HONK!03 The Divas by KALTBLUT Magazine

ART PHOTOGRAPHY MEDIA

Diane Pernet Natalia Avelon Kazaky Suzana Holtgrave Alis Pelleschi Ziad Ghanem Lola DuprĂŠ 1 Jackee Word Sherry Vine Christian Branscheidt Pascale Jean-Louis Mariel Clayton Anita Bresser Zachari Logan Lukasz Wolejko-Wolejszo Amanda M. Jannson Claudio Alvargonzales Tera Marco Rothenburger Aaron Feaver Christo Mitov Marina Gehrman Nicolas Simoneau Emma E.K. Jones Fernando Arriero Marquez Shel Fuller Thomas Langnickel-Stiegler Magnus von Keil Polys Haikal Noyes Marcel Schlutt Nina Kharytonova Cover photo: Pascale Jean-Louis Model: Sarah

#03

THE

DIVA

ISSUE

People with schizophreni ality that are strikingly d and shared by others aroun torted by hallucinations a schizophrenia may feel frig

I DVA Bow your head in reverence and pray!

ia may have perceptions of reHer power is her freedom different from the reality seen her freedom is her joy nd them. Living in a world herdisjoy is boundless and delusions, individuals with like the wind unstoppable ghtened, anxious, and confused

sometimes soft and gentle, sometimes like a hurricane she takes you, and she sweeps you up and far away ... Step beyond, become immortal in the mirror of her gaze.

taken from the poem â&#x20AC;&#x153; Divaâ&#x20AC;? by Silvia Hartmann

#01 #03

Editor in chief Marcel Schlutt Editors Amanda M. Jannson, Emma E.K. Jones, Polys, Nina Kharytonova, Marina Gehrman, Christo Mitov, Jackee Word, Claudio Alvargonzales Tera Freelance author Thomas Langnickel-Stiegler, Shel Fuller, Drew Eastman, Ben Rodgers Graphic design, layout Haikal Noyes Retouching Nicolas Simoneau Web Daniel Ellmenreich Published by Marcel Schlutt & Nina Kharytonova HONK! is based in Berlin / Germany

Welcome to our 3rd issue: the DIVA issue! The word diva today is mostly abused to describe female artists with oversized egos. We here at HONK! think this is wrong. If you look at the origin and the meaning of the word you quickly understand that it refers to people who – with their work, their personality, and their art – inspire us, the more normal people, and draw us into their spell. They have that certain aura; when they enter a room they draw all attention and looks upon themselves. It’s something we can’t tear ourself away from. Usually it’s women that are listed in this group of people – BUT that’s wrong! There are also many men who are great divas: Klaus Kinski, Bruce la Bruce, Maradonna, David Beckham; just to name some of them. Talent, charisma, ingenuity, self-confidence, goodness, and grace are among the features that describe a true diva. In our third issue we would like to introduce this rare species. Artists from various genres of whom you will hear a lot soon. I would like to say thanks to every person who helped me with issue #03. It was great working with you guys.

Greetings, Marcel Schlutt PS: I would like to dedicate this issue two very special ladies, Amanda M. Jannson and Emma E.K. Jones. Without you the work on this issue would have been so much harder. Thank you for Inspiration, your honesty, and your friendship.

C NT #03

8 The One: The Dark Side of Barbie

Photo

Photos by Mariel Clayton

44 Pure: An ode to feminity Photos by Aaron Feaver

88 Fume of Virginity

Photos by Marco Rothenburger

140 Jackee Word: Großstadtmädchen Photos by Joana Dias

172 Your Majesty

Photos by Christian Branscheidt

208 Paris

Photos by Fernando Arriero Marquez

16 Don’t blame the diva

by Thomas Langnickel-Stiegler

32 A Shaded view on a fashion diva

Topic

Interview with Diane Pernet

38 Bette Davis: Tribut to a godess by Nina Kharytonova

84 A letter from New York by Sherry Vine

98 Movie star: The next generation Interview with Natalia Avelon

138 The queen: New York by Shel Fuller

166 The Future: Berlin Faces you should know 168 Obama and the Beast by Christo Mitov

214 The X-Insider 216 Revenge of the nerds: Queens with beards

TENT 22 Drama Babes

Fashion

Photos by Lukasz Wolejko-Wolejszo

74 Dandy Galore

Photos by Anita Bresser

94 A man should wear 96 A woman should wear 104 I’ve seen that face B4

Photos by Pascale Jean-Louis

120 Scary Mary

by Alis Pelleschi

164 Must Have 184 I want my clothes to scream loud: love me,... Interview with Ziad Ghanem

188 Hotel Angst: Menege a trois Photos by Suzana Holtgrave

Art/Media

42 Bete Noire

by Emma E. K. Jones

54 A lady plays in her own league Interview with Suzy Love

60 Who the hell is Madonna? Music reviewed by Polys

66 Trash Divas 68 Horrifying and Hilarious Interview with Lola Dupre

116 Mr. Almodovar and his bizarre world by Claudio Alvargonzalez

128 I am your god: The office diva

Text and Artwork by Drew Eastman

130 Oh boy, it’s a band: Say hi to Kazaky 146 To express masculine bravado & superiority Interview with Zachari Logan

156 Various Artists 182 Women who rock: Museum

THE

SIDE

THE

ONE

DARK

BARBIE

by Mariel Clayton www.thephotographymarielclayton.com Interview by Marcel Schlutt

She is an icon! She is a role model for generations of young girls! Always good-looking, politically correct. Yes that’s Barbie! We have always known that she has a dark side! Mariel, who was born in South Africa and now live in Canada, is an artist who shows us this side of Barbie. His pictures are incredible and full of little details. You must look back several times to see everything. Let´s meet Barbie´s „ best friend“ HONK!: When did you meet her the first time in your life? And how to you came up with the idea to show her darkside? Mariel: I don’t remember when I got my first Barbie! I think I must have been 6 or 7 years old. I remember it was the ‘Peaches and Cream’ Barbie doll. I’m intrigued by sociopathy and the whole outer facade/ inner workings concept and how the two don’t always correspond. Barbie, as the ultimate stereotypical feminine icon just seems to lend herself to an alternate portrayal. I think because she has been idolised as the epitome of everything that is ‘good’ about being female, being sweet and docile and taciturn etcetc. She has been sanitised to the point where she has absolutely no pesonality whatsoever,

so she just seemed to be the perfect model to explore the idea of this hidden evil. The Theme of HONK! #03 is DIVAS! Is Barbie a diva for you? I guess so - I think of the word ‘Diva’ as having a negative connotation though, someone who is bossy and demanding and spoiled. Someone who treats people badly because they believe they are better. I think there may be a part of Barbie that implies that. Every single picture is amazing! And so much is going on there, the set, the decoration, every single piece. I quess it needs days to do all this. How long do you work on one picture?

It’s tough to say! It absolutely depends on the complexity of the piece, and whether I need to make anything for it. For a regular ‘Homicide Barbie’ shot, it usually takes about a minimum 5 hours or so, to set everything up. While I am composing a shot, I constantly stop to look through my camera and make sure everything is lining up the same way through the lens ( I learnt this the hard way, your perspective when you’re sitting at a table is not the same as a camera view). If it’s any of the ‘Hystoria’ pieces - those took a lot longer, about 10 - 15 hours or more. For those I had to make some of the props, costumes etc. It’s hard to say exactly the length of time, because I’m not really paying attention. With most of them I also have to stop, go to work (cursed day job) sleep etc.... My favourite pictures are the one where Barbie is having sex. And also there the details are great. Where do you get the dildos etc from? Is Barbie a sex symbol? I make the little dildoes by hand using polymer clay. I don’t see Barbie as a sex symbol at all - she looks nothing like a ‘normal’ human female. That sort of body isn’t even found in nature. She is a representation of what companies THINK women should aspire to look like, but the women who try to make themselves look like Barbie... are extremely unnatractive and ‘fake’ looking.

Did you have any trouble with „Mattel“ the company who owns Barbie? So far I haven’t hear anything from Mattel... I’d like to keep it that way!!! Mattel tends to sue people who don’t ‘play nicely’ with their toys. What will you do in the future with your doll-photography? Is there more work coming like this? I started out doing this as a hobby, and I will keep doing it as a hobby - as long as I keep getting the ideas I will keep making the pictures! Can you pay your bills from your photography work? Or do you have to do something else for living? I work full-time as a travel agent - that’s how I pay the bills! I make a little money selling prints - and with that I usually buy more dolls or miniatures. I don’t know if this would ever become something I could do as a living, it would be great though - but I’m not holding my breath :)

What our ways

dealingthe

with

exceptional

might say about our

societies

by Thomas Langnickel-Stiegler

When Elizabeth Taylor died in March, some newspapers and magazines spoke of her having been the “last diva”. Undoubtedly, The Taylor was one of the last great actresses of Hollywood’s Golden Age. Being one of the most famous film stars of her time, she was adored not only for her acting, but also for her glamorous lifestyle and her beauty (especially her distinctive double eyelashes). Strictly speaking, she wasn’t the last of her kind, though. Even 30 years after the death of Maria “La Divina” Callas, there are still a couple of classical divas who are very much alive. Within the opera world Spanish soprano singer Montserrat Caballé, who celebrated her 78th birthday this April, is referred to as “La Superba”, meaning that she has reached the status of a diva. American soprano Renée Fleming is also known as “the people’s diva” – due to her “modest suburban upbringing in rural New York”, as The Observer put it. As for Liz Tay-

lor’s colleagues: just think of 76-year-old Oscar-, Golden Globe-, Grammy-, and BAFTA-winning Italian actress Sophia Loren, who gained the status of a diva in the 1960s, when she was one of the most popular actresses in the world. Then again, considering the whole package of ideas that colloquial language has attributed to someone being a diva, Liz Taylor may just as well have been one of the last to combine great talent and success on the one hand with a glamorous appearance,

DON’T BLAME THE DIVA

flamboyant lifestyle, and a scandalising personality on the other. The Caballé’s sunny disposition, The Loren’s sharp wit, and The Fleming’s unshakable grip on reality are vivid examples for artistic genii acting out their extraordinary talents while at the same time cultivating their authentic selves. Modern divas, on the other hand, tend to concentrate on rather flamboyantly-seeming peculiarities: In a 2008 article on guardian.co.uk Ian Gittins presented some contemporary artists that are considered divas and their habits: from Madonna demanding “25 cases of Kabbalah water backstage at her gigs, not to mention 12 dozen boxes of strawberries and Yorkshire tea” to Mariah Carey’s “bottle of Cristal, four champagne glasses and a box of bendy straws” to Jennifer Lopez “scal[ing] down her fruit demands at a recent Miami charity event to merely mango, green seedless grapes, pineapple, papaya, cantaloupe, honeydew melon and watermelon. None of [which] were to enter the sacred space of her personal all-white dressing room”. The illustrious list of prominent singers and their culinary needs goes on like that (and can be found here: http://bit.ly/fooddivas). We should thanks Susan Boyle for saving the day; in 2010, Alan McGee stated in the Guardian’s music blog: “All hail Susan Boyle, the cool new diva of our age. More than just a Cowell creation, [she] puts loneliness and pain into her music […]”. But how come that we obviously use the word “diva” in such confusingly inconsistent ways? What kind of concept is it that lies behind the use of a word that has faced such an enormous change of meaning within the past, say, decade? More fundamentally one might ask: what exactly does it mean to be called a diva nowadays? Originally, the concept of a diva didn’t have anything to do anything with a person’s character. The word “diva” comes from the female form of the Latin word “divus, -a, -um”, meaning “god” or “godlike”. Which means: being a diva used to be about something supernatural being associated with a certain person. Very much like the gods of Ancient Rome or Greece where specialists in their fields of expertise (eg war, love, or the weather), a diva was originally associated with a rare talent that might have appeared superior to what someone who had been less blessed could ever manage to achieve. Or, to quote a dimplier definition, which TIME magazine stated in their 21 October 2002 issue: “By definition, a diva was originally used for great female opera singers, almost always sopranos.” Thus, Melpomene, the

singing goddess and muse of Tragedy, could be considered the first of the divas. On Earth, Ancient Greek actor Thespis of Icaria is considered the first of the divine talents in the Western world. Not only was Thespis the first person ever to appear in a play as a character assuming the resemblance of another person – thus presumably “inventing” acting as well as the genre of tragedy. He is also said to have been a singer of songs about mythology; which is why one might argue that he was in fact the first professional performer, what’s more: a multi-talented one. On a side note, Thepsis would also frequently tour the cities carrying his costumes and masks in a horse-drawn wagon. In recent years “diva” has gone through an interesting shift of meaning, leading to a large bandwidth of attributes connected with the concept behind the word. These days, calling someone a diva isn’t necessarily an expression of admiration or appreciation. I’m actually the living proof for this thesis, as I have myself been called a diva on several occasions during my life – and I’m obviously not blessed with any exceptional artistic talent. So, if someone says to you: “Don’t be such a diva”, his actual aim will be rather to tell you to come down, maybe reflect on how you were just behaving or what you were saying. Obviously, when used in such contexts, the word diva has been attributed additional meaning, linguistically speaking: “diva” has turned polysemic. A polyseme is a word that is actually two or more different words that just randomly look the same. Polysemes have different meanings, which aren’t necessarily based upon the meaning of one origin word. However, basically they come to existence when a word that has become popular is taken out of its original context and is put into a new one instead, often giving the word a completely new meaning. That very same thing seems to have happened in the case of diva. Disregarding the multitude of character traits that can be found when taking a look at the classical opera and Hollywood divas, popular language has adopted the word “diva” to refer to the character of a person being rather eccentric (or very much into herself/himself) compared to what might be considered “normal” within a certain society. This concept must then have been adapted to refer to singers that are said to act diva-ish, which finally led to the the word “diva” often being used pejoratively. Nowadays, the word “diva” often refers to someone – not even necessarily a celebrity anymore

– who is extremely demanding when it comes to her (or his) personal privileges. Or, like on of Senator John McCain’s advisers put it (complaining to CNN about Sarah Palin going off-script): divas are people who we blame to “[…] trust only unto themselves, as they see themselves as the beginning and end of all wisdom”. But, based on this analysis, what is someone’s intention when they call you a diva anyway? The above-mentioned examples show that the concept of “diva” somehow seems to be related to cultural values such as conformity, respectively non-conformity. One could argue that the more brought into line the members of a society are, the flashier anyone who stands out of that conformity will appear compared to them. On the other hand, the more brought into line a culture is, the less probable it might be for anyone to step out of line. In that regard, the Western world has ever since its early days developed a rather well-balanced concept between both the individual’s urge to express itself as well as an ever-present group pressure that a society’s members are subject to, even if only on an unconscious level.

The fact that the majority of language users have chosen to attribute eccentricity or even more negative connotations towards people that are called divas leads to the interesting question, why it isn’t, say, people with an exceptional amount of sympathy that we refer to as divas instead? As we have seen above, there is plenty of classical divas still alive who don’t live up to the reputation of being difficult characters at all. On the contrary: it seems most of the (very rare) true genius-like talent in fact enjoy their lives a lot, and they seem to be far from being socially difficult people. How is it then that we still insist on the cliché of a diva being that arrogant person, who totally thinks of herself/himself to be a cut above everyone else? My theory would be that the majority of users of many languages within the Western world simply have decided that being a divine talent necessarily implies being “too much” of an eccentric person arrogant over ones own perception of reality and relevance for the continued existence of the cosmos. I honestly believe that being confronted with

DON’T BLAME THE DIVA

extraordinary talent has caused less talented people to feel degraded, less valuable, or less important. In order to still be able to defend their own self-consciousness they saw no choice but to look for imperfections in the seemingly god-like. After all, even those divas were still human beings; there had to be at least difficult tempers or capricious moods coming along with all that unbelievable talent. Anything else simply wouldn’t be fair. Well, rules of life, no 1: life is not fair. Looking for human failure behind a talented face is rather especially telling about the ones who try to unmask the divas. Not only because the imperfections that “normal” people are looking for when critically eyeing a diva are actually merely human normality. No one is perfect, sure. But to assume that great talent necessarily has to come with great disorder of the personality is a rather obsessive attempt to try and boost ones own ego at the cost of someone who may simply is a genius. Who are we to blame him? I mean, why is there so much obscurity and insecurity among people when dealing with enormous talent as well as with people who don’t fit in the image of a coherent general public? Sure, it might be annoying to time to be reminded of ones own personality lacking the talent that those singers, actors, and come-

dians have been blessed with. However, one should always keep in mind that just because someone is different(ly talented) doesn’t mean he or she is any more or any less “perfect”, nor any more or any less human. Considering oneself superior to anyone else is lacking contact with reality just as much as pigeonholing people who seemingly don’t fit into any known categories. But maybe we can even learn something from our tendency to do so. What does our being afraid of/ stressed out by overly eccentric people tell us about our own feelings, about our own perception of reality? Maybe those who call other people divas for openly acting out their talents as well as the satisfaction or happiness that may come it, rather shows their insecurity in regard to their own talents. Maybe they are simply afraid that other people standing in the spotlight could compromise their own integrity, which has carefully brought into line by education, peer pressure, and society. Being afraid of that what is different, or that might in a way seem “better”, is a very human reaction. I think, we should try to keep an eye on that human tendency next time we are tempted to pigeonhole someone just because he or she is used to dealing

Thomas Langnickel-Stiegler is a Berlin based communications consultant and co-host of the discourseoriented Berliner Kamingespräche project. Having studied social sciences at the University of Siegen, he worked in public relations for film and TV, in advertising, and as an editorial member of various publications. His 2007 Bachelor’s thesis in Language and Communication dealt with the concepts of image and identity.

with reality in a different way than we might be used to doing. After all, being curious about the different, the new, the unknown, is also part of what it means to be human. In my humble opinion, we should learn to exhibit that positive, productive part of our humanity more regularly again. If you start seeing eccentric people like that, you could just as well describe being a diva in a positive way as the extreme way to explore one’s full potential through one’s facets. To say it with my favourite quotation by German writer Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller: “Rarely do we arrive at the summit of truth without running into extremes; we have frequently to exhaust the part of error, and even of folly, before we work our way up to the noble goal of tranquil wisdom”, (Philosophical Letters, Prefatory Remarks). That said, being a diva can just as well be interpreted as a sceptic approach towards what a society demands of the individual, often without any proper reason. Paradoxically, this unwillingness to unconditionally adapt might even enable the individual to find its true, authentic self – if (sic!) it is not for reasons of catching attention, but to critically reflect on society that one acts out on one’s perseverance.

