Die Neue Sachlichkeit

Haven’t seen for a coons age that crazed older black busker that usually haunts the Yorkstrasse U7 station with his big keyboard and erratic behavior. He looks like a cross between a spinster Rick James and Peaches from Peaches & Herb fame. I can’t remember if he wears his hair in dreadlocks, cornrows, a gherri curl or some combination thereof. A lot of Americans who long for a mainstream career in the entertainment arena come to Germany where I gather they think there is less competition and lower standards. I guess they rationalize if mediocre types like David Hasselhoff can become household names in Deutschland so can they. This poor man in the U7 singing maudlin, histrionic renditions of the lamest pop hits becomes downright psychotic if those passing his music station don’t give him a tip. I guess he is so deluded he thinks that people aren’t there to ride the train but to hear him perform. His occasional outbursts have been recorded into urban lore and most likely have resulted in him becoming persona non grata on the Yorkstrasse platform. Now if only the subway adverts of American expat cabaret singer Gayle Tufts frequent performances could also get the same treatment. In all fairness I have never seen a performance of Ms. Tufts and her Dinglish shtick, but I have been told that  the creator of such hot buttons titles as Some Like it Heisse and Love appears often on German television and is quite cheesy in a bad way and not anyones ideal of a guilty pleasure. One ItalioGerman pal who has been living in Berlin for over 25 years and is vaguely aquainted with the Gayle Tufts orbit told me she is married to a German man is financially independent and popular with a certain middleclass Deutche element, but my young German students share my eyerolling disdain of her very visage lurking in the metro.

Received a cute little new years missive from someone who is actually a true talent the electro soul diva Billie Ray Martin who use to be my Rote Insel downstairs neighbour a couple of years ago when she moved back to Berlin from Hamburg. From what I can muster she is inviting a select number of fans to witness a studio recording session. Check out the links below for details:

Hi all.

This very special event is now open to the non-subscribing public.
Join, get involved, comment, share, share, share.

https://billieraymartin.bandcamp.com/merch/10th-feb-four-ambient-tales-live-recording-exclusive

facebook event for all updates: https://billieraymartin.bandcamp.com/merch/10th-feb-four-ambient-tales-live-recording-exclusive


Thank you.

billie ray martin
disco activisto records
www.billieraymartin.com


That milkman of human humpiness The Love Camel aka:  Andrea Novarin had sent me two rare film titles that I have never heard of.  The strange 1969 incest tale In Search of Gregory starring Julie Christy, John Hurt(pre Naked Civil Servant) and hot-to-trot Michael Sarrazin as the title character, and 1968's trippy Wonderwall starring a gorgeous Jane Birkin.
With my Rising Stars, Falling Stars partner in grime Daniel Hendrickson the Scandinavian Muzlim we had a very fruitfull meeting with the lovely Arsenal Empress Stefanie Schulte Strathaus at her gorgeous spacious compound overlooking Gorlitzter Park. Rising Stars will move in the spring from Arsenal Institut fur film und Videokunst in Postsdamer Platz to the new cultural institution of the Silent Green Kulture Quartier the former crematorium in Wedding. I playfully refer to the Silent Green as the Soylent Green. When we move to Silent Green which already houses the Arsenal public film archive and is headquarters to the Music Board Berlin, the label K-7 Records and other productions and projects we will screen from the archive a quarterly program of sweet 16 milimeter films. I’ve been presenting RSFS now for 8 years at Arsenal so moving to a new locale is very exciting.

Saftig & Kraeftig

So many celebrity deaths lately. Just heard from Scandinavian Muzlim Daniel Hendrickson that David Bowie who shared his birthdate of January 8th died Sunday Jan 11th after turning 69. I was never a big fan of his not owning even one of his many albums. But when I was in New York recently for two months I would walk down 4th Street every day on my way to the 80 WSE Gallery past the theatre with his photo on the front advertising his most recent theatrical endeavour. I did love Mr. Bowie in the films The Man Who Fell to Earth, Absolute Beginners and The Hunger where he co-starred with Catherine Deneuve and my friend the performer and actress Ann Magnusen.

