Protection
London, December 2009
Icing Sugar and Ginger Tears
I admit it, I’m getting that tingly feeling, etiquette must allow us to mention the c word by now. A Christmas playlist, a companion mix to last year’s Snow Fever. Slightly different mood this year, not because of lack of inner elf, more that new quality seasonal songs aren’t that copious for a 8track each year (you may spot a 70s classic in there).
8tracks.com/juliobesq/icing-sugar-and-ginger-tears
Eight Christmas songs on the reflective side. Not obscure but not exactly that popular either. (p.s. in December the lovely Slow Club sing it as “it’s Rudolph, it’s Rudolph, why can’t you see…”)
Where the wild pirates are
Superhero, pirate and robot supplies (courtesy of Wikipedia)
Pirates, time travel and Captain Najork
Towards the end of March this year the trailer for Spike Jonze’s ‘Where The Wild Things Are’ hit our laptop screens. I immediately scrawled a post what with it being a favourite book from my childhood, and since read to my brood, brought my nephews, etc., along with being a fan of Jonze’s work. But I relinquished it to the draughts bin figuring it would be all over the internet already.
With it’s impending release the glossies are again filling with interviews and articles on Jonze, but with no mention of the reason I wanted to write it up. The screenplay is by co-authored with Dave Eggers. And it’s not even that he wrote it. It’s what he has done.
He is a hero, a superhero in fact. And pirate.
I have a pile of his books on my desk that I have brought but never read. So why is he a hero to me? Simple, in 2002 along with Ninive Calegari he founded 826 Valencia – a writing lab to help local students with free one-to-one literacy help. And sell pirate supplies.
The empty premises they rented in which to set up the writing centre and publishers office had only zoning for retail as SimCity has taught me to say: it could only be opened as a shop. So they decided to use the front as a front, selling pirate supplies. What takes this from being a good idea to brilliance is their attention to detail, aside from the fact that what their mission could genuinely be described as awesome, it is also a very splendid pirate suppliers, one of David Byrne’s top five in fact.
Which then inspired the Brooklyn Superhero Supply Co. or 826NYC, where a secret door between the invisibility potions and cloaks leads you into the writing lab. There’s 826michigan or Liberty Street Robot Supply & Repair, 826LA or the Echo Park Time Travel Mart, 826CHI or The Boring Store (which doesn’t have anything to do with spies), 826 Seattle or Greenwood Space Travel Supply Co., and 826 Boston better known as The Greater Boston Bigfoot Research Institute.
I could rattle on about the inspiring work they do and the fantastic stores they front the labs with but Dave Eggers does a much better job of it, here’s his TED talk on the project:
Or watch it at your leisure over at TED –
www.ted.com/talks/dave_eggers_makes_his_ted_prize_wish_once_upon_a_school.html
The attention to detail and humour does not stop with the physical stores and the produce, each has a wonderful web site too.
www.826valencia.org/store
www.greenwoodspacetravelsupply.com
notasecretagentstore.com
And not to forget the fantastic work they do head over to www.826valencia.org and read up on forthcoming events, then onto onceuponaschool.org to find out how you can help your local school. In case that last part didn’t register: if you don’t live close enough to 826 to donate a couple of afternoons every six months, then Eggers has set up Once Upon A School, an organisation seeded with prize money from TED, offering support to people in volunteering at their local schools.
Don’t worry, I feel shallow and complacent after hearing him talk too.
But there is value in goofing off, fooling around and playing too, which is the moral behind “How Tom beat Captain Najork and his hired Sportsmen” by Russell Hoban, another favourite book of mine supposedly intended for children. Whilst Eggers re-imagined the picture book ‘Where the wild things are’ for adults, Hoban who is an award winning author best known for ‘Ridley Walker’ and ‘Angelica’s Grotto’ also writes childrens’ books, much like Roald Dahl, who also used Quentin Blake’s illustration skills.
His invented language skills seen in ‘Ridley Walker’ comes into wonderful play during ‘How Tom…’ where the protagonist has to eat his greasy bloaters and potato sog under the watchful eye of aunt Fidget Wonkham-Strong, who wears an iron hat. Highly highly recommended and like Antoine De Saint-Exupery’s ‘The Little Prince’ reminds us that play is as important as any business ethos.Track down a copy via www.abebooks.co.uk, or Amazon if you must.
