Latest News | Biography | Filmography | Performances and Exhibitions | Discography | Bibliography | Zineography | Press | Links | Photos | Merchandise and Contacts

Thursday, November 19, 2020

ES IST EIN WÜTENDER WIND AUSGEBROCHEN

Es ist ein wütender Wind ausgebrochen

der von allen Enden die Scharen zusammengetrieben hat

Michael Socha the young British actor who is a dead ringer for American star Jake Gyllenhaal almost collided with Vaginal Davis on Potsdamer Str. It's the second time this month that La Diva has had a bit of a spill riding on her cute and cuddly Dutch girl bike. She was coming back from seeing the latest offering at Galerie Isabella Bortolozzi of the divine Hannah Quinlan & Rosie Hastings fresco exhibition Public Affairs. The young artist duo have merged themselves into one dynamic entity producing beautiful work that not only comments and critique's are savage times but is also able to channel Sir Carol Reed's 1968 musical Oliver in one singular breath. The exhibition runs until January 9th.

Ms. Davis' work is nearing completion for her installation for the 13th Gwangju Biennale that will take place next year from late February to May in South Korea. Below is some more info:


* 국문 콘텐츠는 영문 버전의 하단에서 확인하실 수 있습니다.

Dear all,

Our public program initiative GB Talks | Rising to the Surface: Practicing Solidarity Futures continues with three sessions this month: a panel discussion about the unspeakable in the archives related to uprisings; a healing workshop about Rites of Passage and renewal; and a conversation about artistic strategies to address collective trauma with Tibet and Indonesia as conflict sites of study. Join us on Zoom or on the Gwangju Biennale Foundation’s Facebook page.

To watch the recordings of past events, please click here and here for a two-part lecture by academic Vladan Joler about cyber forensics and data networks behind the major web service platforms as part of technocapitalism; here for the nourishing keynote by social justice activist Djamila Ribeiro about the integral role of Brazilian Black feminism in the current political debates globally; and here for a panel focusing on feminist legacies of social uprisings with Gwangju and Khartoum as sites of study, with academic Jeong Kyung-woon, journalist Reem Abbas, and activist Huiyeon Choi.

On Thursday, November 20th, at 8–9.30am CET / 4–5.30pm Gwangju time, we will host a panel titled From Istanbul to Gwangju: Archiving the Unarchivable in Uprisings, exploring the strategies of remembrance for social uprisings from the 1980s onward. Archive researcher Kwon Do Gyun will introduce The May 18 Democratic Movement Records as part of UNESCO World Heritage Records. Artist Zeyno Pekünlü will discuss the ‘unrepresentable’ in the massive visual data related to recent uprisings in Turkey, whereas sociologist Begüm Fırat Özden will speak about how the crowds reemerge in contemporary politics. This event is co-hosted by the Gwangju Biennale Foundation and 5·18 Archives in Gwangju. Join us on Zoom by clicking here (Zoom Webinar ID: 914 1015 4133). We are grateful for SAHA Association’s support for Pekünlü’s and Özden’s participation.

On Wednesday, November 25th, at 8–9.30am CET / 4–5.30pm Gwangju time, Māori Healing practitioner Haaweatea Holly Bryson will lead a workshop titled “Rites of Passage and Renewal,” which looks at the processes to mark the transition from one phase of life to another. Together, we will explore the three stages of the Rites of Passage, leading to intergenerational healing. This map will show us the “bones” or codes of how humanity transitions and transforms, our consciousness, resiliency, belonging, purpose, revelation, and renewal. The workshop is limited to 50 people on a first come first-served basis. Please email publicprogram@gwangjubiennale.org to register and we will send you the Zoom details.

On Saturday, November 28th, at 7–8.30am CET / 3–4.30pm Gwangju time, we will host a conversation titled From Tibet to Indonesia: Rupture and Continuum,about artistic and cinematic strategies dedicated to sites of collective memory and the persistance of trauma under authoritarian rule and occupation. Researcher Kartika Pratiwi will discuss the potential of digital storytelling to create space for witness accounts and survivors’ stories from the mass killings in 1965–66 in Indonesia. Filmmakers Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam will introduce their long-term project featuring the personal archive of Lhamo Tsering—Sonam’s father who was one of the leaders of the CIA-backed guerrilla resistance against Communist China’s military operation in occupied Tibet. Inza Lim will act as respondent and share reflections from her theatre making and activism around the Gwangju democratization process. Join us on Zoom by clicking here (Zoom Webinar ID: 987 3072 1064)

Upcoming schedule is as follows:
December 11th: A conversation around ecocide, Indigenous resistance, and planetary movements with artist Cian Dayrit and Beaska Niillas
December 12th: A discussion about women peasants and commoning farming practices in South Korea with artist collective Rice Brewing Sisters Club
January 16th: A workshop about Rites of passage, renewal, and intergenerational healing with Māori Healing practitioner Haaweatea Holly Bryson
January 30th: A keynote addressing an ethics of renunciation toward a unique proposal for non-injuriousness as a way of life by academic Leela Gandhi

Also, check out our website to watch the video contributions by activist Nadège; curator, researcher, translator, and artist Min-hyung Kang; scholar and activist Lokman Tsui, about collective care on and off the internet, ownership of technology, and the relationship of digital surveillance and grassroots social movements.

As we gear up for the opening of the 13th Gwangju Biennale on February 26 2021, we look forward to our journey with you unravelling the potential of collective intelligence addressing anti-systemic kinship, creative modes of resistance and renewal.

Hope you will join us.

Defne Ayas and Natasha Ginwala
Artistic Directors, 13th Gwangju Biennale

With Public Programming Team (Özge Ersoy, Riksa Afiaty, and Subin Park)


구독자 여러분께,

제13회 광주비엔날레의 공공 프로그램 ‘GB 토크 | 수면 위로 떠오르기: 연대의 미래를 실천하기’가 이번 11월에는 총 세 가지 세션을 진행합니다. 여러 시민 봉기에 대한 연구 기록물 및 보존물 중 재현할 수 없는 요소들을 살펴보는 패널 토론, 통과 의례와 갱신의 의식을 통한 힐링 워크숍, 지역 갈등이 심한 티베트 및 인도네시아를 중심 사례로 집단적 트라우마를 논하는 예술적 전략에 관한 담화 등으로 구성됩니다. 이 모든 프로그램은 줌(Zoom) 혹은 광주비엔날레재단 페이스북 페이지에서 라이브로 감상하실 수 있습니다.

지난 이벤트를 다시 시청하고 싶으시다면 다음의 링크를 클릭해 주시기 바랍니다. 다양한 데이터 네트워크 및 사이버 법의학 기법을 활용해 기술자본주의를 구성하는 주요 온라인 플랫폼의 이면을 살펴본 블라단 욜러(Vladan Joler)의 첫 번째두 번째 강의, 현재 브라질의 정치 담론에서 흑인 페미니즘이 맡은 역할을 논한 철학자 자밀라 리바이로(Djamila Ribeiro)의 키노트, 그리고 광주와 하르툼을 주요 사례로 사회 운동 및 봉기에서 페미니스트의 유산을 살펴본 학자 정경운, 저널리스트 림 압바스(Reem Abbas), 사회 운동가 최희연의 패널 토론 등을 다시 감상하실 수 있습니다.

11월 20일 목요일 오후 4시~5시 30분(중앙유럽 표준시 오전 8시~9시 30분)에는 패널 토론 ‘이스탄불에서 광주까지: 봉기에서 ‘아카이브할 수 없는 것’을 아카이브하기’를 마련해 1980년대 이후 발생한 여러 사회적 봉기를 기억 및 기록하기 위한 전략들을 탐구합니다. 아카이브 연구자 권도균은 유네스코 세계기록유산으로 등재된 광주 5.18 민주화운동 기록물을 소개합니다. 작가 제이노 페퀸루(Zeyno Pekünlü)는 최근 터키에서 일어난 봉기와 관련해 아카이브에서 ‘재현할 수 없는 것’을 논하며, 사회학자 베귐외즈덴 프라트(Begüm Özden Fırat)는 군중이 동시대 정치에 어떻게 재등장하는지 이야기합니다. 이번 행사는 광주비엔날레재단과 5.18민주화운동기록관이 공동 주최합니다. 본 프로그램은 이 링크(Zoom Webinar ID: 914 1015 4133)의 줌 웹사이트에서 참여하실 수 있습니다. 페퀸뤼 및 프라트 씨의 프로그램을 후원해 주신 사하(SAHA: 터키 현대미술 후원 협회)에 감사드립니다.

