‘Doctor’ Mulatu Astatke as he likes to remind us, is not only a jazzman, but a doctor in musicology, who is eager to add to the lists of achievements of his home country, Ethiopia: coffee, inspiration to the Rastafarian faith, the invention of the musical scale, and it would seem, music conducting.

The bushes. Debussy. In the the mouth of Mulatu Astatke, it’s hard to hear the difference between the two.

Doctor Mulatu Astatke, "Father of Ethio-Jazz" as his business Card states. Calvi 2013. 
Photography by René Habermacher.

Mulatu with drum sticks shortly before going on stage. The composer’s own signature instrument is the vibraphone,
a set of graduated aluminum percussion bars that resemble a marimba or a xylophone. Photography by René Habermacher

Mulatu Astatke received late recognition: Originally supposed to become an aeronautical engineer he was
the first African student in the late 1950s at Berklee College of Music — “the only place in that time,” 
he said, to study jazz. Photography by René Habermacher.

Mulatu in action at Calvi On The Rocks, Corsica 2013. Photography by René Habermacher

Mulatu at Calvi On The Rocks, Corsica 2013. Photography by René Habermacher

Mulatu at Calvi On The Rocks, Corsica 2013. In the late 1960s he had returned to Ethiopia with
the first Hammond Organ and Vibraphones. Photography by René Habermacher

And yet everyone is flocking there since the Museum of Civilisations
of Europe & of the Mediterranean, dubbed MuCEM, opened its doors just weeks ago, the first national museum to open in the Phocean city, a project 11 years in the making. 

Having shot & directed the introductory ad campaign for this new institution, The Stimuleye introduces you to the man who designed it, a man as famous for the fights he picks as the building he designs.
Exclusive photos by René Habermacher.

Portrait of architect Rudy Ricciotti by René Habermacher.

One side is the Fort Saint-Jean, linked to the city by a pedestrian steel bridge. A fort not unlike the Bastille – a bastion to defend Marseille against itself – the Fort Saint-Jean had been closed to the public for centuries.

On the other, also connected by a massive steel bridge, is Ricciotti’s creation, facing the Mediterranean Sea.
Refusing “architectural bling,” Ricciotti chose to have the new building dematerialize itself to complement the Fort Saint-Jean.

No reflections – leave it to the sea.

The concrete filigree lace of the MuCEM, a second skin like a screen that allows views, light and air
to pervade the space. Photography by René Habermacher.

TV spot for the MuCEM's launch, directed by Antoine Asseraf with SayWho and Agence White.

The MuCEM's a porous monolithic body planted on pier J4 in the Mediterranean sea, connected to the Fort Saint-Jean
with a 115m long slender pathway made of massive cast iron. Photography by René Habermacher.

Antoine Asseraf: Can you elaborate on your theory of world being split between two sides, matte and shiny ?

Rudy Ricciotti: Shiny is conceptual distance, reason, power and self-assurance.
Matte is frontal narration, intuition, defeat and regret.
Pick your side… I did.

AA: Mediterranean is a concept going beyond “local” but stopping short of  “global” — how do you situate yourself, and the building, within that notion ?

RR: The South is a travel certificate, not a birth certificate.
The inhabitants of Munich are more mediterranean than those of Grenoble.
The Valais region in the south of Switzerland more latin than the Vaucluse in the south of France, etc.
The MuCEM is mediterranean through anxiety and existential difficulty.

AA: What is your relationship to monumental architecture ?

RR: You are talking to me, you fucked my wife ?

Top left: "Notre-Dame de la Garde" looming over Marseille and the the seven-level, 40 000 square meter
structure of the MuCEM. Photography by René Habermacher.

As massive the volume of the MuCEM may seem at first, it is the use of negative space that gives the building
the air of the metaphysical. Photography by René Habermacher

AA: What is the last thing which stimulated you ?

RR: A fish soup made by my partner…
Read my last pamphlet to smile:
« L’Architecture est un sport de combat » [Architecture is a combat sport], edited by Textuel.

MuCEM

With SayWho & Agence White

A jury member for the upcoming Hyères Fashion + Photography Festival, Ascoli is known as the man behind the image of Yohji Yamamoto, Martine Sitbon, Jil Sander for many years.

He knows the times change, and yet the thirst for creativity is never quenched.
Here’s a taste of Hyères.

Marc Ascoli at the Hyères 2012 jury selection, by René Habermacher.

FILEP MOTWARY/UN NOUVEAU IDEAL: What makes a young designer interesting in your eyes ?

His/her sensibility before anything else, that he/she has something to say. But also the degree of creativity, the ability to show he/she doesn’t fit the mold or follow established models.

A young designer, to be interesting, needs to reflect his era and talk about the times.

MALI/SKATTIE: Once you’ve started working with a brand, what is your degree of involvement and counseling?

It really depends on the intensity of the relationship I share with the person. Today the difficulty is to know which direction a brand wants to go, how to express its singularity.

Marc Ascoli + photographer David Sims for Yohji  Yamamoto.

MISHA/TOKYO FASHION DIARIES: Today, it seems essential for a designer to have a public persona. How does that affect you ?

The current situation is ambiguous. Designers are personae, they embody and diffuse the image of the brand. Taking into account the investments made by fashion houses in terms of publicity, designers have become true flag bearers.

But that’s where the error often lies, to hire people gifted in public relations but much less in terms of style.

Today there is a “bottom line” in fashion, people tend to look at things commercially. Does the buzz which personality give off equal the quality of the offering ? The question today is primordial. [In the case of] Sarah Burton for Mc Queen, we don’t see a flamboyant personality, but everyone is floored by her work.

Even though it’s a time of crisis, everything is about competitivity. Considering the number of collections (men’s, women’s, pre-collections), it’s about standing out through quality not only personality.

RENÉ / THE STIMULEYE: What is the role of the stylist in the creation of a fashion image ? How did the evolution of this role impact the role of the artistic/creative director ?

There’s now a lot of confusion between stylists and artistic directors, but I believe the two have very different roles. The artistic director works on the long term image of the brand, its DNA and visual impact, whereas the stylist reflects the brand’s fluctuating image by styling the clothes, whether it’s for ad campaigns or a fashion shows.

Marc Ascoli + photographer Craig McDean for Jil Sander

BRUNO / BRRUN: Does fashion have a political role beyond aesthetic and function ?

Fashion takes place in a different universe. It’s a universe where you’re bringing something else to reality, where there is little concern for politics, because it’s all about creation and individuals.

You can see today that there is a huge gap between fashion and the political reality of our times.
Fashion goes out of fashion; fashion is irrational so it can’t be political.

ANTOINE / THE STIMULEYE: When and how does a creator, singer, artist need to work with an art or creative director ?

An artist always needs an alter ego with whom to exchange ideas, to help write his/her story. It’s not just a matter of positioning. The artistic director has to be sensitive enough to understand the artist’s universe and then catalyze it ; establish an image visually and eventually commercially.

Marc Ascoli + photographer Nick Knight for Martine Sitbon.

What is the last thing which stimulated you ?

Being a very curious person, I am constantly stimulating my creativity through various cultural activities. The exhibit of Madame Grès curated by Olivier Saillard at Musée Bourdelle really seduced me. Everything was in its place, the location, the clothes, the spirit.

I was also very stimulated by the latest Comme des Garçons fashion show. I thought it was majestic.

Hyères 2012, April 27-30, 2012

A marathon performance at MoMa, another retrospective in Moscow, on the cover of POP magazine, hosting a star studded event at Jeffrey Deitch’s MOCA in LA and an exhibition at The Serpentine Gallery slated for 2012, the HBO documentary “The Artist is Present” just screened at Sundance. An ever growing list of projects that is taking her across continents…

Exclusive long form of interview first published in POP magazine FW2012

Marina Abramović with her "Mini Me". Photography by René Habermacher for POP magazine

Marina Abramović is everywhere lately. She has emerged from what was considered an alternative section of contemporary art, Performance Art, to finally occupy an untouchable position in the Pantheon of Pop.
A marathon performance at the MoMa, another retrospective in Moscow scheduled, and an exhibition at The Serpentine Gallery slated for 2012, day and night filming of an HBO documentary and an ever growing list of projects. Marina is known for her works in which she tests and pushes her emotional,mental and physical strength, but her schedule takes its toll: Marina is exhausted.
Broad recognition has come comparably late for Abramović, who was often categorized as some sort of Exotic Serbian Vixen. Nevertheless, she has shaped a significant slice of art history like no other.
Today, less considered for her public sexual identity, and more appreciated for her timelessness and her bravery, one could unarguably call Marina “the diva of contemporary art”, were she not so grounded.

Freja Beha Erichsen with her "Mini Me". A collaboration by Marina Abramović for POP magazine
Photography by René Habermacher

Our conversation takes place just after Marina’s return to New York from Manchester, England where she spent six weeks collaborating with Robert Wilson on a new biography, “The Life and Death of Marina Abramović”. The play was staged with accompanied music written and conducted by Antony (of Antony and the Johnsons) and narrated by a ferocious Willem Dafoe.
The audience witnessed him meticulously rummaging through the details of her life chronologically. Marina has been clear about her lack of appreciation for theatre as a concept and this play marks a sharp departure from her concept of herself as a performance artist.

She participates in what she used to essentially despise: “To be a performance artist, you have to hate theatre. Theatre is fake: there is a black box, you pay for a ticket, and you sit in the dark and see somebody playing somebody else’s life. The knife is not real, the blood is not real, and the emotions are not real. Performance is just the opposite: the knife is real, the blood is real, and the emotions are real. It’s a very different concept. It’s about true reality.”

Death mask of Marina Abramović. Photography by René Habermacher

René Habermacher: With this piece you staged something that you call artificial theatre. It lacks the realness that is central to your work. How was this experience for you?

Marina Abramović: I am his material. I completely gave all the control to Bob (Robert Wilson). That is the only way to really be material for someone else, which is very interesting, because its just absolutely the opposite of what I do. This is first time that i have this really radical approach with Bob – he absolutely refused anything to do with performance. This was an amazing experience for me and very difficult, because his approach to rehearsal is like mine to performance, – but yet it’s just rehearsal! Just be there for hours and hours in order for him to fix the light. I lose my reason, I need the public, I need another kind of dialogue. This was a huge discipline not to kill him!

RH: How did this project with Bob come together?

MA: Oh, I know Bob Wilson since the 70s. He came to ex-Yugoslavia in 1971, when I was a student, and performed. What I like about him is his relationship to architecture, to theatre, to light, to time, to slow motion. All of these elements are very close to my work. We didn’t find any difficulties to connect.

RH: What was the initial spark to collaborate for this?

MA: You know, its because I wanted to include death – to do life AND death.  And there was something about this idea of life and death in the connection with Bob Wilson’s kind of work. I think he is the only one who can actually edit it in the way that he did.

"Mini Me" in the grip of Daisy the boa. Photography by René Habermacher

RH: It is very interesting to have this forward look to your own death and play with his idea. Is there any relation with your orthodox upbringing, the kind of philosophy where the walk of life is transcending into the eternal?

MA: Yes, you are completely right, absolutely! Yes. Because, you know, thats the point. It was definitely the idea – my grandmother used to have her clothes ready for the funeral since 40 years. She lived to the age of 103, and every time the fashion would change, she would change the clothes [for her funeral].

So the presence of death in my daily life was always there, which I think is a very important eastern approach. You never know when the day will come. It is so different from the western culture. When I am here in America, the whole idea of death is removed, you never actually see that. And also there is somehow this idea of “forever young” which is completely unrealistic. The only way to really appreciate life, is to accept death as the final stage. This is the reason, getting 65 this year, I have to include death in my biography.

RH: I find your language as an artist to be very honest in its aim and blunt in its depiction. There were always traces of your upbringing and background. But, lately it seems you refer more often to your heritage as a Balkan child.

MA: That’s totally true. In the beginning of my life, when I started working in Yugoslavia, there were so many obstacles and all I wanted was to leave and get as far as I can go. The older I grow and the more I get distance with now almost 40 years of not living there, the less I want to do that. I have now sort of a big picture where I come from and what its all about. It’s an interesting thing going backwards, looking to the past and revisiting my memory and start understanding connections, which I couldn’t do when I was young. In fact, at the moment I am working with the government to of Montenegro to start a performing arts center which shows the connection of where I am from, and what I have done since.

Freja Beha Erichsen with "Mini Me" of Marina. Photography by René Habermacher

RH: Though your work is very conceptual, there is also a very strong spiritual aspect…

MA: You know I’ve become Buddhist almost 30 years ago. To me spirituality is really the core of my existence. I am not religious, I don’t like religion per se, because religion for me is institutionalized and mostly corrupted. It’s so much more interesting to learn, to actually think about spirituality and what it means. And every good work of art has a spiritual element to it. It is not always the main one, but it is always there, underlining it, and to me its absolutely important to my work.

RH: The art world is very male-dominated, as a woman was that a challenge for you? Is it still?

MA: No. I never felt the differences between men and women; i am not a feminist because of the same reason. I feel that women, by feeling vulnerable and not equal, create this kind of energy and they are perceived that way. For me art doesn’t have any gender… in America, everybody is obsessed with percentage: ‘how many percentage male, female, gay..’  I don’t give a shit about this. It’s good or bad art and who is making it is really not important. I never felt restricted because I always took my position, so I don’t have this kind of feeling. Actually everything that I ever wanted to do takes years, but I did it. i don’t have reason to complain.

RH: So you don’t think it is important to have a sexual identity in your work ?

MA: I don’t care. You know, I am not busy with this. If this comes because its natural and because I am a woman, ok. But I really don’t see this as anything important. It is so funny thinking about this… many other people deal with this much more than I am.

RH: You left your very specific background and moved from Belgrade to Amsterdam in 1974, this must have felt like a very liberating moment…

MA: Yeah, it was a huge jump for me to go to Amsterdam. It was free and everyone was completely liberated, all which I strived for. One interesting thing back in Yugoslavia at that time, socialist time, was that there were clear restrictions on what you can do and you can’t do. You could go for years to prison for something. So you know you take this risk. There I had a lot of reasons to be an artist, I was rebelling against the system. Coming to Amsterdam, i lost reason because nobody cared if I am naked on the street or whatever. So I had to create an entire set of my own restrictions in order to be able to deal with that. It was quite interesting to rearrange my own life.

RH: If you compare today to the 70s that were all about liberation, we live now in a world after the triumph of capitalism where every other ideology has kind of capitulated…

MA: Yeah, that’s absolutely something else. It’s all together different.  […]

And now especially in America, I think that the democracy is so perverse – here, it looks like things are free but actually they’re not. It’s a freedom that is in many ways fake. So it’s a completely other set of restrictions.

RH: Broad recognition of your work has come comparably late. It seems you became part of the pop culture, almost mainstream…

MA: [laughs] Yeah, that’s quite interesting. It took me so long to create this situation where performance became mainstream. That was my aim from the beginning, and it really finally starts happening.

It’s quite interesting how people take the stuff and recycle it. […] God, its just very very different. I’m wondering if I lost control, because I set up these rules for people to re-perform my pieces. But now it became like open, everybody just re-performs without asking permission nor pay royalties. So it’s a completely crazy situation.

AN ARTIST SHOULD NOT MAKE HIMSELF INTO AN IDOL. Marina Abramović and Freja Beha Erichsen.
Photography by Ren'e Habermacher

RH: What is the challenge of the re-performance for you?

MA: You know its really a different story, as performance, first of all its like a child, you have to let it go. There are so many people of my generation who would never give permission to somebody to perform their work because they feel ‘its mine and nobody else’s’. I think that this is a very egoistic point of view because you don’t let your child grow! It think performance is a time based live form of art. If you make a performance once when you are 30 and then you never perform it again, it will just be a dusty image in a book or a bad video and you never have the chance that this work lives. You have to get away from your ego and say ok, even if this is changed, even if this is not the exact same as my work because it is the charisma of the other performer, even if the performer brings his new ideas and things are different, it is still better than it never being re-performed at all. That is my point of view.

