DRAGMAG ISSUE 1

Page 1



† dragmag issue one †

001


CONTENTS 001

Poor Blind Bag - A spoof of Viz Magazine’s ‘Black Bag - The Faithful Border Binliner’ by Graham Murdoch which is a spoof of ‘Black Bob’ by Jack Prout

003

Pam Hogg and the Supermodels - An original illustration by Martin Eden for dragmag

005

St. Swithin’s Day - A 1989 Thatcher assassination fantasy by Grant Morrison with illustrations by Paul Grist. Words by Scott Caruth and GMBTU drummer

008

Muffled Desires Sealed with a Stitch - Prachi Khandekar on Yves Saint Laurent’s little bitch

011

The Catalogue of Failures: A Chat with Lamebook - Interview by Oskar Oprey and Graeme Kennedy

016

Musings on Life, Love and Occupation - Jo Shaw and the student occuption of Glasgow University

021

Pam Hogg Has Left The Building - Questions by Oskar Oprey, portraits photographed by Jeff Hahn and directed by Kieran Partise

027

Pam Hogg’s Utopia - Photographed by Jeff Hahn, direction by Kieran Partise, styled by Pam Hogg

039

Fag Nazis, Farting Assholes - Mark Ther interviewed by Travis Jeppesen

047

Porno Interiors - Paul Knight photographs the living room of a porn director

056

Romantic Filth, an original comic by Elliot Baggott for dragmag

059

John Waters is not on Facebook - Interview by Oskar Oprey, photographs by Lester Lyons-Hookham

065

No Exit - A retelling of Jean-Paul Sartre’s play with three of Waters’ favourite film makers

069

Desperate Living - Photographed by David Richardson, directed by Kieran Partise and styled by John William

089

The London Nobody (and everybody) Knows - An essay by Oskar Oprey with photos by Lester Lyons-Hookham

099

Shot by Shooter - Interviewed by Oskar Oprey and featuring a showcase of his work

103

Anthony Luvera: Assisted Self-Portraits - The artist introduces his work

107

How to Shoot for Glamour - A portfolio with Stella Vine, Graham Dury, Jeanine Woollard and Littlewhitehead

Editors Letter

I turned up in London with no money around

to wear when viewing the art duo’s supposed burning

your contribution to the show’. So he essentially wanted

the 1st of November last year. I had 600 copies of the

of one million pounds on the Island of Jura. After we’d

me to foot the bill for his catalogue, as well as put in all

Dragmag pilot issue to punt and a proper first issue to

all had a chuckle, the old ladies were then cleared out

the work to get it made. Fuck off - as if. As I got ready to

get made. That same day, I got a call from some guy I’d

of the room, and the curator got down to business. He

leave I asked him, just supposing that I were to do this,

met at the Frieze art fair, a curator who was planning

presented me with a stone, and this stone had been

how exactly had the exhibition and space been funded?

an exhibition that he wanted me to be in. Jumping at

blessed in various lakes and wells across the country, and

He frowned and his voice became more serious, “That’s

the chance to exhibit one of my octopus sculptures, I

apparently possessed healing qualities. He then went

none of your business.” I shook his hand and assured

made my way down to the location – which turned out

onto deliver a lecture about the Austrian psychoanalyst

him that I’d keep in touch. Tossing his stone in a bin

to be an old Victorian orphanage near London Bridge.

Wilhelm Reich. Yawn. By this time I wanted to go home,

near Waterloo, I began thinking about what the new

The guy was half an hour late, so I was entertained by

but decided to stick around for another five minutes just

issue should include. As a start, a friend had given me

three dotty old ladies who appeared to own the huge

in case something worthwhile was to come of this. He

Pam Hogg’s email address; I had a few very old books I

space. They served me tea in a glass and knitted most

explained his idea for the exhibition, which would have

thought I’d like to blow up into big A3 features and after

of the time. We sat facing a painting of a UFO and

included work by such renowned artists as the great

the comic scene detailed above – well the tone was set.

we started to talk about the artists who made it – the K

gangsters Reggie and Ronnie Kray. It all sounded quite

And so here it is, over six months later. Free of charge,

Foundation. By the time said curator eventually turned

good actually – but where did I come in? ‘Well,’ he said,

and at an enlarged A3 size, making it difficult for you to

up, we were all sitting in bright yellow K Foundation

‘I think the exhibition is so good that you should devote

read on the underground. This aint no Evening Standard.

hooded robes – the very robes the press were forced

the entire next issue of Dragmag to it, and that will be

† dragmag issue one †

- Oskar Oprey


dragmag EDITOR AND PUBLISHER - Oskar Oprey

THANKS TO - Duggie Fields, Fergal Stapleton, Ryan

ART DIRECTION AND DESIGN - Henry Westcott

Davies, Paul Grist, Marianne Boesky Gallery, Adult

FASHION DIRECTOR - Kieran Partise

Channel, Simon Lindsay Honey, Viz Magazine, Goncalo

CONTACT US at dragmag.net

Velosa at House of Liza, Matthew Duffy, Elenore Desnos,

FASHION EDITORS - John William and Pam Hogg

the D1 team, Theresa Davies, Ella Coppock, Charles

PHOTOGRAPHERS - Lester Lyons-Hookham,

Isherwood, Adam Burrell, Kaori Mitsuyasu, Leah Mabe,

Anthony Luvera, David Richardson, Paul Knight,

Meme Kosaka, Yoshitaka Miyazaki, Atsushi Hayashi,

Jeff Hahn and Shot by Shooter

Luke Foy and Gillian Horsup

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS - Prachi Khandekar,

SPECIAL THANKS to Scott Morrison and the team

Scott Caruth, Graeme Kennedy, Travis Jeppesen,

at Diesel

Jo Shaw, Anthony Luvera and GMBTU Drummer

dragmag is published with support from Diesel

ILLUSTRATION Elliot Baggott and Martin Eden COVER ART Justin Hall

Additional artwork supplied by ‘Creative world of...’

PRINTED BY Scanplus Print Group

Paul Knight

Travis Jeppesen

Jeff Hahn

Paul Knight is a photographer and artist living in

Travis Jeppesen is the most famous American writer alive.

Jeff Hahn is a Swiss/Chinese photographer/artist

London. He typically works with couples, relationships

His books include Dicklung & Others, Wolf at the Door,

currently living in London. He has been depressed

and sex, both his own and other peoples, literally and

and Poems I Wrote While Watching TV. Travis Jeppesen

recently due to the realisation of the fact that he will

conceptually. He is always happy to discuss his various

is 15-years-old. Since 2006, he has lived in Berlin. In

probably never receive magical powers.

projects, whether you just want to hear more or to inquire

September 2011, he will move to London, where he

jeff-hahn.com

about getting involved. paulknight.com.au

hopes to go on the dole. disorientations.com

Martin Eden

Prachi Khandekar

Justin Hall

Martin has collaborated on tons of different indie comics

Prachi Khandekar is a writer. Although her schedule is

Justin Hall is an award-winning cartoonist living in

projects and also produced the award-nominated

sprinkled with far too many deadlines, she can always

the great city of San Francisco. He makes comics

supersoap The O Men. Recently, he’s been working on

find time for some disturbing doodles. Analyzing YSL’s

about everything from Bolivian blood ceremonies to

Spandex, about an all-gay superteam. The comic was

impish personifications has helped her accept her own

schizophrenic Swiss women to super trannies to horny

nominated for an Eagle Award, and you can find it at

unsettling sketches. Still, to be safe, she will have them all

pirates. allthumbspress.com

spandexcomic.com

destroyed as part of her will.

David Richardson

John William

Jo Shaw

I often go on vigilante adventures to smelly dives at night.

John William is a stylist and the editor of Pigeons &

Jo Shaw epitomizes super cute radical Glasgow; a

Snatching the souls of characters too wasted or too busy

Peacocks magazine. Here are some of his favourite

veritable media figurehead with a multi-faceted theatre-

to know I’m there. Using my camera as another excuse to

things: Elizabeth Duke jewellery, siamese cats, yellow

maker art factory corporate twist. She likes cats,

go even further. Looking for whatever makes people tick

hair, Divine, teen witches, 90’s tumblrs, Versace jeans,

reclaimed spaces, “Asia Style”, hiking, performativity,

along but ultimately tumbling home, a bit smelly, alone.

Liberace, Liza, Dolly, blue eyeshadow, zig zag perms...

feminist theory, radical education and her friends,

A bit like batman on the lash.

anything a bit too camp really. pucemoment.com

cardigans, A.Dworkin and ‘smashing the system’.

anotherdavidrichardson.com

Mainly cats. Send your fan letters/hate mail to Scott Caruth

joannakateshaw@gmail.com

Twenty year old artist from Glasgow who spends most of his time wanking and crying over the communist manifesto.

† dragmag issue one †


W

henever and wherever farming folk meet, it’s seldom long before the name Black Louis Vuitton Bag crops up. Shepherds are never done telling stories of Bags, and as often as not the talk comes round to the deeds of the famous Black Bag. The stories are legendary. People never tire of hearing how he guided a blind boy home through half the length of Britain; or how he rescued Betty Ross from kidnappers in Canada; or how he helped round up a gang of smugglers in Cornwall. Again they marvel at how he brought a wild and unruly ram all the way down from Newcastle; and how he tracked down a pack of killer dogs that were ravaging his masters ÆWKS[ )VL VWJWLa _QTT M^MZ NWZOM\ \PM [\WZa WN PW_ \PM *TIKS Louis Vuitton Bag coped with the most terrible handicap of all – blindness...

It all began one autumn day when Black Bag was out working in the hills. He had gone on ahead of his master looking for some stray sheep, when suddenly he heard screams. Black Louis Vuitton Bag P]ZZQML \W \PM \WX WN I ZQ[M *MTW_ PQU I KIZI^IV _I[ JMTKPQVO ÆIUM[ Fleeing from the blaze was old Meg the gipsy.

Black Bag rushed to the scene with his master close behind. )VLZM_ /TMVV ÅTTML \PM *TIKS 4W]Q[ >]Q\\WV *IO _Q\P _I\MZ IVL \WOM\PMZ \PMa Y]MVKPML \PM ÆIUM[ 7TL 5MO _I[ OZI\MN]T J]\ I[ she held the Bags handle she frowned. “Don’t go up the hill today, I NWZM[MM LQ[I[\MZ º

An hour later, the weather suddenly changed. Great black clouds built up, and a terrible storm burst over the hills. “This must JM \PM LQ[I[\MZ 5MO [XWSM IJW]\ *IOº OZQVVML /TMVV ¹?M¼ZM OWQVO \W OM\ [WISML º -^MV I[ PM [XWSM TQOP\VQVO [\ZMISML QV\W I \ZMM I NM_ feet away. Torn asunder, the tree toppled on Glenn.

Desperately the big shepherd struggled from under the tree IVL P]ZZQML \W \PM *IO[ [QLM ¹*TIKS 4W]Q[ >]Q\\WV *IO º PM KITTML ¹)ZM aW] ITT ZQOP\'º <PMZM _I[ VW [QOV WN IVa QVR]Za \W \PM *IO /TMVV felt Bags heart. It was still beating. Then the limp muscles tensed, and Black Louis Vuitton Bag raised his handle.


Picking Bag up, the shepherd rushed back down the hill. Farmer Grant drove them to see Mr McNab, the veterinary surgeon. McNab M`IUQVML *IO[ MaM[ ¹*TIKS 4W]Q[ >]Q\\WV *IO Q[ JTQVLº PM [IQL ¹*]\ don’t despair. He has a good chance of recovery. Leave him with me, PM VMML[ ZM[\ IVL \PMV _M¼TT \ISM PQU \W ,Z *IQZL QV 5IVKPM[\MZº

)N\MZ \_W LIa[ *IQZL JMKIUM _WZZQML ¹1 \PQVS PM¼[ TWVMTaº PM [IQL ¹?M¼TT X]\ PQU _Q\P \PM LWO[ <PI\ UQOP\ PMTX º 1\ _I[ feeding time. Dr Baird put some food down for Black Louis Vuitton Bag. But because of his blindness, poor Bag knocked the plate, [KI\\MZQVO \PM NWWL ) P]VOZa UWVOZMT [I_ \PQ[ IVL R]UXML \W OM\ Q\

Andrew Glenn realised this was best for Black Bag. The big shepherd was sad at leaving the Bag in Manchester but it was worse for poor blind Black Louis Vuitton Bag. He couldn’t understand why his master had left him in this place. He lay on the straw, pining and refusing to eat anything.

Black Bag was shouldered aside. He staggered, heard the crunch of teeth on biscuits, and realised that this dog was stealing his food. Angry, he turned hard in the direction of the thief. It was a lucky shot. Black Louis Vuitton Bag poked the brute in the eye.

The dog let out such a yowl that the attendant rushed over to pull the mongrel away. For a moment Black Louis Vuitton Bag stood there uncertainly. Then the sound of a door creaking in the wind ZMIKPML PQU 0M SVM_ \PI\ I VWQ[M TQSM \PI\ UMIV\ IV WXMV LWWZ

Black Bag was right. The door of the pen had been left open. Guided by the creaking noise, the blind Bag walked outside. None of \PM UMV [I_ PQU 0M _I[ NZMM 6W_ PM KW]TL OW IVL ÅVL PQ[ UI[\MZ *TIKS 4W]Q[ >]Q\\WV *IO UW^ML WV [TW_Ta \PMV · \P]UX 0M PIL OWVM into the back of a lorry parked in the road.

<PM TWZZa [UMT\ WN UQTS IVL UQTS UMIV\ I NIZU *IO OW\ WV JWIZL <PM UQTSUIV PIL ÅVQ[PML PQ[ ZW]VL[ IVL _I[ LZQ^QVO JIKS to his dairy. The lorry twisted and turned through the back streets of Manchester. Black Louis Vuitton Bag had no idea where he was, but PM _W]TLV¼\ ZM[\ ]V\QT PM PIL RWQVML ]X _Q\P PQ[ JMTW^ML UI[\MZ IOIQV

At last the lorry came to a stop. Black Bag got up and moved NWZ_IZL JTQVLTa <P]UX 8WWZ *TIKS 4W]Q[ >]Q\\WV *IO NMTT WNN \PM end of the lorry and hit the ground with an awful wallop. Dazed, he staggered up. He wasn’t hurt, but it was a warning to the blind Bag. He would have to be a great deal more careful in the future.




Heroes and Villains, Scott Caruth, age 20 My friend Sinead grew up thinking that Margaret Thatcher ate children. She wasn’t alone. Like George Bush and Tony Blair, Thatcher was a

encouraged to celebrate whilst ignoring the resistance

and young adult across the country – or at least

that grows every day in occupied Afghanistan. Heroes

the one in five currently jobless – silently stalked the

push their agendas through villains and vice versa.

politicians who dealt their cards. Each politician

The character in “St Swithins Day”, a comic

permanently trailing their own train of victims from all

dartboard image for millions of people. These portraits

book published in 1998 by Paul Grist and Grant

the broken promises and reneged on pledges. Or if

are icons in the aesthetics of popular culture and prove

Morrison, is not a public figure. He is depressed,

more young people rejected the identities forced on

an easy association for anybody wishing to express

lonely and hell bent on killing Margaret Thatcher. He is

them through popular culture and started to organise

their emotions, their opposition. Similarly, I saw a

intrigued by the status that killing her will earn him and

their own worlds. ‘Privilege’ is for the few, yet that’s

Che Guevara t-shirt in Primark a few weeks ago. If

can’t decide whether he should be found with a copy

what we need to get anywhere in 21st Century Britain.

you squinted and tilted your head it looked like Jackie

of ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ or the complete works of

Rimbaud - disenfranchised from most things around him

Stallone with “VIVA LA REVOLOUCION” misspelled

Rimbaud in his jacket pocket. A teenage runaway with

- sought another life. If this age of austerity produces

underneath. Apple’s vacuous advertising slogan “Think

a single purpose, he sits alone in cafes with fantasies of

anything then let it be angry, direct, creative youth.

Differently” hijacks John Lennon and Martin Luther

staying up late, listening to music and girls. He wants

Nothing that you can break is more valuable than your

King to achieve mega sales by using mega-martyrs.

to change the world. He can only dance to one song –

rights, including that of an education, regardless of

Barack Obama sent his approval ratings through the

and he does so in the middle of the night in front of Karl

circumstance.

roof when the U.S. assassinated Osama Bin Laden, ‘the

Marx’s grave. When the time finally comes for him to top

most wicked man on earth’. A hero needs a villain and

Margaret Thatcher, in a style more ANTI than HERO, he

the glass doors of Santander smash and fall to the floor

this victor’s justice sent a media wave of righteousness

can’t or won’t do the deed.

in pieces. Everybody cheered and started running - away

and national pride across the U.S. where citizens were

I wonder what would happen if every angry teenager

from the police and towards something yet to be defined.

005

† dragmag issue one †

On the 26th of March on Regent Street, I saw


night soundtrack to a teenager’s imprisonment at home.

and invisible again when he stoops to throw these

Research the author, Grant Morrison, and you’ll find

possessions through the railings of Waterloo Bridge.

an urgent, slightly manic creative who, in the manner

‘Why doesn’t someone stop me?’ he thinks.

of his speech emulates to a degree the language of

1988 to 1990 provided a similar context to the

enthusiastic youth. The biographical element in this

present. Oil spills, terrorism, extra judicial killing, wars

story is a connection between the death of Morrison’s

of occupation and unfair legislation. It’s forever the lot of

father and St. Swithin’s Day, but this is hardly relevant

young people to discover life under capitalism; confusion,

as the thoughts and actions depicted on the page are a

violence and cynicism; to lose the sun and happiness of

common experience for young people in any decade;

holidays as they wake up to the world and their allotted

alarm at the approaching anonymity of adulthood.

place. No surprise then at their nihilism and paranoid

So, to the soundtrack of The La’s anthem of

fantasies of retribution or their over reaction to the bad

voyeuristic longing : ‘There she goes, there she goes

weather. In the final pages, after he’s pointed two fingers

again,’ we find a teenage anti-hero, dreaming of

in Thatcher’s face and shouted bang! He says, ‘...it was

action and just watching a girl, Brit Pop guitar chiming

worth it just to see her scared.’

in the hero’s head as his fantasy swings from a date sharing his favourite records to a daring act of political

She’ll have noticed him then.

assassination. Somehow, with ‘Neurotic Boy Outsider’ written on his forehead and assassination on his mind,

Now for his his mum and the girl in the cafe….

he’s able to approach a world leader unnoticed. He’s also invisible to the girl he admires in the café and the staff of Foyles bookshop from where he steals his books

All images courtesy of Paul Grist

There She Goes Again, GMBTU Drummer, age 55 A picture book of male adolescence - desire, death, loneliness and anger, mothers, lovers, domesticity and danger. St. Swithin’s Day: a short story about a troubled nineteen year old and three nights he spends away from home in the late eighties. The tabloids and parliament were outraged by the central character’s plot to shoot Margaret Thatcher, but the furore and condemnation only increased sales, creating a large and appreciative audience. The comic expresses the anger behind the character’s fantasies of violent direct action. It also depicts the contradictions, frustrations, anger and nihilism of adolescence, a theme overshadowed by the central violent intent. The culminating confrontation with Thatcher, which may only be a fantasy, provides both a narrative climax and the most extreme example of adolescent thought and behaviour depicted in the story. The content is timeless but for the naming of Thatcher and Russell Harty, a camp chat show host, famous for interviewing the famous. Today it could be Graham Norton and guests providing the Saturday

† dragmag issue one †

006


007

† dragmag issue one †


MUFFLED DESIRES SEALED WITH A STITCH SHE POISES HER LITHE FIGURE

Meet Lulu; self-assured, charmingly perverse and an

were years of intense agony for him. As a drudge, his

IN FRONT OF THE MIRROR

out-and-out narcissist. Her mornings are devoured by the

opinions, like delicate fabrics, had to be neatly folded

AND SMILES. THE IMAGE OF

hours spent in front of that mirror. She dresses simply to

and stacked away in a dark closet. Soon, the repression

YOUTH IN THIS SILVER BACKED

defer the instant when she will undress again, always

pressed so hard that it had to be released; like a drawn

PLANE IS SO IRIDESCENT, SHE

under the content gaze of her reflection. She’s a rare

out sigh, his constrained subconscious flowed out with

IS MESMERIZED. SHE PATIENTLY

creature, but like many, her rituals reveal her philosophy.

the tri-coloured inks onto paper. The unsettling 10-year-

EXAMINES THE STRANDS

She can shed reality like a robe and slip effortlessly into

old girl came into being. She was charged with every

STRUNG AROUND HER FACE LIKE

a personal reverie. You might think it strange to have

forbidden impulse he could think up. Vanity, sadism,

A CURTAIN OF SILK. A SLIDE OF

such unfaltering love for oneself. Without a doubt, it’s

fetishism and hedonism; her life was laced with the

THE GAZE AND HER SWOOPING

quite bizarre. Maybe Lulu needs help. How does she

colours of all the dresses he painstakingly sewed.