11월 25일 수요일 오후 4시~5시 30분(중앙유럽 표준시 오전 8시~9시 30분)에는 마오리 힐링 치유사 하웨테 홀리 브라이슨(Haaweatea Holly Bryson)이 ‘통과 의례와 갱신의 의식’을 진행해, 삶의 한 단계에서 다른 단계로의 이행을 표시하는 과정을 살펴봅니다. 통과 의례의 세 단계를 함께 탐구하며 세대 간의 치유를 끌어내고자 합니다. 이를 그려낸 지도는 인류의 이행과 변환, 우리의 의식, 회복력, 소속감, 목적, 계시, 갱신의 ‘뼈대’ 또는 코드를 보여줄 예정입니다. 워크숍 참여 인원은 선착순 50명으로 제한하며, 참여 신청은 publicprogram@gwangjubiennale.org로 연락해 주시기 바랍니다. 이후 메일을 통해 참가자 분들께 개별적으로 줌 링크를 전달해 드리겠습니다.

11월 28일 토요일 오후 3시~4시 30분(중앙유럽 표준시 오전 7시~8시 30분)에는 패널 토론 ‘티베트에서 인도네시아까지: 단절과 연속체’를 마련해 집단적 기억의 장소를 위한 예술적, 영화적 전략과 함께 권위주의적 지배와 점령하에 지속되는 트라우마를 다룹니다. 카르티카 프래티비(Kartika Pratiwi)는 1965~1966년 인도네시아 대량 학살에서 생존한 이들이 증언할 수 있는 공간을 만드는 데 있어서 디지털 스토리텔링과 대안 교육 플랫폼이 가진 잠재력을 논합니다. 리투 사린(Ritu Sarin)과 텐징 소남(Tenzing Sonam)은 중국 공산군 점령하의 티베트에서 CIA의 지원을 받아 게릴라 저항군 지도자로 활동했으며 소남의 아버지인 라모 체링의 개인 아카이브를 다루는 장기 프로젝트를 소개합니다. 임인자는 토크의 참여자들과 질의응답을 주고받으며, 광주 민주화 과정을 다루는 연극 만들기와 시민운동에 관한 생각을 공유합니다. 본 프로그램은 이 링크(Zoom Webinar ID: 987 3072 1064)의 줌 웹사이트에서 참여하실 수 있습니다.

앞으로 다음과 같은 프로그램도 준비돼 있습니다.
12월 11일: 시안 데이리트(Cian Dayrit)와 베아스카 닐라스(Beaska Niillas)가 의도적인 생태계 파괴, 토착민 사회의 저항, 지구 전반의 생태 운동 등을 주제로 나누는 대담
12월 12일: 라이스 브루잉 시스터즈 클럽(Rice Brewing Sisters Club)이 진행하는 한국에서의 공동체 농업의 제반 활동 및 여성 농부에 관한 워크숍
1월 15일(추후 확정): 하웨테 홀리 브라이슨(Haaweatea Holly Bryson)이 진행하는 통과의례, 재생, 세대 간의 치유에 관한 워크숍
1월 30일: 릴라 간디(Leela Gandhi)가 삶의 한 방식으로서, 서로에게 해를 가하지 않는 유일한 방법론으로서 금욕의 윤리를 논하는 키노트 발제

더불어 사회 운동가 나데게(Nadège), 큐레이터이자 연구자, 번역가, 미술가 강민형, 학자이자 사회 운동가 록만 추이(Lokman Tsui) 등의 참가자가 인터넷 안팎의 집단적 상호 보호 활동, 기술의 소유권, 디지털 감시의 관계 양상, 풀뿌리 사회 운동 등에 관해 논한 영상 프로그램을 이 링크의 웹사이트에서 확인하실 수 있습니다.

2021년 2월 26일 개최할 제13회 광주비엔날레를 준비하는 기간 동안 반체제주의 공동체 의식, 저항과 재생을 위한 창의적인 방편을 제시하는 집단 지성의 잠재력을 여러분과 공유할 수 있길 기대합니다.

이 여정에 저희와 함께 해주시길 바라겠습니다.

데프네 아야스(Defne Ayas), 나타샤 진발라(Natasha Ginwala)
제13회 광주비엔날레 공동예술감독

외즈게 에르소이(Özge Ersoy), 릭사 아피아티(Riksa Afiaty), 박수빈
제13회 광주비엔날레 공공 프로그램 제작팀

*

That lovesexy young artist Elliot Reed , the Black Jerry Lewis of performance art just sent me a link for his latest art video which is quite lovely and he is looking so amazing in it wearing some fancy trainers that everyone will want to get their hands on. Catch him while you can.


Internal Recreation online screening
Though Nov. 22 2020 (Hosted by Women & Performance Journal of Feminist Theory)
Watch my video here

I'm honored to be featured in the digital exhibition Screen Share: Access & Collaboration in the Video Archive Alongside art by Jeneen Frei Njootli, isa & troizel, and Anh Vo. Organized by Kristen Holfeuer and Joanna Evans through W&P Journal at NYU Performance Studies. Special thanks as well to Isa Saldana.

This work is a 2020 video re-imaging of my song "Internal Recreation" originally recorded in 2013. With cinematographers/co-performers Jade Kuriki Olivo (Puppies Puppies) and Diamond Stingily. Read the full description and view the work here.

7pm EST Thursday Nov 19th, visit womenandperformance.org for a live panel with all the artists!

You have until Nov 22nd before it goes offline

...for now







Saturday, November 14, 2020

DER VERTRAUTE DES FÜNFTEN BÜRGERS

Der Vertraute des Fünften Bürgers

Die helle Glocke ist der Ruf in die Halle

The Ms. Davis doll was asked by Art Forum to write about the recent 2020 election. Actually she could have done a drawing, video or produce a text, but because the lady gets so many emails she forgot that detail. Now the text is online and you can read it here:

https://www.artforum.com/slant/vaginal-davis-on-the-us-presidential-election-84335

*

Do you know what you'll be doing Sunday nite at 8pm? Yes I am sure like everyone in the know you will be looking at Participant Inc. latest magnificent eventa. Participant is the only not-for-profit gallery left in Manhattan and so they need your support. Look at this line-up....GO DONATE FOLKS!

Live-streamed on https://participantafterdark.art
This event will include live ASL interpretation
Donate: https://www.paypal.me/PARTICIPANTINC
Arrival DJ set by: April Hunt
Welcome cocktail by our host: Justin Vivian Bond
A toast to our outgoing Board President Jacqueline Humphries by:
Lia Gangitano and Jeffrey Gibson
Presidential Acceptance Poem for Participant Inc
by our incoming Board President: Vaginal Davis
Followed by remarks, performance and video interludes by:
Jonathan Berger with Michael Stipe
Baseera Khan
Susanne Sachsse
Sofia Moreno
Charles Atlas
Glendalys Medina
CHRISTEENE
Narcissister
Ron Athey
And a closing astrological forecast by:
Constantina Zavitsanos and Tourmaline

*

Who do you think is cute, and have your hairy eyeball on? Is it junior high looking bose buben Oliver Malcolm or Lovesexy Jubas Jubilee Jonathan Majors the star of TV's Lovecraft Country? You don't have to answer that right away just think about it.



Thursday, November 12, 2020

DEINE GEBURT IS MEINE GEBURT, DEIN TOD IST MEIN TOD

Deine Geburt ist meine Geburt, dein Tod ist mein Tod

In welchem der kluge Leser die Geschicte einer berühmten Münze vernimmt.

