FutureClaw Magazine Issue 1

FUTURECLAW Issue 1

F U T U R E C L AW

P i c t u r e s & Wo r d s

www.futureclaw.com 14.99US 16.99CDN

Letter From The Editor This is Futureclaw Magazine, Issue 1.

The idea formed a year ago in the fall of 2007 among a small group of people nestled within the Green Mountains of Vermont to capture the zeitgeist with an international scope. Our goal was set to document this spirit through the most obvious format: the use of lots of very big pretty pictures and the written word. This idea was inspired directly by some of the great international fashion and photography magazines, such as Vs., 125, S Magazine, Muse, and so on. We then went about gathering contributors and collaborators for a magazine, and printed a pilot issue in the spring of 2008. More contributors came aboard after that, and we now have this full-size issue that you are holding in your hand (or are viewing online). We are grateful to all of our varied and talented contributors in helping us create this issue, and would like each contributor’s character to be expressed within the pages of Futureclaw.

The energy that exists within the creative mind enables us to create Futureclaw. This energy also defines the culture of the future. The problem for a magazine like ours is capturing this energy while balancing the tension it creates with tradition. Will the ideas we choose to present be acceptable to you? Or even ourselves?

James Laver’s law about the timeline of style states that any style or meme that will be popular in one year is by definition daring right now. For a publication such as Futureclaw to be useful, we are required to stay permanently in this zone where we are expected to identify and define culture a year from now. This is always going to be a challenge for a magazine such as this, and will certainly lead to many long nights of frustration within the inner circle of Futureclaw and its interaction with our audience. Thankfully, humans are simple creatures of habit, and being in this tense zone will become second nature to us. We invite you, the reader, to join us in this routine as well.

Enjoy.

Bobby Mozumder Editor-in-Chief

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Bobby Mozumder CREATIVE DIRECTOR/EDITOR Guy Derry MANAGER/EDITOR Adam DeMartino ART & MUSIC EDITOR Andrew Stock EDITOR/LAYOUT Emma Hazlett CONTACT info@futureclaw.com +1 802.999.4793 113 Church Street Burlington, Vermont USA SUBMISSIONS submissions@futureclaw.com ADVERTISING advertising@futureclaw.com SUBSCRIPTIONS subscriptions@futureclaw.com DISTRIBUTION Ubiquity Distributors +1 718.875.5491 info@ubiquitymags.com © 2008 FutureClaw LLC & Respective Copyright Holders No part of this magazine may be reproduced without written permission from content holders.

SPECIAL THANKS TO Martin Thomas at Isssuu, Shawn and Mary at Greenpoint Gallery Red NYC COVER Photography: Kristiina Wilson Hair: Lacy Redway @ lacyredway.com for bigsexyhair Makeup: Cynthia Rose for Make Up For Ever Stylist: Angela N. Model: Martina @ Supreme Stylists’s Assistant: Todd Jolly Dress: BCBG Max Azria http://www.futureclaw.com

Beautiful Nerd

18

Upload

26

More History is Present

44

Download

56

Studio

60

Rampant

72

Wires

82

Shifting Horizons

94

Some Jokes

108

Aeroplane

112

Reverb

122

Identity

128

Ice House

144

Magical Mystery Tour

154

Appaloosa

158

Lost & Found

166

Children of the Revolution

178

Frank Moore

182

Travis Card

186

White Voodoo

194

Blurbs

196

Friendattack

198

Zwei

ontents

4

Contributors

Steven Harrington Lora Danley Gregory Hermann Karl Isakson Kristiina Wilson David Studarus Agnes Thor JP Candelier Philip Valende Kinsey Labberton Chan Marshall Garrett Heaney Alvin Thompson Nick Zantop George Fox Chris Lisle Shem Roose Laura Marais

I am from Bermuda, and I am greatly inspired by Signe Constable. She took this picture, and is the coolest person I know.

I also think it would be great if everyone wore flowers behind their ears all the time. Its fun and it makes people really happy. Try it. (James Cooper)

Dan Nadel is the proprietor of PictureBox (wwww.pictureboxinc. com), a visual book publishing company and storefront in Brooklyn, NY that counts among its authors Gary Panter, Paper Rad, Katherine Bernhardt, Black Dice, Wilco, Brian Chippendale, C.F., Trenton Doyle Hancock and Julie Doucet. He is also the author of Art Out of Time: Unknown Visionary Cartoonists 1900-1969.

Novel Designs is Caitlin Parker and Alex Plapinger. Together they live and work in Venice, CA. When not studying and making movies, they pass the time taking photos, concert going and investigating the ever-growing LA arts and culture scene. Check out their nascent blog at noveldesigns.blogspot.com. This is the first interview they have ever conducted and they are extraordinarily grateful to the goodpeople at Futureclaw and Steven Harrington who, in addition to being their favorite artist, is a really swell guy.

Dulce Pinzón was born in Mexico City in 1974.

She studied Mass Media Communications at the Universidad de Las Americas in Puebla Mexico and Photography at Indiana University in Pennsylvania. As a young Mexican artist living in the US, Dulce soon found new inspiration for her photography in feelings of nostalgia, questions of identity, and political and cultural frustrations.

Peter Dean Rickards is a founder and Editor of First Magazine and creator of The Afflicted Yard. He’s also a photographer and occasionally has been known to write.

He’s based in Kingston, Jamaica and is likely to stay there until he is surprised at his gate by gunmen who shoot him and steal his cellphone.

Marco Wagner is a twenty-six year old guy who lives with his wife and little daughter in Wuerzburg, Germany. His artwork has been featured in Die Gestalten Verlag, novum magazine, and Illusive 2, among other publications. He’s interested in art, jazz, and spending time with his family, and gets the majority of his work done while wearing his pajamas.

Kathy Grayson is a painter and curator at New York City gallery Deitch Projects. Most recently she organized a group exhibition surveying contemporary approaches to abstraction which included works by Tauba Auerbach, Ara Peterson, and Peter Coffin.

4

Upload

Photography - Lora Danley Styling - Kelly Brown Hair - Kerrie Urban Makeup - Stephanie Flor using Rouge Cosmetics Model - Amanda at Elite Model Management

Inset: Jacket - Arthur Mendonca 18

Top - Erotikritos 19

Jacket - Maison Martin Margiela Boots - Azzedine Alaia

Jumpsuit, Top - Erotokritos Clutch Purse - Alexis Hudson Shoes - YSL

Ring - Jill Jacobsen Dress - Iodice Shoes - YSL

Dress - Alvin Valley Clutch purse - Gabriella Giovanni Shoes - Marc Jacobs

Dress - Sylvia Heisel Cuff Bracelet - Jill Jacobsen Booties - Alvin Valley

Jacket, Pants - Arthur Mendonca Boots - Azzedine Alaia Ring - Jill Jacobsen

Francis Picabia, Portrait d’un couple, ca. 1942/1943 26

SPECIAL PROJECTS

More Hi stor y i s Pre sent curated by Dan Nadel of PictureBox

“The following images represent a true history of visual culture. It’s just one true history, but it informs PictureBox, and the artists we publish. We are working on, or have completed, projects with or related to all of these artists. There is a rich, unexplored history out there that defies markets, fashion, and coolness. Ignore bullshit trends and ignorant assholes. Follow the art. Celebrate the New Dark Age.”

H.C. Westermann, Tribute to America, 1963

Jim Nutt, I’m da Vicious Roomer, 1969

Peter Saul, Ice Box #8, 1963

Err贸, Planescape, 1974

Eduardo Paolizzi, High Life, 1967

Eduardo Paolizzi, The Silken World of Michelangelo, 1967

ร yvind Fahlstrรถm, Roulette, 1966

Tadanori Yokoo, Motorcycle, 1966

Karl Wirsum, Eye Browse, 1969

Hipgnosis, cover for Black Sabbath Technical Ecstasy, 1976

Gary Panter, Gita Head, 1972

Gary Panter, Slash Cover, 1979

Pascal Doury, Untitled (from Pornographique Catholique), 1982

Rory Hayes, Untitled (from Laugh in the Dark #1), 1971

H.C. Westermann, Untitled #8 (See America First IX, Tamarind no. 2432), 1968

Dress - Issey Miyake 44

Download Photography - Bobby Mozumder

Styling - Naoko Watanabe

Shirt, Pant - OMO Norma Kamali Boot - Willow

Jacket,Boots - VPL Swimwear - OMO Norma Kamali

Top - Issey Miyake Skirt - OMO Norma Kamali 49

Dress - Malandrino

51

Dress - Malandrino 52

Coat,Belt,Shoes - Malandrino Skirt - Thuy 53

Makeup - Yiekov Bermudez using Makeup For Ever Hair - Takker at Patrick Melville Salon Model - Justine at Red Photo Assistant - Lora Danley

All items - Issey Miyake

MUSIC | INTERVIEW

Studio Information Records Headquarters is on a narrow, inclined street a few blocks from Gothenburg’s Järntorget Plaza. The façade is nondescript. I only find my way by betting that a tattooed young man with a fashionably tussled demeanor smoking a cigarette on the stoop is one of my subjects. The interior, however, is a tastefully assembled artistic sanctum. One side is lined with suspended acoustic guitars and, in their midst, a selection of synthesizers and microphones. Across the room, tidily arranged paintbrushes sit atop a compact draftsman’s table. The centerpiece is an imposing wooden console that Dan Lissvik, one half of the music group Studio, built and designed himself. Between its two incorporated speakers a pair of wide, sunken screens display layers of tracks, samples, and equalizers.

Rasmus Hägg arrives a few minutes later on his bicycle from another one of Studio’s studios in the city. Reserved and complementarily handsome, both speak a slightly accented but very deliberate, congenial English. They discussed their busy lives and diverse projects between cigarettes, snus (porous tobacco pouches placed against the gums), and sips of tea.

56

SD TI INTERVIEW | MUSIC

MUSIC | INTERVIEW

U

INTERVIEW | MUSIC

Are you guys from Gothenburg?

Rasmus: I come from about ten miles from Stockholm on the East Coast. I moved down to a small town north of Gothenburg, like, fourteen years ago. Then I moved here. So, I’ve been on the West Coast almost twenty years.

become mainly a fashion thing, I think. All the magazines write about.

It’s a fashion thing. It was a pretty cool scene in the early 80s.

Do you think you make dance music?

Rasmus: Yeah, sometimes.

Dan: I’m from the South.

Dan: Slow dance.

Did you ever study music?

Rasmus: Slow dance.

Rasmus: We have this state music school kind of thing.

Your MySpace page says you’re ‘Experimental/Afro-beat/Pop’.

Like a conservatory?

