Sensual, challenging, awkward and sublime in turns, Katie West‘s self portraits readily draw comparisons to folks like Cindy Sherman and Aaron Hawks, although I personally find her output more endearing. She is vulnerable and toothsome, and an unrepentant goofball. It’s been such a joy to watch her vision deepen and ripen over the years. Fellow brave, wee wonkettes of the world, you’ve found your muse. Buy her book.
I have this dear old chum in NYC who’s a bit of a troublemaker in the best possible way, and I’ve been pining to bring him into our Coilhouse endeavor for months now. A brilliant writer, teacher and libertine, he’s not afraid of asking difficult questions or enduring awkward silences, and has a knack of getting to the juicy, palpitating core of an ethos more swiftly than you can say “subvert the dominant paradigm.” He will make you smile, he will make you think, he will make you shift uncomfortably in your chair. Ladies and gents, he’s “Double Agent Oh No, Your Spy in NY”, and here is his premiere piece for Coilhouse, a provocative interview with Mark Mothersbaugh. Stay pruned for more upcoming features. – Mer
De-evolution in the 21st-Century: The Avant-Garde as Derriere-Garde
Whereas the “modern” sensibility envisions a future of ever-greater human freedom and understanding brought about by political, scientific, and aesthetic avant-gardistes who lead, educate, and shock us, some “post-modernists” mock these notions as harmful delusions. The concept of “de-evolution,” introduced by the postmodern “sound and vision” cultural cabal known as DEVO, suggests that human dependence on technology renders us increasingly dependent and dumb. Just recently, Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo showed some of his recent visual art at The Third Ward Gallery in Brooklyn. His show occasioned a conversation between me and Mothersbaugh on art, the culture of consumption, and the aesthetic avant-garde in post-modern times.
The avant-garde in the arts is historically rooted in the early 19th Century financial emancipation of artists from their patrons; Beethoven had the freedom to explore dissonance in his later works whereas Mozart wrote commissioned works.* Immediately, art came to occupy a place of greater personal expression and has had an enhanced potential to join the political avant-garde in challenging the received wisdom of the day. What, then, becomes of art and the avant-gardiste in 21st Century America?
Does de-evolution turn the avant-garde on its head so that it is now the derriere-garde? In other words, in a society growing dumber, do the most mass-produced and contrived artifacts of pop culture actually contain its most advanced ideas? Under de-evolution, are commercials the most revolutionary art form? Is the way to change a society based upon consumption through a “rear-garde” action – by planting subliminal messages through the subconscious, the Freudian backdoor?
You’ve probably at least heard of Star Wreck – a parody that launched Energia Productions into the public eye beyond internet stardom. Now from the same creative team comes a new production. If you, refined reader, like Doctor Strangelove and maybe Spaceballs, prepare to dig Iron Sky.
Towards the end of World War II the staff of SS officer Hans Kammler made a significant breakthrough in anti-gravity.
From a secret base built in the Antarctic, the first Nazi spaceships were launched in late ‘45 to found the military base Schwarze Sonne (Black Sun) on the dark side of the Moon. This base was to build a powerful invasion fleet and return to take over the Earth once the time was right.
Now it’s 2018, the Nazi invasion is on its way and the world is goose-stepping towards its doom.
What’s particularly inspiring about Iron Sky is the way it’s being created. To start, just look at this crew list! In an effort of what director Timo Vuorensola is calling “collaborative filmmaking” the project is semi-automated, gathering large numbers of volunteers and acquiring financing through WreckAMovie.com. Wreck-A-Movie intends to “blend the Internet and the film industry together by unleashing the creative potential of Internet communities, and changing the whole chain of filmmaking”. Yes! This here, peeps, is someone using the Web’s power for good, someone Doing It Right.
The footage in the gorgeous teaser below isn’t from the film, more of a taste of what’s in store. If you like what you see you can help bring this film to life by joining the production, buying War Bonds or submitting your resumé, here.