I was just thinking about the late great lovesexy actor Brad Davis star of the films Midnight Express and Fassbinder's adaptation of Jean Genet's Querelle. He had juicy hustler white energy. I remember seeing him at a Grammy Party doing drugs with the members of the band The Go-Go's. This was at the old Biltmore Hotel across the street from Pershing Square in Downtown, Los Angeles. The Go-Gos were performing in the Gold Ballroom which was the New Wave room for the evening, but almost everyone at the party was in the Crystal Ballroom which was the Disco room. I was at the soiree with the late actress Carrie Fisher, the beautiful and hunky Jon-Erik Hexum who wound up accidently killing himself on a film set. Jon-Erik had a very prominent basket, but rather small feet for a tall man, and was with his then girlfriend E.G. Daily(co-star of that Pee Wee Herman film) whose no nonsense mother Helen Guttman owned the East Hollywood Club Helen's Place that was also known as The Anti-Club. In our little party was also Robin Johnson who was the star of proto Riot Grrl film Times Square, and maybe a few other people that time has made me forget. I was probably the only person not doing cocaine and quaaludes. I've never been much of a drug or alcohol person, but I must admit I did enjoy cocaine and ludes the few times I did engage in them, but I much prefer champagne. Brad Davis was a very tiny man and I think he caused a scandal that evening sucking the penis of Spazz Attack. Whatever happened to olde Spazz. Last thing I heard is he moved to Japan. I will never forget him having a cameo role in that great Debra Winger film Mike's Murder.





Latest from my sexy gallerist Isabella Bortolozzi and La Famiglia:

Galerie Isabella Bortolozzi is pleased to announce


MICHAELA EICHWALD

Walker Art Center
Minneapolis, MN, USA

14 November 2020 – 16 May 2021

Virtual Exhibition Talk
Laura Hoptman on Michaela Eichwald
14 November 2020, 7 pm (CST)



ARTISSIMA UNPLUGGED
Online Catalogue


with works by

Ed Atkins
Juliette Blightman
Ellen Cantor
Jay Chung & Q Takeki Maeda
Michaela Eichwald
Jos de Gruyter & Harald Thys
Calla Henkel & Max Pitegoff
Morag Keil
Veit Laurent Kurz
Danny McDonald
Seth Price
Richard Rezac
S.Greer Rhodes
Diamond Stingily

The platform will remain online
until 9 December 2020


*


Something new and interesting from that very lovely and talented man Mr. Gregg Bordowitz.

The events of the past several months—and, in particular, the past week—pose innumerable questions about the present, about how the future might look and feel. For Answers with Questions, a three-episode streaming series, host Gregg Bordowitz will offer advice to viewers on dealing with inner turmoil and societal breakdown. Send your questions by emailing questions@canopycanopycanopy.com or calling 201-467-8592 by November 17.

With a rotating cast of cohosts and musical guests, Bordowitz will consider the interplay of patience and revolt, the spirit of devotion inherent in political and cultural work, the renewed relevance of Count von Count, and what to do after trading sourdough starters with friends has lost its allure. Tune in for the premiere of Episode 1, with Jasmine Nyende and musical guest Vivien Goldman, on November 18 at 8 p.m. EST via YouTube. They’ll discuss punk’s queer history, maintaining discipline while making trouble, and what the figures of the rock star and the deviant punk can teach us right now.

Bordowitz is still accepting questions for Episode 2 (premiering on Wednesday, November 25, at 8:00 p.m. EST), with Joy Ladin and musical guest Kendall Thomas, who will reflect on the role of belief and theology in facing adversity; and Episode 3 (premiering on Wednesday, December 2, at 8:00 p.m. EST), with Morgan Bassichisand musical guest The Illustrious Pearl, who will parse the relevance and political possibilities of humor. Send questions on belief and new beginnings, and how to navigate social isolation and find freedom amid uncertainty.

Please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Triple Canopy here. A gift of any size will go a long way in supporting our ambitious programs and goals for the year ahead. You can also become a sustaining member of Triple Canopy here.


Two Ears and One Mouth receives support from the Stolbun Collection, Agnes Gund, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and the New York State Council on the Arts.

Monday, November 09, 2020

WIR BESCHLOSSEN,ZU KÄMPFEN

Wir beschlossen, zu kämpfen

Nachts wachten wir, tags schliefen wir, immer abwechselnd.

So now there is a little bit of symbolic hope, but lots of work ahead as we are not out of the muck and mire.

My wonderful talented ex-student from Malmö Art Akademy in Malmö Sweden - Maria Norrman is a young artist on the rise. She sent me this little note about her upcoming exploits:

Hi miss D!
Here's info on the upcoming group show, the Malmö tribute exhibition Fucking Boring!

I will be showing a video of my drag character Millennium Starperforming MFF-Hymnen - the anthem of the local soccer team, at Lorensborg shopping center in Malmö.

I will also show a wall image of Millennium Star at Lorensborg, 4.15 x 2.25 m/163 x 88 inches (enclosed in this mail)

More hugs/Maria

*

Fucking Boring

Participants:

Körner & Moreau

Maria Norrman

Bruno Weibelt

Ella Tillema

Runo Lagomarsino

Monika Larsen Dennis

Ditte Ejlerskov

Beck & Jung







Gallery 21, Malmö

http://www.galleri21.com/g21/




Opening 14 November, last day is 13 December, 2020.

Opening hours: Thursday 15-18/3-6pm , Friday-Sunday 12-16/Noon-4 pm





A text by artist Peter Johansson, curator of the exhibition.





In the late 90's, early 2000, I talked with my friend the art writer Patrik Moreau about the art scene in Malmö, Sweden. We had lived in Stockholm both of us and were about to move to Malmö. It was such a difference. Not only did we get away from the stressful competition-oriented art world in Stockholm, but artistically there was a big difference in attitude and gestures in Malmö.

We actually started planning for an exhibition about these experiences.

But time went by and life came in the way.

However, in fact it was for the better because I got time to really see more of the artists, their working methods and of course the city which influences the art. A kind of historical debt.




In a small town with an art scene dominated by its Art Academy, the trends of the place are often spread to other artists like a ripple effect. For better or worse. Whether one wants to or not, certain main actors become decisive for the opportunities of art students and artists. This also goes for Malmö.




But the approach to these games of power was different than in Stockholm. Here there was the Scanian-Malmö approach, the saying "Auh vaudau?" - meaning something in the lines of a laid back “Eh, what (ever)”, which I liked. Many artists made stripped, one might call it new minimalist work of art. Something uncomplicated in action, material and idea and preferably with an ironic or humorous touch directed at the art itself, or perhaps made with a feminist twist. Well, they reused minimalism but they added a lot of the Malmö-spirit to this.




Like Denmark, minimalism came to Scania late, only in the 1990s and continued into the 2000s. From the American 50s / 60s minimalism and its continued history, something new was simply pushed forward. We do not need, I believe, to immerse ourselves in formal or semantic reduction, art-historical facts or clarifications, this is a completely personal interpretation and the important thing here is which kind of art suddenly emerged.




Already in the late 1970s and early 80s I visited Malmö a lot. It was the punk movement that drew me to DAD's dancehall and KB, which was then out in Erikslust, as well as Olympen and later Mejeriet in Lund, the neighbour town.

Back then it was rebellious music, newspaper and book publishing, political activism and house occupations which occupied my time, art came to me much later.

Malmö was a heavy working-class city but I felt at home.




In Malmö of today you’ll find an extremely rich part versus the very poor part in the east. Here you find the terrible opposition between Jews and Palestinian and Muslim groups, gang culture, between urban development and old Malmö, and between high culture and economically difficult-to-run clubs like Plan B and activism. Malmö is certainly not Stockholm or Copenhagen, because it is a smaller city, so the distances between these opposites are not too long.

The heavy compact worker-Malmö was also in its time something different than the rest of Sweden.

Early labor immigration and the Kockums shipyard crane that dominated, especially the city towards both the countryside and Stockholm.

