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Royal Wedding Sick Bags
02.15.2011
03:56 pm
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Hand screen-printed “Royal Wedding Sick Bags” by British artist Lydia Leith. Obviously the first batch is already sold out, but you can e-mail Lydia about them here. Each vomit bag sells for £3.00.

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(via Nerdcore)

Posted by Tara McGinley
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02.15.2011
03:56 pm
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Condom packaging from the 1930s and 1940s
02.15.2011
12:52 pm
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I have to admit the designs on these vintage paper-based condom envelopes are far cooler than Crown Jewels’ Prince William and Catherine Middleton condoms. ‘Nuff said.

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More images after the jump…

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Posted by Tara McGinley
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02.15.2011
12:52 pm
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‘Modern Masters Andy Warhol’: BBC documentary on the King of Pop
02.15.2011
11:09 am
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Modern Masters was a 4-part BBC Arts series first shown in 2010. In each program, Daily Telegraph art critic, Alastair Sooke examined the lives and work of one of the 20th century’s most important artists, Henri Matisse; Pablo Picasso; Salvador Dali and Andy Warhol.

Sooke set out to discover “why these artists are considered so great and how they still influence our lives today,” not exactly an original approach, but hey, it’s the BBC. The series kicked-off with his documentary on Andy Warhol, “the king of Pop Art”, which certainly had great access, and some very fine archive, and while I’m sure Mr. Warhol would have loved it, it is all a bit hit-and-miss and depends on how well you take to Sooke’s approach as a presenter. Andrew Billen in the London Times wrote of the program:

The Warhol era seems so distant that it was a happy surprise that in New York Sooke found so many of Warhol’s contemporaries to interview. In the Serendipity coffee shop where Warhol sold his first paintings, its owner recalled that his favourite drink was frozen ice chocolate and lemon ice box pie (I think he said it was a drink). The nice couple who employed him to design the logo for their leather business said that he always came with five new ideas for marketing campaigns and if they didn’t like them he would come back next day with another they did. Gerard Malagna, master of the Warhol silk screen, Warholed Sooke’s face into a screen print. Sooke said that he looked like a mouse with lipstick. Malagna agreed: it was just so perfect. Sooke even got an audience with a still well Dennis Hopper. Duchamp had said that the artist would end up just pointing his finger and declaring something art. Warhol pointed his finger at us, said Hopper.

Sooke’s answers to his question “What had Warhol ever done for us?” — predicted celebrity culture, found beauty in banality, toppled the idea of the artist as suffering mystic — were less interesting than his tiggerish approach and his willingness to follow Warhol into absurdity. A stylist apparently called Brix Smith-Start, herself a ringer for Warhol, dressed Sooke in an “Andy-suit” and wig. “Gee Brix! Golly!” exclaimed Sooke, pouting into a cheval. “Yes! You’ve so got it,” gasped Brix. And so he had: the whole thing.

 

 
The rest of ‘Modern Masters: Andy Warhol’, after the jump…
 
With thanks to Douglas Steindorff
 

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Posted by Paul Gallagher
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02.15.2011
11:09 am
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Norn Cutson’s Fabulous ‘Record Collection’
02.14.2011
07:50 pm
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Norn Cutson is an artist based in New York. His work is beautiful and joyous, and always makes me smile. And that’s probably his intention for he describes himself as “an illustrator in NYC bringin’ lots o’ warmth & humor to the world!”

Most likely, you’ll have seen his fabulous illustrations of singers, actresses and pop stars in magazines, on posters, or in his wonderful art book Record Collection, which tells the story of his life through the music he loves.

The novelist Lawrence Durrell once wrote “Music is only love looking for words.” In Norn’s case “Music is only love looking for pictures.”

In Record Collection Norn has re-interpreted the album covers of the music that has been central to his life - from Blondie and Throbbing Gristle to Yoko Ono and Dionne Warwick. Music has always been important to Norn, as he explained to Dangerous Minds.

‘Music was a huge thing for us growing up. My parents love music and they had big record collections; my Dad’s a lot of Martin Denny, Herb Apert, Jackie Gleason and some classical pretensions; Mom’s lots of musicals, soundtracks & pop. My sister & I quickly learned that you could control the mood of the house by choosing the right music.’

It is said, “Artists are born not made,” which is true of Norn, for as far back as he can remember he has been drawing.

‘Before I could even sit up by myself, my Mom would guide my hand with a crayon, making shapes on paper. As I got older, we would play a game transforming the shapes into animals. So I’ve really been drawing all my life.’

From crayon animals, he started copying the Funnies.

