album Trench and how that came about? always really long. Live in Europe, 2006. Photos by Paul Drake
Aaron Hemphill: That actually makes sense because we really do Angus: Yeah.
(below)
feel like with this new record we’ve come full circle from that. ANP: Your titles definitely generated some discussion Photo shoot for They Were Wrong So We
ANP: Exactly. There are elements of the new record that for a moment, because of their length. Were you trying Drowned, New Jersey, 2004
actually remind me of 4-track stuff that you guys gave me to interject more meaning in them, by having them
(opposite)
from that time period. There’s a similar sensibility. so lengthy?
Contact sheet from recording sessions for
Aaron: That makes sense. Aaron: Some people were actually disappointed when we came out self-titled album Liars in Berlin, 2007
Julian Gross: Where exactly was that cover drawn from? Was it with normal length song titles.
created for the cover or had you done it before? ANP: So were long song titles something that you guys
Aaron: No, it was just some dumb drawing. I had an idea to make discussed?
some video and that drawing was supposed to represent a scene Angus: No. It was just like the first time we had the opportunity to
or something. write something there on a record, so why not take up as much
ANP: It’s very reminiscent of an Alfred Hitchcock room as you can. With that first record it really felt like no one was
storyboard frame, was that and idea. going to look at it or listen to it anyway, so none of the decisions
Aaron: I just used to doodle a lot. Angus and I were living together were big decisions. We were excited about the possibility of just
at the time and we would just think of things for stickers or having it on vinyl. Being able to play our music back.
whatever. Maybe that was originally a sticker idea? The label said Aaron: That was before we even had computers that could burn a
that either we could get tour posters made or a four-color record CD. I remember being really excited the first time we burned a CD
sleeve. So there was a limitation on what the cover could be. Angus of our music. We kind of didn’t even think the record was real so we
picked it and did all the type. We did it pretty quick. just kind of titled them without thinking about it too much.
ANP: Sometimes when you have less time to think about ANP: Do you feel the visuals that accompany an album are
things they’re more immediate and natural. equally important to the music?
Aaron: Yeah, I mean it almost felt like to me that we’d be able to Angus: Yes. Even more so today with the internet.
re-do it at some point or something. Like maybe no one would buy Julian: We have the leeway now to create an entire visual platform
the record, so when we re-did it there would be a better cover. It’s and generate interest before anything even happens.
the same way we came up with our name. Angus: Now you kind of have to...
ANP: Was it a unanimous decision to call yourselves ANP: That’s a pretty big change since Trench came out.
Liars? Angus: You have to come up with a whole visual component,
Angus Andrew: Oh no! That was just us trying to think of something sometimes like a year before the record comes out. When we started
really generic or something. I don’t think we were really ever that making this record we met with the label and they were pretty keen
excited about it. that we start to do something more internet-based. That’s
Aaron: It was always backwards for us. Like when Brian and I something that we had never been interested in, so that was
played in a band in when we were teenagers, we had a million something that we’ve had to learn to deal with. It was really a
stickers and no songs. But with Liars we had like a ton of songs question of us starting early on to think about some kind of
but no name. We just wanted to start playing shows so we realized conceptual way for us to attack that medium, you know something
we needed a name. We had all these shows booked, so we had to different than the simple day to day, here’s what we’re eating.
think of something quick. We always thought we would think of a ANP: You almost have to invent a whole separate world.
better one. Angus: Yeah. Otherwise it’s just this kind of mundane overload of
Angus: There were lots of elaborate names at that time. information, which I think is the biggest problem with the internet
ANP: Do you remember any of them? sometimes. There are so many mediums and platforms that people
Angus: I remember that was the time when that band And You’ll are accessing now that it’s not that thing anymore where you get
Know Us By The Trail of the Dead came out. We were just like, “Oh that record and you’re like, “Weird! Who are these people? How did
man, we gotta do the opposite of that.” they do it?” Now you just mainline their entire history and back
RVCA .COM / 73
Aaron: Well, we had a ton of songs for WIXIW. We could have chosen a group
of songs that were of really good quality that would have made a very distinct
statement. Like making a totally electronic record...something that has no
semblance to sounds that we’ve used in the past. After a couple of listens it
would still sound like Liars, but we could have assembled a more shocking
group of songs. But I think it’s that whole idea of looking hard at what the song
actually was. The songs that we chose are maybe a bit less of a break in terms of
experimentation, but they just had more of a certain mood or sentiment that we
thought was expressing our idea more. I think people just expect us to do
something different every time.
ANP: Well it’s really a refining process.
Aaron: It seems like people were surprised that this record was as not much of a
break as they had originally hoped.
ANP: Which brings it back to the artistic process and looking at
Liars not just as a band, but also as an overall concept. You guys
take that risk knowing that you’re constantly reacting against your
old work.
Angus: Well, I don’t know. At the same time I think we all feel that because of
where we’re are at creatively any given time. We admire people who are able to
be more linear with their work. It’s like almost surreal. It would be nice to be
the kind of people who could just refine a sound and get better at playing guitar
over ten years and just be a shredder. It’s almost as though each time we make a
record we go backwards maybe?
Aaron: It’s not just backwards it’s more like running into walls and building
walls that we then have to climb over and hurdle because we’ve never seen
it before.
ANP: Well it’s kind of like all these manuals for electronic gear that
are lying all over the place here.
Julian: Yeah, well that’s kind of what we do these days. We just look at manuals
We’re thinking the same thing” We have these common interests and there’s this common thing we
and try to figure out all this gear. We give ourselves all this homework. We
want to express. But when you’re alone and you’re banging your head against the wall you have to
literally leave the studio and say like “OK, your homework for tonight is this,
suddenly condense all these ideas into one thing that exemplifies what we spoke about.
this and this.”
ANP: One of the things that I feel about your records and why they always work so well is
Angus: Every time we just try to forget what we just figured out and try be
the beauty of the edit. Being able to curate what makes a record.
completely naive about it all again.
Angus: Yeah, that’s one of the hardest parts. Conceptually it’s got to be part of it. Depending on the
Aaron: With our first lineup, when we were a four-piece, we had songs that we
record. With Sisterworld that was a big determining factor. Does this song speak to this overarching
had written as a band prepared so that we could have had a second record with
thing? Then, with this one, the hard part was that we made such an effort experimenting with sound
those guys. If we were to have recorded that, it would have been the only time
that we just developed this huge catalog of really interesting noises. Then we had to apply those and
we would have experienced not refinement but a sense of familiarity. Like that
make songs out of those sounds. They almost became sonic decisions really. You know where we would
we had done that before. But we’ve never really had that every time it just
develop a song that has that interesting sound and work on that song more because we want to have
seems so scary.
that sound.
ANP: Do you have a sense that you are free-falling or that the feeling
ANP: You were looking for sonic diversity.
of being lost in space is part of what make Liars who they are?
Angus: Yeah, and because we were all so in love with particular sounds we didn’t want to give them up.