Feed your inner child. Just not on cabbage and potato sog.
Wave iPhone user interface
Officially excited by the prospect of Wave coming to the iPhone. Spent the day mentally visualising touch, tap and tipping engagement, and reducing the existing interface to the simplest solution. Without recourse to sliders. After being made to include gratuitous ones in BirdSongFM I now suffer from a churlish refusal to use them even when they would be entirely suited. Plus you can’t really beat pretty coloured circles.
Adam Hoyle my collaborator likes it too, even through the fug of his hangover, so it looks as if it’s a go.
Hello Wave, goodbye Ring
It was with some embarrassment that I noticed the date stamp on the post announcing ‘Ring’ was a year old. Which would explain the somewhat terse tone of voice from my collaborator Adam Hoyle this morning when I mentioned I wanted to change it from Ring to Wave.
In the past year we abandoned premiering it in a gallery space or online show and instead embraced the new platform of the iPhone. Adam coded up a beta and sent me a screenshot of it running. Quite awhile a go.
Irony kicks into play, as I don’t have an iPhone, or even a mobile at the moment due to philosophical constraint, so the ball rebounded to a stop in my court. A poor excuse I know since I’m not coding, but Ring/Wave is back on the hot plate since our BirdSongFM hit the iTunes store. When I proposed the conceptual leap to a wave it was meet with a ring of unenthusiasm; so I have bartered a visit to Adam’s studio next week in exchange for the change in virtual motion.
I am using the wisdom of stating something publicly to avoid backing out – like that worked so well last time I posted about ‘Ring’ – however I’m feeling quiet excitement about seeing this published so expect to ‘Wave’ hello soon. (Sorry).
Joy Orbison
Isn’t it great when you hear a new tunesmith whose music excites. Joy Orbison is ticking all my boxes at the moment. Curiously none of the blogs can pigeon-hole the genre, no offense but the dance fan-boys get pretty train-spotter about whether something is UK funky or dubstep or…
But Joy Orbison is confounding labeling, it reminds me of the original Balearic mixes, in the way it mashes together a host of dance styles into something joyous that takes both the feet and the mind on a journey. Ibiza 2.0 seems like a good tag for now.
electrodrone.blogspot.com posted this mix www.mediafire.com/?jkyfyngdain
Playlist triptych
Reading ‘Red Men’ by Matthew De Abiatua – a near future farce on marketing and consumerism – the protagonist is analysed by software and his tastes served up exactly. Whilst user spending profiling is with us, and I don’t want to start getting all paranoid and muttering about living “off grid”, there are some things that algorithms can’t quite pass muster at.
Playlists being one: Genius Bar from Apple, Last.fm and thesixtyone all work quite well but they rely on genre tags, customer also likes and similar. What makes a great mixtape is the throwing in of something unexpected; out of character but which just makes perfect sense. A bridge between worlds. No point in getting too philosophical here, Nick Hornby’s ‘High Fidelity’ covers the ground well enough.
8tracks are made by humans (actually this post is a kind of repeat of one a few months a go so I will cut to the chase, to the drop), it’s a great source of discovering new tunes so I felt duty bound to return something to the pool and slung together a triptych of mixes – each a very different flavour. Hope something catches.
8tracks.com/juliobesq/cocktail
Incroyables and Merveilleuses
Johnny Rotten in London, 1976, by Bob Gruen
Checking out the latest Hawk! A Vagrant strip, intrigued by references to the protagonists I Googled them (having missed that lesson at school).
Stolen straight from www.fashionencyclopedia.com:
The Incroyables (the Unbelievables) and the Merveilleuses (the Marvelous Ones) were part of a rebellious youth movement that arose during the 1790s, during the French Revolution (1789–99). The revolution had begun a tremendous upheaval in France pitting the poor and the middle class against the wealthy, and the government was very unstable. The Incroyables (men) and the Merveilleuses (women) were political young people, who were the product of an explosive time in history. They made their political statement by dressing in outlandish fashions that exaggerated and mocked the luxurious styles that had been worn in the court of King Louis XVI (1754–1793), who had recently been executed by the revolutionary government. Though many ridiculed the extreme fashions of the Incroyablesand the Merveilleusesand called them immoral, they did remind people of the time before the revolution, when outrageous fashions had been more than a jest.