‘I remember at 5 years old locking myself in my room and teaching myself to draw Charles Schulz’ Peanuts characters, because I wanted to tell my own stories with them. You can still totally see that influence in my art.

‘I’m always drawing. Even when I am not physically drawing, I am still working things out. I have more images in my mind than I will ever have time to bring into physical reality.

‘Art is Alchemy. It’s all about snatching the image out of the ether, solidifying it in your mind, forcing the image out of your shoulder, down your arm and out of the body onto paper, so the rest of the world can see.’

His book Record Collection is a wonderful treat, a brilliant collection of pop history that synthesizes Norn’s life thru music and art.

‘My Record Collection series came out of finding a new way to tell my story. I’ve drawn autobiographical comics for decades. I love it, but sometimes when you are using words, there’s too much room for misunderstanding. Plus, I have a tendency to get sappy in my writing.

‘With Record Collection, I can evoke a time & emotion just using imagery, and its better that it’s open for everyone to project their own experience on. Peggy Lee might mean one thing to me, and something totally different for you, but we’ll both have a valid response to her image.

‘One of the things (cartoonist and author) Lynda Barry teaches is to always work in a series; that way, you build momentum from one piece to the next, and before you know it, you’ve got a body of work.

Record Collection also came out of that idea. But what would it be a series about?

‘At first, I thought Hindu gods & goddesses, because they would be fun to research & draw; but then I realized, to be authentic, the series had to be something that was meaningful for me, not just something I’d read about. It had to be something that really happened to me.

‘I hadn’t grown up with any religion, so what could I use as symbols that other people could see their own stories in, that was coming from a spiritual place?

‘And then of course, I knew: MUSIC was the belief system we were raised with. And with that, I’ve tapped into a series that can last me the rest of my life.

‘I believe The Goddess sends messages through the shuffle feature of our ipods. She may not be playing what we want to hear, but she’s playing what we *need* to hear. What does this song mean to me now? What did it mean when I first heard it? How does this song apply to my life?

‘Sometimes, you can use music as a time machine to go back in time and fix things, or at least understand them better.’

Volume 2 of Record Collection will be published in March, and then Norn will be working on a book of autobiographical comics. He is also planning another exhibition.

‘I’d like to have another show of my work. Seeing people’s smiles when they look at my art is a wonderful feeling. Nothing makes me happier than knowing there’s a place in the word for my images, and that I have the ability to translate them into a form that other people can see and enjoy. I feel if we have that blessing, its our responsibility to serve it.’

Check out more of Norn’s work here and on his Pinterest page.
 
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More of Norn’s fabulous pics, plus bonus clip, after the jump…
 

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Posted by Paul Gallagher
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02.14.2011
07:50 pm
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Lypsinka has a glamour fit
02.14.2011
04:48 pm
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Drag artiste John Epperson as his glamorous alter ego “Lypsinka” performing at The Tiffany Theatre in Los Angeles, 2001. Lypsinka! The Boxed Set was the winner of the LA Weekly’s “Best Solo Performance Award” that year. This video is a great look at a brilliant performer, really on fire here.
 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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02.14.2011
04:48 pm
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Betty Boop in the real world
02.14.2011
01:06 pm
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Happy Valentine’s Day!

(via Super Punch)

Posted by Tara McGinley
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02.14.2011
01:06 pm
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Velvet Underground documentary from 1986 puts it all together in a nice package
02.14.2011
04:57 am
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Originally broadcast in 1986 in the UK, The South Bank Show’s Velvet Underground documentary was directed by Kim Evans with the help of Mary Harron. It contains interviews with Lou, John, Sterling, Moe, Nico, Warhol and lots of early Velvet performance footage, including stuff shot by Jonas Mekas. For hardcore Velvet fans none of this will be new, but isn’t it nice to have it compiled in a visually pleasing package? And for the casual VU fan, this is essential.

John Cale: “The only reason we wore sunglasses on stage was because we couldn’t stand the sight of the audience.”
 

Posted by Marc Campbell
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02.14.2011
04:57 am
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‘Jesus Christ Savior’: Klaus Kinski’s 1971 punk rock apocalypse
02.13.2011
04:21 am
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Here is Klaus Kinski’s inspired, sublime, psychotic and fearlessly confrontational performance of Jesus Christ Savior with English subtitles. Working from footage shot in 1971, Kinski biographer and film director Peter Geyer reconstructs the infamous night in which Kinski psychically assaults and provokes an audience of 5000 curiosity seekers at a concert hall in Berlin. What was intended to be the first night of an extended tour ended in a theatrical crash, burn and resurrection of almost Biblical proportions. Kinski is to theater what punk rock is to music. God bless his tormented and beautiful soul.