RH: Performance is considered an alternative art form because you don’t produce an object that has a price tag on it. So in the “business” of art, your work doesn’t really have a position. Unlike some of your peers, you never made objects or installations for the market.

MA: No, no. It’s really special my position. If you look at my generation of artists and the enormous amount of money they are making and how little I generate – take Damien Hirst, who is like half age of me, not half but much younger, you are talking millions. My maximum price for photographs is much less and the galleries take 50%. So my image and my price are  completely disproportionate. It’s always been like this and now I stop worrying about it. I am not attached to money – for me money is something to get somewhere and make new work.

But I really want to find funding for my foundation. I have to see how I can sell my work in a different way, or create some kind of market that can be able to give this kind of donation to my foundation.

RH: What are the specific directions and the goals of this institute?

MA: There are two things that I will be working to establish for the next 10 years.

One is in Hudson, where i want to do the Marina Abramović Institute for the Preservation of Performance Art.

It’s really for long-durational performance work. I want to make a unique place just for that, that doesn’t yet exist. Its about the idea that only long-durational work can transform the performer and the viewer in a way that no other form of art can do. After 40 years of performance, I have come to this conclusion.

And the other is this huge fridge factory in Cetinje, Montenegro where 8000 people used to produce fridges for eastern europe. It will be like a production tank, where I want the work to be produced.

The government of Montenegro has supported me by asking me o create the concept for it to become a production place for pieces of opera, dance, theatre and film. Not mainstream and not bullshit, but really with content.

I have to go to the office now and then taking a car and going to the countryside…

Ok Baby, kiss – i am running!

June 13-15, The Life and Death of Marina Abramović, Theater Basel, Basel
June  22-24, The Life and Death of Marina Abramović, Carre Theater, Amsterdam
June 28-30, The Life and Death of Marina Abramović, DeSingel, Antwerp

The POP covers of FW2012. Marina and Freja wearing Giorgio Armani. Photography by René Habermacher

Rene Habermacher – Photographer
Isabelle Kontoure – Fashion Editor/Stylist

NY CREW
Hair Stylist: Peter Gray , Makeup Artist: Romy Soleimani, Manicurist: Tracylee , Casting: Angus Munro, Photography Assistance : Cesar Rebollar, Fashion Assistance : Jodie Latham, Stephanie Waknine, Rebecca Sammon & Michaela Dosamantes, Digital Technician: Dilek Isildak, Digital Remastering: The Stimuleye, Set Design: Anne Koch, Production: John Engstrom, Studio: Eagles Nest Daylight Studios NYC

UK CREW
Hair Stylist: Chi Wong, Makeup Artist: Yannis Siskos, Photography Assistance: Jonathan Flanders & Hannan Jones, Digital Remasterin: The Stimuley, Production: Lynsey Peisinger for The Stimuleye, Snake Wrangler: David Steward for Creature Feature

Lori Sean Berg and Shane Aspegren jamming on a cloudy day in Paris. Photo by René Habermacher

What was the last thing that inspired you?

S: That’s a hard one to answer.  As time goes on, it’s a lot harder to be really be blown away by things.  We just did the project with Le Musee Du Quai Branly in Paris and had the chance to dig through their audio archive.  This was really refreshing to work on to discover new sounds from around the world.  Also, Lori and I saw the Anish Kapoor installation at Le Grand Palais together and that was really amazing.  It was something that you needed to spend some time inside to appreciate the full effect. I suppose we like things without immediate gratification.

Can you remember a particular inspiration for your latest album BUILD WITH EROSION?

S: The record was created over such a long period of time that there were so many things that were poured into it.  In the end, the theme of erosion was really important.

L:  We use a lot of eroded musical equipment. I’m not sure how to say it? We love dust!

S: In a way it’s always been a theme of the band… using instruments that are on their way out, or loving the sounds that came from pedals with dying batteries…

THE BERG SANS NIPPLE in action. Photo by René Habermacher

Is the concept of “erosion of instruments” something that interests you conceptually or is it the frailty of sounds created?

S:  I guess it’s both of those things.  There’s always been a balance of harshness and beautiful sounds in there.  Also, lyrically, it all ties in together, but that’s all there for people to digest as they’d like.

L:  I love instruments on their last legs. I want to give them a second life

Tell us a little more about why you work with concepts. In advance of the album release, you set up a site for BUILD WITH EROSION incorporating the surrealist concept of the exquisite corpse.  You used this concept again for the promotional video for Change the Shape. Why?

The Berg Sans Nipple – Change The Shape from Clapping Music on Vimeo.

S: A band that I was part of back in the late 90’s used to make exquisite corpses in the van on tour and, at that time, I was really into the Surrealists.  I’ve always wanted to do a project like that and it worked really well with the “Change the Shape” theme.  It also gives a different energy to a project when you can get a bunch of other artists involved.

L:  Although “Build with erosion” is not a “conceptual” album…

S:  Maybe not conceptual in the sense of advance planning but, in the end, it developed into a unified concept.  Things become what they are and it all makes sense together.

Lori Sean Berg of THE BERG SANS NIPPLE

One of my favourite tracks on the album is DEAD DINOSAURS RULE THE EARTH.  How did that track develop?

Dead Dinosaurs Rule The Earth – The Berg Sans Nipple by blackmaps

L:  From Zari!

S: Of course, the title came from my daughter and I jotted it down in a notebook.  We had a bass line and drumbeat in a tape full of improvs that we had done together and I thought that the title was perfect for the bass line.  As always, it went through a lot of transformation to get to the end of that track, but it all stemmed from a child’s mouth and an improv.

L:  An old old idea. Probably recorded from my minidisc.

S:  Yep, that wasn’t one that we created from opposite sides of the world. Apart from the lyrics, it was worked on in an old fashion style, when we were together.  I think even all of the kalimba lines were from that minidisc!

Lori, you live in France and Shane, you live in Nebraska.  Do you work together while living apart by exchanging ideas or do you tend to do most of the work in the concentrated periods when you are actually together?

L:  We really need to be together for “the moment “. But maybe we could do a conceptual album through skype next time?

S: It’s really combination of the two.  The best stuff comes out in the concentrated periods of being together though.  The brooding and frustration comes at the other points, but then gets weeded out when we meet up again.

L:  That sounds agonizing. But when were together we have a lot of fun, we play pinball and drink wine and champagne.

S:  visit caves…

L:  and meet cavemen…

S: Cro-mags from the perigord noir!

Shane Aspegren has a fable for unusual soundtools..

The Berg Sans Nipple is known for its amazing live shows.  How do the two of you go out there and recreate the complexities of your sound?

S:  We started as a live band.  In fact the first few shows we did, we never repeated any of the music that we made, but were really just writing a set of music to perform live.  Now thing are a lot more complicated in that we’re writing in the studio and then trying to figure out how to transform that into a two person live setting.  I love both sides, but it’s become more challenging as things have evolved.

L: It’s always a “casse-tête chinois” when we play shows! I think it would be much easier for us to simply work in the studio.  But it’s important for us to play live music… to be connected with people.

S:  We’ve always tried to make a connection between each other, even through sampling each other live and setting up face-to-face. I think that was our first goal in playing with each other.  So the idea was the inception of the band.  And hopefully that’s how we connect with our crowd.

...and malt brew

You both work outside the band, including work in film and photography. Do you have any favourite photographers or visual artists?

S: I have a hard time pinpointing favourites of anything.  I was really into Robert Frank and Duane Michaels and photographers like that when I first started taking photos, but there’s a lot to love about so many things. I like colour a lot more now.  But speaking of visual artists, we’re really lucky to have been working with Cody Hudson and Stephen Eichhorn (who were responsible for the artwork for “Build with Erosion”).

If  THE BERG SANS NIPPLE could work with anyone who would it be?

L:  Johnny Cash.

S: That’s interesting. I feel like it’s always the thing that’s the most exotic that interests both of us, which is maybe why the trans-atlantic game works for us.  I’d probably say that scoring something with Ennio Morricone or maybe even moreso, Bernard Herrmann.  It wouldn’t necessarily be a film though… maybe something in a public setting.  Or we could score Johnny Cash’s life.

In what direction do you see THE BERG SANS NIPPLE developing into in the future?

L:  Pinball sound design. That is the future for me!

S: If Lori is going to go off on his own to get lost in pinball world, then I guess that it’s, the end!  We’re trying not to focus too much on the future but to work on the present as much as possible. We’re starting to do a lot more film work together and that’s what we’re really interested in.  I don’t see us ever stopping making music together, but we’re also ready for another step into other things.  We’ve got another project in the works as well… a new record with a different concept that won’t necessarily be the BSN, but will still be in the same spirit.

The Berg Sans Nipple – ‘Build With Erosion’ by blackmaps

USA, 1963, Washington, John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy receive the Moroccan king Hassan II
© Max Scheler Estate, Hamburg Germany

I remember Max Scheler with one of his beloved Davidoff cigarillos smoldering away nearby. He was an impressive character, with an elegant dryness that one would be tempted to account being Hamburgian, yet he was born a boy from Cologne. In his later years Max had dedicated his time entirely to taking care of the Herbert List estate – the iconic work of the photographer who shaped and mentored him. On one of my visits to the archives we went through folders and boxes of photographs and came so across prints of Max’ work for the first time, almost by accident. I had not been aware of his photography then, though i knew he had worked at Merian and founded the magazine GEO at Gruner & Jahr, introducing colour reportage to the wider audience.

I’ve talked with co-curator Olaf Richter, head of the estates of both Herbert List and Max Scheler about Max, his background and the relationship to Herbert List and the current exhibition

RENÉ HABERMACHER: How did this exhibition come together- and why right now?
PEER-OLAF RICHTER: The idea of this show was born in February 2003 – the month Max Scheler died.  It took us about 6 years to finish this project.  Why did it take so long?  Max Scheler was humble if not neglecting his own work. He stopped working as a photographer in 1975 and since then had turned the tables. He rather worked to publish other photographers work, than his own.

I took quite a bit of effort to rediscover what was going on in his life as a photographer. The negatives from the late 50s until the mid 70s were in a rough chronological order, but before that, the first 8 years, were all over the place.  For us the first period was especially interesting, because it told us something of where he was coming from. He learnt photography from another photographer: Herbert List.

Herbert List printed the images that he considered important. The Estate had a rich base of vintage prints that covered all the projects he worked on in his life time. These prints were frequently titled on the back. The main books on List that had been on the market had all been made with these prints as a basis.

For Max Scheler things are very different. There is not that much vintage material, and it is hard to say if these old images reflect his personal choice or some editors preference. So we went back to the negative and contacts and researched there. Unfortunately the negative have only a rough labelling, and therefore it took a lot longer to make a selection, research locations and titles.

Max would always put Herbert’s work ahead of his own – which was something that I never understood. Why this hesitation?
I guess he felt that his work of that period, was the work of a pupil, while the work of his teacher, was really what was worth remembering. It is interesting how close the two worked together. After an initial year or two as an assistant on the road and in the darkroom, Scheler started getting his own assignments, gained some respect, moved from Munich to Paris, met Robert Capa and  even became a junior member of Magnum.

How did the relationship of the two evolve after the first meeting during war in Munich: personally and professionally? I am also asking that as I have a special interest in the idea of the “stimulating” mentor.
I guess stimulation needs at least to prerequisites. At first the receiver of the stimulus needs to be in a situation of wanting to open up, receive a certain change in her/his perception and possibly even her/his life. And the stimulus must also be desireable and fit the pattern of interest of the receiver. If the stimulus is too foreign or threatening it might be rejected. I think these things fell in place when Max Scheler met Herbert List.

He was very young then- it must have been the shaping experience…

Max and his mother left Cologne in 1941, when Max was 13 or 14 years of age. Around the same time List left Athens, because Germany invaded Greece. He had tried to immigrate to the USA but failed and had to return to Germany. Max was raised without a father, since he died the year Max was born.  The sudden presence of a male person of authority in the life of Max and his mother was quite welcome. Not to be misunderstood all three of them were very liberal, unconventional and forward thinking persons. None of them wanted to construct a classical family. It was more the realisation of his mother that this very sophisticated photographer in his forties did spark some certain interest and outlook in the young max’ life, that she possibly could not, because the was too close. She of course realized that he was gay and therefore no husband material. But she might have also understood that the conventional reaction of a mother to not allow her son to have contact to a 25 years-older gay man, would have been rather short-sighted.

So through the turmoil of the war they kept close contact.

The stimulation we talked about earlier, that caused Max Scheler to learn a craft, languages and a certain ‘savoir vivre’ from Herbert List, developed through that time.

And I think that it was manyfold. I am not sure if photography was really the most potent influence here. And I am not sure what was going on between the two of them emotionally. Did they fall in love? That is speculation, but I guess it safe to say that a certain amount of love and trust is necessary to allow oneself to be stimulated.

In that context – I am wondering what kind of surrounding Max was born into?
Max family background is rather interesting and must have been very intellectually stimulating. The father was next to Heidegger the most prominent German philosopher of his time. And I dare say with regards to his several marriages and scandalous affairs his outlook on life must have also been rather liberal. Also his mother was a very autonomous person. Raising a boy by yourself during the war was a destiny she shared with many women at that time, but to be the publisher of her husbands writings and lectures after his death, surely required some intellectual capacity and stamina.

So little Max already came with some added ballast weight, preparing him in a way for this relationship…
Well… I would not call it a burden, but it is interesting that he would choose an opposite lifestyle from his father. Being a straight man with several marriages, that opened his mind from a desk or auditorium in German midsize towns like Jena or Cologne, he would rather take after List, and go out and explore the world visually.

But then again his relentless work for the estate of his mentor in later year of his life is quite similar to the position his mother took with the writings of her husband.

USA, 1961, Los Angeles, All around the country private fall out shelters are available, in case the A-bomb will be dropped.
Part of an extensive reportage on the defense of the USA in cold war times. © Max Scheler Estate, Hamburg Germany

In regards to that highly academic family background, one perhaps would consider Max’s path to see the world as a photographer as rather flamboyant….
To be honest I think Max was everything else but flamboyant… that adjective better describes Capote or Liberace. Max was almost conservative, classical italian in his choice of clothes, his furniture, slightly sportive with his cars — he owned several Porsche. And not least the motorcycle he was riding until his 70th birthday.

To what you said before regarding mentoring : I would say that tradition is being carried on in your “house” in one way or another  – Herbert – Max – Michael – and now you.
Yes…we are diverting.

So they had a concept of partnership or family in a very unconventional way. Max clearly passed this tradition on.  He invited us, Michael and me, to share a very open life with him. He enabled Michael and to a certain extent also me to study, and not least to travel, see the world, and get to know interesting people.

So let’s talk about carrying on the torch. Herbert List enabled Max to leave postwar germany and go and explore the world. Max lived in Paris and then Rome in his twenties – Rome was clearly the place to be in the mid-fifties. And he met a tons of interesting and important people.  So all this he kind of owes to List. The man who gave him a camera. And they were a family at times, and then at other time they did not see each other for a few months, since Max was in Africa or Asia on assignment, or Herbert made a book in the caribbean.

Herberts maintained many relationships to artists and celebrities of the time, which is evident in his work. What was the social surrounding of Max like?

Max had quite a few artist friends himself, some of them rather being pop culture – singer, actors. But he was not the one that the magazine sent to do in depth portraits of an artist with a difficult or complex attitude.

Politicians, Industrialists, Monarchy, — such things would be his beat. He had very good manners, was fluent in 5 languages and sophisticated and charming. That opened many doors.