There’s more and it’s worth reading. Incroyables and Merveilleuses? They rock.
Mr Rotten from the anthemic tumblr ‘x’
Peachy the fourth
Wasn’t going to mention it, but I find myself becoming, well not excited, but warmed by thoughts of the return of Peachy tonight…
David Gale’s Peachy Coochy Nites
The projector projects 20 images for precisely 20 seconds each. The Coocheur (or Presenter) speaks for precisely twenty seconds per image. Randomness is discouraged but narrative linearity is not automatically esteemed.
David Gale, having launched a nationwide performance must-have, continues to curate this series of Peachy Coochy events at ArtsAdmin’s stylish yet reassuring Bar. Each event features six Coocheurs, or Presenters, drawn from many walks of life. Each Coocheur will compose a verbal response to 20 images of their choice. Each presentation lasts 6 minutes and 40 seconds. There will be gaps between presentations for drinking and light conversation.
David, something of a Black Belt in these matters, will both compere and present the chippings that may not be reverse engineered towards an originating block.
Peachy Coochy Nites subscribes to the the National Belief System and is therefore committed to the provision of a wide range of contributors such as the wrangler, the wrestler, the trainer, the page, the maid, the surfer, the beachcomber, the collector, she who maintains a corral, he who mends fences, they who do windows.
The next Peachy Coochy Nite will be held, as usual, in the Bar at Toynbee Studios on Thursday November 26th at 7.30 pm. Tickets £5.00. Booking advised but walk up welcome.
More details here:www.artsadmin.co.uk/projects/project.php?id=211
A map here: www.artsadmin.co.uk/contacts/The Guardian catches some cooch: www.guardian.co.uk/stage/theatreblog/2008/nov/17/theatre-peachy-coochy-performance-art
Sub sole nihil novi est
More digressions, but read on for there will be murder, sex and swearing.
Times change, and nothing changes.
I am an advocate of Freecycle and when an attic’s worth of sixties poetry books were put on offer I reciprocated, thinking them a suitable gift for my darling who spins a rhyming pen. Amongst the gems, which included humourous poems for vicars (a niche market), was ‘Other Man’s Flowers’ by Field Marshall Viscount A. P. Wavell, later Lord Wavell, I marveled at the title. That times have changed and such a title would not past muster today without a marketing strategist pointing out that ‘Other Man’s Flowers’ may indeed have homoerotic connotations. As an aside I still marvel at the beautiful typesetting of the title.
Further down the pile lay ‘A Treasury of Ribaldry’ which promised gay and robust reading. Oh the times really have moved on I thought. And took a look inside. To find a song called ‘Frankie and Johnny’, which follows…
Frankie and Johnny were sweethearts, O Lordy, how they could love!
Swore to be true to each other, true as the stars above.
He was her man, but he done her wrongFrankie she was a good woman, just like everybody knows;
She gave her man a hundred dollars to buy himself a suit of clothes
He was her man, but he done her wrongFrankie and Johnny went walking, Johnny in his brand new suit.
“Oh, good Lord” says Frankie, “don’t my Johnny look cute?”
He was her man, but he done her wrongFrankie went down to Memphis, she went on the evening train.
She paid one hundred dollars for Johnny a watch and chain.
He was her man, but he done her wrongFrankie lived in the crib-house, crib-house had only two doors;
Gave all her money to Johnny, who spent it on parlor whores.
He was her man, but he done her wrongFrankie went down to the corner to buy a class of beer,
Says to the fat bartender, “Has my lovingest man been here?”
He was her man, but he done her wrong“Ain’t going to tell you no story; ain”t going to tell you no lie;
I seen your man ’bout an hour ago with a girl named Nellie Bly.
If he’s your man, he’s doing you wrong.”Frankie went down to the pawnshop, she didn’t go there for fun;
She hocked all of her jewelery, brought a pearl-handled forty-four gun
For to get her man, who was doing her wrong.Frankie went down to the hotel, she rang that hotel bell.
