Reserved magazine

volume 1

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

O

the accidental artist: Mitja Bokun

by Whitney Smith Cripe

ver time, Facebook has become many things – a nuisance, a shape-shifting reminder of friends old and new, and (most would say) an uneven yardstick of career and personal success. But for 36-year-old Mitja Bokun, it’s become something gleaming and fresh and overwhelmingly positive – his own personal art gallery. “It’s incredibly immediate…” Bokun says of the social media platform. “My wall is more for my images than words; my updates are my work in real time.” And people are taking notice of this online, ink-splashed creative corridor with open and amused eyes.

A self-described “accidental artist,” Bokun remembers his first go at artistic work, drawing cars sitting in a little orange chair in his parents’ home in his native Slovenia. As time passed, he found that his illustrations delighted friends and others, and he was always being asked to him to “draw stuff” for them.

And draw stuff he did, turning a nursery hobby, over time, into a remarkable, offbeat and untraditional success.

With absolutely no formal artistic training (Bokun holds a degree in IT Technology Management and Logistics – why oh why?) his only teacher has been his fanaticism for pen and ink. Producing new work daily – beginning most days at dawn (usually with a chipper alert – via Facebook of course- that he’s ready to tackle the day), pen in hand, ready to capture and create images so real, crisp and accessible – many describe them as photographs.

So how does an artistic visionary go from sketching away in sleepy, bucolic Ljubljana, Slovenia, to golden tickets on the front rows of the collections each spring and fall? With confidence, thank you very much. Here’s the story, with his deep desire to draw fashion- an art and industry he says is “without rules” - Bokun approached a fashion PR maven for a ticket to show in Ljubljana so he could draw some of the collections in motion. “She skeptically asked to see some of my work and I told her she could see it on Facebook.” Whether it was curiosity or snobbish disbelief, she looked at it, and Bokun had a ticket in hand to the show the next day. Facebook has been both his evolving gallery and his passport into the fashion jungle ever since. Prolific is a word that can be overused, but it’s pitch-perfect adjective for Bokun, who posts one or two drawings daily and often gives a little commentary into the work – or a companion quote (always positive) on how he’s taking his artistic life by the teeth and making it visible to the world. With contagious optimism, he’s transformed his childhood joy into profoundly personal creative victories.

In particular, faces and fashion seem to inspire Bokun deeply. He can transform the fold of a dress or the angle of a face into something equally realistic and cheeky, with licks of color or amusing drops of ink layering the images- his signature mark.

“I’m meeting myself for the first time through social media,” Bokun shares during our conversation earlier this summer. “I’ve thought a lot about how artists have promoted their work over time, and Facebook gives me a place to share work every day with everyone who cares to see it.”

Case in point, a singular post of a drawing Bokun created of Grace Coddington was seen by the famed and flamed-haired creative director herself, and she promptly posted to her own Facebook wall. A moment Bokun relishes – a pivotal moment when one creative visionary recognizes another – and shines a light on them. That red-headed endorsement (along with many others) has since opened countless doors. From Prada, to Vivienne Westwood to the UK’s David Johnson, Bokun is now regularly in demand to take the work shown on the runway and express it in ink. His drawing captures the designs, in many ways, in their original state. Just as each look started its life as a sketch – Bokun bookends the final outcome, again, as a sketch, his own take on the product and the person framing it. His version including and celebrating the human face and the form fused to the fabric.

With a full calendar of bookings, and the frequent flier miles to show for it, Bokun is the most in-demand fashion illustrator of the moment – interpreting the clothes and those who wear them with exactness, clarity and I dare say, huge love. You’d have to love it to do it as much or as well as this blue-eyed, gentle soul does it.

Next stops for Bokun include a one-man show in Paris at the EVA MEYER CONTEMPORARY ART GALLERY in Paris where launched the career of Man Ray and also regular gigs to capture the runways of Fashion Week (Paris, New York, London, Milan and beyond), where an increasing stable of designers are clamoring to have him reflect and interpret their work with his busy and beautiful pen.

For Bokun, he embraces this newfound career surge with humor and unstoppable energy. A recent bit of Facebook commentary captures it as only Bokun (who’s English is broken in all the best ways) can – “let’s do something crazy in this morning’s darkness.”

As his friend and colleague Whitney Mercurio described on meeting him in person for the first time after a few transcontinental collaborations – “When I first saw his hands I thought, wow, there they are. He’s so talented it’s crazy and his talent is limitless.”

At Reserved, we celebrate Mitja’s work, his hands and his graceful talent. An accident, perhaps, but a deliriously happy one at that. Mitja Bokun resides in Kranj, Slovenia with his wife and two young children. He draws, travels, maximizes his Facebook page/ personal art gallery, and in his free time he loves soak up New York, his adopted American hometown. Find him sketching runway-side and contributing his ink to this very publication, for which he serves as a co-editor-in-chief with Whitney Mercurio.

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

editors-in-chief & creative directors whitney mercurio & mitja bokun

editor at large jim downey nordic editor at large, copenhagen xavier morales

design director brad holroyd

fashion editor jennifer malatesta

production assistant marina gharabegian

features editor quynh dang

beauty editor dawn collins

production coordinator /assistant to whitney & mitja giselle abusleme

west coast editor richard dupont

fashion features editor jeffrey felner

fashion director & director of brand marketing e.s. stargardt

director of communications, media & special events jason preston

contributing photographers jaka vinšek, matjaž tančič, michael david adams joseph staska, michael donnelly, stephanie dinkel, thomas feehly pieter henket, filippo del vita, peter strongwater, david sawyer contributing writers jeffrey felner, tomi vugrinec, quynh dang, steve kelley, whitney mercurio rodrigo alcazar, whitney smith cripe, peter danbury, steven krakow contributors dawn collins, milton glaser, richard dupont, mitja bokun, evan venegas, quentin jones, dennis devoy, mariko arai, charlie johnson viktorija bowers adams, don west, rodrigo alcazar, missy papageorge, rafé totengco, giacomo francia, chad murawczyk mindy yang, monica mary warhol, marc-antoine coulon, peter strongwater, ali boyd, peter loughrey, lisa lebofsky anna ritsch, zaria forman, per skovgaard, james coviello, giles deacon, morgane le fay, ford models, vny model management mc2 model management printing tiskarna knjigoveznica radovljica d.o.o. a very special thank-you to stacy lastrina, mara singer, MiN new york, missy papageorge, john connelly, brad holroyd, kévin legoux marina gharabegian, dawn collins, jaka vinšek, romain brau, michael donnelly, richard dupont, xavier morales, rodrigo alcazar, jeffrey felner mirko ilić, giselle abusleme, michael david adams, viktorija bowers adams, e.s. stargardt, jason preston, facebook our family and friends who believed in us and the cities of new york and paris for embracing us and giving us your best talent! mitja & whitney

on the cover: photographer - michael david adams hair/makeup - viktorija bowers adams styling - don west dress - james coviello model - haley sutton / vny model management

www.reservedmagazine.com whitney@reservedmagazine.com

mitja@reservedmagazine.com

No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher.

ART & FA SHI ON:

Just imagine: it’s 1924 … we are in Monte Carlo ... French Riviera ... a modern Art Deco style theatre ... Sergei Djagilev is working with his Ballets Russes group on a new piece called The Blue Train - Le Train Bleu ... The Ballets Russes group is composed of the biggest names in the Russian ballet of the time and has already successfully provided performances in Paris and Monte Carlo since 1909 ... Sergei is nervously glancing towards the choreographer Bronislava Nijinsky while the costume designer Coco Chanel controls the movement of her creations on stage ... Coco pulls a few smokes from the ever-present cigarette, she corrects her pearl necklace and then happily addresses the artist engaged in a background scene for the ballet ... Pablo Picasso in his signature striped t-shirt smiles and nods at her...

A dream? No, just the starts of the route of Fashion and Art walking together at the beginning of the 20th century. Indeed, just at that time, the Fashion was set on world scene as an independent design branch and the first stylists immediately showed interest to participate in creation of clothes and fashion accessories integrated with all sorts of modern art from painting and sculpture to movies and theatre… Mature and finally freelance fashion stylists and couturiers formed links between the common and the ethereal - between practical fashion and the eternity of art. The Ballets Russes group consisted of (among others) a painter and costume designer Henri Matisse and composer Maurice Ravel... A dream indeed…

At that time in Paris… Elsa Schiaparelli went for a walk. After London and New York and a painful separation she was looking for a fertile ground for her creativity. In New York, she teamed up with many of the biggest names of Dada movement such as Man Ray and Marcel Duchamp and in Paris she fell in love with the creations of a famous fashion designer Paul Poiret. In need of money, Elsa decided to create her own line of clothing for women “who dare”. Her first collection was an instant success. La Schiaparelli - the biggest competitor of an already famous Coco - is (among other things) famous for the “invention” of a shocking pink colour, trompe l’ oeil technique on clothing and the use of zippers in the fashion industry. Her creativity knew no bounds. She manufactured clothing, fashion accessories and perfumes, which showed her love for art trends of that time. Together with her friend Salvador Dalí she made ​​few pieces that will always remain on top of fashion creativity. Evening bags in the form of a telephone, a Tear Gown and an evening dress distinguished by giant lobster motifs, a shoe as a hat and humorous fashion accessories that will obscure the line between art and fashion in the middle of the last century.

But Salvador Dalí – a truly polyhedral artist - was not only collaborating with The Visionary Elsa. He created (together with his friend Christian Dior) a true haute couture evening dress, called Costume for the year 2045. This 1949 futuristic silk jersey aqua dress is enhanced by a bizarre fashion accessory - a red velvet crutch, too big to sustain a body. In any case, a bizarre and interesting combination…

stepsisters or siamese twins?

by Tomi Vugrinec

... Back in 1930, Lola Prusac, stylist of the fashion house Hermes designed a line of fashion accessories inspired by the genius creations of painter Piet Mondrian. And this love story between Fashion and Art continues 35 years later when Yves Saint Laurent again rendered homage to this extraordinary artist, his colours and minimalist chaos.

Avant-garde fashion designers stand alongside avant-garde artists.

Andre Courreges was fascinated by black and white Op-art of Victor Vassarely while Paco Rabanne and Pierre Cardin are inspirited by the childish abstraction of Joan Miró.

During the dominance of the American art and the so-called Pop Art period, the boundaries between art and fashion were permanently deleted. Fashion and Art appeared hand in hand on the streets and became a part of everyday life. Andy Warhol will always remain one of the greatest icons of modern art and one of the biggest inspirations and challenges for the world of fashion. Almost all the big fashion designers - from his time to the present - have paid tribute to his name. Some of his most successful connotations related to instant art and fashion can be found in the work of stylists such as Jean Charles De Castelbajack and Moschino. Even the untouchable Miuccia Prada rendered homage to Andy Warhol with flowers printed on fur of this year’s woman’s SS collection, and Raf Simons - for the fashion house Dior - chose Andy Warhol’s little-known fashion illustrations as prints on his excellent minimalist creations.

Fruitful collaboration between Fashion and Art on American soil is certainly not new. Already in 1951 the American Vogue used paintings of one of the most popular American artists of all time, Jackson Pollock, as a background for one of its high-fashion photo shootings.

At that time Jackson’s drip paintings were certainly a fashion hit and as a pioneer of a new, active approach to the painting Pollock perfectly captured the vision of the most “modern” fashion magazine of all time.

At the other end of world, at that time, two giants of Fashion and Art “fell in love”. The first lady of minimalist evening haute couture Mila Schon and Italian avant-garde painter, sculptor and ceramist Lucio Fontana. His unusual monochrome images with some precision and strategic cuts represent a shift in the perception of the canvas painting at the time. Together with the founder of the global fashion house Mila Schon he created a collection of jewellery and later Mila will pay homage to Fontana with unique pieces of clothing inspired by his works of art.