As a friend of his former wife Angie Bowie and also the legendary Jayne County I never really believed in the cult of David Bowie like so many of my generation and younger kids who shared an affinity through so called “alternative culture” a term which of course doesn’t really mean anything anymore. Was having café & kuchen with Piero Bellomo of La Collecione and we walked by the flat that Mr. Bowie lived at during his Berlin sourjourne on the Hauptstrasse and it was flanked with young girls with bad hair and make-up crying, candles and flowers ala the death of Princess Diana.

The French fashion designer Andre’ Courre’ges who also died at age 92 was more of a hero to me. I adored his futuristic 1960s work and 1980s new wave comeback. One of my former Weissensee Art Akademy art students Lydia Hamann inherited many Courre’ges outfits from the 1980s that belonged to her stylish mother. Courre’ges also designed the costumes to the 1960s films The 10th Victim and Barbarella.

Had a lovely reunion the other day with that mega beautiful NewYork treasure Lia Gangitano of Participant Inc. who came through Berlin working with her lovely and very sweet Bard colleague Ms. Jeannine Tang. Lia along with Wolfgang Tilmans will put out a book on the late great artist Greer Lankton which I am really excited about. Lia curated a show of Greer’s work in New York which was the talk of the town and generated universal press kudos. Wolfgang brought Lia to Berlin last year to do a version of her Lankton exhibition at his gallery here which was also a huge hit. There is no one on the planet smarter or sexier then Miss Lia and so I was excited that La Sachsse--Susanne and her boyfriend Marcuse Siegelstein hosted a little private intimate dinner party for her. The food was heavenly, and the gossiping went on until the wee hours of the evening. Yes your ears were burning for a reason as we were most likely badmouthing YOU.

I am not one to gossip so you didn’t hear this one from me, but I was gagging on the lovely extravaganza when I was told by a young LA curator recently that he has had it with a certain vanity gallery in Hollywood and its owner who he calls “Grifty Gertie”. The things he was saying about this supremely icky person had me cackling so loud that we were getting dirty looks from the other patrons of the restaurant he took me to for brunch. I am constantly being asked by people if I miss Los Angeles. Yes I sometimes do but not certain people who shall remain nameless who give the town its bad rep.

Behoerde, Eiskalt

I am so glad winter waited till after the new year to rear its fugly Gydra three heads.In Berlina its beyond freezing temps with snow on the ground. But in London and Paris where I am making pit stops for a big project with the Tate, Pompidou, and Palais de Tokyo its still a bit unseasonably warmish. Before leaving had a deli reunion with Gottheit aka Akira Knightley the make-up artiste suprema who has become a Gallic delight. Akira designed my wig when I was recently in New Yorika and she will have an upcoming 16 page fashion editorial spread in a men’s mag that features her ultra nate modern make-up and hair do dos. La Frau Sachsse hosted the tete’ at her eastside compound and cooked a scrumptious meal and powerhouse gin martinis by her mixologist lover Marcuse Siegelstein. The Fearless Leader of CHEAP kollektiv also hosted a formal post Xmas dindin that was very chic and scrumptious with a guest list that included scholar Heather Love and her lady love Mara, Arsenal Empress Stefanie Schulte Strathaus, the personable Miss Kalani of Goethe Universitaet, Muzlim jihadist Daniel Hendrickson and the super famous and handsome Deidrich Diedrichson.

Just learned of another celebrity death in the form of Oscar winning Hungarian born cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond(Close Encounters of the Third Kind,The Deerhunter). He was 82 and no I never met him or had any personal contact with him.

Puderluder

Rising Stars, Falling Stars new series Briefe aus der Garderobe went off without a hitch Sunday Dec 27th at Arsenal Institut fur film und video kunst with a screening of Jean Jacques Beinex’s Diva. This short series will take place two more times at Arsenal with a screening on January 31st with the Pina Bausch film Die Klagender Kaiserin and March 27th Easter Sunday with Frank Ripploho’s Taxi zum Klo then Rising Stars will switch to a quarterly series at the Crematorium in Wedding where the Arsenal archive is housed. For the showing of Diva from 1981 there were so many people wanting to see the film that the kasse had to turn away over 30 plus people including Toby Ashraf of the Berlin Art Film Festival, artist Maggie Schneider and Norweigan theater and sex god Vegard Venge. The fortunate few that got seats included Arsenal Empress Stefanie Schulte Strathaus, Gwenael Ratzky and Garret Woltemath of the Berlinale’s Panorama section, visiting filmmakers from Cairo Mohammed Shawky and Louly who is in the DFFB program on color grading, Daniel Hendrickson, Piero Bellomo with famed medical specialist Miriam Preuss, Susanne Sachsse & Marcuse Siegelstein, 19 year olde Alex Crossan who performs under the moniker Mura Masa, Clarisse Mehring of the popular feminist sex toy shop in Kreuzberg the name of which I can’t remember at the moment, Heather Love, Mara and their delightful college age children, theatre and costume designer Ida Muhler, scholar Nanna Heidenreich and her very cute friend Josefina. Remember just two more RSFS at Arsenal before we relocate to the Crematorium in Wedding next year in the Spring.