Dan: Yea, you choose three. [Laughs] Any three.

Dan: Yeah, I think it’s mandatory in pre-school. You start out with the flute and then you get to pick out your instrument. My first choice was actually saxophone, but I got drums instead. We’ve always been in different bands from an early age, [but] my focus was never music. I’m not really a collector or a fan of certain music. [Making music] is just a natural expression. It’s just something you do.

Rasmus: When you make music with a steady drum beat, it’s suddenly dance music. It’s pretty hard not to have a steady beat, so it’s dance music in that way. But we’re not really into other disco producers, the whole techno thing. It’s the elements from other kinds of genres that are more important. The contemporary dance scene is somewhat boring, I think. It’s been pretty fun for some years, [now that] everybody has loosened up. You don’t need a steady bass drum all the time and heavy production… I think those dance elements are nice to work with, but, from a pop angle.

You have a lot of instruments here. How many of these make it onto your records?

Dan: Half of these are another guy’s who plays in a band called Embassy.

So he’s here recording all the time and I’m producing. He left, like, three guitars and this crappy bass, so it’s not all mine.

The Tough Alliance named their label after an Embassy song.

Dan: It’s very Swedish indie. There are about twenty bands that sound almost the same.

Is that the Gothenburg scene we hear so much about?

Rasmus: It is a scene, but we don’t all hang out.

Dan: There are actually kind of, like, two and a half scenes. There’s an old school scene. That was the peak of the whole indie rock thing that was really huge in Gothenburg.

Rasmus: Like the Union Carbide Productions, The Soundtrack of Our Lives—

Are you still playing live?

Dan: Not anymore. We had a couple of shows. It’s kind of strange playing live with this project because we play live instruments, most of it, and then edit it on a computer. So it’s not really formed or created to work in a live situation. We’re focused on the recordings, so it’s kind of weird taking the step up onto the stage. I mean, how do you make it work? We’re only two people. You have to do decide: playback or not playback? That was kind of an issue before the last sessions. The indie scene in Gothenburg is very much playback-based. We don’t really want to make a playback show. We had a huge light show and made remixes of the whole West Coast album. But it’s kind of a big apparatus, almost too big for us to handle. So now we’re focused on recording.

It’s rumored that you had an album ready for release, but tossed it to go back into the studio with a live band.

Dan: Silverbullitt. And then there’s the new indie scene: Tough Alliance, Embassy, Air France, Boat Club. That’s really a scene: people getting up, singing into a flower with the CD playing.

Dan: We actually have a couple albums ‘in the can.’ [Before West Coast], I was working on an album that was half-finished, then stopped that and just concentrated on the West Coast songs. There was an album before West Coast. Now everything is back to scratch. We’ve got a lot of material, but it all comes down to when we actually do it. It’s hard to stay in one direction, make deadlines.

Rasmus: I think the biggest scene here would be the heavy rock scene with HammerFall and all that. In Germany they’re kind of gods—Inca gods.

Rasmus: We’ve released one album out of five or six. So, we’ll have to do a retrospective. [Laughs] We can relate to the in-house secret catalogue.

I told someone in a bar that I was here to interview some Gothenburg bands, and they said, ‘In Flames?’

Dan: It’s weird when we get questions about our music, because it’s hard to focus on just that album. Because the whole thing is so much more, and sometimes the interviews get a bit off. Just like the whole Afro-beat thing on MySpace—‘But it sounds more like New Order!’

Rasmus: [Laughs] We almost had the same accountant as In Flames.

We should have taken him.

Dan: The ‘scene’ we belong to, if you can say something like that, started around 2003 or so, with the whole club scene shifting from indie hits to weird disco, psychedelics. But that scene is kind of small.

That’s the so-called Balearic scene.

Dan: But now everything is Balearic; Air France is Balearic.

It’s like a state of mind, almost.

Rasmus: Yeah, you wear a sailor hat and you’re Balearic. [Laughs] It’s

So West Coast was pieced together from years of material?

Dan: There are some guitars from 2002 on West Coast. I think ‘West Side’ is version number six or something.

Rasmus: We re-worked it that much, like 14 times. It was a nice process because we didn’t speak to any first idea we had of the songs. It was like remixing yourself over and over, like, ‘Whoa! Let’s do this!’

Yearbook 2 is a collection of your remixes. When you do a remix, who approaches whom? What about bigger name artists?

Rasmus: With the A Mountain of One thing [‘Brown Piano’], we were planning to do a split single with them, a swap, like an old-school grunge thing with one side each. So we kind of approached each other.

Otherwise, it’s the labels or bands that make the requests.

What are you working on right now?

Rasmus: I’m doing a mix for Windsurf [members of Hatchback and Sorcerer] from California. And that’ll be the last remix.

Dan: I’m mixing a local band called Fontän.

Are you producing the whole album?

Rasmus: No, just supervising, curating. They’re producing it themselves.

We’re just… guidance. The Fontän album will come out sometime this autumn.

Dan: Then our lighting guy has a band called Century with another dude in Oslo, and we’ll release that album.

So you work on projects individually?

Rasmus: Yeah, we kind of take charge of different projects, but we’re always involved in each other’s productions.

And it still comes out as a Studio release.

Dan: Or Information.

You two are Information?

Rasmus: Yeah, with a third guy. He’s kind of…a hired hand. [Laughs] Who does your artwork?

Rasmus: We do… [Referring to a Studio poster on the wall] I’m kind of mad at the printer. There’s a magenta tone. Should be grey. Fifty percent.

Plans to come to the U.S.?

Rasmus: We’ve had some for years, but we’ll never make it [Laughs].

You still tour as DJs, though?

Rasmus: Or the Cure, or straight pop, or nothing weird at all.

Rasmus: We used to, yeah, but we kind of quit that.

Dan: Sort of the problem nowadays is that anything is possible. You can do a straight Afro recording, pure jungle tone. [He chants and taps out a rhythm on his leg]. Or anything, or a symphony—

Dan: Sounds like we’re really tired. [Laughs]

Rasmus: Yeah, in your own bedroom.

Dan: A lot of Balearic questions.

Dan: Then you just have to take one step [record it] and that’s the result.

That’s what you’ve done. So it’s kind of weird having this project: ‘This is us,’ and knowing it’s maybe just us at that time period, those, four months? It’s kind of a schizophrenic project.

Rasmus: They come running with those.

Too many interviews?

For more information on Studio and their releases visit www.thestudio.se and www.myspace.com/sstudio.

Interview by GREGORY HERMANN Rasmus Hagg and Dan Lissvik photographed by KARL ISAKSON

Rampant

Photography - Kristiina Wilson Styling - Angella N. 60

Coat - Peter Som Blouse - Aurelio Costarella Stockings - Donna Karan Shoes - Giuseppe Zanotti

62

Dress - GF Ferre’ Belt - Just Cavailli Stockings - Jonathon Aston Boots - Giuseppe Zanotti

Blouse - GF Ferre’ Trousers - Operations 64

65

Blouse - Skaparinn Shorts - Catherine Holstein Stockings - DKNY

Dress - BCBG Max Azria Stockings - DKNY

Dress - Zero Maria Cornejo Ring - Subversive Jewelry

69

Shrugs - Galliano Top - Chris Han Skirt - Fendi Stockings - Donna Karan

Makeup - Cynthia Rose for Make Up For Ever Hair - Lacy Redway @ lacyredway.com for bigsexyhair Model - Martina @ Supreme Stylist’s Assistant - Todd Jolly

72

Wires

David Studarus Los Angeles

74

75

76

79

80

82

Agnes Thor Sweden

Special Projects

Some Joke s

by Kathy Grayson

Every year, thousands of aspiring artists move to New York for one reason or another. While some take the plunge in order to be among like-minded peers, others go hoping it will be the shrewdest move in their career development. In this essay, Kathy Grayson, a New York painter and curator, describes, analyzes, defends, and valorizes the artistic efforts of one such peer group. This network includes the likes of Terence Koh, Dash Snow, Dan Colen, and Nate Lowman, among others. Her inside perspective sheds curious light on this notorious downtown scene, showing us the role that humor plays in their work, and why, in turn, such work could only be created in New York.

EVERY issue of every art-related glossy magazine reads as though it were their “New York issue” and that alone might justify the recent irritation I’ve been feeling in the air towards a loose group of New York artists of my acquaintance. But I have a sneaking suspicion that deeper lies a situation of misunderstanding that is a logical, but unnecessary corollary to the type of artwork being made in New York right now. The most notorious New York artists are too busy being themselves and making their marks and messing things up to participate in most interviews let alone to encourage critical discourse. Part of the art is a no-comment do what you will-ness, and part of the pose, if you want to call it that, is a “what you see is what you see”, fuck everything, knowing grin.

When reality and clear-headedness begin in-between more rollercoaster-related evening experiences, I keep notes on my perception of this gaggle of gallery artists—many of whom I cherishingly call friends—and my reflections on my favorite works of theirs. Not that they mind in the least and Terence certainly collects them, but the negative press irks me and this thesis-less accumulation is for you, the naysayers: Downtown is alive again! If this is corny to you spend five minutes alone in a room with Aaron Bondaroff and he will have you grinning ear to ear and running home to make a ‘zine for him. Aaron, A-Ron the Don, etc. is self-proclaimedly and even more so in reality at the center of the excitement right now in New York.

With abundant energy and ridiculous slang to sling, Aaron orchestrates, connects, and promotes the most interesting young artists, designers, musicians, and derelicts the city has to offer. His community is like all the things they told you New York could never be like but secretly you hoped it could. Says musician Ethan Swan on Aaron’s masterpiece website The New York Glob: “The skaters and vandals and punks and artists and weirdos can all be in the same room and no one’s getting punched or shit-talked or even left out. You don’t even have to do anything; you just have to show up.”

Hopefully this reality will discourage the component of New York critique that sees the scene as a cliquey cool cool kids club. Many of the most interesting artists have come to New York recently from far afield anyway, drawn by this interdisciplinary downtown renaissance like bugs to a streetlight. Aurel Schmidt comes from the Canadian countryside, Gardar Eide Einarsson from somewhere kids get cool names like that, Hannah Liden from Sweden, Ry Fyan from LA, Patrick Griffin from San Francisco, Steve Powers from Philadelphia, etc., etc.

You don’t have to live in New York Shitty all your life you just have to love the street grit between your toes.

The literal shittiness of downtown is a huge inspiration. Vandalism, crime, drugs, poverty, punk are the big words that get listed, but little things like mangled homemade signs in Chinatown shops, antifreeze green slime puddles leading to sewer drains, scratched love notes on phone booths and subway windows, those are there too. The New York Post, the most despicable newspaper in America, is the newsprint proof of every 94

area where the shittiness of quotidian city life erupts through the cracks in the police state façade. Dash Snow obsessively collects these, and occasionally decorates them as he did in his “corrupt cops” series where each cover portraying a bogus cop in the past few years was exuberantly spooged and glittered.