All in all, in a society of masses that are attending yoga classes, clerical services (ie go to church), seeking “professional” counsel to find their true self (some of us are even said to try to find themselves in sexual encounters) – by what right do those blame the socalled divas for trying it their way? And what about those who still insist on mocking you for seemingly being out of control every now and then? Well, next time someone calls you a diva, why not tell them to diva your ass instead? Or, simply ignore them. However you do it: be above it, be yourself, be diva!

Isabel Jumpsuit LALA BERLIN, Shoes KAVIAR GAUCHE Lina Cardigan LALA BERLIN, Necklace YAZBUKI available from www.cabinet206.com Shoes KAVIAR GAUCHE

! Photography by Lukasz Wolejko-Wolejszo www.wolejko-wolejszo.com Styling & Production Marina German Modele, Hair & Make-Up: Isabel / SeeDs by Lara R端ffert with Armani Cosmectics / 21agency Lina / MegaModels by Mischka Hart / Basics

DRAMA BABES!

Lina, this page Dress DAWID TOMASZEWSKI, Bracelet J DAUPHIN Lina, facing page Top and Scarf TIGER OF SWEDEN, Bracelet J DAUPHIN

Isabel Swimsuit Â WE ARE HANDSOME available from www.cabinet206.com Necklace COS, Hat FIONA BENNETT

DRAMA BABES!

Isabel, this page Dress DAWID TOMASZEWSKI, Bracelet J DAUPHIN Lina, facing page Cardigan LALA BERLIN, Necklace YAZBUKI available from www.cabinet206.com

DRAMA BABES!

Lina, this page Top and Leggings CLARISSA LABIN, Bracelet J DAUPHIN Lina, facing page Top TIGER OF SWEDEN, Shoes KAVIAR GAUCHE Isabel, facing page Swimsuit WE ARE HANDSOME available from www.cabinet206.com Necklace COS, Hat FIONA BENNETT, Shoes SCHOLL

DIANE pERNET

A SHADED VIEW

ON A

FASHION DIVA Interview by Christo Mitov www.ashadedviewonfashion.com www.ashadedviewonfashionﬁlm.com Photos by http://www.ﬂickr.com/photos/lorenzobusato

The first thing you notice physically about this lady is her look. Usually her eyes are covered with black cat eye shades, her lips bloody red and dramatic, her skin aristocratically pale. The next thing you see is how she’s wearing her dark hair in a towering pompadour with a black veil and cladding her body in layers of black clothing and gothic attire. She is someone who knows the fashion industry from many angles, but perplexingly her look remains static - she strikes a silhouette as instantly recognizable as that of Karl Lagerfeld’s. She is Diane pernet. In the 1980s, Diane was a successful fashion designer in New York before becoming a fashion journalist and relocating to paris. In her capacity as journalist, editor, blogger and now curator of her own fashion film festival she relentlessly supports the young, independent forward-looking designers and thinkers in fashion. Nowadays she is best known for her cult blog, www.ashadedviewonfashion.com (ASVOF) which spawned the traveling fashion film festival, www.ashadedviewonfashionfilm.com (ASVOFF) After a successful season last year in Milano with a collaboration with Vogue Italia and a specially commissioned new project – ‘1 Minute Light’ that was won by Miho Kinamura and Zaiba Jabbar, this year ASVOFF number 4 will kick off from 7-9 October at the Centre georges pompidou in paris. You can still submit your work and be part of ASVOFF until June 30th 2011. HONK! met Diane virtually on the night she arrived in poland traveling with ASVOFF. Christo Mitov talks fashion, business and art with Mrs. pernet and gets some of the wittiest yet not pretentious answers on the future of fashion.

Where are you now and what are you doing recently? I just checked into my hotel in LODZ, it is the city where David Lynch filmed Inland Empire. I’m here for Fashion Philosophy Poland Fashion week. Wednesday I go to Cannes with ASVOFF. Actually I’m in LODZ with ASVOFF. Then the following week I go to Vicenza d’oro where I’ve curated a film and accessory exhibition and then back to Paris for 2 nights and off to Chile for their first fashion week with my good friend, Robb Young, the author of Power Dressing: First Ladies, Women Politicians and Fashion. We’e never been there and are looking forward to the adventure.

You are traveling a lot. How do you organize your suitcase? What clothes do you always take and how do you plan your luggage? It is super easy for me. I’m a uniform person. Carry on for the computer, cables, the tiny bit of liquids we are allowed to carry and a good book. Then clothes, black, skirts, shirts, beauty products, bathrobe, under garments, parasol for the sun, umbrella for the rain, change of shoes. It’s simple. Describe me your closet. Two closets, both black, except for two bathrobes one

A SHADED VIEW ON A FASHION DIVA

a red kimono and the other a blue plaid wool flannel. It is all black, put together skirts, shirts, jackets, coats. Shoes etc in boxes and bags in a separate drawer. How did you get into fashion? What attracted you to this industry? I’ve always loved two things film and fashion. I was very concerned about my clothes even when I was 4 years old. I used to be obsessed with overly girly things, ruffles and petticoats all preferably in pink. As I grew up I fell in love with the work of Guy Bourdin and thought about becoming a fashion photographer but only if I could be better than him which I decided I couldn’t. Later I wanted to design but could not draw, went to film school and then ended up taking 9 months in fashion at Parsons and FIT in NYC. Opened my own brand and did that for 13 years.

Do you actually call it an industry satisfying a luxurious need or is it art? With most designers it is a business like a Louis Vuitton, Celine, Dior, etc. For some it is a luxury like Givenchy couture, for others it is a perfect mix between fashion and art, people like Hussein Chalayan, Rick Owens, Boudicca, Haider… Do you define yourself as an artist or a businesswoman? Basically I’m a creative person, I’ve always either made films or designed….but now I am organizing exhibitions, curating them and putting together my film festival. I aspire to be more of a business woman than I am, It is never too late to learn. Do you think fashion is happening more in the ateliers than on the street nowadays?

Half and half, some cities have more interesting street looks than others. I’m dreaming of creativity coming back to the ateliers but not so sure that is the direction we are in or are heading towards. One can dream. Which designer from the past (who has past away) do you want to meet and what would you want to talk about with him? I would have loved to have known Madame Gres. The exhibition currently in Paris is a dream. Is there a comparably creative and talented designer as Alexander McQueen nowadays? Different style but Rick Owens, Haider Ackermann, Boudicca, Raf Simons…. What makes a good collection? The three designers that I mentioned above make a good collection because they use their own signature and it really does not emulate anyone else. Who is the most influential person or brand in fashion right now and why? I think Rick Owens because he has the perfect balance between being edgy and being commercial. He’s probably the most copied designer of our decade. Who would you crown as an ultimate fashion diva? It is a tie between Anna Piaggi and in the grave, Isabella Blow. They both love/loved fashion and are/were a pleasure to look at. What annoys you about the fashion industry? Arrogant and pretentious people who are basically about nothing beyond their own skin. Fashion and art quite often go hand by hand. What do you think about collaborations like the one Lady Gaga is running with Thierry Mügler? I think Nicola Formichetti is genius and has his finger on the pulse. He knew exactly what he was doing putting Lady Gaga on the runway. He told me Mugler was not prepared for the collection to sell as wildly well as it did. We are living in a celebrity decade…that is what sells clothes for better or worse. On the other hand, what do you think of high-end labels like Victor&Rolf collaborating with labels like H&M? I think it is great, it makes fashion available to the masses. I thought that the H & M Lanvin collaboration was excellent, especially the film by Mike Figgis. Now everyone can own Comme des Garcons, Lanvin, Sonia, Matthew who ever, why not? I think it is a win win situation. Nobody expects those clothes to last forever.

There are many fashion documentaries - on Anna Wintour, on Karl Lagerfeld, etc. Do you think they present the real face of fashion and the people they are focusing on? My favorite fashion documentary is an old one from the 80’s Unzipped, genius and real. I also liked the Last Emperor Valentino and I did like The September issue, Grace was the star and yes, I think some people looked good and others not but it rang pretty true. Who gave you the most valuable fashion advice that you’re still following? Can you share it with us? I’ve thought about that and I feel bad not coming up with a genius answer. Honestly I don’t remember anyone giving me fashion advice that I took and thought was something to live by. I can give some, dress to please yourself, you are never going to please everybody anyway and do you really care?

Bête Noire

by Emma E. K. Jones www.that-suicide-is-painless.blogspot.com

This night, the stars disguised, the horseshoes choke the silence And in the room, the shadows bloom, before their lady’s violence. As she commands, the moths construct the graves of million phantoms. And in the dark, with hair blond and long, and eyes like burning coal, she is smiling very bitter. Fairer than a chimera, when her thorns turn to feathers, and her tears into drops of wine. The perfume of death. Her lips will whisper things, tales no one wants to know of, tales that haunt you forever and the salamanders cry will posses the living. When the moon decides to take its own life as a sacrifice She will rule, do not be fooled, you can’t escape her gallows She is our Queen, the Queen of beasts and shadows. No human mirror can sustain to carry her reflection, only in the eyes of unicorns slides a mere portrait of her deception. And as she leaves worshiped by skeletons and flies, a charming melody drowns the zephyr. The song she sang, the night that Gods could not endure her beauty.

BETTE DAVIS

TRIBUTE A

GODESS by Nina Kharytonova

They are robbing respiratory beautiful, they are loved, admired and hated. They are glamorous and unattainable as a goddess (because that is the linguistic interpretation of â&#x20AC;&#x153;Divaâ&#x20AC;?). We are talking about the Hollywood dynasty of 1940-years. Elizabeth Taylor, Eva Gardner, Katherine Hepburn, Marlene Dietrich, Marilyn Monroe just to name a few names here. They have used the term diva reinvented, embossed and they gave us some unforgettable moments in cinema. The one that particularly stands out is Bette Davis. Especially because she was not a typical diva. Which was not alone on her choice of roles - she never hesitated to play ugly and nasty unerotic women but also their entire presence, charisma, and not least unusual in their appearance. Bette Davis did not match precisely to the ideal of beauty of at that time in Hollywood. Everything about her face was a bit too big: the nose, the mouth, but above all her fascinating eyes. And yes she has managed it, especially from those flaws to create a brand, because they exuded a kind of beauty to you that it was difficult for someone to believe something else.

Her childhood was not always golden. Bette was born in 04/05/1908 in Lowell, Massachusetts(USA). A year later, then her sister Harriet Barbara (Bobby) was born. Trapped in an unhappy marriage with unwanted children her father recite in 1915 the small family and left the three women to their own fate. This event coined especially his daughters very much. Ruth (her mother) has always preferred Bette. She tried to survive with photography, her favorite subject was always their first-born child. The desire to become an actress Bette expressed the first time in 1921 (when her family moved to New

Hollywood always wanted me to be pretty, but I fought for realism.

TRIBUTE TO A GODESS

York), she was just 13 years old. But this desire manifested itself when she saw in 1926 a theater production of “The Wild Duck”. It was the poignant spectacle of Peggy Entwistle. As the family could not afford expensive theater acting lessons, Ruthie has once again inserted for Bette and so she got hold a study on rates at the „John Murray Anderson School of Theatre“. Later, Bette got the most desirable scholarship as recognition of her enormous ambition, but she did not use the scholarship, she left the school to act in her first play. However as chance would have it, the piece was displaced and Bette had to face again the harsh reality. This coincidence is due Bette got her first starring role, the actress who played the main role in a movie has been ill and Bette steped in, probably. Even in their first attempts in Hollywood, she was not really welcome there. At that time she was very shy, inexperienced, modest and just could not offer typical Hollywood stimuli. Just before her contract with Universal Studios was terminated, the cinematographer Karl Freund persuaded the studio bosses to give her a small role. And so Bette Davis made her film debut in “The Bad Sister” (1931) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021636/ However the desired success failed and Bette was just before leaving Hollywood. At this moment Fortuna

smiled into her face. At that time the well-known actor and filmmaker George Arliss gave her the female lead role in “The Man Who Played God” http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0023181/ The film was a huge success and for the rest of her life, she was George Arliss grateful that he helped her to break through in Hollywood. After this movie Bette got a five-year contract with Warner Brothers. Their most important success so far, after more than 20 films, she had with the role of evil Mildred Rogers in “Human Bondage” (1934) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0025586/ The fact that this film has not received an Oscar nomination, sparked some protests and resulted to a subsequent change in the voting procedure at the Academy Awards. A year later she got the trophy for best actress for “Dangerous “ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026261/ But she called this as Belated recognitionto her performance in the film “Human Bondage”. For the representation of a Southern belle in “Jezebel” http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi3652124953/ she got her second Academy Award in 1938. Overall she had a very unusual relationship with the Academy,

she was nominated for an Oscar ten times. In 1941 she became the first female president of the „Academy of Motion Pictures and Arts “, but angered the committee with her research nature and left without further ado, the Academy. She even claimed that she gave the award the nickname “Oscar”. By her brash, impatient and unbridled nature, Bette Davis squandered themselves with their employer the „Warner Brothers Studios“. When she was afraid thather career bend through the mediocre roles that the studiio allocates to her, she took the offer of a British producer company to lead in two of their films. In order to escape the just penalty for the infringement summarily sued the Warner Brothers studio in the English court. The case was later the historic milestone because more similar cases were decided in favor of the plaintiff actor. Bette, however, lost the lawsuit and went back to Hollywood in debt. She remained still at the „Warner Brother Studios“ and later she became the highest paid actress at her time. Bette’s meteoric rise had a rather negative effect on their private life. 1932-1960 Davis had four husbands and three children. 1932 she married “Ham” Nelson. The marriage broke up, however, in 1938, on Bette’s infidelity and success. Her second husband, Arthur

Farnsworth was a native of England innkeeper. The happiness was short-lived, as he died in 1943 on a skull fracture. 1945 Bette married for the third time, this time to the artist William Grant Sherry. At the age of 39, she gave birth to a daughter, Barbara. 1950 Bette has a divorce from William. And then 25 days later she married her fellow actor Gary Merrill. Gary adopted Bette’s daughter Barbara and within the next two years, the two actors adopted two more children - a girl named Margaret and a boy - Michael. Some years later the first daughter Barbara broke off the contact, as she published a rather unpleasant biography of the relationship to her mother. Bette Davis even claimed that the director William Wyler was her one true love. He, however, refused to leave his wife, and so Bette Davis stays alone from 1960 on. After several years without success, Bette Davis had a critically acclaimed comeback as Baby Jane in the horror film “What happened to Baby Jane “ (1962) http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi836895001/ The fascinating thing about this film was that she played with her arch rival Joan Crawford. This film was a worldwide success, just by the fact that the two actresses could now live out their rivalry in front of the camera. Rumor has this dislike arose from the fact that

TRIBUTE TO A GODESS

I was the

Marlon Brando of my generation.

Joan Crawford fell in love with Bette. However, Davis rejected it. In revenge, Mrs. Crwaford got married to Franchot Tone, he has thrown himself an eye on Bette at that time. Legendary is the black humor of the diva and her devotedly maintained enmity with her rival Joan Crawford, she used to say. “One should not say anything bad about the death, but good Joan Crawford is dead good!” or better yet “I would not even piss on her if she were on fire. “ She argued, however, not only with Joan Crawford, on the set everyone knew to work with Bette is not easy. Often she found the scripts are bad, the directors and fellow actors for untalented and said this is also loud. Even though she had a negative image and played unsympathetic characters, their movie, Davis was very very popular and she had many advocate and friends in the industry. She worked until her death. She was the star in more than a hundred films. Her career had a period of 60

years , which was for a Hollywood actress, a rather unusual life. Davis’s own aging has perceived as “massacre”. She once said: “Growing old is not for sissies. “ At the age of 75, she suffered a heart attack, later diagnosed with breast cancer. A few days after the operation she had a stroke. Their last major appearance was in 1986 in Lindsay Anderson’s “Whales of August “. In October 1989 at the San Sebastian Film Festival she accepting her last award, she was so weak that she could not return home. She died on 6. October 1989 in Paris. She was buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills), in addition to her mother Ruthie and her sister, Bobby. On her grave stone is written, “She did it the hard way” and that was true, because the only thing that Bette Davis did not choose, was an easy way to go. Besides the wonderful movies, Bette Davis leaves a legacy that says : Faith in yourself and strength of character certainly can move mountains!

