Posts from the “Dazed” Category

Dave Schubert: Photos from the Underground

Posted on August 11, 2017

Photo: © Dave Schubert

Photo: © Dave Schubert

When Dave Schubert was six years old, his father gave him a camera – and he hasn’t put it down since. As the son of a military man and an English mod, Schubert was drawn to anti-authoritarian subcultures. He started writing graffiti after watching The Warriors and skipping school to head up to New York, where he photographed the underground skate scene at the banks by City Hall.

He started shooting for Slap magazine and realised that doing commercial work made him lose his natural instincts. In the 90s, he moved out to San Francisco to go to school and returned to the art of street photography. In the 20 years since he’s been out west, he’s seen the city transform. Once upon a time, there were gun battles right outside his door; today, Silicon Valley computer nerds rock Star Wars t-shirts at the bar.

“I’m only staying here out of spite,” Schubert laughs. “I really want to go somewhere and get my own Unabomber cabin, not be around anyone, and make prints all day long.”

That day may come but until then, Schubert shoots and scores, living as an artist on his own terms. His photographs capture the essence of rebellion, the freedom to create and destroy, the pleasures of sex, drugs, and art, and the spirit of “never say die.” He speaks with us about the pictures he’s made – and the ones that got away.

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Photo: © Dave Schubert

Photo: © Dave Schubert

Categories: 1990s, Dazed, Graffiti, Photography

Dissecting the Political Impact of Acid House

Posted on August 10, 2017

Norman Jay MBW. Photographer unknown.

Back in 1979, in a Chicago nightclub called The Warehouse, DJ Frankie Knuckles helped incubate the nascent genre of house music. Taking its name from The Warehouse, house music spread through the US underground and around the globe, and in London, it transformed into something entirely new. The acid house movement combined the hippie spirit found on the island of Ibiza with the sensation of taking a trip, be an ecstasy pill, a hit of acid, or a plane ticket to a faraway land.

By 1987, acid house had taken UK by storm with an irrepressible, revolutionary energy that evoked the utopian vibes of the Summer of Love. Peace, love, respect, and unity were the order of the day, albeit within the confines of illegal parties that were cropping up across the country, drawing thousands of revelers from all walks of life who wanted nothing more than to dance through the dawn. But the acid house scene was more than a cosmic display of hedonism. It was a movement that subverted the racial and class boundaries of Margaret Thatcher’s seemingly endless premiership. Although its political impact is often overlooked, acid house united a deeply segregated society, and what’s more, it empowered those who have been written out of history to rise and come to the fore.

In celebration of the 30th anniversary of acid house, Sky Arts are broadcasting The Agony & The Ecstasy, a three-party documentary series that tells the story of the rave revolution through 40 seminal figures on the scene including superstar DJs Norman Jay MBE, Goldie MBE, Paul Oakenfold, and Dave Pearce, as well as producers, promoters, club owners, former police officers, and the unsung heroes of the scene.

Norman Jay MBE, one of the original godfathers of warehouse parties, first got his start at the tender age of eight, when he DJed a tenth birthday party. The Notting Hill, London native was born to Grenadian parents and came of age during the 1970s when collaborating with his brother with a reggae sound system they called Great Tribulation. A visit to New York City changed everything and they renamed the system Good Times, with a nod to Nile Rodgers’ disco band Chic. Good Times led the way as acid house came up, helping to spread the culture through the creation of London pirate radio station Kiss FM in 1985.

Norman Jay MBE spoke to Dazed about the political implications of acid house, and how the music forever changed the British landscape.

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Categories: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Dazed, Music

~~ A Tribute to Arlene Gottfried ~~

Posted on August 9, 2017

Portrait of Arlene Gottfried: © Kevin C. Down

“Only in New York, kids, only in New York.”

American columnist Cindy Adams’ famed bon mot could easily caption any number of photographs in the archive of Arlene Gottfried. Whether partying in legendary 1970s sex club Plato’s Retreat, hanging out at the Nuyorican Poet’s Café with Miguel Piñero, or singing gospel with the Eternal Light Community Singers on the Lower East Side, Arlene was there and has the pictures to prove it.

