ART, Photography

ANDRE KERTESZ, DISTORTIONS, 1933

Gallery Leave a comment
Tirage gélatino-argentique

In 1933 photographer Andre Kertész was commissioned for the series, Distortion, about 200 photographs of Najinskaya Verackhatz and Nadia Kasine, two models portrayed nude and in various poses, with their reflections caught in a combination of distortion mirrors, similar to a carnival’s house of mirrors. In some photographs, only certain limbs or features were visible in the reflection. Some images also appeared in the 2 March issue of the “girly magazine” Le Sourire and in the 15 September 1933 issue of Arts et métiers graphiques. Later that year, Kertész published the book Distortions, a collection of the work. -wikipedia, Andre Kertesz

ART, Music, Video

BRIAN ENO :: Interview, Red Bull Academy, NYC 2013, 90min.

Video Leave a comment

Emma Warren hosts a wide-ranging and engaging interview with Eno

interview notes from RBA:

The record producer, sound conceptualist, futurist and artist extraordinaire sits on the couch at the 2013 Red Bull Music Academy. Electronic music didn’t start with Eno, but it was certainly never the same after him. On Roxy Music’s first two albums he helped make synthesizers and tape effects part of a rock lineup, pricking the ears of future synth-pop creators such as Human League. As a solo artist he forged a new genre, which he dubbed ambient music, before effectively becoming a one-man genre himself, lending touches to Genesis (where he’s credited with ‘Enossification’), John Cale, and Bowie during his golden Berlin period. There wasn’t much in the way of experimental ’70s music that wasn’t made a little odder by Eno’s touch. But that touch could also be a multiplatinum one, as he showed as a producer for U2 in the mid-’80s and Coldplay 20 years later. In the ’90s he created perhaps the most widely heard music of all: the six-second start-up sound for Microsoft’s Windows 95 operating system. Typically mischievous, he later let it be known that he’d created it on a Mac.

Hosted by Emma Warren

ART, Video

MERCE CUNNINGHAM / JOHN CAGE EXCERPTS, VARIATIONS V

Video Leave a comment

Variations V (1965)
Musicians: John Cage, David Tudor and Gordon Mumma
Choreography: Merce Cunningham
The Merce Cunningham Dance Company
Filmed Projections & Visual Effects: Stan VanDerBeek and Nam June Paik
Lighting: Beverly Emmons
Directed for Film by Arne Arnborn
Variations V reflects the experimentation and spirit of the 1960s — a collaborative, interactive multi-media event with choreographed dance, elaborate mobile decor, variable lighting, multiple film projection, and live-electronic music often activated by the dancers’ movements.

Continue reading MERCE CUNNINGHAM / JOHN CAGE EXCERPTS, VARIATIONS V →

Music

SOME YO YO STUFF : An observation of the observations of Don Van Vliet by Anton Corbijn 1993 approx 13 min.

Gallery Leave a comment

After Don Van Vliet, aka Captain Beefheart retired from music in the 80s, he concentrated on his newfound career as an internationally recognized abstract painter and gradually became more and more reclusive. One of the few glimpses of Van Vliet during the ’90s is in Anton Corbijn’s 13 minute poetic 1993 documentary, Some Yo Yo Stuff, which features features him talking about life, philosophy, music and art.  Van Vliet’s mother and David Lynch make appearances in the film as well. Continue reading SOME YO YO STUFF : An observation of the observations of Don Van Vliet by Anton Corbijn 1993 approx 13 min. →

CultCrit, Video

SMILE – A Documentary about the Perception of Mental Illness, 2014, 24min

Video Leave a comment

SMILE follows a series of interviews conducted by Luke Mordue and his team with those who have been affected by the darkness of depression and anxiety from various perspectives.

Shining a light on mental illness in an approachable, light manner, the team fight to eradicate the ignorance and stigma that still lives in today’s society with the hope that it will one day be accepted worldwide as a real problem that needs to be addressed.

It is time it was realised depression and anxiety will not go away with a simple smile.’