Angus: If it were different we wouldn’t be a band anymore. It would not have
There was some point where we just had so many songs going and we just had to make ourselves
been interesting enough. If part of being in a band had to do with refinement as
physically stop making anymore interesting sounds. We had to really concentrate on the ones that we
a state of purpose I don’t think we would have done it. In terms of a sort of
really liked the most. Actually, what helped me was at some point saying, “OK. We’ll just release a
conceptual thing or the fact that this is a multi-media thing, I think that’s what
second record.”
has kept us excited. We have the opportunity to do the next record about
ANP: How do you judge whether a sound is interesting?
whatever. We can use mandolins. There’s never been any kind of box or
Angus. It’s just that we like it.
restriction on what we do and that’s what makes us excited. I want to do the
Aaron: Maybe it’s the same for Angus but I spend days just looking through sounds and making an edit
next record because there is always still the possibility that we can forget
of which sounds I am going to use as an arsenal or palette. It’s so time consuming that when a sound
everything that we’ve ever done.
pops up it just happens where something about it excites me to make a song. I want to feature that
ANP: Your next record should be a hip-hop record then.
sound in a song. You know that’s the challenge. Can I write a chorus around that sound? It’s this whole
Angus: I think that even if we did try to tackle a hip-hop record that it would
long process to write a song around a sound.
end up sounding like a Liars record, just with different tools maybe? That’s
Angus: Which is completely backwards to the way we would have done it in the past. Usually, we
what we’ve always banked on. When we started playing together, I definitely
would start with a melody and make some interesting things happen around that. This way is a lot
was not very adept at playing. We’d say, “Lets see what it’s like if we try to make
more difficult.
a Black Sabbath song.” You know it’s not going to work like that, but it then
ANP: But after listening to the record it still always fits within a Liars sensibility.
becomes what we are. That’s where things get interesting. So it seems to be the
Angus: I think that might be. There are certain things that we’ve toyed with in the past, but never had to
case that it doesn’t really matter what the idea is or what the approach is. The
time to focus all of our attention on.
result is gonna be somewhere in line with who we are. We could do a bossanova
ANP: But that’s how you can make something new without forgetting everything
record and go to Brazil but people would still say it’s a Liars record.
you’ve learned...
Aaron: Yeah we’re always floating it. We’re not pro at that.
Angus: Yeah, it’s not like we’re going to employ all the right producers and that
sort of stuff. We’ll probably get some piece of software or equipment that
apparently people use to make that music and then play it really wrong! That
result is always what’s interesting though.
ANP: That’s possibly a top-level concept of your band. Using the
expected in an unexpected way.
Angus: Yeah, and lets do it even though we don’t know how to.
Aaron: We’ve always emphasized mistakes. The very first time we wrote songs,
very early on, we would never stop. Even if we messed up terribly, we knew that
it would always turn into a really neat part. In some of our early songs there
were times when we would record Angus leaving the room and there was just
no sound for two minutes. Then he would come back and that became the
middle part of the song. We don’t have the attitude of needing to freak people
out by doing a hip-hop record. Its always more about saying we really like
hip-hop, and we could in our heads be trying to make a hip-hop record by the
numbers, but it will always be a Liars record.
Angus: I think that’s where we started to run into a bit of an issue with
overbearing conceptual stuff. Where we would project to people, “OK. We’re
doing this record about witches or whatever.” You know this is drama and this
is a heart attack and we’d have to go through this whole period of heavy
discussion amongst ourselves about that thing...as opposed to the music. At
some point we realized that that thing is great for us. We like that thing because
it helps us to write what we want to write. It helps us concentrate, but in terms
of relating it to people, that’s not really the biggest issue. Often it’s best if too
much emphasis isn’t put on that.
(from top) Julian: Yeah, sometimes the music can get lost in the conceptual story and
Still from Plaster Casts Of Everything, video shoot directed by Patrick Daughters, 2009 that’s not the right tipping of the scales.
Angus: It’s just our tool to make what we want to make. It’s cool to have a
Liars live at Monster Island, Brooklyn, New York, 2001. Photo by Emily Wilson
subject matter to give us focus, but it doesn’t mean that when people listen to
(opposite) the record that they have to research that subject.
Liars, John Weiss, and High Places show poster, 2011. Artwork by Julian Gross ANP: How do internal visuals play in your composing process?
(opposite)
Studio image of wax dipped and embossed WIXIW special edition LP, 2012
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FEMALE GAZE
There has been a debate raging for decades about the way that women are portrayed in photography and how it is almost always men
who are defining that image. In response to this, we here at ANPQ have decided to ask six of our favorite female photographers to send
us images that represent their particularly female take on male sexuality. We’ve found it quite striking to see the differences between what
men and women generally find to be attractive in the opposite sex. In that regard these photographs are quite telling.
MELODIE McDANIEL
RUTH SWANSON
DEANNA TEMPLETON
ANGELA BOATWRIGHT
CHERYL DUNN
THE
NEW
AESTHETIC
James Bridle and The Mythology of a Pixel
by Liz Armstrong / Portrait by Pat Graham
Glitches are seams that reveal where stuff gets interesting. So says Londoner James Bridle, somewhat accidental father of the New Aesthetic, an
intellectual movement that attempts to apprehend the experience of living in a world where the digital and tangible experiences overlap. In many
ways, seeing with our eyes is secondary; we look at what we’ve designed machines to show us. So then what are we trying to say to ourselves? Or
has the digital interception changed the information and is giving us insight we wouldn’t otherwise have the ability to perceive?
In May 2011 Bridle spilled a handful of seeds on Tumblr—pixilated and tessellated art in the physical world as sculpture or pattern on fabric,
images of real humans navigating digitally-rendered architecture, Google Earth’s unintentional sense of humor, the sociological subtext of
several types of facial recognition, etc.—and a thousand of its babies were quickly identified. Animated gifs re-animated as zoetropes, DIY
drones, composite imagery app revelations, Facebook app-branded ice cream, a descriptive camera that generates and prints out a written
description of what was shot rather than capturing an image, a sound wave transformed into a chair, on and on and on…so many things we
previously noticed or made or used but didn’t really stop to think about, were now being recognized and collated under one large descriptor.
Then last spring at South by Southwest, New Aesthetic blew up. From there, academics at Harvard, artists and art critics, and tech writers
started chewing on it, and it still hasn’t lost its flavor.
Thing is, it’s not really art, nor is it technology or networking, nor does it provide enough boundaries for its own philosophy. Describing New
Aesthetic is like describing being human: You know exactly what that means, but how do you define it? Bridle, a learned fellow in artificial
intelligence and philosophy, maintains a logical, categorical approach to his own offering that at this point describes how this isn’t art, or
technology—it’s more about the linguistics of understanding, creating a universal sub-code where all metaphors coalesce. New Aesthetics, for
intellectuals, is an evolving amoeba that lets us watch its organelle development, an ever-dilating and constricting conversation that will consider
anything and naturally eject what doesn’t belong without suffering a disembowelment. To romantics, it’s a visual, semi-tactile poem about how
we create life within an idea. It breathes. It generates information about itself. And it might know.