The closures and the depression of the 80s, the desire for revenge in the 90s and then the new construction with on opposite poles, the Social Democrat Ilmar Reepalu and the construction contractor Percy Nilsson, who despite all the differences, met in the making of the new Malmö.




The artists I have chosen for the exhibition are all parts of this sprawling memory image of Malmö which I call Fucking Boring. It is actually a tribute to Malmö.




Monika Larsen Dennis works with sculpture, photography and video. She was born and raised in Malmö but educated in Iceland and the Stockholm Academy of the Arts. She has lived and worked in Stockholm, New York and Malmö, among other places. She actually lived for a time in the famous building Turning Torso in Malmö, the house which by both the general public and the government became a symbol of the new Malmö during the early 2000s. Monika is a generational friend of mine. Her stripped-down small objects, but foremost her work "The Kiss", 2004 is for me the reason why she is in this exhibition.

The Kiss is a work for its time period. From Auguste Rodin's well-known sculpture from the 19th century, Monika has removed the kissing couple to make room for the viewer to take a seat in the work. When you do it, you get a physical feeling of the limitation in how close we can get to each other. With a simple shape and a purity in the choice of material, Monika examines this thing called love.




Körner & Moreau are Kristian Körner and Robert Moreau, both of them worked as artists on their own in the 90s and early 2000s. Robert was actually born, partly raised and studied in Malmö.

They meet 15 years ago when Kristian moved to Malmö and have worked in close collaboration for almost five years, they’ve been deeply focused on the slide frame's strange allure.

This year, 2020, it is finally time to collect all the works of art, films, installations and thoughts they have prepared for exhibitions. First out was Aura Krognoshuset in Lund in October, and now I have had the great honor of receiving the baton.

It is something enormously imaginative which happens when you remove the image content from the slide frames. From the emptiness that arises, Körner & Moreau then builds both meticulous and time-consuming very strict works that receive dizzying references to art history, housing projects and family albums. Their work also consists of photography and video films as well as installations, where there is room for both dystopia and comedy. That's why the artist duo is in Fucking Boring.




Runo Lagomarsino was not born in Malmö, but Lund, the neighbouring town. Born in 1977, he is also a generation younger than me and the above mentioned persons, but he is also a bit more clever in his artistic work. I see him as a child of the refugees from southern South America which came to Malmö and Lund in the mid - 70s. His parents emigrated from Argentina.

For me, Runo is extremely important for this exhibition. He weaves new from old photographs, historical events, focuses on things most people would think of as rubbish, uninteresting or just completely misses, from this come fantastic poetic or even political works of art. He tells the story of things. He becomes to me like a bridge between the old and often forgotten history and the present.

The artwork which has meant the most to me is probably the film with Runo and his father as they approach a colossal monument and literally throw eggs at the grotesque sculpture and its history. ("More Delicate than the Historians" are the Map-makers " Colors ”video, 2012-13).




Bruno Wiebelt builds such grotesque sculptures that Runo throws eggs at, albeit in miniature.

These small masterpieces are not only the image of Malmö from the workers' era, but could be miniatures of communist monuments from Azerbaijan or Armenia, standing like bunkes in the middle of a border conflict, just to make a contemporary example. They are violent, brute, absurd and just simply wonderfully outstanding. I think Bruno spends as much time and care on his brutalist objects as our artist duo Körner & Moreau, but although the difference in form and appearance is miles wide, I still think the meaning is the same. Bruno makes the pictures which Körner & Moreau removed from the frames of their slides.




Ella Tillema is also of the younger generation, fortunately. Because if you take a quick glance, it may seem that Ella is a painter from the political 70s. But she is more a product of its time.

Ella is an activist and makes art as resistance to injustice, to struggle and change. Her paintings and objects are hopeful fantasies, sometimes mundane, sometimes magnificently visionary, but always stripped, daring picture stories. She builds optimistic castles made of air. Pictures of mountaineers walking towards their destiny, of the Malmö resident Wiehe, who sung about the Titanic, and self-portraits in the middle of everyday chores, all of this mixed together, yet clear and positive.

This is art against business and new degrading labor reforms, against excessive consumption, against capitalism, against the prevailing system and racism. Together with her whole family for feminism and justice.




Maria Norrman is always highly topical. She’s made one of the contemporary video works which inspire me the most: "The Regiment" (video, 2015), where five Danish history enthusiasts (reenactors) choose to dress in Nazi uniforms and play roles as if they were these people. They recreate various historical military battles and events. The strange and fantastic thing is how Maria also acts and goes in and out of the film and the story and manages to bring out both horrible and human aspects of the persons and history.

In this exhibition, Maria shows documentation of her drag character "Millennium Star,” a performance at the typically Malmö-dull Lorensborg, a shopping center, the heart of Malmö's joy of shopping. In this mundane space, Millennium sings in tribute to Malmö FF - the soccer team native to Lorensborg, and it all makes for an aesthetic chaos in my brain.




Ditte Ejlerskov also repeats events, more contemporary ones and more actively manipulates and dissects everything from stereotypes, contempt for women to the beauty industry and the world's need for space. Often with material taken from the digital world and always with the feminist angle. Stripped repetitions clarify what she sees and wants to point out.

Ditte has, just like Maria Norrman and Ella Tillema studied at Malmö Art Academy.

One of the works which really influenced me is her collaboration with EvaMarie Lindahl, "About: The Blank Pages" (2014), where they show with clear precision the skewed view on art made by women in the art world through the book publisher Taschen's art publications, where 95 books are published, 5 about female artists. Their artistic reaction woke me up.




Beck & Jung is an artist duo and the historical reference that this exhibition needs. Beck & Jung was the name of two Scanian artists: Holger Bäckström (born in Lund, 1939 - 1997) and Bo Ljungberg (born in Lund, 1939 - 2007), and they were computer art pioneers. They used mainframes as they were called at the time, as early as 1966 at Lund University's data center. They worked with line printers and later pen plotters and needle printers. Here their first works of art came to life. In the 70's, the inkjet printers came and they switched to using color.

They made concrete pictures with geometric patterns and their art was shown all over the world. Their last exhibition was called "Computer Art" and was shown 1997 in Germany.




The work I have personally fallen completely in love with and which has followed me from the 80s, is the aluminum or brass sculpture / ashtray "Ultima" which is available in countless versions (70s). This genius work is still a guiding light for me and is the artist duo's bestseller with an edition exceeding a million.

Friday, November 06, 2020

TROMMEL WIRBEL FÜR RANCAS

Trommelwirbel für Rancas
die davon erzählt, was geschah

Its easy to tell Alden Ehrenreich's pert bullet nipples don't get enough attention. The young diminutive actor---I'm sorry 5"9' is tiny. His love interests in his films must have to stand on a box like what Paramount Pictures forced its lady stars to do back in the 1940s with Alan Ladd. Either that or not wear high heels in a scene with pretty Alden.

Is Alden related to the writer Barbara Ehrenreich and her dinosaur dicked son Ben? I don't think so, but getting back to the point which is Alden Ehrenreich has the perfect nips. Actually his entire titty cavity is quite audacious. Too bad he doesn't have broad shoulders. Will somebody---anybody please jump, jump to it--lick, suck,

and squeeze Mr. Alden Ehrenreich's chewy raisinette nipples before its too late.

*

So excited that La Famiglia is working with the Ellen Cantor Estate:

Galerie Isabella Bortolozzi
is pleased to announce

ARTISSIMA XYZ

Disegni, curated by
Letizia Ragaglia and Bettina Steinbrügge

with
ELLEN CANTOR

The platform will remain online
until 9 December 2020

and more from Adams & Ollman in Portland, Oregon:

New Works - Joan Nelson November 7-December 19, 2020







Joan Nelson, Untitled, 2020, spray enamel, acrylic ink, marker on acrylic sheet, 24 x 24 inches.
Hayley Barker, Beverlywood, 2020, oil on linen, 60 x 48 inches.