Why did I bring that up? That is why everyone who hates this stuff hates it right? People who are afraid of their own wieners and masturbate with poststructuralism or something? I dunno. I guess I brought it up as a transition: The best part of New York art making is jokes! New York magazine puts Dash on the cover and in some pantingly fame-struck envy fest inside adds, “How much talent does it take to cum on the new York post anyway?” so Dash prints the emboldened textlet 4 feet large and slatheringly decorates the entire thing. Printed en masse by Peres Projects as a poster, you can still get one if you email them just right. But this is not a serious aside; this is a distraction until we have more jokes at the end. Keep reading!

Trash bin-ing: maybe this woulda made a better transition? Borrowing from low vernacular culture is a trick as old as modernism itself, but these artists find fresh transformations to what will always be a refreshed junk pile here in the city. The current tendency is fairly in tune with Richard Prince style of taking low-brow culture out of context to show hidden narratives of power, control, pathos, greed, class conflict, etc. This is something Nate Lowman does extremely well. I picture him walking around his Franklin street studio or around the internet or around his memory and being able to extract only the most polyvalent, bizarre and poignant bits of visual culture and knowing just what small transformation to make to get them to glow bright. In his collaborative exhibition with Dan Colen, Closing Down Sale, recently at Maccarone, they got a Will Smith movie, a “honk if you’re horny” trucker sign, and some novelty lighters to coexist in a lo-fi amalgam that was refreshingly no more than the sum of its parts. This literal use of materials has allowed Artforum to reintroduce the adjective “ham-fisted.”

How punk, how pop? These words should not be in the same sentence fragment but the mingling of the worst bits of the “establishment” and the most renegade anti-establishment energy are going into artworks that ultimately are cherished by the establishment. Leaving the artist free from the responsibility of their reception, how do artists in New York today reconcile these divergent tendencies? The “pop” that tantalizes artists is of a certain ilk: it includes junk from a 99cent store more than JCREW, degraded and shamed celebrities more than red carpet heroines, and truck stop chintz instead of shopping mall material. Less Hamptons, more Coney Island. Kembra developed her Karen Black Flag from exactly that aforementioned trucker trash, and her sewn vagina piece for Penthouse, not Vogue.

Dash Snow & Dan Colen Nest, Deitch Projects 2007

Aurel Schmidt, Weeping Woman, 2008 Pencil, colored pencil, acrylic on paper 27 x 33 inches

Special Projects

“…Making money is art, and working is art and good business is the best art.”

Money is now happening to this group lets not beat around the bush and mention Terence in the context of sincerity, swaddled in fur and Fendi in his all-white Canal street building. Terence is a charlatan: he lies so often it becomes truth. He minces, he watches, he tells you what you want to hear. He speak Chinese, you want Chinese? He has recently been on at least four magazine covers photographed as or with the words WARHOL across him, and I think we can all agree with this relationship and put it aside. But Terence is a strange white animal: his artworks are not mass produced fuck-yous to the market (although some sculptures covered in “gold” may be mere spray-paint) but are rather delicate, degraded, half-dreams half nightmares as unique as he is. His artworks are poems written during a fantastic glowing all night party. And despite all the white, when Terence is black he is very very black: a recent exhibition in Zurich found Koh rebuilding the Last Supper in black with skeletons and a poison-ant filled cast of himself as Christ. The exhibition, called GOD, included a black catalogue teeming with photos of pornographic violence and degradation featuring the artist and mysterious men.

Speaking of girls, which we haven’t yet at all really, Aurel Schmidt builds Archiboldo-esque babes out of the punkest junk around, all illusionistically and elegantly drawn in pastel shades of colored pencil. She literally collects shit off the street and squirrels it home to her Long Island City studio to draw and ponder. She had me elbow deep in trash more than once to help her get just the right used condom. But I’ve forgiven her for that already and can say unrestrictedly that her recent Party Monster series includes some of the most spot-on New York City portraits of a moment that I’ve seen. Only by being there at 4am as whatever crappy cool venue is closing or on Terence’s couch at sun up or covered in unfathomable filth from Dash’s floor the next day can you see the visages in real life that Aurel captures here with blood, puke, cum, drugs, and debris. This is one of the ways that art and life are back in close relationship after a prolonged break up.

That was another transition! Sincerity is a dirty word but one I’m not afraid to use. Without revealing too much privileged info about personal life, will everyone take my word for the fact that these artists are living their works? Many artists are not from a grad-schooled art background and their diversity of life experiences breathes fresh energy into what can be a very boring parade of bland art-historical update art. Everything you’ve read about Dash’s playboy millionaire life is a lie; everything you’ve read about a-historical ignorant ingénues is off. Terence only ”came out of nowhere” to the world at large but to his friends he was a severely struggling Canadian Chinese freak in a shit apartment down here below Canal. The back-story should be irrelevant. If you look at the artworks with a little optimism, parting the imparted cynicism just a tad, you will get all the real deal feeling from the artworks themselves.

Terence Koh The End of My Life as a Rabbit, Deitch Projects 2007

Special Projects

Koh is a few conceptual rotations ahead of the curve, and if you catch yourself irritated by his facades and phoniness, you are right, but a little behind. To explain how such layered insincerity becomes the most felt and real thing you have experienced, try this example: Terence recently gave a lecture in Berlin where, pulling up in a black Mercedes, he daintily excited the vehicle in head to toe S and M fierce Geisha drag and was escorted/carried to the stage. From the podium, Koh presented a series of slides and video relating to politics and sexuality, and fervently spoke, in complete gibberish, for 30 minutes. If you have ever tried to generate nonsense, you will find after about a minute or so that you have run out of the energy and creativity it takes to make non-meaningful speech. Terence performed this marathon of activity in the most constricting outfit and with the most rigorous deadpan to create this work, his comic masterpiece.

Speaking of jokes, some jokes: Aaron’s entire speech, which is a huge part of his art, revolves around his hilarious creative misuse of language. His best t-shirts are jokes like “never not working” with a joint and a pencil, POST-911 in the New York Post font, how he describes his old store as “junk in the front, crack in the back”, how he tells haters to “leggo my ego”, how whenever he sees “found art” in the street (i.e. trash or building materials or crack pipes or, or) he yells “call Deitch!” Actually that joke is a little too close to home.

Dan Colen paints a Disney-esqe candle whose smoke spells BLOW ME. Kembra updates Yves Klein body art using her own rump in a series of abstract butt paintings called “Sit-Ins”. Patrick Griffin paints large punk pin paintings that read I’M INSINCERE AND I MEAN IT and HAVE A NICE DAY (ELSEWHERE). Steve Powers paints paintings with slogans like ASS GAS OR CASH, NO ONE RIDES FOR FREE or YOU HAVE ONE NEW MESSAGE with a one-finger salute. Dash collages New York Posts together to read SNUGGLING GAY COPS DIED IN MY ARMS. I suppose this is less a joke than a perverse reality or dream but you see what I mean. What else? I close my eyes and picture a photo he took of a branching tree that looks like a wrinkly vagina, a zine of photos of his baby Secret with various facial hair arrangements drawn on. Or wait, how he decorated his Nest installation with such favorites as, “Have a stable relationship: fuck a horse” and put up a t-shirt reading, “No white lady, I don’t want your purse!” his friend Jack Walls gave him. How he called his last show “God spoiled a perfect asshole when he put teeth in your mouth.”

Nate Lowman Installation shot, United Artists, Ltd. 2008 Image courtesy of Michele Maccarone Gallery

Kembra Pfahler (front) The Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black

Aurel Schmidt, Sniffy, 2007 Graphite and colored pencil on paper 15 x 15 inches

Special Projects

Everything Terence does is a serious joke. Have you heard this one? He hosted a show at his gallery (called Asian Song Society so Terence could tell all his friends when he had an A.S.S. OPENING, ha ha) where the press release stated that North Korean artist Chang Chol is exhibiting packing peanuts shipped from the US to North Korea and back to represent “an ultimate refusal of the west”. Except Chang Chol is not a real person and Terence just wanted to fill his gallery with peanuts for people to swim around in. I could really go on forever. You’ve been a great audience: thank you and good night!

Despite Terence’s flamboyant expenditure as art activity, many other artists on the scene exhibit themes of antiboom angst: for example, Nate’s whole oeuvre contains the anxiety of imminent collapse. Crazy whirlwind of an artist Agathe Snow recently threw a “recession beach party”, hilariously featured in ELLE Magazine, where she fed fifty people for under two-hundred bucks with shit from the back of a U-Haul filled with sand and a taped up beach photo. Kembra’s prevailing mandate of AVAILABISM states that you can only make things out of the materials available (and usually scavenged, donated, or free), and must do everything yourself. Closing Down Sale, we covered that already, right? What these artists are really fascinated with is the decadence and decay of (late) (post) capitalism. Nate tells Tokion his soul is “somewhere between retail and spiritual” and retail is about to take a dive. Whatever, all of us have eaten rice with barbeque sauce for a week, or are immanently about to. Artists are as notoriously durable as cockroaches. But the optimism comes from these artists’ dogged pursuit of turning shit into gold. Which Terence literally made once as an art piece.

Laughing all the way to the bank or maybe just laughing through the tears. Why is New York repeatedly the epicenter for artists working in this post punk punning pop mode? Why doesn’t New York produce abstract, spiritual video artists or conceptual figuration sculptors? I think unless you are interested in and inspired by all the low down dirty shit that happens here in New York, you would have moved away long ago. And the art world and its surrounding party monster make us all crazy and self-conscious and the best of us respond in an interesting way. You couldn’t make these artworks somewhere else, they are as befouled and bemused as we all are here.

All images courtesy of KATHY GRAYSON and DEITCH PROJECTS unless otherwise noted.

MUSIC | INTERVIEW

Aeroplane Pop music appears to be entering a new phase of sophistication. Artists these days are engaging the entirety of recent music and cultural history in their pursuits of fresh riddums, combining genres with a flare heretofore unseen (-heard?). Rising acts like MGMT, Cut Copy, Hercules & Love Affair, and Yeasayer are mining the hell out of seventies progressive rock, mid-western contributions to dance music, cosmic disco, psychedelia, straight Motown R&B, croony folk, club culture, and so on in their investigations of melody and good sound.