Assigning sentience and meaningfulness to theory is how you create myth. It explains not only itself but other things around it too: it has a life of
inflection. So is Bridle’s initial proposition an aesthetic, or is this something else entirely? We talked to him in an attempt to understand.
Drone Shadow, Silicon Car Park, London 27/02/2012. James Bridle & Einar Sneve Martinussen
RVCA .COM / 85
Graffiti of Getty Images Watermark, 2012. Photo by Jerry Hsu
ANP: I’m curious how you started coming up with New Aesthetic. those futures that has failed us, of god-like creative artificial intelligence—it turns out
James Bridle: It started from a couple of positions, two things that are very closely machines don’t work that way, and we don’t work that way. But it can be kind of useful.
connected. I was increasingly frustrated with the so-called cultural dominance of So one of the things I was doing a lot with New Aesthetic was attributing intentionality
retro and vintage. Where everyone’s got interesting facial hair and wears braces and to a lot of non-human actions. That doesn’t mean I believe they have intentionality, I
has this idea that there’s something authentic in the past that we’ve lost, and that just think that’s sometimes an interesting and useful way to talk about them.
authenticity can only be located in the past. Which is fine, but it seems to have become ANP: Do you want to tell me more about your background?
so overblown that we’ve lost all sight of any possible futures. And that’s very connected JB: I was in computer science and artificial intelligence, and psychology and
to the fact that indeed these potential futures seem to have failed us. The future that we linguistics, which all sort of built toward attempts to understand. In particular
believed in for so long—where we’re living on other planets—that’s not the future we’re computer science and cognitive science, which is one of the ways to approach artificial
getting, right? That these two are connected are evident in all kinds of things—many, intelligence, is a way of looking at the brain as if it’s a computer. So you hypothesize
many things. At the very simplest level, I set out to find things that felt genuinely that the brain is a black box, like an unmarked computer and you give it inputs and
new. Things that would be inexplicable to someone 20 or even 10 years ago. I usually you see what comes out, and you try and reverse engineer how the brain works by
start off these projects with the idea that something I’m looking for must be out there doing that. It’s tied to things like evolutionary psychology, which presupposes that
somewhere, in some form. And if you look for it hard enough, it’ll appear. In this case, a lot of our newer hardwiring is how it is because it’s how we were on the savannah
the imagery at least, that you might see in some of the manifestations of New Aesthetic millions of years ago. I don’t really buy that anymore. But it’s an interesting way of
are what I’ve found. approaching the problem. It’s a solving technique by which you break down everything
ANP: What you just said—if you look hard enough it’ll appear—makes me that’s possible, the most algorithmic way you can because you’re coming at it from a
wonder how much you think the intent of our consciousness informs our computer science background. It’s an interesting approach; it works in some ways and
mundane reality. it doesn’t work in many other ways. It’s really good if you’re interested in language and
JB: I’m very interested in consciousness but I’d be loath to tie it too closely to what psychology and newer biology. But I studied that for years and by the time I got done
I’m talking about. I oscillate massively between the positions that the internet is a new and qualified in it, I hated computers so much that I went to work in very traditional
form of human consciousness and the idea that that’s probably complete bullshit. At book publishing. So I was a publisher and an editor publishing contemporary fiction
times I want it to be true. I think there are aspects in which maybe it is, but I’m more for a few years.
interested the fact that the network gives us new ways of seeing things that we simply ANP: That’s amazing.
didn’t have before. It doesn’t mean they didn’t exist before, it didn’t mean they didn’t JB: I figured that’s somewhere I could go where I wouldn’t have to worry about
sufficiently work. They weren’t accessible to us before, but we suddenly have this computers so much.
ability to see so much further than we did, which is one of the aims of consciousness. ANP: It’s a bit of a more analog form of communication.
I don’t necessarily believe that the network gives us anything particularly new, but it JB: That’s what I thought, but I was wrong. It turns out that what literature and
does reveal things that previously were a lot harder to see. the publishing industry and fiction and everything else needed was a far better
ANP: It also could be what we do as humans, which is project our own understanding of what the network was bringing. Slowly, my specialty became what
experience on animals or plants or inanimate things, such as a network. happens when literature meets technology, what happens when literature meets the
Where we’re saying maybe this network has consciousness because we network, and the strange forms you see emerging at those points. The New Aesthetic
do too. emerged from what happens when all of culture does that—when things become digital
JB: Again, I’m nervous about ascribing consciousness to it, but I am interested in and fundamentally changed by that. It’s something that we’re really bad at addressing;
ascribing consciousness to it as a framing device to try to understand it. I studied we’re very good at picking metaphors for why digital things are like physical things,
classical AI. I did a final work on creativity in artificial intelligence. And I left that but we’re bad at examining the ways in which they’re not. But it’s the ways in which
course with a profound disappointment in what was possible. That’s another one of they’re not that seem to be important and interesting.
Dutch Landscapes by Mishka Henner. When Google introduced its free satellite imagery service to the world in 2005, views of our planet only previously accessible to astronauts and surveyors were suddenly
available to anyone with an internet connection. Yet the vistas revealed by this technology were not universally embraced.
Governments concerned about the sudden visibility of political, economic and military locations exerted considerable influence on suppliers of this imagery to censor sites deemed vital to national security. This
form of censorship continues today and techniques vary from country to country with preferred methods generally including use of cloning, blurring, pixelization, and whitening out sites of interest.
Surprisingly, one of the most vociferous of all governments to enforce this form of censorship were the Dutch, hiding hundreds of significant sites including royal palaces, fuel depots and army barracks through-
out their relatively small country. The Dutch method of censorship is notable for its stylistic intervention compared to other countries; imposing bold, multi-coloured polygons over sites rather than the subtler
and more standard techniques employed in other countries. The result is a landscape occasionally punctuated by sharp aesthetic contrasts between secret sites and the rural and urban environments surrounding
them. www.mishka.lockandhenner.com
ANP: You talk about how much you love Spambots. I wonder if this love television and advertising in order to recreate them. Now take that and project it
and the attempt to parse what part of them might be human or attempting forward into the future and it feels to me like that’s what we’re trying to do with a lot
to truly communicate with humans, I wonder if you’ve found any difficulty of our online activity. Because we have this whole network sphere in which we spend
in talking to people as a result. a vast amount of our time and yet we have no memory or experience in it. And we still
JB: I don’t know. If I take it a step back and understand how these digital things are have to work out how we have lasting memories and experiences, and for me it’s all we
affecting the way we see the world, the one thing spambots don’t do very well is they have, it’s what makes us. How do we construct those in the digital world? What do they
don’t have any sense of memory or experience. They seem incredibly naïve. Which look like? What does a digital souvenir look like? Can you imagine a digital souvenir
is charming, right? It’s something nice and makes them seem vulnerable, like a that has no substantiation? I’m increasingly sensitive to it.
puppy. But that quality of memory and experience is exactly what humans seem ANP: That’s really interesting, and you’re making me think two things
to struggle with. here. First, does the digital experience enhance authenticity? Or does it
ANP: When you put it that way, it seems like humans and spambots aren’t falsify it if we can’t touch it?
so different. I guess these are universal concerns. JB: I don’t know what authenticity means. I say that with incredible seriousness.