“Blixa sighed and rolled sideways, his arm reaching unconsciously into the space where Nick should have been. The absence of an expected touch was enough to pull him out of sleep, and he blinked rapidly as his eyes adjusted to the dim light in the room. The faint orange glow from the streetlamps outside allowed him to pick out Nick’s silhouette against the window. He was looking upwards, naked, framed by the open curtains.”
Yes, Virginia. There is such a thing as Nick Cave/Blixa Bargeld slash. Of course! So what is that makes this celebrated pairing – affectionately titled “Nixa” by fans – so hot? Is it the fact they’re a couple of tall, brooding preternaturally beautiful men? Perhaps it’s the fact that both exude a type of sizzling intensity, so that there appears to be a constant electrical tension between them. Whether you’re a Nixaphile or just a Bad Seeds fan, the video above – a piece of live concert footage that originally aired on German television – is very touching. The crowd evidently expected Kylie Minogue to appear on stage and sing Where The Wild Roses Grow with Nick Cave like she does in the music video, but guess who took her place? That’s right. Blixa. The Aragorn to Nick Cave’s Legolas. The Lee Adama to to Nick Cave’s Romo Lampkin. The Lord Voldemort to Nick Cave’s … oh, just watch the video.
I love the part where Nick gives Blixa a flower! So romantic. And just ’cause, here’s a hot picture of a younger Blixa:
Summer winds are here and they’re sweeping our Mer away onceagain. This time she’s headed south and then all over the US, on extendo-tour with the Faun Fables. This could be your chance to catch one of these performances! Having witnessed this intense phantasmafolk first-hand I suggest you mark these dates in your calendars, dress to the nines and go rock, hard. In the meantime we’ll be standing by the window, clutching a handkerchief and longingly gazing at the open road until she returns to us.
You know, there’s really nothing I enjoy more than banging my head to relentlessblackmetal. Unless it’s making and consuming baked goods. Fucking A, dude, I love cookies. In some parallel universe, a far more brutal and satanic Mer than I is seated on an obsidian throne atop a baronial mountain built from the bones of her enemies, gorging on bottomless trays of red velvet cupcakes and snickerdoodles while truly epic tremolo-picked riffs reverberate through the charnel canyons. Occasionally she pauses to issue forth a soul-rending shriek. Dark chocolatey death spews from her corpse-painted mouth. HAIL.
Yet even this nightmarish Mer incarnation would grovel in terror before a certain gastronomical overlord known to worshipful initiates as All-Devouring Megan the Bae Korr. Megan currently resides in this world (in Oakland, California, no less! I must find her and become her minion!) and recently started a baking recipe blog called The Black Oven. It is kvlt as fuck. An excerpt:
Boiled down to its very essence, metal is nothing more than a mixture of molasses and alienation. By that definition, these cookies are black fucking metal. Packed full of grim and evil spices, they will leave you feeling despondent and isolated within their stronghold of flavor.
Make it:
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup molasses
1/8 cup honey
1 egg yolk
1 cup crystallized ginger pieces
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
1 1/2 tblsp cinnamon
1 to 2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp nutmeg
Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Cream together butter, sugar, molasses, and honey. Beat in egg yolk and ginger pieces.
Sift together flour baking soda, baking powder, salt and spices.
Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients in thirds.
Chill for an hour.
bake 8-10 minutes
DO NOT OVER BAKE. To do so would not be brutal.
Enjoy, and sacrifice one to Space Odin.
I’ve just made a batch of her “Where the Chocolate Beats Incessant” brownies. Doom never tasted more delicious. Megan, I raise my fist and my flour sifter to you!
Quiet, everyone. Ruhe, bitte! Teacher’s in and you must make room for her hair. Today’s lesson is a crash course in German. Your aids will be Kraftwerk, a parrot and the color red. Sharpen your pencils and brains as you pay close attention to this 80s TV treasure.