Aeroplane, a Belgium-based band fronted by Stephen Fasano and Vito De Luca, is running with this pack, too. Their take on where pop music is heading embraces slower, steady rhythms complete with kicky, disco-inspired bass, SWEET electric guitar riffs, and so-called ‘balearic’ harmonies. They’ve remixed Low Motion Disco, Allez Allez, MGMT, and Cut Copy, among others.

They’ve collaborated with Kathy Diamond on track. They’ve released three of their own singles, and are preparing to put out a full length album. They’re DJing up and down and across Europe. In short, they are pretty accomplished for an outfit that was officially launched less than a year ago. We jumped at the chance to throw a few questions Stephen’s way (Vito was vacationing).

108

AOA EPN MUSIC | INTERVIEW

109

INTERVIEW | MUSIC

Your music is usually labelled as ‘balearic disco’. Do you agree with this classification or do you think there’s a more accurate description of what you’re producing?

Stephen Fasano: We do pop music with disco, seventies psychedelic pop/rock, and italo synth-pop influences. People always want to classify bands in a style… We don’t care about that, we do music we like!

Do you aim to make dance music or are you guys after something else?

Not inevitably… If you want to dance on our music, no probs! Our first album will be a little bit different than what we did before…

Is there an era of music that most influences your sound? What about your music makes it distinct from music of previous eras?

We love the Brian Wilson’s arrangements, the Elton John’s piano, the Pink Floyd’s guitars echoes, The Who’s drums, the Moroder’s arpeggio, the Lucio Battisti’s melancholy… We don’t want to imitate all of these but inspire ourselves with new compositions, arrangements, and sounds.

If you were living say one hundred years ago, what sorts of instruments would you be making music with?

Harps and strings.

How do you feel about vocals? You seem to use them sparingly in most of your songs. Any particular reason?

In general, when we do a remix for someone, we keep the vocal or a part of it -- it’s fun to compose around it. A reason for why we don’t use many vocals in our own songs? Maybe neither of us can sing.

How do you two work together? What do you each contribute? How did the collaboration come about?

At the beginning I started to work with Vito with a clear vision of the music I wanted. Now we share all our ideas. In general, Vito start with a new melody and we find together the best way around. Vito is a musician, he plays guitars, synths and basslines.

My girlfriend told me that listening to some of your music makes her think of traveling, watching landscapes pass by, and surveying the inner landscape. Any of that resonate with your intentions or feelings about your music?

We are dreamers… We make sounds or synth melodies with an image, a landscape in mind. This image livens up when we add in our bass, drums, effects…

For more information on Aeroplane visit www.myspace.com/aeroplanemusiclove.

Interview by DREW STOCK Photo courtesy of AEROPLANE

Reverb

112

JP Candelier Vermont

IDENTITY

Rock STars, Party Goers, Drama Queens, and artists. people that fascinate me, all of them Latinos.

122

DULCE

pinzon

brooklyn, ny

Quartz and Rough Emerald Necklace - Ellen Christine Dress, Jacket - Khoon Hooi 128

Ice House

Photography/Concept/Art Direction - Philip Valende Styling - Cameron Carpenter & Kevin Stinson Ice Sculpting - Takeo Okamoto @ Okamoto Studios

Fur Poncho - Sao Paolo Blouse - Chili Cuoture London Bubbled Hem Skirt - C. Carpenter Takeo wears throughout: Shirt - European Culture Pants - Custo Barcelona Sunglasses - Ray Ban Hat - His Own

Jacket - Custo Barcelona Dress - Sherri Bodell Shoes - Ruthi Davis

Dress - Molly Morgan Sparkle Tights - American Apparel Silver Boots - A.F. Vandervorst

Dress, Coat - Khoon Hooi Foil Tights - Norma Kamali Shoes - CKC

Fur Stole - Linda Richards Pod Jacket, Arm Warmers - BNX Headpiece - Ellen Christine Couture Millinery Satin Dress - Jackie Rogers Crystal Embedded Shoes - Martinez Valero

Makeup - El-leo for Mac Pro Hair - Daleesa Weary Model - Amanda Booth @ New York Model Management First Assistant - Duck Five Second Assistant - Mike Hulsey Third Assistant - Eli Ceballos Production Coordinator - Chelsea Nalley

INTERVIEW | ART

Ste ven Har r ing ton Magical Mystery Tour

Steven Harrington lives and works on both commissioned and self-inspired art projects in Los Angeles, CA. Influenced by images, fashion and graphics discovered in Time Life Encyclopedias from 1965-1972, thrift stores, and The Moody Blues, his art might be termed contextual objectivism. He has designed boards for Burton and Element, contributed to the French clothing line Sixpack, and produced a series of silkscreen prints based on the idea of "community". In addition to having exhibited personal work in Los Angeles, New York, Dallas, San Francisco, Chicago, Philadelphia, Montreal, Tokyo, Melbourne and Barcelona, Steven owns and operates National Forest Design with fellow artist Justin Krietemeyer, which has provided design services for Burton, Coca Cola, The North Face, ESPN, Urban Outfitters, Spin Magazine, and Nike.

Recently, to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Sixpack France, Steven prepared a traveling exhibition of original work titled "Our Mountain," sponsored in part by Element, as well as an accompanying 180 page commemorative book. Novel Designs’ Caitling Anne Parker and Alex S. Plapinger caught up with Steven, who was about to take off for a surf trip, to discuss how this magical mystery tour came about.

144

ART | INTERVIEW

“It became quite an exciting adventure.”

So you’re leaving for a surf trip?

Steven Harrington: Yeah, I’m leaving in the middle of the week. I’m going down south to San Diego county and camping there. I’m super looking forward to it. I do it every year and I’ll meet up sometimes with my parents.

But you live in LA? Yeah I live in South Pasadena and the National Forest studio is up in Atwater Village, Los Angeles.

You’re going on this trip right now but you were just in Europe. How did the show “Our Mountain” come about and why do it in all these different cities?

A friend of mine, Cody Hudson (Struggle, Inc.), introduced me to Lionel, who runs Sixpack France, and told me, “Hey there’s this cool guy who has a clothing line, you should do some work for him.” I did a couple t-shirts for him, he really liked my stuff, and it took off. He hooked me up with Clark Magazine, which is a pretty big culture and music magazine out there in France, and I did the cover for that. Then I worked on several seasons with Lionel just doing the clothing and it was literally like the project grew from three t-shirts to the next season I was doing all over prints and all over graphics for him, and then just recently I did my own signature custom line, shortly after which he asked me to work on this art show. I told him that I’d been wanting to do a show based on this idea of going up to this mountain with my brother and my dad when we were really young. He was really into it and since I had such a long-standing history with Element Skateboards we asked them for sponsorship and they said yeah. From there we just took the momentum that we were building and scheduled several days in Paris, Barcelona, Milan, and Berlin at various galleries. Then we released a book out there, some prints, Element skateboards, a couple t-shirts, some fabric and some three dimensional pieces. So it was this really natural progression as to how it slowly shaped up and evolved. I had no clue that it would turn into this big touring show and that we were going to be releasing a book. It became quite an exciting adventure.

Any highlights from the trip? A favorite city?

I think Paris. We were there for the longest. But Paris in general was just a really great city and everybody there was really into the work and really embraced what I was doing. It was cool because most of the time you go to visit cities and, especially cities when you travel overseas, you feel kind of outside the culture. But we flew directly right into this really cool crew of friends and people and they just treated us so well. The food was also very much a highlight.

And you showed at the Lazy Dog in Paris?

Yeah it’s really cool. It’s like Zakka, the bookstore out in New York, but

it’s really, really design and art-driven. I was really tripping out because I feel like I stay on top of books and publications pretty well, but out there there were so many published pieces that I wasn’t familiar with and so many books that I had never heard of.

I didn’t realize that you had designed Element Skateboards in the past.

What were the earlier boards? Are you going to keep designing boards with Element?

Yeah. I’ve actually designed for them for...maybe two years. I’ve designed over seventy-five boards for them and over a hundred pieces of apparel.

A lot of it is very heavily branded so some of the stuff you would never even know that I had designed it.

And so clearly, you’re a surfer too. Have you ever designed surfboards?

Would you want to?

Yeah, I’ve never designed surfboards, but, dude, I would love to.

Where do you surf in LA? We surf Malibu a little bit and then during the summer we take a lot of trips down to San Diego county. This place San Onofre nicknamed “Old Man’s” is probably one of my favorite beaches and then San Elijo is a really awesome beach, too. They have campgrounds there so you can just camp for like a week or a couple weeks at a time down there and just wake up and surf every day.

Do you go camping a lot? It sort of seems like you do.

Yeah, yeah totally. I try to get to Yosemite every other year. I go to Big Sur and every year we go surf camping in the summer down in San Elijo.

I’m very much a fan of state parks and all that.

There are a lot of guitars in your work and a musical quality. Do you play an instrument?

I do actually play the drums. My Dad plays the guitar and my brother plays a little bit, too.

You have a little family band action?

Yeah, we definitely get down on the family band.

What songs do you guys play?

My Dad’s way into the blues. So a lot of it’s primarily blues. But then as soon as he leaves the room, my brother and I, it just turns into like SPACE ROCK.

What’s a day in the life of Steven Harrington? Does the sun wink at you as you get out of bed at the crack of dawn and high five a bluebird?

I wish that was everyday. Even with a beer or something…. It really depends. With co-owning and operating National Forest with Justin we keep a consistent schedule. I usually either ride my bike into work or just drive in and we’ll meet up at like 9:30 or 10, and then depending on what we’re working on and depending on how many projects we have, we’ll juggle things throughout the day and then work pretty steady, try to have normal lunch and breaks . We work up until maybe seven and then after that I’ll usually come back to my home studio or stay and work on other personal pieces after that. I’ve been really trying to get my schedule locked back down to a nine to five and just try and rest up.

The whole European tour was so much work and it really threw me off.

I’m trying to watch movies and just immerse myself back into American culture again.

In the past you’ve noted Native American culture and sixties hippie culture as an influence. Is there anything new that’s coming into play for you as an inspiration? What have you been watching, reading, and listening to?

I’ve been purposely trying to immerse myself in this Americana culture.

Like I just recently went to see that latest Batman flick. Just big-budget stuff like that is really interesting to me right now because over the last several years I pulled myself away from that culture. Things I found really interesting were like thrift stores and Native American imagery. But I’ve found myself traveling back recently and throwing the radio on because that’s something that I just never do anymore, and listening, just really trying to pay attention to what popular media has to say these days.

A lot of people note the youthful, playful spirit of your art. There’s a lot of basic shapes and bright colors. Did you watch a lot of Sesame Street as a kid?