In this business, until youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re known as a monster youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re not a star

PURE An ode to femininity Photos by Aaron Feaver www.feaverishphotography.com

PURE

Interview with Aaron Feaver by Amanda M. Jannson Aaron Feaver is a photographer living in Los Angeles. His stunning art photography of women and the female body is inspired by his personal view of female beauty. What sets him out is his strong and daring perspective which still manages to maintain a unique tenderness and dream like nature but also the fact that he is not willing to censor himself or compromise his vision at any cost. What is beauty in a woman according to you? Beauty, in the purely physical sense of something visually pleasing, has been pretty hard-wired into us, I think. Babies reaching for pretty faces over plain ones, etc. It’s all evolution and math, and photographing or painting it is basically still life. But there’s that beauty of personality or character that everyone has that you can capture a bit of in an expression, and I’d like to think that’s what I’m going for. What does it take to be a real diva? Ha…well, to be honest I haven’t worked with many divas, so I’m probably not the best judge. I don’t think I’d have much patience for a diva, frankly; I appreciate someone who worked hard to get to the top of their game, but not at the expense of their down-toearth-ed-ness. How is it to work with women? It’s about the same as working with men. One thing is, there’s kind of a negative stereotype of the fashion photographer as lech, and that’s definitely something I’m conscious of and work extra hard to avoid. There are, I’m sure, guys who set out to be fashion photographers for the chance to look at beautiful women all day, but that’s not at all what I’m about.

What has inspired you to photograph women the way you do? (Why women?) I started photographing people because I saw beautiful photos by people like Dusdin Condren and Lou Noble that I wanted to imitate. I’d been taking photos of seascapes and whatnot for a year or so and I guess I was ready for the next step. I dabbled in photographing women in a sexy way, sometimes naked or half naked, but I’ve moved on from that, too. It can quickly become a crutch, I think. I get a lot of my feedback from Flickr, for instance, and it’s so easy to take a “popular” photo if it’s a nude, or a Polaroid, or…god forbid… both. It’s a confidence booster, for sure, but it’s easy to get lazy. I’d rather a photo be popular because it’s a good photo, regardless of the format or the content. So, yeah, I pretty much don’t take nude photos any more, for those reasons. Now, if nudity adds to the photo or is necessary (somehow) for the photo, then, sure; I’m not against it, I’m just wary of using it unnecessarily. How important do you think photography has been in creating divas over the times? Well, everyone likes to look pretty, and there can be a defining power in photographs that I’m sure could lead someone to have an inflated view of themselves.

SUZY

LOVE

LADY PLAYS IN HER OWN A

LEAGUE Interview by Marcel Schlutt

A few weeks ago I received an email from a photographer called Suzana Holtgrave. I was more than surprised how good the photos were. I then find out that Suzana is also making music. Under the pseudonym Suzy Love. I was flashed from the first minute. Her music is some kind of 80s-90s-2011s electronic/rock sound. Just great! I was thinking not long and I asked her if she will do a fashion story for HONK! I was very happy when she said yes. Then when we first met, I fell in love with her. The native Croatia woman, has so much power, coupled with charm and heart. She is direct. She is loud. She is hot. She is a strong women. Not from this planet. When you get to know Suzy a bit, you will notice this lady has a lot of experiences in her life. Suzy Love is an artist to adore. This lady is playing in her own league.

SUZY LOVE

Suzy, you are an an allround-talent. How would you describe yourself as an artist? Who is Suzy Love? I am a woman with a free spirit. Outwards with great desire. Yes, i am someone who likes the limelight. Someone who loves very much the music and photography. That is why i choosed word LOVE! Love is my creative driving force. I love of all the beautiful things around me. Convince me, let them manifest and then put it to my own art. Sometimes in music , sometimes in fashion, sometimes in photography ... my personal menage a trois. You you end up in the early 80s, in a roundabout way, in Berlin. How have you experienced the time back then? Berlin was at this time: the place to be! Berlin is always the place to be. For some people just for a short time. For me Berlin has become my second home. But yes, you’re right, that was a unique situation. The East-West conflict, the Cold War, the wall. A city divided in two. Communism to capitalism. It was very difficult for me to understand what it is about. What’s going on. At the beginning I was afraid of the city.

A party chased the next. Berlin - Kreuzberg. We were dancing on tables. I worked in a trendy disco „The Jungle. It was like dancing on a volcano. The city was boiling, we were on an island surrounded by the wall. And of course that was: the place to be for many artist. It was a very creative time ... oh .. now I feel a sentimental nostalgia. All of that was also romantic. ou are singing, you are taking pictures and you worked as asuccessfully model. What came first? Nothing of that. First I wanted to study fashion design. I’ve always loved fashion. I have done sewn, knitted, crocheted, glued, no matter what, important was: it looks cool and it does not have anybody. Very simply no jeans and t-shirt, The clothes were bad done, they survite sometime just one party..Then came the modeling. I have done more in between. I have done photography always but I never had a good camera. A year ago I got my Canon. It is my new love and I always kiss my camera. (She laughs) How would you describe your music?

Photo Sascha Kramer

Oh that’s hard. A bit of everything. Like a good stew. All what I like: electro, techno, of course rock `n ‘roll , a pinch of 60s, a la Brigitte Bardot. It must be sexy and a bit of Hummor. This is very important. I always work with Mike Fuzz. He produces, plays instruments and he makes the beats ... (he is also an all-round talent). You see, I’m not the only one with many interests. I am his muse. I write lyrics and sing. Thanks to Mike, because of him I am start to sing. In Croatia, I’ve sung in the choir, but they were rather Yugoslav songs.

many jobs. That was about 13 years ago. Modeling is a very cool job. I would have liked to continue, but the girls were getting younger and younger. So, it was about time to say goodbye from the spotlight. Through the modeling I’ve learned a lot about professionalism, punctuality - is in Germany, very important! Now I benefit from this time. I´ve worked for designers like Nanna Kuckuck or Fiona Bennet. And now I take pictures of their designs (see @ HONK! the diva-issue Hotel angst-menage a trois). This is whole new experience for all of us.

From the musician and nightlife icon, to the successful model. How and when were you discovered? And how was your model career ? I have done modeling before for my friends and I have already noticed that it’s fun. I was asked by a photographer at Kurfürstendamm in Berlin . If i would like to do some photos. I immediately said;. Yes, sure.! That is how it all starts. Test shoots, agencies, shows. I was always the smallest at the catwalk (which annoyed me very much). But i had

Now about 20 years later you’re on your way to be a great photographer. Was the logical next step, after all your experiences? The photography came to me. No one asked me. Great or not great, I learn something new every day. And it gives me a lot of fun. This is to me is the most important part. Why do have a different name as a photographer than as a singer ? Are you afraid to be put in a drawer ?

SUZY LOVE

I’m not afraid. I am not thinking about it. Suzy Love suits best with my personality. Suzy is the abbreviation of Suzana and Love is my favorite word. And it sounds better on a record. For example: Intercooler feat.Suzy Love. The name is fun and plays with sexuality. Like me. Suzana Holtgrave is more serious. I am not an intellectual artist. Maybe subconsciously I wanted to be taken seriously as a photographer. Why not more names? I am authentic in both roles, as Suzy Love and Suzana Suzy Holtgrave. I don´t hide myself behind a name. No fake. Everything I do, I do it with 100% believe and I stand 100% behind it.

Let’s play a little game. I say to you three famous women and tell me in short words what do you think about them. Lady Gaga: Innovative, flashy, allien, fun

If you had to describe your style as a photographer by yourself, how would that sound? I would not define me. And I constantly invent myselves new. I am inspired by the painting, old movies, nature and of course by my models. And Helmut Newton .. one of the biggest Artist on the planet. I love his work and the way he works. I had the luck to work with him. He spend a long time in Berlin. Here he has made a movie about his life. And I had a small role in the movie. The shoot was tough, I had to do my scene a few times until I had bloody knees. Newton said once:“ You’re great, you play like Greta Garbo.“ I do not know if he was simply a good liar or if he really meant it. But I was in a trance of sheer luck. This is the most important thing you should communicate to your models and actors. They are great, then you get the best results. Unfortunately, I’ve never seen the film, I think he was never filmed to the end. Unfortunately.

Which woman has influenced you in your career? Do you have any role models? NO, not necessarily a role model. My aunts from Croatia, maybe. All very strong personalities. With my mother there are four women in the family, wearing the pants. Otherwise, of course, many women have influenced me. Sofia Loren, Brigitte Bardot, Patty Smith. There are so many great women and of course a photographer: Ellen von Unwerth.

When you do your shootings, you are the photographer, stylist, and you are createing the concept. Are you a perfectionist? I could produce myselves and take pictures of myself. There goes a lot more. Egomania .. ha, ha ... I leave nothing to chance, l even search for the models by myself. Perfectionist? Not really, sometimes it’s the time that drives me to do everything by my own. The ideas are bubbling out of me. And I want it to be realized quickly. It’s like a drug, an addiction!!! How important is fashion in your life? Today, less than then. Now I also prefer a jeans and t-shirt on, but for photos, it is clear super important. Fashion inspires me. It says a lot about a person. Fashion is fun. There are designers who make artistic fashion. Sometimes it is also an escape from reality. An escape into the beauty. Fashion is ephemeral, like everything in life.

Sharon Stone blond, IQ, sexy, at least in the 80s & 90s Angela Merkel Ambition, it is not easy to survive in a man’s world (politics), she is not photogenic.

What can we expect from you in 2011/2012 ? Any new projects? I do not like to talk about the future. That is why, it is the future. I am concerned with the here and now. I hope I can continue photographs. Create my concepts. This has something to do with artistic freedom. To keep my brain open to new ideas, to continue to be creative and to keep my joy. Everything else will be seen. I am also very curious .... Thanks Suzy for the interview! HONK! loves you. And we are proud that your a big part in our little magazine. Kiss, Suzy Love www.myspace.com/suzyloverockt www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1203737630&sk=info

Photo Andre Rival

Who the hell is Madonna MUSIC

Music reviewed by Polys

His taste in music is legendary in Berlin. No dance floor is safe! He loves music and music loves him! Now the top of the top of Polys playlist!

Oh Land

Oh Land • Oh Land is the 23-year old Danish singer-songwriter and record producer Nanna Øland Fabricius. • The daughter of an opera singer mother and an organist father was a trained ballerina before she decided to embark on a music career following a back injury. • 2008 > Release of Oh Land’s debut album “Fauna”. • 2011 > Release of Oh Land’s second self-titled Album. • Peaked at number five on the Danish Albums Charts. • April 2011 > Music Artist award at the NewNowNext Awards. • Fabricius says: “I want my music to feel like 2050 meets something really classic, like meeting a stranger that feels as familiar as an old friend”. • Although relatively new to the indie electronic scene, Oh Land is sure to impress. • Oh Land is a wonderfully produced album with a terrific vocalist and beautiful, aesthetic music that paints gentle pictures in your mind. • A collection of unique and energetic electronic beats that make dancing too hard to resist. • Oh Land is not afraid of the “unusual”, furthermore she is using a kind of unconventional aesthetic and surprise effects, more than well-directed, for her per-

Interpret: Oh Land Album: Oh Land Genres: Pop, electronic, experimental Label: Fake Diamond, Epic, RCA Origin: Denmark Released: March 2011 Line-up: Nanna Øland Fabricius

WHO THE HELL IS MADONNA

Interpret: The Dø Album: Both Ways Open Jaws Genres: Indie-Pop Label: Cinq7 Origin: France, Finland Released: March 2011 Line-up: Olivia Bouyssou Merilahti, Dan Levy

sonal and phonetic presentation. • Denmark isn’t that different from Sweden and it could have the next generation of Scandinavian female singers, like Mette Lindberg of The Asteroids Galaxy Tour (QRO live review), and now Nanna Øland Fabricius, a.k.a. Oh Land. • There are really few records that I can listen to over and over again. And this one is definitely one of them! Favourite tracks: Perfection, Sun of a gun, White nights.

The Dø • The last years even more and more new French Singers and Bands finally recognise that they have to leave aside their French-language-pride and sing in English. Hallelujah! • The band’s name is derived from the first note of the solfège scale, so it is pronounced the same as the English word “dough” (with a long “o” sound). • 2005 > Olivia and Dan met in Paris while recording the music for a French movie and founded “The Dø”. • A few months later they released their first EP and

Interpret: When Saints Go Machine Album: Fail Forever Genres: Pop Label: !K7, EMI Origin: Denmark Released: January 2011 Line-up: Silas Moldenhawer, Jonas Kenton, Simon Muschinsky, Nikolaj Manuel Vonsild

kept on working for cinema, dance, as well as poetry and theatre. • 2008 > Release of The Dø’s debut album “A Mouthful” • “A Mouthful” topped the French charts (n°1 on the first week), making them the first French act singing in English to reach that position. • 2011 > Release of the bands second album “Both Ways Open Jaws” • Olivia’s highly varied vocals in combination with Dan’s sound diversity and unusual arrangements and beats give this album its unique character. • The truth is that The Dø doesn’t really sound like anything else going on right now, but is just the next step in the evolution of fantastic musical art. • The Dø have the ability to combine dark and haunting numbers, regional sounds, cutting-edge arrangements and pop magic. • The layered vocals are the kind of touches that affect the listener without being obvious. • The album’s childish melodies and impulsive rhythms will strike you as both new sounding and classic, as both fresh and rooted in tradition. • Favourite tracks: B.W.O.J, Slippery slope, Bohemian dances.

When Saints Go Machine

When Saints Go Machine • And not just the ones of the well-known bands like Efterklang, Trentemøller and Kashmir, but also - or even more – the so far unknown. • Is Denmark becoming the land of electronic madness? • Such a promising release comes from the band with the rather funny name “When Saints Go Machine”. • They won the “Talent of the Year” award of the Danish National Radio. • 2011 > Release of their first mini-album “Fail forever”. • These 5 tracks with duration of 17:45 min. definitely make you want more! • “Fail Forever” sounds as a hybrid of Empire Of The Sun and Crystal Castles. • Very strange and fascinating music if you ask me. • Nikolaj says: “We wanted to make music that manages over beyond the borders of Denmark. What do we do now is pop with a lot of electronics, I would say. “ • The album was mixed by Christoffer Berg, who previously balanced The Knife’s Deep Cuts and Silent Shout. • The range of material covered in these 5 tracks makes their sound extremely hard to pin down. • Open with a bang. Close with a bang (with some pretty good parts in the middle). For a mini-album

with only 5 tracks, by my calculation that makes ‘Fail Forever’ pretty darn good. • Favourite tracks: Fail forever, Pinned, Pick up your tears and run.

Agoria • Agoria was the name of a techno-party-series in Lyon and Sébastien Devaud was a co-organiser. • Early 90’s > Sébastien Devaud starts Djing with the pseudonym “Agoria”. • His Style > almost everything between DetroitTechno and Jazz. • 2000 > The first DJ to get promoted by FAIR, a fund organisation that supports and promotes young French musicians. • 2010 > Agoria found his own label “Infiné” • 2011 > Release of his label-debut album “Impermanence” (his third album overall) • His music influences for this album flowed from many different directions. • Sébastien says: “…the result sounds more like me”. • He managed to found the balance a good album needs.

WHO THE HELL IS MADONNA

Metronomy

Interpret: Agoria Album: Impermanence Genres: Techno, Detroit techno, Deep house, Ambient Label: Infiné Origin: France Released: January 2011 Line-up: Sébastien Devaud

• The album consists of a constantly discontinuous mix of a bit of pop, a bit of Detroit, a bit of ambient with some well chosen features like Seth Troxler, Carl Craig and Kid A. • Devaud reverts to his own brand of sex-house, which involves guest producers (Carl Craig) talking dirty while the Frenchman plays vivid techno signatures. • Kid A is my personal highlight of “Impermanence”. Her seductive voice makes the tracks “Kiss my soul” and “Heart beating” the most memorable, given the fact that they stay with you forever after! • Favourite tracks: Kiss my soul, Heart beating, Panta Rei.

YOUNG GALAXY • Young Galaxy is (now) a three-piece consisting of guitar, bass, and keyboard with vocal duties split across multiple members. • The band has toured in Canada, The United States and Europe, opening for Arcade Fire, The Album Leaf, The Frames, Peter, Bjorn and John, Stars and Death Cab For Cutie. • 2007 > Released their self-titled debut.

Interpret: Young Galaxy Album: Shapeshifting Genres: Indie rock, Dream pop Label: Paper Bag Records, Smalltown Supersound Origin: Canada Released: April 2011 Line-up: Stephen Ramsay, Catherine McCandless, Stephen Kamp

• 2009 > Their second album “Invisible Republic” was released independently. • 2011 > Released their third album “Shapeshifting” which was produced by Dan Lissvik in Sweden. • The album retains the band’s new wave and synthpop influences while also dabbling in both more electronic and more earthly sounds and textures. • Shapeshifting isn’t proper dance music-- let’s call it dance-inflected pop-- but it is fantastic and unbound, interesting and engaging. • The recruitment of Dan Lissvik to mix the record did definitely helped a lot but however, having the perfect producer means nothing if the band and the material can’t give them something to work with, so ultimately the credit should go to Young Galaxy themselves. • Favourite tracks: Cover your tracks, The angels are surely weeping, We have everything.

METRONOMY • 1999 > Joseph Mount formes in England Metronomy • Mount also releases remixes under the name

Interpret: Metronomy Album: The English Riviera Genres: Electropop, Indie Label: Because Music Origin: England Released: April 2011 Line-up: Joseph Mount, Oscar Cash, Anna Prior, Gbenga Adelekan

“Metronomy”, and has remixed many artists including Gorillaz, Franz Ferdinand, Klaxons, Goldfrapp, Ladytron, Kate Nash, Lykke Li and much more. But he refused to remix Sugababes. ;) • 2005 > Release of Metronomy’s debut album “Pip Paine (Pay the £5000 You Owe)”. • Metronomy have toured widely throughout the UK and Europe supporting acts such as Bloc Party, CSS, Klaxons, Kate Nash and Justice. • Their music consists of instrumental electronic music and vocal electronic pop music. • “The English Riviera” is completely different than the previous albums of Metronomy. • It is slicker and smoother, but in some point it’s a little too uptight! Actually it could almost be the album of a completely different band. • If you’re used to dancing to Metronomy’s earlier stuff at grimy electro nights, this might take some getting used to, as the band have taken a totally new direction into a 70’s surf feel. • Nevertheless, the “lazy summer night songs” of this album makes it to the perfect soundtrack for the coming summer! • Favourite tracks: The look, She wants, Corinne.