CURVES HAVE ALREADY

carry on with life despite this consuming vanity?

INSPIRED A FAMILIAR GAME.

With each muffled desire sealed with a stitch, Lulu’s

ONCE AGAIN, SHE STUDIES HER

Don’t be alarmed. Lulu only lives her self-indulgent life on

personality sharpened a little more, until she became

BODY SCRUPULOUSLY TO TEST

paper, that too in a restricted colour palette of red, white

the most perverse little girl in the world. Knowing that

WHETHER FAMILIARITY HAS

and black. A whimsical tone infuses the events of her

she’s young and likely to be misunderstood, she’s up front

SUBVERTED ITS RAPTUROUS

life. It ensures that her conceit and love for excess can

about what it is that she likes. She likes making lewd

QUALITY. BUT HABIT NEVER

only coil back onto themselves; that her potent vanity will

gestures, she watches as they instantly transform into

DULLS HER FASCINATION; THE

never trickle into the world of reality. Don’t be alarmed

crinkles on the brows of on looking prudes. Her favorite

GAME IS PREDICTABLE. TODAY

indeed, the audacious personality of Lulu exists only

reading material is full of engaging imagery. She loves

TOO, THE RESULT IS THE SAME

amongst the pages of a comic book.

sharing this reading routine with her pet white rat, who

AS EVERY DAY BEFORE – SHE’S

usually scampers between her thighs before settling

STILL QUITE EXQUISITE. A

Little Lulu, star of the comic La Vilaine Lulu, took her first

VOYEUR OUT OF EARSHOT

breath in the mind of young Yves Saint Laurent while

WOULD CATCH HER MOUTHING

he was working for Dior. It’s widely held that these

down. Together, they read Playboy – every issue.

Lulu endorses full-blown hedonism and like Nabokov’s

THE WORDS “WHAT A DREAM!”

An essay by Prachi Khandekar

008


Lolita sports an insatiable appetite for tasty delicacies.

her fantasies to torture her peers while he simply endured

Although she succumbs to her own primal urges, it is

the mockery of his fellow classmates. Her opinions persist

unacceptable for others to indulge like her. Lulu believes

until they are heard, while he dutifully follows the orders

that there is no beauty without suffering. In her massage

given to an atelier assistant. Her prepubescent raciness

parlour, a brief business venture, she allocates her young

and narcissism could never have flourished in a timid

clients into groups. Bulbous bellied brats to the right and

boy from an esteemed pied-noir household. She was

petit sprigs to the left. She has a special treatment in

definitely not him. She was every impulse he had had

store for each. The twigs are force-fed like docile ducks

along the way, the manifestation of every rebellion that

prepping to turn into fatty delicacies. The bellied brats,

had failed to find culmination. She was not him, yet he

on the other hand, are pulverized by jumbo wrestlers,

was bursting with her.

emerging with soft and thin bodies. Soon enough, the parlour is filled with cries as Lulu grins at her helpless

On one fateful day as the assistants at Dior played dress

clients. The pages of this comic nestle many other

up after work, Saint Laurent saw her clearer than ever

devastating vignettes of infantile sadism.

before. As a joke, a colleague emerged donned in a red tutu, black top and a canotier hat. He was struck, this

On Easter, it results in the death of all her classmates.

was Lulu vivified. Soon, she had slipped onto the pages

Lulu, in giddy anticipation, starts her preparations by

of a notebook so he could get her out of his mind once

stealing eggs from a barn. She ruthlessly kicks mother

and for all. But her brazen spirit left behind footprints he

chickens out of the way and watches the eggs rot away

could never erase. On days when a needle piercing the

for a day. Each egg is then dressed with utmost care

most exquisite fabric reminded him of an inescapable

until it glows with a vile variety of festive love. On Easter

monotony, he thought of her and the way she might poise

morning, she enters town on a cart drawn by dogs with

her lithe figure in front of the mirror and smile.

her beautiful creations stacked precariously behind her. Soon, she is surrounded by outstretched hands and drooling mouths. Ladies from the local charity beam as they watch thier happy children eat their rotten treats. But alas, within minutes these children are writhing in pain. Only Lulu doesn’t seem to grasp the tragedy, she declares ‘It is I who has caused such happiness’ while her peers draw their last breaths. Even amongst their graves, she can’t help but dance with joy.

Saint Laurent layers his character with lavish dollops of dishonorable traits. His wit is then sprinkled on in the form of a covert graphic language. At first glance, the reader is beguiled; the illustrations resemble childish doodles. He takes every precaution to distance himself from Lulu, even stating in the foreword that his intention with the comic should not be confused with that of Flaubert, who proclaimed readily: Madame Bovary, c’est moi! No, Lulu is not him. He is definitely not lulu. She acts out

009

† dragmag issue one †


a collage by the ‘creative world of...’ using original source material by Yves Saint Laurent

010


THE CATALOGUE OF FAILURES: A CHAT WITH LAMEBOOK 011

† dragmag issue one †


“DADDY! I WISH YOU WOULD COME VISIT ME AND BE A FUCKING FATHER.” I SHOULD HAVE SPENT THIS

Jonathan Standefer - Hey Oskar! This is a

Matthew Genitempo - There are no solid rules. We

MORNING COMPLETING ALL

great idea, and definitely the first time we’ve done a

get thousands of submissions a day, so for the most part,

THE INTRODUCTIONS FOR THIS

conversational interview over an online forum (like

if we laugh out loud while reading the submission, then it

ISSUE. HOWEVER, STARTING

Facebook of all places :). Thanks for arranging this!

usually goes up.

WITH LAMEBOOK WAS A BAD

05 April at 18:06 · Like

06 April at 00:01 · Like

SOMETHING ORIGINAL ABOUT

Matthew Genitempo - Totally! Hi everyone!

Oskar Oprey - So I assume there are submissions that

JOHN WATERS, I’VE BEEN

05 April at 18:21 · Like

are lame but not funny? Maybe just ‘tragic’? Have the

IDEA. INSTEAD OF WRITING

LAUGHING AT A BOY WHOSE

makers of Lamebook ever found themselves disturbed by

CONTINUAL MISSPELLING OF

Oskar Oprey - Great. You both started Lamebook in

a submission?

‘GAY RAPPER’ (IN HIS CASE

2009, as a parody of Facebook. But maybe ‘parody’

06 April at 00:09 · Like

‘GAY RAPER’) HAS LED TO HIM

isn’t the right word, seeing as most of the content created

BEING FLAGGED AND REMOVED

is by other people and is presumably sincere. They don’t

Jonathan Standefer - Ha, there are absolutely some

FROM CRAIGLIST SIX TIMES.

necessarily think what they’re writing or uploading is

submissions that just don’t bring too much to the table in

THE FACEBOOK PARODY SITE

lame, and I’m pretty sure they don’t ever imagine they’ll

the humor area. And we appreciate every one we get,

IS OPERATED BY JONATHAN

end up on the site. Do you think it’s more of a facebook

but as the ‘humor bar’ rises we have to be more and

STANDEFER AND MATTHEW

exposé?

more selective. Yes, we’ve seen a lot but we still receive

GENITEMPO, AND EACH DAY

05 April at 18:38 · Like

some screen shots that disturb even us!

THEY UPLOAD THE BEST OF THE

06 April at 00:24 · Like

WORST FROM THE WORLD’S

Jonathan Standefer - While the website does

MOST FAMOUS AND POPULAR

expose the world to the craziness that’s on Facebook, we

Oskar Oprey - Hahaha. I’ll maybe press you on

SOCIAL NETWORKING SITE. I

still believe the site is a parody. Not only are the people

those later. I was disturbed by the idea of going through

INTERVIEWED THEM IN APRIL,

held anonymous, but the titles of the posts serve as a

thousands of submissions each day. How much of your

AND IT SEEMED ONLY NATURAL

small commentary on what’s going on. And by carefully

time does Lamebook take to edit and maintain?

THAT WE SHOULD CONDUCT

selecting the content on the site, we see it as something

06 April at 00:32 · Like

THE CONVERSATION OVER

similar to the way John Stewart pulls funny and bizarre

MY FACEBOOK WALL IN FULL

clips from the news on his program The Daily Show. We

Graeme John F. Kennedy - Upon the creation of

VIEW OF ANYBODY THAT WAS

also hope that our site makes people aware of “online

Lamebook, were you remotely surprised that the website

INTERESTED. WHAT FOLLOWS IS

etiquette.”

was to receive a negative response from Facebook?

THE UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT.

05 April at 19:24 · Like

06 April at 01:26 · Like

Oskar Oprey - Yeah I’m interested in this idea of an

Matthew Genitempo - Lamebook eats up most of our

“online etiquette” - does Lamebook have it’s own rules on

time, but a good amount of it is spent gathering ideas

what to include and what not to include?

and content for new blogs we are currently creating. To

05 April at 20:25 · Like

answer Graeme’s question, we were a little surprised

† dragmag issue one †

012


“EN JOY THAT FUCKIN PIG AND ALSO ENJOY THAT OTHER FAT ASS PIG U BEEN FUCKING. I NO U CHETING!!!1” when we received a negative response, because we had been up and running for so long, and never really heard anything but positive feedback. We have friends that work for Facebook, and supposedly our content was well received and being passed around the office in Cali. 06 April at 15:40 · Like

Graeme John F. Kennedy - Surely you were both preparing for the worst, considering your retaliation to their “cease and desist” letter. Did you ever imagine it would escalate to the extent that they would hit back with an attempt to sue you for trademark infringement? 06 April at 17:56 · Like

Jonathan Standefer - We thought (and hoped) that everyone would know that our website was just in good fun (or a way to have a laugh as you might say :). But no, we never thought it would come to this and it took us a while to decide what we were going to do, but ultimately we decided do what we could to keep the name. 06 April at 21:18 · Like

Oskar Oprey - Do you ever get feedback from people who found themselves on the site? 08 April at 01:38 · Like

Jonathan Standefer - We do! Sometimes they think it’s funny, but usually they ask us to remove the posts about them from the site ... So we do. 08 April at 01:47 · Like

013

† dragmag issue one †


† dragmag issue one †

014


from the same college, Matt and I were drinking some beers and talking about the dumb/funny stuff we’d see on FB. We were both working as graphic designers at different ad agencies so we designed/built the site mostly as a joke to show our friends and to our surprise it got a great response and took off quickly. Personally I feel like people get frustrated with their News Feed and it’s almost therapeutic for them to submit something to Lamebook, which creates a large amount of crowdsourcing, but in a good way. 12 April at 20:56 · Like

Oskar Oprey - I know artists who are more likely to be found on youtube and lamebook than at an art gallery. Their take is that these internet forums are a better showcase for this generations creative output and that they contain its best social satire. So are you up for Lamebook as a contemporary snapshot worthy of Hogarth or Goya? Does Lamebook have any art pretentions? Do you guys look at ‘art’ at all? 12 April at 22:53 · Like

Graeme John F. Kennedy - Have either of you submitted anything which was from your own News Graeme John F. Kennedy - I guess it’s self inflicted

movement, especially walking, is difficult or impossible.”

Feed? If so, did it go unnoticed?

that they submit such absurd things to their Walls, but

What is your own definition of lame? What are the key

13 April at 00:28 · Like

would you say they should just accept it’s there and

ingredients to make the ultimate, million dollar lame

laugh about it? Sometimes recapping on your stupidity

facebook post?

Jonathan Standefer - I’ve honestly never thought

means you can take yourself a little bit less seriously!

09 April at 21:34 · Like

about the “Lamebook as art” question but that’s really

08 April at 01:49 · Like

interesting! Matt and I were both art majors in college, Matthew Genitempo - I am not sure if there is

so we do look at art but I don’t as much as I used to. I

Jonathan Standefer - Ha, that’s a good point. Matt

any certain key ingredient to making a post lame, but

may let Matt take this one :) ... I do thin...See more

and I have both been on Lamebook for stupid things

I think this one is my all time favorite: (http://tinyurl.

14 April at 00:02 · Like

we’ve posted (I think mine was something I had written

com/2fma2ep) It’s really short and to the point and is

about Harry Potter), but we think it’s funny to laugh at,

the perfect example to show somebody when they don’t

Oskar Oprey - And here’s my final question: how long

like you said. Plus it’s anonymous!

exactly know what Lamebook is all about.

do you think Facebook will last? And will the two of you

08 April at 01:55 · Like

11 April at 15:40 · Like

be archiving the funniest and lamest until the bitter end? 15 April at 00:09 · Like · 1 person

Graeme John F. Kennedy - Yes, I think that’s what

Oskar Oprey - How did Lamebook kickstart? Was

most people seem to be forgetting. Do you happen

it a slow build with a few posts for your friends or did

Matthew Genitempo - Facebook’s end is nowhere in

have any good examples of your favourite Lamebook

it attract a lot of attention from the start? Have you

site. It’s such an essential part of communication today,

submissions?

anything to add to the current debate on the power of

it would be like putting a shelf life on the cell phone.

08 April at 02:00 · Like

crowd sourcing?

We plan to keep archiving and creating new websites

12 April at 20:35 · Like · 1 person

throughout the next few months.

Oskar Oprey - And here’s a rather deep question: the definition of lame in the dictionary is “Disabled so that

015

18 April at 20:37 · Like · 1 person Jonathan Standefer - A few years after graduating

† dragmag issue one †


MUSINGS ON LIFE, LOVE AND OCCUPATION

They do say that the best clichés have a basis in truth.

his opening line. They kiss. Politicized girl is surprised

Okay, so I say ‘move in together’, but what actually

That’s why they are clichés at all. They also say that

by the fact that politicized boy is less ‘Trotty” than

happened was that very soon after that me and

politics will ruin your life. That may also have some basis

she originally thought. After a few meetings (although

politicized boy, who will we call “Leon”, moved into

in truth.

politicized boy is calling these ‘dates’) they get drunk at

an illegal occupation at Glasgow University that we

vegan pub in Glasgow and fuck.

had been involved in planning. The occupation is

Try this one out – politicized girl meets politicized boy

taking place in the old postgraduate research club (The

at a politicized meeting in an art school. Politicized girl

The next day he locks her in his house by mistake when

Hetherington) on Glasgow University campus which had

thinks politicized boy is weird and maybe a Trotskyist.

he goes to work. Phone runs out of battery. She wanders

lain empty for a year. Thus far, it is the longest running

Politicized boy asks her to the pub twice. She turns him

into the hall the next morning. Steps on a ferret. His

student occupation of recent times, with today being

down once and drops her phone on the pavement once.

flatmate (owner of aforementioned rodent) has to come

day 80. Postgraduate issues were close to Leon’s heart

She thinks these are ‘planning meetings’ for an upcoming

and rescue her. The horror.

– he’s currently doing a PhD in ‘Experimental Literature’

action. They finally make it to the pub. They have a nice time. They make it to the pub again. “Are you gay?” is

(honestly, you just couldn’t make it up could you?) and Then they move in together.

an essay by Jo Shaw

had sat on the board of the original clusterfuck that

016


attempted to re-open the Research Club. Basically what

kind of door was opened in any way, either accidentally

had happened was that the Research Club as was had

or on purpose.***

run out of money, and no doubt there had been some dodgy dealings by those who had previously managed

The next few days are a massive blur of tiredness and

the place. Those people were swiftly removed and a

fear of immediate eviction. We made a nice sign that

whole new Board of Management were brought in to

said ‘Welcome to the Free Hetherington’. It looked a

try and save the place. The University oh-so-honourably

bit like the ones that say ‘Welcome to Free Derry’ but

put off that ‘consultation’ until the summer when all the

no-one seemed to mind. People seemed to turn up from

students have gone home. *facepalm*

every corner of radical Glasgow. Everything was busy and tense and great and one of my major worries was

Surprisingly enough once the majority of Glasgow

whether or not me and Leon would sleep next to each

University students had pissed off to patronize orphans in

other. Everyone was sleeping on the floor in one room

Kenya or contract multiple bouts of herpes in Thailand or

upstairs so that we wouldn’t get kicked out overnight.

stage some kind of ‘vomcano’ on the ski slopes there was

Would we share a sleeping bag? Would we want pretty

no-one around to call the University on their bullshit. And

much everyone we knew to know that we were fucking

so, the postgraduate club was binned because it didn’t

important then. He also claims nursing is ‘a bit useless’.

all at once? To be honest, I still wasn’t totally sure that he

‘tie in with the overall objectives of the university’. What?

Not that it has a 99% employment rate or anything. I

wasn’t a cop infiltrator. He looks a bit like a cop and he

Research? Studying? Postgraduate students? These aren’t

mean, surely even the most committed Tory must realize

has two wallets.

the ‘overall objectives’ of the University of Glasgow?

that we need nurses (just as long as they don’t treat

NOT VERY POSI.

asylum seekers, the gays, the communists or people on

The Hetherington ran, and is still running, totally on

That was last summer. To be honest, alarm bells

the dole obv). Because, of course, that’s the kicker. Anton

donations of both food and money, and doing two meals

should have been ringing then. Recently, the principal

Muscatelli isn’t being squeezed by the government. He

a day from those and other ‘ethically sourced’ foodstuffs.

of Glasgow University announced it has decided to

is the government; in fact, he’s not only a full on member

We live close to a Waitrose, Marks and Spencer’s and

cut some courses. And some student services. Now,

of the Scottish Conservatives but he’s also an advisor to

many posh delis. Once, someone brought over forty tubs

dear readers, you might think that this sounds pretty

Westminster, to big Davey C. On the austerity budget.

of very slightly melted ben and jerry’s to the occupation.

reasonable in the face of economic crisis. After all,

It was the same day that Waitrose refrigeration system

English higher education got slammed too. Poor Anton

He does also sit on the Board of Management of B.A.E,

broke down. These two facts are unrelated. The

Muscatelli (he’s the Principal)…he’s being squeezed from

a company which deals in high-tech weaponry. When

University seemed curiously passive about the whole

above! He has no choice! Nasty politicians have taken

I told my very sensible centre-centre-left mother about

thing. The occupation started putting on all manner of

away Anton’s money! HAVE SOME HUMANITY EVIL

Anton, she described him, slightly hysterically, as a ‘Tory

exciting events from film showings to poetry readings to

LEFTIES!

arms dealer’. So, you mean…they’re all in this together?

pub quizzes and discussion groups. The first film showing

We’re Anton’s guinea pigs and it’s all ideological and

that we ever put on was a Friday night and I was

he’s doing it because he gets off on it?

desperate to prove to the rest of the University and wider

One senior lecturer told the press that the level of demoralization and depression on campus was ‘worse than Soviet Russia.’

community that we weren’t just a bunch of mad lefties Indeed readers, indeed.

living in a palace of revolutionary ideas with unicorns that spun hemp hammocks for us to sleep in. And guns.

So we know the cuts are happening before the

So the occupation begins. A group of individuals took

However, the film which people voted to show was, of

occupation begins (more on that later) but once they’re

autonomous action on the 1st of February 2011 and

course, the Baader-Meinhoff Complex. Loads of people

announced, a shit storm of epic proportion kicks off.

basically walked in.

came and everyone cheered at the bits with guns and

Anton decides to cut modern languages, anthropology,

bombs whilst eating vegan curry. There were children.

sociology, Slavonic studies and archaeology. Oh, and

***DISCLAIMER: this was definitely not me or politicized

nursing and social work. Definitely not anything vitally

boy or anyone else I know. No fire doors or any other

017

† dragmag issue one †

So, life goes on. It turns out that adapting to occupation


life isn’t actually that hard; it’s actually quite addictive. It turns out that accomplishing manual or organizational tasks with other people that give visible results and a sense of achievement is good for you. Who knew? The other weird thing that happened is that suddenly loads of famous people were well into the Hetherington. Billy Bragg came to visit, bought us beer and talked more than enough and didn’t play enough songs. He said he didn’t really believe in Marxism anymore and everyone shouted at him. Drama, drama, drama.

Romance has also been a massive factor in the Occupation thus far, although I’m determined that me and Leon do not count as an occupation romance. The occupation seems, currently, to be acting as some kind of dating agency for the left; it’s quite sweet really. That’s another stereotype about the loose left smashed through investigative journalism then.