At the beginning of the 1980’s the fashion throne is finally conquered

by Italian designers thanks to the one and only Giorgio Armani. One of the most prominent representatives of the new wave of Italian contemporary fashion designers Gianni Versace created a collection dedicated to one of lesser known but very interesting Italian futurist painter and illustrator - Fortunato Depero. His colourful and humorous creations are one-off basis of the Versace’s crazy world of fashion creativity. And

even the fashion emperor Valentino, who very rarely explicitly resorted inspiration from the art world, felt in love with one the most exciting periods of European art - the Viennese Secession. And what about the Italian fashion genius Franco Moschino, who literally translated his love for art (in particular surrealism) into his intelligent, provocative and humorous creations and formulated a comprehensive image of his brand in the legacy of the French painter Renè Magritte?

Today, fashion creators are looking for inspiration for their creations in everything that surrounds us. On the street, on worldwide trips, in books and films and within museums and galleries. Some designers may look way back - as the Mulleavy sisters (Rodarte) - who recently paid tribute to the “mad genius” of art -Vincent Van Gogh ... In the spring of 2012 their gowns printed with Van Gogh’s Sunflowers or Starry Sky became a must-have for all romantic post-impressionist girls.

Others, however, look forward and work with contemporary artists and stars of the todays art world. Yes, because now some artists have become world-class stars, leaving aside the memory of those, who in general became valued and recognised post mortem. Today, everyone knows at least some names of contemporary artists. And the biggest of them are involved with the biggest Houses Of Fashion in making (too) expensive fashion collections, where the role of Art and Fashion merge under the flag of marketing and consumerism.

Takashi Murakami, Stephen Sprouse and Yayoi Kusama for Louis Vuitton, Damien Hirst for The Row and Alexander McQueen, James Luna for Prada, Zaha Hadid for United Nude, Jeff Koons for Lisa Perry ... just a few famous collaborations between artists and fashion brands.

The list will go on indefinitely until Art and Fashion are producing a lot of money ... And maybe it’s the right path. As long as there are also intelligently set limits ... where true artists remain true artists and fashion designers continue to be fashion designers.

I think it’s time art earns back the aura of modesty with a touch of inaccessible snobbism. Because I really DON’T want to see Marina Abramovich dancing in a glitter corset in the next Lady Gaga’s music video “masterpiece”.

Born and raised in Italy,

filippo del vita

was introduced to photography by his grandfather at a very young age. After studies in Florence and a stint in Turin, he settled in New York to pursue photography on a

professional level. His work has been exhibited at the Milan Triennale, the Sony award in London and at Reus, Spain, for the Medalla Gaudi. His commercial and fashion photography have landed Del Vita notable jobs with leading advertising agencies both in Europe and the U.S. not to mention a steady stream of contributors to well-known magazines the world over as Glamour, Elle, Marie Claire, L’Officiel, Amica,Tatler, Cosmopolitan, Madame Figaro, Flair and many more. photography Filippo Del Vita

styling LIM

make up Marika Aoki

Model Shelby at RED and the invisible man

In March, 2013, Reserved was invited to sit down with renowned American graphic designer Milton Glaser. The following is a piece taken from our interview.

M

agazines want to know where

things are going and those things are always unpredictable. Magazines anticipate. They are always about what is current to the degree that they can foresee where the culture is at the particular moment they appeal to their readership. But the truth is you can never tell where anything is going because life is contradictory and destructive and you can never tell the consequence of any single act because things are so contradictory. As the Buddha said, ’bad yields good, good yields bad’. I’m a very poor forecaster, and I have no interest in forecasting or where things are going. It is hard enough to understand where you are and the idea of knowing where you’ll be is absurd. And who would have guessed the consequence of technology might, in fact, drive more people back to drawing or into returning to using their hand. Also, I think the cause and effect, the relationship between things, is so contradictory and unpredictable that every time I read something that is supposed to be a forecast of the consequence of any single act I laugh, because if you live long enough you realize how absurd those forecasts are. I stopped doing that. But what is of interest is the fact there are effects of technology that cannot be anticipated. What I have discovered since I have started taking advantage of technology, which I have done over the last few years, is that I have gotten very intrigued by the use of technology. But the way I use a computer is totally dependent on my understanding of print making. The fact that I started out as a print maker and used photography and etching and the world of prints as my fundamental training, makes the computer merely an extension of that universe. If somebody didn’t start in that world they would have a totally different view of what a computer is. Everything is shaped by my previous experience, so that my present experience is an application of what I had learned previously. There is no universal meaning to technology except in its application and subjective use by an individual. I started doing prints that were based on pattern making that came out of my interests in work that I did in the Rubin Museum and then I used those patterns to make rugs that were made in Tibet in an old fashioned way based on work that I had done on the computer. Those kinds of inter-relationships are not predictable and are not linear. They are just incomprehensible and they are intuitive and they don’t make sense. I am interested in work that doesn’t make sense, that isn’t rational, that isn’t logical, because you know that work comes out of the irrational. It’s not predictable and one of the things about forecasting or anticipating consequences is that it is rational and the interesting work that you do doesn’t come out of rationality or objective conditions. It comes

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 pastel on paper out of intuition, metaphor, contradiction and thesoft irrational.”

Portrait by Michael Somoroff

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

T

he featured photo series is a metaphor for applying traditional yogic philosophy to urban life of a westerner. We are successful and happy when in tune with ourselves and the environment. In my profession as an architect and designer urban yoga helps me to intensify spatial sensuousness, which reveals spatial qualities, such as stories, atmosphere, passing of time and movement, thereby opening new possibilities, new ways of thinking and living. anja humljan

architect and designer photography by jaka vinšek

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Rafe Totengco

“maryanne” minaudiere - photography by david sawyer

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photography byMichael

Donnelly

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

olivia.

photographer -thomas feehly styling - jennifer malatesta hair / makeup - dawn collins model - olivia frischer / vny model management wardrobe - giles deacon & vintage

special thanks to swarovski, missy papageorge and colton amster at redline restorations

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

evan venegas

I was inspired by the birth of my daughter.

I used watercolors, which is a delicate medium, a basic shape, and subtle use of color to show fragility. I wanted to show a complete body, while at the time, showing the individual parts that create it.

My process was initiated by my own daily organizing and setting values to life tasks, events, situations and other “emotional data.” I then translate these values into different colors and sizes of circles. The arrangement of these individual shapes, which build a unified piece, represent the process of balancing elements in my life.

Evan Venegas is an artist living and working in New York (top) daymap b 8”x10” watercolor, (bottom) daymap d 8”x10” watercolor

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daymap e 8”x10” watercolor

FA CTO RY BOY: Richard DuPont

photograph by and courtesy of Anton Perich

written by richard dupont introduction and edit by quynh dang

“I remember crying into the arms of Loulou de la Falaise... in Marrakech.

She said to me, ‘You’re young, my love.

One day you will find the true love of your life and it will be magical.”

Former Factory Boys and identical twins, Richard and Robert DuPont, were just a pair of 17 year-old Connecticut prepsters when they found themselves at the center of the drug, booze, and sex-induced intoxication that was Andy Warhol’s New York City in 1977.

More than 35 years later, one-half of the DuPont twins and Reserved Magazine’s West Coast Editor, Richard DuPont, shares some of his most treasured memories with us. To our delight, his experiences were indeed laced with all the glamour, seduction, and power that one would expect of the era. In taking a closer look, however, we discovered vulnerability, heartbreak, and fragility of spirit at the core.

New York to see every Broadway show I could—this was sure better than buying drugs. But I eventually lost that drive when my disease caught up with me and I was drinking and drugging every night at Studio 54. It was after working a party in NYC with Martha that we went to Studio. Two waiters working the party asked us to go with them. It had been open for, maybe, a week.

When unraveled, Richard’s stories of friendships, fashion, and fetes all reveal one common thread—the pursuit of love and magic. Today, Richard has a new tale, a memoir that celebrates this quest, entitled I Found Somebody to Love Me.

On his early days: My twin brother, Robert and I, like my dear friend Whitney Mercurio, grew up in Fairfield, Connecticut. We were adopted and our parents divorced when we were very young. After the divorce, Mother was always looking for the next husband, and we were constantly moving from home to home. There were maybe 20 homes until Robert and I left at 17. We basically took care of ourselves and never had parents at home. I knew I was gay when I was 15 when I went to my first gay bar, The Brook Café in Westport. I met a Yale graduate student there named Bill. After one night with him, he began to blackmail and threaten me, saying he would tell my parents, the whole town of Fairfield, and everyone in my school that I was gay. It lasted for several months.

Robert and I both worked for Martha. We also worked at her gourmet shop in Westport called The Market Basket. There I met Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, who were on the board of The Westport Country Playhouse. They got me a telemarketing job there; I was raising money for the playhouse’s renovation. I was also an usher; I worked all the time.

I just wanted to run away from my life in Connecticut, move to NYC, and become an actor.

Anyway, back to Bill (the Yalie); I just wanted all of his tormenting to end.

It did, one weekend in P’town, in the summer of ‘76. We were at The Crown & Anchor and I was crying at the bar when Bill went to the bathroom. A gentleman beside me asked with a thick Southern accent, what was the matter. I told him what Bill was doing to me, and boy, oh boy, was he angry! He said to me, “You won’t have to worry about Bill again. Go home, do your best in school and get a good education.” I never saw Bill again, but I did see that fine Southern gentleman again. It was Tennessee Williams, who became a dear friend.

Back in Fairfield, I took Tennessee Williams’ advice, and started to do better in school. I took an interest in art and photography (David LaChappelle was in my photography class.). At this time, I also discovered Alcoholics Anonymous and started going to meetings. They say, “You’re only as sick as your secrets,” so I shared my homosexuality there, and I made some friends.

I discovered my love for theatre and dance. With the money I was making with Martha Stewart, I started taking dance lessons, and going to

On friendships: I was not thinking about continuing my education at all. I was still working for Martha, who was constantly saying, “Where will you be going to school? Where are you applying?” I did not tell her about Robert and my new life in NYC. But I did confide in Dorian Leigh, who worked with Martha. Dorian was the original ‘Fire and Ice’ girl for Revlon. She was Suzy Parker’s sister; (Richard) Avedon’s favorite model. They say Audrey Hepburn’s character in Funny Face was based on Dorian; and apparently, so was Holly Golightly.

Dorian Leigh became my best girlfriend and closest confidant. She taught me about fashion; she worked with the best designers. We talked about fashion photography and she showed me all of her Avedon and Dahl-Wolfe photographs. We also chatted about men, “Take ‘em and leave ‘em,” she said, “there will be lots, my darling.” I told her about all the fabulous people I was meeting, like Egon von Furstenberg who gave me a job producing his and Nikki Haskell’s cable TV show, The Nikki Haskell show. Dorian said, “Sweetie Pie, you will, like me, meet lots of fabulous and interesting people in your life. I certainly have. They all are your friends. But you know, Sugar, at the end you can only count on one hand who your ‘true friends’ are. Take that from me.” I learned this. She said, “You don’t need college. You’re getting the best education you can get from me and all the people you are meeting.”

These are the stories he reserved for us, shared via text message conversations.

I was scared to death of being “found out”. I couldn’t sleep. My grades were horrible along with my attendance, so I started drinking and doing drugs. I had to get a job to support my cocaine and heroin habit, so I started working for Martha Stewart, who had just started a catering company.

ships. Rudolph would say, “You talk for hours and have these marathon calls. What do you talk about for this long?”