You know from his opening words ‘Wanted: Jesus Christ, for anarchistic tendencies’ that Kinski’s spin on the messiah story is going to be an interesting one. Standing alone on the stage in complete darkness save for the light of a single spotlight shining directly on him, Kinski elaborates on his subject but soon becomes increasingly irate when the audience tries to speak over him. As the tension builds between audience and performer, Kinski notes that Christ did not have a big mouth, unlike some of the ‘pigs’ in the audience.
 
It becomes increasingly obvious that the vast majority of people who paid ‘ten marks’ to get in did so just to cause trouble. The audience becomes increasingly antagonistic towards Kinski, who responds in kind and eventually screams at them and launches a microphone stand off of the stage. He exits, and a promoter comes out and asks the troublemakers to leave. Kinski then returns to a group of roughly a hundred people, and once again tries to deliver his monologue, but it’s obvious that the anger he feels is overpowering him and the message he intended to deliver is lost.

As all of this plays out in front of the camera, we feel the political tensions that were brewing in Germany at the time. Kinski is frequently called a fascist by members of the audience, most of whom are younger hippy types obviously rebelling against the far right politics of the generation that preceded them. Kinksi’s bursts of anger only add fuel to this fire, and it’s fascinating to watch it all spiral out of control and to watch how Kinski’s personality completely erodes any Christ-like tendencies he may have initially hoped to demonstrate. For a show that should have preached love, tolerance and compassion, Kinski Jesus Christ Savior turns remarkably fast into a series of hate filled diatribes and outbursts of uncontrollable rage.

Kinski’s absolute commitment to and embodiment of his art is awe-inspiring. This goes beyond acting into the realm of transfiguration. Divine intoxication.

“The ultimate acting is to destroy yourself.” Klaus Kinski.

 
Previously on DM: “I am not your Superstar’: Klaus Kinski as Jesus Christ.”

Posted by Marc Campbell
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02.13.2011
04:21 am
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Little known footage of “Vamp” era Grace Jones
02.10.2011
07:46 pm
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Here’s some great, candid footage of Grace Jones on the set of the 1986 film Vamp. First there’s an interview in some amazing Egyptian headgear, and then a strangely intimate video of her rehearsing for the role as the two thousand year old vampire Katrina with the film’s director Robert Wenk. I’ve been a huge fan of Ms Jones for a long time, but have to admit I have never seen this film, even though the whole thing is up on YouTube. I will someday, even if it is just for her amazing outfits, and the Keith Haring body art.  Although I get the feeling that you could dress her in random items pulled from a garbage truck and she would still look breathtaking, it’s funny how different Grace comes off in her interviews to her public image - articulate, funny, warm, even slightly goofy. I’d definitely hang with her.
 

 
After the jump, Grace rehearses for a scene in Vamp, plus the scene itself.

Previously on DM:
Keith Haring & Grace Jones: Flesh graffiti and the Queen of the Vampires.

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Posted by Niall O'Conghaile
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02.10.2011
07:46 pm
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Ah Poop is Here! William Burroughs’ actual turd used in bioart project
02.08.2011
03:21 pm
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Here’s something that you don’t read about every day... Dangerous Minds pal RU Sirius informed us of this unusual bioart cum performance art piece called “Mutate or Die: a W.S. Burroughs Biotechnological Bestiary,” a wild new project by Tony Allard and Adam Zaretsky.

As Allard wrote in H+ magazine: “I know a guy in Lawrence, Kansas who has some of William Burroughs’ shit, literally, and could you, Adam, combine this gut flora/genetic info of WSB with another organism to produce an avant, transgenic mutation?” Adam says yes, and in his yes emerges a potent riff on mutagenesis and transgenic beings created by mutation.”

Okay, sure… but exactly how would this work? What they’re doing, in a nutshell, is

1: Take a glob of William S. Burroughs’ preserved shit
2: Isolate the DNA with a kit
3: Make, many, many copies of the DNA we extract
4: Soak the DNA in gold dust
5: Load the DNA dust into a genegun (a modified air pistol)
6: Fire the DNA dust into a mix of fresh sperm, blood and shit
7: Call the genetically modified mix of blood, shit, and sperm a living bioart, a new media paint, a living cut-up literary device and/or a mutant sculpture.

Or a homunculus!

The Burroughs Estate has given the artists its thumbs up to the project. You can even participate yourself here.

Posted by Richard Metzger
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02.08.2011
03:21 pm
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