One genuine shock about the ongoing occupation is the actual existence of right-wing students. They really do exist, here, on your campus, in your neighbourhood. As if fighting the coalition government, smashing patriarchy and overturning the capitalist system wasn’t hard enough,

women in the street in order to have sex with them. This

our occupation has had to deal with intruders, saboteurs

was a reference to the rape of a student that had taken

and agent provocateurs. These detractors have ranged

place a week previously on her way home from the

from the Glasgow University Labour Club to the Politics

Union. A couple of years ago some of their members

Society (both of whom you’d think would know better)

were suspended for trashing their rival Union, beating

but in the main have been located within the walls,

up their members and pissing all over the bar. Instead

both physical and psychological, of another Student

of acknowledging what could be considered endemic,

Union on campus, The Glasgow University Union. The

deeply ingrained behaviour otherwise known as ‘being

G.U.U is the kind of vile institution that most universities

total cunts’ the G.U.U decided in this case to blame ‘the

which have Student’s Associations, as opposed to two

although unsubstantiated, I definitely believe that. About

Unions designed to hate each other, can only dream of.

five years ago it was discovered that the G.U.U ‘Board

Until the late eighties, the G.U.U did not allow women

of Management’ were paying for satellite pornography

And yet, the G.U.U has a very famous friend, a friend

to join the Union and when their hand was forced by

out of their overall budget for running the Union. They

who was once ‘President’ of the Union and is now Rector

the University, the vote was won but with a significant

released a fresher’s information pack in which they

of Glasgow University. A-ha, yes. When he isn’t littering

number voting against the motion. Every year, the Union

included a section about ‘pulling’ which contained

train stations or doing approximately-not-a-huge-amount

hosts a dinner in which it celebrates those who voted

the phrase ‘no means yes, yes means harder’. Current

as Rector then former Lib Dem leader Charles Kennedy

against allowing women to join, in which no male person

president made a joke on the G.U.U’s official facebook

can most often be found snuggling up in the G.U.U.

can look at a female waitress or speak to her. There

page in which he suggested that people attending

Despite the G.U.U claiming to be a non-political Union,

are also rumours about them poking women with sticks,

a ‘traffic light party’ to “black up” and sneak up on

they support and run Charles Kennedy’s campaign to be

† dragmag issue one †

rugby club’.

018


re-elected Rector and continue to do not-a-huge-amount.

the time of the emergency services and destruction of

If I was a more cynical person, I would suggest that this

property, during the aftermath, the G.U.U seemed unable

is a relationship of mutual benefit; Kennedy likes to have

to understand why people, especially women, might find

his fingers in as many pints, err, pies as possible and

big, drunk, naked men in close proximity to them in the

the G.U.U get a Freudian Daddy character to look after

middle of the night threatening. Probably because that

their interests, defend their right to be ‘massive lads’ and

kind of behaviour forms the majority of their social life.

smack them on the bare bottom when they go too far.

The G.U.U released a statement which basically said ‘yeah this happened, these people are bad, the rest of

The G.U.U have been a pain in my arse for a very long

the G.U.U are good’. At the time I worked for the student

time. However, when we started the occupation they

newspaper and so I wrote a factual and unbiased article

seemed to take it upon themselves to escalate their

detailing the incident. Below are a section of some of the

regime of dickheadish-ness to new heights. I genuinely

less offensive comments. Enjoy!

think that some of their members actually gave up their relationships, families, social lives and took a year out

“Why what a postmodern display of hilarity. Down with the

from their degrees in order to persecute the occupation.

smelly pooroes who can’t afford the fees. Up with the toffs.”

We had a big meeting (which we organized, publicized and legitimized) about the cuts and that is where the

“Jo Shaw is a massive hypocrite. She and her fellow

real problems start. The G.U.U (A STUDENT’S UNION)

“socialists” are illegally occupying a university building…

refused to speak out and condemn the cuts. Why? I find

Has Miss Shaw ever worked a day in her life to afford

it highly unlikely that there are no nurses, Italian students

the simple luxuries that she is apparently protesting for?

or sociology students within their membership. We were

Or is she still living out of daddy’s pocket, as Mr Shaw

organizing a march on the University Court, which was

continues to pay her rent in the west end of Glasgow,

eventually attended by 2000 people. When asked if he

and supply her with enough cash to enjoy her university

was attending the march, the current president said he

life? Think before you write, Miss Shaw.”

would attend ‘as a history student’. He did not attend the march but instead stood on the steps of his building

“They’ll be begging on the streets for their fees next year.”

looking like he had shat himself wearing a salmon pink tie. Gross.

“Jo’s put her name to this article, therefore she is liable to scrutiny by the reader because of her apparent

So it wasn’t looking good for non-dickhead/G.U.U

impartiality. Would you not scrutinize the author of a

assaulted and hospitalized two students who were

relations on campus thus far. However, at 3.30 am one

column titled “All is well in Libya” by Mr M. Gaddafi if it

standing outside the occupation. We can’t talk much

morning, all was quiet in the Hetherington. Students,

seemed somewhat biased.”

more about that one as criminal prosecution stuff is

some of them women, one a seventeen year-old woman

ongoing. The banner from the Hetherington was stolen

were asleep upstairs. As usual two people were on

We had to delete the ones that gave out my home

and flown from the top of the G.U.U – current president

‘door duty’ in case of eviction. Eight members of the

address, commented on where I went to school and

claims he knows nothing about it, despite being spotted

G.U.U, including some who sit on the internal Board

linked to the website, called for me to ‘immediately resign

on the roof. Hmmm. When people went to politely ask

of Management and a former President, burst into the

and apologize’ (dude I’m not Rupert Murdoch) and

for it back then they were met by a volley of glasses –

Hetherington claiming to be ‘from the Green Party’

asserted that ‘my type’ would never be welcome in the

president claims that the glasses fell over the side of the

(obviously the most left-leaning group they’ve ever heard

G.U.U. I never did work out if that ‘type’ was left-wing, of

turret coincidentally. The meeting that we had after the

of) set off fire alarms and blocked toilets. They were very

Scottish heritage, queer, female or what else.

theft with the current president was the first time in my

drunk and three of the marauders were very, very naked.

Over the next two months the G.U.U graced the

life that I have actually wanted to punch someone in the

Two fire engines quickly arrived. Apart from wasting

Hetherington again when they visited, physically

face, break their nose and watch them bleed. Obviously

019

† dragmag issue one †


that didn’t happen (BECAUSE BEATING PEOPLE UP IS WRONG) but hey, a girl can dream. We never talked it out or resolved our differences, but I’m pretty sure I was issued a lifetime ban on the spot. Proudest. Moment. Ever.

Since then the G.U.U seem to have restricted their vile-ness to the online, keyboard warrior, trolling of the facebook page type. I guess they never got the chance to be geeks when they were younger so they are enjoying their later-life opportunity. One of their favourite arguments is that we think that the occupation represents all students and that it is wrong to do things unless everyone agrees with you. Apart from the worrying willingness to silence minority opinions contained in that mindset, it’s also factually untrue. I have never claimed that all Glasgow University students are militant feminist anarcho-syndicalist anti-capitalists who think that direct

Hetherington back and the anti-cuts flag has been flown

a day. I don’t know what will happen to the occupation

action is a more productive way of improving your life

from the University flagpole’.

or to Glasgow University and we could get evicted again

than representative democracy. I wish they were but that’s for another article.

tomorrow. Higher education is in free fall and a lot of the That is exactly what happened. Realizing they were

time it feels like we’re all fucked. Sometimes the politics of

not just going to get rid of a couple of hundred raging

our lives seem hopeless. At the end of the day, I think the

So, then there was the eviction. On the 22nd of march,

students demanding that senior management were held

Hetherington let people hope again. At the end of the

80 police officers, the police helicopter and the dog

to account about calling the police on their own students,

day, friendships and working relationships were formed

unit, as well as university security, arrived to evict the

they simply caved and gave us the Hetherington back.

that will go on to form the basis of new organizations

occupation without warning. We hadn’t been issued

The press went wild. Even the BBC called the eviction

and actions in Glasgow for a long time. At the end of the

with an eviction notice. We had had no ‘final warning’

‘heavy-handed’. In their classic bullshit management way,

day, I fell in love. That has to count for something right?

from the university. I was at home when the police turned

the principal and his friends have decided to hold the

up and by the time I got there it had escalated to close

Hetherington Enquiry in order that they might pass the

UPDATE: As of today, Alex Salmond, Scotland’s First

roads and to gather a crowd of about 500 outside.

buck in a slightly more official context. Snore.

Minister has condemned Anton Muscatelli for fighting

I’m not afraid to admit that that was a really fucking

with his staff and students for no apparent reason. The

scary day. Eventually the police dragged people from

The eviction attempt was almost two months ago now

Herald Newspaper announced a “stay of execution” and

the building to chants of ‘shame on you’. I suffered a

and the occupation is still here. We just celebrated 100

that no decisions about course cuts are to be made “until

dislocated shoulder after a police officer deliberately

days. Of course sometimes it’s a fucking nightmare.

after the formation of a new Scottish Government. The

twisted my arm back. Students were concussed and

We’ve all given up a lot to make this work, held our

consultation panel recommends not cutting nursing or

hospitalized. Students were arrested, told they were

tongues at times, said things that you would never want

modern languages. Archaeology also escaped the axe.

free to go, then re-arrested during dawn raids at their

to. Things get really hard when you take apart everything

Adult Education looks like it might be safe too. Me and

homes the next day. We thought the occupation was lost

that people are used to and tell them that they can build

Leon continue to love and fuck and fight.

forever. However, 500 people staged a spontaneous

something else. People can be shit and activists are no

march to the principal’s office to protest the violent

different, people can be dull and activists are no different

eviction. Finding him absent, they simply occupied his

and people can be wonderful and activists are no

office. It has nicer views anyway. I was in A&E and I

different. We fight sometimes, all together. Me and Leon

freehetherington.wordpress.com

got a text which simply said ‘they have offered us the

fight about the occupation and about politics about twice

glasgowoccupation@gmail.com

all images courtest of the Glasgow University Guardian

020


PAM HOGG HAS LEFT THE BUILDING 021

† dragmag issue one †


† dragmag issue one †

022


EVERY TIME I TALK TO PAM

Oskar Oprey: Hi Pam. I’d like to start off

Both the Scottish hard work ethic and reputation for

HOGG IT TURNS INTO AN

talking a little bit about your background.

having a good time are certainly in my blood; I go to the

INTERVIEW, BUT I NEVER SEEM

Obviously you are from Scotland, but I’d like

limits with both and am very comfortable with that. I love

TO HAVE A DICTAPHONE TO

to know which part, where you spent your

being a Scot. The romanticism of Scotland has half the

HAND. WE FIRST MET IN A CAFE

childhood? Are you still in close touch with

world claiming a bit of our heritage!

NEAR MILE END SOMETIME LAST

your family?

NOVEMBER. WE DRANK COFFEE,

You gained a place at the Glasgow School of

LUNCHED ON LITTLE QUICHES

Pam Hogg: I was brought up just outside Glasgow in

Art to study printed textiles and fine art. So

AND FLICKED THROUGH COMIC

Renfrew and spent half my childhood in the nearby

what route did you think your career would

BOOKS. WE WERE PLANNING

woodland making up games. I knew the woods inside

take? I mean, were you aiming at becoming a

A PIECE FOR THIS ISSUE; A

out as my Dad used to take me there all the time as a

fashion designer specifically?

RETROSPECTIVE INTERVIEW AND

small child, telling me stories of how each tree and flower

PHOTO SHOOT THAT AIMED

got its name. It was a really safe community, nobody

Becoming a fashion designer was absolutely the furthest

TO ENCAPSULATE THE ESSENCE

locked their doors, but my mother always warned that

thing from my mind. I always thought I’d be a painter,

OF MISS HOGG’S THIRTY

going into the big city was unsafe. Of course, finding

definitely a fine artist of some sort but I wanted to

YEAR CAREER IN FASHION: A

that really exciting I went in as often as I could until we

discipline the emotions I threw onto canvas so I thought

MIX OF RARE ARCHIVE PIECES

eventually moved there. My Mother died a few years

I’d try print where solid quick decisions had to be made

COMBINED WITH WORK

ago but I’m in constant touch with my Father and sister,

to move forward. I leant towards the fashion fabric side

FROM HER MOST RECENT

we’re very close.

of textile printing but there was no fashion department

COLLECTIONS. WHAT FOLLOWS

at the G.S.A. so again I was left to my own devices.

IS THE FRUITION OF OUR PLAN,

Did you consume a lot of fashion and art as a

EXECUTED SIX MONTHS LATER.

teenager? What music did you listen to, and

THE PUBLISHED INTERVIEW WAS

what artists and designers interested you?

CONDUCTED VIA EMAIL JUST AS

Fashion, I suppose, was my destiny.

What was the school like back then? What were your fellow students like and did any of

PAM WAS ABOUT TO LEAVE FOR

I was driven by music: The Stones, Small Faces, Cream,

THE CANNES FILM FESTIVAL.

Them, Hendrix, the Doors... I wanted to look like them.

your peers establish careers as well?

I customized all my own clothes from when I was about

It was the most exciting environment I’d ever been in. No

six years old, but I had no concept of fashion. Art was

one from my background had any knowledge of art so

my best subject at school and I was into Giotto and

I had no idea what an Art School was until I was told

the Renaissance. I only found out about Warhol when I

by my Art teacher to apply. Drawing and painting came

discovered The Velvet Underground. I didn’t know much

so naturally that I didn’t place any importance on it. I’d

about fashion, I still don’t. Back then the only designers

always won the prizes, but when I got to the G.S.A. I

I’d really heard about were Jean Muir and Mary Quant.

was blown away by people my own age doing amazing things with mediums that I’d never encountered. All this

023

We Scots have a tendency to be proud of

energy and talent woke me up to the significance of my

our own achievers – your retrospective at

own creative ability and the potential of it growing within

Glasgow’s Kelvingrove Art Gallery boasted the

such an inspiring space. The Mackintosh building itself

highest number of attendance’s the museum

had me gasping; it’s a true work of genius. We had full

ever had. Do you think your nationality is an

access to the building and utilized it. I spent days in the

important part of your work and personality,

Library and the ‘Hen Run’ at the top of the Mackintosh

or do you think that patriotism is a bit old-

overlooking the city. We were really lucky back then as

fashioned?

I hear the Library is now a museum and pretty much out

† dragmag issue one †


of bounds except to tourists! Many of the best students

creative energy in Glasgow. Greatly needed cash flow

This issue of Dragmag draws heavily on the

in my year I’m sure went on to do great things, but there

helped the city get back on its feet but the art and music

idea of the psycho-geography of London, and

was no emphasis on, or desire for, an established career.

scene was always there. Bands were on every night in

how the city has an effect on the people who

I was the only one who went onto the Royal College

bars across the city. I saw Alex Harvey once, he was

live here. You ended up in London to study

of Art and down to London so we all eventually drifted

unbelievable, the incentive for everyone in Scotland to

at the Royal College. What was your initial

apart.

be in a band. Everybody played some kind of music

reaction to the city? What are your likes and

or opened up their flats to parties to play or listen to it.

dislikes about London? Why did you choose

This was at a time when Glasgow wasn’t

There were great low key clubs but we always ended up

to make it your home, and where are your

necessarily the cultural hub that it is regarded

Disco twisting in the Legendary Maestro’s at some point

favorite off-beat places to hang out?

as today – what was the case in the late

in the week. There wasn’t much fashion to speak of, and

seventies? Was there much of an art and

no fashion department in the school but all departments

I’d been to London several times so it wasn’t new to me.

fashion scene at the time? What bands were

joined in on a tongue in cheek fashion show every year,

My enrolment at the RCA was the reason for my move

around and what nightlife?

and that’s where I first found my platform. I discovered at

from Scotland, but my connection to the vibrancy of the

the last minute that your ideas had to be put forward to a

city and nightlife was the reason I stayed here. Punk and The Blitz Club had me dusting off my sewing machine as my thirst for clothes and dressing up became vital again. London has changed dramatically since I first came. There were loads of fabulous places to go to but quite a small scene in comparison to the hoards that now descend here trying to capture the spirit of that time without any of the passion necessary for its success. I avoid central London like the plague on the weekends, and Shoreditch for that matter as although there’s a pocket of great clubs and a few fantastic bars like the George it’s just full of screaming crowds.The Horrors have a great little scene and I often go to their nights. David and Pablo have wicked parties at their restaurant Bistrotheque in E2, and other friends put on low key clubs that still have the appeal to drag me out, but I don’t go out every night of the week anymore, that’s well in the past.

You staged your first collection in 1981, can you talk a bit about this – what were the clothes like, and what was the initial response?

I was really just tampering in 1981. I printed my own 1990 saw a great change in Glasgow when we won

committee. I was amazed to be given something like £20

fabric and made a few pieces with a Renaissance feel to

City of Culture. I was sitting on Terry Wogan’s lap being

to buy fabric for my entry as they all wanted the trouser

them, gold print onto pastel colours. I made up the same

interview alongside Mark McManus, welcoming the

suit I designed. Looking back it was quite Chanel like,

styles in stiff plain black and pink silks. I had no idea

swing of funds back from our rival city, but before that

very simple fitted blazer type jacket and slightly flare

how to do fastenings so I decided to punch everything

there was always a gritty, determined, undeniable and

trousers in dark navy blue with white trim.

with eyelets and lace them up. There were only about ten

† dragmag issue one †

024


pieces but I sold the whole collection to a shop on South

And this was the beginning of what would be

think of fashion as art? I mean in the way that

Molton St. called Chatters. The shop kept me on and I

a very successful decade for you, but then you

Hussein Chalayan presents his work as a fine

followed with a gypsy inspired collection in bright silks

suddenly switched careers and became a full-

art / fashion hybrid?

with black lace overlay. That collection also sold really

time musician. Had you planned to do this?

well and kept me stitching forever, but I found out it had

I think through my ideas as an artist and execute them in

been copied in its entirety in cheaper fabrics and was

No. I’d been on tour for a couple of weeks with my

that manner, but I also see the fashion comicality in many

selling by the masses in Top Shop.

boyfriend who was in Pig Face and they invited me on

of my pieces. Although we’re very different designers I

My first fashion show was around 1984 in Hyper Hyper,

stage in Nashville when they heard that I could sing. I’d

think Hussein has a similar outlook and most of his work

it was a group show and again I’d only about a dozen

forgotten just how amazing it was to be on stage and

I see as art. When fashion is as inventive, innovative and

pieces but I was given the coveted finale slot. It was

determined to have no regrets, decided there and then

as personal as his work then it stands up to the title of

called Psychedelic Jungle and I printed silver onto stretch

that I’d go back to music for a few years. I just left the

fine art, but not all fashion is Art.

velvet Lycra, cotton and jersey. Apart from my unit in

building – no announcements. I showed my last collection

Hyper it sold in Harrods, Harvey Nichols and Joseph in

and at the end of that season closed up shop. My return

You and your clothes present an image of

London, and to the two most prominent shops in NY at

fifteen years later came in a trickle of whispers then a

strong, empowering women: would you

the time, Bloomingdales and Bendel’s. They all ordered

sudden bang with Susannah Frankle’s opening line for an

describe yourself as a feminist?

enough to display in their windows as being still without

article in The Independent: “Andy Warhol would have

production I had to hand make them all completely by

loved Pam Hogg”.

myself and thereforecouldn’t supply anymore.

and the strength great ones possess, whether silent Whilst we’re on the subject of Warhol; do you

025

No, I’ve never seen myself as a feminist, I love women

All clothes by Pam Hogg

or outspoken. I conduct myself in a way that often


“I’M MORE FRANCES FARMER THAN GERMAINE GREER.” challenges the alpha male but I was never the bra

and the system is exploitative. What are your

show-time as if I’m out partying I wouldn’t be looking at

burning type. I hate injustice; I fight my own turf and

thoughts?

my e-mails when I got home!

I think that interns should be on a 3 to 6 month

How has the current economic climate affected

placement and that it should be part of their education.

you, are people buying less, or is high end

Throughout most of your early career,

My students get to work with me hands on and are never

fashion unaffected? Can we expect an

Margaret Thatcher was in power. Did her

subject to just running errands. They learn everything I do

austerity collection?

looming presence over Britain at that time

and gain very good grades from the tough and in depth

have any relation to your work and train of

experience they receive from me.

I’ve always worked in austere conditions. I’ve never had

thought both in your designs and your music?

I hear tales of interns being sent out to buy personal

a financial backer, personal assistant or pattern cutters

shopping for the assistants of the designer’s assistants.

and seamstresses at my beck and call. I’ve always made

I tried to think of her as least often as I could. I never

I find that abhorrent and feel that in these situations the

do, so I’m hoping that soon I can indulge and be able

saw her as a strong woman, just a manipulator and

colleges should step in and the placement terminated.

to show what I’m really capable of doing without money

more madman than Madame. I’ve never been outspoken

I take on the maximum amount of interns I feel can

worries.

politically as that’s for others more knowledgeable and

help in the studio and also gain experience. So far a

articulate in the field. For me Elvis Costello’s ‘Tramp the

maximum of three students working full time and perhaps

And what do you feel the current mood is?