TRASH 66

DIVAS Mister Magnus v. Keil is a very well known Dj based in Berlin. His taste of music is very trashy and we love him because of that. That´s why HONK! asked him to make a top 5 of trashdivas in music. www.vonkeil.com

5.) SABRINA

The Hot Girl with a Bikini Problem. The fact that with the right combination of disco trash and bare breasts equals a recipe for guaranteed success was apparent to European music producers no later than 1985. Clear across the continent, the Samantha Fox clones sprouted like mushrooms out the dirt and bribed their public with particularly scanty clothes and sparse talent. The ladies wore little in most cases actually nothing more than just their first name - rhymed ‘Dancing’ – ‘Romancin’ or ‘Action’ – ‘Satisfaction’ , and especially moved the male youth of Europe into euphoria. This is also true of the Italian Sabrina Salerno, former fashion model for sleazy magazines, which we were allowed, in the video for “Boys Boys Boys” in 1987, to take a very intimate glimpse at her splashing around in a pink crepebikini. Even today, in the age of barrier free sexuality, this is only tolerable under the influence of a lot of Blue Curacao. But please, with umbrellas! “Hot Girl” - www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2e6OsAF7Rs

4.) VALERIE DORE

The Cleaning Lady with a Penchant for “Romantic Dance “. The astounding popularity of thin women’s voices from the Mediterranean would have probably never existed without the success of Valerie Dore’s 1984 debut single “The Night”. That, of course, is not only because of her special sound, but also her bizarre, expressionistic dance style that Valerie Dore displayed during her stage performances – consequently, requiring a new musical categorization appropriately termed “Romantic Dance “. The fact that Valerie Dore, in real life actually Stucci Monica, currently working as a cleaner in a recording studio and the real singer Dora Carofiglio who was represented as an optical double, was only known by a few insiders. Later, Stucci made her own attempt in front of the microphone - but unfortunately these efforts were almost completely ignored. In 1991, she moved to Madagascar to record a whole new album with ethnic influences...and we are all still waiting on. “Lancelot” - www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmAUflk0US8&feature=related

3.) DEE D. JACKSON

The Trash Queen from Uranus What would happen if you threw Kate Bush together with a few feet of aluminum foil in the disco-washing machine? Well - this question seems to have been asked in the UK during the heyday of the 1978 Star Wars frenzy. Quickly, someone decided to make an attempt and the result was Dee D. Jackson, a more than strange new cyber heroine in a spandex suit. Whether the video clip of her debut single “Automatic Lover” was meant as a joke or should really be taken seriously remains a mystery until today - at least she made it with her song to # 5 on the German charts. The follow-up single, “Meteor Man”, flopped, as well as her first LP with the promising name “Comic Curves”. Later efforts to break into the Italodisco genre were also fruitless. Too bad – but it wasn’t because of their cosmic curves..… “Automatic Lover” www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTFCwKvlKZo

2.) ANEKA

The Asiophile Dentist’s Wife. In 1981, Mary Sandeman decided that she had had enough of Gaelic folk music. Something new was needed - but what? Spontaneously, someone squeezed the petite lady into colorful kimonos, sat a two-toned geisha wig on her head and forced her into costume-friendly Asian tinged disco pop - Aneka was born. For weeks, she defended her hit single, “Japanese Boy” at the top of the European charts and remained in the memories of the hit parade audience through their oddly wooden live performances. But unfortunately, this thoroughly sophisticated concept was not destined for long-lasting success – By the release of her third single, “Ooh Shooby Doo Doo Lang”, the short career of the fictional character ‘Aneka’ over. Whether this was due to the catchy little “Schepper-soprano” Sandeman or her apparent helplessness and uncertainty during stage performances is sometimes still an open question. At least, Aneka floated blissfully, smiling back to Nirvana and Mary Sandeman graciously allowed to return to her musical roots. “Little Lady” www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fp2iyUDqK2c

1.) C.C. CATCH

The Lucrative Recycling Plant. Actually, a clever man, that Dieter Bohlen: for even the songs that Modern Talking deemed ‘too bad’, were given to other artists for their own musical treatment in order to earn a bit more money. How convenient! One of these artists was C.C. Catch, who, in addition to Sandra, became a stylistic model of the homebred - West German small town girl. It is unfortunate that Caro Catharina was not actually paying attention to what was happening to her, not only because of the precarious substance of her musical catalog which was highlighted by her visibly thin little voice but also her hopelessly over-ambitious emotional intonation with which she pulled himself through outrageous nonsense texts which still is searching for its equal. (see: “Soul Survivor”) But in exchange, the choreography, outfits and hairstyle were more opulent. Therefore, I place, C.C. Catch, as the number one undisputed queen of Euro-Trash! “Stranges By Night” www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5si4rGARBo&feature=related

LOLA DUPRĂ&#x2030;

horrifying

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hilarious Interview by Christo Mitov www.loladupre.com

Lola Dupre (28) is a human Photoshop machine. Except that unlike the image altering program, the Glasgow-based artist takes a couple more hours or even days to make the changes that would cost you a couple of clicks with the Adobe program. Lola is born in Algeria, grows up in Paris and London. Glasgow has been her home for about 15 years now. She is a raw talent. She never went to university - her attempt to try out architecture study in London turned out to be a path she wouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t go along with. In a world where little can impress me much and excitement with media is reduced to new casting show formats and the eventual death of Osama bin Laden, her arresting surreal collages give you a new, hand-crafted perspective on image manipulation. Taking pre-existing imagery from iconic historical and contemporary artists, as well as images of her friends and the people around her, she manipulates and warps familiar canvases to create new, twisted artworks that invoke both memories and new perspectives. She is a master of scissors, glue, and surrealism. Talking about the obstacles she has as a female artist and sharing some conspiracy theories with us, Dupre gives HONK! an insight into her grotesque collage world.

LOLA DUPRÉ

What made you decide you want to become an artist? When i was very young, first i wanted to be a writer, then a sculptor, then an artist working in 2D. I wanted to express myself, this was my motivation. Why did u gave up on your dream to become a writer? Have you written anything? I don’t think i was very good at it, I wrote a 25 page psychedelic poem when i was a teenager. It was truly awful but i thought it was great at the time. I tried to get it published at the time but it was thrown back in my face. One copy of it still exists.. but I am very tempted to destroy it once and for all.

Do you easily find photographers to collaborate with? Sometimes, i often meet enthusiastic photographers, but a lot of them never get past the planning stage for various reasons. I am always looking to meet new talented photographers with a vision. I have collaborated several times with the photographer Kristiina Wilson, and i have more projects underway with her. She’s great, and i very much admire her work and work-ethic. Why don’t you have a portrait of yourself? I’m shy, and i’m working up to doing a portrait of myself when i feel ready.

What other artists - from your and other fields and arts - inspire you? Lots, from all fields, i love what Walter Van Beirendonck and Gareth Pugh are doing in fashion. I love the art of fashion, and fashion photography. I love film and traditional art, music and the written word. I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t like really listing my heroes because there are so many names to mention. I do not like to number them in a list. I am inspired also just by individual works of art, not necessarily the creator. Â

Your images show a distorted reality - is this how you see the world? Yes, the world is often a terrible, hopeless and dark place. The truth is out there, but we get bombarded with lies at every step. Even when the world is happy, bright and hopeful, much is contorted and out of place. I feel the distortion to be both horrifying and hilarious. Â What technique do you use for your art? How does a piece come together? I use scissors, multiple prints and PVA glue, the process of how a piece comes together varies wildly between different projects.

LOLA DUPRÉ

How long does it take to create one piece? Impossible to say, some are done before i can catch my breath, some take countless millennia to complete. Many of your images display people who seem to suffer from Dawn’s syndrome or at least the distortion has made them look like that. Is it intended? Certainly not!, i intend nothing, the only interpretation is in the eye of the viewer. I find suggesting something to be much more powerful than proclaiming it out loud. Is it hard for a female artist to emerge nowadays? I don’t think so, you need balls to get far in this industry. I have even better than that, I have tits. What were biggest obstacles in your career so far? Getting to the point where i was selling enough work to make a living from. It took many years but i am finally in that coveted place where i make a living from my art and doing exactly what i want to do.

Do you think Osama Bin Laden is really dead? Ohhh tricky question, well possibly. It’s also possible he died some time ago, and the US military have only just identified his corpse. I certainly imagine the details of it have been manipulated for propaganda purposes anyway. Its also possible that his contract with the CIA has run out and he has retired in Florida. It’s not that important to me, he is just one man. What’s next for you? What piece are you working on? I am currently making a new group of work for a solo show i am doing at the phone booth gallery in Long Beach California in October of this year. For this show i am making a collection of pieces in the “exploding” style of which there are already a few pieces on my site.

DANDY

gALORE Photographer Anita Bresser www.anitabresser.com Model Alexander Jakob www.centoscouting.com Styling Julius Forgo www.juliusforgo.com Styling assistant Tanja Metter www.jenka.eu Hair + Make up Tan Vuaong worked with “armani cosmetics www.basic-berlin.de Photographer´s assistant René Greuél Special thanks to: Departmentstore Quartier 206 Darkland

Jacket Henrik Vibskov Chemise Adddress Trousers Butterflysoulfire Hat Butterflysoulfire Headpiece Boesser/Schorn Bracelet Julius Forgo Earring Stylist own Bag a Portegna@Departmentstor Quartier 206

Top Schmidttakashi Blazer Damir Doma Knit jumper Boessert/Schorn Pin Minimarket Hat Henrik Vibskov Bracelet Vintage Cane/Stick Dandy of the Grotesque

Chemise Carin Wester Vest Vladimir Karaleev Jacket Patrick Mohr Trousers Adddress

Shoes Damir Doma Belt Vans Bracelet Julius Forgo Hat Vintage

Bag Marstaller @Departement Quartier 206 Earring Stylist own Ring Vintage

Chemise Ann Demeulemeestr@Darkland Cape Butterflysoulfire Bagpipejacket Vintage Trousers Reality Studio Shoes Trippen Ring Vintage Glasses Mykita

DANDY GALORE

Chemise Dandy of the Grotesque Trousers Damir Doma Shoes Bless

Hat Vintage Belt Skipping rope Earring Stylist own

Pullover Maison Martin Margiela @Departement Quartier 206 Shirt Reality Studio Vest Dandy of the Grotesque Hat Rike Feuerstein Tie pin as a Brooche Dandy of the Grotesque Earring Stylist own

DANDY GALORE

Top Patrick Mohr Vest Boesser/Schorn Jacket Butterflysoulfire

Trousers Jenka Scar Boessert/Schorn

Jacket Patrick Mohr Glasses Mykita Earring Stylist own

Chemise Dandy of the Grotesque Coat Damir Doma Pants Butterflysoulfire Hat Vintage Glasses Vintage Earring Stylist own

by Sherry Vine If you’re a true diva you can be a diva anywhere, anytime! But to be a diva in NYC you better get ready to bring it sister! Of course, there are many types of divas. You may be a high class Fifth Avenue diva, dashing to the Plaza in your Chanel suit. Or a Lower East Side diva skate boarding to the coffee shop in a sexy Zweite Hand ensemble. There’s a Chelsea diva, rollerblading along the river in hot go go shorts and tank top, Prada sunglasses and the latest trendy headphones. I live in Hell’s Kitchen where many different breeds of divas co-habitate together. You’re likely to see yoga divas walking down the street with their mat and sweater tied around their neck. Or the allusive dancer diva - strolling along the Avenue in 2nd position puffing away on a cigarette. Also be on the look out for the young gay diva disguised as a street thug in hoodie, cap and baggy jeans. If you approach them to quickly they’re likely to snap at you - as in finger snap! But my favorite diva is the one who makes it look easy - no attitude - just gorgeous. My kind of diva shops for knock-offs on Canal Street, hits the art galleries in Chelsea and then bar hops in Hell’s Kitchen. I carry my $20 knock off Versace purse as if Dontella handed it to me herself! To really enjoy Manhattan this diva must: 1. Rock a glamorous wig from www.WigBar.com in China Town. They do all the wigs in my videos and are the best in town! Weather you need a GaGa bang or pink mohawk or Imperial Court up-do, theses are your boys.

2. Strut on 8th Street for the sexiest shoes in town. There are about 50 stores with shoes and you can get really good deals. Just pretend you’re in Morocco and don’t be afraid to strike a deal. 3. Grab a delicous meal and cocktail at elmo restaurant. They have a wide selection of food and a delicious array of cocktails. The tuna tartar is yummy! 4. Take in a Broadway show - they are NOT the same as in other cities! You can get cheap tickets for almost every show at Hot Tix. Even though Superman is getting terrible reviews I heard it’s spectacular. And I saw the opening night of Priscilla, Queen of The Desert and it’s soooo colorful and fun! 5. Stroll thru Central Park - there’s a zoo, pond, half dressed men! In the Spring there’s nowhere in the city more fun to hang out in. There are shows, concerts, dancing, boating, movies and more. So many people forget about Central Park so take advantage of it. 6. And, most importantly, see my show! lol. The Sherry Vine Show every Sunday at Barracuda at midnight and Sherrylicious every Wednesday at VIG 27 at 10pm. You can find all info at www. sherryvine.com The Big Apple is so diverse that there’s room for all divas! Be respectful, be careful and be original! The only thing that is un-diva is rudeness. So wear a smile and have fun! Sherry

HONK! Handmade cottonbags coloured: #001- 10,00€ + 2,90 € postage white: #002 - 8,00€ + 2,90€ postage order : bags@honk-mag.de

Ava Gardner 1922-1980

FUME

VIRGINITY Photos by Marco Rothenburger www.Marco-Rothenburger.de

Model Eli B @PMA Models MakeUp & Hair Fee Romero Retouching Imre Fejes Assistant Julia Sieckmann

FUME OF VIRGINITY

A MAN

SHOULD

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The perfect dress for the HONK!GENTLEMAN

Henrik Vibskov

JUUN.J

Ashish

Walter van Beirendonck

A WOMAN

SHOULD

WEAR The perfect dress for the HONK!LADY

Rejina Pyo

Manish Arora

Mal AimĂŠe

Iris van Herpen

NATALIA AVELON

MOVIE

STAR THE NExT gENERATION Interview by Marcel Schlutt Photos by Bernhard Musil www.be-musil.com Styling Marina Gehrman Hair&Make up Pascale J. Louis Production assitant Nicolas Heimburger Special thanks to RADIALSYSTEM V www.radialsystem.de

Since the origin of cinema was the role of diva occupied by many many actresses. They dominated the picture of a whole generation of women. Looking at the cinema today, we are missing those women. Natalia Avelon could easily save the tradition of those divas. She has everything what a great movie star needs. The beauty, the grace, the talend, the heart and charisma. She is one of the new stars of the European film. So it is time we give Natalia the attention she deserves.

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NATALIA AVELON

Natalia, as a young girl you emigrated with your parents from Poland to Germany. How did you experience this time? As far as I can remember, for me it was an adventure. New impressions, new people and friendships. A foreign language, communication with hands and feet, and above all with the heart! I have only positive memories! Could you speak German there already? And was it hard to leave your home and friends? I could not speak a single word of German. But my new primary school has welcomed me with open arms and I was quickly integrated. The people took care of me. I was the newcomer and it was really touching. On the other hand, they met through me a new country and a new culture: Poland. Yes of course I had to leave my friends. But I knew that the distance between us is too big and no obstacle to our friendship would be. But Karo and Milosz and I are still friends, to these days even though we live in the meantime, distributed all over the world. Would you say these experiences as a young girl have shaped you? And if so how far in? All of my experiences I have gained as the new one and a foreigner, have shaped me into a tolerant, socially committed woman of moral courage. At the age of 9, I was thrown into a completely unknown life, in which I had to find my way and integrate myself. I developed a lot of ambition, discipline and patience through this experience. Properties that I need, especially in my profession and I can use them today. During your school days you have discovered your passion for acting. How and when have you made your first steps in that direction? I took my first steps at the St. James Theatre in Karlsruhe. An amateur theater, where I had my first experience with stage, audiences and critics. A great and memorable time! After your school you studied drama in Munich. Is this not the exact opposite of acting? How did you finance your study time? By catering jobs? Or modeling, acting? I wanted to learn all about acting from the ground up. That is why I´ve started studying theater arts. I had worked casually at the Call Center of the FC Bayern, babysitting and i had worked as a hostess at trade shows. Living in Munich is insanely expensive. I also took private actor, singing and dancing lessons. You did your first movie experience in German soap operas like “Forbidden Love “ or “Storm of Love”. Two of the

most popular German TV series. When you were a young actres, you were not afraid to hang forever in the soap bar? Or were you just happy to work during this time? At the this time I was 20 years old. Oh it is already 11 years ago! Madness. I never think in a drawer and i am open to all experiences that expand my horizons. And the guest appearances on soap operas, have been financially a giftto me! And above all, Iike the work ethic and structure may know of such formats. It is a very concentrated and focused work. The workload is immense! And the pressure behind it at least as large. In 2007 came the great career step for you! You have been well known in Europe overnight. You played the main role in the movie “Eight Miles High” www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZ0Jxn4xRMM A movie about THE! German icon Uschi Obermeier. How much has this movie changed your life and your career? It was my first starring role! And then cinema! It was the jackpot of my life! The role was a big challenge. I have prepared myself for the movie for more then one year. It was my introduction to the world in which I feel at home. The dream world. The world of movies. I think it is very difficult to play someone who is still alive. Because it is easier to be compared and an actres gets more criticism. I think it is easier to play someone who is dead. Or am i wrong? How was it in your case? Right from our first meeting Uschi Obermeier has signed me into her heart and strengthened my back. This has supported me in my preparation a lot and I removed some pressure. For content questions, she was my original source and she was always there for me. And i worked a lot with the director Frank Betzel and my acting coach. It was wonderful teamwork. Because of the big success of the movie and your precedent on the screen and your erotic charisma . You became a new symbol of femininity. How does it feels to be one of the most beautiful women in cinema? Thank you for the compliment. I’m rarely thinking about what I embody. I concentrate on my work, my preparations, my roles and my dreams and goals. Everything else I put it to the side and laugh about it or get angry. Sometimes when I have the feeling of being violated. What I represent as Natalia Avelon interpreted for each individual is completely different. If I were asked, for which I stand, I could not answer. I float with my thoughts and my imagination somewhere else. We will not conceal, of course, that you are also a very successful singer. The theme song for your movie, “Eight Miles High” have you sung with „HIM“ superstar Ville Vallo.