Tuesday, November 03, 2020

GEWALT UND LEIDENSHAFT



Gewalt und Leidenschaft

Kostenloses Muskellaubau Rezept

I don't want to be the harbinger of bad celestial tidings but Monday, November 2nd the weather in Berlin was 70 degrees fahrenheit. Unseasonably warm weather does not bode well for a planetary fate. 'When visiting Berlin in the winter back in the 80s and 90s it would be freezing cold, the kind of chill that would go through into your bones and make it difficult to warm yourself. In 2005 when I moved to Berlin from Los Angeles there was very heavy snow in the winter time. For the last six or seven years I have been able to ride my bike year round, which on the surface seems nice but believe me its not. Mild weather in the winter is not a good thing or normal. The summers in Berlin have been getting drastically warmer with very little rain. I am fortunate to live in an old apartment building built in 1860 with very thick walls, so in the summer it stays relatively cool and comfortable as long as I keep the windows closed.

*

With Day of the Dead I was thinking of the people I have lost in the last ten years. One person I have been thinking about a lot is Henry Peck. Henry was one of LA's most underrated DJ's. His musical taste was incredible. He co-owned an indie record store that became world famous called Vinyl Fetish with his former lover and business partner Joseph Brooks. The record store started off on LaBrea Avenue and then moved to its most popular location on Melrose Avenue during the 1980s. Their in-store appearances of British music artists were renown. I worked at the boutique Retail Slut doing window displays at the time. The owner of Retail Slut Helen "Bed" O'Neill became one of my Afro Sisters playing the role of Urethra Franklin. At the time I loved visiting Ron Athey and Valerie who worked at Poseur, my other Afro Sister Leslie Beatty (Clitoris Turner) and Big Dick Sneaky Pete Tomlinson(later my drummer with PME) worked at Cowboys& Poodles, Jennifer Friedman at Gräu, Gorilla Rose and Holly Woodlawn at Wacko and Soap Plant, Priscilla Hazelwood("Pop That Cherry" Jefferson) at Maya, Miguel Berenstein and Monty Messex at Flip of Hollywood. Henry's employee "Peace Frog" aka Steve Schayer (of the band Clay Idols) was one of the first people to play early Afro Sister mixed tapes during working hours at the record store. These tapes were copied and circulated on Melrose Avenue and beyond which led to my getting more gigs and writing for magazines like the British Music journal ZigZag. Everything in those days was so grass roots.

Henry Peck created a lot of underground dance clubs in Hollywood. The most famous being The Veil, which started off at Cathay De Grande in Hollywood then had a long reign at Club Lingerie on Sunset Blvd. He was also the DJ of another popular club that I frequented called Bar DeLux which took place on Tuesday nites on the Sunset Strip at a famous Japanese Restaurant. One of his clubs that I liked the most was at the old Cattle Baron's restaurant on Restaurant Row on La Cienega Blvd at Beverly. It was an unlikely location for a dance club, and that is what made it so special. Henry was also a top rate hair stylist who specialized in creating unusual shapes and hair colorings. A lot of the hair color trends that are still popular today can be attributed to Henry Peck.

This just in from the famous post card series by Sherry Millner:











Friday, October 30, 2020

ICH WILL KEINEN SKANDAL


Ich will keinen Skandal.

Du darfst nur keinen Schritt mehr von mir weggehen.

In the second wave of Miss Rona Barrett virus in Germany the numbers keep climbing and now its up to over 10,000 new cases a day in the country with over 1000 in the capital city. November 2nd will be a second lockdown to curb the rise. I realized things were going downhill when the Federal Health Minister of the country Jens Spahn a ganymede if ever there was one came down with the virus. He probably caught it from too many bukake parties with his husband Daniel Funke and the former US ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell, a sad sack if ever there was one. Listen kiddies don't rush out too quickly in a misguided search for alpha spermatozoa.

Speaking of elections, the Vagimule Doll has been voted President of the board of directors for the not-for-profit artist space Participant Inc. in the lower east side of New York City. Participant Inc. founded by the great Lia Gangitano.  They will be celebrating almost 20 years of valued work in the Downtown art community. So excited to be a part of ushering in a new period for this hallowed space.

*

Upcoming for the winter season of Adams & Ollman in Portland Oregon's Pacific Northwest, Ms. Davis' west coast gallerist:







Installation view, Lois Dodd and Sharif Farrag.

Joan Nelson, Untitled, 2019, spray enamel and acrylic ink on acrylic sheet, 24 x 24 inches.


*

Also DJ Snax sent a little note with some special end of the year treats from the longtime Berlin favorite.

‘No Dancing - Remastered’
and
‘Hat Trick - Remastered’


1/06, Everywhere 11/20.

Hi all,
I'm thrilled to re-release two singles from my first album, and honored to include the fabulous remixes, too!

I wrote 'No Dancing' sitting in bed in my East Village New York apartment with a Roland 303 Groovebox. The lyrics reflected a changing city, brought about by Giuliani and the reintroduction of archaic dance licensing laws that literally banned dancing in bars. Who knew that grieving over a time when we could get together and dance would still resonate twenty years later? As for 'Hat Trick,' that was a disco meditation on the ups and downs of gay cruising, the titular hat a metaphor for various disguises and fronts put on in such environments.

These two tunes along with 'Got This Thing' were first unleashed on a small new label called Freu_nd, run by future DJ star ND Baumecker. The release was just one reason I eventually made my way over to Europe, settling in Berlin and releasing my first full album From The Rocking Chair To The Stage on Geneva's Mental Groove. MG ordered up remixes for limited edition releases of both songs, and all tracks have now been remastered.

For 'No Dancing', my partner in Captain Comatose, Khan, delivered the appropriately titled No New York remix, while Australian disco dolls Stereogamous provided me with their first ever remix. The original extended version of 'Hat Trick' clocks in at an exhilarating nine minutes plus, while the legendery JG Thirlwell (Foetus, Steroid Maximus) bombards you with his signature outrageous treatment. Switter Lilly. Finally, a cappella versions round out both sets.

Gracing the covers are glamour shots taken back in the New York daze by my good friend, artist Adrian Garcia Gomez; shot in my aforementioned East Village hot spot.

Hope you enjoy these tunes and remixes.




Thursday, October 29, 2020

ERSTES KAPITEL

Erstes Kapitel

Heimkehr nach Galicien

Met with Fearless Leader Susanne Sachsse and film historian Marcuse Siegelstein at the juicy Lebenese boite on Crelle Str in Berlin Schöneberg the other day to exchange CD's for our CHEAP Funk monthly radio show on Reboot FM. This was most likely the last warm day of the year to be enjoying alfresco dining. With the second wave of the Pandora Pandemic raging there won't be any eating inside in restaurants for me. I got my flu shot in early October and now I just have my regular three month jaunt to the kidney doctor. Fun and fancy free.

Marc and Susi gave me a lovely bomber jacket that is perfect for the winter months courtesy of Trixie von Schönherr. The coat use to belong to her late husband the artist and filmmaker Ludvig von Schönherr and fits the doll to a living breathing T.

I hope all you expats went to the American Embassy and cast your ballots in the election of the century. The orange hued tetrarch must be relieved of office along with his prissy co-horts. This winter will be dire for the USA and the world. Because of the lack of stewardship of the planet we will have more disasters and lethal pandemics heading our way--mark my words. Enough on this line of though as I don't want to be Pollyanna with a hatchet.

Those in Los Angeles please check out the first solo show of my darling Damien Davis in the City of the Angels. Damien has been a frequent collaborator with the doll and was crucial for our project The Magic Flute, Part One-An Opera in Six Steps back in 2015 in NYC.

Also La Famiglia de Isabella Bortolozzi has a host of beautiful events that are always scintilating and perceptive plus Discoteca Flaming Star and the great Julie Tolentino who deserves a million congrats for winning the Queer/Art Prize this year. I have known and collaborated with Julie forever and she is pure genius and so love sexy that she deserves an award for every day of the year.