On Andy Warhol:

On his first love: At seventeen I took my first trip to Paris with my first true love, Rudolph Nureyev. I met Rudolph in ‘77 after an evening of dancing at Studio 54 at Doris Duke’s apartment. We danced for hours together in Doris’ Disco Den. And had fantastic sex there for hours. The next day we were flying to Paris together where I stayed with him for five months.

Life was so grand in Paris with Rudolph. He introduced me to caviar and dressed me in fur coats and Saint Laurent. His Paris apartment was like a Czar’s dream palace. The apartment occupied an 18th-century building overlooking the Louvre. He adored objects—paintings, fabrics and carpets. We went shopping almost every day. He would take me to his dear friend Yves Saint Laurent’s salon and dressed me in the most marvelous suits: lots of velvets.

I knew it wasn’t going to last with Rudolph. I had the best five months with him and the greatest memories. We had a great friendship. He taught me to enjoy life and really appreciate the arts.

There were always guys around more handsome than me, though, with better bodies. Most were dancers. I feel, now, that my jealousy ruined the relationship.

The relationship ended after a trip to Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Berge’s home in Marrakech. We were there for three nights, or so. Rudolph invited two other guys to join us that I didn’t know about. It was ‘The End.’ I remember crying into the arms of Loulou de la Falaise who was there, in Marrakech. She said to me, “You’re young, my love. One day you will find the true love of your life and it will be magical.”

I used to joke that Rudolph broke up with me because of my long distance phone calls to Andy and Truman (Capote) in New York. Andy and Truman always gave me great advice, especially when it came to relation-

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper original artwork silkscreen: Richard DuPont by Monica Mary Warhol

Andy worked hard; he painted every day, Saturdays and Sundays, too.

It was all about work for him. He was always working on getting ads for Interview, or trying to get portrait commissions. He was so generous with his time with me. He taught me how to be a good listener. He would say, “If you’re not having fun with the work you’re doing, then don’t do it.”

Maybe that’s why I’ve had so many careers.

When I met Andy, l felt really drawn to him. He said, “You’re so handsome. You should be in Interview.” I used to walk sometimes from his home on 66th Street to 860 Broadway. We’d be carrying copies of Interview and these kids, who were my age, would want his autograph.

He’d say, “Get Richard’s, too, he’s famous.” He always made you feel so special. If the kids were cute, Andy would say, “Come on up for lunch at The Factory. We’ll put you on the cover.” I don’t remember any of these kids getting in, though. You had to be buzzed in by Brigid (Berlin), who was Andy’s closest friend and confidant. When I lived with Brigid a few years ago, I used to call her Mrs. Warhol.

Andy liked youth. And I think he would still be with the kids if he were with us today. He appreciated anybody who was creative and young, and helped them.

Andy would say to me, “Hard work will never kill anyone. Idle time will.”

He had a great work ethic.

I think the biggest misconception about Andy is that he was shy. He was incredibly talkative and hilarious. I would laugh so hard around him, or when I was on the phone with him. I’d cry; he was so very funny.

We’d chat about what went on at Studio 54 after he went home, and what went on at Halston’s house later. He wanted to know everything about what was going on. Andy was very curious.

On Freddie Mercury: Andy was a great matchmaker. He fixed Freddie Mercury and me up.

Richard DuPont continued...

“Andy was a great matchmaker. He fixed Freddie Mercury and me up.”

my apartment. Streemetht urchins. One of the guys went running down Sunset Blvd. with it under his arm. This jerk knew what he had under his arm and sold it for a quick fix of drugs. Anyway, it’s just a thing. could sing like Freddie Mercury, he is the greatest there is.” This guy didn’t believe it was Freddie Mercury sitting there at the Brook Café in Westport. We had a great time there. We laughed so much.

I met Freddie at Trader Vic’s one evening. I was there with Salvador Dali and Gala. Freddie came up to me and asked me for a cigarette. We smoked our cigarettes and I told him I had to go to a dinner at Regine’s; that a friend had invited me to. I asked if he would like to join me. We walked over to Regine’s to join Andy, Diana Vreeland, Fred Hughes and Catherine Guinness.

Andy said to me, “You don’t know who your friend is, do you? That’s Freddie Mercury from Queen,” he said. “You must make him your boyfriend. He’s famous.” I didn’t know Queen. I knew Barbara Streisand and Diana Ross and my favorite, The Carpenters. Also any Broadway show album. Andy was saying to Freddie, “Richard is so fabulous and fun to have around, He will keep you laughing all of the time, and really is so charming.” I turned beet red. Freddie was laughing, as was the rest of the table. Freddie looked at me and said, “Do you want to keep me laughing for a while, and come back to my hotel?” I did, and that was the beginning of a relationship that lasted over a year.

I was young and impressionable. I remember being at Halston’s house one evening, and Bianca Jagger was there. She was staying there when she and Mick split up. I remember saying to her how in love I was with Freddie and that I hardly saw much of him because he was working all of the time. I remember Halston saying, “You’re a rock star wife, get used to lots of lonely nights in bed. And, sweetie pie, he must be seeing other people don’t you think?” Bianca was sympathetic, I remember.

I was now becoming more insecure about our relationship. Freddie would fly to New York and stay with me at the St. Regis hotel. My brother and I were living there as guests of our friends, Salvador Dali and Gala. I would fly to London and stay at The Dorchester. I couldn’t stay with him because of his cats. I’m so allergic.

When we were dating, Freddie wanted to see where I grew up. So, we drove to my home on Spruce Street in Southport, CT, the pretty, upperclass little section of the already upperclass town of Fairfield. We stayed for two nights. Freddie said to me, “I want to dress like my Prepster,” so I took him shopping at the Fairfield Department Store, where he bought several Lacoste shirts. We had a great time in Connecticut. We even danced at the legendary Brook Café in Westport, where someone said, “Did anyone ever tell you that you look like Freddie Mercury?” Freddie said, “All the time.” Freddie wanted to have fun with this guy, so he sang a few lines from a Queen song. The silly guy then said, “You wish you

Back in those days, in the Disco Era, the men I was falling in love with all wanted ‘open relationships.’ I remember the evening Freddie said to me, at Mr. Chow in London, that he wanted to see other guys and that he already was. I got so upset. “Why can’t we have a Doris Day/Rock Hudson relationship?” I asked (Omg, was I pathetic.) He responded, “I heard Rock Hudson is gay. You should go out with him and also other people.”

I got into my drama queen mode and threw a drink in Freddie’s face. He and I started arguing and my dear friend the late Tina Chow came rushing over to our table. “Will you two stop it? Behave yourselves. You two are like George and Martha from Who’s Afraid of Virgina Woolf’,” the divine Tina Chow said. We began calling ourselves George and Martha after that. But it became so unhealthy that we ended it.

On technology: I was talking to a friend the other day about Andy. He asked me if I think Andy would be on Facebook, or the computer. Andy would say, “Isn’t this so great? It’s so Joe Modern.” But I think he’d have people around who were able to use the computer, and do Facebook for him.

When I was living with Brigid Berlin, in NYC a few years ago, she didn’t understand texting. She would get annoyed with me when I was texting.

I don’t think Andy would be texting on a cell phone. Like Brigid, he would pick up the phone. Texting would be too modern. He loved chatting on the phone.

Brigid and I were producers on the film Factory Girl. We spent a lot of time with the film’s stars Guy Pearce and Sienna Miller. I remember being out to dinner with Brigid, Guy, and Sienna. Sienna had a few phones and was texting. Brigid was amazed at how she could be texting on several phones and Sienna offered to teach Brigid how to text. Brigid wasn’t interested. “It’s too modern. I prefer to go out on the phone,” she said. Like Andy, Brigid likes talking on the phone.

On addiction: Dali did a wonderful, large drawing of Robert and me. It’s gone now.

When I found out I was positive in ‘94, my addiction really got the worse of me. I was drinking heavily and doing every drug available: heroin, cocaine, crystal . My life was unmanageable. I was really sick and weighed 155 pounds. I had the lowest element of people in my life then living in

A possession. I remember having lunch with two good friends in L.A. at Spago, Truman Capote and Lester Persky. It was just before Truman passed away. Truman said, “Possessions are obligations. What’s important is wonderful friends and great loves.” I have to agree with my friend Truman.

On self-discovery: Robert and I were living in Beverly Hills and we decided to find our natural mother who had put us up for adoption. We ended up moving east to Connecticut, where she lives, to get to know her. It didn’t work out too well. After giving birth to us, she became a nun for several years.

She’s no longer a nun, but couldn’t accept that Robert and I were gay, so Cornelia and C.Z. Guest (who we met through Truman) said, “Get out of that unhealthy situation, and come and live with us for a while.”

As Dorian Leigh said, you only have a handful of people you can call true friends. I hold my friendship with C.Z. and Cornelia close to my heart.

On saying goodbye: A memory I will always cherish is one from 1989. I moved to LA that year and decided one day to drive the Pacific Coast Highway to San Francisco. I checked into the Mark Hopkins Hotel there. I hadn’t seen Halston for several years. I was in the elevator going up to my room, the elevator stops, the doors open, and there is Halston in front of me.

He was living at the Mark Hopkins and was sick, It was a year before he died. He smiled, and in Halston manner said, “Darling twin, Richard or Robert.”

He said, “Honey, want to go for a ride with me?” Of course I said yes, after giving him a hug and big kiss.

We drove around San Francisco in a black Rolls Royce for about an hour or so, just driving and reminiscing of the great times at 54, his home, and friends that were gone. He told his driver to put in the Studio 54 tape. Halston said Stevie (Rubell) gave it to him years before and he still played it. The two of us sang along to some of the songs. I remember singing to Donna Summer’s “Last Dance.” I guess you could say that was my last dance with my friend Halston.

“I’m getting back on my floatie. Two hot guys in the pool, and I want to meet them. At this moment, I’d be up for a three-way.”

artwork: left: Richard and Robert DuPont with handwritten text “To Andy with Love XXX Richard DuPont & Robert”, n.d. Collection of the Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburg center: Richard DuPont, illustration by Mitja Bokun right: original artwork silkscreen: Richard DuPont by Monica Mary Warhol

by peter danbury

mood indigo Duke Ellington’s Mood Indigo as done by Charles Mingus on the album, Mingus, Mingus, Mingus, Mingus, Mingus.

In particular, his own long solo. Piano held for a spell to a drip, horns away, drummer laying off the drums, bristling the hi-hat like a vinyl record’s circulating splash of static, floating that bass, that upright bass a graceful drunk bumbling delicately through his home through the night, catching vases, glasses, bottles, iron apples he upsets, water towers, pumpkins, planets, each intact, kept from crashing to the floor on which he moves on toward the fragrant bedroom, by way of the living room, basement, back porch, back swamp, orchard, kitchen, moon, childhood, hallway, hooked by the thought, the horns come back piano-led, swaying, stung sleepy by the thought of his night-blue wife asleep so near, so elsewhere dreaming, beside whose breathing body he’ll lay down, big, his own and rest a hand, its plucking fingers tingling, upon the round of her belly.

if say

A burst of steam from a tea kettle could To preface its ecstasy Go Boing And our hearts with just Such noise resound Or nimble Somersault down hills and up And cartwheel up through branches too Too adroit To get caught to get The least bit scratched And silent Sunlight keep Its world-cupping promise Cleaning Each of the world’s Murderous windows Then The bell-round stir of love my heart cups for you now might be Entirely As an author’s own renowned translation Submissively Trusted Till it sang sang sang Its wunderbar delicioso Tongue

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

illustration by mitja bokun

photographer - stephanie dinkel hair - dennis devoy make up - mariko arai photographer’s assistant - anna ritsch model - solomiya zgoda / ford models ny

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

tempest.

photography by michael david adams

hair/makeup - viktorija bowers adams styling - don west wardrobe - james coviello & vintage model - haley sutton / vny model management

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Per Skovgaard

A mixed media artist born in 1975, Per Skovgaard uses his expressions in current paintings. A natural mechanical and intelligent world of reaction, direction and reflections from the water. He makes use of nature’s own perfect sequences.

