The holy trinity of French coolness: Serge Gainsbourg, Gerard Depardieu and Johnny Hallyday performing Gainsbourg’s “Harley Davidson” on French TV in the early 1980s.
Don’t tell anyone, but Serge is sitting on a BMW.
Negativland’s No Other Possibility (1989) is a prophetic video mash-up that visualizes a future (and the future is now) in which the mis-information highway, the Universal Media Netweb, is a traffic jam of useless artifacts of consumer culture, propaganda, mind numbing sensory overload and wasted time. Two decades before the term “meme” had become ubiquitous, Negativland was poking at the contagions in the petri dish of pop culture.
Life is a sales pitch and everybody’s buying.
Before Brian De Palma became a narrative film maker he made documentaries. Among them is The Responsive Eye, which chronicles the Museum Of Modern Art’s 1965 exhibition of op-art. Curated by William Seitz, this was the first significant exhibit of optical art synchronous with and in some cases arising out of the early days of psychedelic culture. It’s amusing to watch the stuffed shirts within the art world attempt to describe what they are looking at in conventional terms or resorting to psychological mumbo jumbo without ever mentioning mescaline or LSD.
Artists featured in the show include the well-known Victor Vasarely and Josef Albers as well as the sensational and underappreciated Paul Feeley, collective work by Equipo 57, a group of Spanish artists, and Bridget Riley, among others.”
Josef Albers taught at Black Mountain College in the mid-1930s and while it’s doubtful that he took drugs it is well-known that his students were traveling to Mexico to participate in peyote eating ceremonies. Victor Vaserly may not have taken any psychedelics but his artwork appeared on everything from blacklight posters to blotter acid. Bridget Riley’s op art designs were bootlegged and began appearing as prints on trendy clothing in Carnaby Street boutiques.
Bridget Riley
The Responsive Eye exhibit was the beginning of the mainstreaming of op-art and suddenly it was appearing everywhere, in magazine ads, tv commercials, fashion and countless posters taped to the walls of hippie crashpads.
Have a look at the trailer for Devolved
Antonello Branca’s 1967 documentary What’s Happening? is an exciting look at New York City at a pivotal time when poets and painters were prophets revolutionizing art and pop culture forever. Featuring Allen Ginsberg, Roy Lichtenstein, Fred Mogubgub, Andy Warhol, Marie Benois, Robert Rauschenberg, Leon Kraushar and Gregory Corso.
The Manhattan street montages and music provide an additional burst of energy..
If Jane Birkin is sellin’, I’m buyin’.
Directed by Serge Gainsbourg in 1976. And, yes, the voice over is by Serge.
From now on when I think of hand washables, I’ll be in a Birkin state of mind. Wooleet? Mais oui.
Mondo movie fans, take note: Our friends at Cinefamily, here in Los Angeles are programming another of their weird and wonderful weekend festivals. Focusing on the cheesy paranormal docs and TV shows of the 1970s like In Search Of, the two-day (and night) Phenome-Con 2011 features some outrageous “psychic” fare, that was once surprisingly commonplace in American culture:
In the ‘60s, baby boomers looked for God in a sugar cube, The Beatles seeked enlightenment in India and hippies freaked over Jesus. As the post-summer of love, pre-New Age ‘70s rolled in, it seems everyone went searching for the mysteries of life. Is there a higher power? Is there life after death? Where lies the lost empire of Atlantis? Can plants read your thoughts? How do I bend a fork with my mind? Does yogurt have feelings? Psychic surgery, hypnosis, ESP, UFOs, The Bermuda Triangle—it all held a fascination for Mr. and Mrs. America. It was a Phenomena Phenomenon, if you will. Reflecting these various crazes, a host of “speculative documentaries” quickly cropped up in grindhouses and drive-ins. This weekend, not only will we watch a crop of mind-marinating films, but we’ll also explore pyramid power, mind reading and we’ll search for Bigfoot. Cinefamily invites you to investigate with us the mysteries of our universe—join us for Phenome-Con!