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It was a big top hit in Europe . How did it come to this cooperation? The director, Achim Bornhak had the idea of a remake of the song “Summer Wine” for our soundtrack record, and he asked me if I would dare to sing the part of Nancy Sinatra. It was another adventure for me! Unknown territory! I love adventures! How does it feel to be suddenly a pop star? To hear your own song on the radio? Departed! Crazy! Beautiful! Unbelievable! Unrealistic! It is as if I have two personalities. The one sits at home with a sausage sandwich and listens to the radio and the other one , which can be seen in the video and has sung this song. Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Lovely! Will you sing once again in the future and bring a new album out? I love music! I’m in love with music! I would like to realize my visions that I have regarding to music, yes! You do acting, you sing and you are successful as a model. For many young girls you are a role model. Which artist has inspired you as a teenager? And why? I wanted to be so beautiful and exotic and peculiar as Janet Jackson is! And dance as good as her. Michael Jackson is still my role model, in terms of music and entertainment. Pharrell Williams, Will.I.Am, Madonna, Lady Gaga. Hitchcock, Vincent Price, Louis De Funes, Charlie Chaplin . They are all very visionary characters that define me in many ways and not to swim with the tide. I like colorful birds. And I do not mean their appearance but their personalities. People who are express themselves in the forefront. People with creativity, heart, soul and imagination!

Jacket: CARIN WESTER Top: WEEKDAY Pants: STINE GOYA

The tradition of great movie divas no longer exists these days. Pitty!. Who is one of the great divas ever for you? Liz Taylor, Katharine Hepburn, Catherine Deneuve. When i see photos of , like those on the current GQ cover. I can see that you have a very classic diva charisma. Now after meeting you i can say : You are one of the nicest and warmest actresses i have ever met. Who keeps you on the floor ? Thank you! This is a very, very nice compliment! I see no reason to play a diva. The term diva has to do with life experience, a certain age, great power, class and glamour. I’m still too young to be a diva. My family and friends would be disappointed in me, if i would act like a big diva. And also pride always comes before a fall. I think I have too much love and respect toward life in myself.

In 2008 you won the DIVA Award - New Talent of the Year. You are officially pimped out to a diva.! How was it for you to be suddenly in the spotlight ? Did you have to learn how to move on the big stage? I can imagine that this is not easy. I enjoyed it right from the first hour. Life and especially the entertainment industry is a large, colorful game. That you should not take all too seriously. Instead, you should deal with many things in life easy and fun and you will enjoy it more! With whom do you would love to work with? Is there a particular movie material, a role that you want to play? Oh there are so many! I would like to work with Gaspar Noe. Also with Werner Herzog, David Lynch,

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David Fincher, Detlev Buck, Leander Haussmann, Dominik Graf! With colleagues like Daniel Day Lewis, Sean Penn, Joaquin Phoenix, Gary Oldman, Cate Blanchett, Tilda Swinton. I would love to work with Marilyn Manson and N.E.R.D., and and and ..! What does a movie needs to seduce you? I am inspired by films like “The Wizard of Oz, “ “Murder by Death“, “Donnie Darko”, “City of God”, “Orfeu Negro, “”The Rose Tattoo “. Intelligently made movies with talented actors, created by talented creators and authors inspire me. As the last film I have seen “Poll”: a masterpiece! www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4r9DxdUdlg

What can we expect in the future from you? Any new projects or movies on the way? The next movie that will be released on 06/10/2011 is “Wunderkinder”. A movie told from the perspective of three children who have to give up their friendship and their love of music, because of the second World War. Natalia many thanks for a great day with you, a great shooting and the interview. We wish you all the best! Honk! loves you! And I love u, HONK!

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Peach all in one Beyond Retro headpiece by Tessa Edwards Gold necklace with skulls Gold necklace with pink horse hair both by Giselle Ganne Boots by Maria Francesca Pepe

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Well, well… speaking about divas. If I ask you to think about the biggest European diva alive I bet you might say Sophia Loren or Catherine Deneuve or even Penélope Cruz. But the truth is you would be forgetting one of the biggest (probably the biggest). And that one would be a man… yes! After Valentino or Karl Lagerfeld (but they don’t work in the cinema industry so I won’t say what I think about them which is not exactly good.) the biggest diva in this so called “Old Continent” is Mr. Pedro Almodóvar. Mr. Almodóvar is as difficult as talented. I had the chance to meet him in person some years ago and believe me if I say that for a moment it was like talking to Liza Minelli and Bette Davis at the same time. You could see how this kind of people don’t live in this real universe anymore. He’s gifted but very difficult to deal with. In Spain are quite well known his catfights with some of the actresses he worked with or how he decided to bring down a whole set that took weeks or months to build and cost a million because he didn’t like some little parts. But he is Mr. Almodóvar and he is also his own producer, together with his brother, so problem solved. They lead „El Deseo Producciones“ which is one of the most important production companies in Spain. As you can see I’m definitely not his number one fan but I have to say I don’t hate him either. To some people (specially in America) who think he’s just God and they just buy whatever he is doing. I think there are better directors here down the Pyrenees, like Alejandro Amenábar or Daniel Monzón but at least you must go to see his films because he has always something new to show, then it is up to you if you buy it or not. When do I buy it? Well, that’s easy. When he becomes the huge diva he is and explore the female universe. Sometimes he can touch perfection. But when he decides to explore some other horizons he use to lose his touch. It’s funny! He is a man but when he dives into the male perspective and the main character is a man in the movie. Then the worst Almodóvar comes out. That’s specially clear in his last film “Broken Embraces” (2009), (to me one of his worst films, where only Penélope Cruz saves the show… as usual). Two other examples could be “Bad Education” (2004) and “Live Flesh” (1997), a film I really loathe partly because of the presence of Liberto Rabal, one of the most boring actors ever.

After all I said I wouldn’t be to anxious about his next film, again with a male character leading the show. But this time I’m more than curious. First because Antonio Banderas is back to work with Almodóvar after many years and it’s also good to see him acting in Spanish again. If you read my first article back in issue number #01 you would remember what I said about some actors not acting in their own language and he is a good example. Second because it’s the first time Almodóvar films a kind of horror movie or let say a drama with some drops of horror. The film is based on Thierry Jonquet’s novel “Mygale” about the story of a plastic surgeon on the hunt for the men who raped his daughter. And third because of the whole cast. Antonio Banderas, Elena Anaya and Marisa Paredes together seem like a good reason to give it a try. By the way, If you are in Cannes (France) from 11 to 22 may you might have luck and be the first to watch it at the French film festival. If not you will have to wait until September. Send me an email with your opinion before I destroy you the movie with mine. And now back to the good things. Pedro Almodóvar was born in a very small town in one of Spain’s deepest areas where men worked the fields and women where strong but devoted to men and their kids taking care of their homes. I tell you this because Almodóvar grew up surrounded by women, learning to know them well almost without thinking and waiting for the next old Hollywood film to be shown at the summer cinema and waiting for Ava Gadner, Bette Davis or Elisabeth Taylor to come out of the screen to light up those difficult times in the country side during Franco’s dictatorship. He always admired the golden Hollywood times where the only presence of some of those amazing divas was enough to spend almost all of the salary in a cinema theatre. One of his favorites was Liz “violet eyes” Tay-

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lor. He was so affected for her dead that when the last big diva alive died (forgive me Lauren Bacall) he wrote an article at “El País”, the most important newspaper in Spain, speaking about her influence in his life and movies. Specially her traumatic marriages with Richard Burton or her roles in “Butterfield 8” (Daniel Mann, 1960) and in Tennessee Williams’ “Suddenly, Last Summer” (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1959) and specially “ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” (Richard Brooks, 1958). In fact, Williams’ influence is more than obvious in all of Almodóvar’s filmography, from desperate but powerful women such as Carmen Maura in “¿Qué he hecho yo para merecer esto!!” (1984) and “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown” (1988) or more recently Penélope Cruz in “Volver” (2006) to insane characters fighting solitude and desperately seeking to be loved: Great theatre actress Julieta Serrano again in “Women” or Spanish diva Marisa Paredes in “The Flower of my Secret” (1995). In “All about my mother” (1999), one of his best movies where argentinian actress Cecilia Roth (she never looked better) plays the role of a nurse who lost her son

in an accident after trying to get an autograph from his favorite actress Huma Rojo (Marisa Paredes) who is playing Tennessee Williams’ “A Streetcar Named Desire” in a theatre in Madrid. This movie got the Oscar for best foreign language film in 2000. But that’s not all. Almodóvar’s female universe is pretty much bigger than Hollywood divas. It goes from Italian neorealism where those voluptuous Italian “mammas” like Silvana Mangano or Sophia Loren flow to Mexican divas or artists such as María Felix, Frida Kahlo or Chavela Vargas (Amodóvar’s close friend). “Volver” is one of the best examples of this “Italian trend” where Penélope Cruz gives the performance of her life getting her first Academy Award nomination. The movie is a small masterpiece where he honors all those strong women he grew up with, mixing drama with his peculiar sense of humor. And now a whole paragraph to his best film (in my opinion) of the last decade: “Talk to her” (2002), probably the most touching and complete movie he has ever done where just with the premise of two girls (a classic dancer and a bullfighter) in deep comas he

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creates a story of desolation, loneliness, true love and obsession. The script is nearly perfect, winning the Academy Award for best writing, original screenplay beating “Gangs of New York” (Martin Scorsese, 2002) or “Far from Heaven” (Todd Haynes, 2002) in the same category. If someone told me before that it was possible to mix classic ballet, Pina Bausch and her “Café Müller”, a female bullfighter and Caetano Veloso singing unplugged in the same movie I would thought he was just mad. But with all those ingredients Almodóvar cooks a film about the happiness of talking, about the word as a weapon to run away from solitude, illness, death and madness. Or even that kind of madness so close to tenderness and common sense that it’s difficult to distinguish from normality. And if you still need to add a topping just watch Geraldine Chaplin (Charles Chaplin’s daughter) as a ballet teacher. She’s just Cinema History. Just a curiosity. For some years during the ninety’s there was a project to do a remake of “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown” with Hollywood stars and some of the names interested in the project were

Jane Fonda, Faye Dunaway or even Sharon Stone (Antonio Banderas’ good friend). But I bet the producers thought it would be impossible to shoot with so many divas and egos so the project went back to the drawer where it was until many years later where it became a Broadway musical that was cancelled last year after just a few months on stage. Ok, homework to do: Listen to a Chavela Vargas CD, watch Tennessee Williams’ “The Rose Tattoo” (Daniel Mann, 1955) with Anna Magnani and make a trip to a small village in Castilla La Mancha where I promise you won’t get a word of what they are saying and you will understand why Mr. Pedro Almodóvar makes movies the way he does. You see!... That wasn’t too bad. I can be nice sometimes. That’s because I’m listening to Charles Chaplin’s “Smile” while I’m writing the last part of this article telling me to light up my face with gladness and make me forget shit like “Live Flesh”, “Matador” or “Broken Embraces”.... I can’t! Those movies are all the Razzie Awards together. I need a better image to finish this article… What about Penélope Cruz wearing a pair of Christian Louboutin high heels? Yeah, much better...!

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by Alis Pelleschi www.alispelleschi.com Model Mary-Elizabeth @ First Model Management Dan Szor & Rael Stone Stylist Leeann Soki Mak Makeup Alicia Samuels @ AOXpressions using MAC makeup Hair Liam Curran using SHU EUMURA Nails Emma Zentner at Boom Nails

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Peach all in one Beyond Retro headpiece by Tessa Edwards Gold necklace with skulls, Gold necklace with pink horse hair both by Giselle Ganne Boots by Maria Francesca Pepe

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Mary Floor length dress Fyodor Golan Gloves and swimming cap both from Beyond Retro Silver and rose gold bracelet by Maria Francesca Pepe Creeper boots by Underground Dan & Rael Both Hats by Beyond Retro

Black jacket by Rael Stone Flower headpiece by Little Shilpa Silver plate Necklace by Maria Francesca Pepe

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Pfur trimmed gloves Beyond Retro Pink latex dress by William Wilde Black cap by Ryan Noon Face veil by Alis Pelleschi

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Creepers by underground

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Crown by Rael Stone Pink Latex dress by William Wilde Gold Earring by Maria Francesca Pepe Platform Creepers by Underground

“I just want to do everything” Interview with Alis Pelleschi by Jackee Word

When did you start taking photographs and why? I remember having a little red film click camera when I was a kid, that my dad would load the film in. But I guess I really started taking photos and experimenting with what I was photographing and editing and things when I was about 14. Me and my parents had just moved to a new area, and all my friends lived miles away, which meant I spent a lot of time alone. With the introduction of Myspace, I would spend hours dressing up, photographing myself on self timer and haphazardly edit them and upload them. I

didn’t really think anything more of it than just creating images and dressing up. I gave myself an online name of TAMPON GIRL. I would instantly get feed back on my photos (and videos) and I guess I became a bit of an addict to it all. When I started taking these self-portraits, I had no comprehension that photography could or would turn into a career. What is your best piece to date? I’m probably my own worst critic, so I’m constantly trying to push myself harder, bigger and better. I

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Dress by Fyodor Golan Gold rat skull ring by Giselle Ganne Green emerald ring Relik London Gold Earring by Maria Francesca Pepe Platform Creepers by Underground

pink hat by strictly by ugler gold rat skull ring Giselle Ganne Nude skirt and top both Fyodor Golan

recently shot a series of self-portraits for Super Super magazine entitled LONELY HEARTS, and SUPER FANS. I think that’s when my self-portraits finally started looking aesthetically, how I wanted them to, and it’s the work that most people comment on to me. I love working with people, but there’s this feeling of setting up a scene, and becoming a character and doing it alone and not caring if you look stupid/ugly/ sexy/fat that is so satisfying.

What is your ambition for the next 5 years? I only recently moved to London in the last few months and already loads of things seem to be happening for me. In five years time, I hope to be an top established photographer, flying the world and photographing loads of interesting characters. I also really want to start making videos on a higher level, as well as start designing my own collection and got some music I’m working on. SERIOUS THUG!! I just want to do everything, meet loads of interesting people and be happy.

Who is your biggest inspiration? There’s a billion photographers, artists, etc that I love and find inspiring, but what really inspires me are everyday people, my upbringing in Bradford (up north); popular culture; badly dubbed porn and chip butties.

What/who is your dream photography subject? I would loveeee to photograph the Queen (of England).

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THE

I AM OFFICE YOUR GOD DIVA

Text and Artwork by Drew Eastman www.facebook.com/drew.eastman

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Have you met me? It’s like stumbling onto a scene from the “Devil Wears Prada“, you race to the office and drop into a coffee shop and scream at the barista to make sure its a “Soy Latte“ with vanilla dust and not some normal american with full fat milk all the while scanning the pastries for the demanded cinnamon rolls ... It’s getting close to 9 am and the walk by traffic on the street is mental on this midweek workday. Let me introduce myself: Its ME the new office slave to the queen of all nightmares. This is a scene that can be applied to many office environments so i am not filling in any names, you can enter your own names here where they fit. Just entering the office i can feel her already being in the building, there is an awkward humming going thru the cubicles which usually means she’s already here and probably in a foul mood. Remember that “Soy Latte“? Well, she is already on a war path because of a caffeine withdrawal syndrome. “Where the fuck have you been? Does it always take you this long to get some shitty coffee? You always seem to forget whom you are getting this coffee for, ONLY ME the stupid bitch that is paying your wages, no?” I mean how can i forget who is paying my wages? This witch is reminding me of this fact nearly every day ..., sometimes even twice before lunch and three times after. Usually she is already in the office by the time I get there, by the time any of us gets there really. So what ever you do or whatever time you get there it will never be good enough. I sometimes wonder if she is carried into the office by a bunch of muscular hunks in golden jockstraps like the queen she thinks she is. To be honest I don’t even know if she does go home at all, i’m joking obviously but she is always here. This is NOT my day, the cinnamon rolls are dry! What does this mean for the rest of the day? I’m fucked! She will be on my case all day now.. I am sure you guessed it by now, this is not an out of the ordinary day, why don’t I just switch jobs? Are you high on crack? For all the shit I have to put up with this is my dream job, just like in that movie. There even have been a moment or two when I indeed felt some kinda connection to her, she might have been dunk though or it was a line of coke, don’t care really cos it was nice to not being shouted at and feel like a human next to her in one room. In my head this moment lasted I think an hour ... In reality I guess it was more like five minutes. That’s the fucked up thing about reality, isn’t it?