USA, 1964, Atlanta, Martin Luther King and his family on a sunday walk. © Max Scheler Estate, Hamburg Germany

To me it felt Herbert’s view was very driven by “sehnsucht”, a certain longing, while Max’s work stood as rather pragmatic, living through “zwischentoene” [nuances], maybe in that way recalling the metaphysic approach of his “mentor”?
It is very difficult to talk about their work from a biographical, psychological background. There is lots of room for speculation there.

I think the justified comparison between the two leads to the difference on how Herbert saw photography as a young man looking for an outlet of his creative energy and how Max might have seen it.

Herbert saw himself an amateur – not meaning dilletant with little knowledge of technique and such, but rather, that he refused to work on commercial assignments. After the war the situations changed for him, but at least that were his roots.

For Max photography was always a profession and he was a “gun for hire”. In terms of composition and atmosphere a lot of the early images of Max still relate to the style of List. He thinks in single shots, not in whole photo essays. After the initial 5 years in the business that changed. Like List in the mid 50s,  he switched from the Rolleiflex to the Leica, from single shots to story telling through a series of images.

List actually took his first 35mm pictures with Max’s camera. Max had a Leica first, List followed.

It is interesting to see how Herbert went into a different approach later on with work that goes more in the direction of reportage. As the special issues on Naples for DU magazine for example…
Herbert saw himself clearly as an artist. Even in his years he worked as a photographer for money, he always tried to maintain complete control over what he was doing. It was his vision and his idea and the camera was his tool. He therefore related to all artist on and eye to eye level.

I think the war and the horror surrounding it, really initiated a shift in Lists work and also gave a base to Max’ interest with the Camera. List was very much interested in photographing objects, architecture, still-lifes and landscapes in the 1930 and 40s. But he changed and started focussing on the human being. This shift to “human interest” was not a singular incident for the work of List, but happened all over. A rougher style of photography – out on the streets, in peoples life, focussing on their emotions – became popular. For List this was something that he added to his vocabulary, but for Max Scheler, this was always the main focus. He was a “died in the wool” human interest photographer.

What is the last thing that stimulated you?
I saw the movie IMPORT/EXPORT last night on Arte. That really moved but also disturbed me. It reminded me of photos of Antoine d’Agata. His book STIGMA is one of the best.

The exhibition “From Konrad A. to Jackie O.” runs to 31.07.2011 at the Willy-Brandt Haus in Berlin
Tuesday to Sunday 12.00-18.00, Willy-Brandt-Haus, Wilhelmstraße 140 / Stresemannstraße 28, 10963 Berlin-Kreuzberg

by Lynsey Peisinger, Photography René Habermacher

Son Henry Blumenfeld in front of his fathers DOE EYE with Jean Patchett for Vogue US 1950

LYNSEY PEISINGER: Where were you born?

HENRY BLUMENFELD: I was born in 1925 in Zandfoort near Amsterdam. My father had been an ambulance driver during the first World War. During the war, he had met my mother who was Dutch, Lena Citroen, who was a cousin of Pal Citroen, a German/Dutch artist. He grew up in Berlin with my father and they went to school together and they were very close friends. Through Pal, he met my mother and they corresponded during the war. My mother came to visit him in Germany when he was a soldier there. He tried to leave Germany, but he couldn’t. So, just after the war he came to Holland and then, a little bit later, married my mother in the early 20s. I guess, 1921. And because he was German and she was Dutch, she became German — that was the Dutch law at the time. I was born in Holland, but because I had a German father, I also became German.

LP: What was your father doing at that time?

HB: He was surviving. Leaving Germany at the end of the war, he tried to survive with the help of my mother and set up some kind of art dealing business with a friend, but that didn’t work very well. He was doing a lot of collage and kept in touch with other German Dadaists. After two years, he started to work as a clerk in a department store. Later, around the time I was born, he opened his own shop called the Fox Leather Company, selling ladies handbags and suitcases on the Kalvestraat. That went fairly well, but soon Hitler came to power and the business went badly and eventually bankrupt. That’s when he decided to become a photographer in 1934.

ERWIN BLUMENFELD Exhibition at the villa Noailles Squash Court. Right: Erwin Blumenfeld OPHELIA 1947

RENE HABERMACHER: So your father’s first art oriented interest was collage and he was in the Dadaist movement?

HB: He was already interested in photography. He got his first camera when he was about 6 or 7. But his main interest was perhaps the theatre. That was something he was strongly attached to: the German language. His Dutch always remained a little bit feeble to say the least. He worked quite a lot, but with theatre in German language, he couldn’t make much of a living… With his collages he couldn’t make a living with that either but always kept in touch with the Germans — Grosz and Richard Huelsenbeck and other people of the Dadaist movement. Recently there was an exhibition in Berlin on this periods work of my father and a book has been published.

LP: Did he continue to do collage later on when he started doing photography?

HB: No. When he was doing collage, he was also painting — he was a Sunday painter: He did quite a bit of painting on Saturdays and Sundays. But he dropped doing his collage and the painting and started doing photography in Amsterdam. The business went rather poorly, he had health problems and more or less escaped to Paris around the 1st of January 1936. The first year it was very difficult for him to make a living. He got support from the family of his wife, of my mother. On his side he didn’t have much family left. His father had died before the first world war and his mother deceased shortly afterwards. He lost his brother in the war as a soldier in the German army and his sister died of Tuberculosis shortly after.

My father was friends with Walter Feilchenfeldt’s wife Marianne. He was a quite well known art dealer in Zurich. Mariane Feilchenfeldt helped him to rent his studio in Paris at 9 rue Delambre.

RH: So in Paris he got introduced to photography on a professional level?

HB: Already in Holland he was doing it on a professional level. He took many portraits and pictures there, but they didn’t sell much. He got in touch with some French people who came to Holland and they eventually supported him when he went to Paris — like Andre Girard the painter. Then, after about a year later, he started to sell photos to small photo magazines in the US and England, such as Lilliput. In 1937, he met british photographer Cecil Beaton who introduced him to Vogue. My father started to work for Paris Vogue in 1938.

When he was in Paris, he worked only in black and white. Color was not yet really developed for photography. It was very difficult for individuals to use color in their own studios, so he only did black and white while he was in Paris. I should mention that for his Paris period, his publications in Verve were very important. He had some of his striking black and white photos published in the first issues of that magazine. In the dark room, he experimented a lot, but only in black and white.

Then came the war and during the war, we were foreigners in france — we were not really refugees, but were without status, so it was quite difficult. In the beginning of the war, we were more or less exiled, we lived in a hotel in Vessely nine months, a sort of medieval town in Burgundy, France with a really nice cathedral. Then the Germans came and my father and sister were put in a camp. My mother and my brother and I, with the help of some Citroen cousins, managed to escape to the south of France. Our father was then in a rather horrible camp in France. We stayed in the Country until 1941, trying to get out. Then we managed to get a visa for the US — my father had been to the US already, in June of 1939. That was were, I think he took his first color photographs. He came back to France in July 1939 and he was stuck in France for two years. Then when we got to go to the US, he started working first with Harper’s Bazaar for two or three years, switched to Vogue and started doing color photography. At the time, he took his color pictures in the studio, using different color lights and so on — he was very experimental. But for the development and the printing, it was completely out of his hands. It was always done by Kodak. At the time, he couldn’t do anything in color on his own in the laboratory.

Most of these photos here were printed by Kodak. When I say printed, they weren’t really printed, they were large color transparencies. Like big negatives — 12 by 15 inches. I think that all of these photos here were taken in this large format and they were transparencies. The pictures were only printed for Vogue — working from the transparencies. Sometimes my father would give some direction on how they should be printed, but he was not generally involved in the printing itself. Only later, around 1956, they started to develop a new process called C-Prints. He bought the C-Print machine and he could start doing his own color. But C-Prints were very unstable as far as the color went — if they were exposed to light, in a few days they would essentially vanish. So all of his work in C-Print is essentially gone. Even the color transparencies that we have of his work have either faded or changed color a lot. Especially the reds, had faded. So, our doughtier Nadia has worked a lot with Olivier Berg at a laboratory in Lozère to try to restore the original colors. She is using the original publications because those prints have kept their color much better than the transparencies. So what you see in this exhibit is the result of the work that Olivier Berg and Nadia have done.

RH: Would you say that your father was somebody who was very progressive and pushing for new things in general?

HB: I don’t know about new things…. He was for the experimental, which is a little bit different. I don’t know if he was really striving for new things, but he tried to do do things differently and experimented. He was very much inspired by especially old painters like Goya and Renoir and much impressed by Picasso. I don’t know if he ever got to meet Picasso in Paris at the time. But he met quite a few artists as Dali and others.

Erwin Blumenfeld advertising for PALL MALL circa 1957.

RH: But he liked the experimental, so maybe that was something that remained with him from the Dadaist movement?

HB: Yes, that was important to him.

LP: I heard Michel Mallard talking earlier about how remarkable it is that there was no photoshop or digital editing at that time… this image, this one with the lips and the eye, DOE EYE, where the nose is missing and there is color separation, was this done in the retouching process?

HB: This was done in the process of retouching. It was an original black and white picture. It was colored afterwards by my father and by Vogue. They worked on it together. That was a special case because the others that you see were done in color and then reworked. This one did not originally have these colors.

RH: When your father was working, did you often witness his process and how he worked in his studio?

HB: No. When he was in Paris, working in black and white, I was somewhat present. But afterwards, in the States, I was not really present anymore. So I didn’t really witness him working in color.

RH: Was his approach as a photographer more controlled or more spontaneous?

HB: I think both. He was quite controlled — all of these pictures here were taken in a studio. But he also traveled quite a bit in America and in Europe and he took many 35 millimeter color slides. Incidentally, the color of those slides kept much better than the color on the transparencies. But, in the studio, he was very controlled and would take many pictures to get something specific in a sitting.

Left: Erwin Blumenfeld LE DECOLLETE 1952, RIGHT: Henry Blumenfeld in Conversation

LP: In Paris, were you present when he would shoot people in the studio?

HB: Sometimes, but not very often. I was more present when he was working in the dark room.

RH: I recently saw notes from Richard Avedon where he had a black and white print and he marked on it all of the places where he wanted the development to be darker or lighter using manipulation techniques in the dark room. Was your father working with these techniques too?

HB: Yes in the dark room, for black and white, he manipulated a lot. It would have been interesting to see what he would have done with color photography if he had been born fifty years later. At the time, the technology wasn’t there for him to do anything after a picture was taken in color.

RH: Where would your father have his intellectual and creative relationships — in other photography or painting etc?

HB: I would think painting. Very much painting, classical painting. Many of his photos were inspired by different painters. He was also inspired by modern life and by life in NY at the time, in the 40s and 50s. He liked jazz music very much, in the New Orleans style.

And he was quite interested in looking at television when it first came out. We got our first television set around 1950 or so. It was black and white at the time. I don’t think he ever saw color television. Maybe he saw it, but he never had one. He liked movies — but more for the content than for the photography. He liked Nanook of the North, about a Danish explorer. He was interested in movies — liked Erich Von Stroheim and he liked Sunset Boulevard and Billy WIlder.

RH: Was that love for cinema also what led to him making films?

HB: The filming was more in line with advertising. I think he was trying to see if he could use the filming for advertising, rather than to tell a story like in movies. Now you see everything mixed, advertising and movies. But at the time, it was an experiment.

RH: Do you think that your father really divided the things that he did for himself and the things that he was commissioned to do? The time after the war was quite commercial driven in America — was it easy for him to also do what he wanted to do?

HB: For one thing, the black and white and the color were two different things. In black and white, he could do what he wanted. In color, probably none of them were published in the exact way that they had been taken. They were made and developed specifically for Vogue. He did appreciate the possibility to work in color, but the whole fashion business and the way it worked was not very attractive for him. But still, when he had started out in Germany, he had started out working for a textile company and so, even then, he was interested in materials and fashion. Still, he didn’t really appreciate the fashion magazine business, but he knew that he could make his living there. So there were two sides to it for him — on one side, it was a place for him to make a living, on the other side, it gave him the opportunity to work in color, which he might not have had otherwise. He did have certain resentments, which is true for everyone in any job.

Erwin Blumenfeld DECOLLETEE and BLUE both 1952, and POWDER BOX 1944

RH: There are artists who suffer between the economical need to do something commercial and the desire to make the work that they are passionate about. They can feel torn…

HB: I don’t think that was his case. First of all, he did well financially in the 40s and 50s and he appreciated that. And then, because of that he was able to continue his work in black and white. You might have seen his book “My One Hundred Best Photos”. We have people comment on the fact that there is almost no fashion in that book–he did a little fashion photography in black and white for Vogue before the war, but later he didn’t do any fashion work in black and white. But, it gave him a lot of satisfaction to be able to do that book of his black and white work.

Still…he wasn’t always satisfied with everything. Becoming old for him was very difficult. It made him suffer a lot…some people accept it, but he accepted it quite badly.

LP: You said that he was experimental as a photographer. As a person and as a father, did he also have that type of attitude? And did he transmit that type of approach to his children?

HB: Well….I think he had his ups and downs. He was a very active father in many ways. He was involved with his children and either pleased or displeased with what they were doing. I don’t know….the children turned out very differently. I became an elementary particle physicist. My brother became a writer. He is not exactly politically minded… he is interested in art, sociology in many ways and in the way people behave. He was very rich in ideas my father, perhaps more so than his children.

LP: Did any of his children take an interest in photography?

HB: Interest yes, but not active in photography. Though, my wife became a photographer. She was born in Paris to an Algerian/Russian father and a British aristocratic mother. She survived the war in France — her father was Jewish, her mother was British, but anyway they would have liked to capture her. After the war she came to New York and worked for one year for the New York Times, one of the first women to work in a non-secretary position at the New York Times. Then she went back to France and when she came back to the States, the New York Times fired her because her vacation to France was more vacation than they were willing to give. Then she met the wife of Alex Liberman, the editor of Vogue, and became model editor at Vogue. Her job was to provide models for the photographers. Then she met my father and after a fews years, she started working for him. She started representing him. She never got any lessons from him in photography but she worked with him as an assistant– sending his photographs to different commercial companies. Then after we got married, she became a photographer herself and worked quite actively as a photographer. First a bit in Princeton where we lived. Then in Geneva for a few years. Then we came to Paris and she started working for Vogue and other magazines. She did mostly portraits of personalities and important political people and scientists etc. And other side projects, like children photography too. To a large extent inspired by my father. Of course, after we got married and had children, my father got another assistant, Marina Schinz. She became a photographer too — mostly garden photography and published a book on that.

LP: It is interesting that she worked with your father, who was doing a lot of fashion photography and then she became a garden photographer…

HB: She admired his work very much and when he died, she bought his studio on Central Park South. And she didn’t have a single photograph of his on the wall.

Both she and Kathleen, my wife, probably wouldn’t have become photographers without him. They were inspired by him, but they probably felt that they couldn’t really rival him, so they chose different styles.

LP: Do you think that he was a good teacher?

HB: He wasn’t really a teacher. But he was a big influence. My wife saw how he worked, but he never tried to give her lessons. Same with Marina Schinz.

When my father died, he let Marina handle his photographic inheritance. From the point of view of his will, it was never very clear…He left the photos with her and she tried to handle it the best possible way. So she divided all of the black and white photographs into four lots–one for each of his children and one for herself. Then she gave essentially all of the color transparencies to Nadia. Now Nadia has been quite active in promoting her grandfather’s work. She is now working on an exhibit for next year in Chalands sur Seine. There is a photography museum there and next year they will do an exhibit of my father’s work.

Left: Erwin Blumenfeld BLUE with model Leslie Redgate 1952.  Right: Erwin Blumenfeld VARIATIONS, unpublished 1947

LP: What is the last thing that stimulated you?