JB: I’m incredibly sensitive to the ways in which we attempt to manipulate memory Our ideas of authenticity have always been rooted in physical objects. But that’s been
and experience. I see it in the ways in which we try to present our experiences online, a myth; I see it all the time, again with books. This idea that because something is
the way in which we relate. In my own work it very much came out in trying to physically instantiated is therefore authentic, that’s simply not true, there have always
understand why our experience with books is different when they become ebooks. been fakes and heresies and ways of confusing this issue. The network reveals that
I see exactly the same process happening with the way that we deal with digital those things stand on very shaky foundations. We’re increasingly aware of that, though
photographs online—for example, the spread of the retro-filter movement in I’m loath to admit it or deal with it in any kind of real way.
Instagram—and also in huge numbers of other things. Seems to me to be a way ANP: The other thing that this talk about our digital experience and
that we’re trying to impose emotions and memories that we understand as almost memory is making me think about is how it’s forcing a nostalgia for things
physical onto very digital things. we weren’t old enough to actually experience. And it’s the same thing you
Then I start to see that in terms of how easily constructed a lot of those memories were talking about, which you formed or identified the New Aesthetic as a
are. Take the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. There’s a whole effort of collective memory response to. That idea that things were better in the old days, and a lot of
creation going on where we’re trying to implant in the consciousness of the country a these kids aren’t even old enough to have experienced the aesthetic
memory of what those 60 years have been like. Now, I don’t remember any of those they’re perpetuating.
things. I wasn’t there. I haven’t taken part in any of these street parties that they JB: That’s always been the case. I grew up listening to music made long before I was
say are one of the cultural signifiers of the nation. But we construct them through born and loving it and thinking it was the best thing. The network has made it obvious
Sebastian Schmieg & Sylvio Lorusso’s “56 Broken Kindle Screens” is a print on demand paperback that consists of found photos depicting broken Kindle screens. The Kindle is Amazon’s e-reading device which
is by default connected to the company’s book store.The book takes as its starting point the peculiar aesthetic of broken E Ink displays and serves as an examination into the reading device’s materiality. As the
screens break, they become collages composed of different pages, cover illustrations and interface elements. www.sebastianschmieg.com
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Black and White Coding Dots, 2012. Photo by Sebastian Schramm. www.bueroschramm.de
and untenable that I now know and I can find out exactly when records were made and ANP: So then New Aesthetic is largely imaginary, right? It seems it’d
when their popularity was. I’m suddenly so hyper aware of my distance from them, have to be in order to be self-evolving or self-perpetuating? Because then
even though they’re closer than ever, because I can reach across the network and take wouldn’t it have an expiration date?
whatever I want from any period in history. That at the same time makes it quite clear JB: At some point it should collapse into the real. It depends on what you mean by
that there’s a kind of leak forming. I’m suspicious of notions that don’t even carry imaginary. To me, New Aesthetic was always not about things themselves but about
on recycling that stuff. It seems ever easier to do so, and also an abdication of the experience of living in a world where such things manifest. And are legible. What is
responsibility to find the new thing. And the new thing has got to be where it interesting is that even though we can’t explain them, really, we still experience them
gets interesting. on some level. They get through to us and make us realize there is something going
ANP: Right. Sometimes I think the new thing is in the bridge of the on here. What is interesting about a lot of the artifacts of the New Aesthetic is they’re
pastiche. Like what you’re talking about where you’ll grab things from already everyday things, but we haven’t really noticed how strange and wonderful they
different eras or places and that becomes what’s meaningful to you. And are. We’ve been so focused on the massive, vast experiences we’ve been expecting that
that bridge, that reveal of interstitial information, is what is the new thing. we haven’t noticed how the smaller things have crept in and become normal.
JB: When I think about bridge, I think of the point at which something genuinely new ANP: Like the pixilated camouflage drones and the funny Google street
gets absorbed into something that we recognize and are comfortable with. So we can view blurs. These everyday objects, and how out of place they are, but we
take bits and make analogies or complex metaphors to explain new things in terms of don’t even notice—I’m making a sort of awkward leap into thinking about
the things we already understand, but it doesn’t mean that we genuinely understand glitches, and how they seem to be alluring to you.
them or that we genuinely change in any new way. The things that we were excited JB: The glitches of many of the artifacts of the New Aesthetic felt like seams in things
about in the old visions of the future were things that were genuinely new experiences. that reveal where it became interesting. There’s a lot of discourse in design around the
Space travel is like a genuinely new thing, way beyond air travel. Air travel, essentially seams and the edges where stuff meets. For a long time I believed that there was a firm
as we understand it now and experience it—going to airports and sitting on passenger boundary particularly between the physical and the digital, that there was some kind
jets—is not much different from a fast train ride, or frankly a fast horse and carriage. of hard layer that things existed on one side and then others on the other side. I don’t
That is explicable to someone who lived hundreds of years ago, it’s just a faster way really believe that anymore. I think the two are overlaid upon one another, that they
of getting from point to point. We lose the ability to conceptualize the difference. extend in all directions and overlap. It’s incredibly hard to separate, if you’ve grown up
But I think with the network gives us the opportunity, if we face it head-on, to start with access to the digital world; there are no hard and fast boundaries. The things that
conceptualizing new experiences. are important—your memories and experiences—exist in both.
NATO plans to issue biometrically backed identification cards to 1.65 million Afghans by next May. Local and NATO forces are already compiling “biometric dossiers on hundreds of thousands of cops, crooks,
soldiers, insurgents and ordinary citizens. It’s a high-tech upgrade to a classic counterinsurgency move—simultaneously taking a census of the population, culling security forces of double agents and cutting
off guerrilla routes.” – Wired Magazine.
Frog Queen, or the Prisma Engineering Headquarters (a machine and motor technology company) is located in Graz, Styria, Austria. Its facade was designed by Splitterwerk and looks like one giant
pixelized box. Even the facade itself is practically a square. However, if you look very closely, you will see that each one of the pixels has circular patterns screenprinted on its face. Photography by
Nikolaos Zachariadis, Splitterwerk.
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(left to right)
Pixel Fashion by Kunihiko Morinaga for Anrealage. www.anrealage.com
Google employees recently began testing the company’s new augmented-reality glasses called Project Glass. The glasses are the company’s first venture into wearable computing. The glasses are not yet for
sale. Google will, however, be testing them in public.
Square Enix and Prada teamed up to promote the fashion giant’s 2012 men’s spring/summer collection by producing a CGI photoshoot, starring JRPG Final Fantasy characters. The images appeared in Arena
Homme+ as part of the 25th Anniversary celebration of the Final Fantasy series. Characters Lightning, Noel, Snow, Sazh and Hope are all wearing Prada gear. They were created by Square Enix’s Visual
Works studio in Japan, working alongside the Final Fantasy character designers.