*

HARD LINE FADE
OCTOBER 24 - NOVEMBER 28, 2020

Charlie James Gallery is delighted to present Hard Line Fade, New York-based artist Damien Davis’s first solo show with the gallery, opening October 24th and running thru November 28th, 2020.The work of NY-based artist Damien Davis (b. 1984) explores historical representations of Blackness, seeking to unpack the visual language of cultures and investigate how society codes, decodes, and recodes representations of race through craft, design and digital modes of production. Composed of glyphic shapes, patterns, and images, the works interact in prismatic ways, creating ever-shifting relationships to meaning, brokering new associations and conversations about how identity is performed in culture.

*

Galerie Isabella Bortolozzi
is pleased to announce

Hannah Quinlan & Rosie Hastings
PUBLIC AFFAIRS

Galerie Isabella Bortolozzi
31 October 2020 – 9 January 2021

Opening:
Saturday, 31 October 2020, 12 – 8 pm

*

Galerie Isabella Bortolozzi
is pleased to announce

Art Basel Online Viewing Rooms
OVR:C20


with works by

Enrico Baj, Ellen Cantor
and Aldo Mondino

VIP Preview:
Wednesday, October 28 – Friday, 30 October 2020

Public days:
Friday, 30 October – Saturday, 31 October 2020

Register to access
Viewing Room

*

Galerie Isabella Bortolozzi is pleased to announce


Dorothy Iannone & Juliette Blightman
The Köln Concert

31 October 2020 – 31 January 2021

Opening:
Friday, 31 October, 3–9 pm

Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne, Germany

*

Discoteca Flaming Star (CGB, Sofia Lomba, WM, Sara Pereira)
“Touching without Touching (Ingrids Web_Hospital install 3)”


at Artists and Allies, Berlin http://artistsandallies.art/
Friday, Oct 30, 18.00-21.00
Reserve, select a time and donate here:
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/discoteca-flaming-star-tickets-125597889669
Subjective fragments of the performance will be live on twitch:
https://www.twitch.tv/discotecaflamingstar

*

Last Thursday night, a radiating crowd of more than 200 LGBTQ+ artists and allies convened virtually for Queer|Art's biggest event of the year: The Queer|Art Annual Party. The 2020 Queer|Art Annual Party took place on Zoom this year, featuring special performances and readings in celebration of the graduating Fellows of the 2019-2020 Queer|Art|Mentorship program cycle and the winners for the 2020 Queer|Art|Prize (made possible with generous support from HBO).

This year's Prize honored the legendary activist, performance artist, caregiver, and club organizer, Julie Tolentino and multi-disciplinary artist and DJ, Yulan Grant with awards recognizing their significant contributions to queer culture and community. The Prize awards artists in two categories: Sustained Achievement and Recent Work.


Saturday, October 24, 2020

HOLLYWOOD BE THINE NAME

Hollywood Be Thine Name

Ein verzaubert schönes Gebäude

A little excerpt from the Vaginal Davis unfinished novel, The Republic of Virility.

Hari Fabrikant would latch on to the blandest blond men for sexen. She was a female high snow queen, who grew up in Pasadena. Our Miss Hari was light skindidid but couldn’t pass.

Her best friends at the sorority MarLou and Sned tried to curb her from being used and discarded by the horrid men she chased, but it was to no avail as a pattern had been established that would continue into advanced middle age with Hari continuing to swallowing one bitter pill after another.

*

In Gleisdrieick Park today a hint of late Indian Summer. In the outdoor workout centre was a brownette boy built like a Cromwell tank, topless with muscles glistening all over his chesty morgan. My hairy eyeballs kept falling out of the socket and I was forced to retrieve them from the gravel tarmac near the elevated Ubahn train.

*

Monday October 26th a brand new monthly CHEAP radio program will go online. The theme is Red October which seemed fitting with this new second wave of Covid Pandora Pandemic. The CHEAP Kollektive members including Fearless Leader Susanne Sachsse, Marcuse Siegelstein, Daniel Hendrickson and Vaginal Davis decided to create a program with nothing but music for your listening enjoyment. Our little art gang compiled everything separately in their individual lockdowns. Take a listen and tell us what you think.

CHEAP Funk - Red October

The second wave. Racism keeps a wavin’. Antisemitism too. The left gets its panties in a whirl over itself while the structures of the right expand in the state, the police, the army, the pseudo-ironic gestures of the social sadists. But it’s October. Red October. CHEAP Funk takes you back to the Yiddish communist resistance against czars, the police and exploitation. We'd rather stay in the Diaspora. And fight for our liberation. Donny Hathaway summarizes the tryin’ times. But maybe folks wouldn't have to suffer, If there was more love for your brother. Red October. We remember Ostad, Mohammad Reza Shajarian who died earlier this month. We gather strength from his voice. He helps us resist the waves. More resources for our tryin’ times. Bette Davis, Amy Winehouse, Daniel Kahn, Buffy Sainte Marie, Gio Black Peter, Rudy Ray Moore aka: Dolemite, Petula Clark and CHEAP Funk. Red October. Okay. Even Barry Manilow helps a bit.

http://reboot.fm/category/magazin-talk/cheap-funk/

***

Liebe CHEAP Freunde

Während des COVID Lockdowns Anfang dieses Jahres hat CHEAP nicht nur ihre ersten fünf Roller CHEAP People Are Other People gemacht. Susanne Sachsse, Jamie Stewart (XIU XIU) und ich arbeiteten auch zusammen, um für die Sendung "Paranoia TV" des Steirischen Herbstes einen lauten, anarchischen 60-minütigen Unterhaltungsrundfunkdienst mit Verbreitung von Musikanlangen zusammenzustellen. Unser Beitrag trägt den offensichtlichen Titel YOU’RE SO PARANOID, YOU PROBABLY THINK THIS RADIO SHOW IS ABOUT YOU , und feiert heute, Sonntag, 18. Oktober, auf der folgenden Website ihre online Premiere (ohne Geoblocking, so dass ihr ihn unabhängig von Ihrem Wohnort hören können):

https://www.paranoia-tv.com/de/program/content/207-youre-so-paranoid-you-probably-think-this-radio-show-is-about-you-ein-musikalischer-unterhaltungsrundfunkdienst

Es wird bis zum 31. Dezember 2020 für Ihr Hörvergnügen zur Verfügung stehen.

Wir haben bei dieser Radiosendung mit einer fantastischen Gruppe von Freund*innen und Künstler*innen zusammengearbeitet. Ihr werdet die melodiösen Klänge hören von:

Maximilian Brauer | Vaginal Davis | Salome Gersch | Gotthard Lange
Susanne Sachsse | Angela Seo | Şenol Sentürk | Marc Siegel
Martin Siemann | Pola Sieverding | Jamie Stewart
Ich hoffe, ihr findet eine Chance, sie anzuhören!

Herzlich,

Friday, October 16, 2020

GEGEN DEN HASS

Gegen Den Hass
Bitterer beigeschmack


Yes the Miss Rona Barrett pandemic is in its second wave here in Europe. With daily cases in Germany past 6000 and in the capital city of Berlin over 700. Things are far worse in France, Spain and the UK.

The Vagimule doll has almost every pre existing condition known to man including diabetes, kidney condition, hypertension and asthma. She has lived since March in pretty much an isolated state so that will continue into the winter months which means the lady will have to limit her Bukake parties from 100 virile men twice a week to 25 runts once a week.