Simple chaos in perfect order.

photographer: Joseph Staska

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

In June, 2013, I rented a photo studio on 26th StREET in new york for a fashion editorial shoot. Itwasowned and run by a man who, months later, I discovered TO BE CELEBRITY photographer Peter Strongwater, WHO HAD SHOT THOSE ICONIC INTERVIEW MAGAZINE COVERS IN THE 80’S. one of the most INFLUENTIAL pop-icon photographers of all-time.

Reserved: How were you able to catch the shiny ‘Crystal Ball of Pop,’ that is, Interview Magazine, or did it catch you? How did it happen?

Peter: It was years ago. I had a connection to Fred Hughes who was Andy’s manager at that time. I just mentioned casually, “Gee, I like Interview. It would be fun to work for them.”

I was a good friend of Linda Hutton.

He said, “Go do a picture,” they like society names and stuff.

Linda Hutton came from a pretty substantial family. He said, “Go take a picture of Linda Hutton.” I took a picture and they said okay, we love it. Then they called me up about a week later and said, “How would you like to do a cover?”

I was speechless. I said that’s great, yeah, fabulous. I remember, they said, “Well, we’re going to send you Isabella Rossellini.” That was my first cover in ‘80, ‘82, somewhere around there. I became very friendly with the managing editor, Robert Hayes. It was very nice. I mean, I knew Andy, and at The Factory, most of the time when I was working, I would just come up, it was all very informal. Marc Balet was the creative director. Of course you never got paid. That was a minor problem. They wanted 16x20’s. Each shooting cost me like a thousand or fifteen hundred dollars, but it was great fun, and I got to shoot everyone.

I became pretty good friends with Bridget Berlin up there, who lives around the corner from me here, and it just worked.

I mean, for I don’t know, three, four years, I must have done sixteen covers, or something like that.

Reserved: Wow! Visually, who were your favorites--your favorite subjects?

Peter: Who was my favorite?

magazine, so he could get into film festivals for free. I remember seeing him walking up and down Madison Avenue, handing out copies of the magazine at different stores as a way to advertise.

Reserved: Paul Morrissey involved, wasn’t he?

Peter: Yes, he was. I mean, most of the people that were in the ‘painting’ department— art department— really didn’t have much to do with the way Interview was run. When I say a shoestring, it was really basically Mark and Robert, maybe two or three interns.

We had André Leon Talley who was the fashion writing consultant. We had all of these kinds of people that would come and go. Basically, the magazine was put out maybe by three people.

Richard Bernstein did the covers. Everyone thinks Andy did the covers. Andy did not do the covers. I would present a picture, and Richard Bernstein would paint over them, and it looked like they could be done by Andy, but it was really all done by Richard. I don’t think he ever really got the credit he deserved for doing this, because everyone just assumed that it was Andy. It looked like something that Andy would do.

Reserved: Did you just hand over the photograph, and he would …

Peter: I would just hand over the black and white print and that was the last I’d see of it! The next time I would see it would be one the newsstand and it would be in color. I was shooting everything—we did no color at that time—I was shooting everything in black and white. We never did it in color, because that probably would’ve blown the budget to pieces!

Peter: Richard painted them all. I don’t even think Andy really gave much advice. I think he let Richard do whatever he wanted to do. Mark would come to the shooting, and he did a really did a great job. I mean, he was a great art director at that, you know, photo magazine because they really let you do what you wanted to do.

I mean, once in a while we would come up with a theme or an idea or something like that. When we did Mick, Mark got the idea to hang records from the ceiling, and that became the background. We would use a striped wallpaper or something like that.

Again, we were somewhat limited in what we could do because we had no money almost.

Reserved: Did you find that liberating or constraining? Was it frustrating?

Peter: No, I felt it fun, because most of the stuff was done on white. Once in a while we would do some kind of set, but it was very, very, basic. It was unfortunate. We did one picture of Diana Ross on the street, where she was in a Jeep being driven.

Other than that, I really can’t remember that we ever did anything outside of the … no, no, excuse me ...We did a really a great, great story of Phoebe Cates out in Southampton.

The only reason we could do that is I was very good friends with Marty Raynes who had a large estate out there.

I asked Marty if we could use his house to do these pictures of Phoebe Cates, who was then very hot. She had just come off, what was her first...

Peter: I think Mick Jagger was great. I loved doing Mick. He was incredible. He just came here, and there was no entourage at that point. He just arrived. There weren’t a million PR people. He just rang the doorbell, said, “Hi, I’m Mick.”

You know, literally. It was that cool!

Reserved: Fast Times at Ridgemont High?

He was really great. We had a really good time, and the pictures were amazing. I really liked him. Diana Ross was very interesting. She came with a huge entourage of people. That was fun. Then sometimes we would prepare a lunch outside on the terrace, and Andy would come over sometimes. He would do the Polaroids of them, and then get them suckered into do a portrait. That was one of the purposes of the interview. It was a marketing tool because he would say, “Well, I’ll get you on the cover of Interview. Oh, by the way, you can do a triptych, it’s really reasonable,” it’s only $30,000 a print at that time or something.

Reserved: That’s great.

Just about everyone that I ever photographed, John McEnroe or Diane von Furstenberg, they wound up eventually buying prints from Andy. Andy would come with his little camera and take photographs of them while I was shooting, or while they were getting dressed.

Reserved: Yeah. You’re being auctioned now, I see.

He never said much, but he would hang around for lunch and stuff. Sometimes we’d also have lunch down at The Factory. That was another way to sucker them in. He would have sponsors—try to get a liquor company or a camera company to buy some pages.

I also worked on a project for the USIA during that period, where I photographed a lot of… it was called Monuments, and it was basically a collection of photographs of people who have fundamentally changed your life. Whether good, or bad, or something.

The magazine—it was pretty primitive then as to what it is now. I mean, when it was being run by Peter Brant’s wife, the paper quality was not there. I mean, it had graduated a great deal from being a movie review magazine, which was how it started. Andy was too cheap to buy tickets to go to the film festival but he wanted to go, so he said, “I’ll start a film review magazine.”

It was everything from Oppenheimer, who made the hydrogen bomb, to Hugh Hefner who revolutionized magazine publishing, to Mohammed Ali. It was just a weird collection of people. The man who designed the interstate highway system, people who really made major contributions to your life, but you really weren’t aware of what they did. Who did it? How did this highway system, you know, how did it come to pass?

Reserved: I love it. Wasn’t it Fran Lebowitz, one of the reviewers?

Peter: Yeah, that’s how Interview started: it was a film review

Peter: Yes! He said yeah “as long as I can meet her.” I said, “Don’t worry about it.” At the very worst, we’ll put a Polaroid under your pillow. He did like that!

Peter: Yeah, that was a location shoot. I think John McEnroe—we shot him in his in his apartment, because he was too lazy to get out of his studio.

I could kill myself, because I had stacks, you know, you start dealing with the only payment you could get is you could get as many copies of the magazine as you wanted. There’s a store now on 57th Street and Park Avenue that sells these vintage covers for over $100 a piece.

Peter: They are being auctioned now, at the Phillips du Pury in London and also here in New York. Of course it never got past official approvals. It was kind of complicated.

Or Dr. Johnson from Masters and Johnson. It was an interesting collection of people. That was scheduled to tour the communist states. Of course they never got past the cycle; it

Peter Strongwater photographed by Jaka Vinsek

was kind of complicated but I got to do the photographs.

uninspiring.

Reserved: Did they ever see the light of day?

I mean, Conde Nast has cut their budgets back. There’s no longer a month trip to Tokyo.

Peter: They’re in the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, D.C. They did get to see the light of day. They didn’t go on tour. They were all gifted over to the Smithsonian.

Reserved: That’s fantastic. You have a wide breadth of experience in your career.

Peter: It is. I mean, Interview opened up a lot of doors.

Reserved: What do you do now to nurture your creative spirit? Do you shoot still?

Peter: No, I actually got to want to live a life, and eat, and do things like that. I have a production company, and what we do is we organize difficult shoots for large companies, basically. Such as, one of our clients is the Ford Motor Company; Zip Cars; large pharmaceutical companies; Budweiser, Anheuser Busch, Pepsi.

Reserved: So you’re full service production?

Peter: Yea, what we do is we organize these shoots, and we cast them. We have location scouting, we organize everything: we produce a book and just guide them through the shoot. Then, of course, we have a rental studio next door …

Having the knowledge of photography, it’s great. A lot of photographers trust me because I’ve been through. It’s not like I’m coming from an office experience. I have a pretty deep background in photography.

So that keeps us pretty busy. Also, managing the collection of prints that I have from Interview. There’s an exhibit now that’s going to be done in Colette in Paris. I just got an email from them about it. They’re going to add more pictures up. Again, it’s a labor of love more than a labor of cash, by the time I get them framed and by the time I ship them and stuff like that. But it’s nice to know that people like them: they’re iconic and they really stand out.

Just managing that takes some time. Between all of the things, I’m relatively busy.

Reserved: Is there any one or anything that inspired you creatively?

Peter: Creatively? I don’t like to complain about what’s going on now.

Reserved: Oh, I do!

Peter: I just think, I don’t want to sound ancient but digital has taken the soul, I think, out of photography. It has become almost a mechanical wall before, I was inspired by so many great photographers that I would see. I mean, Bill Solano was a great friend of mine, also Hans Fuhrer, all of these photographers. There was motion, they were great… you looked at Vogue, or even you looked at the New York Times, and they were great fucking pictures.

You look at the stuff today and it all looks like Glamour.

Some kind of version of Glamour. There are specialized publications that try to do a nice job that are really barking after advertising and willing to take new photographers: new choices and stuff like that. The mainstream publications that everyone sees, they’re for the most part

I remember working for Seventeen when we used to fly on a plane that was Walter Annenberg’s plane to fly to the locations. We used to call his pilot Mr. Lucky.

That stuff isn’t done today. Today, it has unfortunately become more of a business than anything… even in the successful ‘art photographers,’ there’s just sighs, huge, gigantic sighs. We’ll sell it for a couple of hundred thousand dollars.

It just changed a lot. Like everything else new, it’s become unfortunately money driven, where before people did it because they loved it.

Reserved: Yeah, and it’s had such a different aesthetic. My father shot for Playboy in the 70’s.

Peter: It was, it was inspiring, because they really, really, loved everything about it. At Playboy was Marilyn Gowansky, it was a great publication at that time, I used to work with her and also Joe Brooks at Penthouse. At that time Penthouse put out a “high class” women’s magazine called VIVA with none other than Anna Wintour as its fashion editor, today every time I see her around she tries not to remember that we worked together it is really very funny, it is a strange back story and I am not sure if many people know it.

Every time I see her she pretends—I see her weirdly in certain situations. Obviously she knows me, I mean I worked with her, and it’s like she can’t really process the point that she worked with Elliott Erwitt. VIVA was a beautiful publication. It had a great art director, Roland Johnson, and it was really way ahead of its time.

Reserved: Photography has really changed. Thanks to computers, photos are too perfect… extremely over-retouched.

Peter: Yeah, and Photoshopped to death. We worked with several photographers that will remain nameless, and the pictures don’t even look like a picture. Then a client stands over the monitor during a shoot.

One of the beautiful things about film is that you never really knew exactly what you were going to get, so there was always the surprise at the end. Sometimes disaster, but a lot of times, great. I’m a pretty good friend of Elliott Erwitt, and, you know, the unexpected result of photographs at that point was so much better.