“Stand back, all you chippies, or I’ll blow you straight to hell.
I want my man, who’s doing me wrong”Frankie went up to the parlor, looked over the transom so high;
There on the bed was her Johnny a-lovin’ up Nellie Bly.
He was her man, but he done her wrongFrankie threw back her kimono, she took out her forty-four,
Root-a-toot three times she shot right through that hotel door
She was after her man, who done her wrongJohnny grabbed his Stetson, “Oh, good Lord, Frankie, don’t shoot!”
But Frankie pulled the trigger and the gun went root-a-toot-toot.
He was her man, but she shot him down“Roll me over easy; roll me over slow;
Roll me over on my left hand; for the bullet is hurting me so.
I was her man, but I done her wrong”Oh, bring on your rubber-tired hearses; bring on your rubber-tired hacks;
They’re taking Johnny to the cemetery, and they ain’t a-bringing him back.
He was her man, but he done her wrongNow it was not murder in the second degree; it was not murder in the third.
That woman simply dropped her man, like a hunter drops her bird.“Oh, put me in that dungeon. Oh, put me in that cell.
Put me where the northeast wind blows from the southwest corner of hell.
I shot my man, ’cause he done me wrong.”Frankie walked up the scaffold, as calm as a girl can be,
And turning her eyes to heaven she said “Good Lord, I’m coming to Thee.
Her was my man, and I done him wrong.”This story got no moral, this story has got no end.
This story only goes to show that there ain’t no good in men.
He was her man, but he done her wrong
Reading through I was struck by the modernity of it, how they would not sound out of place being spat of the mouth of Nick Cave, who indeed covered Stagger Lee written a few decades later. Perhaps I am being naive but I was surprised to learn that these lyrics were composed in 1850. The song is thought to have been penned about Frankie Baker, no relation. If you haven’t heard it, a word of advice – don’t. It’s awful. I made that mistake and sought a copy to discover it’s a horrendous upbeat clippity clop affair.
Instead create your version, perhaps as the indubitable Mr Cave might croon, below is ‘Obvious is Obvious’ by The Dirty Three. A group featuring Warren Ellis on violin who moonlights as a Bad Seed. If the music appeals to you may I also recommend Cave and Ellis’s instrumental soundtrack to ‘The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford’, but I digress. Hit play and interpret a true rendition of Frankie and Johnnie. If it’s a hit remember to invite me to the aftershow party.
Of course I should not have been surprised by the age of this tale of sex and murder, for they have a pedigree and heritage as old as humanity. During a visit to Pompeii I was struck at how little cities have changed in 2000 years – for clearly visible were signage for both bakers and brothels. In fact the Frankie ballad pales into an insignificance suitable only to amuse a vicar in light verse compared to this ditty by Catullus, composed in Latin circa 79 BC
I will bugger you and face-fuck you.
Cock-sucker Aurelius and catamite Furius,
You who think, because my verses
Are delicate, that I am a sissy.
For it’s right for the devoted poet to be chaste
Himself, but it’s not necessary for his verses to be so.
Verses which then have taste and charm,
If they are delicate and sexy,
And can incite an itch,
And I don’t mean in boys, but in those hairy old men
Who can’t get their flaccid dicks up.
You, because you have read of my thousand kisses,
You think I’m a sissy?
I will bugger you and face-fuck you.
If times have not changed, the meaning of the odd word may have, for now if you were offended at being called sissy, which in terms of insults is usually on the gay axis, you probably wouldn’t threaten to bugger them.
Having said that, when I read Catullus’s ode to verse and anal rape on Synthetic Pubes (a wonderful tumblr, whose denizen scours Flickr daily for beautiful erotica: tough work I know but they are doing for us, so be thankful) – I knew it would be a suitable candidate for the Monday morning dirty poem from Bookkake. Moral compunction forced me to email the editor a link, who kindly thanked me and enquired whether I had heard of it via news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/8375511.stm.
So, apart from Mr Lowe then. If you are thinking of laying into someone in Latin maybe a different cuss? I recommend www.yuni.com/library/latin.html where I cribbed the post’s title from.
Visit bookkake.com/tag/monday-poem/ to read more poetic filth or subscribe for a start of the working week email literary lubricator.