Directed by: Luke Mordue.

Video

PHILIP GLASS, IN CONVERSATION WITH TODD L. BURNS: Red Bull Music Academy Lectures NYC, 2013 1.5hours

Video Leave a comment

Todd L. Burns hosts Philip Glass at a Red Bull Music Lecture in 2013. 1.5hours

Introductory Notes:

It’s hard to overstate the influence of New York City composer Philip Glass. Along with Steve Reich, his minimalist compositions transformed the world of classical music and, eventually, popular music in general. Glass’ early epiphanies occurred in Paris during his time in the mid-’60s studying under Nadia Boulanger and in New York when he heard Steve Reich’s “Piano Phase.” These events helped set Glass on a course toward the repetitive, dramatic, and conceptually rigorous style that has become his trademark. Throughout the ’70s Glass refined his work, resulting in career-defining compositions like Music In Twelve Parts and Einstein On The Beach. In the process he became a popular sensation, a serious composer who wasn’t willfully obscure or too difficult to understand. Glass’ stunning soundtrack work for films like The Thin Blue Line and The Hours, and a symphony based on David Bowie’s album Heroes, has only elevated his standing as one of America’s most popular living composers. In this talk at the 2013 RBMA, Glass waxes nostalgic on his time spent in Paris, musical tradition, and the art of performance. 

 

ART, Photography

GUY BOURDIN : WALKING LEGS

Gallery Leave a comment

“THE EROTIC, UNNERVING IMAGES OF HIGH HEELED SHOES WALKING, DISCONNECTED FROM THE BODY, ALONG BEACHES OR ACROSS INDUSTRIAL WASTELAND ARE IN CONTRAST TO OTHER SEXUALLY CHARGED PHOTOGRAPHS FOR FRENCH VOGUE”

– SUZY MENKES, VOGUE

Guy Bourdin, born in Paris in 1928, was the pioneering fashion photographer whose arresting photographs filled the pages of French Vogue for three decades from the 1950s through to the 80s. He is notorious for breaking the boundaries of traditional commercial photography and reshaping the classic fashion picture, using a daring narrative and vibrant colour palette. Vogue’s editor introduced Bourdin to the shoe designer Charles Jourdan, for whom he became the brand’s official advertising photographer, producing some of his best images during this period. The beauty in many of his pictures is that you can see small imperfections and fine details such as the models’ pores. In this respect they hold an integrity that is rarely seen today.

In 1950, Guy Bourdin met Man Ray and became his protégé. The spirit of the Surrealists is ever-present in Bourdin’s work: we see this in the dream-like quality of his pictures and the artist’s use of uncanny juxtapositions. Taking photography as his medium of choice, Bourdin explored the provocative and the sublime with a relentless perfectionism and sharp humour. He captured the imagination of a generation, and yet his images have a timeless quality, so much so that they continue to influence the worlds of fashion and advertising today, twenty years since his death.

To coincide with the UK’s largest ever exhibition of the influential and enigmatic fashion photographer Guy Bourdin at Somerset House, the Michael Hoppen Gallery is delighted to exhibit a wonderful group of images ‘Walking Legs’. Officially being unveiled alongside Somerset House’s show ‘Image-Maker’, ‘Walking Legs’, is one of Bourdin’s most loved Charles Jourdan campaign series. ‘Walking legs’ was shot in 1979 by the French designer and photographer using quintessentially English landscapes as the backdrop to this high-end campaign. Photographed at locations on a road trip taken in a Cadillac from London to Brighton, many of the city and seaside scenes remain the same today and include familiar sights such as the London bus stop and the classic park bench. As with much of Bourdin’s work, the model is mysteriously absent – all that is seen is a pair of mannequin legs, adorned with Charles Jourdan’s creations.

-Guy Bourdin, Walking Legs, Michael Hoppen Gallery, http://www.michaelhoppengallery.com/exhibitions/8/overview/#/image_standalone/14

 

kneeling to the god of eclecticism and allergic to the commonplace