Gallery news: Ms. Davis' lovely and talented daughter Wu Tsang has a new exhibition in Paris, plus humpy Seth Price and that genius child of high art Jonathan Berger's exhibition at Participant Inc. in NYC gets extended. See below:

Galerie Isabella Bortolozzi is pleased to announce


Wu Tsang

Visionary Company

21 October 2020 - 3 January 2021


Lafayette anticipations

9 Rue du Plâtre, 75004 Paris, France








Galerie Isabella Bortolozzi is pleased to announce


A reading of


SETH PRICE

DEDICATED TO LIFE


Livestream on Instagram


Saturday 17 October 2020, 7 pm CET


by 

Seth Price, Caroline Busta, 

Christopher Bollen, Kim Gordon, Lil Internet, 

Jutta Koether, Josephine Pryde, 

Stacy Skolnik and others


Jonathan Berger,  An Introduction to Nameless Love

Exhibition extended through Nov. 15, 2020

Appointments are required

Wednesday - Sunday, noon - 7pm


View the exhibition online


In collaboration with Mady Schutzman, Emily Anderson, Tina Beebe, Julian Bittiner, Matthew Brannon, Barbara Fahs Charles, Brother Arnold Hadd, Erica Heilman, Esther Kaplan, Margaret Morton, Richard Ogust, Maria A. Prado, Robert Staples, Michael Stipe, Mark Utter, Michael Wiener, and Sara Workneh


Jonathan Berger,  An Introduction to Nameless Love  takes the form of a large-scale sculptural installation that includes over 533,000 tin, nickel, and charcoal parts, Berger's exhibition chronicles a series of remarkable relationships, creating a platform for complex stories about love to be told . The exhibition draws from Berger's expansive practice, which comprises a spectrum of activity - brought together here for the first time - including experimental approaches to non-fiction, sculpture and installation, oral history and biography-based narratives, and exhibition-making practices. 


Co-organized by Participant Inc and Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts at Harvard University.

Friday, October 09, 2020

ENDLICH WIEDER DA!

ENDLICH WIEDER DA! JEDE WOCHE NEU

Erfroren sind schon viele erstunken ist noch keiner

The super gorgeous high art girl Baseera Khan who was such a big part of the team that helped me realise my Hag Gallery Exhibition at Participant Inc. in NYC back in 2012 has a residence at the famous Kitchen in New York. Her project By Faith and her valiant production team, including Director/Producer Ethan Weinstock, Director of Photography Christina Wairegi, and Kitchen curator Lumi Tan are producing something very beautiful and demented. The Vagimule Doll has come along for the joy ride via Zoom. I don’t like Zoom events in general but Baseera has risen the Zoom bar with what she is accomplishing and her zany energy is so infectious that one can’t help but get swooped up in the process.

During a residency with The Kitchen at Queenslab, she worked out a quirky pilot for a television show titled By Faith. In collaboration with a community of close friends, staged, directed, and performed scenes based on intimate, real-life conversations and situations. By creating a modular film set that replicates her own apartment, she cultivated comfort amongst performers/friends and collapsed the parallel realities of the often-lonely domestic life and abundant online social life that many are experiencing during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ahead of the event, see documentation footage and stills from the production of By Faith on The Kitchen OnScreen.

A Nelly Afterthought

Saw an Andrew Gould doppelgänger yesterday in Berlin. Andrew Gould was the young handsome Brit co-founder of Bricktops at the Parlour Club with Ms. Davis. The German Andrew twin was around the same age, a little shorter then Andrew, heavier, blonder, gruff, muscular and oh so salty dogg.

While eating breakfast alfresco a man walked by wearing grey pants, shirt, jumper, grey shoes with grey hair and grey skin. Fascinating.

The local Spati post office blondine boy who is rather cute and dorky but a little doughy who flirts with me a bit when I come in the store to mail letters i just saw pushing a stroller. He looks way too young to have a child. He always seems to light up when I come into the store, so its not like he really flirts that much with me but he definitely notices me, and is somewhat playful for a German man. Being socially playful isn’t the norm for German males so i sense he does somewhat like me, though I really can’t define what that means.

*

MarLou DeLuna, is one of my oldest friends. I’ve known her since the 4th grade in 1971, when her family first came to Los Angeles from The Philippines. We went to middle school together and UCLA where she joined a sorority. MarLou is a lawyer working for the State of California. Her husband Hal Marinus who we both met at UCLA is also a lawyer, but is employed by a top LA commercial law firm. Mar Lou & Hal live in a large gorgeous old house in the Montrose Hills near Glendale.

MarLou sent me an emug the other day letting me know that an old shared acquaintance Jeffrey Enyeart had died. Jeffrey and his younger brother “Chops” came to California in the early 1980s from Indiana. Jeff had graduated from Ball State University. I hadn’t seen him since the mid 1980s. His brother Chops was a good time Charlie who was a lot of fun to be around. When I first met Jeff he was very personable, but after I helped him get a job working for Enterprise Car Rentals Company in the mid 80s he became very conservative and status conscience.

*

Very interesting group of people have contacted Ms. Davis lately including the 20 year old UK Bose Buben Oliver Malcolm. What he wants to do with Ms. Davis was very vague but the conversation was completely nutters and wild in a lovely way. Also our lady was approached by actors OT Fagbenle, Jacob Elordi and musician Julian Morris. How they even know about our lady of the perpetual dry puss is beyond my comprehension.

Here are some exhibitions you might want to check out:

Fredericks & Freiser is pleased to present an exhibition by Kathe Burkhart. Ongoing since 1982, Kathe Burkhart's Liz Taylor Series has evolved into a serial performative life work that draws from traditional worldviews involving presumed emotional "truths" put forth in painting and cinema. Its graphic images cut deeply both ways — for Liz and those depicted around her; for the artist and viewers alike. In works on canvas, images of Liz Taylor drawn from film stills, press and archival sources are overlaid with singular typographic profanities to provide a seemingly vast platform in which Burkhart addresses feminist resistance, female dominance, and sexual power. Love is Just a Four-Letter Word includes works on canvas from the series ranging from 2007-2016, as well as works on paper depicting the star from 2005-2015. Her glow-in-the-dark painting “S’nuff: from the Liz Taylor Series (Ash Wednesday)” from 2016 will be installed in the gallery’s 24th Street window for day and night viewing.

This selection of works on canvas, many being shown in New York for the first time, were among the last works made in Burkhart’s Williamsburg studio before being forced out by gentrification of the neighborhood. Further narrative links are enhanced by groupings and sequencing of works such as “S’nuff: from the Liz Taylor Series (Ash Wednesday),” with “Bitch Goddess: from the Liz Taylor Series (Look magazine, 1970),” 2015, and “Biohazard: from the Liz Taylor Series,” 2016, all of which were made around the conclusion of the artist’s treatment for the Hepatitis C Virus. Works such as “Transbian: from the Liz Taylor Series (Ash Wednesday),” 2015, “Whip it Out: from the Liz Taylor Series (Reflections in a Golden Eye),” 2018, “Whore: from the Liz Taylor Series (The Only Game in Town),” 2013, “Pervert: from the Liz Taylor Series (X, Y and Z),” 2007, and “Love Diary: from the Liz Taylor Series (movie magazine cover),” 2011, all comprise representations of female deviance. The title of the exhibition makes reference to a Bob Dylan song recorded by Joan Baez in the late ‘60s, recalling a memory from her youth in West Virginia, specifically her understanding of the song’s lyrics not as a love song, but a lament for the disparity between left wing 'movement men' and the second wave feminist movement. Burkhart has noted of her choice of Liz Taylor that “she is the actress who always portrays herself,” a notion that figures broadly into the sense, in Burkhart’s work, that Taylor’s image is a stand-in for the artist — one who is required to perform feats of autobiography and gender, but consistently and aggressively overrules the scripts that are handed to her.

When, in hundreds of paintings, the image of Liz Taylor is invoked, a sizable register that includes her beauty is correlated with otherwise abrasive, aggressive, histrionic, and unfettered attributes to deliver a form of debasement administered through deconstructions of iconic representations of the star, combined with graphic direct addresses. Like one of her favorite Liz Taylor movies, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, Burkhart brings us foul language as a device that ruptures too-lengthy silences, deploying anti-formalist strategies to address various systems of oppression, including language. As in Edward Albee’s play, psychological sport, verbal taunting, and manipulation of power are at work; and Burkhart, as well, goes too far with the fun and games, leaving scars after uncomfortable laughter. As Gary Indiana noted of Burkhart’s Liz Taylor Series, “Deflationary of our system of illusion and manipulation, they affirm the act of making-conscious. They raise the ante of awareness beyond the perceptual fence surrounding our collective penitentiary [and] indicate our complicity with oppression of all sorts, while suggesting where its logical dead end must certainly be: the stab we deliver to ourselves, the ultimate wrong targets.”