So what is the thing that distinguishes between them? Or what is common to both to put a neat circle around something is so obviously reductive as to be ridiculous. I’m
of them? That’s us. That comes down to human consciousness and perception that hoping that doesn’t mean an end to all kinds of cultural production, but that’s the bit
must stretch across both of those things. I see us attempting to use the same models that I’m stuck in at the moment.
and metaphors for things in both the physical and networked world. But something ANP: I think it’s about adaptation, right? It’s the same thing with
else must be coming down and I’m trying to—well, I don’t want to pin down what journalism—where the subjective experience is undeniable at this point,
that thing is, but I definitely want to point to the things that make you realize it. My it’s integrated into reportage and pretending otherwise is crazy. People
favorite things of the New Aesthetic are the kind of images that you look at and you saying journalism is dead because there’s no way to get to objective truth,
genuinely struggle to comprehend, your brain goes, “I can not figure out how this thing in that way I am relieved. I like the idea that the experience is a process.
can come to be.” When you understand quite how many pressures must be operating JB: Absolutely. It has historically always been that way. We’ve trusted those
or how far various cultural images and ideas must have traveled in order to come experiences of the people who have the loudest voices. And that is starting to
together into this thing, that sort of hints toward something. But that something, for break down.
the moment, has to remain unknowable and unsay-able. When you start talking about ANP: Yes, as soon as you name something, it is gone. It’s the past. We’re
consciousness, I point toward the unsay-able, essentially. continuously putting things behind us as soon as we identify them in a
ANP: You don’t seem to like to pin things down. concrete way. Something I find exciting about New Aesthetic: You said it
JB: No. I really, really don’t. I think that’s a mistake in idea. I’m deeply uninterested all theoretically coalesces at a certain point, but it seems like actually it
in that. would just keep racing ahead of itself.
ANP: Why? JB: It should. That’s the sign that you’re onto a good thing, right? That’s definitely a
JB: Because if the network reveals anything, it’s that these things are heterogeneous sign that there’s something going on here that’s worthy of attention. As soon as you
but connected. They exist in a state that you can’t make some kind of concrete can stamp it and go, “I’ve got that thing,” it’s dead.
definition of. Maybe we will, but the urge to do so destroys it instantly. As soon as ANP: Exactly.
you try to nail these things down, it will escape it. I was having a conversation last JB: Something is living here. So as long as you keep that door open to what it might
week—a couple conversations, actually. One was with an author; we were talking become, then it remains the interesting thing.
about the process of writing a non-fiction book now, the idea of trying to write a book ANP: I wonder if it’s not even so much an aesthetic that you’re identifying,
about something. What you are trying to do in that state or action, is trying to ring- then, as much as an archetype, or even a form of modern mythology. Am I
fence something: Here is my opinion of it, and I’m going to stamp this with my own being too romantic?
particular view. While the argument will carry on, here is my position. I can’t do that JB: I hope not. The aesthetic was always the bits that fell off the back as you were
now. I’ve approached that issue from a number of angles and I don’t see why you looking for it. You find these shards of evidence and you gather them together and go,
would attempt to do that now. And the other conversation was with a curator of an art “Is this the thing? Does it look like this? Is this a bit of evidence for the thing that I’m
gallery who was quitting her job. She talked about curation in similar terms. In order talking about?” But if you focus on the things then you lose it instantly. You can keep
to be a curator you essentially have to have a strong opinion about something, and you picking up these things and they’re very interesting and they may be pretty or ugly or
curate things that uphold that opinion. And that is how you make a name, practice, whatever, but they are merely the artifact of the thing, they’re not the thing itself.
career, or whatever. And she used the phrase, “That seems deeply non-contemporary ANP: A taxidermied idea. This idea of exploring a seam: Do you think
to me.” That simply is not the way in which we experience the world anymore. That there are seams in our “real world,” our physical experience?
these things are more interleaved and more interconnected now. And therefore trying JB: Do you know a book called The City & The City by China Miéville?
AT&T and Boston Police anonymous crime reporting billboard in Boston. Photo by Adam Greenfield.
What Apple would like to know about you. Apple’s new security questions for iOS.
ANP: I’ve noticed that you’ve referenced it before. in a different set of metaphors, that it’s clear to everyone in the conversation where
JB: Yeah, I reference it a lot because it’s so good at describing what I think you’ve those metaphors intersect and where they don’t. So I could say the same thing about
just asked about. One thing that’s so brilliant about the book is that it gives you a new conspiracy theories, or about attributing intentionality to non-human actions. At some
vocabulary for describing the world. It describes a city that is two cities overlaid, one level in all of these things you’re talking in very broad metaphors, and sometimes
upon the other. So they’re sister cities, but they’re not next to each other, they co-exist. you’re being deadly serious. Anyone who discusses magic(k) seriously is usually doing
And the citizens of the one city are culturated from birth to simply unsee the other city. both things at the same time. Which is often quite hard, but in terms of circles, no,
So you know that the people of your city dress a certain way, the buildings in your city come on down to Treadwell’s bookshop and we’ll talk about the apophatic silence at
have a certain architecture style, you have a language and a whole culture in common. the heart of everything, which is produced by magical, noumenal experience.
If you took two steps to the right, you would effectively be in that other city, even But equally, you can have the same discussion with a bunch of very serious tech
though you would not see it. And that’s the world in which this book is set. people about the difference between a blog post and Twitter. These things are
What’s brilliant is it gives you this vocabulary—there’s a couple particular terms, stacks of metaphors.
such as “cross-hatching,” which is the area where the two cities are literally side-by- ANP: Yes, and I’d say the language you’re speaking in is universal Polari.
side, building by building. And also “breeching,” a criminal offense, is when you step It’s like sub-code we can all relate to.
outside the boundary of your city and you suddenly exist in the other city, which JB: Yes, Polari is a code within the language that’s creating a number of other
must be guarded against by all means. As soon as you read this book, in the real world signifiers for what’s understood. Polari’s a good example in terms of it being useful
you suddenly realize when you’ve breeched. You’re walking down a street and look on some levels, internally and externally. So the thing about Polari is that it creates
down an alleyway and see a side of the city that you know you’re not supposed to see, a sense of solidarity amongst its speakers that is visible to those outside even if they
that exists in a totally different zone of culture and awareness. It’s not how you go don’t understand it, but it’s also a useful way of communicating to people from inside
about your day-to-day life, but once you’ve seen it, once you’ve breeched, it’s unsee- a world. That’s true of magical speech as well. When magicians talk about conversing
able again. with higher beings, they don’t necessarily mean, say, Thoth or elder beings. They
That is constantly happening, where you live in your reality bubble, or bubble of might just mean higher consciousness or their own inner state. But you’ve created
metaphors for how you understand the world, and most of the time we’re very good at a scene around those things that allow you to discuss it on many levels at once. Yes,
unseeing the very things that break those metaphors. But occasionally those things get that’s what I’m frequently doing. Maybe? Possibly.
through. So one of the things the New Aesthetic may have been doing is provoking that ANP: Ha, ha. You’re a magician!
breech between ideas of the present and the imminent future, between the digital and JB: Ah, you know, we’re all magicians. It’s all good.
physical, and saying these things are not as separate as you might have believed they ANP: We’re over a year later from when you’ve first introduced New
were before, that you are capable of transcending that boundary. But it may provoke Aesthetic. It was May last year, right?
very odd reactions within you. JB: That’s when it was given that particular name, which was a very throwaway
ANP: You’re probably going to hate this next question, but what you’re name at the time, just one of those things that stuck. It was, as I’ve said, very
talking about—the subtle perception and the overlap—is what a lot of much connected to much longer discussions about struggling to articulate the new
magic is about. experiences that we were having but somewhat denying because we didn’t have the
JB: Yep. With a k. right words to describe them. It seemed like an interesting way of talking about them.