From the great folks at Slave Labor Graphics comes the Map of Humanity. The brainchild of comics creator and artist James Turner, this wonderful piece just recently arrived in my mailbox and is proving to be all a good carto-fetishist could ever desire.
It’s all here: real cities rub shoulders with fantastic ones lumped in countries such as Beauty, Love, Realism, Hate, Abomination or Fool’s Paradise. If you want to pore over it in detail (warning: you will miss appointments, work and the outside world), do so here. On this map Chicago dwells in the lands of both Depravity and Industry, Dr. Doom’s Latveria borders Riyadh and Utopia is the waypoint between the continents of Wisdom and Reason.
There are a wealth of connections, allusions and little jokes strewn throughout, all – as the best things should – rewarding multiple ponderings. It’s also on ridiculously glorious-feeling super-paper too, for those out there that have that kind of fetish (such as certain editors of this publication who shall remain nameless).
This installment of Z!ST is brought to you by two things I find myself missing more often than not: film and coffee houses. Kris Krug from Vancouver was here a few weeks ago and, to my happy surprise, used film for most of our photos. We shot at Cafe Muse – a relatively new coffee-zone that stays open ’til midnight and, staying true to its name, provides a guitar & piano to its patrons. There is live music, beverages and excellent food at this oasis amidst the dusty clamor of Santa Monica Boulevard.
Words can hardly express how elated I am at the concept of a real cafe within walking distance in my neighborhood, especially one that stays open past 8pm. Hollywood, for the most part, is a city of soulless cardboard franchises, thus it’s a treat to finally have a place nearby where I can station, laptop and coffee in hand, for an evening of writing, sketching, whatever. Such places are utterly crucial to the sanity of the few of us still breathing in this palm-infested desert metropolis. These simple pleasures shouldn’t be so rare.
Oh yes, the outfit! A rare but welcome instance of simplicity appreciation. Usually not a proponent of stirrups, I made an exception for these leggings, in part due to the fact that I found them at a home appliance store in Koreatown. Click on for shopping informations and more photos.
It all started when Energy BBDO created the “Damn Right” ad campaign below for Canadian Club Whiskey. The ads featured vintage photographs from the 60s and 70s, with the running slogan “Damn Right Your Dad Drank It.” The headlines were “Your dad was not a metrosexual,” “Your dad had a van for a reason,” “Your mom wasn’t your dad’s first,” and “Your dad never tweezed anything.” The press release for this campaign proclaimed that “the thought-provoking campaign challenges consumers to embrace their dads [sic] classic masculinity, most visibly expressed through their choice to drink Canadian Club whisky cocktails.” Some choice copy:
Your Dad Was Not a Metrosexual. He didn’t do pilates. Moisturize. Or drink pink cocktails. Your dad drank whiskey cocktails. Made with Canadian Club. Served in a rocks glass. They tasted good. They were effortless. DAMN RIGHT YOUR DAD DRANK IT.
But the people weren’t havin’ it. The first thing that was pointed out on many blogs when this campaign launched is how “Your dad wasn’t your mom’s first” wouldn’t have quite the same ring to it. Graffiti appeared on the Van poster: “and that’s why your mom left him.” And the parodies of the nostalgic views of masculinity poured in… “Your dad didn’t use condoms when he was in Saigon.” “Your Dad smoked while pumping gas.” “Dad didn’t call it ‘Date Rape,’ it was just a ‘Date’.”
But the best was when blogger Michelle Schwartz created this template, which let people really go to town, resulting in the ads below and in many more here. The revised taglines proclaimed, “Damn right your mom drank it! And it sure as hell wasn’t Canadian Club.”
I love the fact that the web lets us respond to advertising so actively and directly. It was definitely amusing and somewhat therapeutic to see these responses emerge. Paradoxically, they probably made this campaign more successful in terms of branding/awareness than ever projected. So victory is bittersweet – unlike the drink, which will forever taste rotten to me.