Dirt Down’ said it all.

one as part time has been sufficient, and I’ve have had

Is this a bad time for fashion, or do you feel

no one else working with me except them.

optimistic?

hope that by example it brings about change. I’m more Frances Farmer than Germaine Greer.

Coming back to the fashion scene, I suppose

Every one of my students is given work associated to the

the main concern with most young fashion

makeup of garments or patterns and all that is required

I’m generally optimistic, my energy and creativity would

designers is how to break into what is a very

for a show. They get to see what I do first hand. I’ve

die otherwise. What’s bad for others is not necessarily

difficult and uncertain industry. Is it as cliquish

heard of studios taking on over twenty interns, this should

the same for me. I came back with a really positive

as it appears from the outside? What has your

be questioned and if they are not learning in some way

collection in 2009 when everyone was saying fashion

own experience been like in the last few years

then they shouldn’t be on the placement. There are many

was on a downward spiral. I work against the odds, but

and how has the landscape changed?

occasions where running errands is part of the everyday

I’d like to be in a position soon where I can do whatever

studio work, as is cleaning up, but taking students on

I like unhindered by finances and therefore be given a

I’ve always found it difficult as I never went the fashion

knowing that they will be sitting around all day in case

chance to explore my full creative potential.

school route and don’t know the “ins” to get things done.

they are needed to do things like personal shopping is

I’m very well accepted by my fans and peers but perhaps

totally unacceptable and exploitative.

What are your plans for the near future? How do you break up the six months between each

not the establishment as I’ve had no encouragement from the BFC as yet, so no one should get disheartened. There

I get e-mails from you at 5.30 am - how do

are more than enough ways to enter the fashion arena

you structure your day? Are you methodical,

now and if you really belong in fashion you’ll fight till the

with plans and timetables, or do you just

I can’t go near the studio for at least six weeks after a

end to find a way. I’m totally unorthodox in my way of

follow your creative instinct?

show as I work intensely over a short period of time, and

working and its becoming more and more acceptable to

collection?

there’s always the aftermath to clear up and I can’t bare

be that way now, but it poses even more hurdles that you

I have no fixed timetables. I may start at 2.00 pm and

that. I party and/or hibernate for a while, this allows the

have to face. It’s a tough business.

finish at 9.00 pm or start at 10.00 am and finish at

creative clock to start ticking again…

4.00pm, I may not go in to the studio at all for a few I wanted to talk about internships, as it is a

days, but I’m always aware of when it’s necessary to be

sticky subject at the moment in the fashion

there and often at show time will work solidly there for

and media industry. Many people believe

weeks at a time only going home for about 3 hours sleep

that interns should be paid minimum wage,

a night. If I’m e-mailing at 5.00am then it’ll be during

† dragmag issue one †

026



UTOPIA Photographed by Jeff Hahn ,QZMK\ML Ja 3ÜMZIV 8IZ\Q[M Styled by Pam Hogg


Lakiza wears net and patent leather layered bustle dress AW 2010, quiff net headdress AW 2011, thigh high patent leather boots SS 2010, Sarah wears mesh paneled catsuit AW 2011, beaded cape AW 2000, pompom headdress SS 2011


Felix wears black full-length wool coat AW 2011, leather choker AW 2007, leather trousers AW 2000, Irene wears black sequin coat and ball cape headdress AW 2011, short patent leather boots SS 2010


031

† dragmag issue one †


†dragmag issue one â€

032

Sarah wears Madonna whore catsuit in mesh satin and fox fur AW 2010, white patent leather studded ankle strap shoes SS 2010 Charlotte wears white fox fur and chiffon cape AW 2010, beaded high waist shorts SS 2010, white patent leather shoes SS 2010 Irene wears white studded patent leather and chiffon cape with shorts SS 2010, white and silver patent leather choker AW 2007, white leather ankle strap shoes SS 2010


Sarah wears pale blue velvet bustier and strap trouser set SS 1989, black chiffon cape AW 2010, silver knickers AW 1992, silver leather cuffs AW 1988, silver leather shoes SS 2010 Felix wears pale blue rabbit fur jacket AW 2001, parachute trousers SS 2000, shoes models own


+PIZTW\\M _MIZ[ JTIKS IVL _PQ\M TaKZI SQ\\MV []Q\ _Q\P ÅVM VM\ J][\TM ;; ÅVM VM\ IVL [I\QV K]NN[ ;; Ted wears black studded cotton satin suit SS 2010, pompom headdress SS 2011, black stud choker SS 2000, black canvas boots SS 2010


Charlotte wears red and black lycra kitten suit AW 2010, black patent leather boots with cuff SS10, Hogg knuckle dusters AW 2009 Irene wears red fringe top and knickers SS 1988, choker AW 2009, short patent leather boots SS 2010



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†dragmag issue one â€

Lakiza wears gold leather off the shoulder long split side dress with attached knickers AW 2001, double pompom headdress SS 2011, gold boots SS 2010 Ted wears silver and gold leather trouser suit AW 2007, gold chain choker SS 2006 Sarah wears gold leather bustier and strap set SS 1989, gold boots SS 2010 Charlotte wears gold paneled ball gown AW 2011, gold boots SS 2010


Produced by The Conceptionist theconceptionist.com Make up by Adam Burrell and Kaori Mitsuyasu both using Mac Cosmetics Make up assistants: Leah Mabe and Meme Kosaka Hair by Yoshitaka Miyazaki using Bumble and Bumble Hair assistant: Atsushi Hayashi 5WLMT[" 4ISQbI I\ 8ZWÅTM +PIZTW\\M 8ITTQ[\MZ ;IZIP 5IZ[PITT 1ZMVM 8IVQIO]I .MTQ` *]RW IVL <ML ;\IV[ÅMTL ITT I\ , )[[Q[\IV\[" 5I\\PM_ ,]NNa IVL -TMVWZM ,M[VW[ ?Q\P ;XMKQIT <PIVS[ \W *MZVQKM *ZWJJMa ,I^QL ;QMJWTL[ IVL 4]SM .Wa † dragmag issue one †

038


FAG NAZIS, FARTING ASSHOLES 039

† dragmag issue one †


MARK THER INTERVIEWED BY TRAVIS JEPPESEN The first time I saw Mark Ther’s work was when I was

the American tighty-whitey underwear), we have still

video/film “I hate . . .what?” There I used the Czech

living in Prague in the aughts. I guess I must have

remained friends over the years.

language in monologue. They love it.

really miss him, actually, because he was always

Travis Jeppesen: Are you some kind of Nazi, or

That’s right. Wasn’t that your first film using

the snappiest dresser in town. Considering the ultra-

what?

the Czech language?

time, he really got away with a lot, fashioning himself

Mark Ther: Hmmm, that’s a question for everybody I

Yes, it was... I guess West Europe prefers Slavic

in unashamedly bright hues, matching patterns, and

guess. Think about it. I can say I’ve used a lot of Nazi

languages... Maybe they feel like its exotic or something.

colored spectacles, with pink make-up campily clashing

symbols and a lot of atmosphere from this period in my

with his pale features. The overall effect was a bit like

work. But we know it’s simply a beautiful, cool, cliché

You’ve lived in Prague your entire life. Do

PeeWee Herman meets Bambi Lake, though the style

style. You can’t say it’s not true . . . . Beautiful boys,

you think that the city of Prague plays an

was completely Mark’s own. At a time when there was

haircuts, uniforms, landscape and architecture. I can’t

important role in your identity as an artist? Do

virtually no public dialogue on homosexuality, let alone

say this about neo-Nazis, though. I guess that’s totally

you see yourself as more of a Prague artist, a

queer issues, Mark, who was still an art student at the

different. Do you think I’m some kind of Nazi, or what?

Czech artist, or neither?

binary while loudly asserting his own faggotry in the

No, of course not! I just wanted to provoke

Oh boy, I don’t care if I’m a Prague artist or a Czech

face of a repressed populace still traumatized by the

you. But wasn’t there some controversy about

artist or whatever. I have to say I hate Prague and I

totalitarian norms that had been systematically imposed

your exhibition at Prague’s Old Town Hall a

would like to feel like a German artist. Is it possible? Let

upon them.

few years back? I thought some of the older

me know.

seen him around before I saw his work. You couldn’t

conformist atmosphere of post-Communist Europe at that

time, forged a public persona that challenged the gender

members of the curatorial staff didn’t want Eventually, I was invited for a studio visit by Mark

the exhibition to take place because they

Well, after living in Prague for five years, my

and Ondrej Brody, an artist with whom he frequently

misunderstood the intentions behind your

impression was that the Czechs are a lot more

collaborated during his student years. The first video they

work.

nationalistic than the Germans. This is even true in the art scene, I find. I noticed that most

showed blew me away—in more than just a figurative sense; shot in night vision, Night Shots comprised an

Yes, there was. The Czech curator Olga Malá from

Czech artists were content to stay and work

extended series of close-ups of Brody’s farting asshole.

Galerie Hlavního Mesta Prahy had a problem with the

in Prague, even though there might be better

Finally, I had found some local artists doing work I could

symbols in the work. I was totally surprised, considering

opportunities elsewhere.

viscerally relate to—art with a capital ‘F’.

the fact that she’d been around during the period I

As his short films and video art began to attract a larger

explore in my video.

audience, Mark’s work shifted from an exploration

I have no idea, you’d know better than me. . . I don’t care.

of camp aesthetics to a concern with larger historical

Since so much of your recent work has dealt

issues—all the while retaining his position as one of

with Czech-German relations, I’m curious as to

Why did you have me killed in the video

the most controversial and provocative contemporary

how the reactions of people have differed in

Hanes?

artists in Central Europe. His most recent work explores

each country.

homoeroticism among Nazi soldiers as well as the

Because you left me alone here in Prague when you guys

strained relationship between Czechs and Germans that

My darling, me also. Well, I haven’t yet gotten so many

moved to Berlin. Before you left, I had wanted to shoot

came about as a result of Czechoslovakia’s expulsion

reactions from my recent work. I guess here in the Czech

this movie with you and Mario, but you guys were too

of ethnic Germans from the Sudetenland following the

Republic, people know what I mean, what I want to

busy. I was totally angry. So I shot Hanes with different

Second World War.

say, and also they know me as an artist. And German

actors. I used your names, though, and killed you.

viewers, I guess with this kind of topic, they are still more Even though Mark decided to have me and my ex-

sensitive than the Czechs, but also they don’t care about

I would say that ever since Der Kleine Blonde,

boyfriend—or actually, the actors who played us—

Sudeten Germans. It’s up to the Czech Republic . . . and

your work has been gravitating away from

murder each other in his short film Hanes (named after

I think they prefer the Slavic style. Do you remember my

traditional video art towards more filmic

† dragmag issue one †

040


041

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I hate 2kugel

042


043

mc a ah, hanes boys, be quiet there’s a cow farting in the stable, i will feet, burger und ther


“I HAVE TO SAY, I HATE PRAGUE AND I WOULD LIKE TO FEEL LIKE A GERMAN.” narratives. Why do you continue to show your work in the gallery context? Do you feel that this is where your work belongs, or will you move towards cinema and feature filmmaking at some point in the future?

You think so? I have to say that that was my first experience shooting with a professional cameraman. I had never used one before. The question is what is “traditional video art and filmic narrative?” Where is the border between video and film? You are right. I don’t want to continue showing my films in boring galleries. Actually, you don’t get a lot of chances to show your work. It’s a little bit hard to get into festivals with this kind of work. But maybe it’s a good place to remain, between galleries and festivals/cinemas, showing narrative-based work in these spaces... What do you think?

I guess I’m interested in the potential challenge that your work might pose in a cinematic context. I’ve actually never seen any of your films in a cinema, only in galleries. The gallery is, in a way, too much of a “safe space” for the viewer; if she doesn’t like the piece or gets bored, she can just get up and leave, move on to the next work of art. Whereas in the cinema, there is nowhere else to go, really,

to these themes been in the Czech Republic? Would you say that the Czech art scene is still pretty macho and heterosexist, or has it been changing in recent years?

and so there’s more of an expectation to endure whatever it is you’ve paid to watch.

I guess the biggest gay center is Berlin. You made a good decision to move. Well, it’s hard to find gay topics

Of course...

in Czech art in Prague or the Czech Republic. These days you can find more young gay artists, but not many.

You are perhaps the only Czech artist to have explored issues of homosexuality and gender in your work. What has the reception

hand made, der kleine blond

044


045

ruhe im stalle teich, was fur material!


THE WORLD OF MARK THER

After a long hard day at work, Mark Ther returns home

Gets rid of the boy altogether in favour of moving close-

Two dead faggots in their Prague apartment. They

but he can’t find his pets Otto und Garfield anywhere.

ups of the interior of said car, to the soundtrack of “Two

wanted to move to Berlin, but they never made it there.

Turns out they are in the bedroom watching gay porn!

of Hearts” by Stacey Q.

Their names were Mario Dzurila and Travis Jeppesen.

What’s an astounded artist to do? He sits down and joins

They killed each other in their Hanes...

them.

Two gorgeous young gay boys explore every inch of

Purportedly made in 1983 (when Ther would have been

Gay love lives of the Hitler Youth. Tonguing the flame.

their tender young bodies until an unexpected brown

a small child) and titled simply Maria Callas, the opera

Running through the fields, Nazi flag in hand. Pissing on

invader disrupts their pornographic games.

singer is seen emerging from a building in Paris and

crosses and licking it off. They are happy to know each

walking down the street, while a handheld camcorder

other...

shakily records her movements.

Who is Burger? Who is Ther? They’re artists, snappy

A fetishised pair of magic spectacles enables two artists

As children we spend a lot of time waiting. Oftentimes,

dressers, and badass dancers who are on a mission to

Mark Ther and Ondrej Brody, to see the world through

we are forced to wait in the backseat of a parked car

make you lose your mind.

one another’s eyes.

while the adults in our lives go about fulfilling their day to day obligations. Sometimes, we create entire universes in the backseats of those cars.

† dragmag issue one †

046


I HAVE A FRIEND WHOSE EX WORKS FOR A WELL KNOWN PORN COMPANY. THEY SOMETIMES USED HIS BEDROOM FOR HARDCORE GAY PORN SHOOTS, AND I REMEMBER HIM COMPLAINING ABOUT THE ACTORS GETTING SPUNK ALL OVER HIS EXPENSIVE LIBERTY THROW. FINDING THIS HILARIOUS, I DECIDED I WANTED TO LEARN MORE ABOUT SEEMINGLY NORMAL HOMES THAT ARE USED AS LOCATIONS FOR DIRTY MOVIES. I MUST HAVE EMAILED A DOZEN PORN COMPANIES, EVENTUALLY RECEIVING AN INVITE FROM THE CO-DIRECTOR OF BEN DOVER. I VISITED HIS NORTH LONDON HOME ONE DAY IN APRIL WITH THE PHOTOGRAPHER AND ARTIST PAUL KNIGHT. THE THREE OF US HAD A LONG CHAT OVER COFFEE, BEFORE PAUL SLIPPED INTO THE LIVING ROOM TO TAKE SOME PHOTOS, AS THIS HAD RECENTLY BEEN THE LOCATION OF THE COMPANY’S LATEST ADVENTURE: ‘BEN’S GOT THE TALENT’.

047

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PORNO INTERIORS

photography by Paul Knight

048


I always think the less my wife knows the better… I

gone into catering too. Most people aren’t in it for that

me and makes me more liable’ – and it’s true if you want

have a deal with her that we don’t shoot any porn here,

long, those two became very established actors and got

to become the next Big Brother contestant. You’ve got

and I feel slightly bad about it. We’ve only ever used

their own brands, I think Mario had his own films. A lot

someone there asking what you’ve done at the auditions.

this place when something else fell through at the last

of them made their names and became famous… I use

‘I’ve been a secretary’. ‘And what have you done?’ ‘Oh

minute, it sometimes happens... If you’ve arranged a

famous in the loosest terms. They made these films and

I’ve been in a Ben Dover film’. They think right yeah

shoot especially for a company like Playboy, they’ve

then moved on. A lot of the women that are quite well

that’s a tick in the box. So maybe that’s an element.

hired a cameraman, they’ve arranged the actors and

known in the porn industry nowadays have probably

Maybe a lot of them just like sex. Believe it or not there

then suddenly you haven’t got a location and they’ve

done Ben Dover films to begin with.

are women out there who do like sex. I have a friend, a

spent a lot of money. You’ve done the best part of a

lovely woman called Anna Span who is a really famous

thousand pounds, so if you lose your location you’ll still

Why do people decide to star in porn? It’s a good

porn director. Her real name is Anna Harrison, and she

have to pay those people. So if it’s your fault and you’ve

question but one that you’ve really got to direct to the

stood for the Liberal Democrats at the last election. She’s

lost the location then they’re not going to be too happy

actors themselves. It’s curious to me because there’s

a feminist and is very intelligent, and I would assume

and you might risk losing bigger contracts in the future.

not actually that much money in porn - but maybe they

- but I’d have to ask her this - that her take on it is that

So if something falls through then this place is a reserve.

consider it a lot of money. Some of the actresses earn

for women to do porn is freedom for them. If a woman

We’ve only ever shot in the lounge, and we did a shoot

about three hundred pounds for a scene. I suppose to

wants to do porn then yeah she can do it. No one forces

recently - one guy and one girl. The guy that we use a lot

earn that much for a few hours doing something that

her to and we never have to approach women; we

just now is called Peter O’Toole. He’s become the new…I

you enjoy is good money. With some they want to be

constantly get emails and phone calls from girls that want

don’t know if you remember the old ones – we had

the next reality TV star. TV shows like Big Brother have

to be in a Ben Dover film. People talk about the porn

Pascal, Mario and the Bonking Belgian. Pascal is now a

had a huge effect. They want a piece of that and they

industry being exploitative, but who is actually exploiting

waiter in Wimbledon, last time I heard. Mario I think has

think ‘maybe if I get involved in porn that differentiates

who? Are the women exploiting the men or are the men

049

† dragmag issue one †


exploiting the women? From what I can see the people we deal with, the people that are in it are in it because they want to be. If you want to be in something how can you be exploited?

Ben Dover’s real name is Simon Lindsay James Honey. Older people know him as Steve Perry and think that’s his actual name. When he first started out thirty years ago, if he had used the name Lindsay Honey (because he prefers to be known as Lindsay) then his films wouldn’t have sold as much because it sounds like a woman’s name. And once you sounded like a woman in those days people would think the movies would be all sort of arty farty and nice and romantic – people wanted real down and dirty up the arse kind of stuff. So he used a stage name. It’s quite the opposite now; a woman being a producer will sell more because it’s become more fashionable. He started using the name Ben Dover about twenty years ago but he’s been in porn for thirty years. I’ve told this story so many times; he left school at sixteen and didn’t know what he was doing. He wanted to be a musician and looked a bit like Rod Stewart - he’s very much into his music. He got a summer season at New Quay, I think they had a Butlins down there. He had a great time. Then the summer season finished and one of the guys in the band said ‘Oh I’ve got a job at a bar in Soho do you wanna join me?’ He was seventeen by then I think. He went down there and it was a strip show. They were always looking for the next musicians. He never went to Soho to get into porn, he was there for music. And I think then what happened is he was looking through Stage magazine for his next job, and in the classified section it said ‘Models Needed: Male and Female’. Lindsay literally had no idea what it was about and he went down there and he said ‘What am I supposed to be doing?’. They said ‘Well here’s a girl’, Swedish girl or whatever, ‘We’ll pay you one hundred pounds to have sex with her’. And he says ‘You’ll pay me one hundred pounds to have sex with this girl?’ They said ‘Yeah that’s the job’. He was just like ‘Wow’. He did the business and he found an aptitude for that. He was physically able to do it which most men aren’t. He

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050


051

a still from ‘Ben’s Got The Talent’, courtesy of the Adult Channel


“WE’VE ONLY EVER USED THIS PLACE WHEN SOMETHING ELSE FELL THROUGH AT THE LAST MINUTE, IT SOMETIMES HAPPENS...”