“Arlene was a real New Yorker who thrived on the energy of the city, roaming the streets and recording everything she felt through a deeply empathetic and loving lens,” Paul Moakley, Deputy Director of Photography at TIME observes.

It was in her beloved city that Arlene Gottfried drew her final breath. She died the morning of August 8, after a long illness that may have taken from her body but never from her heart. In the final years of her life, she experienced a renaissance with the publication of her fifth final book Mommie (powerHouse, 2015), sell-out exhibitions at Daniel Cooney Fine Art, New York, and the 2016 Alice Austen Award for the Advancement of Photography – all of which she attended to with a style all her own.

I put together a tribute to the legendary lady who has always felt like family to me for today’s Dazed.

Photo: © Arlene Gottfried, courtesy of powerHouse Books

Photo: © Arlene Gottfried, courtesy of Daniel Cooney Fine Art.

Categories: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Art, Books, Brooklyn, Dazed, Manhattan, Photography

Brian David Stevens: A Tribute to the Victims of the Grenfell Tower Fire

Posted on August 9, 2017

Photo: © Brian David Stevens

Shortly after midnight on June 14, the call went out: Grenfell Tower was on fire. For the next sixty hours, the building burned and the world watched with horror as the tenants’ worst nightmare came true. For the past four years, the Grenfell Action Group had gone on record, filing official complaints that the building was a firetrap; their concerns had gone unaddressed and ignored – until it was much too late.

As of mid-July, police confirmed that at least 80 people have died but only 45 of the dead have been identified. Residents believe the number of deaths is likely over 120. More than 150 homes were destroyed, leaving survivors homeless and at the mercy of public aid, which has sparked a new round of conversation and debate. As victims face the profound challenges of recovery and re-housing, their plight has become fodder for competing narratives from people on all sides.

Within the noise, a silence exists, the silence of those who are no longer here to speak for themselves. Their faces radiate from handmade posters hung in their memory: the missing and the dead whose absence haunts those who live. Headlines rage and roar, overshadowing the humanity and the need to memorialise all that has been lost.

Photographer Brian David Stevens, a former resident of west London, found himself returning to the scene day after day, walking the streets, being in the presence of those who came to honor the dead. Concerned that in the fog of confusion, the victims will be forgotten, Stevens has focused on documenting the memorials, which serve as a place for people to gather and pay their respect, to grieve openly and find solace and support from others who struggle to cope with the tragedy.

Stevens’ connection to the community goes back two decades. He moved to the west London in 1998, where he lived and worked for ten years, getting to know the people and the neighborhood as only an insider can. In 2004, he created Notting Hill Sound Systems, a series of photographs documenting the central nervous system of Carnival. In 2016, he decided to reprise the project, which was just released in a new book from Café Royal.

Although he no longer lives in west London, the Grenfell Tower fire brought him back to its streets to reflect on the human toll the fire has cost, not only with the death of the innocent but of the burden the survivors are forced to bear living with untold trauma and grief. His photographs will be on view at The Northern Eye International Photography Festival, North Wales, Monday 9th October – Saturday 21st October 2017. All money raised will go to the Grenfell appeal. Below, Stevens speaks with us about his work.

Read the Full Story at Dazed

Photo: © Brian David Stevens

Photo: © Brian David Stevens

Categories: Art, Dazed, Photography

Naomi Klein: No Is Not Enough

Posted on August 1, 2017

Donald Trump is not an anomaly in any shape or form. His rise to power reveals the ugly truth about a nation that prides itself on whitewashing history and spouting disinformation in its place. His election sent those who clung to these illusions into a state of shock, unable to make sense of the inevitable culmination of neoliberal policy, celebrity/CEO worship, and dog-whistle politics aligned under the banner “Make America Great Again.”

Scandalised, they began to deflect, pointing fingers to avoid the facts. Shadowboxing with lies became the order of the day as mainstream media outlets debated false paradigms and fake news, keeping misinformation alive and well. Talking heads wouldn’t shut up, fomenting confusion, rage, and fear – all in a day’s work for the merchants of trauma and confusion.

After decades of reporting on large-scale political and corporate exploitation of society, award-winning journalist and author Naomi Klein saw through the deception and set to work penning No Is Not Enough: Defeating the New Shock Politics (Penguin Press). Here, Klein charts Trump’s ascendancy as a product of our time and offers a bold plan of action to fight back against an administration entrenched in the brutal oppression and destruction of the people, democracy, economy, and environment.