Speaking of marketing strategists and book titles I am surprised no-one raised their hand during the publishing meetings for this.
And the picture of Billy the Kid has no real relevance to any of this, I just think it’s rather superb.
Bow
Curves are just
exceptionally
beautiful lines
Perfect.
I read this line in a tumblr belong to Ashley MacLean, who along with Traci Matlock run an empire of blogs, aside from being a phrase well rounded in thought, it gives me the excuse to post about their work.
I have mentioned them before in passing, but I feel I owe them a bow of gratitude, an admittance, an acknowledgement. I discovered then through their collaborative Flickr stream, which contains the image that set me on the path I am currently traversing. Though perhaps better described as orienteering.
"Light that keeps existence particular," by Ashley & Traci
Like Martin Hannet’s production for the Joy Division opus ‘Unknown Pleasures’ it speaks of the spaces, the unsaid. That an image can be erotic without revealment. That there is power in undisclosure.
It sparked the desire to create imagery on lust, ritual and appetite. I decided not to cheapen these words by working in a pun regarding the dual pronunciation and instead offer a simple bow of thanks for the curves.
Out of pixel
It is common practice for literary journals to request previously published stories are not submitted.
I think I have found a quandary of the digital age: what happens when a story is accepted and published by a very fine litzine (Insolent Rudder in this case) but then the online only publication goes out of pixel (for one can’t say print?).
Unlike a story that had been printed in traditional media, where copies would still be around even when the publisher were not, in the digital realm that story has ceased to exist, it has been unpublished.
Does it then still count as previously published if no-one can point to a copy?
(It is not lost like a fabled masterpiece, for I still have a copy. Although, since I wrote it I know what happens, there’s little point in my reading it.)
What is the etiquette for missing stories?
Something to hide/Nothing to say
Pigeon poster by Isabel Lucena for 'Something to hide'
Do I want to share this?
Self indulgence like petty criticism should be avoided, but stumbling upon the following quote I have decided to commit to print.
Our online tools do a great job at breadth (hundreds of friends, thousands of tweets), but a bad job at depth. We live increasingly superficial lives, reducing our relationships to caricatures and our personalities to billboards, as we speed along at 1,000 miles an hour.
Jonathan Harris
I caught up with a friend recently and the news of a weekend away was not news – my ipod had posted a jog, I had tagged the location. It started me thinking. About social networks.
Rather puzzlingly within the last month a few strangers have requested subscription to my twitter feed. What would someone find in reading the status messages of a stranger?
I discovered that people employ ghost writers to ensure their tweets are prolific and witty enough.
I receive a multitude of social network messages a day, none contain emotional news. I know friends have enjoyed cream today, but not where or with what or who, perhaps that’s knowledge not suitable to share, and yet the cream was spread.
Last week without irony I twittered my last tweet announcing my retirement from the medium. I am not the first. I read a parody about Miley Cyrus quitting, the amusement subsiding and admiration growing, like mourning for celebrities one has never met, why publicise an inner dialogue with an unknown audience. Is there a term for stalking in reverse?
In discussing this, the word ‘curmudgeon’ may have been uttered, but there is a phrase that rationalises this social status silence: signal to noise.
Small steps: I reply via email to any Facebook wall enquiries as to my health and happiness. This is news to be whispered in the ears of friends. Words to be sent with love.
(I hear reports of arrests being made using evidence gleaned, nay snooped, from Facebook, let alone horror stories of employers ‘researching’ candidates in social network sites.)
Something to Hide is a fascinating experiment by a group of Amsterdam based designers who realising that all their communications were privy to snooping, not just tweets and statuses, but texts and emails which leave an electronic residue to be read by those with enough technical savvy or power long into the future. No hiding letters in a box under the bed.
They turned off their mobiles and emails and communicated for a few months via pigeon post. In doing so engaged in an activity far removed from ‘social networking’; the rearing and caring for homing pigeons. One imagines each communique was judged, valued, and honed before being sent wingward over the city.
Serious signal to noise dedication.
weblogs.hollanddoc.nl/somethingtohide/
And inspirational. I remember eulogising the action of leaving your mobile off for a weekend in a post about the ‘Slow’ movement. These small steps are now bold strides. As a mental experiment I am stopping using a mobile phone unless actually away. As in abroad. Absent from home for longer than a day and night.