Today, they see it and it’s done—and if they don’t like it they’re redoing. You do it again until it looks exact. They beat the life out of it until there’s nothing left, and then that becomes the picture.

It’s unfortunate, because it has changed the direction and if they don’t like it they can Photoshop it, do whatever they feel like with it. They look almost cartoonish.

Reserved: Shots done with film, compared to the digital shots of today, what a difference! There’s something to really be said for the element of surprise, when you don’t know what you’re going to get and you can’t see what the photographer is seeing.

Peter: It really is true. I mean, you look at some of the old

books of any of the photographers in the beginning, and they’re just very, very, different.

Reserved: Do you think that the shots were more thought out? You had to, when you were shooting with film, right?

Peter: Yeah, because A. you didn’t have the flexibility of shooting these shots… It would’ve cost a fortune. You had maybe, at Interview, you were to get it in ten rolls. If you didn’t get it in ten rolls…you really had to get it pretty instantly. Generally, what I would do is I’d try to get as much information about the subject as I could before I shot. Especially the government shots, because there you’re on their time.

What they would do is they would clear out the office and set everything up. You’ve got ten minutes, and that was the deal. You’re interviewing you have a very good idea of what you wanted to do, and how the person would react to certain things. Because there wasn’t time, you didn’t have unlimited film to waste.

It was much more focused and much more direct, basically.

Reserved: How do you feel about magazine covers now?

How do you feel about what kind of thought is put into them, or the creativity?

Peter: For fashion they’ve changed. They got rid of the models, and they just put Kim Kardashian on the cover or something like that. I guess they sell more, because, really, I look at a fashion magazine as a better produced People.

Reserved: Do you think the pendulum will swing back, in your view?

Peter: That’s a difficult question. Everything eventually changes, but you don’t really hear that much about, there are some ‘supermodels’ out there today, but they’re not like the Christy Turlingtons, they’re not like even the Giseles …

Peter: I couldn’t name any models. They’re younger, too.

A lot of them are from the Slavic countries, Eastern Europe. They’re fifteen to sixteen, they’re giants. They hardly speak any English, and they really don’t have any personalities where before, you had the great Christie Brinkley, Cheryl Tiegs, Lisa Taylor, Patti Hansen, Iman, Janice Dickinson, etc. Great personalities those models had. Today they’re almost bred for the times, because they can just dress them up in whatever they want, take a kind of stand in… I mean, you look at the cover of Vogue, look at the cover of Bazaar, look at the cover of W: except for a different face, they’re basically the same concept.

They’ve picked some movie star, and they just put her on the cover. Because I guess people are celebrity-oriented today. They love gossip and they love celebrities, and anything in that category.

It sells more. They’d rather read more about some celebrity than some model that no one knows anything about.

Then you know all these kids now who want to be designers. The designer is the new rock and roll star. These designers. I mean, when you think, years and years ago. I mean Fashion Week; no one knew about Fashion Week.

Reserved: It was for the buyers.

Peter: Right. Buyers would come into the show room on Seventh Avenue, 1411 or one of those buildings, and they’d look at the line. That was that. There wasn’t any

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on above: paperDiana Ross & Mick Jagger photographed by Peter Strongwater

big extravaganza. Then you look at it today with the Mercedes-Benz things and the tents and the parties and the events. The fashion doesn’t even matter.

Reserved: That’s for the celebs in the front row, right?

Peter: Fashion in these fashion shows is totally obsolete, because they never produce the stuff. It’s now, like everything else. It’s become a huge media event; a media circus. That’s what they say when the circus comes to town.

Reserved: Yeah, it’s arrived.

Peter: And it gets bigger and bigger, not smaller and smaller. The tents, the ones in Lincoln Center, they’re bigger. Then there are all the outside ones, like Marc Jacobs is always across the street with the armory. I go—I have a few friends still in the industry—I go see and stuff like that. Yeah, it’s a very, very different.

Reserved: Yeah, there doesn’t seem to be as much soul.

It’s all very surface and abstract and commercial. People are so worried about the money. They don’t want to take a risk.

Peter: All the clothing they put out there on these shows is just for show, just to be photographed to be in the magazines. I know, it’s a fact, that half the stuff never hits production or it’s too expensive. They can’t really knock it off. Besides, no one really gets dressed anymore.

Who wears Versace? You really see all the wildness and stuff. I mean, it’s like a mystery. How many people are buying Valentino ball gowns? Most of them are given away to actresses for publicity.

Reserved: In the old days, when we would go out, people made an effort when they went out, because you were to be seen.

Peter: Right, yeah. But as I said you’ve got people today— even at formal events—they wear a suit. It’s less and less dressy which is fine with me, but I mean for the high end of fashion… there are how many people? I think in couture, if there are 100 buyers worldwide, that’s counting China, Russia, all those areas, buying couture at $30$40,000 a pop or whatever it would cost, I think that’s about it. I wouldn’t say it’s more than one hundred. Everything else is mass marketing.

Reserved: You have really shown us some amazing perspective today!

Peter: Thank you so much. I hope you’ve got what you need.

Reserved: I think we’re set. Thank you so much Peter!

MiN

NewYork

MiN New York, Crosby St. in SoHo

interview by whitney mercurio photography by Michael Donnelly

I met Chad Murawczyk, the owner of SoHo’s MiN New York, the luxury apothecary and atelier on Crosby St., at a friend’s loft party in July.

After about a minute of talking with him about his niche business of exclusive rare and hard-tofind fragrances and cool comprehensive selection of “dear old things”, I realized he was someone who understood people like me who function from the emotional side of their brain, who create and register “moments” through smell, sound, touch and whose personal litmus tests are goodold visceral reactions when choosing a scent, or anything for that matter. His shop on Crosby St. is so beautiful to look at and exist in, let alone breathe in. He has managed to create an environment which embodies the MiN concept of “the art of living”. A genuine and uncontrived experience for those who appreciate luxury.

-Do you create scents based on your life’s experiences? How do you formulate them? I am inspired by so many things in this world... memories, places, people... The moments that are precious, once captured, remain with us forever. I may draw inspiration from a certain raw material that inspires me. I feel that fragrance should have a confident signature.

-Do you feel that scents are chosen by process of involuntary and subtle emotional responses? Our memories, experiences and emotions are all triggered by the scents we are exposed to.

Before we are even able to register the scent and categorize it, it has already activated the limbic system, triggering more deep-seated emotional responses. So, yes!

-We have all had times where a smell triggers the memory of a moment or time in our life. Can you speak to any of yours? I have many great memories that I share with my family and loved ones. One was from years back when I was in Sinai by the Red Sea. We did a lot of diving but one of the strongest memories I have from that trip was night diving. It was an absolutely lunatic idea and honestly, that’s what made it even more appealing to me! It was a hot dry night and even by the sea you can smell the dry desert air with a smoking fire lingering through it. Under a canopy of stars, it was one of those nights when you look up at the sky and you get almost dizzy from the beauty of it, the feeling of being alive and possibilities ahead of you.

The scent that is very vivid in my mind is the combination of that dry desert air with the sea saltiness that you can almost taste when you breathe in.

-What role does each person’s individual chemistry play in an applied scent and does it fade into different notes after it is applied? Each person’s individual chemistry will react with the fragrance in slightly different ways, that is the beauty of it all. You are creating something that will evolve into all these different directions, each one interesting in its own way. Perfumes are like potions! It is alchemy.

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

-How do you orchestrate the top, mid and base notes of a fragrance? The process of perfume creation depends on the inspiration behind it. A niche perfume tend to have a well-designed and orchestrated journey. Molecular chemistry kicks into gear utilizing ingredients as instruments in a composed symphony with the intention that the result is a masterpiece that magically captures a moment of time or emotion.

-Does the mass luxury fragrance market suffer because it must appeal to such a wide demographic in order to survive? It is the mission of the mass market to please the public, cut cost, and round out all the edges. At the mass luxury level, a good portion of the process is risk reduction finding opportunities to increase shareholder value. That’s why most beauty products, including designer and celebrity perfumes, lead with money sunk into marketing campaigns, endorsements, packaging, and born essentially out of focus groups.

Once one acquires a more distinctive point of view in personal style and develops a more refined taste in consumption, you become curious about our world and the eyes open to a universe of wondrous indulgences. Individuality is the key and exploration is endless. It’s no different than fashion, art, food, wine, and spirits. Timeless things, made with love by hand, born out of inspirations only inspire. It’s a bit like falling into a rabbit hole into wonderland... The world that I live in is a place of creativity. The impossibility of things is where the air is most crisp. Breathe in, find the edge, take a small step back to capture it in my mind and then go to work and build it.

model - lisa ward / mc2 new york wardrobe - morgane le fay photographer’s assistant - dakota leboeuf special thanks to betty mercurio

forever young. photography by michael david adams

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

musee haut, musee bas...

“Do not waste time hitting a wall hoping to transform it into a door. ”

by Rodrigo Alcazar

- Coco Chanel. for Jean.

Someone I admire, had written something that had obfuscated me a little: “Oh, God! Going to the Louvre . . . What a hard thing to do, isn’t it?“ Going to the Louvre is a pleasure when you have time to do it. Walk through the corridors and let your footsteps lead you where they want to. But on that particular day, I was asked at the last minute, to go with a photographer to take some pictures of which our designer wanted to find inspiration for embroidery.

Okay, it’s better than being a cashier in a supermarket, but when you have work on the table, you’d rather not do it .

Fashion opens doors, especially when it is a great house. A simple phone call from our public relations person and a whole hall of the museum is closed to the public for a couple of hours for us to do our documentation research.

Jan, who has been appointed to accompany me with Steven, the photographer, is happy – “It’s nice to get out of this for a few minutes!” - He said. “Looking at it this way it certainly is a pleasure to go out and breathe away the stress that saturates the air in this place.”

“In matters of style, follow the current. But in matters of principles you must remain firm as a rock. “ -Thomas Jefferson In less than ten minutes all the formalities have been fixed and an envelope containing a letter addressed to the director of the museum is in my hands. In return for this letter we will receive three free passes to the museum. No wonder the house I work for makes generous donations!

We walk outside, and a car is waiting for us at the door of the building. We tell Steven to climb aboard with the material as we, ourselves decide to walk. The museum is located just a few blocks away. We want to enjoy the sunshine as long as it is not raining!

It is in moments like this that I realize my work is not so common, even if the post of assistant in the studio is not my real vocation. I am a technician; I know how to make a dress, how to prepare a collection as I have directed a workshop. But these kinds of commissions are not unpleasant.

“Style is the expression of individualism mixed with a bit of charisma. Fashion comes after style. “ -John Fairchild.

When we arrived in front of the Louvre Pyramid, Steven is taking the material out of the car. We intend to help, but like any good photographer, he only allows us to touch the tripod and cartons to guide light. His camera is like his wife, nobody else can touch it! As we pass the safety inspection (protocol “vigie pirate” mandatory because of the terrorist attacks), the supervisor tells me where to get the passes.

Once in the room, a perverse feeling of power gets me. The people who have come to visit find the hall is closed and look at us with a strange mixture of envy and resentment. We finished ahead of schedule, so I call my friend Pascual and ask him to join us to go eat at the Mc Donald’s on Rue de Rivoli. While leaving the museum I want to give the “badges” back, but the clerk tells me to keep them in case we need to return in the following days.

We arrived at the restaurant and found Pascual waiting for us on the line to order ...

“A designer is as a composer. If there are no musicians to play your score, nothing happens. “ - François Lesage.

Steven has some work ahead to print the photographs so they could be ready to be delivered to our official embroiderer.