What we need, Klein argues, is a paradigm shift that goes beyond policies and takes root in values that will protect life on the planet from the scourge of rampant corruption, hatred, and greed that the administration exhibits with pride and impunity. Klein shares her vision and her wisdom with us below, providing insight into the issues at hand and how we can resist, reorganise, and fight back.

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Categories: Books, Dazed

Slava Mogutin: Bros & Brosephines

Posted on July 24, 2017

Photo: © Sloava Mogutin.

Photo: © Sloava Mogutin.

Born in Siberia, Slava Mogutin left his family and moved to Moscow at the age of 14. A third-generation writer and self-taught journalist, Mogutin worked for independent newspapers, publishers, and radio stations, where he was hailed as one of the foremost voices of the post-Perestroika news journalism and the only openly gay personality in the Russian media.

Using the press as his platform, Mogutin openly challenged the taboos against homosexuality in his native land, becoming the target for two highly publicised criminal vases that charged him with “malicious hooliganism with exceptional cynicism and extreme insolence.”

In 1994, Mogutin attempted to officially register the first same-sex marriage in Russia with his then-partner, American artist Robert Filippini, making headlines around the world and fuelling persecution by authorities. A year later, at the age of 21, he was forced to flee and became the first Russian to be granted political asylum in the United States on the grounds of homophobic persecution.

His arrival in New York launched a new chapter of his life centred in the visual arts. Using photography, Mogutin continued to challenge the status quo, introducing radical narratives that peeled back the veneer of polite society and respectability politics. With the 2006 publication of his first monograph, Lost Boys (powerHouse Books) Mogutin achieved global recognition for photographs that blurred the boundaries between sex and style, fusing the genres of nudes, portraiture, documentary, fetish, porn, fashion, and fine art into images that were as provocative as they were profound.

Mogutin is an unstoppable force. On August 1, he will release Bros & Brosephines (powerHouse Books), a collection of 240 photographs from 17 professional and personal series made between 2000-2015. While some of the images were made on big-budget sets, others were done relying on the kindness of friends and strangers. As diverse as the styles and subjects are, the one thing they share in common is their commitment to the avant-garde.

Mogutin gives us an exclusive look at the book and speaks about how art is the perfect catalyst for creativity and play, as well as a means to taking a stance and speaking truth to power.

Read the Full Story at Dazed Digital

Photo: © Sloava Mogutin.

Photo: © Sloava Mogutin.

Categories: Art, Bronx, Dazed, Photography

Kehinde Wiley: Trickster

Posted on June 6, 2017

Artwork: “Portrait of Rashid Johnson and Sanford Biggers, The Ambassadors”, 2017 oil on canvas painting: 120 5/16 x 85 5/8 inches (305.6 x 217.5 cm) framed: 131 5/16 x 96 11/16 x 4 ½ inches (333.5 x 245.6 x 11.4 cm). © Kehinde Wiley, courtesy Sean Kelly, New York

The Trickster exists in different cultures around the globe: the wily shapeshifter with the power to transform the way we see the world. As an archetype, The Trickster can be found in any walk of life where people must operate according to more than one set of rules, moving seamlessly between the appearance of things and the underlying truth.

Artists know this realm well for they are consigned to delve deep below the surface and manifest what they find. Yet their discoveries are not necessarily in line with the status quo; more often than not, they will upset polite society and upend respectability politics by speaking truth to power – quite literally.

In the United States, African Americans know this well. Throughout the course of the nation’s history, they have been forced to deal with systemic oppression and abuse in a culture filled with double speak that began with the words “All men are created equal,” penned in the Declaration of Independence by Thomas Jefferson, a man who kept his own children as slaves until his death.

Throughout his career, artist Kehinde Wiley has moved smoothly between spheres of influence, using the canon of Western art as a tool of subversion, celebration, and recognition for those who have long been excluded from the narrative. “History is written by the victors,” Winston Churchill said, reminding us that now is the time to reclaim that which belongs to us.