HB: What do you mean by stimulated? Something that affected me? Well, the thing that affected me is that my wife, Kathleen, died three months ago. Clearly that affected me. She had been sick, her brain didn’t work anymore. She was going downhill for ten years and in the last two years, she didn’t talk anymore. I don’t know what went on in her head. And three months ago, on the 9th of February, she died next to me…That is the thing that affected me. Also, what affected me was, she died very peacefully next to me. I didn’t realize that she was dead until I felt her and she was still warm and the kin came and said “votre femme est morte”. The morning afterwards, I got the announcement that a second great grandchild had been born. That also affected me. The day afterwards was the funeral and that was quite a moving event–we had five of the grandchildren and they made speeches and my children made speeches and I made a speech. One of the granddaughters filmed it and I now have it on dvd. So, that too affected me. I could tell you more, but maybe that’s enough for the moment.

Kathleen had been very close to my father and she admired him very much. Over the last ten years, she slowly went out of this world.

Thanks to our daughter Nadia, Kathleen had two double page spreads in Match in the last year. Nadia had given the pictures of Kathleen to Roger Viollet and he organized the spread.

RH: What is your work?

HB: I am an elementary particle physicist, experimental! Which is quite different. But I worked first with Cloud Chambers and then with Bubble Chambers and so I surely took more pictures than my father did. Of particles. Millions of pictures.

His work, that is often characterized by a dislocated humor, is transcending the divides between fashion, performance and photography and interrogates the body in relation to society, ideology and politics, subverting the western ‘art library’ as he calls it.

The Stimuleye talks to charming Athi-Patra, who was recently featured in the Phaidon book ‘Younger Than Jesus’, a directory of the world’s best artists under the age of 33, about his work and influences.

Athi Patra Ruga’s intervention for the X-Homes Hillbrow project with the character of ILUWANE.
Photography by Nadine Hutton

RENÉ HABERMACHER: Where are you right now?

ATHI-PATRA RUGA: I’m in my Cape Town studio editing my latest tapestry series and fighting my cats… simultaneously. [laughs] I’m big on cat competitions… my two Russian blues Azange and Shadofax will be taking part so we have been grooming them like crazy… with a few scratches to prove it… hehe.

You’ve just came back from a break – have you got an idea already on what to work on?

At the moment I will be spending the next year creating quietly an extensive body of work revolving around a series of portraits that I will be rendering in tapestry. I have been doing a lot of sittings with various people and doing preliminary sketches. I am editing those now to get started in the next month. I was thinking of titles to name this body or the final exhibition etc: What do you think of :…the do’s and dont’s of bodyworship [laughs]

I am very interested in the power-relations involved in portraiture… especially in response to the ethnographic history involved. I am always concerned with who or what element in the image takes more precedents/importance… the technique or the seater or the artists ego. That argument in my head leads to some lovely renderings.

Your work is known to straddle the divides between fashion, performance and many more disciplines. What is your ultimate goal?

Transcending all boundaries that have been put on who and what one should create.

Athi-Patra Ruga's monogram and portrait photographed by Ant Strack

The monogram you use ‘AP’, seems to be derived from Albrecht Dürer?

Nice spotting, yes Dürer is the reference. A big part of the work is appropriation and ultimately subverting the “western art library”. In this case I am always interested in this “I am the one and only”, self-centric way of creating or rather I am totally disturbed by it. The logo is for Athi-Patra Ruga and studios cc. The name of my company and studio. The “and studio” part alludes to the idea that collaboration forms a big part of my practice. I would like to continue with this point.

Does Athi-Patra mean anything specific?

No, it’s a brand like others. And a brand is the highest promise of good quality and superior concept.

It’s two nicknames of my birth name. I’ve been called those names all my life really. It’s as old as I can remember.

So where does the “evil little boy”, as you called yourself come from?

Well I don’t know… I embrace my evils and vices I suppose. As to where it comes from, let’s just say there are a lot of boys and girls think so… at some points I tend to believe it. [laughs]

I was born in a Bantustan, which is a puppet state created by the apartheid government, a dictatorship. In March 1984, on my 13th birthday, Biggie Smalls died. My mom was a midwife, my dad a sports journalist. My parents were gone for long stretches of time and I had to defend myself. It seemed natural, it was one big ball of trauma. I grew up in the townships and during the strikes and boycotts. Many kids [or rather young adults] used to brutalise us for going to suburban/private schools. I spent most of my time indoors as many kids could not cope with me: I was violent in a violent time. Both at home and outside, the country was going through a revolution.

Athi-Patra Ruga: "Idol Death Mask Series" 2009, Modeled Paper, Approx. 27cm x 23cm each
Image courtesy of the artist and whatiftheworld gallery

How does your family perceive your work as an artist?

Amused. However one would expect, from many conversations, that they would have problems, but I grew up in a very art-sensitive home. They have been very supportive with the rising to actually making my own money. That investment is certainly paying back for them. Proud would be the one word.

It’s said we primarily derive our topics and reflections from childhood experiences- (I admit it sounds very freudian) do you feel the same? what do you remember having left an important mark in your consciousness?

There are so many. I think the ones that have filtered to my image-making a probably those that have been a wake up call as to realising my identity. For example the first moment I was ever called a Kaffir/Faggot/Hood-Rat. I came out at 12 year old. So I had to deal with it.

In a way, I also feel that this resistance to my identity validates me.

However, in my work I try to be graceful and answer or make sense as to why people can so label others with such vitriol. This leads me to one explanation, of which the history and the effects of popular image making become a little formula I use to understand and convey in turn healing these early memories we are speaking about.

When you left home- what did you go for?

I left home at 17. I had just graduated from a liberal arts highs school and moved to Johannesburg to study Haute Couture.

Tell me what is your flirt with fashion about?

I don’t flirt with fashion – I’ve seen what heroine did to my friends and yep…! I think it’s my addiction to the idea/s of perception and the result of that in relation to my life and art.

Fashion is like being part of a SAW Trilogy movie or something.

Don’t get me wrong I love my Raf and shit but I have my issues with it. I cannot play around or even fuck with anything that lacks a political backbone and is transient.

Left: Athi-Patra Ruga, "Castrato as [the] Revolution" 2010
Wool and tapestry thread on Tapestry Canvas, 80cm x 125cm

Right: Athi-Patra Ruga, Votive portrait (umthondo Wesizwe) 2009
Thread on tapestry canvas 74x 94cm. Images courtesy of the artist and whatiftheworld gallery

Is there a connection with your most recent work, the tapestries?

In 2005 after leaving Haute Couture school, I wanted a little hobby to keep that “petite main” discipline going on. It some how led to me picking up readymade tapestries, of which I then felt I could continue also my interventions by actually carrying these said interventions on the canvas – a DADA thing I always say, but it alludes to the point earlier of my obsession with how we receive and act upon imagery. Most of the time the images are very faux naive. However, by the time I am done re-owning them… they are totally different stories. I find that act to be triumphant and a fat middle finger to those ignorant image makers out there.

How much does the backdrop of South Africa form your identity and your work?

Well, to begin with I am Athi.

Then along the way we can add many a labels. South African being one of them. However as much as this is something I do not cling to so much in my work, I do not want to give the impression that the South African Dynamic is nothing I do not interrogate in my work. There is a rich mythology and language that is influenced by the mixes in languages and nuances in this country that lead to a visceral rendering in different design/art elements in my work. I would think it a sin to make or render my practice into a “Poster Boy for South Africa” Sometimes I tend to be very anti-South Africa, that’s part of it, I suppose.

The collective consciousness in the global sense is my concern , as I feel that I have been born into a world that already has so many issues that intermingle through colonialism/christianity/commerce. This hybrid of problems is not only a South African thing. It would be silly to think that MTV and the internet have not had a role to play in this continent and the african diaspora. I travel extensively and I feel that it is a big goal of mine to understand every culture today and to communicate to them. I shy away from art that separates me from the global collective experience by churning art that auto-exoticises me.

[…] If I would have to leave the country, I would like to move to Kinshasa. It’s indescribable!

The history of the place, the music, the culture of physical fitness, the sex, and how in a world that has nothing, people create the most optimistic environments for themselves. This is a place I consider a spiritual home for me, there is a newness in how a society can be resilient and form its own modes of beauty that absolutely blows my mind. And I would love to be part of this newness.

Hypothetically the move would be like many that I have made, simply a new chapter with new concerns and struggles and obviously this will translate in my work as I am a firm believer in the relationship between acting and art making.

Athi Patra Ruga: "Untitled" (X Homes Hillbrow). Photography by Nadine Hutton

Can you tell me more on who is the character of AFRO-WOMBLE and the story behind?

The Afro-Womble character came after my seminal character of Miss Congo. In 2007 I was invited to do a show in Switzerland after a three month residency. I had created an outfit made of a loooot of afro wigs, a poetic stab at the performance-driven christmas parties in lilly-white corporate settings. And also I was going through a phase of translating brutalist / Le Corbusier manifestos into clothes as an exercise.

So the story begins when I was coming out of a Bern club and I see this poster of two white sheep kicking a black sheep of the Swiss Confederation flag, rendered in very cutesy manner that would make Murakami weep. On being told what it was all about and then after just freaking out about its xenophobic connotations, I decided to do a series of performances on a fast-melting glacier, a sheep farm in Lucerne, and an intervention in Zurich during election Day. The way in which the material and many memories clash, and the results that come out is a leading thing in unraveling the work.

I enjoyed Switzerland… I was in Bern with a very cool circle of friends who were all expats from Europe Africa and America. I took speed for the first time there.

How did the Swiss react to your street performance?

It’s interesting that they could identify the schwarze schafe [sic]. The immigrants felt I was poking fun at something they were in the thick of. That made me want to take responsibility for their pain… however I am merely an artist, not an activist you see. I seek engagement, I solicite engagement – Not a confrontation, that gets us nowhere.

Top Left: Swiss People's Party (SVP) "Create safety" poster
for the abduction of criminal foreigners in Switzerland

Following: Athi-Patra Ruga's reaction with the character of Afrowomble:
"Even I Exist in Embo: Jaundiced Tales of Counterpenetration", 2008. Photography by Oliver Neubert.

How you felt being in Switzerland?

I felt unchallenged…

In the “international” art circuit African artists are comparably underrepresented. So are women. What are your thoughts on current racial and gender segregation issues in the art world?

They [THE SO CALLED INTERNATIONAL] do not even enter my headspace. I feel that would be pandering to others codes of acceptance. Integrity and a good work ethic gets you to the places you wanna be at. And also I feel that us as women/gays/blacks/non-christians/lepers/tax evaders etc. have the responsibilities of owning our destiny. That is very important to me.

In your performances you use your own body as a tool- part of this is altering, dislocating and manipulating your physique and with this challenge the perception of classic gender roles.

For me it is a way of returning to a sense of embodiment, simply. I cannot comment on fashion’s apolitical and transient nature without physically mirroring and in turn subverting it’s patriarchal elements of shape shifting and engineering a woman’s body. This leads to a certain amount of disembodiment, non?

This translates in my performances in the sense that when I perform, my preparation is to hire a personal trainer to mould my body. Like the skinny fag designers do – with me being in charge of course. For MISS CONGO I could fit into a size 34, for BEIRUTH too. Later on when I decide to kill Beiruth [for the print series…”THE DEATH OF BEIRUTH”] I decided to gain 20 kg’s. Now with the latest character Ilulwane, I want to have this amazon-like musculature, all in the name of conveying ides around the body-politik.

Athi-Patra Ruga: "The Death of Beiruth" #1 & #2, 2009, Lightjet Print, 74 x 107 cm, Edition of 5 + 2AP
Images courtesy of the artist and whatiftheworld gallery

One of your recent exhibit is called ‘…OF BUGCHASERS AND WATUSSI FAGHAGS’, I love this title! What’s the story behind it?

‘…OF BUGCHASERS AND WATUSSI FAGHAGS’ was the first solo exhibition of Athi-Patra Ruga’s to be held in Johannesburg. The exhibition revolves around the principal character of the “bugchaser”, Beiruth, and his ‘tales of counter-penetration’, realised through craft-mediations and performances undertaken in various urban centers around South Africa and abroad.

This body of work is an interrogation of my interest in the history of image-making, and of displacement – both of people and images. The title of the show is double-edged: it refers to the sexual practice of ‘bug-chasing’ (the act of contracting the H.I. virus intentionally) – with it’s seemingly altruistic motivation; while also referring to the history of the ‘Watussi’, a colonial mis-pronouncement of the Tutsi people of the Burundi-Ruanda nation. The Watussi myth is further explored in the “Pixilated Arcadia” series of tapestries, referencing paintings done by Irma Stern during her 1943 and 1946 expeditions to central Africa depicting the “Watussi”. Stern’s works are re-narrated through irreverent subversion, with the aim of focusing attention on the implicit ethnographic and propagandistic undertones of the work. The “Watussi women” meditations find their retort in the “… WATUSSI MONEYSHOT” (2008) tapestry – a parody on the historical and the contemporary hoochie-mamma…

Athi-Patra Ruga: "the naivety of Beiruth", 2008, lightjet print on fuji crystal archive paper, 40 x 60cm.
Photo by Chris Saunders. Images courtesy of the artist and whatiftheworld gallery

There is this work I did with BEIRUTH….a quick background:

In 2008 , a young lady was physically beaten up in Johannesburg for wearing a mini-skirt[ yes]. it sparked an outcry from us more enlightened people…it is the event that gave rise to Beiruth. as you see Beiruth is this hyper feminine creature who is what people probably found threatening with that young girls honing of her “sexualness”. It’s has a lot to do with putting people civilisation to the test by means of mirroring it…reflecting it.

Beiruth’s name is derived from a pun around the middle-eastern city of Beirut and Ruth, one of the two books in the christian bible authored by a woman…or the only two that were allowed in the bible. – a play on the theme of Orientalism; but more importantly it is the illusive figure that qualifies the autonomous body against that of the sovereign state. The BEIRUTH debut is in a video work title: “…after he left” (2008), the BEIRUTH is documented undertaking various journeys: catching a taxi to the Cape Town township of Atlantis, a place that is a far cry from its legendary namesake; Beiruth seeking a sensual ideal in the form of the increasingly-popular evangelical churches. The video is accompanied by a series of performative stills “…the naivety of Beiruth” (2008), which documents Beiruth’s interactions with various spaces of the inner-city, including Johannesburg Central Police Station (formerly John Voster Square- notorious for deaths in detention during the apartheid).

South African society still suffers from a lot of fractions….

South Africa was built and was sustained for 300 plus years on separation. It’s all we know. The other validates you as a body not you validate yourself…. I believe the whole world has that syndrome.

South Africa is too young a country. The population is starting to engage with race and gender issues now in relation to reconciliation maybe.

Is it that wearing a “miniskirt” or being openly gay becomes a statement, more than just taking your freedom…

….and if it’s a simple statement, you must be neutralised. Unless you fight tooth and nail to retain it. That is the legacy of this country on my generation: WE FIGHT. Coz freedom is all we know….and would give up a lot to retain that personal freedom.

All you have to do is check out skattie. That is the little group we live and express our selves in… against maybe 70 percent of the country. And we fight to retain it. we are having crazy fun down here!

Hope i’ll have the chance sometime to check it out myself!

From your lips to god’s ears….

Athi Patra Ruga: "Deadboyz Auto Exotica Series" 1, 74 x 107 cm, Edition of 5 +2 AP, Photographer: Oliver Kruger
Image courtesy of the artist

What is up next?

I have just come out of a crazy year of gallery exhibitions which started with one in London’s FRED LTD. ,and include a solo here in Cape Town [“Teeth are the only bones that show.”] , a series of performances and now the solo that happened at The VOLTA NY Fair in March. I have also been selected to present a work at the PERFORMA biennale in New York so I shall be travelling that side a lot for pre production for the final performance to take place in November. Performance will take the fore this year clearly as i find that it is usually the basic canon and starting for projects in my other media.