After all I am contactable during studio hours by email, land line and instant messenger. I have a house phone. When I venture out I shall sever the umbilical cord and sail fourth on journeys of discovery, and report sightings upon reaching dock again. Or get lost and have no way to call for help.
Two tweets a day, a couple of texts, these add up to twenty eight sentences, enough to send news to a friend aboard, once a week. A challenge to myself.
(* I reserve the right to twitter announcements of my blogs publicising work on my site. All is vanity.)
Hawk! A vagrant
Comics and comic writing are practically always the reserve of boys. Not so with Hark! A vagrant. Luckily for us Kate Beaton draws the strips and it features amongst others dandies, The Bronte Sisters and Goethe. What’s not to love.
Shunt, the night the music died
Shunt, Saturday 14th November 2009
For the last three years under the arches at London Bridge Station, Shunt Theatre have been hosting an incredible repertoire of performance and art, and at the weekend the sort of parties where you felt you were in a film. It was a privilege to show my work there, and better still, to dance into the early hours.
The construction of the Shard of Glass has forced them to shut the doors on our beloved lounge, and on Saturday those who cared came to party and say goodbye. There were tears, bagpipes and fireworks. As Roots Manuva rang out in the final minutes of the lounge the mic was handed to an audience member who toasted our love, the Djs spun ‘Too Drunk To Fuck’ and it was over.
The lounge may be gone but Shunt continue with their play ‘Money’ and will return with a new venue.
BirdSongFM
Apple rejected my generative bird song piece for having minimal user functionality, since after all listening to the birds sing is usually an experience rich in interactivity. Adam after porting it to the iPhone took exception with their reasoning, added three sliders, and represented it.
Apple approved it.
Now the vaguely insulting part is it passed with the sliders not actually doing anything, other than slide that is. Apparently one will change the volume of the next audio stream that’s generated, which is probably really handy if you don’t want to use the volume control on your phone. But the other two, nada.
So it’s been accepted for appearing as if it has rich user functionality, the testing process not actually going as far as seeing whether the sliders do anything. Which is I suppose is a good compromise: it gets published and leaves the application as is should be, continuous never looping bird song, our gift to cubicle workers.
Purchase it from itunes.com/app/birdsongfm for the grand total of 59 pence.
Just remember you can safely ignore the sliders. If we sell a few copies Adam and I will buy a loaf or two and celebrate by feeding the swans.
Radio Arcadia
A ramble. Which is how it all started.
A walk through the Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Adam Hoyle coding me a sound engine for a client, having a studio in the garden, these elements all conjoined in my creating Radio Arcadia a couple of years back…
An audio tape of birdsong from the Wiltshire garden of Digital One’s chairman has been used as the test transmission for various digital radio stations since it’s recording in the spring of 1992.
When it was last taken off air three years ago, the broadcaster was surprised to find it had dedicated listeners voicing complaint.
Radio Arcadia is my gift to all office and cubicle workers. Play gently. Escape.
For those of you without speakers it boils down to me tweaking Adam’s audio engine to generate an endless stream of British bird song.
Skip to the summer, news reaches Adam and I that radio birdsong has finally been taken off the air (news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/8076381.stm), Adam asks if I would mind if he, in return, tweaked the code back, and ported it to the iPhone.
Which he does, asks me for a logo, and sends it into Apple for approval. Apple vet every application for inclusion in the iTunes store. We get a reply.
Subject: BirdSongFM 1.0: Application Submission Feedback
Dear Mr.Hoyle,
We’ve reviewed your application BirdSongFM and we have determined that this application contains minimal user functionality and will not be appropriate for the App Store.
So it appears that if it hasn’t got a slider it’s no good. Dear Mr Mondrian, perhaps if the viewer were given a felt tip…
I particularly like Apple’s next line in the reply, “If you would like to share it with friends and family, we recommend …” Thanks Apple, I’m sure my mother will be very proud of me too.