In Trickster, a new exhibition of work currently on view at Sean Kelly, Gallery, through June 17, 2017, New York, Wiley honors his contemporaries who walk his same path, creating a series of portraits of extraordinary black artists including Derrick Adams, Sanford Biggers, Nick Cave, Rashid Johnson, Glenn Ligon, Kerry James Marshall, Wangechi Mutu, Yinka Shonibare, Mickalene Thomas, Hank Willis Thomas, Carrie Mae Weems, and Lynette Yiadom-Boakye.

Using Francisco Goya’s infamous Black Paintings as the departure point, Wiley puts blackness front and centre, operating on several levels simultaneously. Below, he speaks to us about this work, revealing the power and courage it takes to go beyond the known.

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Artwork: Kehinde Wiley, “Portrait of Wangechi Mutu, Mamiwata” © Kehinde Wiley, courtesy Sean Kelly, New York

Artwork: “Portrait of Nick Cave, Nadezhda Polovtseva”, 2017 oil on canvas painting: 120 5/16 x 81 ¾ inches (305.6 x 207.6 cm) framed: 131 5/16 x 92 ¾ x 4 ½ inches (333.5 x 235.6 x 11.4 cm). © Kehinde Wiley, courtesy Sean Kelly, New York

Categories: Art, Dazed, Exhibitions, Painting

John Ingham: Spirit of 76

Posted on May 12, 2017

Photo: The Damned opened 1977 at the Hope & Anchor, a pub in Islington with a history of live bands. Comfortably holding about 100 people, there were double that number crammed in. Sweat was running down the walls. 2 January 1977. Photography John Ingham.

A dark cloud swept across England in the mid-1970s, washing away the buoyant optimism of Swinging London. The bright promise turned bleak, as the recession pushed more and more people into unemployment. Couple this with strikes, power cuts, and IRA bombs, and the only fitting response was to burn the whole thing down.

More than music and style, punk was an attitude. It gave no fucks as it seized the moment and made its way out of the art schools and on to the world stage in 1976. Journalist John Ingham, who was writing for Sounds, conducted the first interview with the Sex Pistols and got hooked on the raw energy, soul, and nerve. He began covering the scene, which accelerated rapidly as punk ignited a movement across the U.K.

New bands like the Clash, the Damned, and Subway Sect began to appear – but no one was photographing them until Ingham picked up a camera. His photographs, which include the very first color pictures of punk, have been collected for the very first time in Spirit of 76: London Punk Eyewitness (Anthology Editions). Ingham reflects on what it was like to be in the front row of a wildfire.

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Friends and countrymen at the Sex Pistols, Notre Dame de France, 15 Nov 1976. Viv Albertine Siouxsie Sioux smoking cigarette, Steve Severin, Kenny Morris, Sarah Hall, one of the two ladies who came with John to the first interview in April. Photography John Ingham

Categories: 1970s, Art, Books, Dazed, Music

Larry Clark: White Trash

Posted on May 10, 2017

Artwork: Christopher Wool, “Untitled”, 1987 enamel on paper 18 3/4 x 14 3/4 inches – framed. © Christopher Wool; courtesy of the artist, and Luhring Augustine, New York.

“People are boring unless they’re extremists,” Jenny Holzer exhorts from a laundry list of aphorisms she made in 1978. Her words perfectly describe the spirit of artist, filmmaker, and writer Larry Clark – and his obsessive passion for collecting. Since his first girlfriend gave him a portrait she made of him in 1961, Clark has amassed a vast panoply of art, objects, and artifacts that he keeps piled up in his Tribeca loft, creating a warren of glorious stuff.

“You should enjoy yourself because you can’t change anything anyway,” Holzer notes on that same list, which is one of the many works in White Trash, an exhibition culled from Clark’s collection, now on view at Luhring Augustine, Brooklyn, through June 18. As you stroll through the show, you feel the pleasure, the pain, and the poignancy of the works that have called to Clark over the years.

From a high corner, Alberto Korda’s portrait of Che Guevara hangs, gazing above the scene, which includes an impressive array of paintings, prints, photographs, sculptures, film and music posters, skateboards, furniture, books, vintage pieces, and neon signs like a Jack Pierson sculpture that flashes the word “APPLAUSE.”