I’m very excited about the PERFORMA piece and how it is developing right now:

Most of the performance works that I make revolve around the interventionist execution, where I am firstly influence by a space along with its myths and history , for this work I will finally be doing what i call an “opera sans mots” inspired by the visual works of my long time heroes David Worjnarowicz and Alvin Baltrop with the latter being the icon of the work. Manhattans West Side Piers forms the backdrop of the space.

Athi-Patra Ruga is represented by the whatiftheworld gallery

Collaborating with Dutch designer Irma Boom, Jennifer Butler has published an innovative book: JAMES JENNIFER GEORGINA, a taxi yellow, 1200 pages volume in limited editions of 999 copies, parted in three sections with a joint spine, telling a unique story through 1136 postcards and 20 dialogues.

Jennifer travelled the world with her husband James, in an effort to dry him out from his alcoholism, while their daughter Georgina stayed at home with various nannies, but Jennifer sent her daughter 1 postcard per day away –  1136 postcards written from 1989 to 1999.

205 flights taken, 268,162 miles driven, 2 bullfights.

A speeding ticket.

53 unpaid parking tickets.

13 cancelled flights, 1 bomb scare, and 205 churches visited, politics, wars, rising prices, births, funerals, holidays…

Yet what comes forward above all is their relationship.

JAMES, JENNIFER, GEORGINA by Jennifer Butler. The 3 spine design allows to lay the book flat

We meet at the American Library in Paris, 23 years after the odyssey started.

As they arrive, Jennifer, a former model, on her side her very British gentleman James, holds a copy of the book in her hands, spiked with post-its of matching yellow. She is in full swing, mentioning another book by Allen Fletcher: “Be aware of wet paint,” he wrote in his beautiful handwriting: ‘I don’t know where I am going, but I am on my way’ and it really sums me up: I don’t know ever where I am going, but I have a sense that I am gonna get there!”.

It was in fact Allen Fletcher’s work, and particularly “The Art of Looking Sideways” that made her look differently at the value of the hundreds of postcards she had kept in boxes after 10 years on the road. When in 1999 the drinking of James stopped, so did the postcards. In 2007, Allen Fletcher was only a few months more to live, so he recommended to Jennifer to work on her project with Dutch designer Irma Boom.

Jennifer Butler at the American Library Paris

Behind the book, says Butler, lies a passion “for extending the boundaries of what a book can be. And the knowledge that books have to be more, different than ‘information.’ More than being able to download them from the internet” she says.  According to her, ‘the book’ is not in the ‘up’ – it’s in the ‘down’:

“The book remains to spread something else: maybe sheer beauty or a much slower, more thought-provoking message” Jennifer expresses in her first correspondence with Irma Boom, sharing the designer’s standpoint on book-making today.

Despite the highly sophisticated and calculated design, JAMES JENNIFER GEORGINA is an emotional matter: “The book is an extension of the content. Irma would not have designed that way for a book about tennis players, or about architecture, whatever. This book is married to the silk screen yellow that she chose, and the yellow canvas. The book is yellow because its full of light and success! […]”

“My husband, Georgina’s father, was drinking himself to death. And with one failed marriage behind me I fought to stave off a second.” James was given only two more years to live, so  “to save us I took the difficult decision to leave Georgina at home. We travelled to dry James out and we travelled to shield her from the indignities of drink. Everyday we were apart I wrote to Georgina. If love waits upon a gesture, then my gesture was these postcards. I wanted her to know just who I was and just what I did. They’re a testament to a mother’s love and a sharing of advice, anecdotes, front page news and exotic places” she explains.

Cassette with the Book of 1200 pages, sewn in yellow cloth

“The post cards were never written for public consumption. They were written because I loved doing them.

And I did miss Georgina. And I did feel guilty and it was a way, felt like mothering from a distance.”

For Jennifer, it is actually a very traditional story: “there is a situation, a lot of descriptions with the postcards of a story, there is drama and there are 3 characters. They’re just divided in a very innovative way, because the description and the situation is part 1, the drama is part 2, and the characters are in an album in part  3. Usually when you read about a family or a story or a novel it’s all in one. […] ” She continues, “when people hear the word alcoholism – you know its like a dirty word or somebody survived it. The alcoholism really gave the book its Alfred Hitchcock time element.”

Jennifer admits that there was certainly a bit of irresponsibility concerning the traveling, looking back on it:

“The structure was: let’s go. Like Thelma and Louise. And I was so excited having James sober and clean shaven!  He was adorable and generous and he is so knowledgeable about Europe, its history and its wars. It was like being back in university when we were driving! And there was no drink. Because he was so excited being on the road. So it really was not just about keeping him sober. He was sober and I loved the way he was.”

Postcard from Granada, February 10, 1996

The book is framing this story of longing guilt and salvation for a wider audience in a fresh way. Despite the 210 postcards that are printed full bore in the volume, accompanied by 400 in miniature, most remarkably, the book also features a series of conversations between James, Georgina and Jennifer: “One guideline that Georgina said, and James backed her 100% up was: there would be no editing! […] “

Irma Boom, according to Jennifer, had approached the book with an enormous integrity and much love for its protagonists had insisted “that we pose the question to Georgina in one of the conversations: what was the sacrifice made by not being there. I said: ‘oh, isn’t this fantastic, Georgina spends every night looking at them.’ My mother said: ‘this is disgusting! my granddaughter is alone a third of her life!’ – of course the people who love you tell you the biggest truths.”

“It was never ever difficult [to talk about our issues as a family]. We’re all very strong characters and I think the love is so loyal that nobody worried about sacrificing love. It was never difficult to talk about the painful subjects: most of all it’s a love story.”

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“Daddy has been brilliant. His French is so good the natives want to claim him.” postcard from March 17, 1992

The [conversation] number 17, the ambush in fact, really laid to rest the most painful experience other then my adoption in my life. I was adopted. And I think one of the reasons why I married James, unconsciously, was that he came from this family which dated back from the doomsday book.  And he never humiliated me or said anything.”

Jennifer recalls being on a bus in Elmira, in upstate NY, where she grew up- and the bus was about to go by where she lived at the time, when she heard a woman saying: ” ‘Oh yes, that’s where Dr. Gladstine’s  adopted daughter lives” and the woman she was sitting with said “Oh, I wonder why Mrs. Gladstine couldn’t have any children.” Again these details inspired me to be a writer. I needed to get this horror on paper, but I still feel an outsider. It’s still an ulcer and very sore point. But I accept it more now, I am not so angry. It’s hard to be adopted, you wonder why your mother could not handle it.”

“Growing up in a small town where gossip had the most real estate value, you become very observant. And I had big ears!”.

"This is my favorite photo of all time" postcard from April 24, 1996

She witnessed another incident, that she describes us. Being about seven, she was walking home from the playground: “I saw sister Ignacious who was the head sister at Saint Joseph’s Hospital where my father was chief of staff – and she was smoking a cigarette! With her elbow outside the window of the station wagon she was driving – and I could not wait to get home to describe… it just seemed inappropriate for a nun to be smoking a cigarette and be driving with one hand! like the teenagers were doing.”

This impression still inspires her, and is probably one of the reasons that brought her to writing and yielded to a correspondence with Simone de Beauvoir she wrote to me “Vous avez beaucoup de talent” — I was thrilled! I slept with the letter! I still carry it around with me!”

In 1959 she won the New York State historical society contest in writing an essay about a village called Horseheads, NY, and the reason of how it came to be called that. “I won 50 dollars! that was an enormous amount of money to a kid!” she says.

Jennifer had laid aside another novel she was working on before James, Jennifer, Georgina:

“Fuji Views”, that she stopped mid-stream, halfway through with about 100 chapters, using the structure of the views: “you know how it’s to write like a train – and I just stopped. In fact I was talking about Joanne, the main character yesterday. It’s definitely on a front burner.”

We ask Jennifer to tell us a little about the Postcards themselves: “Of course I hated choosing 210 of 1136 postcards. it was like abandoning the things I’d  written and loved. As Steinbeck would say: “get rid of all the pretty little things.”

The first Postcard to Georgina, from October 25, 1989

“This is the opening one and it says: “Oui love you more than Paris”- And the “we” is spelled “Oui” its a postcard of a painting of Berthe Morisot of a mother looking at her baby in a cradle. Georgina would have been four months old at that time, and she would not have come home from the hospital until she was three months old because she weighted not even a kilo when she was born. So this was the first postcard that I wrote to her. We didn’t travel while she was in hospital.”

Postcard from London, Mai 6, 1997

“I like this one: ” there is a great effort to be common, common manners or common collars, common ideas, everything but common sense. a kind of tore-poor. flat brain, flat line” and its a cartoon of Tony Blair.”

Postcard from March 22, 1998

“At the end when things were really deteriorating – it’s bad. You know I am taking Prozac and I definitely say ‘this has got to stop!’ James cried when he re-read all the postcards in the last few days.”

The last Postcard from December 11, 1999

“I love the stamp! it reminds me of Rothko, who is one of my favourite artists, because he makes me calm. The last postcard was not chosen because what it said, it was by chance. Because this book has been cosmic and there been a lot of luck. It says, ‘is there is an old french proverb translated: “the simpler the explanation, the closer the truth.”  And it’s true.”

“This book, is really a very simple book. When you think, its postcards, they are usually such a cliché, they are so ordinary. One would not be interesting, but 1136 were hugely interesting!

One reason why I chose, that I knew why Allen Fletcher had recommended Irma, was because I didn’t like Helvetica. You’re laughing! It’s not that i dislike Helvetica- I understand Helvetica and it’s very clean and very accessible, but I hate the G’s !

And if you look at my handwriting, you know my handwriting is unique to me. As Georgina said “I simply have tried a thousand times to forge your signature and I can’t!” and the way I write physically and the pen that I use is always been incredibly relevant to what I write. And I still write long hand I don’t write on the computer. So yes, its Palatino and Neuzeit.

I love the questions that she asked and that she allowed me the arguments. We had passionate fights were we didn’t talk to each other for several days. She would TNT the book with all of these post its. And then on my computer there would be a magenta line which meant: “I don’t like this – fix it!

We communicated and we never signed our emails. Our motive communication was that we didn’t put the X for “love” at the end- that was: ‘I hate you at this moment.’ and we both used it. We both developed a culture and a vocabulary between our selves working together.

Jennifer Butler at the American Library Paris

One of the 1136 Postcards written to Georgina was addressed to Jennifer – from James.

And here they sit at a table late at night, engaged in conversations to different directions but holding hands across an empty chair of someone left earlier, Jennifer mentions the books impact to her personally:

“I would never have learned so much about our marriage and our relationship if I didn’t have it a year and a half later to read. All these moments would have been forgotten if the postcards wouldn’t have been written. And the photographs — I would have forgotten whatIi looked like when I was a young girl!

All these things…. it’s not a tragedy that I am old, because I have the evidence of what it was like to be young. I would not want to be that age again. I made so many mistakes! And my husband thinks I am gorgeous – and he tells me everyday…”

JAMES, JENNIFER, GEORGINA

Jennifer Butler (Text)

Irma Boom (Concept & Design)

Erwin Olaf (Portrait Photos)

London/Amsterdam 2010

Yellow cloth sewn/in cassette 1200 pages

Unique binding method with coloured edges

Full colour illustrations

Text in English

Edition limited to 999 copies

Price: € 999.00

It’s an exuberance of arabesque forms, a visual melody played out of his hand, that remind us of the great gestural and physical richness of action painting. Famous for his meticulous inks on parchment, this “liberated calligraphy” is worked across a variety of extremely different surfaces — from canvas, brass, wood, melamine and papyrus to skin. Though It seems like writing, it is not. It is rather an interlacing of a dialectic relationship, also found within Western abstraction.

Naomi Campbell in Azzedine Alaïa for Numéro Magazine. A collaboration between Nja Mahdaoui and René Habermacher

I came across the work of Nja Mahdaoui the first time, while researching calligraphic styles on a project for the French magazine Numéro on a piece about Azzedine Alaïa to which Babeth Djian incited me. The visual impact of Nja’s work struck me at first sight.

Slightly intimidated by the references of the rich body of his work, I first hesitated but then thought to give it a shot, and contacted him. To my surprise he answered me instantly by email, and called me shortly after. Our collaboration was set — and we created a story of imaginary movements around Naomi Campbell as a dark gazelle, in sheer and revealing Alaïa.

But I only met Nja Mahdaoui in person two summers ago in Tunis. It was an all-embracing, hot and sultry August day that lay heavy on the city, matching the emotional state of its people.

Nja Mahdaoui wit the first prototype of his most recent sculpture. Photography by René Habermacher

A couple of months after the “Jasmine revolution” took place, Nja arrives in full swing to our meeting at a café in sunny, springtime Paris.

He’d come with his daughter Molka Mahdaoui to work on another of his new projects, yet is consumed with excitement by the events. He reacts immediately and impulsively to the question I usually ask last on conversations for The Stimuleye: What is the last thing that stimulated you?

“Stimulated? You’re asking a Tunisian? (laughs). I don’t know if ‘stimulated’ is the word, but it’s the explosion of a generation, I’m completely into it — for us it’s the event of the century!”

Nja Mahdaoui: "Graphemes on Arches 2", 2009, Ink on arches paper; 135cm x 135cm.

With us at the table are the collaborators involved in the process of making his latest project, a sculpture, the main reason for his trip north. Nja loves collaborations – his eyes glow while he talks energetically about upcoming projects. An energy I felt the first time I saw his bold and highly rhythmic work: “a dance of calligraphy”, with Nja as the choreographer of imaginary letters, to which he refers as ‘graphemes’, devoid of actual textual meaning:

“To a non-Arabic speaker it appears as coherent text. In fact even Arabic speakers assume at first that it’s a text with meaning. But when they start reading it they realise it is not an actual word.” he says and recalls an experience:

“It is not easy to write letters in a disjointed way — that is disjointed to not mean anything — and focus only on the aesthetic. There was a study at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. They connected me to a machine in order to test the levels of stress my body was under when I was writing proper words and when I was writing words without meaning. The study showed that my body was 2.5 times more stressed when I was working on words without meaning. So it is a very conscious attempt to create art. I tell people I’m not a calligrapher, but an artist.”

To me his body of work is so vibrant and remarkably innovative that I first had assumed Nja to be in his early 30’s the most, yet he was born in La Marsa, Tunisia, in 1937. As Molka, a filmmaker herself, puts it during our conversation: “sometimes i have to remind myself: Molka, you are thinking older than your own father!”.

Nja Mahdaoui: Design for Gulf Air 50th Anniversary. Image Courtesy of Nja Mahdaoui

Indeed his energy is striking, he takes part vividly in public life in constant dialogue and is virtually hooked to Facebook, like a teenager:

“Blogs are not simple, it’s in between the magazine you buy, the TV news, and the private lives of people. To balance it out you need to create a dialog, create communication in a domain. Who’s the most motivated? Communication is very important. In Tunisia, a great part of the revolt was started by bloggers: The main one was jailed, he’s a good friend of mine, his wife is a filmmaker […] He was a hacker, a net-pirate, and today he is the Secretary for Youth. Seems like a joke!

On the eve of the revolt in Cairo, young Tunisians were able to get around Egypt’s net blockade, and pass information along to people. Internet has developed a lot in Tunisia, we’ve had cheap access for everyone for years, so everyone is connected.”

And Nja stays very connected- to these very times on which he checks repeatedly with his iPhone during our conversation- the recent uprising in Lybia for example: “I love the Libyan people, but there’s very little connection with Tunisia.”