ANP: With or without, I think it works both ways. ANP: What’s happened in this last year?
JB: I have a long and abiding fascination with everyone from Crowley to Gurdjieff JB: The last year’s been really interesting. I got to spend a year playing with this
to way back before then. It’s one of the main taboos of any discussions about idea, and as we discussed, being very careful not to define it. Not to put a direct line
consciousness is that people tend to ignore the huge amounts of research done under on it. My friend Tom Taylor wrote a wonderful thing about it, where he described it
the name of “magic(k).” It’s just reality manipulation and—well, you’ve read Grant as akin to a playlist, something you could drop ideas in and out of and slowly shape
Morrison, right? We’re talking about The Invisibles and technology as standing in for a thing. Which is kind of spot-on. My feeling about what I was doing at least on the
what used to be called magic(k), or various other things. It’s all metaphors. Tumblr was to put these things out there and see how they felt. And many of them, in
ANP: I figured you had to have some sort of knowledge of these worlds. hindsight, weren’t what I was talking about. But by putting the things out there, you
Is that something you’re allowed to talk about in the circles you run kind of got to have the conversation about them and shape it further.
around in? One of the joys in the process was this constant process of correction. For me, pretty
JB: Ha, I’ll talk about anything! Yeah, of course, but you have to be very careful about much as soon as anyone else said, “Ah! I see what you’re talking about, here, it’s this.”
talking about these things, or at least you have to be sure that when you start talking I go, “That’s brilliant, really interesting, but therefore not that.” Because you’ve been
Extract from the Gallery of Default Anonymity: A Work in Progress by Rob Walker. www.murketing.com
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Various digital glitches in photography and video courtesy of www.glitchnews.tumblr.com
Glitch blanket by Phillip Stearns. “These blankets are layered with irony: a digital photographic image, made with an intentionally broken (rewired) camera, is mechanically woven or knit into a photoblanket, an
object commonly advertised as a kitsch memento. In this project, a keepsake for cherishing one’s memories now becomes a platform for fashioning corrupted memory, the cold logic of digital systems into soft,
warm blankets.”
able to put your arms around that particular thing, therefore it is not that. So we’ll veer things, because that essentially is about control. All of this stuff is slowly figuring itself
off into another direction for a bit, and that happened constantly throughout the year. out. This conversation is as much a part of it as anything.
What happened back in March and April, when it exploded, was that kind of happened ANP: What’s next for you?
to almost all of it. Or at least it happened to what was happening on the Tumblr, which JB: I’m mainly interested in two things—well, I’m mainly interested in everything—
was always one aspect of New Aesthetic. There’s been a huge amount of conversation but still attempting to chase down this idea of how we put ourselves (our memory,
and debate around it. But almost all of that is not what I was talking about, even experience, and culture) into the things that we make, which is increasingly mediated
though it’s been incredibly fascinating to figure out, to see how that happened. by the network. The network remains something that we haven’t gotten a handle
On the most basic level, the most interesting thing that happened was that you got to on. We need to keep endlessly generating new metaphors for it, in order to try to
see this immense chasm between technology and art. In that the New Aesthetic was understand. We never truly understand anything, but it’s worth continuing to poke
never about art, though artworks were included in it. Rather there’s this huge area of it. And the other side of it is a better understanding of what the hell we’re doing with
culture that the art world hasn’t really gotten a handle on, and so largely ignored for technology. Like, what we do with it next. So, we’ve built this thing, and we’re still
a long time or treated it completely face value without delving into what was behind really using it as an extension of old media or telephones or existing things. It’s got to
it. It suddenly reached a point where a lot of that stuff looks like art to artists, even be good for something else.
if it was never produced within the theoretical sphere of the art world. Suddenly the ANP: Are we collaborating with the network or are we becoming more
art world has taken up the New Aesthetic, which has produced all sorts of fascinating dependent on it?
conversations. But it seems to be a way of saying, “Oh right! It’s that thing there, we’ll JB: Dependency’s difficult, because we’re always dependent on technology. Except
grab that and grasp that,” While still missing the changes that are happening under the once we’re dumped without them, we seem to mostly do OK. But collaboration is really
hood to have made that occur. interesting, the idea that we are co-producing so much of our world now through
ANP: You’ve created one specific act of actually creating an amorphous technologies we’ve made but are largely illegible, whether that’s the stock market or
framework that didn’t kill the thing it might contain. You’ve created architecture, city planning or the way in which we communicate—those things are
a chase. intimately bound to the technologies we’ve built. I used to think everyone should
JB: Part of me thinks it’s killed a chunk of what I was up to, but that’s OK, that’s just learn to code, and I’m not so about that now. It’s the difference between literacy
again another correction, and we’ll figure out where it goes next. Yeah, it clearly hit and legibility. I used to think everyone needed to be literate in this stuff; I’m not
a nerve, right? We would not be talking if it didn’t. That was part of it from early on, sure that’s true. It’d be nice but it’s kind of ridiculous. You should at least be legible;
to name something that people needed a name for. That’s always very interesting. It people should have a greater awareness of how these things shape everything that we
doesn’t advance the thing itself necessarily. do. I think that’s the only way we’re going to see a larger change in everything, from
ANP: It also makes me think about how we form new archetypes or consciousness to politics to everyday life.
symbols, even. I think about the pixel, or a pixilated edge, becoming a new
alchemical symbol. www.new-aesthetic.tumblr.com
JB: Yeah, there’s something really nice in that. I did a bunch of sigils from pixel stuff.
At South by Southwest, I invoked Crowley. But it was me saying, “This is Crowley,
talking about words of power and how you bind archetypes and blah blah blah.” And
to some extent, that’s what New Aesthetic did. And for a long time after it all kicked
off, I was genuinely like, “This is all Crowley’s revenge. I invoked him arrogantly in the
wrong way and he is showing me what words of power actually do.” I still fairly believe
that to some extent. There’s a very—I hesitate to call it deliberate—a fairly accidental
kind of sigil formation that happened there. Without a doubt. And I was also conscious
of that process happening and very, very conscious that every single magician who
does something like that uses it for powerful ends. And that in itself should be what we
try to avoid.
ANP: What should we avoid?
JB: Trying to have any form of power relations over these things, which is really hard. I
get very nervous around manifestos and people claiming to have strong opinions about
RVCA .COM / 93
At the center of Micaklene Thomas’s exhibition, Origin of the
Universe, is a cropped nude portrait of a black female torso.