I always wondered what “Miss Diva“ is like when she is at home. Maybe her husband is the tyrant there and she is the little chicken that’s doing all the chores? Or she kicks everyone’s arse there too and instead of going for a piss round with the dog she kicks it out the backdoor. Well this is how it happens in my head anyway. We never got that close to find out that part. What turned her into this monster though is what I keep asking myself over and over? Unless she’s been like that even as a little girl kicking the boys in the sandbox and pulling the other girls hair to make them give them their juice boxes and sandwiches. Maybe it was her folks that turned her into this snake pit of a woman that you wanna serve a “Soy Latte“ with ipecac (a serum to induce vomiting like Linda Blair in the exorcist, look it up on google there are also some nice videos on YouTube). I know that certainly will not be abel to change her, I think before that happens I find myself sipping the ipecac myself. Not that I want to but it’s more likely to happen. I think what makes her this way as well is that she thinks she can walk on water, or more like, do this job better than anyone else in this building, god knows even in this industry. Maybe I am sticking around because I am somehow fascinated by this whole show of hers everyday and secretly want to become like her in a few years and then it might be YOU that will bring me my frappuccino with lactose free milk and a pepperoni sandwich! You best make it spicy or I kill you! Sure many of us have over ambitious bosses sitting in front of us that make our live a living hell, have you ever wondered what you would be like running a department or even a whole company? Especially when you have to deal with loads of megalomaniacs and egos bigger than the country they reside in? I am certain it is not easy every day but being a bitch or bastard doesn’t make it easier for us the ones working for you cheese balls. I used to love going into work and now I am just going into work to get somewhere. Kinda hope I get there someday, because you know what? It’s exhausting working for a diva like you. I might be back being the bad ass diva myself you better watch it.

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www.kazaky.com Text Drew Eastman Interview Marcel Schlutt

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What do you get when you cross Madonna (late 90’s), Lady Gaga, Take That and some sexy 90s male workout videos? Kazaky that what. As far as Boyband’s go i think we had our fair share in the last decades from the real damn good ones like the reborn Take That to the very boring ones ‘Boyzone / Westlife’ which i can never keep apart cos they sound so much alike and the god awful US5. Ok, so i left out a lot of them but this is not about the other New and Old on The Block :) Then i was tweeted this link to ‘LOVE’ by Kazaky on YouTube that i Absofuckinlutly had to check out. I confess it took me about an hour to click the link because i was thinking “oh jeez not another Boyband” but i did it anyway and i am glad i did, read on to hear why. With my finger on the MacBook Pro’s trackpad close the red blob to shut the window in a jiffy i was moving further away from the glowing button as the tune was progressing, YES this is actually damn cool. Normally i have to confess that BoyBands are really not my bucket of scotch, i’d rather down a few than

to listen to another cover version by some four to five piece teen dream sensation, but when something comes along that is this exciting i feel obliged to tell you about it. That bad ass electro beat, the bouncy synth stabs and a tune that is basically just one continuous hook are the ingredients of ‘LOVE’ and the debut single ‘In the Middle’. The lads don’t just sing it very sexy they can dance like Lady Gaga’s best Monster Ballers. I might add without all the blood and gore. Curiosity got the better of me and i even checked out their previous video for ‘In the Middle’, gotta say i was reminded of these mid 90’s WorkOut Videos that featured hunky guys with colorful outfits, very retro and very steaming hot, kinda like a gay porn without the penetration - the song delivers that part. No wonder this video got a lot of attention from boys and girls alike.

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So who the hell are these guys ? They are Oleh Zhezhel, Artur Archibaz, Kyryll Fedorenko and Stas Pavlov from Kiev, Ukraine. Their first single called ‘In the Middle’ was released in September of last year. Oleh, the experienced choreographer and dancer was the one who got the four of them together. The video of ‘In the Middle’ didn’t take long to become a YouTube smash hit with now more than 2,3 million views according to Wikipedia and ‘LOVE’ the follow up grabbed about 2.6 million so far if not more. The videos show that it’s not just the music that is important to them but also their image, these guys are very visual, playing around with masculinity and mixing it up with an androgynous style that is kind of unique in the BoyBand business. Just take a look at the images here and the videos and you see exactly what i mean. Another mark of their success so far is the “Breakthrough of the Year” award at the MyWay Dance Awards 2010 along with numerous articles in big name magazines and newspapers all over the globe. Not a bad start for such a fresh new group, hey?

It’s fair to assume that from this wealth of creativity we can look forward to a lot more exciting releases and hopefully a whole album of thumping electropop. So where does this leave us? Pretty simple, if you got this far and i was abel to wet your appetite for these lads then grab some popcorn and head over to YouTube and make your own mind up by watching their videos. I for one can feel a heatwave coming on. HONK! was lucky enough to get a few moments in their busy schedule and our very own Marcel Schlutt had the chance to ask them all a few questions. watch: In the middle www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcNqm2Xb364 Love www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsHEZ_6fAy4

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Oleg Zhezhel Where do you see yourself and your music in 10 years? We decided that we will keep on producing and creating as long as we have inspiration and favor for it. We donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t tend to live for the moment because we are aiming high. Moreover, we are plentiful of ideas, but not for the following decade. Which music artists inspired you? In aspect of performance and presentation Beyonce takes the lead. Each of us has his own preferences and they donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t usually coincide with each other. Personally I have versatile tastes for the music and it is quite uneasy for me to outline a certain artist. First of all, I would name Crystal Castles, Beth Ditto and Stateless.

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Artur Gaspar How does it feels like to be a member of the biggest pop sensations of our time? What made you think that I was feeling like a member of the biggest sensation of our time? I am just doing my own thing and nothing more. Who is your personal music diva? My personal music diva is Beyonce.

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Stas Pavlov What do you like more - shooting a music video or performing on stage? I prefer walking in the forest. Who is the ultimativ music diva for you? My girlfriend.

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Kyryll Fedorenko What was it like when youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve heard for the first time one of your songs on the radio? It was like inner smile, triumph, condition of something great and pleasant. If could you choose a female singer for a duet. Who would it be? Jennifer Lopez. Besides her being an interesting and talented person, I admire the way she scored success all by her own.

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QUEEN

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NEW YORK

Text by Shel Fuller Photo by Jonathan Bell www.jonbell.net

I got off the PATH Train at Christopher Street and ascended the unrealistically windy staircase. On this street, this street where history was made, I was surprised to see how ghetto it was. Random shady looking men, all hip-hopped and covered in bling, waiting on everything and nothing. Two transvestites verbally battling it out on the street corner - one crackhead thin, the other Big Mac fat. A swirling spectrum of skin color, language, and intelligence. God, I love this city. It was not my intention to move to New York City. The idea filled me with dread. So many people packed together - so much competition. What should I do here? I was used to being the big fish in a small pond but now the tables were turned. Here on these wide, traffic-filled streets, I was invisible. Walking among ghosts, slowly I became one myself but these ghosts were not like those that can be found in the tales of Poe. These entities were alive. Shapeshifters, who continually reconceptualize themselves on an hourly basis. During the day, I sat eight hours staring at a computer monitor in rows of cubicles but at night, I transformed into a mystical phoenix. Sipping cocktails at an after work party on the Upper West Side in the evening, melds into dancing in the mist of shirtless, Chelsea bottoms at night. A quick jump over to the East Village to hook up with an overly tattooed freak who just completed his degree in Theology at NYU. “What do you want to do with your degree?” “I want to be a priest.” – No comment. Waking up and realizing that you have to wear the same underwear again because you didn’t make it home last night finally returning to your 3 and a quarter-walled cubicle. My two best friends and I, in one of our stoned states, decided to give each other diva names. William would be La Divina (a reference to Maria Callas). Jason,

would be the Wonder Diva Deluxe (you have to know him to understand that one) and I, of course, was the Grand Diva. I even named my former public relations company, The Grand Diva Group (group meaning me). Back then, I was probably best known for my fearlessness and my deranged adventures. Waking up naked in the apartments of celebrities, late night basement parties in DUMBO, chatting in secret underground wine cellar lounges with tragic supermodels. But it wasn’t me that created all of this supposed glamour. It was the city. It took me by the scruff of my neck and lead me through its streets, begging me to explore which I eagerly did. It was the dimly lit doors at the end of dark allies that lured me into circumstances which most people would only dream of. Sometimes, I look back at those days in wonder. I think about the serendipitous end events and what lead up to them. We only think of people as divas but what surrounds the diva is what inspires a diva to be one. Of course, I wasn’t really a diva. I was more like the dust that trailed the comet along with millions and millions of other specks. Small amounts of plant pollen, human hairs, and textile fibers compressed into 305 square miles (790 km2) of water-rimmed land. This city carries the glamour of ages deep within its tarred sidewalks and hot dog stands. New York is bigger than America. Sometimes, bigger than the Earth. What it symbolizes, what it forces you to believe is an experience that no one will ever take away from you. This city doesn’t need to be covered in cosmetics or drowned in jewels. The city doesn’t even demand that. It wants your love, your curiosity, your respect, and your admiration. Like a mother, it nourishes you with or without your consent. New York City is the ultimate diva of the world.

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Jackee WORD

GROSSSTADTMĂ&#x201E;DCHEN Photos by Joana Dias www.Joanadias.tumblr.com/ Hair&Make up Thary Plast Ic Artwork Nicolas Simoneau

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ZACHARI

LOGAN

EXPRESS MASCULINE BRAVADO & TO

superiority www.zacharilogan.com Interview by Marcel Schlutt

What a man, what a man. What a mighty good man. Yes! That is Zachari Logon. The 30-year-old Canadian is one of the stars of the international art scene in 2011. His paintings continue the great tradition of old masters of painting. It is a joy to marvel at the large paintings. His favorite subject is himself, sometimes drawn, sometimes naked, sometimes strong, and then again with feeling. With his type of art, he will have a great future. We are thrilled to introduce you to Zachari Logan and his work.

Duality 1 (Abraham & Issac) Graphite on paper, 42 x 65 inches, 2010

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HONK!: Zachari , we really like your paintings. when did you find out that you want be a painter? Zachary: Well, for as long as I can remember- I have been working visually. Talking came slow to me as a child and reading even slower, as it was discovered when I was six that I was severely dyslexic... so communicating visually became a very palpable way for me to express myself. You are a very good looking man and it is great to see you on your paintings. What is the meaning behind painting yourself? Are you a Narcissist? If people have an inkling that I draw and paint my own image because I am attracted to myself sexually- and this is my sole endeavour in relation to self-reflexive imagery- they would be mistaken. The use of my own body as subject to set up glyphic gestures was initially a way to express critical thoughts about masculinity both as it has been posed historically in the visual arts and how society still clings to these heterosexist constructions in contemporary society. My body as a type is one that has historically been used by artists to express masculine bravado and superiority, my aim is to undermine that myth, returning a more vulnerable gaze, exposing the male body as a subjective being, as human- as opposed to a spectacle of stereotypic notions.

I have- and still do use my body as a catalyst for this work, both because I am much more comfortable with posing my own body the ways in which I want it, and secondly it eliminates the power dynamic which exist between model and artist (a dialogue I am not interested in, except for the narrative base that using myself as both artist and model creates.) Strangely, the continual use of myself as subject is what people most often react to negatively. This aspect of narcissism which is clearly evident in my work can be found in every artist I believe... in a less transparent way maybe, but I don’t look at self-reflection necessarily as a bad thing. This type of repetition sets up a timescape where I can converse with aspects of myself and projections which evolve a self-anxious, self-reflective internal dialogue that is neither linear nor is it often rational. I am finding a shift within my current work which is becoming much more specific to my own life and experiences. Work that is potentially much more revealing- ironically, as within some of this new work- I appear to have more clothing on... There is always some nudity involved in your work. I am pretty sure there are men and girls out there..seeing you as a sexobject. How do you handle this? Well, this was partially answered in the previous question... however what I will say about the nudity in my work, is that I have no control over how people will interpret it- nor should I... a viewers conceptions about me or my intentions for this work are clearly based on thier own state of mind, they tend to reveal more about themselves than they do about me upon reacting to the work- that is a testament to the power of art, and it usually can only be successful if it’s concept is maliable. We are all sexual creatures... that being said- I don’t ever aim to be a sex object or symbol- I find that type of reaction to my work as simplistic at best. My body is how I express political metaphor about my life as a queer man married to another man, as a sexual being and as a vulnerable subject- no different than anyone else in many respects... this work aims at revealing the normalcy of desire- and I don’t just mean capital D desire, I mean the need to express difference and the to have the visibility to exist among a majority that continually projects objection to my choice... which ends up often manifesting itself as a series of solitary domestic portrayals. Sometimes the work references established art-historical and/or literary works and sometimes it simply refers back to previous work I have made, evolving an already established narrative. How do you start with a new painting? Do you photograph yourself before? Or how do you do it?

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I usually take quite a bit of time thinking about concept before it ever materializes on paper or canvas... sometimes years- but I always use photographic imagery for my work... holding a pose and drawing or painting is virtually impossible. When i saw the first time one of your paintings, ( it was a shoe ) it reminded me of Albrecht Dürer. Do you have an icon? Who influenced you? Many, many icons and influences... and yes Durer for sure, also... Caravaggio, Ingres, Holbein, Gericault, David, Goya, Breugel, Velasquez, Manet, Ribera... many contemporary influences as well... Damien Hirst, Cindy Sherman, Sophie Calle, Alison Norlen, Aurel Schmidt, Odd Nerdrum, AA Bronson/ General Idea, John Currin, Lucien Freud, Evan Penny, Attila Richard Lukacs... among others. You could say though that my muse is art history... during the summer of 2009 as the result of an artist-project grant, I travelled to Paris to study the neoclassical paintings within the grand hall of the Louvre, which resulted in the “Beautiful Losers Project”, the creation of an 18 foot oil painting that saw my body portrayed echoing the gestural elements from my research. I will often times re-sutuate famous literary allegories within my work as well. You have done exhibitions all over the world. How did your career start? Z: It just kind of came about serendipidously, I caught the eye of French gallerist Jean Roch Dard who saw my work in a publication, I believe, and offered me a solo show in Paris. This initial exhibition led to a string of projects in both private and public spaces in NYC and throughout the US in Miami, Cincinnati and Raleigh NC. As well, among these various projects, in 2009 I was one of the recipients of MFA Now, an international painting competition for recent MFA graduates. I was also invited to participate in an exhibition in Paris, titled “When I Grow Up” which paired emerging artists with established ones in an effort to create a dialogue between the two... to my utter suprise, I was paired with one of my favorite contemporary artists Sophie Calle. I have also exhibited in Berlin, Paris, Barcelona and here

Emperor’s New Clothes (from Disappearances series) Pastel on paper, 50 x 110 inches, 2011

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Beautiful Losers Oil on canvas, 110 x 200 inches, 2010

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in Canada, recently in Montreal, Toronto and Ottawa. I have in recent years attended residencies in both Paris and Tenneessee. I am currently at a Canadian artist residency in the mountains of British Columbia... I have in the past couple of years been the recipient of various travel and project grants through the Saskatchewan Arts Board, a provinical granting programming for artists here in Saskatchewan, my province of origin within Canada. If i wanna buy one of your drawings. Where can i get them? And what is the price for one piece? It is best to go directly to my website where listed are the contemporary galleries that show my work, and the prices of individual works can be discussed upon contacting them directly. www.zacharilogan.com

What are your future projects? Where can we see your work next? I heard rumors, there is a book coming? I am currently working on four solo shows for this fall/ winter. The first of which will open early October at Headbones Gallery, where I am presently working as artist in residence until early next month, the second exhibition “Disappearances” will show in Paris at Galerie Jean Roch Dard toward the end of October, the third exhibition”Trauma & Other Stories” opens early November at Daniel Cooney Fine Art with a series titled “Trauma & Other Stories, and for the forth exhibition, I will present my project “Beautiful Losers” through Craig Scott Gallery in January of 2012. During the month of April 2012 I will be attending the NES Artist Residency in Iceland where I will work on a project to be exhibited next fall in Vienna, Austria. And yes, I do have a book of my work coming out through Sternthal Publications (MTL/NYC). “Portraits Without Pants: The Art Of Zachari Logan” is a full-length book spanning my work from 2005 to the present with a forward by prominant British art-historian Edward LucieSmith. Hopefully it be released this fall in conjunction with the upcoming exhibitions. http://www.sternthalbooks.com/?p=zachari_logan Thanks for taking some time to do this little interview. We wish you all the best for the future! And thank-you Marcel & HONK!

Niqab (from Blueboy Series) Blue pencil on mylar, 2010

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Go to Hell (from Trauma & Other Stories) (detail) Blue pencil on mylar, 120 x 42 inches, 2011

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Vignette (Detail) Graphite on paper, 110 x 210 inches, 2011

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Eli Leven is an up and coming young writer from stockholm whose life is governed by drama and love. In his award wining book, that is being translated into english, he is writing about things only a few would dare do -very successfully so- and at the same time he sees his words being turned into a movie being shot in the swedish capital right now, while he is busy writing and acting out his inner diva in New York City. In which sense could u possibly be a diva? I’m going to tell you a story of how I met my present lover. I was ridiculously bored and drunk off my ass at a rave goth club in December in Chinatown when a man approached me and said he heard by his friend that I could vogue. I put on a little show for him. When I turned around he tried to finger me and I slapped his face and he kissed me. We went back to mine and had some mushrooms while watching youtube clips of the Mexican movie icon Maria Felix, we fell asleep and I remember dreaming I was Maria Felix, and me and that guy I brought home went horseback riding in a green valley. If you could be any past diva male or female, which one would you pick and why? Maria Felix was once asked about how Paris was compared to Mexico and she said “Mexico is my first love, I’m their whore but I’m also their mother”. I want to be able to say the same thing . Is there an event that has shaped you in life? Taking antidepressants was really trippy and opened up my mind making me less self critical. I don’t think I would’ve written the novel without them. I’m off now though, but they really changed my life. Tell me a little about your novel, what is it dealing with? I wanted to write about a dying boy, going from being passive and sort of a victim to becoming something new, his imaginary friend, a girl. It’s essentially a love story

about transformation between a femme boy becoming a girl and this butch sexually confused straight guy. A tour de force. It’s partly some kind of fantasies that I started having after watching Wild at Heart when I was 13. I wanted it to be a conversation with other works of art that have inspired me, like Dennis Cooper’s Closer, Our lady of the flowers by Jean Genet and maybe Confessions of a Mask by Yukio Mishima. I was very naive when I started out writing it. I think I wanted it to be a sort of loving father murder. I wrote a lot being angry and disgusted about how the self destructive “twink” is a sex object. Is it in a wider sense autobiographical somehow? In a wider sense maybe. It’s very close to me and I often think it’s hard to know what I’ve written and what I really experienced in real life. Did you expect your novel to be so successful? I got a lot of good feedback as soon as I showed my texts to other people and hoped it would be successful but not like this! I know at the time, you have left Stockholm for New York. What more does it offer you? Excitement. I’m excited almost every day to be here. I like being more anonymous. There are so many possibilities in this city, it’s overwhelming. Are you working on something right now? For a year I have been working on a screenplay based on my novel. I am working together with Ester Martin

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MIU MIU CHARM €120.00 Miu Miu’s silver and neon-green nappa leather appliquéd star keyfob with a cool flash of fluoro.