Ferid, a friend of mine that had met with us at our first meeting in Tunis in 2009 was astonished by the freedom of speech Nja took for himself and the cause of others, even under the regime of president Ben Ali: “He can say things that no one would dare, even on TV!”

Nja Mahdaoui: Window screen for the Kaust Mosque in Thuwal, Mecca. Image Courtesy of Nja Mahdaoui

“Tunisia is a country where, out of 10 million inhabitants, over half are young, and where since independence, education has been a priority. We’re in a country which has invested in culture and knowledge, and has many unemployed graduates with diplomas. Our problem is to have thousands and tens of thousands of graduates for which we need to find positions. Especially since we don’t have any oil!!! I think it’s a good thing not to have oil, it seems like a poisoned gift… Anyway nature has decided for us. But there is the black gold of intelligence, knowledge and communication!”

“Our network is amazing. The new boss of the Central Tunisian Bank was until recently an economics professor in the USA. One of the first things to do is to have an assessment. He determined in a report that 23 kilos of gold had been used for medals. Some of these medals are given by the Ministry of Culture – I’ve received some myself.

[After the revolution] I immediately made an article, “The Medals of Shame”: we thought these medals were a distinction, but if we learn that they were made with gold stolen from the people’s money, I propose that we give these medals back to the Central Bank and have them melted to create some funds for those in need. Some artists wrote back to me “these medals are our diplomas”! Que Dio! Aren’t they ashamed of themselves!”

The Susse Foundry in Paris and Nja Mahdaoui at work. Photography by René Habermacher

Time has come to move, and we leave the sunshine of the cafe’s terrasse to the Susse Foundry that was created in 1758, where the draft of Nja’s sculpture is awaiting us. Nja going ahead: “The Susse Foundry is the most ancient in France. In the world of art, it’s a reference. They make objects as if it was 1901, so they’re a bit shaken up by what is going on today — it’s the first work they make with a technical team from the future.”

Susse’s workshops are in an undistinguished building. Only a bronze shingle identifies the door next to a partly frosted glass window through which one can glimpse a plaster angel negligently hung upside down. Some of the finest sculptors of the 20th century have produced here: Jean Arp, Henry Moore, Germaine Richier, Picasso, Giacometti, Braque, Dali and Chagall.

Manuel Delétré is a meticulous craftsman and joins us at the door with Hubert Lacroix. The foundry’s halls are softly lit through ceiling windows — stacks of molds, sculptures and work-tools fade into gloomy shadows towards the dark embracing walls.

Nja Mahdaoui: Ink on Paper for Cahier Horizons Maghrébins.

The techniques employed at Susse are ancient: ‘lost wax’, the method of classical and renaissance sculptors and ‘sand casting’ for which Susse uses a sand found only in the Seine basin.

And here is Nja, breaking into this world of great heritage with fresh vision and the help of modern inventions:

“In my path I’ve tried sculpture, but not in a classic sense with clay. I’m not a sculptor, but I am for contemporary creation. I go full steam ahead, without hesitation, when it comes to technical challenges. We started with a 2D graphic, but spun it around constantly to get a 3D volume. I’m so happy to say ‘don’t be afraid ! it’s the future !’ If there’s a way, if it exists, then to turn your back and close your eyes is idiotic. It captivates me!”

He shows us the first model of his work, in one of the back rooms where the blue prints to many great works are stored.

Nja is captivated- following the lines of the sculptures with his hands- as caressing it and finishing off the strokes of his calligraphy drawing in the air: “The total piece consists of 22 separate elements that are arranged around the axis” he explains. “The sculpture is meant for… the love of creation”. The final cast will be moulded in June, followed by the process of applying the patina, for which Susse is famous – applying secret acids in order to produce mordant greens, equatorial blues and a glossy black.

In 3 months from now, another circle will becoming full: “We had been looking for years for a graphic designer with the knowledge to go from 2D to 3D, until then all we had been able to do was to give depth, to make an extrusion. It’s the quest of innovation, the challenge of going further.” He has found the process liberating, being free from the confines of two-dimensional space. This is reflected in the energy and dynamism of the new piece.

Nja Mahdaoui: "The sculpture is meant for… the love of creation" Photography by René Habermacher

Over lunch Nja introduces me to another project he is working on, a collaboration with with the Tunisian gallery ‘El Marsa Gallery‘ and the American gallery ‘New Sahara Gallery‘ and CSUN (California State University Northridge):

“For CSU Northridge, I’m putting together the idea of the Behaviour of the Other, the Look of the Other, using all means of communication. So in this installation I’m installing a giant drum, like the one in the British Museum. I’ll bring with me Tunisian sand from the Sahara, a handful to put into a pile of American sand and I mean to have 6 dancers, to whom I am not giving any further instructions. The dancers will listen to these sounds [of the drumsspun], and we’ll try to film the behaviour of the dancers, sitting in front of this drum, and see how long they can resist the urge to dance. Some of these rhythms will get them in the gut. I want to see their automatisms!

From this demand, I await for them to interpret and make their own decisions, decisions of a cultural and political nature. I’m curious to know if [UCSU Northridge] chooses 3 women and 3 men, African-Americans because I’m Tunisian and for them Tunisia = Africa. I’m curious if it’s going to be as mixed as LA is…”

Nja Mahdaoui: Double membrane drum. Collection of The British Museum. Images Courtesy of the British Museum

As knowing Nja I am quite certain he’d prefer this last scenario. Multi-facetted as he is, merging the most diverse inspirations and cultural influences into his work. Collaborating interdisciplinary he recalls an experience at the University of Tokyo in which he and three others from China, India and the West spent hours talking to each other about calligraphy, lettering, styles, forms and mediums — without having a common language.

We ended the day in a pizzeria of the 3rd arrondisement- a loud and hectic place that accomodated our conversation till late at night. Molka joined us again, so did other friends- and among the last guests leaving, Antoine and I accompanied Nja on his stroll home. He insisted to part at Républic: “Paris, this is my City. I know it by heart”

Nja’s exhibiting ‘AZIMUT’ in Los Angeles will run from April through May 2011 at the New Sahara Gallery.
In addition to the exhibit there will be 3 events:

2 events at CSU Northridge University:
– “AZIMUT“ performance at the CSU Northridge University theatre, Tuesday April 12
– a lecture at CSU Northridge University, Thursday April 14,
– a talk at UCLA

Yelle in Marios Schwab FW 2011. By René Habermacher, styling Ines Fendri, make-up by Akiko Sakamoto.

When you play live, do you try to add other things visually, like with the Katy Perry tour for which you’re opening ?

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: Well as opening act we have actually less means on the Katy Perry tour!

JULIE: Normally we’re 6 on tour, with the sounds, the lights, the stage, but on Katy Perry we’re just 4.
Also we don’t give our whole show away, it’s more of a teaser — anyway we know Katy Perry is following up with 4 trucks so there’s no use trying!

JEAN-FRANÇOIS:: We want to make our show stronger, so we have these suspended drums which are very visual, the logo, which is new – an inverted Peace sign. We like bringing in new elements, whether they cost 20 euros or 2000, but we’re not in a fantasy of something crazy. However from the beginning we’ve wanted to make one-off shows, like with a choir, big ensembles…

You were also mentioning new lights for your tour ?

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: We found this guy for lights, we were looking for a long time for someone who would bring something to our live performances,
someone who’s creative on his own but open to our ideas…

TANGUY: We need that extra, because we’re coming a second time around but without huge means, we want to make a show with songs we’re proud of — lighting is really the little ‘plus’ that we can bring.

So would you want to make a “live” music video to show people who don’t know how you perform ?

TANGUY: We thought about it at the end of the last tour, with all that footage [shot by “Ce Jeu” director Yoann Lemoine],

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: We just haven’t been able to edit it yet… we could have done as a single,  but not for the first single of the album — but we’ll do it eventually.

"Ce Jeu" music video by Yoann Lemoine. Photo by Antoine Asseraf.

I still have a hard drive somewhere saying YELLE with all your tour footage, I was asked to help edit it “when I had time”, I was really into it but documentary editing takes so. much. time.

JULIE: And you can’t do just one hour per day, you need to really get into it…

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: Even us,  we don’t even feel like going back in there right away, you kind of need to put those images aside and let them rest, but we would like them to show them at some point.

It looked like an amazing experience.

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: There were some beautiful images…

Trailer for the 2008 Yelle world tour, by Yoann Lemoine.

What’s your idea of the role of the record label, since you started without one and were without one for this album, you also released things without a label in between albums…

JULIE: We learned a lot from the time we had at Source, good things, bad things, some things we didn’t want to do the same way again, it was evident for us that we had to make our own structure, to get even more freedom.

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: To sum things up, on the first album we had ideas but not the means, now we have both!

For the first album you worked with Pierre LeNy, acting as an artistic director of sorts…

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: Yes Pierre brought a lot of ideas, a lot of contacts, a network, in fashion, which made it a lot of easier, now we’re the art directors, it’s the next level.

Second music video for "Je Veux Te Voir".

How was that experience of remaking the video for JE VEUX TE VOIR – doesn’t it feel strange ?

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: That was a flashback [a lot of time had passed since the original release of JE VEUX TE VOIR]. First of all we hate the first music video for JE VEUX TE VOIR, we hated it as soon as we made it.
But you’re not always in a position to say no to a label who’s invested, we still hate the fact that it has so many million views!!

The new video was made with Nicolas Benamou following the experience with Michael Youn, it’s the work of a label, who feels there’s a second life to give to a single,
it was so strange for YELLE, when they first brought the single to radios, they didn’t know what to make of it, but once they had gotten used to it it was ok… it’s really the work of the record label.

So are you at ease with that freedom ? Talking to Roísín Murphy who has done many things herself over the years in terms of styling and ideas for music videos, she was still happy to have worked with an art director on OVERPOWERED, to sharpen the image.

JEFF: We’ve never felt forced, we’ve never had the record label pressuring us, at first we were a bit naive, everyone’s nice, we were just happy to do things, and except for that first video we enjoyed everything we did.

We’ve always been masters of our image, but of course somethings get out of hand, get bigger than you expect them, doing things by ourselves is exciting, it makes us feel more responsible. the DIY style is very stimulating, you want to defend your project even more because all the choices are yours.

Of course it becomes 100% of your life! So when you say “I’m going to relax, i’m going to the beach” you’re not really relaxing because you’re thinking about what you could do. But that’s the case with everyone who’s a freelance or has their own company, it’s an obsession!

Work becomes a luxury.

It’s not work, it’s not labor, it’s energy!

I recently sat down with one such artist, Fabien Blachier, who has developed a culture of textile prints in Shanghai Tang, a fashion house formerly known for a single style of qi pao.

Fabien Blachier by Thuy Tien Crampton.

Laying foundations for a collection, textile designers aim to build a platform that will inspire fellow designers of clothes, furniture to accessories.

Few fashion houses have invested in in-house textile designers. Those that have – Kenzo, Etro, Marni, Dries Van Noten and Shanghai Tang – use textile prints as part of their DNA.

At Shanghai Tang, Fabien uses textiles to put classic Chinese shapes in a new light.

“As a Chinese luxury brand targeting a global audience, we constantly seek to balance modernity and tradition, East and West,” Fabien said. “Above all, we don’t want to create cliché-style Chinese costumes.”

Inspired by the film “In The Mood For Love,” Fabien recently created a collection that was very graphic and bi-color. Not very Chinese.

“In 1960s Hong Kong, the Chinese imported Western fabric for their qi pao,” Fabien said. “I wanted to give a flavor for the era.”

Shanghai Tang textile print: SS 2010/2011. Inspired by "In The Mood For Love".

Sadly, even the most beautiful prints can get lost in the hands of a bad fashion designer. Designers are more at ease employing color, Fabien said, but few appreciate or understand how to work with textile prints.

“I have experienced disappointment quite a few times through misuse of beautiful fabric,” Fabien said. “Fashion designers need to know how to break a print, mistreat it, place it, give it shape.”

“Ideally, textile and fashion designers should work together to balance pattern and form,” Fabien said.

“Dries Van Noten, Marni, Etro, Hermes are among the few fashion houses where patterns are revered and mastered. They know how to contrast small and larger patterns, embrace opulence, use colors, and build up texture,” Fabien added.

For this year’s Spring-Summer collection, Fabien focused on the Miao hilltribe for inspiration. An ethnic group scattered along China’s mountainous border with Southeast Asia, the Miao (also known as the Meo or Hmong) wear indigo outfits with intricately sewn embroidery.

“The Miao theme has never been developed by designers, but they are rich with creativity and art, ranging from jewelry to original patterns,” Fabien said.

Throughout the collection Fabien used butterflies, a Miao symbol of beauty. An additional benefit is that Miao outfits are often square-shaped, which highlights print patterns.

Shanghai Tang textile print: SS 2011/2012. Inspired by Miao hilltribe.

Shanghai Tang textile print: AW 2010/2011. Inspired by jade jewelry.

Prior to Asia, Fabien was a textile designer at Kenzo, a fashion house known for its reverence and mastery of textile prints and colors.

Attracted to the East, Fabien moved to Hong Kong five years ago, working at Shanghai Tang. There, he has nurtured a real print culture.

For this 3 part interview, René Habermacher shot Julie exclusively for THE STIMULEYE wearing the new MARIOS SCHWAB Fall/Winter 2011 collection. Styled by Ines Fendri, Make-Up by Akiko Sakamoto.

Yelle in Marios Schwab FW 2011. By René Habermacher, styling Ines Fendri, make-up by Akiko Sakamoto.

ANTOINE ASSERAF: Let’s talk about your new album first, SAFARI DISCO CLUB, there’s an immediate visual concept from the name to the album and on to the double music video…

JEAN-FRANÇOIS aka “GrandMarnier”: Actually it’s something that was not there to start with but added at the end. We found the name SAFARI DISCO CLUB very late into the process, at the last minute almost. We thought we should keep things simple, find 2 tracks from the album to start with.

The most inspiring track in terms of visual adaptation was SAFARI DISCO CLUB. This double-theme made us naturally think of Jean-Paul Lespagnard [whose styles had inspired the CE JEU video] and his penchant for double-themes, for juxtapositions. So we discussed it with him, with some references such as the final scene of Luc Besson’s SUBWAY, in explorer mode.

The only thing I remember about this film is Isabelle Adjani’s punk  “fuck you” dinner scene…

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: It turns out that Julie’s hair in the video is not far from Isabelle Adjani’s, but that’s pure coincidence…

But the explorer look, that was something stuck in my head — it’s a bit why I started to get into music:  I was such a big fan of Jean Reno playing the drums in the subway as a kid, it left an impression on me. So this final scene where they play music dressed like explorers was the starting points for Jean-Paul to work from…

So, do you feel that this SAFARI DISCO name applies to the album as a whole ?

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: It definitely gives a tinge — from the moment we had the title, we listened to the tracks differently, you hear the percussions more. The word “safari” also brings the meaning of “discovery,” which works because we had applied ourselves to making all the songs very distinct.  We feel very much part of the compilation generation!

It all works out in the end, but once again it wasn’t thought out that way, we made the songs really one by one.

Safari Disco Club album cover by Grégoire Alexandre. Styling by Jean-Paul Lespagnard.

There are some African vibes in the title track and on LA MUSIQUE…

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: There is a percussion side, coming from the live… Julie has a Tom Bass, we have these suspended drums, we really base ourselves on the percussions for the live show, constructed a bit like a  DJ set, with transitions — that really rubbed off on the way we composed for this album.

TANGUY “TEPR”: We didn’t want to copy anything, it’s just a slight tinge, nothing too ‘in your face’…

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: On SDC itself, the most obvious thing in terms of inspiration is the guitar gimmick which is almost Zouk.

Both LA MUSIQUE and SAFARI DISCO CLUB are very instrumental tracks, very percussion-driven, you’re in a sonic trip with words just guiding you on your way…

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: It’s less constructed.