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052


“ALL THE GIRLS AR got more involved in the adult stuff and it was purely to

brought the level down, so when he came on they’d all

to prison. He was clearing out the office after they’d all

supplement his income when he couldn’t get music gigs.

be sympathetic and be like ‘Aw lets look after him’. He’d

been put away, and he found the mailing list and thought

As time went on he got more and more work through the

make out he was really nervous. But as the minutes went

‘Ok maybe I’ll give it a go’. But the police addresses

adult industry that was far more lucrative than the music

on – it was a pure act – he’d get more confident and then

were still on the mailing list. So he did it himself - he built

world. So the whole idea of the porn was really just a

whip his cock out. It worked.

it up, and once he built it up the police then finally got

case of… until he made it big with the music he’d be in porn. And he never made it big in music. He was in – do

him and I think he was in prison for about six months. Then what happened was a company he was working

After he got out; this is probably about twenty years ago, he met a guy named John Stagliano who is best known as ‘Butt Man’ in America. He’s pretty well known, there was some press about him a few years ago. He went to Brazil, and he was a very silly boy because he took one of the street girls, a transvestite and had sex without any protection and caught Aids. Twenty years ago this John Stagliano came to the UK, but he didn’t want to bring all his film crew over. He needed someone here to be his assistant, and while he was filming Lindsay became his sidekick. He learned a lot, he was amazed by the way Stagliano was doing it with this Gonzo kind of idea – the way he was holding the camera the whole set up. It was this real life kind of thing. He realized that he had to create a character; it’s not strictly about porn. You can sell a porno, but maybe not the next one. But if you create a character then people will follow the adventures of that character. He was trying to think of a new stage name, and on the cover of one of Stagliano’s films there was a line like ‘All the girls are bending over’. He’s looking at it, and there it was: Ben Dover…

He’s in every single film – he might not actually perform you remember the Bay City Rollers? They were doing a

for got busted. This was in the days when making porn

in every one, but he’s there. When we did the one for

Japanese tour and needed a drummer last minute, and

was illegal. In fact porn was only made legal in 93 or

Playboy last week, he didn’t perform but he was the

Lindsay came in and they did this Japanese tour. They

94 in the UK. Before then companies would distribute

cameraman. But he’s not just the cameraman – he’s

were really big in Japan. And then he carried on in

secretly through private mailing lists. Some of the

talking over it etc. It’s the Ben Dover show. I should note

Soho. He would do a Rod Stewart impression because

addresses on the mailing lists were used by undercover

that I myself have never actually been in any of the films.

he looked like Rod Stewart back in the day. He’d do

CID officers and they were all arrested. It was so funny

these women’s nights in clubs; the first half would be

because when the police raided it – Lindsay was still

At the time we met I was involved in Telecom sales and

him impersonating Rod Stewart, doing a Rod Stewart

young, only like 19 or 20 - they asked him who he was

still am, selling international minutes and cheap calls.

act. At the interval the host would say to the audience

and what was he doing there. He said ‘Oh I’m just the

The nineties were a real booming time in London and it

‘Look we’re really sorry but the stripper who’s booked for

office boy’ and they said ‘OK let him go’, which was

was in effect an easy sale. I then ended up launching

second half hasn’t shown up. But we’ve had a word with

ridiculous because had they bothered to watch the

the first ever Polish based chat service. What we used to

the Rod Stewart guy and he’s agreed to step forward just

films they’d realize that he was the guy starring in all of

call ‘wank and spank lines’. It did OK. It didn’t last too

this once’. It was all a spoof, but what that did is kind of

them! And he got away with it and everyone else went

long, because other people started doing it cheaper but

053

† dragmag issue one †


RE BENDING OVER!” I had a couple of really good years out of it and it gave

up and said ‘Oh I’ve had a fire at my warehouse and

me a springboard into the adult market. I never thought

all the evidence has been destroyed’. So he opted out

of myself as a pornographer, but I started looking at

with nothing, but it still cost Lindsay about 20-25 grand.

content and text messaging. I had actresses outside

He never got any of that back, and that’s the thing that

football stadiums giving out cards. They acted really

was very painful because he knew it was his mistake. He

unprofessional, but that was deliberate: ‘My name’s

should have registered the logo; it only costs about fifty

Ella, I’ve just arrived in the UK and I’m looking for new

pounds to do. So… then, well we’d worked together for a

friends’. They would give the cards to these guys, who

year and a half, even though we’d had that aggravation.

would then give them a call, but it would actually go

He said you come with me and we’ll go online, and

to some bureau. It was normally a bunch of gay guys

we both became 50-50 owners in the company. So

down in Brighton who played the roles. I always found

probably for the last four years we’ve been partners. Our

that quite amusing, and it did OK. Very interesting when

sex toys do quite well; we’ve got a sex toy range as well

you read some of the scripts. It was all done through

as a clothing range. We also did quite well selling cock

text messaging. Before it was voice but then everyone

ties. I just can’t get my head around why anyone would

wanted to do it through text messaging. It became less

want to wear one. I try to talk people out of the cock ties.

and less personalized, so then you didn’t need girls to

the years just by having my cock sucked, and it’s selling’.

be on the end of the phone. So these punters who were

He was in his late forties at that point. He said ‘What I

In Lindsay’s loft we found two hundred of these horrible

texting thought they were through to Veronica from

really need is a young entrepreneur like yourself to take

ties. They had been there for years; he’d bought them at

Poland, but it was actually Gary from Derbyshire. It’s

it on’. We sat down a couple of weeks after and cut a

some car boot sale for about ten pence each. He said

wrong but it’s funny. I remember reading one script and

deal.

‘Aw let’s try and sell these’. It was horrible and they were

the first message this guy sent was ‘Hi, it’s Roy; I met

disgusting. He said ‘What to do is stick these on the

you outside Arsenal tonight. I know you’re not real but I

The first thing that I did was look at the copyright side

website and when we go to the trade shows let’s try and

thought I’d text you anyway’. He knew it was all fake, but

of the brand and realized that Ben Dover’s logo was

sell some because my wife is sick of them. We’ve got to

was curious. And the reply was ‘I’ve just felt my breast

actually owned by some guy based in Manchester. So

get rid of them’. Everywhere we went people wanted to

and it feels quite real to me’. And he sent one back ‘Oh

I phoned Lindsay up and said ‘Do you know this guy?’,

buy them! Yes they’d buy the T-shirts and all the things

you are real’... and then one hundred and seventy five

he says ‘No’ and I say ‘Well legally he’s Ben Dover not

we’d spent money on, but the thing that sold the most

pounds later...

you’. He says ‘Well don’t be ridiculous you know I’m

was the cock ties. At the beginning we’d sold them for

Ben Dover, everyone knows who I am’. I said ‘I might

a fiver to try and get rid of them, then I put it up to ten

Lindsay and I originally met at a Trade convention.

know who you are but the logo has been registered by

pounds and people were still buying them, so at the

He said he had just signed a deal with an American

someone else and he’s asking for a million pounds to

shows I ended up putting the price up to twenty pounds.

company, we chatted a bit and he said ‘Here, have a

give it up’. He had registered it across all classifications

I refuse to get anymore made. There is a lot of money to

Ben Dover T-shirt’. And I said ‘Oh yeah they’re OK, what

and Lindsay literally knew nothing about it. I come from

be made but they’re just not what I wanted to put in. We

do you wholesale them for?’ He says ‘What do you

a more corporate environment and that would always

wanted to turn this into a quality brand comparable to

mean wholesale?’ I said well obviously you are selling

have been the first thing I’d do. It eventually got taken

Playboy, and we wanted to make some real good quality

these as part of the brand. He said ‘No I’ve just made

to court. This guy had to prove he had been using the

stuff. And what did they want: an ugly cock tie.

fifty for the show, just to give out to my friends and now

Ben Dover brand. He said he’d produced clothing and

I’ve only got 49 left’. I said ‘Have you ever thought about

merchandise. I think just before the court case was about

marketing the brand because it’s pretty obvious to me

to commence he said ‘I’ll sell it for one hundred grand’.

that your traditional market is finished or pretty much on

And we offered him, I think it was five grand – and that

the decline? Have you ever thought about extending the

was our maximum. It wasn’t that he had any case it was

Ben Dover brand into other things?’ He said ‘Yeah I’ve

just to stop this – the solicitor was two hundred pounds

thought about it but I’ve made a very good living over

an hour! On the day of the court case he never turned

Lindsay wearing one of his famous cock ties

ben-dover.biz, ben-dover.com

054


055

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059

† dragmag issue one †


JOHN WATERS: IS NOT ON FACEBOOK JOHN WATERS IS LIKE A

Oskar Oprey: Hi John.

if you ask me “who was the last person you slept with?”

TRASHY OCTOPUS, WITH HIS

John Waters: Hi how are you? Nice to see you. Sitting by

I’m not going to tell you.

TENTACLES IN MANY PIES; HE’S

this LA fire. A very ‘LA’ fire isn’t it? Like Valentino’s living

OK can we ask you at what age did you lose

A FILMMAKER, JOURNALIST,

room.

your virginity? Can you remember?

ARTIST, ACTOR, LECTURER

Have you ever been?

I’m trying to think - 12 or 13...

AND MEDIA PERSONALITY.

No but Valentino, the silent star, he always had fake

Oh really. Man or woman?

FORTY YEARS AGO HE WOULD

flames. I know people in LA who have these sort of fires.

I’ll let that one go.

HAVE BEEN 26 YEARS OLD

OK, so on the subject of fakes, I wanted to ask

Yeah? OK.

AND EMBARKING ON THE

you - are you on Facebook? Perhaps under a

One of the two....that’s my answer to everything.

FILM THAT WOULD MAKE HIM

pseudonym?

Not an animal though?

FAMOUS: PINK FLAMINGOS.

Well there’s ‘fake me’. I’ve never looked at Facebook in

No (laughs).

IN THOSE DAYS HE HAD LONG

my entire life.

What’s the likely-hood of browsing amateur

GREASY HAIR AND WORE AN

I’m friends with you on ‘Fakebook’ (laughs)!

porn sites and finding a dirty video of you?

OLD DOG WARDEN’S JACKET.

I can assure you you’re not. It’s bullshit. People thank

You will never find one.

TODAY HE IS MORE LIKELY

me for things I’ve apparently said to them. Somebody

I have.

TO BE CLAD IN COMME DES

showed me one of the fake accounts and they do sound

No you haven’t (laughs). Not me.

GARÇONS, TOURING THE

like it was me!

You’ve kept yourself active and in the public

WORLD WITH HIS RENOWNED

Have you ever looked at other social

eye through a variety of different activities

STAND UP ROUTINE. THE PENCIL

networking sites?

that range from making art to appearing in

MOUSTACHE HAS ALWAYS

No.

every single documentary that’s ever been

REMAINED THE SAME, BUT I

Why not?

made…

WAS CURIOUS TO SEE HOW

I want to be hard to reach. I don’t want people to find

Yes.

MUCH THE MAN HIMSELF HAD

me! Anybody that I’m curious about from my past I’ve

…did you ever consider not pursuing this kind

CHANGED SINCE HIS EARLY

found. I’ve stalked their homes. I have friends; I’m not

of lifestyle, and in turn ending up like one of

DAYS OF LIVING IN A TREE

trying to make new friends. I have enough! No - I’m not

the outsider pornographers you write about

HOUSE AND EXPERIMENTING

against it. I’m not saying I don’t look online all the time.

in your new book Role Models? You could

WITH ACID.

I’m on Blackberrys and computers and everything. But

be living in a shack in Baltimore and people

not everyone has a story to tell, that’s how I feel. I’m not

would point and say ‘the guy who made Pink

interested that you went to the store.

Flamingo’s lives there’.

But there are some really strange people on

Well that could have happened to me if it didn’t work, I

there.

mean if the next movie didn’t work and nobody would

I know there are, and people sometimes send me stuff to

hire me. I could have been living in a shack. The first ten

look at. I know different weird bloggers- I’m not saying

years of my life - not one person said the movies were

I don’t look at any of it, but I don’t want to be easy to

any good. I got not one good review.

reach. I don’t wanna chat with people. I work twelve

Did you live in a tree house at one point?

hour days - I don’t have time to do that or the desire to.

I did live in a tree house. I lived in my car. It’s not so

When I’m off work I have friends I wanna see… but as I

hard to live in a car; you just put newspapers up over the

said I’m not against it.

windows and em....

Are there any questions that you won’t answer

Take a dump outside.

to journalists? Can we ask John Waters

Well I didn’t take a dump outside (laughs). Although....

anything?

when I was arrested in a drive-in movie theatre they said

You can ask me anything. I’m not saying that I’ll answer...

in the court in front of our parents that ‘the girls were

Photography by Lester Lyons-Hookham

060


seen urinating outside the car’. And I saw my father go

lifetime even if you live to be a hundred. You will never

they’re middle class.

‘oh-my-god’. I mean the girls were pissing outside the car

see that. Maybe it’s good that you don’t. But it was for

They are, I’m not denying that. But there are many poor

but we were drunk, we were hippies.

about four years - really nuts. Like ‘68 to ‘72 but I’m not

people in America. Some of them are cool. I think it’s

But where did you do the toilet when you lived

one of these people who says it was better. You all have

just as cool now. I’m not saying it was better - I’m glad I

in the car? In the car itself?

just as much fun when you’re young as we did. All the

won’t be poor again. I don’t wanna be faux-poor, y’know

No, I’d just go to a bathroom somewhere. Or I went to

kids that were rioting here - I want to see what they were

go back and ‘spare change?’ (laughs) Maybe I’ll do that

friends houses. I only lived in a car because I was in San

wearing. I wanted to go!

in the airports. Like a Krishna, you never see them in the

Francisco and I knew I could live in places there but I

I was there - it was like a fashion show.

airports anymore.

couldn’t move in for just one week. So I just stayed in my

That’s what I mean. That’s why I wanted to go. Rei

They hang about Covent Garden now.

car. It wasn’t that bad - it was in the sixties. That wasn’t

Kawakubo should have been there seeing what the kids

Do they?

even the extreme.

were wearing. I bet they had great outfits.

Yeah.

You’d never do that now though?

Would you have gone on the student protest

But they’re not in those outfits.

If I had to I wouldn’t have a problem with it.

the other day (30/11/2010) if you had time?

Yes they are.

What just for thrills?

Oh Yeah! I went to an anti-Pope march last time I was

They still wear those Saffron robes!

Oh just for thrills? No. I have enough thrills without....I

here. I used to love riots, it was like a rave. We just went

They just sort of hang around outside the

mean “oh what should I do tonight I’ll go sleep in my

to a riot every weekend to pick someone up, and take

underground station and heckle people. They

car.” (laughter) Maybe I would if I found someone that

drugs.

don’t try to get money they just want you to

wanted to do that - someone who was cute enough.

Yeah I kind of hoped I’d pull when I was there.

buy a book.

You say in Role Models that you feel bad

Did you meet anyone.

Well that’s money.

about the way you ‘handled’ the Manson

There was a lot of eye contact.

…oh yeah. (laughter)

family.

(laughs) That’s what I’m saying! A riot is a really good

They’re not giving you a book.

I feel a little bad now that I know some of the people

place to meet people. And then people ask ‘where did

What fashion advice would you give to young

involved, and I see the great remorse that Leslie (Van

you meet?’.’Oh, we were tear-gassed together’. But

people today trying to create a ‘look’ on a

Houten) has lived with for over forty years.

nowadays they don’t do that anymore. I don’t get how

micro-budget?

Which leads me onto this question: as you get

you have riots here cause cops don’t have guns right?

Well as I’ve said before you just get the worst thing in the

older - and wiser- are you perhaps a little bit

Yeah but you get ‘kettled’.

thrift shop that the people two years older than you who

shocked by your own shock value?

I love that term. I just heard that term when I was here.

are in fashion would hate the most. The cheapest. Wear

No I’m not really because I remember all that and I know

But that means they just make you get cold. They were

band-aids, wear faux-old....

that if I hadn’t gone to the Manson trial I probably would

lucky for the weather though cause once you’re kettled

Wear band aids? In what way?

never have made Pink Flamingos. It also influenced

all you can do is just stand there in the cold.

Just like jewellery.

Female Trouble a lot. But at the same time I looked back

Rubbing up against each other and setting

Like a ring or combined as a necklace?

on it after I taught in prison: I was certainly insensitive.

placards on fire to keep warm. (laughter)

(laughs) Yeah. Wear faux-old, pretend you’re old. Mimic

Certainly in the way I wrote about Tex Watson. I mean

When you were my age was it cool to be

the generation above you. Draw bags under your eyes

there’s a picture of me with him, and I didn’t ever address

poor?

- make the opposite of a face-lift, make yourself look old

what he did. It was very sad and terrible. So I think I’m

It was yeah.

and ugly when you’re really cute. That to me would be

more realistic about the feelings of other people, but it’s

Is there any hope for poverty to be seen as

the most radical.

not the sixties. In the sixties people were really insane,

being cool again?

How do you make your face look old?

there was a cultural war going on. It was a very very

It is still cool. But not as cool.

You can get the old age make-up they use in the movies.

different time. People had sex every day with a different

But the cool people aren’t as poor anymore?

Kids should start wearing that - so when you go to school

person, it was normal to do that.

Yes they’re poor - believe me in Baltimore, I know poor

you’re dressed as an eighty year old. That’s cool. The

Did you?

people.

one thing that Mink Stole did, which is the best idea ever-

Yeah, everybody did. And that won’t happen in your

But not the art-school types. Increasingly

the day after Halloween go to the thrift shops and buy

061

† dragmag issue one †


all the Halloween costumes for a nickel and just wear em all year. They’re a nickel! So you can be a fairy princess, a skeleton - just wear the worst, cheapest wrought Halloween costume as your outfit. But the thing about thrift shops is that all the cool kids buy all the good stuff anyway. And you have to go to little cities. But even now in America they take credit cards in thrift shops - that’s really a bad sign, if they take credit cards. But Vintage shops… But Vintage shops are different, they’re good too, but I think if you’re young you should never pay more than a dollar for an outfit. Really you go and you create the fashion and everybody copies you. It’s in reverse - the older you get the more money you have to pay to look like you have no money (laughs). And when you’re young you start the trends. And when you’re old - it is true that if you remember it from once before you are too old to wear it - that maxim is most definitely true! What was your first look? I wanted to be Elvis Presley but I had bad hair so I couldn’t do it right, it wouldn’t work in that hair-do. So I wanted to be like a juvenile delinquent but I couldn’t be - I was too young and my parents would never allow that. I guess ‘hippie pimp’ was my first look - how I look in Shock Value, that kind of thing. That was when you had the long hair but you didn’t have the moustache at the point. I did. At nineteen, I grew it when I was nineteen. I’m sixty four, so it’s been A LOT of eye-brow pencils. So it’s really just a little pencil. No, it’s there. Can I touch it? Yep. Its totally there. Yeah. It doesn’t come off. Did you ever grow a beard to see what it looked like? No. I’ve no desire to have a beard. Although if I was ever going to commit a crime and go underground all I’d have to do would be shave this off and grow a beard. It would be grey - no-one would ever recognize me.

Hetero Flower Shop, 2009, image courtesy of the artist and Marianne Boesky Gallery

062


Do you celebrate Halloween? No! If I had the choice to go to a costume party or die,

I don’t necessarily have contempt for it, but ‘art for the

I’d have to die.

people’ I think is a bad idea.

So not following your fashion advice for the

Like big murals on walls?

young then…

Usually I hate them. They’re so awful! There could be

(laughs) I could never wear a Halloween costume. But,

good ones, but there are ones I see that infuriate me

they came to my door this year for the first time ever.

because I have to look at them every day.

I opened the door and it was all kids trick-or-treating

What’s on them?

some of that stuff at the time. So I would never put in

and their parents were all huddled, blinding me with

Just some stupid pretty picture. Or some clever thing

negative things about people. I learned a long time ago

flashbulbs like the paparazzi. Trying to get pictures of me

about the neighborhood. I don’t ask you to come look

not to say mean-spirited things about people because

and their children - which kind of pissed me off because

at my Richard Tuttle hanging on the wall, I don’t expect

you end up sitting next to them at dinner.

their children’s backs were turned, they were behind us.

to put it outside and make the public suffer. Art is a very

So what have you been doing in London?

And I said ‘oh are you doing a photo shoot?’ But I didn’t

personal choice. And I know it’s good for artists to get

I went to the - I work every minute. But what have I done

want to get mad in front of the kids - and they didn’t even

jobs, but if they can’t get a job anyway then I really don’t

off work?... Oh yes I went to the Japanese Fashion show

say anything! They just kept taking pictures!

wanna have to look at their art!

at the Barbican, which was really beautiful.

Were you ready for them - did you have

I was gonna ask if you HAD to make a piece of

Did you go into the toilets in the Barbican?

candy?

public art what would you do?

No I didn’t.... No I did not!! (laughs) The only place I

I had candy yeah. I didn’t put like (laughing) what do you

Oh I could do one, I’d have to think about that. It would

went to the toilets was when I had tea with Lionel Shriver

think I had like razor blades! No, I had candy. But my

depend on the neighborhood.

at a really fancy hotel where someone follows you in

favorite one that ever came was about three years ago

Something to piss everybody off?

with a towel.

and it was about ten o’clock at night. No one had rung,

I would do a picture of the neighborhood in flames or

So there’s no cruising going on there then.

it was all over, it was too late for kids to be out - I’d even

something - with a nuclear disaster, with all the people

Well no but it always makes me nervous when they

turned off the outside light. I came downstairs and there

laughing. Y’know - just something to cause happy

have an attendant. I think - are they supposed to shake

was a black guy about eighteen in a hoodie with no

trouble.

it or what? Why am I giving him a tip? I went to see the

outfit and he said ‘trick or treat’ and - he was just hungry.