I mean, dude, of course! Yeah I watched a lot of Sesame Street... are you guys familiar with Ed Emberly? He was one of the first how-to-draw artists that I looked at. The way he teaches you how to draw is all based on primary shapes - everything is kind of based on circles, triangles, and squares. My childhood has had a major influence on my work and I’m constantly trying to get back to that, those earlier days of thinking and trying to see the world before you’re taught logic and everything. I think that kids have this ability to see the world as though it were alive and that everything around you is animate, and then later in your life you are taught the opposite. You’re taught that things like fruit aren’t alive, that they can’t breathe, and that wood is dead. I’m trying to find my way back to those days of being able to see everything as these living beings and living personalities.

“I’m trying to find my way back to those days of being able to see everything as these living beings and living personalities.”

What do they know that we don’t?

Is your favorite Beatles song “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”?

I think it’s more a voice of optimism. To me it’s pretty much not to take things too seriously, and to keep looking at the world in an optimistic way.

That’s so funny. I actually have to say that my favorite Beatles song is all of the Magical Mystery Tour. Specifically that instrumental piece “Flying.”

So I’m assuming, just from your work such as “Royaume Nous Grandirons Ensemble”, that you speak French?

What direction do you see yourself going in next? I know since you were on tour you had to bring a lot of prints that you could carry from place to place, but do you see yourself doing larger, installation-type work?

I don’t speak French well. A lot of the French that I’ve written in my work is because I’ve worked so closely with a French audience and Sixpack.

And I’ve always been a fan of works that are in other languages. I’m not really one that’s big on making literal comments on current events, but [Un Royaume] is definitely a comment on the general state of affairs, just the general war and all that stuff, it’s loosely based on that. “One kingdom, we should grow together” - it’s definitely up for interpretation but it’s a loose, loose comment on that.

It seems like a lot of your work does talk about this idea of community, or one world. Do you feel that kind of sense of community in LA? Compared to New York, Los Angeles doesn’t seem to have that much of a close-knit feel, but do you feel like you have that sort of artistic community?

Yeah, Los Angeles is a very, very strange city compared to New York and to all the different cities that we traveled around to. But I think that once you find your place and meet the right people that it can become something special. You find your niche within the context of this bigger metropolitan, sprawling city. The concept of exploring this social connectivity and community is an ongoing theme that I’ve explored, specifically over the last couple years, and it speaks definitely beyond the Los Angeles area. But as far as the artistic community here, by nature of making things and making art and imagery, a lot of my friends and a lot of the people that I hang out with are very much a part of the art community, and they’re into show openings and openings at the Family Bookstore and various galleries around town.

If you could do cover art for any novel or film what would it be?

Film, it would definitely be The Adventures of Baron Munchausen by Terry Gilliam. I just watched that movie and just freaked out. And then I’ve been reading a lot of famous American literature, like really classic American literature, and I think a novel would be The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway.

We’re working on this show in Los Angeles. It’s going to be at Subliminal Projects, Shepard Fairey’s gallery. It’s going to be a lot of the prints from the “Our Mountain” show, but we’re adding on. Justin’s creating a bunch of work and we’re going to bring the teepee in there and then we’re going to create a couple more pieces. I also just finished several apparel graphics with Michael Leon of Commonwealth Spec. He’s artdirecting for Nike skateboarding, so I just designed a couple T-shirts for Nike Skateboarding. I’m working with the guys over at Kid Robot on a bunch of random three-dimensional pieces. And then I’m doing some skateboard graphics for Habitat Skateboards. Those Element skateboards are out, and then we are reissuing them for the states in new color waves, and then we’re going to release them on contemporary board shapes as well, so they’ll be skateable. And then I’m just excited because I released that solo book, so I’m working on getting several distributors.

If we were to take the teepee and those bed sheets on a camping trip is there any place you’d recommend?

I’d recommend that you go to “Our Mountain”. But definitely something very spacey, at night, where you can see a lot of stars.

For more information on Steven and his work visit www.stevenharrington.com Interview by Caitling Anne Parker & Alex S. Plapinger Photos and art work courtesy of Steven Harrington

MUSIC | INTERVIEW

Appaloosa If Nico came back from the dead and fronted Air, Appaloosa is what it would sound like – smokey harmony set to trip hop.

Parisian, Anne-Laure Keib and Londoner, Max Krefeld make up the band named after the famed Nez Perce Indian tribe’s favored equine. Like the infamous breed, it appears this Appaloosa is, indeed, a horse of a different color. It all began with a star-crossed conception at a Berlin karaoke bar. Today, two years later, Appaloosa’s fresh off a world tour with indie hit girl Chan “Cat Power” Marshall. If only so many other karaoke crooners could be so lucky. Needless to say, how one goes from bar room balladeer to the big time is a story of serious serendipity. FUTURECLAW sat down with Appaloosa to find out how it all began.

154

AL PO

INTERVIEW | MUSIC

MUSIC | INTERVIEW

You and Max met at Karaoke? Before that did either of you have aspirations to be professional musicians?

Anne-laure Keib: Definitely not me. Before that, when I lived in NYC (I lived there for about 6 years), all the people I knew there were either in bands, DJs, or worked in a music store, or they used to be in bands, and we would meet in a studio (there was one on Avenue A, quite cheap, called Context), and we would pay for a couple of hours, and jam the shit out of it. I was in a band at some point called Avon Futures with my friend Macrae Semans. We played one show for an opening in Brooklyn.

I think this is the interesting thing about music: like anything -writing, taking photos, designing clothes, even love relationships, etc.- things should be accidental. Nothing should be planned. Music is something people do, ‘cause they love doing it. And if it works, it works. Period. The difference with Max is that we structured some songs.

Max Krefeld: I played guitar in the Big Jazz Band at my school, which was great for learning how musical arrangements and dynamics work. A real Big Band is such an out of time luxuriousness and I am very thankful for that experience, which I still benefit from. At some point I developed an interest in making sequenced electronic music, and in 2005 I released an album called “ABC” on a small and sleepy label. It contains 26 tracks named after the letters of the alphabet. It’s my teenage testament born out of romantic DIY spirit.

So other than dabbling in music, what were you doing prior to Appaloosa?

MK: In 2004, after finishing school and moving to Berlin to do my Zivildienst at a nursing home instead of going to the army, which you are obliged to do as a male German, I started making music with two British people (not from the nursing home). The group is called Candyblasta.

This project has been put on ice for some time because of my work with Appaloosa, but we have some very exciting material and there will be a record next year -- we are just in talks with a label.

Apart from producing music, I go to university in London where I have been living for the past year. The story that Anne Laure and I met at Karaoke admittedly sounds too good to be true, but it really happened that way. Antek Walczak, an American artist that we both knew, introduced us to each other that night.

AK: Before Appaloosa, I had moved to Berlin to escape Paris because I was going crazy there. And instead of digging a hole in my brain and putting a coffin inside, I subletted my place and left. It took me a week.

It was LEAVE OR DIE. I thought, “Berlin is cheap -- easy destination.”

I knew Berlin. I had been there years before, but when I moved there I found that it had changed a lot. When I was 20, and I first went to Berlin, I had this boyfriend who was almost two meters tall, very handsome, with long black hair, and he was into heavy metal. I was very curious at the time. I became more “centered”, an individual with goals; less of a daydreamer.

When I arrived in Berlin, my boyfriend was there. He came one week before I came. He stayed for a week. We had a fight. He went back to Paris. But the good thing is, he introduced me to Shara, a woman with red curly hair and a big smile on her face, high heel shoes, or sneakers with glitter on them, and “too much” make up. Shara is a transsexual and she has a daughter. Before I met Max, I was drinking like a fish and hanging out with Shara. And Shara, she realized I was losing it, so she came to my place with some chocolate and some books and some awesome stories to tell. She is anti-drugs, and I was very protective of her, and so was she toward me. Some people on the streets, mostly men, but also people around her, like this cunt from Canada, really treated her like a dog, like they thought Shara could take all their bitterness. It must be very, very hard to be a transsexual.

What I love about Shara is that she is not just about partying, glitter, and stuff. She goes out during the day, too. She is not hiding. She tries to have a normal life. And she hangs out with these punks, and she has this innocence that is rare. And her reasoning is quite healthy. I felt like a tomboy hanging out with her. Super cool experience. I was sad to not see her recently when we played in Berlin, ‘cause she did not check her email on time. SHARA! Before Berlin: Paris. People are super judgmental in Paris. Sometimes it feels like people don’t feel anything here. When you sit on a terrasse and just listen to the conversations. Or read magazines and stuff -- not all of them, though, there is some good stuff too! It is a latin culture, so it is a lot of talking, a lot of “cha cha cha” and cynicism, but not much in terms of “doing”. Or when there is something new happening, you get all these people saying it sucks, or everything becomes “hip” so quickly. There is no time to really build anything countercultural or substantial.

It is so much about fashion here that it has become the most unfashionable city in the world! In Paris there is a total lack of style, no soul. God, I could go on and on about how I think Paris is such a beautiful city but way too bourgeois.

Apart from that, before Appaloosa, I was doing exactly what I am doing now. It has not changed my life. I still have a job and I write. I have been writing for magazines, too, and have published a book, Steerage, l’idéaliste. I see some friends and read and make love with my boyfriend.

But, if the band becomes more “successful” (I hate this word), we’ll be busier. I love playing shows. I love touring. I have toured a lot by myself with Cat Power because Max could not afford to come. I loved it, even by myself. Performing for fifteen hundred people by myself - that was quite an experience!

You mentioned you met Chan fifteen years ago, how did this event happen?

AK: We met on Avenue A in New York City in front of a Mexican restaurant. Chan was with a friend, Marc Moore, who was like “Oh, check the blonde!” Chan came up to me to facilitate the conversation because Marc was too shy to come and talk to me. Two days after, Chan and I were best friends! It was very intense. We were hanging out everyday until she started touring all over the world. At this time, when we met, she would perform in a club called The Cooler. Marc died a couple of years ago, accidentally.

Why name yourselves after an American Indian breed of horse?

AK: Appaloosas were called different things before they were called “Appaloosa”. The name comes from the Palouse River. I have always loved horses, and appaloosas have always been one of my favorite breeds. As a kid I spent hours reading books about horses. One day, I saw this photo of an appaloosa, a stallion named Klaus.

Appaloosas are fascinating: their coats look somehow like a Jackson Pollock painting, their origins are ancient (China, Europe, Russia, who knows?), and the fact that an Indian tribe selected them and bred them.

They have this special thing. And when I was about ten, living in the Parisian suburbs, I saw this Appaloosa mare one day. She had escaped from the garden of an old hermit who lived nearby in the forest.

She was galloping on the sidewalks, free. I saw her many times, galloping.

The police were after her because she was crossing the roads, galloping.