VIVIENNE WESTWOOD SIGG BOTTLE NO1 €23.00 act! FAST SLOW down STOP CLIMATE CHANGE A cause close to Vivienne’s heart, slow down climate change!

YOU CERTAINLY CAN LIVE WITHOUT THESE ITEMS, BUT LIFE IS SO MUCH MORE BEAUTIFUL WITH THEM. Editors choice by Marina Gehrman

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ERDEM Printed-silk Dachshund toy €179.52 Erdem’s collectable multicolored printed silk Dachshund

BERNHARD WILLHELM FRAGRANCE SIX SCENTS SERIES 1 £ 85.00 Six Scents: Series 1 features fragrances created by six renowned perfumers working with six celebrated designers to help raise money for the International AIDS Awareness Education Centre in Antwerp.

The Arabia horse-print swimsuit

The Los Angeles bandeau swimsuit

The Yosemite bandeau swimsuit

WE ARE HANDSOME €225 Australian swimwear label inspired by the heady adventurism of the ‘70s, ‘80s and ‘90s

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THE

FUTURE BERLIN

FACES

YOU SHOULD KNOW

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NATALIE REICHMANN / THE ANTI-IT gIRL AND STYLE ICON She is the mother of all freaks in this town. She is a style icon and her party weekends are legendary. Thanks to God, we have her and not Paris Hilton. If she enters the club “Berghain”, everyone knows the Queen is at home. No one in this city is loved more than Natalie. No matter whether gay, hetero, men or women. The 28 year-old Berlin woman is a trendsetter and an artist. If you ever see them on your visit in Berlin, give her your most beautiful smile. Because she deserves it. Future a record deal, successful artist and the Queen of the Unicorns www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1538256485&sk=info

gLORIA VIAgRA / THE ROCK´N´ROLL STAR & gAY ACTIVIST Yes! She is a Drag Queen, a Rockstar (her group - Squeezebox), a DJ and one of the most politically active people in this city. Gloria is a good proof that a woman can be successful without the wrong attidute of many many drag queens. She is using her popularity to help help people in many projects and not killing our nervs in „real life“ TV Shows. Always up for a flirt , i am sure she will not say : No , if you invite her for a drink Future Berlin´s first drag major!!! www.gloriaviagra.com

pAUL S. / THE FASHION BOY For many years, German guys are very successful on the catwalks of the world. The 17-year-old Paul S. is based in Berlin and he is the newcomer of the international men’s fashion scene. His vulnerable charisma, cheetah with German virtues make him to a much booked model. Magazines such as TUSH, VANITY TEEN & FHM Collections love to work with him. Agencies: Milano @INDEPENDENT MEN, Paris @NATHALIE Berlin @IZAIO www.izaio.de Future Calvin Klein is calling, Tom Ford will name a collection with his name

DILOSCH MILOSCH THE BEAUTY AND ART Yes Dolisch Milosch is a real beauty .. OH YES .. But her art is a thousand times more beautiful than she is. „Hennacouture“ is the name for what she is doing. Well, we all know that is not a new idea. But no one is doing this kind of art in Europe, like Dilosch is doing it. She gives the henna painting, the coolness which it had not all the years. Because of her it is cool and edgy. Btw. Dilosch is a realy beautyful girl! Future She will create THE trend for 2012

www.diloschmilosch.blogspot.com

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OBAMA AND

BEAST

THE

by Christo Mitov

A prince gets married, the bad guy is dead: Or how May 2011 kicked off with a perfect Disney weekend and a post mortem photo shoot with Obama, or was it Osama? US president Barack Obama didn’t make it to the cover of HONK! #2 FAIRY TALES issue. We had this whole Obama-branded PR stunt planned for the last issue. Imagine a comprehensive retelling of the animated classic Aladdin: a villa rented next to Islamabad, Pakistan, with a pool and 72 virgins in it. Cast: Barack Obama as Aladdin, Osama bin Laden as Jafar, Michelle Obama as Jasmine and Oprah as the Genie (after all she and Robin Williams have essentially the same voice). It was the perfect plan to outshine the royal wedding of William and Kate before it even happened. But you know how competitive Barack is - he insisted on shifting the whole event to beginning of May. Yes, you can safely assume that we knew about this assassination plot all along. We just didn’t want to spoil the fun for you. Because you clearly had a blast after our trusted media outlets confirmed that the Al-Qaeda terrorist leader and mastermind

behind the 9/11 tragedy was finally dead, finally smoked out of his foxhole in god-knows-whatcavern-in-the-middle-of-fuck-all. The events surrounding Bin Laden’s death offered a plethora of entertainment options: there was suspense, there was fun, a few silly jokes, some unexpected twists, and of course, everyone received a souvenir picture as a reminder of this glorious day in the history of humankind. Let’s wrap up some of them:

10 years later... After 10 years, what gave bin Laden away? Osama bin Laden’s decade on the run after September 11th may have come to its end in part because his large hideout reportedly lacked a phone and Internet connection - an unusual absence likely to have drawn investigators’ curiosity. For a decade, his presumed choice of Pakistan as

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place of refuge from history’s most extensive manhunt worked well enough. Overnight, however, bin Laden’s long effort at concealment ran aground when U.S. forces stormed his hideout and shot him dead. What precisely gave him away remains unclear, as many details have yet to be told about the raid. One fact about his location was an immediate surprise - instead of hiding in a cave in a remote peak of the Hindu Kush, the leader of A-Qaeda turned out to have been hiding in an urban area near the capital Islamabad. Perhaps his downfall was due to a failure to cover his communications tracks, rather than his precise choice of location.

Twitter took over mainstream media (?) After the social universe fell into euphoria about the happy royal couple William and Kate (big, British grins) and right before the denouement would kick in, there it was. In the night of May 1st, most of us learned about Osama Bin Laden’s death on Twitter. And in fact, the first credible report from Keith Urbahn (NOT Keith Urban), former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s chief of staff, was also on Twitter. Read his tweet here. (http://twitter.com/#%21/keithurbahn/ status/64877790624886784) And while the White House kept pushing off the official announcement for an hour to inform different parties, the news was

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already being analyzed and spread on Twitter. So did Twitter replace mainstream media as the best source of news about Bin Laden’s death? Yes and no. Yes, many people first heard about the news on Twitter, but more often than not the original source of that news could be traced back to mainstream media. Although some “accidental” on-the-ground-reporting occurred exclusively on Twitter, mainstream media (CNN, NYT, etc) confirmed Bin Laden’s death. Twitter does not supplant other media—it merely amplifies it. According to TechCrunch, during the President’s announcement, people were Tweeting at a rate of over 4,000 Tweets per second, a close second or third—about the same level of Tweets as during the last Super Bowl. Much of what people were Tweeting was what they were hearing on TV, thus passing the news instantly to people who may not have been in front of a TV at the time. But what that means in practice is that if you are following the right people, you don’t have to actually turn on your TV.

all over the world what was supposed to be Osama’s death mugshot. A trusted source in Eurovision not the song contest, but the premier distributor of news content for the world’s top broadcast and media platforms - gave me some inside on coverage on the story. Here is the timeline: Someone hears about Osama Bin Laden’s death, performs a Google Image search; finds a year-old doctored image of dead Osama and sends it to PK TV; they pick it up and use it for their news coverage as a source; PK TV then forwards the image to RTV and APTN; the image then lands all over the world, including Reuters. Hour later Reuters calls back to withdraw the picture explaining it was - wait for it - fake. Still, the only people with supposed to be real images of dead Osama, remain the officials in the White House. I hope they will spread an image which is not completely blurry and shaky and also one that won’t cause another wave of Moon landing conspiracy.

July 4.2 Osama or Obama? Shortly after US president Barack Obama officially announced the assassination of Osama Bin Laden, mainstream media became somewhat confused as to whether Osama or Obama had been killed. Understandably, the distinction between the world’s most-wanted terrorist and the President of the United States of America is so subtle as to be nearly baffling. Frankly, I don’t judge them. Back in 2006 during the London bombings I was live reporting for DARIK radio on the events and I kept on confusing 9/11 with 11/9 and 9/6. Anyway, everybody had a good laugh over CNN, MSNBC, FOX, ABC, El Pais and FNC, which unwillingly put a bullet in Barack Obama. And yet, the confusion is not completely unjustified—bin Laden, just like Tupac, continues to drop new tapes after his death. The next one is to be released very soon. Maybe by the time this article is published it will have made its way through the AlQaeda media pipeline.

Conspiracy photo booth All those speculations lead us to the next conspiracy layer. Apparently there has been a post mortem photo shoot with Osama (as himself) Some outtakes are yet to be released by the Obama administration, although already in the night of Bin Laden’s assassination, news agency Reuters offered media

Although, when you take a step back and look what was and is still happening all over the US after Osama Bin Laden’s death, you can clearly see that the general public doesn’t really care if the US government will get their Osama story straight or not. Bin Laden’s assassination released a wave of spontaneous, organized and unnecessary celebratory events. Accompanying the Osama/Obama confusion in media was the live streaming of joyful celebrations in Washington and at Ground Zero in New York. I really wonder if people at Ground Zero were realizing at the moment they were dancing on the grave of almost 3000 people. Anyway, the ridiculous patriotic outburst wasn’t a surprise altogether, but the way it happened made me wonder if the news had a commercial brake and this was the summer campaign for Coca Cola. To be honest, the whole outcome of events was a little sad that people think of the death of Osama Bin Laden as of victory. If May 1st was supposed to celebrate a victory of the United States over terrorism, it is beyond doubt that this victory is Pyrrhic except for those making money off of it. There was a moment where I dreamed of being a American flag manufacturer, or owner of a company producing full-body suits with the American flag on them or toilet paper with Bin Laden’s face printed on it. Maybe it’s not too late tho - this story is a developing just like the creative ways of producing hideous patriotic merchandize.

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YOUR

MAJESTY Photos by Christian Branscheidt A special thanks to Ina, Jule, Reza, Lea and Edna

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YOUR MAJESTY Imagine that Wolfgang Tillmann and Terry Richardson would have a son. It must be Christian Branscheidt. The young german is guy born 1985 Hamburg/Germany . He is one of those people who donÂ´t know how talendet and giftet they are. Christian is based now in Berlin and is very well known in town for his great and stunning t-shirt collection . And yes the girls in the city love him because he is one of the best hairdressers. But what a waste of talent .Sorry girls! I met Christian around 2 years ago and i was surprised how good his privat photography was and i told him, he has to follow that. So we asked him for our diva issue to do a shoot for us.

Mr Branscheidt donÂ´t need a big team to create something good. It is just him and his little camera! Hands up for his work and we realy hope to see more of him and his work in the future! If you would like to work with him you can contact him on Facebook or send an email to HONK!

www.facebook.com/branscheidt

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Dogs believe they are

human.

Cats believe they are

God. Photo by Christos Kapralos www.homoanarchy.tumblr.com

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Exhibit eras are: Ladies First: The 90´s and the New Millenium The 1990s was the era the riot grrrl, the rapper and the Lilith Fair, reshaping traditional ideas of feminism and traditionally male-dominated areas of the music industry. Women have arguably become the leading voices of the industry, standing -- army-booted, barefooted, or high-heeled stiletto -- toe to toe with any artist of today. Highlighted artists will include Bikini Kill, Meg White, Queen Latifah , ... Dance the mees around: Punk and Post punk Chrissie Hynde said, “That was the beauty of the punk thing: [Sexual] discrimination didn’t exist in that scene.” The DIY aspect of punk rock made it easier for a woman to find a place in music. Highlighted artists will include Yoko Ono, Siouxsie Sioux, Kate Pierson and Cindy Wilson of the B-52s, Deborah Harry, Tina Weymouth, Kim Deal and Marianne Faithful. I will Survive : The 1970s - Rockers to Disco Divas Women are in the center of the ‘70s mainstream, from Joan Jett and the Runaways, Heart and Fleetwood Mac to Donna Summer. The gains of the feminist movement throughout the ‘70s enabled women working in all areas of the music industry to assume more control over their careers The Rock and Roll HALL of Fame And Museum +Women Who Rock: Vision, Passion , Power May 13.2011 till February 26.2012 1100 Rock and Roll Blvd. Cleveland, Ohio 44114 www. rockhall.com The Rock and Roll HALL of Fame And Museum will open a groundbreaking and provocative new exhibit that will illustrate the important roles women have played in rock and roll, from its inception through today. Women Who Rock: Vision, Passion, Power will highlight the flashpoints, the firsts, the best, the celebrated -- and sometimes lesser-known women -who moved rock and roll music and American culture forward. The interactive exhibition will spotlight more than 70 artists and fill two entire floors of the museum. The exhibit will feature artifacts, video and listening stations, as well as a recording booth where visitors can film a short story or moment of inspiration related to women in rock. The exhibit will move through the rock and roll eras, weaving a powerful and engaging narrative that demonstrates how women have been the engines of creation and change in popular music, from the early years of the 20th century to the present.

and many more.

History: More than 25 years ago, leaders in the music industry joined together to establish the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation in New York City to celebrate the music and musicians that changed the world. With that, one of the Foundation’s many functions is to recognize the contributions of those who have had a significant impact on the evolution, development and perpetuation of rock and roll by inducting them into the Hall of Fame. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum opened its doors in 1995 on the shores of Lake Erie in downtown Cleveland, Ohio. Its mission is to educate visitors, fans and scholars from around the world about the history and continuing significance of rock and roll music. It carries out this mission through its operation of a world-class museum that collects, preserves, exhibits and interprets this art form and through its library and archives as well as its educational programs.

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Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum 1100 Rock and Roll Boulevard Cleveland, Ohio 44114 (East Ninth Street at Lake Erie)Open May 13, 2011 - February 26, 2012 | Floors 5 & 6

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ZIAD GHANEM

LOVE

Heart

clothes to scream loud:

LO VE LOVE ME!

I am a Punk

I want my

Interview by Jackee Word Photos by Christopher Dadey www.christopherdadey.com

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by Alis Pelleschi

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ZIAD GHANEM

Ziad Ghanem is a Lebanese fashion designer who is based in London and is currently one of London’s hottest topics, His collections range from Ultra-luxurious haute couture dresses to his ready to wear collections consisting of a heavy punk feel. Ziad uses real people to walk for his shows and each model is someone in the creative world, Previous models have been world renowned burlesque artiste Immodesty Blaize, international DJ Scarlett Etienne and many many more. His shows are noted as the most anticipated and creative shows of the whole London Fashion Week due to the fact they are purely theatrical and all about drama, drama, drama. Not to mention the interest from celebrities, for example an infamous image of Naomi Campbell wearing his “VOGUE” piece. We at HONK! had a chat with Ziad to find out a bit more about the man who is shaking the fashion world by their ankles... So Ziad, You certainly like to emulate the “Drama” factor in your work, Your garments are extrovert, over the top and gorgeous as apposed to simplistic and bland, care to explain why you rather things this way? I believe that every moment in life is a special one and worth a celebration. And my work reflects this. I love all colours and shapes and I am happy to show off. Also I believe that we live in the time of “short attention spam” so that is why I want my clothes to scream loud: LOVE ME LOVE ME LOVE ME! You don’t use regular size 0 superhero models on your runways, you use real people, why did you decide to go down this route and what bonuses do you think it brings not only to your garments but to your brand? I make clothes for people so why not using ‘real ‘people to display those clothes? Simple Philosophy- I love my models they are my ultimate inspiration. A question I always like to ask in my interviews is, if your work was a sexual position, what would it be, and why? Daisy Chain because it is about the connection with each others. Personally for me I can’t go near velours, Ugg boots or the colour peach. What are your most hated fashion DON’Ts and why? I dislike the uniformity and the “must haves” rules in fashion. I don’t like Dark brow and Ugg boots make me throw up. And I have a phobia for hair. Also I hate, fur feathers and tweed. If there was any red carpet Diva you would want to create a garment for who would it be and why?

I am Anti Celebrity and all that .... But If I must... Barbara Windsor cause she is gorgeous. Jessye Norman cause she is a Diva. Boy George everyday... And Joan Collins I will faint before I dress her from excitement. Your work, wether it’s your ready to wear collections or your couture dresses, always has a punk streak running through it, who are you influenced in that sense and would you say it was a very important part of your work? I am a Punk at Heart and a skinhead too. I must admit British early 80’s Music Culture has a big influence on my work. I love London too. I am ever inspired. Can you reveal any gossip about what will be coming soon in the world of Ziad Ghanem? Will you be taking over Paris or New York? Who will you be dressing? Honey I will be taking over no one. If you want me ... Come and find me. www.ziadghanem.co.uk And will dress anyone that pays for my dresses. But if they are poor and nice then will make it for free. I am really happy with everything at the moment and tomorrow is another day. From one Diva to another, I would love to thank you for answering my questions and I wish you all the very best for your next season and all of them after that!” Thanks Jackee, I love you.