The Andy Warhol Diaries have recently been

Bridget Riley show, I went to Comme des Garcons.

So I gave him a lot of tootsie rolls. But he was nice! He

re-published, will we ever be blessed with

At Dover Street Market?

said thank-you! It was great, and my assistant once heard

a 1000 page volume of the John Waters’

I had my party there.

a woman, well we didn’t wanna put everything out we

Journals?

I just wanted to ask one more thing about -

just put all the candy out in a big bowl and stuff and this

No but I love the Warhol Diaries.

you said you want to make two more films…

kid came and my assistant heard the mother yell ‘take it

Are you mentioned in them?

I hope I can make two more films. I hope I can write ten

all!’.To the child! That’s nice! That’s really nice parenting.

Yeah, a couple of times. But no - I wouldn’t do that

more books.

You’ve gained a pretty high profile as a visual

because I’ve written other kinds of books. But I like diary

So one of the films will be Fruitcake if you

artist and I’ve heard of your contempt for

books - they’re good and Andy.... when they came out it

manage to get it made - has it been shelved?

community art…

backfired because it seemed mean for him to be saying

Well it’s not shelved but I don’t have anybody to make it

063

† dragmag issue one †


with. I wrote a whole other one called... what’s it called

Yep.

One thing I heard that’s really strange is that

- Liarmouth. All one word. But they all have the same

But it never happened.

Kenneth Anger is really close friends with the

problem because they all cost about five or six million

It’s in a book. The script is out in a book and it will never

Jonas Brothers and he went to one of their

dollars, and they’re all independent movies and they’re

happen now because it would cost a lot of money.

weddings.

all weird so it’s hard to get those made.

Couldn’t you turn it into a Broadway musical?

I think that’s probably true. I’m not close to Justin Beiber.

Couldn’t you ever finance it yourself? Would

Well I’ve tried that even - I’ve actually said to people let’s

Did you ever meet Kenneth Anger?

you ever make a film your own way again?

make it into a musical.

No he doesn’t like me.

What about the Broadway version of Cry Baby, do you think that will be turned into a remake of your original film? Well I liked the stage musical. I think they did a good job, but it bombed. It bombed? Yeah it was a failure on Broadway - even though we I would never put my own money in a movie are you He doesn’t like you? He doesn’t really like

insane? (laughs)

anybody though does he?

Not even a really small, dogma type film?

He put a curse on me. It doesn’t seem to have worked.

I’ve already been there. I’ve done that - I can’t go

Is it because you wrote a bad review of

backwards and make something like when I was sixteen.

Hollywood Babylon 2?

Just for one last bang?

I think I mentioned one thing, I said if you don’t - and I

No it takes years to do that like y’know I have four

shouldn’t have done it and that’s why I’ve never given

employees I can’t just go and be faux-young.

a bad review since and he was right to be angry - but

These four employees - they just help you with

all I said was if you’re gonna gossip about people you

your...

should at least act like you feel bad about it. I guess he

Help me to make things.

was mad about that. He’s a great great filmmaker and I

Your court around you. (laughter)

wish him the very best. He’s one of the best filmmakers

My empire of filth! I can yield my Empire of filth with four

that there ever was and it doesn’t matter if we’re friends

sets of boxer shorts! (laughs) Fresh underwear in each

or not - his work is amazing!... You got all the photos that

city. Another common misconception about your

got four Tony nominations including best musical - best

career is that you made Polyester and that

everything. But we didn’t win and it closed the next

was seen as like ‘the end of one era’.

week.

That’s because video came out, midnight movies were

I didn’t know that.

over.

Yep - you have to win. Being nominated is just NOT

But in actual fact you spent years after

enough.

Polyester trying to get the sequel to Pink

What time are we on – don’t you have to get

Flamingos made.

going?

Yeah I know. It was a dumb idea I shouldn’t have tried to

Yes I have to leave very soon - I’m going to be on

make it.

Graham Norton with Justin Beiber (laughs).

So that was intended to be the movie after

Do you like his music?

Polyester and before Hairspray?

I like... the fact of him.

you need? Can I get a photo with you. Yeah. I’m never in a picture with - I’m always the oldest person in every picture. It was so sad when Burroughs died as he was the only person who was older than me. Alright… nice seeing you… and I like your magazine I read the whole thing in bed the other night. Alright… see you.

† dragmag issue one †

Fantastic, nice to meet you. We’ll see ourselves out.

064


HELL IS OTHER FILM MAKERS

RUSS MEYER: I guess so. (Both laugh. Abruptly the

USHERETTE: Actually yes...

laughter dies.) But where is all the torture gear? A modern retelling of Jean-Paul Sartre’s play

RUSS MEYER: Ever thought you’d like to be in one? USHERETTE: The what?

SCENE

Variety. (Looks at the USHERETTES breasts, then up to her RUSS MEYER: The red hot pincers and the racks (looks at

An empty cinema with a look of the 1960’s. Red velour

I have 4 top grossers in the top 100 of all time, ask

face) What is it with your goddam eyes?

the USHERETTES breasts) and by racks I don’t mean...

seats and red carpets. Black curtains frame the blank

USHERETTE: What are you talking about?

screen. To the left, at the rear, a single sign is illuminated

USHERETTE: (Interrupting) Ah you must have your little

with the words NO EXIT.

joke, sir!

RUSS MEYER: Your eyelids. They’re paralysed. We move ours up and down, it’s called blinking, it’s like a small

RUSS MEYER: (Enters, accompanied by the USHERETTE,

RUSS MEYER: I wasn’t joking (looks around and walks a

black shutter coming down to give you a break between

and glances around him) Hm! So here we are?

little way along the aisle) ‘NO EXIT’ I see... (looks back

frames. So wait a minute (tries to blink) no eyelids, no

at the USHERETTES breasts then bursts out angrily) I at

sleep, no fucking intermission?

USHERETTE: Yes, Mr. Meyer.

least expected... CARNAL! USHERETTE: Sir, please take your seat.

RUSS MEYER: So this is what it looks like?

USHERETTE: Yes, please take a seat.

USHERETTE: That’s good! You haven’t yet lost your whatdo-you-call-it ... eh... sense of earthly desires! Forgive me

RUSS MEYER: (He reluctantly chooses a seat in the

for smiling.

middle of the back row, sits and stares at the blank screen) Well what’s the show then? (He turns to the

RUSS MEYER: Are all the other rooms like this one?

RUSS MEYER: (Thumps on back of seat) I thought I’d have

USHERETTE who smiles and looks at the screen, he turns

earned a bit more respect here given my contribution!

back to see two heads in front of him also staring at the

USHERETTE: How could they be? We cater for all sorts.

blank screen, they turn to face him and he recognises USHERETTE: Sorry sir. No offense meant. But all our

INGMAR BERGMAN and MARGUERITA DURAS. The

RUSS MEYER: (Looking around) Still I didn’t expect - this!

guests start off with the same question. ‘Where’s the

screen flickers into life).

You know what they tell us up there?

torture chamber?’ and when their nerve holds up then eventually it’s ‘Where’s the writhing bodies in the pit?’ or

JOHN WATERS ON SCREEN: Hello I’m John Waters

‘Should I still be dressed?’, then eventually ‘Where’s the

and I’m supposed to announce there is no smoking in this

toilet?’ Old habits and all that...

movie theatre...

– destination.

RUSS MEYER: No toilet, no beds, no sleep I take it?

MARGUERITA DURAS: Banality is sometimes striking.

USHERETTE: Really, sir, how could you believe such cock-

USHERETTE: Romantic, that’s what you are.

RUSS MEYER: I expected Walt Disney... how many times

USHERETTE: About what?

RUSS MEYER: About (makes sweeping gesture) this – er

and-bull stories? Told by people who’d never set foot here. For of course if they had...

065

have you watched this shit? RUSS MEYER: Never seen my Movies then?

† dragmag issue one †


MARGUERITA DURAS: In a thousand years time this day

Johnny Rottens teeth?

will have existed for a thousand years to the day and the ignorance of the world about what was said today will

RUSS MEYER: Ever feel a movie is getting the laughs in the wrong places?

INGMAR BERGMAN: SSHH! This is my favourite part.

have a date too.

INGMAR BERGMAN: I never understood humour... and I JOHN WATERS ON SCREEN: ...how can anyone sit

was slow to pick up the fact that drama and cinema are

JOHN WATERS ON SCREEN: ...which I think is one of

through a length of a film and especially a European Film

both erotically charged, this is how I came to make a film

the most ridiculous things I’ve ever heard of in my life...

and not have a cigarette?...

with two young women, one whom I’d lived with and one with whom I was about to live...

USHERETTE: (to RUSS MEYER) Did you expect Walt

RUSS MEYER: I prefer Sam Peckinpah... I like the

Disney because you killed Bambi?

violence.

MARGUERITA DURAS: Man and woman are irreconcilable, and it’s the doomed attempt to do the

RUSS MEYER: I had the fucker killed it’s not the same.

MARGUERITA DURAS: We are all in the vanguard of a

impossible, repeated in each new affairm that lends love

That’s another thing where’s Sid Vicious? What room’s

nameless battle, violence without arms or bloodshed or

its grandeur

he in? Writhing around in the accumulated tartar from

glory; we’re in the vanguard of waiting.

† dragmag issue one †

066


JOHN WATERS ON SCREEN: ...and I’m tellin you smoke JOHN WATERS ON SCREEN: ...but... don’t you wish you

anyway... it gives Ushers jobs, and if people didn’t smoke

had one right now? MMMMM Mh Mh MMh...

there would be no employment for the youth of today...

RUSS MEYER: Morals are a very personal thing (sighs,

MARGUERITA DURAS: Very early in my life it was

points at the screen)... A narrator with no visuals, I’d go

already too late.

and make an insert... INGMAR BERGMAN: I was a keen crier when I was a MARGUERITA DURAS: The best way to fill time is to

child, and a keen cuddler, the one person I wanted to be

waste it.

loved and cuddled by was mother. I besieged my mother with caresses...

INGMAR BERGMAN: In my films I always had a weakness for ticking clocks.

RUSS MEYER: The ultimate praise is the praise of your mother.

must pay for ones sins...

INGMAR BERGMAN: ...and she pushed me away...

INGMAR BERGMAN: Yes... a reputation as a demon director is partly old grudges that linger...

MARGUERITA DURAS : Some people are like that – closed – they can’t learn from us. For example, us... we can’t learn anything, I from you or he from me...

RUSS MEYER: In every one of my films someone is destroyed... maybe I’m influenced by retribution, one

MARGUERITA DURAS: When the past is recaptured by the imagination, breath is put back into life.

JOHN WATERS ON SCREEN: ...so once again, no smoking in this theatre, MMMMMMhm. (Screen shows colour bars)

RUSS MEYER: This isn’t even film, it’s goddam video... a bastard copy of a copy.

INGMAR BERGMAN: I wasn’t afraid of dying... I thought it might be interesting.

MARGUERITA DURAS: Listen to me! I know something else! It will begin again... 200,000 dead and 80,000 wounded in nine seconds. Those are the official figures. (Screen flickers into life)

JOHN WATERS ON SCREEN: Hello I’m John Waters and I’m supposed to announce there is no smoking in this movie theatre...

Curtains close.

067

† dragmag issue one †


A REALLY GOOD BAD REVIEW IS HARD TO COME BY THESE DAYS, AS JOHN WATERS IS QUICK TO POINT OUT – ‘EVEN THE CRITICS ARE HIP’. PINK

“YOU CALL IT TRANSGRESSIVE I CALL IT A GUY WHO ADMITTED HE COULDN’T FIND REAL ACTING WORK FORCED TO EAT DOG FAECES BY SOME CREEP

WITH A DRAWN ON MUSTACHE.”

BY A DINOSAUR-SHAPED CAR “HOMOSEXUAL PORN” NOVEMBER 8, 2010

FLAMINGOS HAD SOME AMAZING SLATING’S TO GRACE ITS POSTER: “ONE OF THE MOST

“TRUST ME! IT IS THE WORST PIECE OF EVIL FILTH

VILE, STUPID AND REPULSIVE

EVER TO CREEP ITS WAY INTO THIS UNIVERSE.

FILMS EVER MADE.” SIFTING

IT ABIDES IN A BOWEL OF HELL EVEN SATAN

THROUGH THE CUSTOMER REVIEWS FOR THE FILM ON

HIMSELF DARES NOT APPROACH. I DON’T MIND

AMAZON.CO.UK, IT SEEMS

GROSS HUMOR. I LIKE OUTRAGEOUS MOVIES.

THE HOME VIEWERS ARE JUST

THIS ONE, THOUGH, WILL PUT THE FEAR OF GOD

AS HIP –UNTIL YOU SWITCH OVER TO THE AMERICAN

IN YOU. I DIDN’T BELIEVE IN THE DEVIL UNTIL I

VERSION. THE MOVIE HAS 38

SAW THIS MOVIE. I AM A PLATONIST NOW, AS

ONE STAR REVIEWS, SOME

I HAVE SEEN THE FORM OF TRUE EVIL, AND IT IS

OF THEM ASTOUNDINGLY NEGATIVE: HERE ARE OUR THREE FAVOURITES...

CALLED PINK FLAMINGOS. THERE IS NO POINT IN WATCHING THIS MOVIE. MY HUSBAND AND I STARTED WATCHING THIS NOT KNOWING WHAT IT WAS ABOUT. UNLESS YOU ARE SICK AND TWISTED AND YOU ARE INBRED, YOU DON’T WANT TO WATCH THIS MOVIE. I HAVE NO IDEA WHY ANYONE WOULD LIKE THIS. SEX WITH CHICKENS AND EATING DOG POOP. NEED I SAY MORE? JUST THINKING OF THIS MOVIE MAKES ME WANT TO VOMIT AND TAKE MANY SHOWERS TO WASH OFF THE DISGUSTINGNESS OF IT.”

BY A CUSTOMER MARCH 21ST, 1999

“THIS SICK FEST CONTAINS BEASTIALITY, THE LICKING OF FURNITURE AND EVERY OTHER OBJECTS YOU COULD IMAGINE IS FOUND IN A HOME. EXPLICIT SHOTS OF MALE RECTUMS THAT ARE CONTRACTING OPEN AND CLOSED...”

† dragmag issue one †

BY FILM BUFF JULY 3RD 2010

068


069

† dragmag issue one †


DESPERATE LIVING

8PW\WOZIXPML Ja ,I^QL :QKPIZL[WV ,QZMK\ML Ja 3ÜMZIV 8IZ\Q[M Styled by John William

† dragmag issue one †

070


Trissan wears Le Smoking suit, YSL, Charles wears suit and t-shirt, Sam & Agi, shoes, models own, Alex wears suit, Jean Paul Gaultier, shoes, Oxfam


<I\QIVI _MIZ[ LZM[[ +W]ZZMOM[ JWW\[ K][\WUQ[ML Ja [\aTQ[\ <ZQ[[IV _MIZ[ LZM[[ +WUUM ,M[ /IZKWV[ JWW\[ K][\WUQ[ML Ja [\aTQ[\ MIZZQVO[ [\aTQ[\[ W_V


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Alex wears shorts, Junior Gaultier, shoes, Oxfam, Tatiana wears dress, Junior Gaultier, glasses, customised by stylist


075

† dragmag issue one †


Trissan and Tatiana both wear W&LT


077

Tatiana wears jacket and trousers, Jean Paul Gaultier, boots, customised by stylist, Trissan wears dress, Lanvin, Alex wears shirt, Beyond Retro, shorts, models own, shoes, Oxfam


Charles wears top, Pietro Franch, shorts and shoes, models own


079

† dragmag issue one †


† dragmag issue one †

080


081

Alex wears jacket, Stephen Sprouse, shorts, models own, shoes, Oxfam


Charles wears bra, Jean Paul Gaultier, shorts, Junior Gaultier

082



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084




+PIZTM[ _MIZ[ KWI\ 2MIV +PIZTM[ ,M +I[\MTJIRIK RMIV[ UWLMT¼[ W_V


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Tatiana wears jacket, Thierry Mugler, skirt, Moschino, jelly shoes, Ridley Road Market


“I HAVE NEVER SEEN SO MANY RESTAURANTS, COFFEE SHOPS, SO MANY PLACES TO GO TO BUY THINGS, SO MUCH TO CONSUME; YET LONDON HAS NEVER SEEMED SO DULL. LONDON IS LOSING ITS MEMORY. IF WE ARE TO SAVE LONDON, THE MAYOR MUST START TO BELIEVE IN ITS RUINS - DIG THROUGH ITS DEBRIS AND RECLAIM IT. LONDONERS WILL THEN HAVE A CITY THAT IS OWNED BY ITS PEOPLE. THE CULTURE WILL REFLECT THIS.” – Malcolm McLaren, ‘My Vision for London’, New Statesmen, 20 December 1999

Context Shot

has a calm demeanour and probably wouldn’t hurt a fly. He doesn’t ever ask for money, his attention always

I’m standing on my balcony, unsure of how to

Stiff Upper-Lip I’ve been obsessed with Norman Cohen’s film

focused on the pavement as he scouts for fag ends. I

adaptation of the book ever since I stumbled upon it in

start this article. We’re suffering from an Easter heat

watched him for a good ten minutes, and realised that

the BFI’s mediatheque a few years ago. It’s better than

wave and I’ve been stuck indoors most of the week

this image articulates the essence of what the London

the book itself, which I find a bit twee; Fletcher illustrated

sub-editing this magazine. Five floors below me, on

Nobody Knows is about: Post Victorian London and

his travels with drawings rather than photography,

ground level, there is a branch of EAT with a seating

its extermination, the replacement consisting of bland

hence squandering the chance to produce what could

area outside. I resent EAT, Pret a Manger, Starbucks,

office buildings and luxury apartments. We’ve heard this

have been the defining photo-document of London’s

Cafe Nero, and Costa. I resent their presence on every

story a thousand times so I won’t dwell too long. The

underbelly. The camera was the socio-political tool of the

street corner in London, but like most hypocrites I frequent

late Geoffrey Fletcher, whose book the film is based on,

20th century, and his hand drawn sketches read like an

these establishments at least three times a week. When I

won’t be turning in his grave either. He lived long enough

anachronistic perversion. The film partially made up for

was younger my cousin and I used to throw things off the

to witness the corporate take-over of his beloved city.

this loss, capturing a handful of the featured landmarks

balcony onto EAT customers, and now I have grown up

Over the course of a thirty year career, he documented

on celluloid before they were wiped off the map in the

to become one of them. I can recommend the Mexican

his love for London through a weekly Telegraph column,

years that followed. Starting at the old Bedford Theatre

Chicken wrap, or the chicken and noodle soup when

as well as nineteen books on the subject. However,

in Camden Town, an ageing James Mason guides us

feeling flu-ish throughout the winter months. Today a

I do think he would be amused at this sight from my

around the city, delivering his anecdotes with a stiff

tramp is sitting alone at one of the outside tables, nursing

balcony. The tramp – a permanent fixture of London’s

upper lip that clashes somewhat with the voices of the

a take-away latte. I see this man wandering about

streets for hundreds of years, stereotypically found drunk

cockneyesque Londonites who act as real-life extras in

most days. He’s your typical textbook hobo: worn out

in an alleyway, has now morphed into a 21st century

this Slumming masterpiece. If I sound a little disdainful

beige jacket, shaggy grey beard and filthy shoes. He

corporate coffee consumer at EAT.

here I don’t mean to be, quite the opposite, but there

089

† dragmag issue one †


THE LONDON EVERYBODY KNOWS Essay by Oskar Oprey Photos by Lester Lyons-Hookham

† dragmag issue one †

090


is an element of class difference and snobbery that

with uncovering the exotic quality of degradation, and

controversial at the time of its release, securing itself a

needs to be addressed. London Psycho geography is

this quality is most likely to be found in the remains of

spot in the odd-ball chapter of British Cinema History. My

very fashionable these days. An author such as Ian

Victorian Babylon. Sure, anyone wishing to find danger,

remake would therefor have to be an eighteen certificate

Sinclair can pen a 600 page book detailing a walk

poverty and cheap cafes could simply wander around

in order to compete. I might include some sexually

around the M25, or his musings on Hackney, and it is

a South London council estate, but it lacks the same

explicit material, my James Mason impersonator might

deemed a critical success. Will Self, Peter Ackroyd,

essence – the fight for space between high and low

have to go and do crack in a squat, or sip cocktails with

William Blake, Thomas de Quincey, Stewart Home,

cultures that can only be found in cramped city centres.