So it seems that the iPhone is a closed platform. Adam is muttering about adding a tweet intensity control, but I for one think it may have ended for the best since I really hate the icon I drew, and publish it here to chastise myself for so fucking cute. Should have stuck to my guns too and called it Radio Arcadia.
Oh, and I learnt through the power of Google that Iggy sings “radio burning up above” and not radio birdland, although I kind of prefer my misheard version.
Christmasses
London, October 2009
Sometimes you can reel off a load of shots only to find it’s the initial test image that has it all…
Carlo Mollino
I feel I’ve come to the party too late. And what a fantastic party it would have been. Until June there has been an exhibition of Carlo Mollino’s work here in London. And I found at about him last weekend.
Chatting at the lab about lo-fi erotica with fellow rock Holgist Brian from www.letthemeatcoal.com, waiting for our clip tests to develop, he asks if I like the work of Mr Mollino. Ignorance. Google to the rescue.
Carlo Mollino is a well renowned furniture designer and architect, noted for his lavish interiors with attention to handcrafted detail, as well as respected photographer. But beyond that he lived a life with an sybaritic exuberance that reads like a Scott Fitzgerald playboy.
Here’s a quick round-up of his endevours aside from the above: winning the 24-hour race at La Mans is a car of his own design; writing a book on his own techniques for downhill skiing; aviator and engineer of airplane parts; publishing a thesis on photography, using extensive retouching techniques to match the photographic reality to his mind’s fantasy. He wrote…
Everything is allowed, imagination is always saved
He had built an elaborate room to die in and hence be carried on into the afterlife, other sources suggest he was an occultist, drug user and sex addict but these have only ‘internet substantiation’ so far. But the icing on the tiered cake for me is, when the executors of his will started clearing his house they uncovered hundreds of erotic polaroids and photographs shot over twenty years.
The polaroids must have given him a freedom to pursue this private pastime as the imagery gets bolder. He hired local Turin prostitutes to pose in meticulously posed scenarios, using new models for each shot. Their beauty and pathos I think emerge from the fact that although this were clandestine and risque, he was not capturing them as pornography to masturbate over, nor as trophy photos of conquests; they were shot intended as erotic art if just for his personal audience of one. The non-professional models bring a voluptuousness and honesty that only heightens his aspirations.
Carlo Mollino, quite a card.
Further reading:
www.postmedia.net/06/mollino.htm
www.designboom.com/world/mollino/photos/index.html
findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0268/is_2_42/ai_109023355/
ambushstudio.blogspot.com/2009/06/carlo-mollino.html
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlo_Mollino
www.designboom.com/weblog/cat/8/view/6374/carlo-mollino-interiors-at-sebastian-and-barquet-london.html
www.nytimes.com/2009/05/04/fashion/04iht-design4.html
www.colectiva.tv/wordpress/lang/en-us/las-polaroids-de-carlo-mollinocarlo-mollinos-polaroids/
All polaroids shot by Carlo Mollino
Barbed Wire Love
Blasted by your booby traps
I felt the blow in both knee-caps
Your eyes did shine
Your lips were fine
And the device in you pants was out of sight
All you give me is barbed wire love
All caught up in barbed wire love
Tangled up in barbed wire love
Throw my leg over barbed wire love
Barbed wire love snags my jeans
Fantastic.
Thirty years a go Stiff Little Fingers released ‘Inflammable Material’, featuring their incendiary paean to teenage lust ‘Barbed Wire Love’: a raw marriage of punk and doo-wop.
Both musical movements share another legacy, that of prolific reproduction. Punk with it’s do-it-yourself aesthetic and a fan base centred around live gigs with direct contact to the groups, spawned for a short while a huge number of record releases. Anyone who saved enough money from their Saturday job could put out a record. And with Geoff Travis deciding to form Rough Trade to wrest control of distribution away from the majors anyone had a chance too.
But independent record production has an unsung birth, in the vocal harmony groups of the 40s and 50s, a genre which became popularised as Doo-Wop. Across America in black neighbourhoods groups of friends would gather and vocal harmonise together. With no musical instruments and need for overdubs or mixing levels these groups found it simple to to pitch up at a recording studio, complete their song in a single take, and purchase a pressing of perhaps a hundred records. It is estimate that over it’s 25 year span Doo-Wop gave birth to 30,000 songs. Shaaa-bop!