Sad to relate the end of the year deaths of famed artist and shrimp enthusiast Elsworth Kelly 92, Lemmy of Motorhead 70, Natalie Cole 65 and cinematographer Haskell Wexler age 93. Mr. Wexler also directed the very famous film Medium Cool from 1969 and shot the famous helicopter shot from the 1950s film Picnic. Mr. Wexler was one of my film teachers at UCLA back in the 1970s when I was a weenager in the Upward Bound program for mentally gifted minors.

Lana, Ava, Judy & Lena

The MGM  stars of the Hollywood goldenen era: Lana Turner, Ava Gardner, Judy Garland and Lena Horne were all very close girlfriends in the 1940s while under contract to Metro.  Lana & Ava even shared husbands, but what few people know about was that these great stars were also saaphic sweeties as well as close confidants.  Just one of those little tidbits of historical lore that I’m throwing out to ya!

Got mentioned in this blog called Weird Sisters as one of 2015’s best bloggers.  See for yourself with this link that came to me courtesy of the famous Love Camel aka: Andrea Novarin in the UK:

http://weird-sister.com/2015/12/17/top-10-2015-feminist-zineschapbooksblogs/#more-5134

Attention all you true philanthrapists out there and not those rich ungenerous idiots that only give money to see their name on a building or museum wing.  Please give mucho moula$$$$ to support Lia Gangitano and Participant Inc. Gallery the only not-for-profit gallery that promotes left field work in New York City.  Lia has sacrificed everything and continues to daily go against the odds in presenting challenging work that no one else would dare touch.  Lia is art personified and is a New York treasure.  I have known and worked with her for way over 20 plus years and she always keeps me surprised and invigorated with her sassy smarts and genius glamour.   Read her little missive below and click on the contribution section and make haste and send her gobs of filthy lucre.  Its an easy rule for kids to follow.

Friends,

Last week we joined our heroes, and family members -- Martin Wong, Johanna Fateman, Vaginal Davis, James Son Ford Thomas -- among the New York Times Best of 2015. It's YOU who make it happen.

Help us be our best by making a year-end, tax-deductible contribution. 


"It defied definition."
--Emre Hüner on Greer Lankton, LOVE ME, Best of 2015, Artists' Artists
Support from our community allows us to produce this and other unprecedented projects such as A.K. Burns, A SMEARY SPOT; Doveman and Tom Kalin, My Silent One (In the Sweetness of Time), and our current El Mirage by Martin Gustavsson, which hosts Stanley Love Performance Group in residence to produce a new work this January, Tapestry Truths; and Ephemera Office Enterprises: Martin Wong, organized by Olga Dekalo in conjunction with Martin Wong: Human Instamatic at the Bronx Museum of the Arts.
Your gift goes a long way. Thanks for your support.

With our gratitude, and warm wishes for the new,
Lia
PARTICIPANT
***

The Magic Flute project at 80 WSE Gallery and Come on Daughter Save Me at Invisible-Exports Gallery were hugely successful with tons of press, below are some of the links from Art Forum, The New York Times and The New Yorker Magazine.  It was a lot of work and great fun collaborating with a group of wonderful talented people.  Of course I am now on to the next project as there is no rest for perennially wicked.

-- The New York Times, Dec 2015

• -- The New Yorker, Dec 2015
• -- Artforum, Dec 2015

• -- The New York Times (The Magic Flute), Dec 2015
• -- New York Magazine, Fall 2015
• -- Vice Magazine, November 2015
• -- Bedford & Bowery, November 2015
• -- aqnb, November 2015
• -- A Shaded View on Fashion, November 2015