I phone and ask them to send someone. Jean, the manager of the workshop, offered to come to pick them up. When he arrives, we talk for a few minutes, and I tell him about my afternoon taking the pictures. He tells me that he lives in Paris but has never visited the museum.

Then, a brilliant idea comes to me: I propose to take him to the museum, saying that I’ll just say it would be good for him to see the original. I tell my boss I will be away for an hour and a half to take Jean to the museum. I put the badges in my bag...

“Fashion is what adopt those who do not know who they are. - Quentin Crisp Life would be so simple if we hadn’t all these a-priori preconceived ideas in our heads due to a visual conditioning preventing us from leaving home without looking at our images in the mirror. Our standard part of the education received by all means, what make us see all proportion out of the rules as unsightly or outdated.

The giant shoulder pads left the place to the Armani shoulder and this, to the natural shoulder, the pagoda, raglan, kimono and arrowhead. We all follow fashion, even those who think they don’t. In fact, they are the most feared customers. Nothing suits them, they have too clear an idea of what they want, or rather yet, what they do not want to buy ...

“Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable. It has to be altered every six months. “ - Oscar (born to be) Wilde.

Once we are at the museum, like any rebel, I kept my “badge” in the pocket of my jacket, while Jean wears it proudly on his chest. I walk through the museum with apparent indifference . . . a product of my previous visits, but Jean wants to see everything. Well, everything won’t be possible, but the “best of”. . . that he will have!

Started with The Victory of Samothrace, aka Athena Nike, who was the inspiration for the logo of the sportswear brand of the same name. The silhouette logo . . . it is none other than one of the wings drawn in a stylized fashion. A few rooms later we find the Venus de Milo, with which Jean insisted he be photographed with.

We passed Les Noces de Cana of Véronese, La Grande Odalisque by Ingres, Le Sacre of Napoleon by Jacques Louis David and Le Verrou of Fragonard and the Raft Of The Medusa of Gericault. When Jean sees La Liberté Guidant the Peuple, he stops and says “This is La France!” not without pride.

“I dress for the image. Not for myself, not for the public, or for fashion, even less for a man. “ - Marlene Dietrich I take Jean to see the prisoners of Michel-Ange, unfinished sculptures that had been ordered to decorate the tomb of Pope Julius II, but they were relegated because of the work of the Sistine Chapel. The statues ended in France by the bias of Roberto Strozzi who Michel-Ange had given them... Back to the hall of paintings, where we see the portrait of Mme. De Pompadour made by Delatour and works of Botticelli . . . But Jean wants to see the only picture I try to avoid: La Gioconda.

As a good guide, I do my duty and lead him to the lady in question, where a crowd of visitors fights to approach her. - It is in a box! - Jean exclaims disenchanted. People could say what they want, but that painting is not worth the San Juan Bautista who jealous watches her a few feet further. - Why do people talk so much about her? - My neophyte companion asks and I reply that perhaps for reasons of marketing ...

Before we left, I take him to the Cour Marly, which seems to make him forget his disappointment . . .

“Every generation laughs at the fashion of the past but follows religiously new fashion. “ - Henry David Thoreau.

We ended our visit with a coffee in the cafe Marly. Jean wants to pay for me, but I tell him to let the company pay. I will not let him pay 50 Euros for two coffees and two cakes! Is then that Jean makes me notice we forgot to see the picture for the embroidery . . .

The next day at 8pm I get a package with the embroidery samples they have created overnight. Unfortunately, the models have been eliminated from the collection, and all this display of effort has gone to waste. I took the package and put it in a drawer. I ask if there’s anything else I can do, but my boss tells me to go back home to rest. I put on my coat, grab my backpack and hit the road. The doorman asks me if I need a taxi, but I tell him not to worry, that I’ll find one on the way.

I walk down the Rue de Rivoli when suddenly feel in the pocket of my jacket the badge of the museum, look up and see before me the palace of the Louvre. I head for the entrance. It’s Wednesday, the day of ”nocturnes“, what means the museum stays open until 10 pm. I have one hour to visit. I get in and go to the first floor, to the section of French paintings. The museum is dimly lit, and most people have left. I sit in front of Vermeer’s “La Dentelliere”, and I stood there, alone, enjoying just one single painting . . .

Minutes later, one of the guards appears and informs me that the museum will close its doors shortly.

When he sees my badge, he smiles and says I can stay ten more minutes, and that he will come back and walk me to the exit.

“Fashion condemns us to commit many follies; the biggest of them is to become their slaves.” - Napoleon Bonaparte.

Once outside, I have no difficulty finding a taxi. Once inside, I let my eyes wander around the buildings and monuments of Paris, which did not happen to me very often. It is true that I’m a lucky person, no matter if my job sometimes seems to be senseless.

Suddenly, the Eiffel Tower begins to twinkling and I smile. The driver kindly tells me “Nice spectacle!

Don’t you think so? First time in Paris?”. I nod affirmatively, and I have never been more sincere in my whole life.

Every day in Paris, it’s like the first one...

Lisa Lebofsky

~ lago escondido fog, oil on aluminum 10�x 16�

2. Atmosphere is VERY important to me. I loved the smell of honeysuckle bush next to my house as a child. I remember tasting the tiny drop of nectar. I was wearing a little sundress and my English sheepdog Schaeffer was at my side. Mom probably had Neil Young on or some Seals and Crofts song. I was walking to my car last month and was drawn to one in full bloom at the back of the parking lot. I was so excited!!! I drove my son back to it and stuck his face in it. I said to him “THAT’s my childhood!”. Can you relate to this? Have you had a similar experience?

3.

4.

5.

I met Chad Murawczyk, owner of SoHo’s MiN New York, the luxury apothecary and atelier on Crosby St., at a friend’s loft party in July. After about a minute of talking with him about his niche business of exclusive rare and hard-to-find fragrances and comprehensive selection of “dear old things” as pertaining to high end beauty and grooming, I realized he was someone who understood people like me who function from the emotional side of their brain, who create and register “moments” through smell, sound, touch and whose personal litmus tests are good-old visceral reactions when choosing a scent, or anything for that matter.

His shop on Crosby St. is so beautiful to look at and exist in, let alone inhale. He has managed to create an environment which embodies the MiN concept of “the art of living”. A genuine and uncontrived experience for those who appreciate luxury.

I had a few questions for him.

-Do you create scents based on your life’s experiences? How do you formulate them?

I am inspired by so many things in this world... memories, places, people... The moments that are precious, once captured, remain with us forever. I may draw inspiration from a certain raw material that inspires me.

-Do you feel that scents are chosen by process of involuntary and subtle emotional responses?

Our memories, experiences and emotions are all triggered by the scents we are exposed to. Before we are even able to register the scent and categorize it, it has already activated the limbic system, triggering more deep-seated emotional responses. So, yes!

-We have all had times where a smell triggers the memory of a moment or time in our life. Can you speak to any of yours?

I have many great memories that I share with my family and loved ones. One of the recent ones was a few years back when I was in Sinai by the Red Sea. We did a lot of diving but one of the strongest memories I have from that trip was night diving. It was an absolutely lunatic idea and honestly, thats what made it even more appealing to me! I had to experience it at least once in my life. It was a hot dry night and even by the sea you can smell the dry desert air with a smoking fire lingering through it. Under a canopy of stars, it was one of those nights when you look up at the sky and you get almost dizzy from the beauty of it, the feeling of being alive and possibilities ahead of you. The scent that is very vivid in my mind is the combination of that dry desert air with the sea saltiness that you can almost taste when you breathe in.

-What role does each person’s individual chemistry play in an applied scent and does it fade into different notes after it is applied?

Each person’s individual chemistry will be reacting with the fragrance in different ways, that is the beauty of it all. You are creating something that will evolve into all these different directions, each one interesting in its own way.

-How do you orchestrate the top, mid and basenotes of a fragrance?

The process of perfume creation depends on the initial idea behind it. You will have to stay in tune by searching and finding that perfect initial note and build around it and together with it, finding strike chord and blending everything to the point when you have harmony and it evokes the emotions you imagined it would while creating it.

-Does the mass luxury fragrance market suffer because it must appeal to such a wide demographic in order to survive?

The mass luxury market has no choice but to please the public, cut the cost and round all the edges so that it will safely appeal to many. They don’t have the luxury of creating a fragrance that is truly unique and risky. This is why so many people are learning more about niche world and prefer to explore the land where individuality is the key and risk is admired. Essentially it is a process of risk reduction and increasing shareholder value. True creativity does not survive in the mass process. It is the exercise of producing “good enough” in order to capture the transaction.

The world that I live in is a place of true creation. The impossibility of things is where the air is most crisp. Breath in, find the edge, take a small step back to capture it in my mind and go to work. This is where the true creatives live.

Zaria Forman

greenland #7 66”x 50” soft pastel on paper

Zaria’s enthusiasm for drawing began during her childhood when she and her family traveled to some of the world’s most remote landscapes, the subject of her mother’s fine art photography. A graduate in Studio Arts from Skidmore College, Zaria has exhibited extensively at galleries and venues throughout the United States and overseas.

by Steve Kelley Peter Loughrey, founder and owner of Los Angeles Modern Auctions, talks about the modern aesthetic and what’s next on the block.

it Started with a Bowling ball Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Recognized internationally as one of the world’s foremost experts in modern art and design, Peter Loughrey takes a holistic view of the aesthetic.

“Modernism is simply the byproduct of our evolution,” Loughrey explained. “Throughout history there is an overwhelming record of mankind being modern. The pyramids, gunpowder, and the humble mortar and pestle are towering examples of mankind’s modern capacity. Yet all are many millennia old.”

So, simply put, a modernist piece is anything that was (or is) being made with a new set of ideas.

Loughrey was raised in rural Maryland and is from good antique collecting stock (some of his first memories are of visiting fairs and shows with his parents) but it was a move to L.A. in the ’80s that sparked his fascination with modernism. Architecture and design from the first half of the twentieth century was being re-examined, and southern California was a hotbed of activity. Loughrey found himself in the right place at the right time. He found the retail gallery world boring, so he founded LAMA—the first auction house to specialize in modernist art and design—in 1992.

Loughrey’s advice to new collectors is simple - buy what you like. “With time, which equals experience,” he noted, “novice collectors will become connoisseurs. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes or to get rid of mistakes.” Loughrey doesn’t recall the first piece of fine art he purchased except to say that he guaranteed it was “unremarkable.” But he does recall the first object he bought as a dealer. It was a bowling ball.

“It may sound silly,” he said, “but in that very first piece I now recognize a purity of modernism that

is hard to replicate. The simple bowling ball is a marvelous distillation of many tenets of modern. It has geometric perfection like the pyramids. Its use is a fairly modern updating of a classical game— lawn bowling dates to the seventeenth century and other games of rolling balls go back much further.

The material of cast and polished vinyl or plastic is a great example of getting the most out of a modern material. And it is ergonomically suited for use by design.”

Even as LAMA’s volume increases, Loughrey’s curatorial integrity is evidenced in the unique blend of fine art and functional design presented as well as a rigorous vetting process. Buyers at LAMA benefit from Loughrey’s seasoned and sophisticated editorial eye.

The next sale is scheduled for October 13, 2013, and will feature canvasses by luminaries like Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein. It will also include an impressive group of Gertrud and Otto Natzler ceramics. The LAMA twitter feed has rightly called the October auction an embarrassment of riches, but there is one piece that Loughrey is particularly proud of.

“It is a rare, large canvas by Larry Rivers from 1959,” noted Loughrey. “His work from this period was the precursor to the pop movement. It has all the power and gravitas of a de Kooning woman. I believe it is probably the most important historical work of modern art that we have ever offered. At $200,000 - 300,000 it is a bargain!”