JULIE: Less of a traditional song format.

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: The voice is used more like an instrument, on POP-UP it was more spoken.

TANGUY: Julie’s way of singing changed, not in a calculated way but gradually while writing — it was very spoken and broken on POP UP,  on SAFARI DISCO you find this style only on one track really: COMME UN ENFANT.  We wanted to try new things.

And yet QUE VEUX TU is very classic pop…

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: SAFARI and QUE VEUX-TU are the 2 extremes on the album, that’s actually why we are releasing them at the same time. SAFARI is different for us because there’s a breakdown on the chorus, while QUE VEUX-TU is more classic… the album goes back and forth between these two moods.

Que veux-tu by YELLE

Safari Disco Club by YELLE

How do you feel you’ve evolved since your first album, musically, visually and personally ? It feels like you know where you’re going more…

TANGUY: We worked with [our label] Source before releasing POP UP, and then between the release and the last tour date in 2009, the label disappeared and we became “label orphans”… all the people at the label really worked hard for YELLE, we were in a kind of symbiotic relation. You start alone, you meet a lot of people, and the you end up alone…

It helped us find our ground and think things out a bit better – we created our own label [Recreation Center], and we realized we could do a lot of things ourselves…

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: For the evolution, we were touring to support POP UP for 3 years, we really gave it all our energy, with tours getting bigger and bigger each time: first 3 shows in USA, then 8 with Coachella, then 25, twice Japan, twice Australia, 3 times Scandinavia… bigger venues, more people… in the end we’re the ones who said “we have to take a break” – we were tired, thin even, we wanted to think about the next phase – so we went home, we got some rest, and then we started getting depressed…

Then we started writing, in a cabin in the middle of the woods of Brittany, to get things started. It was a mix of excitement over starting something new with the melancholy of everything that had happened, and you feel it in the album, this need for energy.

Often you hear about bands on tour who have tons of ideas and record right away — somehow it was not your case ? (laughs)

JULIE: We take notes, Jeff sings some beats, but we really need to be in the studio to get to work.

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: We don’t write on the road because it’s not as easy as picking up a guitar — we need to let it simmer, there are no rules for us, we’re not in a method of looking for riffs like a rock band. We find an idea, we put it aside, then we rework it in detail, and the boil it down to the essentials because we’re in a fantasy of “less is more.”

We got a bit older. POP UP was written 5 years ago, we’ve evolved visually as well – we try to refine things. We have another fantasy, which is to mix fun and elegance, that’s what we’re aiming towards… That’s also why we worked with Jean-Paul Lespagnard, we share that with him.

That leads to my next question – I’m tempted to call YELLE a project more than a group — so what is essential to the Yelle project ?

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: It’s funny because actually it’s something that comes up a lot – we don’t really like the word “project” because everything in Yelle is built on top of the music, afterwards. Never did we think “we’re going to make music in this style: colorful”…

T-shirt from the Recreation Center webshop.

With a friend of mine, years ago, we had decided to make a band but went about it all wrong, we spent tons of time choosing the name, then thinking of the music video… we were out of ideas before we even got to the music.

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: It’s a bit risky to begin this way, in fact everything that accompanies the music was done by excitement:
because when you have songs it’s nice to make cool things to go along,
when you’re on tour people you want to give tshirts that people are asking,
when you make a video, you want to learn something, not just make a video for the sake of it,
and the implication in all these elements which revolve around the music, they’re not things that are planned from the beginning, they come as the music develops.

We ‘re all musicians without being purists, we’re from an advertising generation, so we’re open to proposals for branding. Pop culture, logos… it’s our generation.

That makes me think of the opposite of PORTISHEAD  – Geoff Barrow announcing the next album by saying THERE WILL BE NO SINGLE THERE WILL BE NO EXCLUSIVES THERE WILL BE NO TSHIRTS THERE WILL BE NO REMIXES THERE WON’T BE, THERE WON’T BE, THERE WON’T BE…JUST THE ALBUM, AND THAT’S IT.”

JEAN-FRANÇOIS: That I can understand a bit, especially everything concerning extras, because we like making remixes, but we like doing them our way, through our own connections. But when it’s iTunes saying “you need 5 remixes and 1 cover”, because they need “versions for countries”… it’s something else if you can’t synchronize it with real connections. On this album we were lucky to do that with the 2 covers, “Low Fi Funk” and “Fortune”, who are friends, but on the first album we didn’t know anyone, and it felt bit random to go knocking on doors: “knock knock, could I get a remix please?”

When it’s forced it’s a real drag, but it’s no reason to become so reactionary…

La Musique (Discodeine remix) by YELLE

JULIE: Especially since fans usually love these small extras, the goodies…

It really depends on your audience — I’m guessing the Portishead audience loves it when they hear YOU WON’T GET ANYTHING. (laughs)

She has recently put together the exhibition 19th-Century British Photographs; the third in a series of five exhibitions of selected masterpieces of the collection of the National Gallery. This exhibition traces the development of photography in Britain over the course of the Victorian era; from early, salted paper prints, to daguerreotypes, to magnificent turn-of-the-century platinum prints.

I met Lori at a guided tour of the exhibition. Ann Thomas, also a curator at the National Gallery, whom I had met in one of the events I organized introduced me to her and we briefly talked about meeting up to chat about Mexican artists included in the collection amongst other things.

Not too long after we met and talked about astrophotography, the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Ron Mueck, her twin sister and some of the cultural differences I have noticed while in Canada.

For my first contribution to The Stimuleye, I will be sharing some of the questions I had for her on the exhibition.

Miguel Batel: How did the idea for this exhibition came together?

Lori Pauli: Basically, with our drawings collection we started a series of exhibitions based on our holdings, so we decided for photographs we would do the same thing. The first one was modern photographs from the collection, then we did 19th-Century French, and after this it will be American Photography from 1900 to 1950.

The fifth probably will be either American 1950 to the present, or possibly our holdings of Canadian photography.

Will this exhibition be travelling?

It will, I’m not sure exactly where it’s travelling, we have had interest from across the country,  and we are just deciding where its going to end up.

How many photographs did you have to go through, and how many are currently exhibited?

There are about 112 photographs in the show, and I think I went through 2,000 in terms of 19th-Century photographs from the collection, so there was quite a bit to choose from, which was great.

The exhibition features some of the earliest photographic techniques. Which are some of the photographs you would consider to be the most important?

Well, of course some of the earliest would be the daguerreotypes, and we have a really great daguerreotype, that is quite large format; I don’t know if you remember it, but its of a man called John Berret Nelson and its around 8” by 10”, its fairly large compared to what normal daguerreotype sizes are. It’s called a mammoth plate, its beautifully created – masterfully crafted- and it comes with its original frame as well, so that is a real gem in the collection.

In terms of British we have a lot of salted paper prints by William Henry Fox Talbot, so those are other also really important pieces, because that’s the inventor of paper photography, it’s really great to have those.

Are there any borrowed items?

No, it is all from the collection.

You acquired some photographs for this exhibition, any specially difficult one to get?

One of them was the piece of armour, we think its by a woman called Jane Clifford. She was married to Charles Clifford, who was the most important photographer working in Spain. He made a lot of use of Queen Isabelle II construction projects and he did use of her armoury and her treasures. We recently acquired that.

We bought three of these photographs, but we are not quite sure if Jane just made the print or if she was behind the camera…

Another recent acquisition is the Wells Cathedral by Frederick H. Evans; he kept out any kind of reference to the present day or any kind of additions that would have been put on and just kept it to its original architectural features.

How did you get involved with photography?

I was actually in a dance programme, and I took a course in dance criticism but the only way we could criticize dance other than watching films was to look at photographs and write a review based on the photograph. Then I realized I liked photography more than dance (laughs).

Then I took a few courses on history of photography, but you couldn’t get a degree here in Canada, so I completed a degree in art history. I wanted to work on Degas and his photographs, but I ended up working on his landscape paintings; and then I came here to work on the Degas show in 87’ or 88’, when we first moved into this building.

But I also took courses on how to make a daguerreotype and how to make an ambrotype and how to make a tintype, because I always find I cant really talk about the process if I haven’t made it myself.

This is a wonderful building by Moshe Safdie, how is it for working?

Its fantastic and it’s great for exhibiting. The curators were actually involved in discussions with Moshe Safdie, so for photography we wanted the ceilings to be fairly low, and we didn’t want windows or natural light in order to protect the works. It’s a great building.

What are some of your next projects for the NGC?

I’m also doing an installation on hands including prints, drawings, photographs and even sculpture, so its all images of the hand that artists have done. There is even a Ron Mueck hand that was a small prototype study for one of the baby sculptures he did. I decided to do it because its a subject artists have always done, its sort of readily available and they can draw their own hand or photograph their own hands… there are about fifty objects.

We have great photographs by a contemporary American photographer called Gary Schneider who basically presses his hand up on the emulsion of film, and the image is actually just made of the heat of the hand; It’s almost a self-portrait in a way.

Tell me more about some of your personal favourites on this exhibition.

One of them would have to be Poor Jo, the one on the cover of the catalogue. It is by a Swedish photographer called Oscar Gustave Rejlander, but he only worked in England. I have always been interested in the idea of staged photography and acting in photography, and we has one of the first to do that.

He did a really famous one called The Two Ways of Life, and it was scandalous in its day because it included naked women and Queen Victoria actually bought a copy of it. I would actually like to do an exhibition on his work.

I also really like this daguerreotype by John Benjamin Dancer. The portrait is of a man called Richard Buxton who was botanist and was known by cataloguing and identifying all the flowers and ferns within sixteen miles of Manchester and he wrote a book on this. But it turns out he was by day a shoe-maker, and was famous in scientific circles for this publication; today it would never happen.

He’s very humble, apparently he was born to a fairly well off family, but they came on to hard times, and he had to drop out of school at an early age so he lost the ability to read because he only got a smattering of it at the beginning. So it is remarkable that he could compose a book in adulthood. I just like that picture a lot.

Where did the quotes come from?

I took them from all different places. There is one of John Herschel I took from a letter he wrote to Talbot, it was his reaction to first seeing a daguerreotype. He was working with Talbot on the paper photograph process, but he saw the daguerreotype in France he wrote back very excited saying ¨you’ve got to see this things, they are pretty miraculous”.

The one from Julie Margaret Cameron its published in her book “annals of my glasshouse” but I like the way it talked about how photography affected her family life, the fact that she was staining dining room tablecloths and things like that.

I just like to give a feel to the times…

19th-Century British Photographs / 4 February – 17 April 2011 / National Gallery of Canada

Excerpt of upcoming film "25 Hyères". by Antoine Asseraf

Dries Van Noten, Steven Klein, Oliviero Toscani, Theo Mercier and much more in the full documentary.

26th Hyères Fashion & Photography Festival, April 29th – May 2nd 2011.

Continuing the conversation with Greek choreographer Dimitris Papaioannou, this second part concentrates on his post olympic work as MEDEA2 and the influences of butoh and his native Athens in his work.

Scene from MEDEA2 by Dimitris Papaioannou. Photo by René Habermacher

RENÉ HABERMACHER: Over the years your journey has brought your work to ever-larger audiences. Recently, with your play MEDEA2, you revisited the past. How was that experience?

DIMITRIS PAPAIOANNOU: It challenged me for a number of reasons. If you follow my journey, I was violently exposed to the general public with the success of the Opening Ceremony of the Athens Olympic Games. In order to recover from the experience, I had to take a two-year break.

The first thing I chose to do after this pause was a show called 2. 2 was actually an attempt to pick up where I had left off before the ceremony, to return to my roots and re-evaluate my work. I constructed a very personal show on a large scale because I was offered the opportunity to do so, and I tried to restart my interrupted line of development in an unusual way.

After this experience many question marks arose, and I realised that I was still exposed to a much larger public than I was used to. I had the feeling that there was a new kind of communication being created that was both charming and dangerous. I needed more time before taking my next step.

Jason crossing the sea. Scene from MEDEA2 by Dimitris Papaioannou. Photo by René Habermacher

Many people were suddenly exposed to my work through the Olympics, but of those who had a real interest, many were too young to have experienced MEDEA. So I returned to MEDEA, attracted by the idea of presenting it again with an all new cast, and approaching it with a new idea: to take the passion out. I wanted to reconstruct it, refine it, clear it out, strip it of anything unnecessary, drain the blood from the performance and deliver it in the cleanest form I could manage. That was my intention with MEDEA2.

Having done that, I could continue with new work, first NOWHERE and now INSIDE. This is a completely new phase, where I am tending to create shows with no protagonists and no characters. The crowd is the element I’m focusing on now, using it in a more open structure in order to create images involving spatial and human relationships.

Excerpts of MEDEA 2 accompanied by interview with Dimitris Papaioannou.

I had the impression that MEDEA2 was influenced by the Butoh school of expression, which I thought was a very interesting element incorporated into an ancient Greek drama.

Butoh formed part of my intense training in New York [with Maureen Fleming at LaMama studio] when I was 18 years old, and it was the first technique that was compatible with my body. And because it suited me, I discovered true sensations of human emotions through it.

Helios in the opening Scene from MEDEA2 by Dimitris Papaioannou. Photo by René Habermacher

When I started out with my group in the squat, most of my work was linked to Butoh. It was a mixture many things: of my Butoh experiences,

of traditional Greek aesthetics, of questioning this perception of beauty, and of the concept that a human statue is a vehicle for ideas throughout the ages. So MEDEA2 was this hybrid created to draw from the energy of Butoh, but it also questions this beauty, and the idea that the body is the vehicle of it over the centuries. This play is like a visit to the Greek National Museum, to its sculpture galleries. We bathed the set in light to look like a day at a museum. The story is being told by figures who somehow vogue a series of poses taken from ancient Greek sculpture.

Do you think this cultural connection is limited to the aesthetics of Butoh and the ancient Greek plays, or are there some more general parallels between ancient Greek and ancient Japanese culture? Such as the stripping away of the unnecessary to achieve purity, which is something that I also see in your work.

It’s drama. It’s drama and tragedy. The tragic element is very evident in the expressionist dance of Butoh. Archetypes of conflict come very close to the archetypal animalistic body energy that Butoh requires. That’s why I think they are deeply connected. My connection is more illustrative, it’s more like looking through a picture book: the only thing that I use from the true core of Butoh is the way in which energy is released from the body while remaining constrained. I would say that that is the true influence. At the beginning of the classical Greek period, before realism, simplicity of form was like a manifestation of beauty. From this aesthetic point of view, I can see a connection.

The devastated Medea. Scene from MEDEA2 by Dimitris Papaioannou

To me, your MEDEA became something very timeless and universal in its final form. Is that something you seek to achieve?

I have no complaints about MEDEA. It was my biggest hit! [100,000 tickets were sold.] Perhaps for the wrong reasons, but I am sure that for at least a portion of audiences, for the right reasons. I think the power of MEDEA lies in the structure of the storytelling, the simplicity of it. But I guess it’s not for me to say.

Anyway, MEDEA is sad. I think it’s a sad play. Because it’s trying to achieve as much beauty as it can. But beauty in the simplest sense. For this reason I think it’s sad, it’s melancholic. Again, I think it evokes the sort of feeling you get when you gaze at a statue: there is a melancholic feeling that comes over you. This connection you get to a manifestation of a human being who once was. The thought of a human being standing there in time. I think MEDEA has some of this emotional impact.

Scene from MEDEA2 by Dimitris Papaioannou. Photo by René Habermacher

Well, I think it’s very zen in that regard. Your work draws heavily from Greek heritage and reflects upon it. How important is Greece, and in particular Athens to you as the backdrop to your work?

What is important is that I grew up in a city with this particular kind of life. I was walking on the ruins of another civilisation, an ancient one. I was permanently exposed to the images of nude, or semi-nude carved marble bodies. In that sense, whether I like it or not, it was very influential for me.