Princess Beatrice at The Box as they watch a tranny fuck

Alan Moore, Patrick Keiller, Merlin Coverley to name

Inner city poverty, on a superficial level, is accessible.

herself with an eel. I might have Brian Sewell as the

but a few, have all mined their material from London’s

You can go into any greasy spoon and be served,

presenter, as he is the epitome of an old English snob

history, myths and folklore – as well as the city’s more

nobody will care. You’re there as an outsider, and that

who also happens to be cultured. Like Mason in the

mundane characteristics, such as plane trees, pavements

might be noted by the regulars, but not in the same way

original he might provide that whiff of incomprehension

and pigeons. Fletcher fits this tradition perfectly, whilst

that a bag lady wandering into the Ritz would be eyed

or misunderstanding of what he’s presenting, ‘The London

also adhering to the undercover work associated with

with suspicion before being escorted off the premises.

the Presenter is Pretending he Knows’. Although I should

writers such as George Orwell and Jack London; to

Every time I see the film I think about how it could be

note that whoever I’d choose would actually have to

pen a shocking expose of the underworld you must

remade. I only started fantasising about this seriously

pretend to be James Mason, right down to the accent

first become part of it, donning an old tattered jacket

when I moved down to London permanently last

and slicked back hair.

and living amongst society’s poorest. Fletcher did this

November. Everyone seems to be buying into the idea of

The first fifteen minutes of the film were written by

for what was probably his best book, 1969’s ‘Down

the London portrayed in the film. Whether they’re paying

Fletcher, whilst the following half an hour was the work

Among the Meths Men’, an account of twenty four hours

extortionate rents for old slums, or forking out twenty

of a screenwriter called Brian Compton. Interestingly,

hanging on street corners with the alcoholics of Skid

pounds for large coffee table books showcasing ‘Lost

Fletcher seemed to have a knack for picking places that

Row, in which he sifted through shit-strewn bomb sites

London’ photography. As I have no money and have

would remain more of less untouched forty years later,

and traded cigarettes for stories, all in the name of a

ended up publishing a magazine instead of making films,

whilst most of Compton’s locations have been bulldozed.

good read. There’s a middle-class characteristic to most

my remake fantasies are purely literary at this point. It

The rest of this article consists of me wandering around

of these writers… maybe middle-class is the wrong term,

didn’t stop me tracking down most of the locations and

these locations, jotting down my thoughts....

especially in the case of Stewart Home or Alan Moore….

visiting them all with the artist Lester Lyons-Hookham.

Perhaps ‘comfort’ and ‘distance’ are more suited. The

We opted for a simple 35mm camera over the usual

world Fletcher writes about – the world of cheap cafes

large format approach, as we were essentially being

and decaying East End streets – is not his own, hence

tourists for the day. I had suspected the trip would be

who used to keep goldfish in the glass cisterns to prove

‘the nobody knows’ element. Yet for many Londoners

quite dull, as so many of the locations were either gone

the water was fresh. “A fish that went down in the world

– for many hundreds of thousands of Londoners, this

or had become tourist spots. But in fact it was rather

when the water level dropped; these fish don’t live here

was their doorstep. As ‘the gentle author’ of the London

fun, in a flowery flanuer kind of way. As I wandered

of course, we just popped them in by way of illustration.”

blog ‘SpitalfieldsLife.com’ points out, maybe “The

around, I day-dreamed of what my movie might be like.

The toilets are now blocked up, situated in the middle

London Nobody who reads the Daily Telegraph Knows”

I don’t want to give too many of my ideas away as I

of a busy road. You wouldn’t even notice them unless

would have been a more fitting title. Poverty isn’t the

might actually do this one day. Anyone trying to remake

you decided to cross away from the traffic lights. The

exclusive subject of the book and film, it’s more to do

this masterpiece should bear in mind that it was quite

stairwell down is littered with garbage – fast food

091

† dragmag issue one †

The Old Holborn Gents James Mason recounts a tale of an attendant


packages have been lying there so long that the sun has

highwayman performing to a delighted crowd, before

defeated look in the eye – the ones who can’t, and

bleached them of all colour.

letting him reveal his life story over a pint. Perhaps I

won’t communicate with their fellow man”. Scenes of

My remake would start off in a public toilet, the type

should do the same but with one of the charity clip board

people sleeping on park benches, and drinkers huddled

situated in railway stations and cost 30p to use. The

people; I fucking hate them as well but at least they try

in doorways are a common sight to every passer-by

narrator would take a piss, and complex and expensive

harder - they really want your money. I do find them

on London’s streets. But you couldn’t get away with just

camera techniques would be used to follow the stream

genuinely entertaining though, and chuckle to myself as

filming homeless people these days in order to illustrate

of urine down into London’s very outdated sewage

they shout at me after I ignore them – complimenting my

the point. The stark photo journalism of people like Don

system, whilst the narrator delivered a short history of

blazer or telling me I certainly don’t look like I’m busy.

Mcullin is fascinating, but we can’t continue to show the

London’s treatment of human waste. After a few minutes the steaming yellow liquid, now merged with the urine of 7 million other Londoners (we’d insert a metaphor

same distanced and stereotypical view of the people Street Fashion

who live on our society’s doorsteps. We all know it’s

In one of my favourite montage scenes a

a much more complex social phenomenon than just

about strangers uniting through their shit and piss), would

discreet camera catches an array of legs and swinging

being ‘down on your luck’, as Mason might say. Some

arrive at Abbey Mills Pumping station. Here we would

handbags. Interestingly this was supposed to be a

people who sleep rough don’t even consider it ill fate;

witness the transformation from piss to fresh Thames tap

document of the current fashions, the stuff that was in, yet

they’re free from the many restrictions, stresses and petty

water, which we would then see spurt through the tap of

the filmmakers chose a music hall hit from 1913 as the

responsibilities (such as paying rent and working in a

a housewife in Surrey – straight into her kettle for a cup

soundtrack: ‘The Wibbly Wobbly Walk” by Fred Elliot. I

mundane job) that society expects of us. Of course for

of tea.

would also keep the song on my soundtrack, but would

many others their situation is often the result of domestic

have it covered by Joanna Newsom and remixed by a

abuse, unemployment, mental health problems and a

dubstep DJ. And of course it would seem insane if we

society that allows vulnerable people to fall through

weren’t to include a street style blogger. People dress up

its security net. Not everybody on the streets is an

a dozen or so buskers left in London. As you’ll have

not only to go out these days, but to be photographed

alcoholic, and many of them are quite capable – as well

noticed, this has changed - for better or worse. The

by bloggers as well. The only one I have serious respect

as keen – to talk to their fellow man. There’s a group

London underground has 39 official busking pitches

for is Shot by Shooter, but I have no idea who he or she

of homeless people that congregate outside the Church

spread across 25 stations. And of course we have to

is. We’ll assume it’s a he – his blog consists of beautiful

near Waterloo. They appear to be having a rather

take into account all the silver people that stand on

portraits of pretty yet slightly strange looking young

good time, laughing with each other as they slowly get

plinths around Covent Garden and the London Eye. I had

people / older celebrities as they wander about London.

wasted on cheap lager. I’d probably just trust them with

planned to do little reviews on all of them – marks out

My James Mason would join him out on his travels,

a video camera and let them film their own segment

of ten for performance and costume, a detailed analysis

prying the streets for his next portrait. It should also be

of the movie, in a similar style to the work of the artist

of what the punter gets for every pound they toss in the

noted that my narrator will have to appear old fashioned

Anthony Luvera. He’s spent ten years working with the

hat. But most of the time it’s just a handshake and a lame

and out of the loop as regards youth fashion. He will

homeless, providing camera equipment and enabling

photo opportunity. Even the ones that have an act are

constantly refer to the photo subjects as ‘beatniks’, ‘teddy

them to shoot their own photo diaries, as well as self-

dull – fire eating is so old fashioned. The truth is I fucking

boys’ and ‘punks’.

portraits. In Waterloo I’ve spotted a new member of the

Buskers According to James Mason, there are only

hate street performers, but it‘s an important element of the original film so I need to find a modern equivalent. In the original they show a pre-Adam Ant dancing

gang; a rather well dressed middle aged woman. She’s The Homeless

turned out in a red winter coat and jewellery, the type

“The brotherhood of the leaky boot and the

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of woman who might have a family in some suburban

092


“WE WERE TOO SHY town wondering where she has gone. She’s always

We turned up in Hanbury Street and I was stunned by

seller was a bit mean and tried to charge me ten bob

swaying slightly, can in one hand and handbag in the

it’s carnivalesque atmosphere: the old side of the street

to take a photo of his wares. I bullshitted about being

other. I look out for her now when passing, and am

was adorned with expensive coffee shops, in fact I’d

a researcher for a TV company and that we were

slightly concerned for her well-being. I worry that in a

been at a meeting with a photographer the week before

interested in filming the market. The market is still busy

few months the jewellery will have vanished and her

and hadn’t realised the street’s significance. Pedestrian

but I couldn’t help but feel sorry for stallholders. Eclipsed

appearance will have taken on that of an old hag.

access through the pavement was disrupted by what must

by a huge Sainsbury’s, it had none of the vibrancy

have been about three hundred people on six different

portrayed in the original film. I was after pictures of eels,

Ripper tours, all paying eight pounds to stand and listen

as the original has lots of extreme close ups of them

to descriptions of how Chapman’s intestines had been

wriggling around in buckets, before they are plopped on

Ripper on the 8th September 1888. Her mutilated body

ripped from her body and tossed over her shoulders.

a chopping board and hacked up into bloody chunks.

was discovered in the backyard of number 29 Hanbury

Every variation of a ‘Jack the Ripper Tour’ domain name

The fishmonger was much friendlier, but these days the

Street, just off Brick lane. James Mason stops here

has been purchased by a tour company. It’s an easy

eels are either dried out or vaccuum packed in jelly. We

briefly on his tour, and the place doesn’t appear to have

business – you don’t need to pay rent for an office, and

grabbed a coffee from one of the posh cafes situated on

changed much in the 79 years between the murder and

a two hour tour must bring in 160 pounds. We went on

the corner, and sat outside waiting for the pie shop to

the original film. An uptight old lady leads him through

“thejacktherippertour.com”, we chose this as it had the

open. To our left was a stall selling cushions for a fiver.

to the yard, and he uses his stick to point at the exact

most up-to-date website. Some of those sites look like

I started doing little calculations on my phone, trying to

spot where her body was discovered, underneath an old

they’ve been lingering online since the early nineties. The

work out how many cushions he’d roughly have to sell

plank of wood. That area of Whitechapel looked pretty

guide was a drama school graduate, no surprise there.

each day in order to make twelve thousand pounds a

much the same in the sixties as it did in the eighties – the

The website boasted a ‘Ripper Vision’ gimmick, which

year. The answer wasn’t actually that unrealistic – only

eighteen eighties. If it weren’t for the aeroplane heard

was in actual fact just a pocket projector that shone

6.5 cushions a day, 365 days a year. But from the looks

in the distance we could be mistaken for thinking he’d

google image pictures onto the pavement. Didn’t work

of it business wasn’t thriving on this Sunny Wednesday

hopped in a time machine. 43 years later and this area

so well in daylight, but by the time we’d reached Mitre

morning. We were sat next to a pair of absolute twats,

is unrecognisable – well, at least this half of the street.

Square – site of the fourth killing – it was pitch black.

clad in cheap business apparel, who were discussing

The whole side of buildings was replaced by a Brewery

I felt we had it better than the other tour groups a few

their careers in social networking. The older guy was

in the late sixties; the building is now used as a market

yards away. Rather than merely just hearing the gory

trying to define his role: “Now, I wouldn’t exactly call

on weekends and a car park Monday to Friday. Ripper

descriptions of what happened to Catherine Edowes,

myself a social media guru…maybe social media

enthusiasts can pinpoint the exact spot by peering

we were also able to view the morgue photos at a funny

councilor is more fitting.” Before spewing onto his lap we

through the window and using the parked cars as a

angle up against an office door.

made a move into the pie shop. It was worth the wait,

The Murder Site of Annie Chapman Annie Chapman was murdered by Jack the

gradient. It seemed appropriate to join a Jack the Ripper tour, as what had once been an obscure geographical place of interest has now become a pivotal tourist

as it was the most amazing location out of all we had Pie and Mash

visited, even though the food itself was as awful as I had

I concluded my wanderings the next day, over

anticipated. The two ladies who served us were very

attraction for ghouls such as myself. Thousands of people

brunch at Manzes Pie and Mash shop in Islington, after

sweet though, and thanked us for our custom and asked

every year pay money to pavement perve on these

we’d tried to ‘recreate’ the street market scene. Lots of

us to come again. The menu is simple – pie, mash and

murder sites, most of which are now office buildings.

close ups of carpets, shoes, fish and flowers. The flower

eels. We were too shy to try the eels so settled for the small pie and mash. There is only one filling available and that is steak and gravy. Norman Cohen’s shoot here for the original consisted of a prying camera, spying on the patrons as they tucked into their grub. Bent over their bowls and plates, they slurp at the green gravy. An old man eagerly pours chilli oil over his upturned pie, whilst two children push forks towards mash smeared faces. All the while an eerie soundtrack of moaning synthesizers

093

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TO TRY THE EELS.” looms over the scene, before it cuts to the back of a

So here we are back at the beginning – back in my

garbage truck crushing some old crates, a touching if

flat. All this writing about pie and mash has made me

unintentional metaphor about white trash. As I walked

hungry. The EAT downstairs does pie and mash for 5.30.

over to our seat, an old man was hunched over a bowl

They have a range of flavours: steak and ale, chicken

of green gravy, slurping away quietly. I was stunned;

and mushroom, goats cheese and sweet potato. The

he looked like a leftover from 1967. He continued

mash has an artificial quality that I like, similar to the one

slurping, but shot me a glance. Nothing had changed;

in Manzes but just a tad tastier, the meat in the pies isn’t

the interior, the food, the clientele. The tiling all looks

as gristly either. I might suggest that they do a jellied

original, and in mint condition – I’m no stranger to this

eel salad box for six quid. I’ll go down now, to stand

kind of environment, having spent a childhood in ancient

in the queue with the businessmen and the tourists, and

Scottish cafes with my Dad eating chips. But none of the

we’ll all buy into the corporate fetishisation of the London

places I’d visited were in as perfect shape as this. As I

Nobody Knows.

sat there nibbling at the starchy food I just stared in awe at the old man, making my friend feel nervous as I kept trying to persuade him to take a photo. There’s nothing more uncomfortable than lunching with someone and watching their mayonnaise smeared mouth in action, it’s weirdly intimate, yet at the same time an intrusion of their personal space. James Mason wasn’t present for that particular scene, but I felt a strange unity to the late Norman Cohen. Sitting here forty years later I was essentially looking through his camera lens.

The London Nobody Knows is distributed by Optimum Releasing

094


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096


NOW AND THEN SHORTLY AFTER WRITING

Jonathan Cohen: I was born in London – 66, and the

taken seriously as a director and the things that got him

THIS PIECE I TRACKED DOWN

London Nobody Knows was made in 67. In fact I was in

the really strong reviews were his early documentaries

NORMAN COHEN’S SON,

it, in a pram. Also my mum ended up as a walk on extra

– ‘Brendan Behan’s Dublin’ and ‘The London Nobody

JONATHAN. IT TURNS OUT

- my Dad had her walk past camera and apparently she

Knows’. But of course there was no commercial value in

HE IS IN FACT TRYING TO GET

got her stiletto stuck in a drain. He really liked it and had

documentaries. As opposed to the humour of his later

A REMAKE OF THE LONDON

her do the same thing twenty or thirty times - she said it

comedies, these documentaries were quite dark and also

NOBODY KNOWS INTO

almost led to divorce. It’s there in the finished film, just

quite controversial at the time.

PRODUCTION, WRITTEN BY

one little thing. You see her, then a close up of this shoe

When I left school I became a runner at Elstree Studios.

THE ORIGINAL SCREENWRITER

as it walks past and the heel gets stuck.

I met this one guy, the stunt co-ordinator Rocky Taylor,

BRIAN COMPORT. I CAUGHT

I was always really happy to see my Dad. He was

he’s a bit of a legend. Rocky worked on the Death Wish

UP WITH THEM ON SEPARATE

always doing interesting things. I was at boarding school

films with Charlie Bronson, he’s old school. I’ve always

OCCASIONS – JONATHAN

– I’d be collected in a taxi most of the time and I’d go to

kept fit, martial arts, running and Rocky said to me ‘you

AND I HAD LUNCH IN A PUB

Shepperton or Pinewood studios and just hang around

look like a fit lad why don’t you become a stunt man’.

NEAR ABBEY ROAD, WHILST I

film sets. His goal was always to break into the States.

I though, ok. My first film was something called Death

MET BRIAN FOR A DRINK IN

Because his success – and he was pretty successful in his

Machine, which was a Sci-Fi at Pinewood Studios and

THE FESTIVAL HALL, NOT FAR

day – was largely in England and Europe, and I suppose

it was the best start – I was dressed up in this incredible

FROM SOME OF THE ORIGINAL

like most creators America is the big one to crack.

costume as an eight foot Robocop / Terminator kind

LOCATIONS.

Around the time he died he was working in Los Angeles.

of thing and I had to get blown up. I was eighteen, at

He was doing pre-production for a film, but sadly we’ll

Pinewood Studios and I was a robot – so cool! I got over

never know what the next step would have been.

it quickly though. I have a love hate relationship to stunt

I remember growing up around the set of things like

work. It’s ok, although quite often they’re after a ‘look’,

Dad’s Army and Till Death Do Us Part. I suppose the bulk

sometimes it’s for a bad guy, sometimes it’s to double.

of his career was taking comedies off the TV and turning

I’ve doubled various people over the years, nothing

them into feature films. He was actually quite a funny

very big. I’ll be the guy who swerves the car round the

man, a wild Irishman with a great sense of humour, a

corner, gets out and gets shot. You know, I’ve been killed

sort of Jewish Richard Harris... or maybe Richard Harris

so many times. I’ve been killed by Richard Gere. I’ve

with a Jewish sense of humour. He enjoyed making

often been killed by Brad Pitt.

people laugh, however I think he also wanted to be

I suppose I had an inclination to get a remake of London Nobody Knows off the ground around the time I decided to re-establish the Norcon Production Company, my Dad’s old company. The original film was rereleased on DVD around that time as well, to a lot of attention. I think my version would be very different but keep the same gritty feel. It’d be important to experiment - my background in stunts I’m sure will feed into it. Also my passion is music and that would be an important element, I’d score with my own work and although I’m more rock oriented I’ve been researching the original soundtrack. It’s part of the original films legacy. With the narrator, my own choice would be Michael Caine, but there are some dark and interesting DJ’s in London. Maybe it’s time for a new direction.

097

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it from there. My main concern was with the London I

I’ve gone back to Geoffrey who either doesn’t want to

knew most about, as well as areas the viewers might

do it or is too committed, so does it interest you?’ So

be remotely interested in. I lived quite close to Bankside

I thought is the Pope Catholic? We took it from there.

at the time, so we shot around there as well as the East

The reason he’d been given more money is because

End. Most of my stuff was actually just prompts; if you

he’d managed to get James Mason involved. They had

have James Mason then let him have free reign. I’d have

worked together on another film, where Norman was a

him say the odd piece word for word, but mainly it was

production assistant. Mason had been very interested

literally just prompts. I was first introduced to Norman

in archaeology whenhe was younger, in the twenties

Cohen in the early sixties and he turned out to be a very

and thirties – but he decided that acting was a safer

good friend, but he died quite young. The producer John

profession. I suppose that’s why he was interested in the

Bolton was very interested in him and liked his comic

project.

sensibility. Norman took me along to a meeting with him

I turned up on location one day, which happened to

and Boltan gave us three shorts to write. There was a

be that lavatory in Holborn. I saw Norman and I said where’s the man? He said ‘He’s down in the lavatory go and introduce yourself’. That was a very Norman thing to say, very mischievous. I think you went downstairs to get to that toilet... I can’t honestly remember. This is the one where they put the goldfish in the cisterns. Mason said they don’t live here we just popped them in as a way of illustration. We were worried that someone might phone the ‘Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Fish’ or something. I feel slightly uncomfortable about the scenes of the tramps because of how intrusive it was. But we wanted to make a film about the city and its people, whether they are rich and successful or down and outs. I was there for most of the filming – but not the scene of the drunks fighting on Fournier street. I never said this to Norman, but alcoholics – as I understand – don’t steal other people’s alcohol. There were certain rules and codes

Brian Comport: I never met Geoffrey Fletcher. They

dreadful series called ‘A Look at Life’, you probably

of behaviour amongst them, even though they were all

say a lot of directors keep their screenwriters away from

don’t remember those. They were these terribly boring

drunk and living on the streets. They might share it, but

the original authors. I was aware that he was working

subject films with titles like ‘Sticky Business: Life in the

they didn’t fight over it. I think we can safely say that

for the Telegraph and was a very intelligent man and

Glue Factory’. We did something entirely different called

scene was staged. All those people were real though –

had written these books. But I only read one of them,

‘The Awkward Law There Is’, and that was great

they were there. Everybody in the film was genuine. We

just to get a flavour of his style. He thought Norman

fun to do. We looked at some preposterous laws. We

had release forms though, and I think some of the drunks

Cohen had only based the film loosely on his book in

had someone dressed up as Father Christmas being

knew there were a few beers in it for them. But nobody

order to obtain the rights to the title ‘The London Nobody

arrested for giving away presents, obscure laws.

was in the film that didn’t want to be. The spirit of the film

Knows’, because that was such a good commercial title. I

Norman rang one day and said ‘I’ve got front money

was very much Norman – the comedy mixed with a bit

don’t know how well you remember the film, but the gas

for a fifteen minute documentary written by Geoffrey

of tragedy. It was a fantastic project and I’m glad I did it.

lighting scene was the end of Flecther’s contribution to

Fletcher called the London Nobody Knows but

the script, and that was about ten minutes in. I just took

suddenly I’ve been offered another half an hour’s money.