The schedule for Day One, Saturday, March 26:
4:00pm Phenome-Con Saturday Afternoon Party (feat. The Best of “In Search Of…”)
7:30pm-ish The Amazing World Of Ghosts
10:00pm-sh A Bigfoot Celebration (feat. The Legend of Boggy Creek)
Midnight-ish Journey Into The Beyond
2:00am-ish The Devil’s Triangle
Day Two, Sunday March 27:
4:00pm Sunday Afternoon Part feat. more selections from The Best of “In Search Of…”, a casual Sunday patio hang-out, and then it’s time for…
6:00pm-ish The Pyramid
8:00pm Concluding the Phenome-Con will be a special screening and Q&A with director Don Como (hosted by Process Media’s Jodi Wille) featuring his 1978 film, Unknown Powers.
Get tickets at Cinefamily.org
Hotly-touted, Tony Visconti-produced “dirty showbiz” rockers, Semi Precious Weapons, have been touring with Lady Gaga as her opening act since 2009 with her “Monster Ball” extravaganza.
As if it’s not enough to be the bass player for a group produced by the famous Bowie and T-Rex collaborator, or to be a part of one of the biggest rock tours of recent years, bassist Cole Whittle is also a visual artist. The first show of his unusual artwork will be on display (along with Austin Young’s fab portrait exhibit YOUR FACE HERE, so you can take in both shows) at the Pop tART Gallery in Los Angeles and opens this weekend.
Whittle’s installation, titled ALL THE KICKS consists of mixed media pieces, freaky clothing, new music and video and, as they say… more.
Cole Whittle’s ALL THE KICKS opens Saturday March 26, with reception from 8pm to midnight. Curated by Lenora Claire.
Pop tART Gallery, 3023 W. 6th St. Los Angeles, CA 90020
Mark Ryden seen here in the process of painting “Incarnation” in 2009 via time-lapse photography. If you’re a fan of his work (hand raised!) this is an incredible thing to see.
I’ve examined a lot of Mark Ryden’s paintings “in the flesh,” so to speak, and I gotta tell you, it’s always been impossible for me to figure out how he “does” it. When I first saw his work, I just assumed that he used an airbrush and was one of the greatest airbrush artists of all time. Nope, he gets his signature effects using a regular brush. Even though you can “see” exactly how he works here—and it’s fucking fascinating—after watching this, the artisan magic of what Mark Ryden does to a canvas was still very much a mystery to me. I think it’s best kept that way, don’t you?
Lady Gaga should hire Mark Ryden to do a portrait and repay the favor… After all, she got a lot of mileage out of one his best-known ideas.
From our friends at Mod Cinema comes this fantastic forty song collection of TV performances, promo films and some wonderful duets featuring breathtakingly gorgeous French chanteuse Françoise Hardy. I was introduced to her at party in the the mid-90s and believe me when I tell you, it was a special thrill just to touch her hand. She was in her 50s at the time, and she was still one of the most beautiful creatures I have ever laid eyes on. Talk about a MILF…!
Françoise Hardy covered more stylistic ground and owed more debts to pop/rock than she’s given credit for. Immensely popular in her native France, the chanteuse first displayed her breathy, measured vocals in the early and mid-‘60s. Her (mostly self-penned) recordings from that era draw from French pop traditions, lightweight ‘50s teen idol rock, girl groups, and sultry jazz and blues—sometimes in the same song. The songs are invariably catchy and the production, arrangements, and near-operatic backup harmonies excellent, at times almost Spector-esque. This DVD compiles rare footage of Françoise performing on French television. Over 40 songs including “Tous les garçons et les filles”, “Le premier bonheur du jour”, “Ton meilleur ami”, “Mon amie la rose”, “La maison où j’ai grandi”, “Voilà”, “Comment te dire adieu?”, “J’écoute de la musique saoûle”, as wells as duets with Jane Birkin, Sylvie Vartan, Patrick Bouchtey, and Sacha Distel.
This two-hour collection is an embarrassment of groovy goodness. And the quality of the clips is uniformly very high.
Order a copy of the Françoise Hardy Collection Vol.1 (1963-1979) from Mod Cinema
Below, Françoise Hardy performing “Ma jeunesse fout l’camp”