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Quentin Jones SPEAKS. interviewed by brad holroyd

1. What is it about fashion that fascinates you?

For me, fashion divides into so many different subcategories- from clothing I covet, to an artform I get to think about through my work, to everyday things I throw on to wear to my studio... and everything in between. What I love with my work is that I get to explore where fashion meets art, music, paper, scissors, or gets considered over a timeline or in sequences. It is how I can think about this time-old subject that re-interprets it, and puts in a new light. Fashion doesn’t exist on an island it sits and mixes with the most exciting elements of the arts, and in film I get to play with this.

2. What about the Dadaists’ work do you relate to?

I love their freedom of approach, to combine things for that are surprising, and just for the joy of the visual coincidence.

3. Does the environment in which you live influence you in any way? i.e. - living in London vs. New York I think you can’t help but absorb a bit of what it around you- my cycle ride to work is certainly different. It is such a buzz speeding over the Williamsburg Bridge everyday. You start and end on quite a high. But I think the main differ-

ence is the teams. The industry is much bigger The only time I chose to be in my own piece in NY so you get the chance to work with amaz- was for the film Paint Test, all the stills are led ing people. by requests from magazines or brands. For Paint Test, it was a sort of experiment- I usually direct 4. Does your study of philosophy at Cambridge a girl, plan how what she does will relate to anaffect how you approach or inform your work imation and editing, paint on top of stills of her in any way? a then sew everything back together. I wanted I would say that studying any academic subject to make something that I didn’t have to storycan be useful preparation to going to art school board, explain to anyone at all, shoot without a and eventually becoming an artist- learning to team, and paint directly onto myself rather than think through other people’s ideas rather than images of myself. spend too long emoting, and living inside one’s own imagination. There is a lot of self indul- 6. How important is it for you to inject humor gence at art school, in fashion and most of the into your work? arts. I think it is good if you can see your work It can be quite important depending on the clifor what it is, and not just from your own van- ent. Fashion takes itself way too seriously, when tage point. I think I get when the humour in my it can/should be a vehicle for entertainment. drawings is purile, or when my ideas won’t appeal to a certain client. I think studying philos- 7. What are the challenges (if any) of working ophy maybe gives me the right amount of self- with commercial clients/brands? doubt. And, perhaps pushing myself to do three It is about learning to compromise- to allow half years of exams in philosophy was a good train- your ego to be put aside and not do what you ing in commitment, when what I really craved really think is the best option, or edit to your project because of product-led concerns. I keep doing was taking photographs and painting. thinking about those Orange cinema ads, where 5. What was the catalyst to becoming the sub- they have the tag line “don’t let a mobile phone ject of some of your art and in what way is it ruin your movie”, when a client asks for their different from focusing on an outside subject? boot to be the focal point of a film, or illustration.

8. Are there any of your films that are particular favorites of yours? And why?

This year I really liked The Paper Boy, with Nicole Kidman and John Cusack. Maybe because I enjoyed how terrifying it was. In the last while Pan’s Labyrinth was one of my favorites- the surreal meeting the everyday has always been a theme I enjoy. So for the same reason The Labyrinth was a childhood film I watched again and again. I think all of the films share some sort of twisted escapism.

9. Anyone or any brand that you would love to work with that you haven’t yet?

On my hit-list- Stella McCartney, Prada, Beyonce (I know not a brand... or is she??)

10. Do you like to plan or storyboard things out or is your process more instinctual?

Sadly, I have no option but to storyboard. I hate nothing more than the storyboarding process, but it is a necessary evil. You need to be able to show people your ideas to be able to get a team to work with you to help make them happen.

Luckily now, I can choose to have storyboarders do them for me if I am too busy to do them myself... but they never quite translate your own ideas as well as you can.

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

Lacroix

illustration by Marc-Antoine Coulon

by Jeffrey Felner

I am indescribably honored and humbled to have had the one and only Christian Lacroix answer a few questions for me about… well… so many things; some of it pertains to fashion. He is one of the most emblematic designers of the last 2 decades of the 20th century and he was the last of a breed to inhabit the world of Haute Couture. Here is a man who has made an indelible mark within the milieu of fashion.

His latest collaboration was with the house of Schiaparelli and he continues to design for the world of the stage whether it is ballet or opera or anything in between. The man evokes exuberance through his love of color, his humor and his native Arles. His “like” shall not walk amongst us during this life time and so take a few minutes and learn something about the man known as CHRISTIAN LACROIX! I need to personally say MERCI BEAUCOUP... MILLE FOIS... I cannot express my gratitude and respect for this man for giving of his time on this project... let alone for enriching every one of us who has a love of fashion. Here in his own words…

1-What is the most treasured possession in your wardrobe?

NONE ??? OR MY FATHER FORTIES WAR BLACK MARKET FABRICS DANDY LOOKS I USED TO WEAR MYSELF ON THE MID SIXTIES ??? OR HUMBLE OLD VINTAGE HOLYDAYS & HOME THINGS CAREFULLY PATCHED, MENDED, OLD FASHIONNED DARNED 2-What is your most sterling trait and what trait do you treasure most in your friendships?

I DO IGNORE ANY STERLING TRAIT OF MINE WITH FRIENDS I DO TREASURE MUTUAL UNDERSTANDING, SAME SENSE OF HUMOR MEANS I HAVE NOT MANY, BUT A HANDFUL IS ENOUGH 3-What is your bliss?

BEING OFF-DUTY IN A BEAUTIFUL LANDSCAPE 4-What is your guilty secret?

5-Where is your ideal home?

HIGH VIEW ON SEA AND ISLANDS FROM A CONTEMPORARY HOUSE, HILLS AND MOUTAINS SOMEWHERE IN MEDITERRANEAN AREAS FROM A RUSTIC SIMPLE ROMAN ABBEY OR PALAZZO OR ON NY OR PARIS ROOFS FROM A HIGH PENTHOUSE WITH ROOF GARDEN 6-If you could not be a designer/retailer/etc:, what would you be A MONK, A HERMIT ARTIST SKETCHING, READING, CREATING COLLAGES, PAINTINGS, CERAMICS 7-What is on your bedside table right now?

WOODEN CHURCH CHANDELIER, BOOKS, DYPTIQUE VETIVER FRAGANCE, SUN GLASSES, SILVER SKULL, AND AN ABSTRACT IRON SCULPTURE 8-What do you wear to bed?

CHARVET OLD STYLE PYJAMAS WHEN ON TRIP, AND HOME - VINTAGE DJELLABAHS IN SUMMER, OLD JOGGINGS IN WINTER, OR NOTHING 9-What if any, book are you reading now or last read?

MY FRIEND PATRICK MAURIÉS “FRAGMENT D’UNE FORÊT”, JUST FINISHED CLAUDE ARNAUD “PROUST CONTRE COCTEAU” ANS STILL READING MY IDOL PHILIP SO MANY... !!! AND A SECRET IS A SECRET...

PE JULLIAN (1919-1977) DIARY 1940/1950 10-What’s your advice to the “newcomer?”

“CE QUE LE PUBLIC TE REPROCHE CULTIVE-LE, C’EST TOI” (COCTEAU) “IL Y A PLUS DE LARMES VERSÉES SUR LES PRIÈRES EXAUCÉES QUE SUR CELLES QUI NE LE SONT PAS” (TRUMAN CAPOTE ? OR SAINTE THÉRÈSE D’AVILA ???

AND, FROM ME (!) “BEWARE OF YOUR DEEPEST SOUL & GUTS WISHES, BECAUSE THEY’LL HAPPEN. AND OF COURSE “WORK, WORK, WORK, DON’T WASTE ANY SECOND OR DROP, LIFE IS SHORT AND CHANCE IS ONLY ONCE” 11-Who or what is your inspiration/style icon?

ALL THESE SOCIALITES, MODELS AND ICONS FROM 40/50/60/70’s VOGUE OR BAZAAR. CHIC STOPPED WITH THE 80’s...

12-What is the best advice you ever received?

“PUT SOME ICE IN YOUR STOMACH” AND “FASHION IS JUST AN ASS/ SEX AFFAIR” BOTH FROM THE LATE HEBE DORSEY (A DRAGON AND GODDESS JOURNALIST IN THE HERALD TRIBUNE FROM 60/80, THE SUZY MENKES OF THE TIMES),

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

13-In 3 words or less, describe the current state of fashion.

SCHIZOPHRENC - ONE ON RUNWAYS ONLY FOR MAGAZINES. AND THE UNKNOWN LABEL REALLY WORN 14-If you were a retailer, would you wear your own designs or shop in your own store ? or where would you shop?

OF COURSE, AS A RETAILER 15-If you won a $200,000,000 power ball (lottery), what is the first thing you would buy or do?

SEE ABOVE, BUILDING A CONTEMPORARY HOUSE, BUYING A PALAZZO OR ABBEY HIGH ON THE SEA AND A PENTHOUSE WITH A ROOF GARDEN, IF THE “TIME MACHINE” STILL DOESN’T EXIST YET. OPENING A FOUNDATION OR MUSEUM HELPING ARTISTS AND RESEARCH PEOPLE 16-If you could invite up to 4 people for dinner, who would they be…dead or alive?

FOR THE MOMENT PROUST, COCTEAU AND PHILIPPE JULLIAN, BECAUSE OF THE BOOK I’M READING OR JUST READ…. OR DEAR CLOSE FRIENDS OF MINE WHO HAS PASSED AWAY TOO YOUNG IN THE PAST TWENTY/THIRTY YEARS 17-What is your favorite movie /or movie star?

DEPENDS ON THE MOMENT RIGHT NOW VANESSA REDGRAVE IN “BLOW-UP” OR KAY KENDALL IN “THE RELUCTANT DEBUTANTE”, ELINA LABOURDETTE IN “LES DAMES DU BOIS DE BOULOGNE”, ITALIAN MOVIES FROM 50/60, ANOUK AIMÉE IN “8 1/2”, RAMPLING IN “THE DAMNED”, “MANGANO” IN “THEOREMA” 18-What is the one thing you would change about yourself?

EVERYTHING 19-Whose opinion do you value most?

MY WIFE AND MY FRIEND OLIVIER SAILLARD 20-What store or which designer do you most like to shop in or wear ?

RALPH LAUREN, MARGIELA, COMME DES GARCONS 21-What’s your take on magazines, books versus the internet?

PREFER PAPER FOR SENSUALITY BUT FIND MORE & MORE WONDERFUL DOCUMENTS ON INTERNET 22-Do you have a dream collaborator?

I DON’T THINK SO 23-What is your crowning achievement thus far in your career?

I LIKE MY NEW LIFE IN BETWEEN STAGE COSTUMES DESIGNING, HOTELS DECORATING, EXHIBITION CURATING AND SCENOGRAPHIES AFTER YEARS OF FASHION AND ALSO TRAIN/TRAMWAY DESIGNING 24-What’s your music library like?

NONE, ONLY CLASSIC RADIO 25-What and where is your favorite meal?

ANYTHING WITH GARLIC, OLIVE AND OLIVE OIL, CHEESE, GOOD WINE AND OF COURSE LOBSTER, CAVIAR, FOIE GRAS, LOVE “JULES CESAR” RESTAURANT IN ARLES (I’LL RUSH THERE IN TWO MINUTES AS SOON AS THIS ANSWERING WILL BE OVER !!!)