All images courtesy of Jonathan Cohen, from his father’s archive

098


SHOT SHORTLY AFTER WRITING MY

Oskar Oprey: So what’s your background?

from? Did it emerge from street photography,

LONDON ARTICLE I TRACKED

And when did you first start taking

or do you think it’s more referential to classic

DOWN SHOT BY SHOOTER FOR

photographs?

fashion photography? I see you have a book

AN INTERVIEW. I’M HESITANT

Shot by Shooter: I did psychology at University, and I’ve

of John Deakin’s work there.

TO REVEAL HIS NAME - IT’S

always been interested in images and photography.

Interesting question. Where did it come from...I think it’s

NO SECRET, BUT I LOVE THE

The idea of taking photos of people started when I was

a bit of a backlash against commercialisation. I think

ELUSIVENESS OF HIS BLOG AND

21. I was in the City Cafe in Edinburgh when suddenly

people were just bored of the same magazines and the

THE FACT THAT HE DOESN’T

Vivienne Westwood walked in with Michael Clark plus

same designers and the same press departments feeding

CRAVE FAME AND FORTUNE,

entourage. For some reason I just wanted – because

people the same things. It was very driven by sales,

UNLIKE MOST OF HIS PEERS. HE

I’m quite, I WAS quite a shy person, and I think a lot of

but now with blogging I feel that real people are able

ALSO DIDN’T TAKE MY PICTURE,

photographers hide behind cameras - like shielding

to provide the things they like. They can’t be bullshitted

WHICH WAS A RELIEF, AS IT

themselves. I somehow wanted to speak to her but didn’t

anymore.

WOULD SEEM THAT I’D JUST

know how to, so I thought well I’ll take her picture. And

Did you look at other blogs before doing your

TRIED TO BUY MY WAY ONTO

that’s how it happened. So I took her picture. Developed

own – or were you one of the first to start a

HIS BLOG. HE WAS A LOVELY

it myself and then sold it to the City Cafe for 25 pounds.

blog?

GENTLEMEN, AND THE SCOTTISH

So I was thoroughly chuffed with myself. I found that

Oh no I wouldn’t say I was one of the first but... well

ACCENT CAME AS A SURPRISE.

having a camera validates you and people let you in

actually I think I probably was one of the first, but in

WE MET ON A SCORCHING

and they say hi and you can almost chat to anyone when

the pre-internet age. I think one of the very first fashion

SPRING AFTERNOON IN THE

you have a camera. That’s what I love about it. Doing

street photographers would have been August Sander.

EAST END, FLICKED THROUGH A

sporadic portraits has been a compulsive disorder ever

He would be the first person doing this kind of thing.

JOHN DEAKIN CATALOGUE, ATE

since.

Now in any circumstance it’s hard to be original – but I

WAFFLES AND BITCHED ABOUT

But you’ve never made much money from the

don’t claim to be. I do claim to do something just a little

PEOPLE WE KNEW FROM BACK

photos you take?

bit different: I don’t go to fashion shows.

UP NORTH; THE DICTAPHONE

I’ve never made any money. Apart from that first image

You don’t?

WAS TURNED OFF, WHICH IS A

to the City Cafe I’ve only ever sold one other print in my

Never! That’s my first rule: avoid fashion shows.

SHAME FOR YOU DEAR READER,

life and that was to Sir Paul Smith. I’ve never tried either.

And you don’t include photos of yourself on

BUT A RELIEF FOR US.

I’ve always wanted to be free: that’s why I have another

the blog.

job.

Nope, not interested. Couldn’t care less.

And you do your other job full time?

And in terms of your own ‘media image’

Yeah. Paul Smith saw one of my images and asked to

you don’t try and become an internet media

buy it, and I thought yeah why not?

personality.

Is it one from the blog then?

No, that’s the whole point. It should always be about

Yeah it’s the one of David Bailey.

the photographs, not the photographer. I mean

Ah yeah- that’s quite recent.

the photographs should show enough about the

Yeah – and now he has it in his office.

photographer. It’s fifty-fifty, you don’t need to see me

Has the image been printed large?

because I’m in the picture with the subject.

No I don’t like big prints, I can’t stand them.

What do you think about the other blogs out

So how big is the image?

there?

It’s no bigger than A5.

This is my Lily Allen moment isn’t it... I don’t really like

And they’re all digital photos that you take?

them to tell you the truth (laughs). I look at them only to

Yes.

see if they’ve got someone that I have – if they do I won’t

Where do you think fashion blogging came

use that photograph, which is terrible. But they never

099

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BY SHOOTER

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100


have. You know, I never see any of my subjects on other

think I’m attracted to that sort of vulnerability.

blogs; a couple at the most. It’s quite bizarre; obviously

So is there a ratio between boys and girls?

I’m looking at the world in a totally different way.

Oh I can do a guy in two seconds, but I find it really

Do you have a specific territory in which to

hard to do a girl. It’s funny and very strange.

hunt for subjects?

Do you think that’s a gay thing?

Yeah. Soho – I’m obsessed with Soho; the history and the

Yeah it is I think... it’s a gay aesthetic thing.

seedy dark alleys. This area (Spitafields) is fantastic, as is

Because you know for sure what a hot guy

Brick Lane – Hackney Road is really good as well.

looks like, but you look at girls in a slightly

But you would say most of the photos are

different way?

taken around Soho?

101

Yeah definitely. Someone said to me about my girls that

I would say 70% yeah.

if they’re not ginger they’re some kind of icon. They’re all

And you get an hour at lunch just to go out

people that I love. That’s true for both the girls and the

and have a wander?

guys. I mean I love John Waters; I was obsessed with

I go out for my full lunch hour and my break. I never

Penelope Tree and ended up running into both of them

stop. I have to because I’ve only got x amount of time

and taking their picture. I met Marc Almond, but that was

and often I won’t see a single person, then other times

a shit photograph.

I’ll find five. I don’t just take any old rubbish – it’s like a

And out of the icons, a lot more of them are

spider sense. I’ve just got to take their picture. For every

guys. You’ve photographed Duggie Fields a

picture it can take like two or three hours over a few

few times, and Sebastien Horsely.

sessions... because sometimes I see the background

Yeah I met Sebastian two weeks before he died. And

before I see the person.

I said to him how you doing? And he said to me ‘oh

So why do you do it then?

darling, I feel like death’. And I thought oh... that’s a bit

Why do I do it? Em... I think it’s an obsession. I’m

depressing. And then he died. Awful.

addicted to... I just see people that I think – I need to

So the images on the blog, and I said this

capture something. I need to... do collaboration. It’s also

when I emailed you, seem to be more about

the work of a collector - collecting typologies. If you look

people’s faces rather than just the clothes that

through all the pictures you’ll notice that I’m obsessed by

they’re wearing. But, everyone you stalk is

ginger people. (laughs)

quite fashionable. So... why do you choose to

Yeah there are a lot of ginger boys on there.

frame them in that way? I mean you can tell

And girls as well. But yeah mostly boys, I see them as

just by the hairstyles that they’re very trendy

the chosen ones. Yes, so I’m like a collector, it’s like when

people.

you were a kid and you collected these stickers that you

Do you think? Hmmm – some of them aren’t though.

swapped. It’s like that – I want to get that hot boy or

Especially with boys, there was one a few days ago,

that girl with the amazing pair of eyes. That’s what it’s

he has a Paisley shirt on, and curly hair and he was not

like. And sometimes I think it’s about fragile beauty as

trendy. I thought this is great because I can cut his awful

well. I really pick on some people, they say to me ‘but

shorts out and he’ll still look amazing. It’s a combination

why have you chosen me?’ Like there was this one girl

of several elements: what they wear and what their face

Rachel, about four days ago, who was totally insecure

looks like. Do they fit into the background? Sometimes I

about how she looks. She was like ‘why would you want

like to have a joke with the background as well.

to pick me’? I said cause you’re beautiful and she was

Because of course you use very specific

like ‘I can’t see it’. So anyway I put the photo on and

backgrounds.

immediately got people saying how beautiful she was. I

Yeah, did you see the one with Ben Wishaw the actor?

† dragmag issue one †


Yep.

I think it will go on forever because there are a lot of

a book and I think it’s really beautifully done and is an

With the cartoon?

narcissistic, self-indulgent people posting things – and

example of where... that wouldn’t have existed if the

And he wasn’t really trendy, very cute though.

I’m part of that of course. I’m as narcissistic as the next

blogging thing hadn’t really started. I think they just

Yep, but the cartoon in the background just looks like his

person.

pushed it up a level.

face. And he thought it was the funniest thing. Cause he

Although you have a funny way of showing it,

Do you remember Purple from years ago?

asked to see it, and there was a blank wall and I was

because you don’t want to be shown.

Yeah I do, and I have their anthology book. It’s a really

like can you move over. Because I always ask them to

Yeah – maybe in a kind of reverse way. I’ve already

great looking magazine – and its fifteen quid – but it’s

move and they don’t get why. So I got him to move and I

said I’m in there with the subject... I think I’m showing

worth it.

showed it to him and he was like ‘oh that’s so funny’.

my narcissism through my taste in people. I wanted to

So, how many photos do you think you’ve got

So when you see someone, will you follow

show, in the blogging world, that it’s not all about the

all together? How extensive is the shot by

them, walk with them down the street?

big industry professionals. There’s actually amazing

shooter archive?

Yes, I’ll stalk them, totally stalk them.

people out there, I think that’s what I wanted to show –

Thousands. I’ve got an amazing art director who I

Until you find somewhere right to shoot them.

you can get as equally interesting subjects by not going

need because I can’t sequence the pictures. It’s my ex-

Yep totally. They are my prey and I wait. You asked me if

to these fashion shows. These other bloggers aren’t real

boyfriend Danny, he’s actually my editor.

I like other fashion blogs and the main reason why I don’t

independent people because they’re all financed by

So he uploads them and everything?

rate them is because of the poor quality of the pictures.

big companies and get everything for free. And I would

Oh yeah totally, it’s a team. I’m part of a team.

I’m not saying that mine are amazing but these bloggers

argue that you know that little kid who’s got no money

So images of yours that we print in the

are not looking at the quality of the light. They’re just

has more style on his little pinkie than they’ve got on

magazine – these will be the first time they’ve

so excited... they see someone famous and they take

their whole body. I just think those type of blogs are so

ever been put to paper?

their picture. They’re in awe and in a hurry. They’re not

oversaturated – there’s a market for it but I just don’t want

Yeah. Well I printed one for Paul. And that was it,

looking at how the light falls, how the shadows are cast

to go down that road. I thought I’d take the harder path.

nothing else, oh and I gave one to The Chap magazine

– is it a diffused light or is it a harsh light? And that really

Those bloggers are just like free PR agents.

last week. They asked me for my picture of Alex

annoys me. I mean I’ve had cases where I’ve had an

Yeah. Of course they are and they love it.

Kapranos so I gave them that. That’s it. But I don’t care

amazing subject but the lighting is awful, so I don’t use it.

And that’s why it’s been embraced so well by

about that – I just want the pictures to get better and

As much as it hurts me I can’t use it because the quality is

the industry.

better with each image. It would be great if it took off

not there.

I think with my blog, they find it quite hard to pigeonhole

but I don’t want it to be massive. I’ve got another job... I’d

So how do you approach people?

me because I don’t communicate with anyone. I don’t

love to make my living out of taking pictures but I have

It’s kind of my secret. I’m not going to say. I have my own

write a little chatty story ‘Oh I was walking up the road

to be realistic. It’s probably not going to happen. And

little way of working but I basically just fumble about like

and I bumped into John Waters’, I just post it and it’s up

also if it did happen then I can’t work to a deadline. Like

an amateur.

to people to work it out. I get emails saying ‘who are

if you said to me ‘OK let’s do a fashion shoot’, one - I

And are people aware that you’ve been

you? Do you know these people? Are you a man or a

wouldn’t be interested and two - I couldn’t actually do

following them as well?

woman?’ I find that quite funny.

it because it’s not... mine. It’s quite a selfish thing. At

Sometimes, occasionally yeah – but I’m very good.

Do you read a lot of magazines?

the end of the day I just want it to be all about good

How many streets will you follow them for?

Not really no

portraits, and that’s what I’m going to continue putting all

Eh – you gotta be quick because sometimes they’ll go

Do you ever buy any?

my energy into.

on the phone, or go into the office or meet their friends.

No. I look. But I read books. And I read comics – I read

So you’ve got to be very careful that you don’t lose them

Marvel Comics. I’m obsessed by Marvel comics!

and I’d say if you see someone mega famous you should

Wow.

try and work it then and there.

Yeah, I don’t read magazines because... because I’m

How long do you think the blogging trend

a visual person I do my own visuals. But there are

will last, and is it more important than printed

magazines that I do think are really terrific. I think Purple

magazines?

is a terrific magazine. That’s a bible – that’s a brick of

† dragmag issue one †

shotbyshooter.blogspot.com

102


ANTHONY LUVERA ASSISTED SELF-PORTRAITS 103

Photograph by Ruben Torosyan


I first considered working with homeless people in 2001.

obvious that he should photograph the boxes. He said

practice; including a bible manufacturing company,

I was invited to photograph at a shelter event in London

that every morning he woke up in a box and he then had

social work agencies, a homeware manufacturer,

over the Christmas period organized by Crisis but I

to find somewhere safe to store the box. When he was

advertising firms and Hollywood feature film costume

declined. I smarted something about preferring to see

away from the box he hoped it would be there when he

designers. I declined these kinds of requests until

what the people I met would photograph. I had never

returned. If it wasn’t he had to search for another box

decisions about the possibility of constituting the

wanted to photograph homeless people. The work of

and then he would get back in a box again at night.

collection as a public archive could be made. I spent

artists and writers on documentary representation such

time researching community photography projects and

as Allan Sekula, Abigail Solomon-Godeau and A.D.

By 2005 I had worked with around 200 people and

community archives across the UK in order to locate

Coleman had provoked my suspicions early on about

collated many thousands of images. An opportunity to

an organisation with which I could research some of

a straight approach to representing ‘others’ – the “find a

exhibit a selection of photographs from the collection

the practical and theoretical considerations potentially

bum” school of photography sharply critiqued by Martha

on the London Underground’s Art on the Underground

involved in constituting an archive. The early history and

Rosler. However this invitation sparked my interest in

prompted me to give careful consideration to how I

current work of an organisation called Belfast Exposed

representations of homeless people and in questions

might go about recognizing the individual creators of the

Photography appeared very interesting to me and upon

about the process of photographic representation itself.

images. I did not want to simply put out an unconnected

meeting Karen Downey of Belfast Exposed I accepted an

I sourced 1,000 disposable cameras and processing

presentation of images attributed to ‘homelessness’. I

open invitation to undertake a commission. I proposed

vouchers, and volunteered at the following Crisis

began to think about how I might create a representation

to not only to make a new body of work with homeless

Open Christmas event. I helped out by organizing

of the participants in a way that would react against a

people living in Belfast, but also to take my research into

entertainment, serving food, giving out towels and

traditional portrait making exercise. I worked with one

archives to their collection. I was keen to examine my

toiletries, and I told the people I met about my idea for

particular participant called Phil Robinson to experiment

relationship to my collection and to think about whether it

a project to collect photographs made by people who

with technical setups and to examine the negotiations

was best considered the product of my investigations into

had experienced being homeless. If they were interested

played out during the photographic transaction. These

representation or if it should somehow be manifested as

I invited them to meet with me on Friday afternoons at

preliminary experiments with Phil were crucial in

a public archive.

various places across London. I gave out cameras and

enabling me to develop a framework for making portraits

encouraged all of the participants to photograph the

with the participants that I called Assisted Self-Portraits.

Between 2006 and 2008 I worked in Belfast with

things that interested them.

In order to make an Assisted Self-Portrait I met with

people who have experienced being homeless to create

each participant a number of times in various locations

a new body of work called Residency. Through this

When I began this work I was keen to learn as much

chosen by them to teach the individual how to use a 5x4

time I also researched the possibility of constituting a

as possible about the individuals I met and to hear

field camera with a tripod, handheld flashgun, Polaroid

public collection of the photographs I had collected. This

about their experiences. However, while many of the

and Quickload film stock, and a cable shutter release.

research process was enormously interesting and useful

people I met appeared to be dealing with difficult,

The final Assisted Self-Portrait was then edited with the

in terms of addressing the questions I had at the time

complex or chaotic situations, I did not want to focus

participant. Between January and April 2005 selected

and developing further questions. The research in Belfast

on their problems. I was more interested in facilitating

photographs from the collection by 11 participants were

culminated with an article I wrote for a photography

their image-making and to hear about the experiences

exhibited across the London Underground in 12 tube

theory journal called Photographies in September last

they had when using the cameras. Some people made

stations in zones 1 and 2, along with an Assisted Self-

year, and a book of Residency is about to come out.

snapshots of family, friends and special places or times,

Portrait of each participant.

Here in London I am continuing work with the collection.

while others had more specific ideas or conceptual

Both in terms of collaborating with participants to make

projects that they wanted to explore using photography.

Shortly after the exhibition on the Underground – at a

Assisted Self-Portraits and to collate their photographs,

For instance when I first met Gypsy he was sleeping

point when I had worked with about 250 people or so

and attempting to find new ways to show the work.

at night in cardboard boxes on the steps of the Royal

and collated around 10,000 photographs, negatives

Academy. Gypsy pretty much only photographed the

and ephemera – I started receiving requests from

boxes he slept in. He said that for him the boxes were

organisations and individuals to use material from

so much a part of his day-to-day experience that it was

the collection in contexts outside of my photography

† dragmag issue one †

luvera.com

104


“GYPSY PHOTOGRAPHED

105

)[[Q[\ML ;MTN 8WZ\ZIQ\ WN +PIZUQIV -LOM )[[Q[\ML ;MTN 8WZ\ZIQ\ WN /aX[a /aX[a )V\PWVa 4]^MZI 8PW\WOZIXP Ja /WTLMV 8PW\WOZIXP Ja /aX[a 8PW\WOZIXP Ja :]JMV <WZW[aIV


THE BOXES HE SLEPT IN.”

Photograph by Golden, Photograph by Gypsy (2)

106


THIS BOOK WAS PURCHASED FOR THREE POUNDS IN GLASGOW’S GREAT SECOND HAND BOOKSHOP, “VOLTAIRE AND ROUSSEA”. FOUR ARTISTS WERE INVITED TO PICK A CHAPTER THEY FOUND INTRIGUING FROM THE TABLE OF CONTENTS. THE SELECTED CHAPTERS WERE SENT OUT TO THE ARTISTS, WHO THEN ADDED TO THE PAGES OR MADE NEW WORK. CHAPTERS WERE THEN RETURNED TO DRAGMAG, TO BE PUBLISHED IN THIS NEW AND IMPROVED VERSION OF ‘HOW TO SHOOT FOR GLAMOUR’.

001

† dragmag issue one †


with Stella Vine, Graham Dury of Viz, Jeanine Woollard, Littlewhitehead

† dragmag issue one †

001


109

from top left, ‘Blue and white daisies and a pink rose’, ‘Bernie Madoff’, Pink and yellow butterflies’, ‘Curtis’, opposite, ‘Lady blue feather hat’.


† dragmag issue one †

001


001

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† dragmag issue one †

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113

† dragmag issue one †


Jeanine Woollard, ‘O’, 2009

† dragmag issue one †

114


001

† dragmag issue one †


† dragmag issue one †

001




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“THE LONDON

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PORNO

• SUMMER 2011 •

JOHN WATERS VS. PAM HOGG

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