Theatrical trailer for "2" by Dimitris Papaioannou. Directed and produced by Athina Tsagari. 
Re-edited by Dimitris Siammas.

“2″ has many aspects that reflect on contemporary Greek life.

Definitely, and this contemporary Athenian life of course has its particularities. But then it is also a manifestation of global city life set in the Mediterranean. You could call it a semi-developed city. [laughs]

I would say it’s a little Middle Eastern, actually. Speaking of the contemporary, I’ve noticed that you work with the element of camp, for example in “2”.

In MEDEA too. I think MEDEA is also quite camp. Yes, I use the element as much as I can, and the more I use it the better it seems to become. It amuses me.

So how do you use camp as a mechanism?

When something is too much of a gesture, too reminiscent of silent movies and postcards, when something embraces the banality of beauty and at the same time tries to place it in an environment that ridicules it yet at the same time re-creates it on the other side of ridicule. Camp is very useful when you can’t say something directly, because it’s worn out and forces you have to find another way of phrasing it. I think that’s where camp is useful, at least for my work.

Scene from MEDEA2 by Dimitris Papaioannou. Photo by René Habermacher

This is another element you share with Tsarouchis.

And with many Greeks. Especially homosexual Greeks, male homosexual Greek artists. We have had a long line of men like that here, who have somehow shaped the cultural identity of contemporary Greece, as you know.

I know it very well! I’ve seen many of your rehearsals, for MEDEA2 as well as for INSIDE last week. It seems you draw a great deal from your communication with your collaborators.

The older I get, the closer I come to a universal truth: “if you have a group, work with it”.

I wasn’t that wise in the past. But, you know, many artists have been much wiser than me at a much younger age. It takes me a long time to evolve. Yes, of course I want my collaborators to be creative, and I want there to be a friendly atmosphere at rehearsals. I try to inspire this as much as I can.

Is this environment also something that keeps you in Athens?

No. What keeps me in Athens is that I have a job here and I have my friends here. And I am used to the weather. These are the things that keep me in Athens. If I were to experiment with living somewhere else, which I might do, I’d have to start from scratch. I flirt with this idea a lot.

I used the opportunity that the Fulbright Artist’s Scholarship gave me to spend some time in New York and I think I will experiment with some other cities. Not for a chance to work, but for the chance to live in a more unpredictable way than I do here in Athens. If in the end I transform myself into somebody who makes only videos or movies, maybe I can just carry my material with me and live wherever I want.

Matthias recently married to Donovan and since then, they both sign as Vriens-McGrath. For a while now I was informed about a new project they have been preparing, BL33N, but finally the mystery is solved, since our last night’s conversation..

BL33N (pronounced BLEEN) is a project by Donovan and Matthias which will oficially launch in May 2011. Since yesterday a rather tantalizingly sexy trailer hit the web in order to prepare us for what’s coming. Bl33n will be an online magazine experience, where all material shot by Donovan and Matthias as a team will support the t-shirts that they sell.

By Matthias Vriens-McGrath.

The first collection is inspired by the body. Its design placed inside the shirt, when turned upside down will become a mask when worn over the face while others will include hair prints on shoulders and back that look like heavy metal or jewelry printed in mirror silver and latex. Printing technics will include latex, glitter. Their aim is to open up to a world wide collaboration of people connecting globally and will include a lot of world travel with the brand, while promoting freedom for all.

“Filep,  free,  freedom is something we take for granted and not available to all of us. Such an abstract, intellectual property, yet essential for all. We would like to promote freedom for all and with bl33n we intend to do just that. Part of our profit will go to promote freedom.”

FILEP MOTWARY: So Matthias,how did you come up with the idea of BL33N?

MATTHIAS VRIENS-MCGRATH: By accident via google, we found bleen, then bought intellectual property of bl33n.

You were one of the founders of published bible DUTCH MAGAZINE back in the late 90’s and early 00’s. How do you see yourself creating a web-platform?

We are just doing it… and take it from there. As we both have never been one to over-think or over intellectualize matters.

Whats the web’s real power today regarding fashion?

I believe pretty strong, information is scattered around in seconds, no where to hide. As horrid as it can be, once embraced it’s pretty cool and exciting.

Your new project along with your huspand surrounds a variety of actions including orthologic actions like promoting ideas like “freedom for all”. What do you really mean with this?

Our believes are visual delights and as simple as that might seem, the human body in all of it’s glory remains a struggle. Nudity as a metaphor for freedom and its something we all have, yet not available to all of us. Seems simple no…?

I would like to know more about the t-shirt collection you are preparing?

The first collection relates -again- to the body. Monster faces, printed upside down, inside out, become masks when pulled over your head. hair prints draped over back and shoulders printed in latex become ornamental, sculptural jewelry. There will be several collages-shirts that connect to the contemporary art world, while others are printed with the BL33N logo placed on parts of the body that become ‘questionable’

Are you thinking or extent it to a complete collection in the coming future?

Yes, both Donovan and feel strongly about underwear for example, but all in time…

Why do you think this new project you are about to launch is important, in what ways?

Well, after some time has passed now since Dutch magazine, I feel strongly about shooting some editorial that is not censured by any editorial structure. Donovan is as passionate about photography as I am, so we have a lot of fun together and come up with some pretty good material.

Whats missing from fashion at them moment?

Balls, big hairy balls. Not ONLY literally, but please embrace today and shoot what you really need to be shooting. All of it looks so old (I include my own commercial editorial contributions). Right now I have this tremendous desire to break free and shoot for BL33N!

Regarding your photography, how do you see yourself in it now compared to six years ago when I first interviewed you?

I have fallen asleep (laughs)

(laughs) Is there something else you would like to share about your mutual future projects with Donovan?

He’s hot, very hot!

Matthias and Donovan on their wedding day in Malibu.

BL33N will be a unisex line of shirts and available at colette and on www.bl33n.com

In 2005 Dimitris Papaioannou was awarded the Golden Cross of the Order of Honour by the President of the Hellenic Republic for outstanding artistic achievement. For his following shows “2″ and MEDEA2 enjoyed an unprecedented run in the Greek capital, each with over 100 000 tickets sold. This accelerated development came not without controversy. With his latest play INSIDE Dimitris returns to his experimental roots.

THE STIMULEYE met with him during a break of rehearsals in Athens, to speak about his new play and look back to his point of departure.
Following the first part of three on the conversation with Dimitris Papaioannou, accompanied with exclusive pictures by René Habermacher.

Dimitris Papaioannou on the rehearsal set for his new play INSIDE. Photo by René Habermacher

pasolinian touch

DIMITRIS PAPAIOANNOU: I’ll be right with you — I’m just making a coffee!

RENÉ HABERMACHER: You’re freshly shaven! You look very 19th-century with your moustache.

I am from the 19th century honey, I’m very old!

It’s been a while since we had time for a talk, since I left Athens and you last visited Paris. We met only briefly during the rehearsals for your new play INSIDE, which you’re currently working on. You spent last Spring in New York. Tell me about what you did there.

I was there from March until June on a Fulbright Artist’s Scholarship. A mid-career scholarship obviously… [laughs]

Actually in a way I was studying the story of performance art [with Laurie Anderson at The Kitchen NYC] and developing my Final Cut Pro skills, as well as experiencing a little more of New York life, now that I’m a mature boy and things are different!

How was it returning to Athens after that?

For me it was a blessing because I discovered that I had left New York when I was still under construction. It’s the perfect place to be when you are like that, but in this phase of my life what I found there was a little more superficial than I would have liked. The Athens I returned to was in complete economic crisis and emotionally depressed, but still I was deeply relieved to spend summer back home.

Dimitris, I know you were born in Athens, but we’ve never talked about your childhood.

I was born and grew up in Athens, in a lower-middle class family. My parents made financial sacrifices so that I could go to a very expensive school, the Athens College. Then I had to run away from home because my parents wanted me to live the life of a straight architect. But I was a gay man, and I wanted to be a painter. I became the student of the Greek painter Yannis Tsarouchis* (1) in the old fashioned way, where painters trained people in their atelier. It was there I was introduced to true art. I had been painting since I was a child, but it was when I met Tsarouchis that I realised what painting really was. Later I entered the Athens School of Fine Arts.

* (1) : Yannis Tsarouchis, 1910-1989 One of the most important twentieth-century Greek painters, Yannis Tsarouchis portrayed and helped to define modern Greek identity. The deeply sensual painter was much influenced by the French impressionists and often depicted sailors, soldiers and the nude male body in erotic situations.

The departure of Jason in reference to Yannis Tsarouchis. Scene from MEDEA2 by Dimitris Papaioannou

How did you meet Tsarouchis?

I knocked on his door. I showed him some my paintings and asked for his comments. He was not cruel, as he could have been, about those awkward early drawings — instead he was very polite. My college had organised an exhibition of my work in the building’s library, so I invited Tsarouchis to see my work up close. The next day he called me and invited me back to his house, after which he allowed me to watch him paint, and would give corrections on my paintings. I became his student.

How did this encounter shape you? Did it leave a mark on your artistic work?

Well, your first mentor leaves a strong mark on your life. I grew up in a house that had no contact with artists, there wasn’t a single painting on the walls. My parents weren’t very fond of art, it wasn’t part of their lives. I felt like an alien, wanting to enter this world. So Tsarouchis was the first artist I really saw working, and I realised that the life of an artist is possible and, to my eyes, very charming. I felt at home in a way. And he was a great painter. He had a quality that interests me a great deal: he could make magic with the humblest of materials — he could make roses out of toilet paper, use wires to make small sculptures. The thing I think I have learned from him is that you can make poetry out of garbage.

“Helios”. Scene from MEDEA2 by Dimitris Papaioannou. Photo by René Habermacher

To me you are the only true heir to Tsarouchis. There is something else I feel you both share: a certain ambiguity in your work, “the beauty and the trash”.

It is a Pasolinian touch! A touch of Pasolini existed in Tsarouchis: he could discover beauty in the humblest of environments.

Tsarouchis is a very important figure in Greece. The Greek establishment hang his work in their living rooms (if they can afford it, of course).

But there was a time when his exhibitions were censored, closed down because of the content of his paintings: erotic, homoerotic, even considered insulting to Greek national identity. Before an artist such as Tsarouchis becomes fashionable he belongs exclusively to the true lovers, but once he’s become fashionable you find conservative people who hang his works in their homes and yet are blind to their sheer homoerotic presence.

That is the funny thing: how does Greek society absorb these elements, which are also evident in your work?

It manages somehow. But one has to focus on that unknown number of people who come in contact with your work because they feel a need to. I have been “fashionable” for some years now, and I think I’ve been accepted by people who would never have accepted me had I not been cast as some sort of a social phenomenon because of the Opening Ceremony of the Athens Olympic Games.

What do you think is the difference in the way audiences perceive your work today, now that you are part of the establishment? How do your experiences compare to those of the past — let’s say when your play MEDEA*(2) was first performed, before the Olympic Games?

There was an element of surprise and of passion back then, because whatever the nature of the work itself, there was always the energy of discovering something new, the energy of promise. In the early part of my career, as my audiences grew larger and larger, there was still this dynamic of being part of a group of people who expressed some things about the nature of life and art that we all agreed on. Right now, I strongly doubt whether everybody who comes to see what I do has that same need to do so.

MEDEA theatrical poster. Photo: René Habermacher

When you started out as a dancer and choreographer, you came up from the “underground” as you say, with projects that were staged without any financial support.

Yes, we squatted illegally in an abandoned building and transformed it into a theatre. We never sent out a press release, we had no government support. We just shared the income from the 60 seats we could house.

It is very clear to me that, after my painting, my move into comics art and stage works came out of a pure and utter need for expression. And for some reason, my work has rarely been rejected. For some reason people were interested in the things I was doing. [Melina Mercouri, then Greek Minister of Culture, attended performances at the squat, reportedly sitting in the last row, legs up on another chair, chain-smoking…].

So there was a need for what you were doing, there was a gap you filled.

Well, when I first began presenting my stage works, the performing arts scene in Greece was far more conservative, so my work in contrast seemed very progressive. This is not the case nowadays.

Why do you think that is?

You know, that’s the job of the youngsters! I tend to believe that the best way to live my life is not to consciously try to make a difference, which would mean having an open conversation with an unknown public, but to try and materialise my vision as best I can. Some of my ideas are the same as those I had at the very start. Of course as I grow older I learn more about how to realise these ideas, and I hope that now I am concentrating on more essential things.

2004 Athens Olympics Opening Ceremony by Dimitris Papaioannou -  Extract

Caroline Daily: what is the first film which made an impression on you ?

Antoine Asseraf: The most striking memory for me is David Lynch’s Lost Highway.
It was my first Lynch, and the mix of glamour and goth, the changes in personality, the concept of looping, free intepretation, all left me without voice.

With David Lynch, there is always a staggering artistic direction, a mix of architecture, music, design and casting which create entirely novel worlds.

In a different register, there is also Danny Boyle’s Trainspotting, which left a mark because it’s such a violent film, but with an “english” type of violence – very different from the hollywood violence to which i had grown accustomed.

cd: this film for erotokritos is filled with references to classic cinema, what are your cult movies ?

Well of course Lost Highway, you can find in “La Lutte De L’Amour” the splitting of personality between the blonde and the brunette, who may or may not be the same woman…

There is also a film I had seen for a class on cinema which had struck me by how conceptual it was : Suture, where the main character is perceived by the other characters as white is played by a black actor, which creates a very disturbing offset between the spectators and the film’s characters. I attempted to do something similar in “La Lutte De L’Amour” with the voice-overs, which get gradually describe the image less and less.

I really love all types of films, but as strange as it may seem, the films that have followed me around the most are the ones I saw dozens of times as a teenager, and therefore not necessarily great classics… My classics are rather “The Addams Family,””Addams Family Values,””Priscilla Queen Of The Desert,” the films of John Waters and early Almodovar. Very kitsch, very camp comedies, whose one-liners still make me laugh. I think that’s why I couldn’t resist making a cheesy joke with “skull” and “skullhead.”

cd: why a struggle ? what is the message of this film which seems like a double-edged sword, between lightness and madness ?

At the heart of this film, there are Erotokritos’ moodboards, with pictures from Godard’s “Contempt,” but also the imaginary universe of his brand and above all, his name. The name “Erotokritos” comes from a famous epic poem of the Greek renaissance, and means more or less “struggle of love.” So I imagined that this could be the title of a Nouvelle Vague film about the vagaries of a Parisian couple…
It seemed essential to have a contrast, a tension (between “love” and “struggle”), to avoid falling into something too honeyed or too “costume drama.”

cd: for this film and in general, what are your sources of inspiration ?

For this film my point of departure was the trailer for Contempt.

 Each detail was thought out. With this short, I wanted to do something rich, that you could watch several times, noticing new details with each viewing. I’m a bit of graphic designer, so for the lettering, I used the actual letters of LE MEPRIS to write LA LUTTE DE L’AMOUR, while the conceptual discrepancy between voice and visual spoke to my advertising side.

Inspiration comes from all over, and sometimes it’s difficult to concentrate on one thing, so I try to ask myself very down-to-earth questions : “what do we need,” “what are the strengths of the brand, the actors, the clothes,” “what tools are available.” It’s a bit the “Robert Rodriguez school of filming” : we have a car, two horses, a riffle and a belly-dancer – what kind of film can we build with all that ?

cd: what are your next projects ?

Well, there is the The Stimuleye.
I’m working on a series of interviews between Maria Luisa and different designers : Rick Owens, Haider Ackermann.
I’m working on a project for Viktor & Rolf’s Flowerbomb perfume.
I have to finish this Buto-inspired film, filmed in December.
And I just did the creative direction for a series of fashion films for Armani, which should come out soon…