IN PARIS I’M VERY FOND OF “MEURICE” AND “BRISTOL” BAR AND RESTAURANTS, LE “VOLTAIRE” AND “PETRELLE” TOO

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e’ve probably all fantasized that we have some secret past relative that did something truly great or infamous in their day, and that digging through family archices would yield an epic discovery in our lineage. In filmmaker Ali Boyd’s household, a family realtion was only spoken of in hushed tones or dismissed altogther, but Boyd always suspected there was more to the story. It turns out her uncle (by marriage) Curtis Rabey , who she only met once, was also known as cult singer-songwriter and larger-than-life drug dealer, Peter Kelley. “I was always aware of him, and knew my sister was not my parents’, but his child…I knew my sister was there because he couldn’t be, because of something illegal—before I even knew what that meant,” the Providence-based documentary director explains. “We had his records at my house, so as early as 4 I knew his name, but I didn’t relaly know anything till about 5 years ago—as a kid I didn’t even like his records!” Boyd expressed. Peter Kelley’s two records, 1969’s “Path of the Wave” and ‘71’s “Dealin’ Blues” came out on the legendary Sire records (a division of London recs., home to the Stones, ZZ Top, and other rock luminaries) and featured pained, rambling tunes that picked up where Dylan’s “Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands” left off, with a heady 4am vibe pervading the intimate lyrical portraits. “Eventually while listening to ‘Heather’ off of ‘Dealin’ Blues,’ I sobbed, a lot of things started to make sense to me, he was so dire and angry,” explained Boyd.

Heather was Boyd’s transplanted sister from an early age, joining her family when her mother’s sister couldn’t handle being a single mother--as Curtis Rabey was on the run from the FBI and would soon become alias Peter Kelley in NY. The story was epic in scale, perhaps out of some 70s gritty counterculture film, and Boyd knew almost immediately she had to tell his story. “The idea for my film, Peter Kelley: The Man Is Dead came about after talking to all these amazing people--around 2008, I was just looking for some footage or childhood photos of him for my sister, and I started learning about all these connections I never noticed before--all these people’s names on the record, ands one of the first people I found was David Budin, who’s a producer on ‘Path of the Wave.’ Within a few days of communicating with him I knew there was a lot to this story, and the idea to make a movie was almost instant. My perspective of (Kelley) had changed dramatically, I went to looking at him behind a sheet of glass to looking in a mirror, I was just in there with him.” Boyd’s journey con-

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tinued down river, as Budin introduced her to fellow Kelley LP-producer Bart Friedman. “They were so excited to talk about (Kelley), I wasn’t even expecting them to remember him, yet they didn’t even know what had happened to him, no one knew that he had died, and come back to Rhode Island,” said filmmaker Boyd. Yes, Kelley’s music career had never exactly taken off, despite good reviews and label publicity campaigns (like giant burlap sacks with “Peter Kelley’s Grade A Marijuana” written on them) and Kelley had truly felt the blues of dealing after experiencing the rigors of smuggling, and after getting a bit too high on his own supply. So Peter had returned to Rhode Island, a bit defeated, got back to work, and died in a tragic alcohol related crash in 1983. But Boyd learned his music continued to have a life of its own, and yielded more unexpected connections to the entertainment world. “In the first few weeks I learned people on his records played in Wind in the Willows (Debbie Harry’s hippie psychpop band) , and Franne (Newman) Lee who took the photos went on to be a costume designer on Saturday Night Live,” she said. Also, members of Rare Earth and Springsteen’s E.Street band played on the record, and Kelley had more relatives and friends with a unique presepctive on the man to express. “It took me a while to track down his sister Drena, who lived a half hour away, and then some people didn’t want to talk about him at all—but I was so surprised that so many people thought so highly of him, that he was funny, kind, smart, but when I was a kid he was this dark cloud. It was like I pulled this string that unravelled his life,” Boyd found.

She located and interviewed more interesting associates of Kelley; like clothing designer/painter Virginia Lust, who was friends with Yoko Ono and starred in her “Fly” film; Richard Gottehrer, producer/label executive at Sire; and the author of “King of Nepal,” Joe Pietri-- who aided Kelley on daring smuggling missions. Boyd also found out that Kelley’s music had indeed left a fingerprint, his influence was being felt in the current crop of “freak folk” types, like Matt Valentine, James “Wooden Wand” Toth or reclusive outsider Jim Collins, who has his own rabid cult following. Collins is among those Boyd would still love to interview for the film, as well as Sire records head Seymour Stein, and even Debbie Harry or Yoko Ono, who did know Kelley. Sadly Kelley’s bassist and confidant Jack Nailon passed away recently, but not before Boyd could commit his amazing tales to paper from phone interviews, which gave her the idea of filming recreations, which was cemented when she met James Caruso, who was the spitting image of Kelley and could play him.Luckily Boyd works in the Department of Theatre, Dance and Film at Providence College, with access to actors and a wardrobe assistant, and of course a camera and production crew was also acquired through her connections in the arts and music community in Providence. Boyd hopes for the film to be finished in a few years, but she says one can never predict the way things unravel,

and she’s eager to get the entire story captured. The entire experience has proven liberating for Boyd, who has raised money for the project via RISCA grants and kickstarter . “I never thought I could take on a project of this size, but I just knew I could do this, it was a huge shift in my life,” she exclaimed, adding that this in-progress film “changed my entire perspective”---as any meaningful work of art should.

What really keeps time – clocks or memories?

by Matjaž Tančič

Timekeeper« is a series of photographs by Matjaž Tančič, inspired by the set up of Hui-style living rooms in the old village houses of Yixian. As one enters these dwellings, the eye is again and again greeted by the same sight: a small altar com ised of a clock, two vases and a mirror.

Why were these altars created? What do they signify? In Chinese, the Zhong Sheng Ping Jing (clock, vases, mirror) has the same pronounciation as lifelong tranquility. But what at first glance gives the impression of sacred artifacts and hints at an exciting tradition, is later revealed to be only objects to the majority of today’s villagers. Just a clock, two vases and a mirror. The young have all but forgotten the original purpose of their use altars, just as old traditions and ancestral values slowly but surely fade away.

The »timekeepers« now tell a new story – a story of today.

The old clock may be replaced or even lost, but then perhaps another object will take its place, transforming the altar into a reflection of the household. Photo albums, medicines,

wrist watches, toys or food are now all part of the set up and tell the story of the altar’s current owners – farmers, tea growers, retired teachers and artists. Individuals from several different villages are featured in the photos with an altar of clock, two vases and a mirror.

As the altars changed, so have the villages. They are way past their prime, the young people desiring the hustle and bustle of the city. Trade has also found new home in large urban areas, turning the once wealthy village merchants into a mere memory. What remains are their luxurious uses that have now seen centuries, and in them – small altars that keep old memories and tell new stories. Timekeepers.

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

It was Jan 2012 when I got a phone call from my friend Rodrigo Otazu. Over Skype he told me he was the creative director of a Brazilian Carnival which they were taking from Rio to the mountains of San Luis in Argentina. . “Pieter I need you to come and document this!” That was it, the full extent of the conversation! Being that my work is almost entirely staged I felt an urge to know more about this mysterious project. I wanted to see what Roger, my husband, thought about this brief conversation and we both concluded -­‐‘hhmm, Lets go to Argentina!’

The day arrived when we flew to Buenos Aires, without a clue as to awaited us.

“A Brazilian Carnival carried out by the best people of the Rio Carnival in the deep mountains of Argentina with a mixture of local Argentinians”. That was all we knew! Rodrigo, Roger and I then got on a bus and drove 11 hours through the night to arrive early morning in San Luis. It was a peaceful, friendly city. Right away we drove to the Formula One circuit situated between two mountains. This is where we will hold the carnival, Rodrigo told us. There was a stage and a long strip that two local men were painting white with big paint guns. Right away my eyes were drawn to the amazing faces of the local people characterized by large noses -­‐ Faces that seem unfamiliar now in the modern world.

Slowly the city started filling up with people that were there for the carnival. I started thinking of how I could make this project my own and how I could document this in my own style. That night I attended the rehearsals of the 150 local Argentinians who were performing acts directed by Rodrigo. These people were not professional dancers, they were all your regular, local people who were excited to be part of something magical. We had found a group of amazing people and so I came up with the idea of building a studio and taking their portraits. I wanted to combine the combustible explosive energy of the Carnival with the calm before the storm, by taking very peaceful, delicate portraits of the locals.

Irrespective of what their role was in the show itself, our casting was inspired by interesting faces, features and smiles.

I began to realize more and more that we had arrived and were taking part in something which felt very special. The location itself is so remote that it felt like no one from the outside world would ever get to witness this. I needed to document it all but I also knew that I had to maintain some of this mystery. I decided to divide the project into 3 parts focusing firstly on nature: portraits of the landscape of San Luis, the mountains and the salt lake. This to me represented something so mysterious and so remote. Peaceful, yet so alive. Then secondly with Portraits of the local Argentinians who were taking part in the Carnival but also including whoever else was involved in whatever capacity -­‐ the builders, the painters, the cleaning ladies, the dancers and the musicians. Last but not least I focused on the Carnival itself.

The buses all arrived together there and unloaded 3000 Brazilians who had just spend the last 3 days getting there. These people were of all ages and shapes and sizes and they were ready to party! Slowly this hot summer evening in this car park started to fill up with lots and lots of feathers, drums, smiles and songs. I got goosebumps walking through this with a total feeling of exhilaration. I was anxious though in the back of my mind worrying that I had never taken snap shots before. I had to do it so that I could control the light in my own way. As the Parade started, I realized that the lights of the parade were so bright that my photos would not be any different than those of any one else that was there to take pictures. So I ran as fast as I could back to the car park. This is where the true soul of the festival seemed to be. 80-­‐year-­‐old women in huge dresses waiting for their turn to perform. Due to the huge volume of people, some had to wait hours till they got to walk on the strip.

This is where I experienced something magical. It was very dark with one street light and there were lots of sounds with drum bands practicing. Dance groups were going through their last minute routines and the energy was amazing. I perceived something dark about this whole experience and that is what brought it back to the aesthetic of my work. Dark, fairy -­‐tale like stories where people are left to guess themselves what it is about. An image that makes them comes up with their own story.

I knew then that the Carnival itself was the least interesting thing about this whole event to me. I found something more special and purer than that – principally, the underlying core of the whole thing. I decided to focus on this. ‘What’s the feeling behind it?’. I started asking the people that I photographed to close their eyes and think of what the festival meant to them.

Amazing moments ensued. My studio became a big attraction and suddenly everyone wanted to be photographed. As my tent had see-­‐through walls it became very hard to get these local people to express themselves while their friends were outside screaming. I had Roger translate my instructions to try and calm them down. Every one of them was a challenge but at the same time I don’t think I have ever had more real moments in front of my camera while at the same time I was still able to stage my concept.

I gave the book the title STARS TO THE SUN. For a while I thought how I could connect the unique combination of Brazilians celebrating and dancing together with the Argentinians. The fact was that 3000 of the best performers from the Brazilian Carnival travelled for several, long days to Argentina to share their joy with others. I started looking for connections and looked into the flags of both countries, I found stars on the Brazilian flag and a Sun on the Argentinian flag. The link was clear -­‐ the Brazilian stars go to the Sun. Stars to the Sun.

The day of the Carnival had come and after lots of arguing with the organization of the festival, Roger had them build me a tent. Next to the tent was a generator so that my strobes would be able to flash in the tent. I had brought my good old grey 9 -­‐foot long canvases that I use for lots of my projects, (including sitting on it on the beach with all my friends in the summer time!). We spread it out and setup my makeshift studio.

A local photographer arrived with 2 very old strobes. I had to make this work.

The next day the Carnival began. There were buses everywhere and long lines of people arriving by foot, cars, mopeds and bikes. I had never seen so many buses in my life. At the very far end of the racetrack there was a big parking lot.

Stars to the Sun

Pieter Henket

Zaria Forman / Greenland #61 40x60 soft pastel on paper

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s, a e h t o l c e k i e is l A perfum costume that .a message.. one who wears it. e defines th

curating the art of living.