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Ménage à trois Photographer & Concept & Styling by Suzana Holtgrave Hair & Make up by Ilka Jänicke/Blossom Berlin Models Helena Narra Kapidzic @ Izaio Models Marcelle Wissel @ Metropolis Models Dawid Schaffranke @ Seeds Management Special thanks to Olympiapark Berlin

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Helena Dress Frida Weyer, Raven hat Fiona Bennett Marcelle Dress Frida Weyer, Eyemask Ponpon Berlin, Shoes YSL Dawid Swim tunks Pappenberg

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1001 NIGHTS

Marcelle Mask with Swarowski Rhinestones Fiona Bennett, Lingerie Chantelle, Jacket Thierry Mugler

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Helena Trouser suit(kimono style) Tata Christiane

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1001 NIGHTS Helena Trouser suit with leather cape Ponpon Berlin, Turban Ponpon Dawid Shirt Dolce & Gabbana, Vest Comme des Garรงons

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Marcelle Bra Chantelle, Jacket Vintage collection Opium, Hat Ponpon Berlin

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Marcelle Jacket Vintage collection Opium, Skirt Thierry Mugler, Hat Ponpon Berlin

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Helena Eye hat Ponpon Berlin, Sequin dress Frida WeyerÂ

Dawid Swim trunks Papenberg

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Marcelle Jacket Thierry Mugler, Hat Ponpon Berlin

Helena Dress Nanna Kuckuck Haute Couture, Swan hat Fiona Bennet

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Marcelle Suit(costume) Thierry Mugler Shoe hat Fiona Bennett

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1001 NIGHTS Marcelle Swarowski Rhinestone mask Fiona Bennett, Jacket Thierry Mugler, Tights Ciprian

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Marcelle Mask Ponpon Berlin

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1001 NIGHTS Dawid Chapeau claque & Bow tie Stylist own, Shirt Dolce & Gabbana, Vest Comme des Garรงons

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Helena Raven hat Fiona Bennett, Dress Frida Weyer, Ring/Bracelet 2 Engel Jewellery

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1001 NIGHTS

Dawid Swim trunks Papenberg

Helena Dress Nanna Kuckuck Haute Couture, Eyewear Stylist own

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Marcelle Dress Frida Weyer, Mask Ponpon Berlin

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www.peterpapenberg.de

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Photos by Fernando Arriero Marquez www.facebook.com/proďŹ le.php?id=1021481221

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11,5 Million Residents

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pARIS

more than 160 museums

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14,518 square kilometers

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pARIS

The city has developed since the mid-3rd Century BC

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la defense - 10.000 Appartements

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A toilet attendant Let’s face it .. They are the true queens of the night. No matter how hard you style your own. Completely unimportant how cool you are. A toilet attendant will survive all of you. Generations of club kids owe her many funny nights on the club toilete. A toilet woman is something like the good soul of the club. We met Erika. She works in one of the hottest clubs in Frankfurt/Main. Erika, why do work as a toilet cleaner in a club? You are 56 years old. Is this job not too stressful?

woman is in many ways a lot dirtier than a man, in general.

10 years ago lost my job as a secretary. At the age of 45 it is not easy for woman to get a new job. Then I landed here. At first I was not happy to work here. But now I love it. I only work on Saturdays and I don´t lose the contact with the youth.

Laughs. That’s funny to hear it from the mouth of a female toilets.

You do the job for 10 years now, can you tell us: If and how the youth has changed during these years? Oh, very! Nowadays the young people take much more drugs then years ago. Also sexually happened in the toilets more than a few years now. (She laughs) I remember my party time, we always had a lot of fun on the toilet. I remember also been fucking there. What do you do if caught someone doing it ? Oh, what shall I do? You know the young men are not as powerful as the men were back in my youth. (A big big laugh). The numbers are often so fast, as fast as I can not knock at the door. How do you stand on drug? Surely you are get offered any? Yes, it is always very sweet. When the children are standing before me and they are barely able to look straight ahead. I was also young once and I have tried everything. My God!!! We were soooo stoned. I smoke a joint sometimes with them, this is fun and the night is easier to bear. Who makes more dirt on the toilet? The boys or the girls? In any case the girls!!! They are often very disgusting. It is very difficult to explain. Maybe it’s because the girls always go in groups to the toilet. They always stay very very long there. The boys do their business and ready. I think that a

Yes, I see the irony. (laughs loudly) But hey, I may can say that as toilets woman. And theme of your magazine is : Divas? Right? So, Let me act once as if I were one. Sure girl! Go for it!! You work in a club with electronic music. What kind of music do you hear at home? I really love the music of AC/DC, Led Zeppelin and Janis Joplin. You can also celebrate to this music much better than to techno music. We have taken lots of drugs when i was young to the music from The Rolling Stones. Oh oh, the old times. You see i was a bad girl. I can well imagine. How do you deal with getting older? I think it’s certainly not easy when you see every weekend the young generation in the club? I have no problem with my age. I had my time, my fun and I have a great life now. In my age you should be relaxed. If not , then you did something wrong in your life. I also know that all the girls will be old at some point ago. (laughs) What are your plans for the future? Forever working on the toilet? Oh yes! I’m really looking forward to the time when this is over. My husband and I wanna continue working for another 5 years. Then we will leave Germany. We will then move to thailand. A paradise for older people. Life there is cheap. Sun and good weather. Hey hey we wish you much fun in Thailand.

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WITH

QUEENS BEARDS by Christo Mitov

Illustration Ango The Meek Dead

still on the market. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, this is a gay edition of REVENGE OF THE NERDS focusing on sexcapades, roosters and other animals. I am frustrated. Before I dropped the pink bomb at my mother at the age of 19, I thought that the worst part of my life would be coming out of the closet. Well obviously I was wrong. I finally no longer had to answer the dreaded question “Do you have a girlfriend?” and I was granted my gay single amnesty. The details of my sex life scared most people and only my closest friends were brave enough to ask me if I were top or bottom. Everything was perfect until the day my mother asked me again - “So are you seeing anyone?” I started to scan through the memories of one-night stands, fuck buddies and meaningless sex. It made me realize that the gay scene in Berlin is no different than the cape of the lotus-eaters Odysseus goes to on his way back from Troy. Except for the fact that instead of lotus flowers, people pop pills and play with the disco snow. I know making this statement sounds tedious, but read till the end before you call me a conservative fanatic or brand me as boring.

You know the drill - you go to Möbel Olfe (Maybe one of Berlin’s most popular gay bars on a Thursday night) and you get the feeling that you just walked in one of those new naked scanners you find at airport security. You get so many looks that you start to wonder if you turned into a QR code. But this is nothing new if you’re somewhere between the ages of twenty and forty and

In Berlin there’s always a new fuck. There is always something better waiting around the corner. That’s why you never settle, never decide to invest your energy in one person and keep your options open. That’s why you actually enjoy the market and the naked scanner in Möbel Olfe. Don’t get me wrong - it’s not like I would never set foot in this bar again or would have never had sexcapades. That’s also what Steven Bereznai ( http://www.stevenbereznai.com/portfolio.html )

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asks himself in his book Gay and Single... Forever? – He defines the borderline between desperate sex addiction and becoming a kitsch gay cliché. Actually on a gay night out in the German capital you can see that this is the biggest fear everyone has - being or becoming a gay cliché. That’s why they put ironic glasses, hats and black T-shirts with names of death metal bands on them. The trashier they look, the cooler they are. For tourists and newcomers it’s like a blessing - men are hairy, musky, masculine and not overly manicured. In other words, “Not typically gay.” Their music taste is going beyond Madonna and Kylie (and yet not further than Robyn); their clothing tastes beyond Abercrombie & Fitch (but not way higher than American Apparel); their cultural interests beyond Sex and The City or Queer as Folk (but not further than RuPaul’s Drag Race). Another word for this Berlin phenomenon is rooster, or a gay hipster. If you don’t remember what my opinion on this breed of species is - you can refresh your memory in HONK! #1. And yet, this so-called alternative gay scene does nothing else, but produce a new queer stereotype. The beard. Usually in the gay ecosystem, the beard is solely a distinctive feature or privilege of bears. Bears tend to have hairy bodies and facial hair; some are heavy-set or muscular; some project an image of working-class masculinity in their grooming and appearance, though none of these are requirements or unique indicators. The bear cult is very prominent in Berlin and Germany, but recently its’ main tokens have become a deceitful cover for roosters. Most men with beards you see in Berlin, are gay - except for those you see in the ethnically diverse neighborhoods, although Allah knows I know a couple of exceptions there too. Thick, dark, ginger, thin, salt n’ pepper beards are everywhere. Hairy chests, armpits and legs might be exciting to some US tourists, but their owners don’t keep them flourishing because they like themselves this way or they want to make a political statement, but because it’s IN. That goes for the whole “hairy man” cult, the infamous Gay Boys With Beards website etc. In the end, right after they open their mouth, you realize those guys are nothing more than queens with beards. It’s not all about being gay anymore. Sometimes the gay scene in Berlin can be tiring. You go to Cocktail D’Amore - you see the same people you saw at Olfe; you go to Horse Meat Disco, you see the same people from Cocktail; you go to Pet Shop Bears, you see the same people from HMD; and then you go to a gallery opening – and you see all of them all over

again. Going out and cruising, the alternative gay scene is maybe one of the most boring experiences that the city has to offer - at least most of the time. I’m proud of my heterosexual friends. Actually this is one of the very rare occasions to label them as such. I love hanging out with them, going to other clubs and bars that are not gay oriented. Back in the 1970s men concealed that they were gay. Over the last decade and a half, the AIDS virus transitioned from a death sentence to largely treatable, and the gay culture moved from the margins closer to the mainstream. More than 40 years later we still segregate ourselves from the society by going to gay-only parties or by surrounding us only with queer friends (whom we have mostly had some kind of bodily fluid exchange with). Sorry, but this is more than aggravating. Today homosexuals are restlessly hiding any hint of desperation by trying way too hard and refusing to deal with their fear of getting out of their comfort zone. Larry Kramer, The Pulitzer-nominated playwright, screenwriter, author and activist has been one of the most controversial figures in American gay life over the past 30 years. In 2005, he published “The Tragedy of Today’s Gays,” a transcript of a speech in which he attacked the younger generation of gay men for their apathy over gay causes and accused them of condemning their “predecessors to nonexistence.” This might be true on one level. But, as Mr. Kramer obviously addressed in his speech, I also felt obliged to answer that his understanding of homosexuality is giving me rash. In a recent interview Larry addresses the recent development of integration and acceptance of homosexuals as follows: “I am a gay person before I’m anything else. I’m a gay person before I’m a white person, before I’m a Jew, before I’m a writer, before I’m American, anything. That is my most identifying characteristic and I don’t find many people who would say that.” Yes, since it’s 2011 we live in and evolution of acceptance, which is not something bad and does not automatically mean that all gays will become housewives, marry rich businessmen and have three kids in suburbia. The times where homosexuality defined men and their whole life are past. Whereas the discussion on those identity issues belongs to the future. This is obviously a topic that exceeds the 1200 words frame of REVENGE OF THE NERDS. So if you have a thought or two on the queens with beards, I’d be more than happy to chat... or meet for coffee: cmitov@honkmag.de

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I USED TO BE SNOW WHITE

BUT I DRIFTED. Mae West 1896-1980

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WHAT WHE

WHAT, WH to the most intere

by Ben Rodgers

Swatch FIVB World Championships

All-African-Games

What: The countdown has started for the FIVB Swatch Beach Volleyball World Championships Rome 2011, where the best male and female beach volleyball players around the world will compete for the premier title in international beach volleyball. The best 96 pairs – 48 in each gender – in the world will compete for $1million in prize money with Germany’s Julius Brink and Jonas Reckermann, and Jen Kessy and April Ross from USA the defending men’s and women’s world champions respectively from two years ago in Norway. The main draw will be composed of 12 pools of four teams competing in a robin round system before the top two teams from each group and the eight best third-paced teams will advance to the 32 spots in the single-elimination phase of the competition. Where: Rome/ Italy When : June 13-19 More info at: www.beachvolleyroma.com

What: The 10th All-African Games will take place on September 3–18, 2011 in Maputo, Mozambique. Maputo’s hosting will mark only the third time the Games will be held in the southern part of the continent. The event will feature 23 sports ( athletics, table tennis, gymnastics and many many more), 2 of which will also feature disabled events (athletics and swimming). While most venues will be located in and around Maputo, the Canoeing and Rowing venue will be Chidenguella Lagoon, 275 km north of the city. Sport has been very important for the people in Africa. Mozambique is a very beautyful country and it is worthwhile to spend his vacation there. Where: Maputo/ Mozambique When: September 3-18 More info at: www.allafricagamesmaputo.com US Open Golf What: Golf is one of the most boring sports out

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HERE and WHEN are the questions that will guide us in this issue teresting SPORTS festivals for 2011. The first one starts tomorrow, so you better hurry up or follow it online. Bon voyage!

there. Loved by the rich and beautiful people. This sport relies on a year-long tradition. The rules are dusty and old. But thanks to athletes like Tiger Woods, the sport is getting more attention. Tiger Woods is one of the stars of this sport, he got more attention with his private sex life then with the sport. Let’s see how he cut in 2011 at the U.S. Open. Where: Bethesda, Maryland/ USA When: June 16-19 More info at: www.usopen.com

and horses participate. Nowhere are six days of the tournament have more visitors. Every year about 300,000 spectators to the various events and Disciplines. During these days you will meet all the big names in the horse riding sports. Aachen is also one of the most beautyful citys in Germany. Where: Aachen/ Germany When: July 8-17 More info at: www.chioaachen.de

World Equestrian Festival CHIO

2011 World Aquatics Championships

The CHIO Aachen, the World Equestrian Festival. Horses are very proud animals. It is a pleasure to see these animals in action. The ChIO Aachen is the world’s largest equestrian event. Nowhere else will take the five disciplines of Jumping, Dressage, Eventing, Vaulting and carriage driving more riders, drivers

What: The 14th Fina World Championships are scheduled for July 16–31, 2011 in Shanghai, China at the Shanghai Oriental Sports Center. The 2011 World Championships will again feature the 5 aquatics disciplines: swimming, water polo, diving, open water, and synchronized swimming. Aqua sport is one of the most popular sport events

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WHAT WHERE WHEN

in the world. It is always fun to see those good looking athletics in action. It doesnt matter if you watch it at hom in front of your TV or if you fly to Shanghai. It is always very funny to watch the synchronized swimming part. Where: Shanghai/ China When: July 16-31 More info at: www.shanghai-fina2011.com/en/

The 13th World Championships in Athletics What: The world championships in Athletics is one of the biggest sports events this year. The big event is a special events for each athletic in the world. The queen of the sports event for this is the 100 m sprint final for the men. It’s very funny to see how American sports heroes present their ego. We are now looking forward to see how many of these athletes are doped. The event will be held in South Korea and is perhaps a good reason to visit the country. Where: Daegu/ South Korea When: August 27 - September 4 More info at: www.daegu2011.org

EuroBasket 2011 Basketball is for many people more than just sport. It is a way of life for many. In the USA Basketball has a great tradition and is a very popular sport. Even in Europe, this sport is getting more popular. Although we are laughed at Americans but yes, we Europeans can play it too. Maybe the sport is more for men. But the energy of the game also attracts many women. The competition will be hosted by Lithuania. And it is the second time that this country is the host for this event. It was first decided that 16 teams will participate in Eurobasket 2011, however FIBA Europe decided on September 5, 2010, in a meeting in Istanbul, that there would be 24 teams in the championships. Where: Lithuania When: August 31 - September 18 More info at: www.eurobasket2011.org/en

FIRS Men’s Roller Hockey World Cup What: The FIRS Roller Hockey World Cup is a competition also referred as the World Championship - A between the best male national teams in the World. It happens every two years. The Group A contains the 16 best world teams. Roller Hockey is a form of hockey played on a dry

surface using skates with wheels. The term “Roller Hockey” is often used interchangeably to refer to two variant forms chiefly differentiated by the type of skate used. There is traditional “Roller Hockey,” played with quad roller skates and „Inline Hockey“. Combined, roller hockey is played in nearly 60 countries worldwide. Where: San Juan/ Argentina When: September 24- October 1 More info at: www.mundialsanjuan2011.com

If Stockholm Open What: „If the Stockholm Open“ lead after the Asian Tour following the European part of the tournament series. The Stockholm Open is a tournament of the ATP World Tour Category 250th The game is played indoors on hard court, where the prize is approximately $ 500,000. The game is played in a single 28er from a main field. All the big stars of the sport are going to Stockholm. It is as always a great festival of international tennis. Sweden is very a friendly country, so it worth a trip to this event. Where: Stockholm/ Sweden When: October 15-23 More info at: www.ifstockholmopen.se

Niagara Falls International Marathon What: This marathon has the most beautiful running route of the world. The athletes have the good fortune to practice their sport in a beautiful landscape. The race was known as the Skylon Marathon. Beginning during the first wave of the North American running boom, it quickly became a favourite as it was, and still is, the only marathon in the world that starts in one country and finishes in another… a destination marathon that crosses an international border, providing the runners with an experience of a lifetime. Where: Niagara Falls/ Canada When: October 23 More info at: www.niagarafallsmarathon.com

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