“Learn to trust your own eyes,” Holzer advises as you proceed through the show, taking in works by Helmut Newton, Andy Warhol, Richard Prince, Raymond Pettibon, Jack Pierson, Jeff Koons, Mark Gonzales, Max Blagg, and Ralph Gibson, to name just a few. White Trash becomes a visual memoir of Clark’s travels on earth – but it is the presence of his studio door, which stands perpendicular to the wall, feels the most intimate and sacred object in the entire show.

“Slipping into madness is valuable for the sake of passion,” Holzer concludes, and you can’t really argue that sentiment while standing in this room. There’s much to be said for letting desire lead the way. Clark speaks with Dazed about his unconditional love for collecting, and the power of living with art.

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Bottom Artwork: Christy Rupp, “The Rat Patrol”, 1979. offset print 10 5/8 x 22 7/16 inches (framed). © Christy Rupp, courtesy of the artist and Luhring Augustine, New York

Categories: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Art, Dazed, Exhibitions, Painting, Photography

Anton Perich: Max’s Kansas City

Posted on May 5, 2017

The Cockettes, Photo by Anton Perich

or a decade Max’s Kansas City ruled New York, becoming the premier spot to eat, drink, dance, party, and frolic. Proprietor Mickey Ruskin opened the nightclub and restaurant in 1965, drawing top talents like Allen Ginsberg. William S. Burroughs, and Robert Rauschenberg. But when Andy Warhol and his entourage started hanging out in the back room, Max’s quickly became the place to be. Soon David Bowie, Iggy Pop, and Lou Reed were regulars, along with Warhol’s latest superstars like Candy Darling, Jackie Curtis, and Holly Woodlawn.

In 1970, Croatian émigré, Anton Perich arrived a Max’s, by way of Paris. An activist in the Lettrism group during the 68 Revolution, Perich was an avant-garde filmmaker. He made friends with some busboys on staff, and they said it was the best job in America. In 1972, he joined the staff, which included busboy Carlos Falchi, manager Eric Emerson, and waitress Debbie Harry, whose presence eluded him.

For the next two years, Perich would fill in when someone called out. As he remembers, the best time to work was late at night, when the famous and the infamous alike could come and let down their hair. No one batted an eye when Perich pulled out his camera for a photo. As you can see from the photos here, they were more than happy to oblige – or sometimes, not even aware. He was soon contributing his candid snaps to Interview before going on to launch NIGHT in 1978, his very own publication.

Perich speaks about those heady years, when it was impossible to tell the nights from the days.

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Candy Darling, Photo by Anton Perich

Robert Mapplethorpe, Photo by Anton Perich

Categories: 1970s, Art, Dazed, Manhattan, Music, Photography

Ryan McGinley: The Kids Were Alright

Posted on April 24, 2017

On a chilly night back in February 2003, Ryan McGinley: The Kids Are Alright opened at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Ryan McGinley, then just 25-years-old, was the youngest artist to have a solo show in the museum’s seven decades on Madison Avenue.

I’m not entirely sure the Whitney knew what to expect, as the denizens of downtown piled into the tiny gallery. I overheard a security guard say, “Excuse me, ma’am. Do not lean against the art,” to blonde in a faux-fur coat with slurry eyes. Moments later a security guard said, The blonde shoved on, disappearing into the throngs that jostled their way in and out of the exhibition. The lurid, glamorous and grizzled characters in McGinley’s photographs were there in the flesh, celebrating the artist’s quicksilver rise to the top. In a period of just five years, McGinley documented the luminous tail of the bohemian comet that swept New York throughout the second half of the twentieth century.

McGinley hung with a squadron of graffiti writers, artists, and personalities that made their own rules – and what remains of those days and nights are the photos. Some 1,600 pictures made between 1998 and 2003, most never-before-seen, have just been released in the new book, The Kids Were Alright, (Rizzoli) to time with an exhibition of the same name now at the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver through August 17, 2017.

The documentary-style photographs and Polaroids are raw, sexy images of intense intimacy. Whether partying, having sex, or just hanging out, McGinley’s photos present a portrait of his generation at their most uninhibited peak. McGinley spoke with Dazed about coming of age in True York.

Read the Full Story at Dazed Digital

Categories: 1990s, Art, Books, Dazed, Exhibitions, Graffiti, Manhattan, Photography