When I saw that mare for the first time, I thought I had seen the white rabbit of Alice’s Wonderland! This was my dream horse, and our band is about that: dreaming.

like someone else. It might sound esoteric, but we started working on this collaboration way before we met each other. You don’t sit down and start from zero. You bring all your emotional baggage with you and you condense it to some minutes of musically choreographed and stylized drama. It’s all in the music.

At moments your sound reminds me of Blonde Redhead. Who are your biggest lyrical and musical influences?

What have you learned from life on the road?

AK: Of course, the first time I heard “All Tomorrow’s Parties”, I was bewitched by the voice. I love the way Moe Tucker sings, too: “if you close the door, the night will last forever…” These kinds of sweet, natural voices. I don’t like technically strong, ‘perfect’ voices. I like emotional voices. I love the way Chan sings. Or Billie Holiday. Those voices, they make you cry, they give you strength, they stick forever. A gift of Heaven, the naked texture of it tells about their souls. On another register, I have always loved Kim Gordon’s voice: “Come on baby are you here? I want to take your breath away, come on, baby.” I love Robert Smith’s voice. All kinds of vocalists: Lou Reed, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder. I don’t know if all this influences me, though. I sing the way I sing. I love Daft Punk, Neu, N.W.A., Glass Candy, etc. I pretty much love what everyone loves!

I still buy CDs and records. But I don’t collect music.

MK: I also don’t collect music. I regularly delete all my MP3s. Maybe it has to do with the fact that all the music that has ever been recorded is available all the time these days. Home recording, the internet, and the people I work with or meet are much more important influences for me rather than particular acts. I listen to all kinds of music, often in a very analytical way: “How did they do this? How did they do that?”

Max, you say you don’t collect music. Is the act of deleting your MP3’s a way to not conform or avoid sounding too much like someone else?

MK: Not at all. It’s not very stimulating to worry a lot about sounding

MK: The show must go on! It was a completely new experience for me because I had never been on tour before. I had played a few shows here and there, in small clubs in Germany, solo and with my other projects like Candyblasta - but touring with Cat Power and playing all those big steeped-in-history theatre venues was very special. There wasn’t much time between us knowing that we would tour with them and us actually being on stage in front of the fifteen hundred plus people that came to see Cat Power. I am grateful that Chan made this happen and for Anne Laure’s performance. Traveling through the USA was particularly great.

I would love to return and play there.

AK: Touring is life at a fast pace: you wake up, eat breakfast, sound check, play a show, hang out, sleep, next city. But the new thing was to learn about how it works on stage (sound, audience, etc). and how to keep a schedule, and learn how to only drink one or two beers a night (that is what I do) because next day is the next show. So that is what I have learned: stay focused and just do the work as seriously as I can.

Anne-Laure, you said you like voices with emotion, and your own voice suggests a similar sound. When you are singing what feelings do you pull from to convey a song?

AK: When we recorded the song “The Day” in Berlin two years ago I remember I was stressed ‘cause we only had two days left to record some songs with a good mic. I wanted to finish the work and do it properly and not have to come back to Berlin, later, and finish it. The mic was in front

of a window at Max’s apartment, and I said to Max, “Let’s light some candles.” I kept telling him the lyrics say ‘I would die for this feeling.’

I was emphasizing die, kind of angry. Because I feel sometimes people think it is easy to say some words or write stuff, like many people say things and they don’t touch what they say. But this thing, I really meant it: “[…] die for this feeling.” I kept saying, “It is not a happy song. I got to really feel it and sing it properly, it is like religious.” So I put my mind in this frame. I was just looking at the candles and thinking, “Enough with the pain.”

When I sing, I need to feel light - any stress really shows in my voice. I sometimes just close my eyes. I need to remember what I meant when I wrote something, stuff like “the sky is such an absolute”. It means: I am in a cage, but I am going to fly away from this cage, with my mind, and touch something that resembles the freedom I devour.

What’s next for Appaloosa?

AK: Max is coming to Paris and we are going to be recording some new songs at my place with some new material. We are also going to be putting together an album and we are playing two shows here. We got some songs we don’t like anymore so we will keep the ones we like, work on them, and figure out something good, hopefully.

MK: 2009 is going to be the year of the horse.

For more information on Appaloosa visit www.myspace.com/intimate.

Interview by KINSEY LABBERTON Anne-laure Keib photographed by CHAN MARSHALL

[Lost & Found] Photography - Al Thompson Styling - Cheryl Simmons

158

Top - Jamie Kreitman Black Tank - Zara Skirt - Selma Karaca

Pant - Alvin Alley Dress - Iodice Stockings - Stylist’s own Bootie - Sergio Zelcer

Dress - Selma Karaca

Dress - Foley & Corinna Bangles - H & M Necklace - Stylst’s Own

Jacket - Selma Karaca Pants - Charles & Victoria

Gray Sequin Bolero - Jamie Kreitman Black Tank - Zara Skirt - Selma Karaca

Hair - Jamal Hodges Makeup - Riki Frankel Model - Lillian @ W Model Management

White Sequin Bolero - Jamie Kreitman Taffeta Party Dress - Foley & Corinna Pirate Watch Black with Black Swarovski Crystal Dial - VaBene Gold and Black Sandal - Sergio Zelcer

Peter Wears: Blazer - 7 Diamonds Jeans - LTB Boots - JMiles 166

Children of the

Revolution

Photography - Nick Zantop Styling - Jenny Kridos & Morgan Withworth Hair and Makeup - Cassandra Celestin Models - Kurt Dofort and Matt Jones @ Republica Management, Peter Mischenko @ Percent Managemnt, Zachary Gesaman Ryan Stewart, Loui Pacheco 167

Loui Wears: Shirt - J. Lindberg Jeans - UNIF Necklace - Kid Viskous Boots - Corcoran Jacket - Stylist’s own 168

Peter Wears: Shirt - Hugo Boss Black Label Jeans - 7 for all Mankind Boots - Dolce & Gabbana 169

Zachary Wears: Jacket - Burberry Prorsum Necklace - Stylist’s own 170

Zachary Wears: Jacket - Burberry Prorsum Necklace - Stylist’s own Jeans - LTB Ryan Wears: Button-up - Diesel Jeans - LTB Boots - Giorgio Brutini 171

Kurt Wears: Jeans - 7 for all Mankind Belt - Diesel Boots - JMiles Necklace - Kid Viskous Ring - Joe Dean Bracelets - Invicta Elements 172

Matt Wears: Pants - French Connection Bracelet - Diesel Boots - Smith’s America Hat - Fashions by Azucar Necklace - Kid Viskous 173

Zachary Wears: Jacket - 4 YOU Jeans - Fever Boots - JMiles 174

Kurt Wears: Jacket - Ted Baker Jeans - LTB Necklace - Kid Viskous Belt - Allen Edmonds 175

Ryan Wears: Shirt, Jeans - UNIF Boots - Rick Owens Gloves - Vintage 176

Ryan Wears: Jacket - Report Collection Striped Tee - Rick Owens Boots - Doc Martens Jeans - UNIF Necklace - Kid Viskous 177

INTERVIEW | POLITICS

Frank Moore Third Party Candidate

American and international media are giving Americans heaps of political choices: Hillary or Obama?

Obama or McCain? Will you vote democrat or will you vote republican? Are you conservative or liberal? George W. Bush: Good or bad? Black president or woman president?

There are more than two choices in the American democracy. Futureclaw took a recent interview opportunity with presidential hopeful Frank Moore of Austin, Texas in an effort step outside the dualistic nature of traditional media coverage.

178

­­ your early campaign address for the New York Foundation of the Arts you stated, “I am a real, serious In candidate.” How do you intend to compete with the major contenders of the 2008 election without comparable finances?

We live as a tribal body. This tells you that I will expand concepts such as a family and family values. My relationships have always been what I am about. So we put our personal relationships and one another first.

This opens up possibilities and expands our ability to use opportunities.

Realistically/practically a write-in candidate cannot win the presidency because the odds are stacked against such an independent candidate in various ways. The lack of money is the least of it. Almost half of the states either outright do not allow their people to write somebody in or make it virtually impossible for somebody to become an officially sanctioned write-in candidate. You can’t win when half of the states are off limits to you no matter how much money you have. Add to this the freezing out of both independent and third party candidates by the mainstream (and most of the alternative) media coverage and so on, and it becomes obvious that winning is not a sane goal for someone in my position to have. Historically, independent and third party candidates have induced new possibilities, expanded our freedoms, and introduced fresh concepts into society, which the mainstream then absorbs. The process is very similar to that of the artist in society. I have operated within the process of an artist in society focused on inducing change in society for forty years, so I’m used to and comfortable within the process: operating with little/no money, getting the message (the dream/vision) out despite the blocks, getting things done in new ways, etc. This interview with you shows the campaign is working! The European mainstream press has given our campaign serious respectful coverage.

It now looks like we will qualify in most states where that is a possibility. That is amazing for a campaign that has no money nor an army of operatives! But the real fuel for me is seeing people fill up with hope when they read my platform.

In her essay Hookergate II, your running mate Dr. Susan M. Block writes that war is porn for journalists.

Her open sexuality quite obviously has political motivations. Upon visiting her Bloggamy, however, my first impression was that it was about a step away from a porno site. The American public has a long history of lambasting open sexuality whilst consuming it privately. How closely does sexual freedom tie into your platform?

Obviously, the odds are not stacked in your favor this election. Why even run?

Well, it gives me a powerful position to outline our dreams in a direct, clear, practical way, thereby exposing who is blocking those dreams, and how and why they have been blocked. In the late Nineties, Sen. Jesse Helms provided me a similar position when he targeted/blacklisted me and four other performance artists. When you are given such a position, I think it is your responsibility to take the ride, to fully use it to expand freedom for everyone.

I never know when something appearing to be trivial will bloom into an important channel for change, be it a show, a magazine, a web station, a series, a political project, or whatever. It takes years to realize the potential of such things. This has always been how my life has unfolded. This campaign started with a Three Stooges shirt!

Mikee, one of the 5 people who I live tribally with, had a Curly for President shirt. For Christmas two years ago, they made me a Frank Moore for President shirt. Fun. But when I wore the shirt, people started seriously asking me what my platform was. So I wrote up a blueprint of how we can create the society we have been dreaming of. The platform was clear, direct, practical. When people read it -even people who at first thought it was an artsy joke- they changed right before our eyes, filling up with hope, saying things like, “This would work!” and “Finally!” and So why don’t we have this now? Their reactions and deep seriousness and longings placed on me the responsibility to put on a real campaign. This set up a feedback cycle, attracting European coverage, the support of a wide range of people, opportunities to address the issues in ways candidates rarely, if ever, do. I always follow openings! Who knows, we may even win this sucker! We have already forced a few states to refine their election procedures.