Trained in the theoretical traditions of conceptual and feminist art, versed in ideas of deconstruction and appropriation, Burkhart's work came of age in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, yet resisted the packaging of a period that fetishized technique and delivered a diffused form of feminist art that devolved into a representational painting style practiced by women artists, rather than manifesting transgressive potential. Remaining persistent in her visual articulation of the radical female subject, Burkhart continues to make Liz Taylor paintings that corrupt the master's tongue with curses, as well as the master's tools in painting, mounting a conceptual assault on the proscribed roles assigned to women. Although Burkhart makes paintings, she does not consider herself a painter. She works in a variety of interdisciplinary media, making video, installation, performance, photography, and sculpture; and writing fiction, poetry and criticism. Her performative, language-based practice, in general, comprises an accumulation of photographic and typographical research, writing alone and alongside others, and the combination and reproduction, by hand, of existing representations. Gleaning the clandestine oppositional substance that lies dormant in seemingly passive inflections, she, like writer Sissy Goforth (Liz Taylor's character in Boom!) plays by her own rules.—Lia Gangitano

About the Artist

Kathe Burkhart (American, born 1958) has had solo exhibitions at Fri Art, Kunsthalle Fribourg, Fribourg, Switzerland; MoMA PS1, New York; Participant Inc., New York; NICC, Brussels, Belgium; Cultuurcentrum Brugge, Bruges, Belgium among other venues. Her work has been shown recently in group exhibitions such as The American Dream: American Realism 1945-2017, Kunsthalle Emden, Emden, Germany; Fast Forward, Paintings from the 1980s, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; The Furious Gaze, Montehermoso Cultural Center, Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain; and 1993: NYC Experimental Jet Set Trash & No Star, New Museum, New York. Burkhart participated in the 45th Venice Biennale (1993), and was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2017. Her work is included in numerous collections including The Art Institute of Chicago, Brooklyn Museum, Whitney Museum of American Art, SMAK Collection, Ghent, Belgium; and the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam. She maintains an interdisciplinary practice, having published four books of fiction, in addition to a vast collection of poetry and essays. Burkhart currently lives and works in Amsterdam and New York.

Upcoming:

David Humphrey

November 12 to December 19

(A new monograph spanning the artist’s four-decade career will be available)

Fredericks & Freiser is located at 536 West 24th Street, New York, NY. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 10am - 6pm. During the COVID 19 pandemic, capacity will be limited, large groups will not be accommodated, and private appointments can be made for individual viewing. For more information, please contact us by phone: (212) 633 6555, or email: info@fredericksfreisergallery.com. Visit us on Instagram, @fredericksandfreiser.

Monday, September 28, 2020

RANDOM HARVEST

Random Harvest

A Dispatch From Reuters

Busby Baloys. What an unusual name that matched the person attached. We met at Berendo Jr. High School. He was an odd black kid, wore a Jheri curl or wet perm, was tiny and thin, a teller of outlandish tales. He lived on 24th Street near Vermont not far from Fertile La Toyah Jackson. We bonded over a shared love of Elton John, Queen, The New York Dolls, Glam Rock, Circus and Cream Magazine. Very few other kids in our school knew about these rock publications. Busby and another even stranger kid named James Nolan stood out in our school. James always wore platform shoes with white gym socks, high water pants and a corduroy jacket. James and Busby floated in and out of my hanging with Paul Lee and Fertile after I basically stole them from their former best friends. Paul had known Luis Alfaro since they had attended 10th Street Elementary School in Pico Union. Years later Luis became a MacArthur Grant winning performance artist and playwright.

Herman Candejas,  Alberto "Abbie" Morales, Michael Matsunaga bullied and ridiculed Fertile every day of 8th grade until i rescued him. Fertile stayed loyal to them as friends because of their shared histories from the elementary school they had attended together that fed into Berendo Middle School. 

James Nolan lived near LaFayette Park with his white grandmother. He was mixed Caucasian and Latino if I do remember correctly. He had wavy dark brown hair and a peach fuzz moustache. James was bright and somewhat good looking with a dorky white boy type of personality. We lost contact with each other as we went to different high schools but later during the post punk scene of the early1980s whenever i was being interviewed on radio with the Afro Sisters he would always call the station to talk to me so he kept up with my post Junior High career. The last time i heard from him was about 2011 when i was in LA doing the performance piece Dejecta for MOCA and I was being interviewed on Stella’s Stray Pop the long running late nite radio program on KXLU out of Loyola Marymount College. James called in to talk to me and for some reason I was annoyed by this and wasn’t featuring chatting with someone from so far back in my distant past. I regret brushing him off. For some reason i suspected he was a recluse or shut-in of some kind, so I should have been more sensitive to his need for connection of some kind.  He also had writtem letters to the editor at the LA Weekly after some of my articles that appeared in that publication over the many decades i wrote for them.

Later in the 1990s during my time hosting and DJaning at Club Sucker at the Garage in Silverlake i reconnected somewhat with Busby Baloys. He was using a different moniker at the time I think he called himself Christian Hornsby and was speaking in an affected British accent saying he was related to the family that owns the luxury automotive brand Jaguar. Throughout the 90s Busby was hanging with a lot of the Silver Lake 40 gay crowd. One guy in particular a goofball of a sweet dude named Chris Ganzer who had a punk band called Ganzer that played at Club Sucker. Chris Ganzer worked in the film industry and confided in me that he sometimes hired Busby aka: Christian to work on film related projects as a production assistant and that he was a very industrious worker. He also didn’t question him about his little white lies about his so called family connections to wealth and priveledge. He would give him rides home, but Busby would always have him drop him off on a street corner in Downtown LA. One time he surreptitiously followed him to see exactly where he lived and it seemed he was living at a run down Single Room Occupancy Hotel. Since the climate in Los Angeles since the new century is not one conducive to roughing it or living hand-to-mouth like it was in the 80s and 90s. I wonder if Busby Baloys or James Nolan are even alive now.

Saturday, September 19, 2020

THEY ARE VERY SKINNY, INCREDIBLY HORNY AND READY FOR THE MOST SENSATIONAL GAY SEX IMAGINABLE

They are very skinny, incredibly horny and ready for the most sensational gay sex imaginable. Impeccable screwing for a big booty Brazilian stud.

The Willie Aames jogger circa the exotic teen exploitation film Paradise (1982) that thundered down the Hauptstrasse almost made me spill my glass of Riesling. Sitting outside the Asian fusion boite Pitaya watching the lads file by with this superior dorky, horn rimmed glasses specimen with thighs and whispers that could pull a mack truck. Oh how he glistened in that magic hour. Isn't it curious how the light reflects on the asphalt making even so so boyards seem like Babylonian Gorgons.

*
Put your penis where your mouth is and show that you really support Black and Trans people of color artists.

Deeds for AIRs

Help us provide housing for black and trans, housing-insecure artists!

During the month of June, in the midst of the BLM protests in New York, Angel, Danyele, Donte, Rj, and Stev—the Artists in Residents (AIRs)—were invited by People’s Space—a group of artists from our 02020 initiative—to work with Performance Space New York. What started as a project to offer refuge for protesters quickly shifted to a mutual aid space for those facing houselessness. After securing temporary housing for the AIRs, it soon became apparent that the five artists needed a more permanent solution.
People’s Space and Performance Space are now helping the AIRs raise funds to collectively purchase a home outside of NYC, and to provide seed funding for their artistic careers. With your support, the AIRs will be able to secure both long-term housing for themselves and eventually other houseless, Black and trans artists.

Help us raise $60,000 by October 15 to lift up impacted communities and most of all, help keep them safe, sustained, and supported!


The donation will not go to Performance Space; 100% of the proceeds will go directly to the AIRs.

Donate to the Deeds for AIRs Campaign

 
 
 
 
Jennifer Levonian, Agitated Still Life, 2020, acrylic on paper, 16 3/4 x 12 7/16 inches.