The painting updates L’origine du monde, folding Courbet’s
famously ambiguous gesture back on itself to re-inscribe
it within a narrative of black identity politics and feminist
sexuality. The original ambiguity doesn’t disappear, however—
it proliferates a series of new questions about which universe
is being created and what or whom is doing the creating. The
questions are again re-phrased and compounded on the cover
of the monograph accompanying the show, which instead of the
nude torso displays a photograph of a one of Thomas’s signature
cozy interiors. A brightly patterned couch with a riot of throw-
pillows nestles in the corner of a presumptive living room,
waiting placidly beneath Thomas’s ubiquitous wall-paneling
and a photograph of a naked woman seated in a refracted,
nearly identical environment, her afro the same size as the vinyl
records haloed on the wall behind her.
These two different implicit versions of the Origin mutually
inform each other and map out the valences Thomas’s work
has taken recently—zooming in to deep personal interiors and
telescoping out to collaged landscapes and figureless spaces.
While ‘figureless’ isn’t usually a very descriptive term, in
Thomas’s work it makes sense; the momentum of the body of
work she has produced over the last decade of her meteoric rise
implies a figure even when none is present. She has become
famous for her bold rhinestone-encrusted portraits of black
women seated in plush cacophonous interiors, the women’s
postures at once seductive and challenging, lustrous and
evaluative. This work culminated in Thomas’s gigantic painting
commissioned by MOMA in 2010. Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe:
Les Trois Femmes Noir—a fractured, explosive kaleidoscope
of texture and pattern presided over by three women who look
back at the viewer as though waiting for answer as to why you
have interrupted their moment (but maybe if you’re cool you
can have some quiche). Now, even when Thomas paints a room
without anyone there, you still feel the presence of her women
boldly gazing out.
Thomas’s landscapes remove further from figured space without
leaving altogether the realm of interior. Strips of camouflage
fight for space with ‘trees’ of wood paneling punctuated with
colored shapes that recall Stuart Davis’s work. But under
Thomas’s hand, even the naked torso of Origin itself becomes
a refracted landscape, viewed and viewing without eyes, a
cipher yet still a real physical presence. Origin of the Universe—
Thomas’s recent large-scale solo museum exhibition, at the
Brooklyn Museum of Art, represents a huge transition in
her work both in style and subject matter, while retaining
her signature themes. We spoke about the new show, her
technique and what has lead her to this point in a recent phone
conversation...
by Sean Kennerly / images courtesy the artist
MICKALENE
THOMAS
(previous page)
Portrait of Mnonja with
Flower in Her Hair #2, 2011
Rhinestones, acrylic and
enamel on wood panel,
60x48 in.
(this spread)
Le Dejeuner sur l’herbe les
Trois Femmes Noires, 2010
Rhinestones, acrylic and
enamel on wood panel,
120x288 in.
RVCA .COM / 97
(clockwise from top left)
Landscape Majestic, 2011
Woodblock, silkscreen and
digital collage print,
52x68 5/8 in.
I began to scan them in and get photographs printed interested in. It reminds me of Jacob Lawrence. So so much deeper than an edict of female genitalia.
of them, and then started collaging them, mixing them those are some new things that I’m playing with in my That image will always be very powerful, it will always
up with other images that I had. own work. I’m interested in that way of painting right be controversial because of the problems we have in
SK: You’re specifically talking about the now. I think I’m interested in genres and formalities of the world. It’s like, there’s other issues that require
interiors in the show, the Striped Foyer painting more than the concept behind it. our attention much more than a created, secondary
painting and Blue Couch with Green Owl? SK: In general, your work seems very joyful image that’s of an expression in an artistic form that’s
MT: Yeah, those come from images from the and positive. about the illusion and fantasy that’s trapped into the
encyclopedia and photographs of landscapes that MT: It does? That’s nice. provocative notions of what we’re dealing with. There
I’ve taken, from my own photographic resources and SK: I wonder if you really think of it that way, are other ways that we could deal with this issue
my installations. I wanted to recreate an interior as opposed to this dark heavy thing where than banning certain expressions of creativity. Those
environment that was removing the figure. Artificial you’re working out demons… things, these images are harmless. The restrictions
spaces that appear to be real environments, but MT: Yeah, the world’s already full of that. You they put on women’s reproductive rights are harmful.
they’re not. None of those spaces exist—they’re all know, I’m interested in beautiful images and things I have problems with them not letting the image up on
fabrications of spaces that I would imagine, or spaces that make people feel good. I actually like that you Facebook. They think people aren’t able to deal with
that I would create if I could with the actual materials. think that my images are positive. If was to start certain images. There’s such a waste about female
It was easier to do it with the collage and then make working with dark and heavy ideas or images, I sexuality. You know, I’m glad to know that my body
paintings of them. And I wanted to do something would probably get depressed. I think some people has so much power in the world that people cannot
without the figure—it’s as simple as that. can work with those things, but I can’t. It’s not how deal with that, with looking of female sexuality.
SK: You also went in the other direction, I live my life and I think my work has all aspects of America—we’re complacent and lazy. It just makes me
with close-ups of the figure in your updating who I am as a person. Artwork and creativity are an really sad somehow that we can’t use certain images
of Courbet’s L’origine du monde. Was that a extension of the person. It’s up to us to make works in 2013. That’s why it’s important for artists to keep
counter-balance? that make the viewer see the world in our way. That making what they’re going to make. Because there
MK: Absolutely. It’s a way to have all these aspects could be political, or controversial—whatever aspects may be some time when we may not be able to. We
of my work in the show. It’s also just about having that person is interested in, it’s up to them to be as may jailed or fined or stoned. So I’ll stick to my pretty
fun with painting. Sometimes I can get bogged down authentic as they can with their creative work. images for a little longer. I’m not ready to have a fight.
with certain things and images, so for me, I just want SK: Courbet’s L’origine has a long history That’s why I love Tracy Emin’s work. She did a sort
to have fun with the painting and creating the image. controversy and censorship—I was reading of Origin of the Universe but with her neon lights. So
I think working abstractly without a figure, it’s just the other day about how it is currently banned colorful, just a line form, saying so much with so little.
easier sometimes, you know, figure painting and on Facebook. But those were banned too.
portrait painting you get so attached to that person MT: You can’t post mine there either. You can’t even
that it doesn’t allow you to really think about print them in newspapers or use them for press.
a painting. SK: You’ve encountered problems with
And I started looking at a lot of other bodies of work that already?
that I never really truly considered before—I became MT: Yeah. It’s really funny. I think when as a society
really interested in Stuart Davis and how these flat we allow women to have control over our own
planes of color, how he created these flat planes and reproductive rights, that’s when we are going to
geometric shapes of color to create space. I found allow a female nude to exist in the world the way it
those very interesting and wanted to use some of those should be. We still have a long way to go when we
elements in my own work. And that’s why every once have our government determining what a woman
in a while you’ll see these big sheets or shapes of flat can and cannot do to her own body. We still have
color. He creates a different type of collage of shapes problems. The female nude in that sense, it’s like
that I find very interesting. There’s a rhythm that I’m c’mon now, where are we? Where are we living? It’s
Anyone who is familiar with the East Side of bookstore/art gallery Wacko in Los Feliz. They
Los Angeles has undoubtedly spent time in the are a true artist family. Peter has considered
neighborhood of Echo Park. It’s now considered himself an artist since the 1960s when he was
one of the trendiest areas to live in in the city, a teenager, but it wasn’t until he discovered
chocked full of cafes, natural markets and ceramics that he really began to blossom.