Do you consider yourself a hippie?

What do mean by a hippie?

For about forty years I have lived tribally/communally. Now the six of us live together in two houses [one of which we built] on a street in Berkeley with four cats. Linda and I have been together for over thirty-five years.

Michael has been with us for twenty years, as have Corey and Alexi. Erika joined us six years ago.

Both Suzy and I use sex in our art, our work, and our lives as a tool for political and cultural change among other things! When you talk about sexual freedom, what you are really talking about is personal freedom, which is basic to my political philosophy. During the Helms’ attack on artists, which is generally considered the first battle in The Cultural Wars, it was always framed in terms of sex. But in reality all of us targeted artists were doing politically motivated art from suppressed groups (gays, women, etc.). The real aim of the attack was to kill this political art.

Suzy and I don’t hide in closets! Funny, sex rarely has come up in the campaign and when it does come up, it is positive! This speaks volumes about our campaign!

Supposing you actually became the President of the United States of America, how do you think congress would react to your extensive cuts in the military budget? How would you convince them to support a 50% military budget cut?

Well, as the Commander in Chief, I wouldn’t spend what they budgeted! But to answer the core of your question: true, I’d be facing a congress full of people in both of the parties who are still operating in the old limiting boxes. However, the fact that I had gotten into The White House would mean the people are tired of wasting money on a bloated, wasteful military designed for an era that has long passed, a military that is used primarily to promote the corporate interest, rather than the real national interest. I would work directly with the people to convince Congress to invest the money into rebuilding our society rather than in insanity.

With a weakened military how would America defend itself?

First, a smaller military is not a weakened military. Our bloated military is out of date by at least forty years in terms of the actual kinds of threats we are or may be in the future facing. This has been true since World War II. In the real world that we live in, we need a much smaller, more flexible military, based primarily in this country. I would cut the pork and the waste out of the military.

To answer the question of how America would defend itself you first need to define what we are defending ourselves from. Our military couldn’t defend against 9/11. Good police work could have.

How would you deal with another attack such as 9/11?

You need a lot more details about such an attack to responsibly answer this question. I would not give up our freedoms and our principles for a myth of security. I wouldn’t invade a third country that had nothing to do with the attack. I wouldn’t wage a war whose goals can’t be explained, a war which has taken thousands of lives, left us much more vulnerable in various ways, left us in debt billions upon billions to China and Japan, placing our financial/economical future at risk.

If we remove our forces from Iraq, what do you see in the country’s near future? Do you feel they need our military support to maintain at least some semblance of stability in such a volatile region?

expectation. Then that expectation would have created my reality. I would have long ago died without any other possibilities.

Funny, they asked the same question about Vietnam. The fact is we need to withdraw. Whenever we do, there will be a chaotic period. That is no reason to put our leaving off. We should work through the U.N. to ease this period. But to put off our leaving would be like putting off getting out of a failed/violent marriage just to avoid admitting the ugly reality.

Instead, my parents rejected this expectation for the possibility they saw in my eyes, for what for them should have been true. This rejection of the cultural expectation of reality could not be a one‑time choice. They had to passionately live their choice everyday, every minute, or the cultural expectation would have sucked them and me into it. It fought them at every new possibility they opened to me. Their passionate commitment to how they thought things should be attracted people to me who kept opening new possibilities for me. Of course, these were in the minority. But I focused on them, making them how people should be, how I wanted to be. So I expected people and myself to be like that. So people were for the most part that way at least I saw them that way. This opened up to me what is called luck. It also gave me the ability to trust and the ability to use opportunities.

You propose a 75% flat tax for all businesses with earnings over five million dollars. This is certainly not appealing to larger corporations. What would you do to prevent the flight of corporations (and their money) from the United States?

Let me be clear: one of my main aims is the breaking up of the big corporations and their negative distorting influence and control over every aspect of our society. We have to break the addiction of going after obscenely huge profits. This addiction is the root cause of most of the problems we face today. I will go after the greed culture.

So the tax is only one aspect one of my platform aimed at the corporations!

Where are the corporations moving to? China? Don’t think so! Europe has similar taxes. It hard to see the corporations moving from the U.S., especially if to sell their products in this country they will have to certify that their products were manufactured in accordance with this country’s labor, wage, environmental, and safety laws (according to my platform) no matter where they were produced.

Your health care plan seeks to eliminate private monopolies of new drugs and health products. These monopolies supply the current private health care providers with the wealth and resources to invest vast quantities of money into further product development and enable them to pay professionals much more than they are paid in other countries for their drug development knowledge and expertise. How would you keep incentive for product development strong in the switchover from private to public healthcare?

Today, because of those monopolies, we pay much more for drugs and have less access to drugs than most Western nations. The drug companies are searching for what will generate the largest profits, and that dictates the research. This means many problems that are deemed unprofitable are left unexplored. Under my policies, companies that develop drugs based on research done at universities, government labs or other public institutions will pay royalties to those public institutions, thereby making future research possible.

Franklin D. Roosevelt hid his disability from the American public. Do you think that the American public will see your paralysis as a weakness or as strength?

Well, first of all I am spastic, not paralyzed. I move, dance! That said, most people see that I’m somebody who gets things done, no matter what -- using my body as an asset, moreover. So they see me as a strong person. I have always been dumb to what is impossible. So I just figure how to do the impossible. I have been doing this all my life! I am sixty-one. I was born with cerebral palsy. I communicate using a laser-pointer and a board of letters, numbers and commonly-used words. But I am a host of a popular public access talk show. Go figure it! So now I am setting my sights, as president, on eliminating poverty, hunger, war, etc.

Impossible, eh?

When I was born, doctors told my parents that I had no intelligence, that I had no future, that I would be best put into an institution and forgotten. This was a powerful expectation with all the force of western science and medicine, as well as social influences, behind it. It would have been easy for my parents to be swept up into this

So the struggle for freedom, and against the powers-that-be, has been my life. And it has been a continuous struggle, struggling with schools to let me in, etc. I have always been a radical. But that became obvious when I was eighteen and invented my head pointer with which I type and communicate. I started writing political columns for the high school paper, as well as putting out an underground paper. I was in the first special class placed on a regular high school campus so that the disabled students could be in regular classes and be a part of campus life. I was involved in the civil rights and anti-war movements. This was 1965 before it was popular to be against the Vietnam War. In the school paper I got into a debate with a G.I. in Vietnam. I was sat down and told that, because of my political philosophy and activities, I was hurting the chances of the disabled students who would come after me. I replied that the goal was to get the rights for the disabled [and for all people] to be complete and equal and that included the right to be political. I would not surrender that or any other right.

Most of your views and actions do not quite coincide with the conservative Republican political stances many Americans choose to align themselves with. Do you have any plan to convince these voters that they should vote for you?

Hey! Ain’t I doing that now? I never sell people short or sell them out! If they read my platform, they can see if it is what they desire!

For more information on Frank Moore’s campaign visit www.frankmooreforpresident08.com Interview by ADAM DeMARTINO Photos courtesy of FRANK MOORE

182

ART & SPORT | INTERVIEW

Kyle Burroughs | Switch Wallride | Photo: Shem Roose

Interview: Travis Card Skateboarding: sport or not? I can remember being younger and reading countless interviews where pros would always be asked this question. To me the answer seemed simple. When asked if I played any sports, my answer was always, “No, I skateboard.” I realize now that by answering in this way, I was saying that skateboarding was different from other sports; it’s separate.

I’m still not sure what exactly skateboarding is.

What I do know is that skateboarding, aside from being a damn good time, is an art form.

Travis Card agrees. Card’s love for skateboarding and the artistic expression it embodies has led him to pursue a career filming skateboarding. The past six years have taken Travis and his camera from San Francisco to Miami, up to Montreal, over to Barcelona, and back to home base in Burlington, Vermont. Having already worked on two videos, the 24 year-old filmmaker is currently working on his next release, due in Spring 2009. In the following interview, Travis Card discusses his experience as a young skateboarder in Vermont, an up-and-coming filmer, and a creator whose mediums are often misinterpreted as being anything but art.

“I like to think of it as inhaling the chaos and projecting my response through my work.�

The madness of society!

ART & SPORT | INTERVIEW

So I asked you this before, but where are you from?

When did you get into filming and start taking it more seriously?

Travis Card: You know that’s a question with a long answer, but let me try and do my best with it. I was born in New Hampshire, lived all around Boston for the first 10 to 12 years of my life. Moved up to Maine for a little while, and came to Burlington, Vermont when I was 14 in 1996.

With the exception of a few winters in Miami, and a couple months out in Europe, I’ve been in Burlington for the past 10 years.

Well, at first you just go out and you might happen to be the kid filming that day, but at a certain point you kind of start to like it. Certain people may not like it, but for me it felt like something I was good at and something that was interesting. I felt like it was cool to be the person actually documenting this stuff.

Where would you say you really grew up?

Burlington.

So aside from being posted in VT where have you traveled lately?

The closest city to us is Montreal so thats pretty routine, beside that Boston, New York, Miami, New Orleans, Cincinnati, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Hawaii and Barcelona have all been recent adventures.

Let’s talk about skateboarding. When did you get into skateboarding?

I initially got into skateboarding around 1991. I got a Bart Simpson skateboard that said “eat my shorts” on the bottom of it, and I would just bomb around on the hills. I couldn’t really do any tricks, I had never seen a magazine or watched any videos. Pretty much me and my brother would just go fly around on our boards like little maniacs. Eventually I started seeing kids in the neighborhood who started building launch ramps and kids would launch off them, but I never got too crazy. I’d say I really started skating in ‘97, about a year after I had been in Burlington. I would go down to city hall park because that’s where the scene was back in those days.

How has skateboarding in Burlington, Vermont transitioned from when you started skating up until now?

There were no skateparks before. So, take Talent, Waterfront park, the Burton bowl, JDK, the Essex park, take all those kids and before any of those parks where there, they were all at City Hall park. Another thing is that the local support has really grown a lot, whereas back then you only had the B-Side. Now there is Talent, Ridin’ High, and Maven.

What is skateboarding in Burlington, Vermont like now?

Popular (laughs). So now, you know, it’s like anything someone sees and they’re fascinated by and they can’t do it, but they want to learn how to do it. I would say the biggest thing that has changed over the years is that skateboarders have become more organized. There’s more of an awareness for it, whereas it used to just be shunned away because people assumed if you skated, you were a punk. Skater punk, you know, Bart Simpson...the bad kid. Things have changed a lot since then because people are realizing that it’s just an art form, it’s like identifying graffiti with being a hobo. Some of the greatest, most talented artists ever have been graffiti artists, just like some of the most talented athletes, not just physically but artistically as well, have been skateboarders.