The 70s saw a revival in vocal harmonies (Manhattan Transfer anyone?) and Stiff Little Fingers ripped the pastiche apart from the inside and hurled it into present. Their blue print lay dormant for thirty years till Glasvegas picked up the mantle.
Punk was largely posturing and the main players sang of revolution but it was SLF coming up from the streets of belfast who gave anger of revolt it’s true voice. Buy the album from www.slf.com and listen to the righteous paint-blistering anger of Suspect Device. And then there is their finest moment…
People occasionally cover a Bob Marley song, and usually with a ‘why bother’ result. To equal Saint Bob is something, but to better him…? SLF take Rita Marley’s ‘Johnny Was’ and transpose the senseless shooting of the protagonist from the electoral violence of Jamaica’s Kingston to the occupation and civil war in Northern Ireland. Shedding along the way any pretense of authenticity of reggae and playing it out it a white heat of guitar noise. Still, when Jake Burns rasps “a single shot shot rings out in the Belfast night” the hairs on my neck stand on end, thirty years on.
Is it that good? Buy the album and see for yourself.
Vaudeville Ruin portrait
‘Vaudeville Ruin’
Fire eater. Burlesque performer. Hula Queen.
London, October 2009
3 days of Lomoporno
The internet is both a blessing and a curse. But you knew that. Whilst allowing the easy publication of ideas and work that would never reach us in the mainstream media it offers one major drawback: it’s a little too easy to get lost in it’s flows and eddies when you should be working.
Lomoporno is a new venture from www.flashglamtrash.com, one of the destinations I stop off out to see what’s new in the world. A world where diamonds in the gutter come wrapped in suspiciously stained flyers from Studio 54 perhaps. Not always not safe for work.
Not sure they would want to be called nice people, so I shall just say those people at Lomoporno published a selection of my photographs. And now I discover it’s going off line because The Lomographic Society object to the site’s name. How often do you type ‘porno’ by accident instead of ‘graphy’? I understand protecting a brand but I find it a touch ironic given rule 10 at www.lomography.com/about/the-ten-golden-rules.
No hard feelings, and you might like to know The Photographers Gallery sells Holgas at £25, same price as eBay.
Handbag at BAC
I will not be dancing as part of Geraldine Pilgrim’s “Handbag” this Monday evening at Battersea Arts Centre. Do come along and not shake a leg. It’s rather uplifting and joyous.
In an empty ballroom a caretaker sweeps away the remnants of a previous event. A woman enters the space and puts down her handbag. A beat begins, a mirror ball turns and the sound of a classic dance track fills the air…
A witty and wistful performance that, in a few delirious moments, succinctly makes the point that no woman needs a man when she has got her handbag in tow. Lyn Gardner, The Guardian
Tickets and information at www.artsadmin.co.uk/events/event.php?id=619
Vaudeville Ruin
Today I learnt that like clowns who paint their faces on egg shells to register their unique look, burlesque performers are known and identified by their costumes.
(Untitled)
The above is from the trailer for ‘(Untitled)’, a new comedy directed by Jonathan Parker (who I have never heard of before) set in the world of modern art.
I had a genuine laugh out loud moment when I saw the label. Then I thought why hadn’t I thought of that. Pure brilliance.
If it has just one other joke as good then the price of admission is money well spent. (The title doesn’t count).
The Glamour
I have just finished ‘The Glamour’ by Christopher Priest. An author who for me only came to light after becoming curious having seen his novel ‘The Prestige’ adapted as a film.
He is woefully unknown, sharing many similar traits with early to mid period Ballard, perhaps it is use of science fiction motifs that have held back wider fame. Even after a hit film he still languishes in obscurity.
His novels could also been seen as having parallels with the canon of John Fowles, residing as they do in the use of literary devices. Words within words, worlds within worlds.
May I recommend in particular ‘The Affirmation’, a beautifully sculpted work that still resonates with me long after finishing. (Much of his oeuvre remains out of print so with some reluctance I recommend buying second hand from Amazon). If you can, it’s best to buy The Glamour without reading any reviews as knowing what said glamour is may spoil some of your enjoyment.
I have been touched by The Glamour.
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