clothing boutiques catering to the upwardly Through access to pottery, he began to develop a
mobile hipster. However, that hasn’t always unique style of post-modernism that permeates
been the case. Back in the 1950s the area had his work even today. Ceramics eventually led
a much different name. They called it the Red to furniture design and it was while pursuing
Gulch. The area got this name because at the furniture that he was introduced to the world-
time (all through the 1950s and 1960s) it was renowned designer, Ettore Sottsass who was at
the hotbed of American Communist activity the time developing a whole new school of design
in Los Angeles. If you’re wondering what this he was calling Memphis. The Memphis Group
has to do with artist Peter Shire, then you’re was an Italian design and architecture group
in for a treat. In fact, this is an article that I’ve that started around 1981. They drew inspiration
been trying to get into this magazine for years. from such movements as Art Deco and Pop Art
I first learned about Peter, his history and his including styles such as the 1950s Kitsch and
work when I was housesitting for some friends futuristic themes. Their designs included Post-
in Echo Park. These friends were at the time Modern furniture, fabrics, ceramics, glass and
subletting the Shire family house and it was metal objects. The group’s colorful, ironic pieces
through my brief time living there that I learned were hailed as some of the most iconic examples
his story. Peter was what they used to call a Red of Post Modernism in design and the arts. Peter
Diaper baby, meaning that his parents were Shire was soon to become their only American
communists. He grew up in this house and the member. Now, with some serious credibility
place literally reeked of counter-cultural history. under his belt, Peter began to really expand his
It was a wonder of mid-century design, simple range. Back in Los Angeles, he embarked on
and perfect in it’s construction. But by the time I numerous large-scale sculptural and architectural
was staying there Peter has basically customized projects alongside continuing innovations in
the whole thing with his unique primary colored ceramics, metal and furniture. He started Echo
sculptural elements so that it felt something like Park Pottery in a disused industrial space,
a hybrid between a Charles Eames construction just blocks where he grew up and continues to
and a the set of a Go-Go’s video. It was wild. I maintain that studio to this day. If you happen
became incredibly intrigued by the secret slice of to find yourself in the neighborhood, please stop
Los Angeles history that Peter had opened up for by his studio. There are some wonderful things
me and it drove me to dig deeper. I soon found to see, feel, taste and buy there. Unique stories in
out that not only was Peter Shire an artist who Southern California are a dime a dozen, but very
grew up with communist parents, but his entire few are as loaded with innovation, politics and
family had influenced the cultural landscape of artistic diversity as the creative life of Peter Shire.
Los Angeles. His brother, Billy Shire is a popular He is a true one of a kind and we could not be
gallerist as well as founder of the underground more excited about this interview.
(opposite)
Studio Parking Lot, Photograph by Joshua White
Lisa Rovner is a French American filmmaker, writer and artist whose interest in cultural studies has led her to experience media as an art ma-
terial, and mass media as a curatorial space. The medium is her medium. Through her expansive work in film, photography, performance and
the written word, Rovner engages with historical precedents and predecessors all the while confronting History with her story. Her company,
Message is the Medium, specializes in creative consulting and branded films. www.messageisthemedium.com
Kate Williams writes about art, music, fashion and pop culture for magazines and websites. She grew up in Kansas, not far from the Garden
of Eden, but she is pretty sure that her own personal utopia lies someplace not far from the beach. Or maybe the desert...but there are definitely
cacti. More of her work can be found at www.lightasafeatherstiffasaboard.co.
King Tuff is a musician and visual artist from Brattleboro, Vermont, now living in Los Angeles. He grew up reading dirty comic books and
playing baseball, spent the middle part of his life writing rock & roll songs, partying and texting, and eventually settled down as an old man,
oil painting in his cabin in the woods, bald with long hair on the sides, wearing glasses, drinking wine, watering his plants, stacking his books,
dancing by himself, and looking out of his many windows.
Chris Lux is artist, a painter, and a sculptor who lives and works in Los Angeles. He is represented by Jancar Jones Gallery and has recently
published a book 12 Saints through Peradam Press in New York City. He interviewed Clare Rojas for this issue.
Alexis Georgopoulos is a composer and artist based in New York City. As ARP, he makes liminal, minimal music, often with analog synthe-
sizers and, increasingly, with classical stringed instruments. His album The Soft Wave (Smalltown Supersound) was named a New York Times
Notable Album of 2010. He is currently at work on two albums of new material which be released by Smalltown Supersound and RVNG INTL,
respectively, in 2013.
Liz Armstrong’s primary quest is perfecting the art of writing motivational notes of self-fulfilling prophecy, though she also devotes much
of her time to exploring subtle methods of perception and communication. She finds living in Los Angeles a huge enabler of fascination with
all things glittery and fantastic. A professional writer, she covers topics of invented immersive reality—currently for this publication, Vice, The
Fader, and Rookie. When not jacked up on magical, heady concepts in front of a computer screen, she’s playing saxophone, DJing at KCHUNG,
encouraging friends to just fucking go for it already, or is off on some adventure generally involving mountains, partial nudity, ridiculous mis-
hap, and spreading love.
Pat Graham has been photographing artists, designers and musicians for over a decade. His photographs have been featured in artwork for
iconic record covers such as Bikini Kill’s eponymous first LP, Modest Mouse’s Lonesome Crowded West, and many more. He has been included
in numerous books and articles and has exhibited widely across the world. He is a partner in 96 Gillespie, a non-profit art gallery in London. His
photographs have been featured in Rolling Stone, Spin, Artforum, Dazed & Confused, Village Voice, the Guardian and many others. His first
book of photographs, Silent Pictures, was published by Chronicle Books in 2011. He shot our cover boy James Bridle for this issue.
Sean Kennerly is a writer/muscian who lives in Brooklyn, where he fronts the inscrutable Ice Balloons in a fly mask. His articles have ap-
peared in the SF Bay Guardian, Juxtapose and Rolling Stone. His mother once told him that 90% of pain is self-pity, but she was there for him
when he broke his arm. He is currently working on a novel about hyenas.
Cali Thornhill-DeWitt co-wrote our article on LA Punk Gangs and runs the record label, Teenage Teardrops, releasing all manner of books,
prints, vinyl records by emerging artists who are true to the spirit and philosophy of underground culture. He is also a talented photographer,
writer, DJ, and partner in the multi-media publishing company, Witchhat. He lives in Los Angeles with his bride Jenna, and their rescued
poodle, Caramel Bobby.
(back cover)
Clare Rojas, Untitled, 2012
Oil on linen, 60x48 in, image courtesy
Prism Gallery, Los Angeles
doverstreetmarket.com
london tokyo beijing
artist oscar murillo