One thing that has developed a lot over the years is the industry behind it. Now there’s actually an industry that’s paying people once they are at the top of the class for skateboarding, and they are able to make a living if they get there and get into the right situations. Back in the days, it was very uncommon to know anyone around [Burlington, VT] that was getting paid for skating.

You got into skateboarding about 17 years ago. Where along this path did you get into filming?

I’d say around 2000. It pretty much just started out, you know, you’d always be at the spot with your friends and everyone’s skating, maybe someone’s doing something they’ve never done before, they want to try something that would be really cool, you just want to get it on film. It’s the classic documentation. You do it, you film it, and you have it. You’re making something tangible out of something that is hard to put monetary value on. You could describe what you did to someone, you could go and do it again and it might not look the same, or maybe you couldn’t ever go do it again. The fact that you film it actually makes it tangible.

You can say, “here it is, this is what it is.” You’re really capturing the moment right there.

Basically, getting footage became more and more addictive. Every time you push the level you’re at and do something that’s a new accomplishment, you want to continue progressing. Once I realized that people were depending on me to film their tricks, and as people around me progressed as skaters, I knew I had to progress as a filmer. I became intrigued with the fact that I could produce a project with my own creative control, and at the same time get all the skaters around me excited to make a project that represented them as well. It’s a realization that taking all the time to go through the footage and find the best 3 to 5 second clip here and there is worth all the while. You know you’re working towards something.

Tell me about the different projects you’ve been involved with?

Well, aside from little, miniature edits, my first real skate video was called Peace of Time. I made it with Luke Sullivan in April 2004, and we didn’t even know we were going to make a video until we had all the footage together and just decided to try it out. It came out alright, we did a couple premiers, got a little media coverage. It was cool, it was a lot of the kids’ first video and we sold about 1000 copies through local limited distribution. It was like the equivalent of a bad high school project. We had fun and learned a lot. It’s crazy that people still tell me these days when they’ve been watching it.

I put together Family Tree in 2007. All the footage was from ‘05 through ‘06. Family Tree was the first independent project that I filmed, edited, and produced. It sold about 2000 copies. That was the first video that actually got a lot of the kids around here sponsored so you know, it was the first video that got out to the industry, got more than 10,000 views on Youtube. Pretty much the rookie card for my skateboard filming career.

What goes into the process of making a skate video?

First you have to go out and get the footage, which can be discouraging with cops, security guards, etc., not to mention that you’re trying to land the trick and you have all these outside distractions. Its like having someone trying to tackle you while you’re playing a game of golf.

Imagine that. Skateboarders have a lot to overcome before they can get footage, let alone being able to do the tricks they’re trying without getting hurt.

After you go out and get the footage, you have to import it into your computer to some type of video editing program. IVideo is a common one, I use FinalCut Pro. After that, you have to label all the footage and put it into folders to stay organized. Then you have to get each skater in the video and decide which type of song will fit their style. You have to put all the tricks on a timeline and place them all on beats because you want the landings to hit right on beat. You have to move the tricks around and chop them up, add your transitions, maybe some slow-mo or other effects. Next you have to master the sound so it doesn’t crack when someone turns the volume up.

After you get the sound all mastered, you put the DVD menu together.

The last thing I do is get all the artwork together and have the copies made. That’s pretty much the gist of it.

When making a video what types of things trigger your creative process?

The madness of society! I like to think of it as inhaling the chaos and projecting my response through my work.

Music is huge too, a certain part of a song can have something cool going on within the beat or even a certain lyric could spark an idea. Really the vibe of the song determines the kind of edit I’m gonna use, and on the flip side, the type of footage I’m working with helps to shape my choosing a song. I also take a lot from watching TV and movies... studying different directors and noticing subtle things that they might

do and that can invoke random tangents. Really anything can inspire me creatively. Trying to do new things and combine different art forms is what I’m striving for. Overcoming the monotonous norm, that’s the true test, though!

You create art through the use of a video camera and a computer. Are there other artistic mediums that you are interested in?

Yeah, music. My parents were hippies and I grew up going to music festivals. I had a ton of friends that were playing instruments and I was always intrigued by it, but never really focused on any one thing. As I got a little older, I started messing with poetry and rhymes and it seemed to come easy to me. I have a lot of respect for musicians. I’m also a super big fan of graffiti. I think its crazy that people can depict things looking so real with just a can of paint. I feel like graffiti is like skateboarding because its been so looked down upon and misinterpreted. That’s one thing that drew me to graffiti. I really just respect any art form that doesn’t necessarily have to be unique, I just like to see a unique approach on art forms, even old art forms. It’s like skating, everything has been done in skateboarding but you can always do something differently. I think anyone doing it for the right reasons like being creative and innovative, that’s really what it’s all about. Just try something you’ve never done and stay creative with it.

I know this question pops up in a lot of interviews, but I’m interested in a filmer’s thoughts on this. Is skateboarding a sport?

Well...first off I’ll just start by saying “Skateboarding” has many realms.

You’ve got contests, demos, downhill, street, vert, as well as the filming/ photography approach. So in certain areas, specifically the competitive ones, it would seem to be a sport, however, the clear difference is that skating has no defined monetary value. Whereas the goal of most sports is to score points and determine a winner or “Champion” so to speak, skateboarding is really about your own personal goals and accomplishments. For that reason I believe it is an art, and like any art form I think everyone has their own reasons and inspiration behind why they do it.

There are no rules and no rights or wrongs with skating, it’s simply a matter of preference. Some people would prefer to skate big rails and gaps, other people are attracted to the vert/ramp aspect. Me personally, I thrive on the technical side of it. By that I mean doing multiple tricks in one such as a flip trick into or out of a grind, slide or manual. The one thing that defines each skater is their style! You can’t say which type is the best because it’s completely subjective. It’s like trying to decide who was better, da Vinci or Michelangelo? That’s the great thing about skating, you can take what you want from it!

Very werd. So what are the latest projects you are working on?

The new promo video is called Spare Change and it’s free with the purchase of anything on our website, Symptomscollective.com. It’s basically a free promo video just to show everyone what we’ve been up to before the new full length video comes out next spring. Don’t be confused by the name or the word promo, it’s got some gems.

Alright Travis, time for your shout outs.

Shout outs to THE ENTIRE Symptoms Collective, my mom and dad for encouraging me to follow my dreams. My brother Jarrod and sister Shari for paving the way. All my friends and family for whom this life would be meaningless without. The true supporters of independent artforms, and everyone spreading the positive vibration.

Interview by GEORGE FOX Photography by CHRIS LISLE, SHEM ROOSE

TE H I W D OO V OO

186

JAMES COOPER Bermuda

Paddy Johnson is an artist/blogger who is changing the way the art world works by participating in an online community of critics. She shares some of the latest information on contemporary art.

Burt Bacharach, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Hot Chip, The Persuasions, Dan Deacon, Cori Bishop (aka Elyse Weinberg), United Steel Workers of Montreal, The Dodos, Liam Finn, Wintersleep, Dark Meat, Headlights, Playdoe, Dabaaz, Kim, Eric Bélanger, The Veils, WIRE, Crystal Castles, Black Kids, St Catherines, Vetiver, Silver Apples, Thomas Function, Julie Doiron, Chad Van Gaalen, Dominique Grange & Jacques Tardi, Great Lake Swimmers, Katie Moore, Socalled, Woodhands, You Say Party!

We Say Die!, Sam Shalabi, Gatineau, Jason Collett, Chocolat, Irma Thomas, Wedding Present, Evangelicals, Beach House, Jana Hunter, Cex, Teeth Mountain, Teki Latex, D’Urbervilles, Michie Mee.

www.artfagcity.com

www.popmontreal.com

Art Fag

City

5th Generation Warfare

Illustrative is a two week illustration and graphic arts festival that occurs twice a year in various cities across Europe. This year in Zurich there will be exhibitions by 25 internationally recognized artists as well as conferences and an additional exhibition by the winners of the festival’s Young Illustrators contest. www.illustrative.de

The horizon is where something enters your view, and I’m not worried about the future at all. The future is over the horizon. I have no idea what the future will bring and I’m not really qualified to make predictions.

I do see the present, though, and that’s what worries me. www.wishtank.org 194

A sardonic and not-eloquent running commentary on hipster culture, style, and music. www.hipsterrunoff.com

The perfect excuse to go to wonderland. Beautiful parties, beautiful people, beautiful music, and geothermal energy. www.icelandairwaves.com

“The Champagne of Comics” www.marriedtothesea.com

Rising out of Los Angeles alongside band members Thomas Greene (percussion, drums), Andrew Carter (cello, keys, theramin), Ben Jaber (French Horn), and sound engineer Jordan Long, Karin Tatoyan’s unique (crazy) vocals tie together superior instrument manipulation. Think Björk, only younger, hipper, and not as angry. www.myspace.com/karintatoyan

friendattack

Laura Marais Montreal, QC 2008

In seven words or less, what is friendattack?

Photo website documenting Montreal’s exuberant and effervescent nightlife scene (almost 7 words! : - )

Why is night time the right time?

Night time combines a lot of good elements for me in terms of the type of photography I like doing. I like candid photography, the “hit or miss” kind of approach and the mix of darkness, music, alcohol, dancing and sexual tension often creates a sort of euphoria. People tend to let go of their inhibitions and that’s what I like to capture. It’s harder to get this kind of unawareness and spontaneity in broad day light, when you are holding a camera right in front of someone’s face.

Another reason why night time is interesting to me is because you never really know if what you see is all that there really is. Evolving in the party scene just makes this even more interesting because of all the stereotypes that are usually associated to it. I mean, I often run into people during daytime that I have photographed at parties, and I am amazed to see how little I could have told about this person, judging only by what I saw of him or her on the dance floor. It’s all about the idea that appearances can be deceiving and that we are all multifaceted people. Just because you like dressing up in glitters at night doesn’t mean that you can’t be a physics PHD student by day.

Do kids follow the lights and music, or is it the other way around?

I think the music is always there to begin with. As for the people, I think it goes both ways. There are the ones who will pay attention to what’s going on, be curious about it and who will want to learn more and go out because they care about what they are going to see and who is performing. Some others will follow it because it’s the “thing of the moment” or because it conveys an image that they want to see themselves associated with. In the end, I think the “follower” influences it as much as the savvy connoisseur since they both, for their own reasons, keep the heart of the music and the lights pumping. www.thefriendattack.com

Marco Wagner Hรถchberg, Germany 198