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Saturday, March 11, 2017

Fetish Baroque

Been getting a lot of spotlighted international press for my collaboration with Jamie Stewart of XiuXiu reciting one of his poems on the album Forget.  I did this recording back in 2015 when we were working on The Magic Flute Part One-An Opera in Six Steps in New York City.
 A very sexy, handsome K-Pop Producer who is a big XiuXiu fan has been shuttling me to a secret villa location somewhere between Brandenberg Commons and Potsdamng  for field recordings and what not.  The producer and his crew are all mega fine, tall and muscular.  Like most young people they are a little too stoner hesher chick for my taste, but the experience has been delightful plus they came with a private chef making the most tasty Korean dishes that remind me of K-Town in Los Ang. Its all very mysterious and hush hush, and I hope the Vagimule doll doesn't wind up kidnapped and shipped off to North Korea as the race horse arsed concubine of big dicked dearest leader darling Kim Jong-un.  I'm supposed to be going to China and Korea soon courtesy of the Goethe Institut for site specific location scouting for my latest project on Anna May Wong.
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Myrecent time in Paris was beyond devoon.  Got to reconnect with my dearest olde pals the great Michele Lamy and genius genius genius Rick Owens.  Rick invited me as his special guest to see his Fall collection during Fashion Week at Palais du Tokyo.  I was picked up by the most beautiful young curly haired rosy cheeked French boy at my lovely Hotel du Vieux Marais on 8 rue de Platre and rushed over to the Palais to hangout backstage with Michele who was looking radiant in the way that is synonomous with all that has been the Michele Lamy I have known for over 35 years.  Seeing all the fashionistas and peronistas upclose and personal was a little bit overwhelming.  Rick was being interviewed by countless journalists so i took my first row seat in the family section.  Ricks wonderous Mexican mamita Connie was also at the show.  She comes all the way from Porterville for every one of her famous sons spectaculars, driven to the airport by non other then Glen Meadmore.

What can i say about a Rick Owens fashion extravaganza other then Rick is the ultimate operatic showman.  He is this centuries great Florenz Ziegfeld at his gamey game best.  The fashion show reminded me of a deconstructed version of the 1941 film Ziegfeld Girl that starred Judy Garland, Lana Turner and Hedy Lamarr.  Here like in the movie the ladies descend a staircase, but instead of books on their head its sex magic pageantry.  Ziegfeld Girls designer was Gilbert Adrian and Rick salutes him sortof, with an utterly sublime army of Lesbian lovers and General Jinjur's armada of revolt taking seige upon the Emerald City of Oz to remove the Scarecrow (That orange creature in the White House) from his throne.
What about the clothes? Aleister Crowley tiara's adorned with hoody sleeves, Sigmund and the Seamonster tendrils, Puff  the Magic Dragon blankets, hajibs and grandma wore the bustle spicy beefcurtains and pampas rosettes, while Kenneth Anger is invocating his younger, smarter demon brother.

After the show I had to do major saaphic processing by taking a long walk in the Parisian night air.  I walked for over two hours arriving fashionably late to Rick & Michele's dinner party in my honor.   I still can't believe after putting on such a miraculous event that Rick & Michele still wanted to have a dinner party for me in their 7 story palais that use to be the offices of Francois Mitterand.
The supper was sumpteous created by their personal chef the young hunky African Malonga.  I've never eaten so well.  My Paris crew included artist Wu Tsang and her girlfriend the performer Boychild, Norweigan experimental musician Bendik Giske, Editathon Art&Feminisms curator Flora Katz and Francois Quintin the director of Lafayette Anticipations the institution that brought me to France. Didn't get to talk to Rick very much at dinner as his charming photog pal Danielle Levitt and her boyfriend who are LA natives, and Rick's other friends wanted to know all about me and my relationship to Rick and Michele.  Michele's daughter Scarlette Rouge was in New York where she had a visual art opening.  Scarlette's murals are the center piece of the Owens/Lamy drawing room.
The next morning i was back at the Owenscorp Officina for a photo shoot supervised by Rick and shot by his creative director Luke.  I can't believe I was photographed without a wig and absolutely no makeup, modeling the Crowleyesque headdresses.  Since Rick and I are both workaholics, its the only time we are relaxed and able to seriously talk.  His mom Connie made her famous persimmon cookies for me and we both discussed our bi-racial identity.  Rick's late father was a white intellectual who infused in Rick a love for classical music and high art.  The music for the fashion show as a Beethovan piano sonata remixed and edited by Jeff Judd/aka Jolet a mutual friend of ours who has done the music for all of Rick's show.  Rick seemed to agree with my assessment  that the cold, harsh,  anglo side of his personality from his father, mixed with his mothers Mexican warmth and generosity give his talent the edge that has made him such a sparkling success.  I told Rick that my father was born in Mexico and my grandfather was a mean old cranky Prussian born in Berlin, and I doubt that as we both age there is certainly no chance of us turning into mean old bitter white dudes
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For my performance at the Editathon with Wu Tsang at the beautiful Archives nationales I was fortunate to have a gorgeous young Morrocan assistant Tarek Lakhrissi who was devoted to the doll. Tarek who is a poet, is tall and strikingly gorgeous and knows all the juciest youthquakers in Paris.
I didn't expect such a large crowd to come to my performative talk with Wu on the late great NYU Professor Jose Esteban Munoz.  One of the themes of the Editathon was Disidentifications which is the name of the famed academic treatise written by Jose that continues to inspire young people the world over.  I am the books cover girl and Jose writes a chapter in the book about my work.
The Editathon is in its third year in Paris and is devoted to two days  of editing workshops to reduce the gender gap on Wikipedia platforms.  The young pretty and smart curator Flora Katz worked in partnership with Wikimedia at the Sorbonne University.  When working with a young curator I was a little worried that she would expect in my staged conversation with Wu that we should explain things. One of my biggest peeves with the art and theatre world with dramaturgy is this constant need for further explaination  and the pull to present in a linear fashion.  Of course  I have fought against this way of thinking for over 30 years, yet it sometimes still rears its head.  I was positive that once Wu and I began talking it would all come together organically and the audience would appreciate my more abstract style of performance and they did eagerly with few walkouts.
The audiences for the two day congress were a lovely cross generational/cross racial mix, Something you hardly see in Germany.  I was interviewed by a lot of young feminist writers, activists, bloggers,  and journalists who give me a lot of hope for the female future.
In the audience for my perrformance with Wu was the great writer Dennis Cooper who now lives in Paris.  He came with film director Christophe Honore and actors Romain Duris, Gaspard Ulliel, Gre'goire LePrince-Ringuet, Clotilde Hesme and Simon Porte Jacquemus.
I really enjoyed the lecture of art critic and art historian Elvan Zabunyan and the dramatic interpretive dance by Boychild with assist on saxophone by Bendik.  Wu's ejaculating sculpture was the perfect addition to the  proceedings spritzing every 40 minutes or so.
On the second day Wikipedia editing chief Kvardek du  did a nice subtle performance slyly transforming from a Dauphine into a Chavalier and then a Renaissance Prinzessin.  The congress closed brilliantly with an informatively sublime lecture by dulcimet voiced performance studies specialist Hypatia Vourloumis, the beautiful and enchanting Greek/Indonesian former student of Dr. Jose.  Hypatia who looks like a mixture of famed Greek actress Irene Pappas and bond girl Barbara Carerra is carrying the Disidentification torch with grace, intelligence, dignity and aplomb.