The homie Lance Bangs shot this great video of Bonnie Prince Billy in a provocative tracksuit. He is accompanied by Cynthia Hopkins. While on the subject looks like Tripping with Caveh is on youtube, a documentary of Will and Caveh Zehedi doing mushrooms:
posted by kramer at 4:47 PM
1 comments
Thursday!
Special brand new 7" release party performance!
a side: White Widow
b side: White Rabbit
posted by kramer at 1:25 AM
0 comments
Special brand new 7" release party performance!
a side: White Widow
b side: White Rabbit
posted by kramer at 1:25 AM
0 comments
comics notes.
-Crickets #3 is sold out. I think the last place to get it is at the PictureBox website, Right Here (if you're a retailer/distro'r and you have copies, let me know so I can tell people).
-I did my first newspaper strip, a guest fill-in on Amazing Facts and Beyond, published in the St Louis weekly, The River Front Times. Read it here.
posted by sammy at 11:27 AM
3 comments
-Crickets #3 is sold out. I think the last place to get it is at the PictureBox website, Right Here (if you're a retailer/distro'r and you have copies, let me know so I can tell people).
-I did my first newspaper strip, a guest fill-in on Amazing Facts and Beyond, published in the St Louis weekly, The River Front Times. Read it here.
posted by sammy at 11:27 AM
3 comments
John Cassavetes Festival
Silkscreen poster by John Pham for the current John Cassavetes festival at The Cinefamily, which is rich with riches, running throughout the month. Gary Oldman is interviewing Ben Gazzara on Sunday before the showing of The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, which would be worth going to just ask Oldman Alan Clarke questions. Gena Rowlands, Lelia Goldoni, Seymour Cassel, and a print of Machine Gun McCain are all scheduled to come out for different events as well. More information here.
posted by sammy at 8:34 PM
1 comments
Silkscreen poster by John Pham for the current John Cassavetes festival at The Cinefamily, which is rich with riches, running throughout the month. Gary Oldman is interviewing Ben Gazzara on Sunday before the showing of The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, which would be worth going to just ask Oldman Alan Clarke questions. Gena Rowlands, Lelia Goldoni, Seymour Cassel, and a print of Machine Gun McCain are all scheduled to come out for different events as well. More information here.
posted by sammy at 8:34 PM
1 comments
Torbjørn Rødland's - Andy Capp Variations
Sunday, March 13, 7pm
Family and Hassla are proud to present an evening with Torbjørn Rødland in honor of his new book, Andy Capp Variations.
Rødland will present a slideshow with commentary and audience q&a, followed by a signing.
About the book:
"Rødland employs the comic strip character of Andy Capp as the starting point for a series of black and white photographs. Repeating the same drawn image of this character, these photographs seem motivated by an interest in nivellation; an attempt at having the photographs neither appear as portrait, nor landscape, nor still life.
Torbjørn Rødland's recent body of works centres around a trademark portrait of this British comic strip character (whose strip has been running in daily newspapers since the late 1950s). Here the working class figure is rendered with his iconic pose: cap tipped down and cigarette dangling from his lips. Rødland located this drawing printed onto a souvenir mirror. The mirror was then applied to make a rhythmic reappearance of the same motif, but also to serve as a tool to tweak the logic of photographic flatness and pictorial space. Throughout these twelve photographs Rødland seeks to obscure the relationship between foreground and background, while never extending this play beyond the limits of analogue photographic techniques.
"Andy Capp Variations" could both be seen as a hard return to repetition and as an attempt to dissolve the classical genres that Rødland has been preoccupied with in recent years: the still life, the portrait and the landscape photography. These recent photographs apparently relish the arbitrary combination of elements from all the above genres. In isolating this pleasure from reason, Rødland would claim, these photographs are 'perverted': "Perverted photography doesn't sell a product or communicate a message. It's not meant to be decoded, but to keep you in the process of looking. It's layered and complex. It mirrors and triggers you without end and for no good reason, and that is erotic". Thus these photographs take an obvious interest in a limited play: the staccato insistence on the same image on the one hand and the continuous and restless re-contextualizing of the very same image on the other.
The choice of Andy Capp as the centre of this play could partly be explained by an interest in Andy Capp as a representation of the 'common man' or the comic strip as a representation of 'common sense'. Being about the people and for the people it does not rely on any education or esoteric knowledge."
Torbjørn Rødland (b. 1970) has exhibited extensively in Europe at venues such as the Centre Pompidou, Paris; the 48th Venice Biennale, Venice; Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Reina Sofia Museum, Madrid, and Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. Recent and upcoming solo exhibitions include Air de Paris, Paris; Michael Benevento, Los Angeles; Sørlandets Art Museum, Kristiansand, and Galerie Rodolphe Janssen, Brussels. Recent group exhibitions includ Mai 36 Galerie, Zürich; Musée d'Art Contemporain de Lyon, Lyon; Andrew Kreps Gallery, New York; and Malmö Art Museum, Malmö.
To reserve or have a signed copy of the book shipped: orders@familylosangeles.com
posted by kramer at 1:38 AM
0 comments
Sunday, March 13, 7pm
Family and Hassla are proud to present an evening with Torbjørn Rødland in honor of his new book, Andy Capp Variations.
Rødland will present a slideshow with commentary and audience q&a, followed by a signing.
About the book:
"Rødland employs the comic strip character of Andy Capp as the starting point for a series of black and white photographs. Repeating the same drawn image of this character, these photographs seem motivated by an interest in nivellation; an attempt at having the photographs neither appear as portrait, nor landscape, nor still life.
Torbjørn Rødland's recent body of works centres around a trademark portrait of this British comic strip character (whose strip has been running in daily newspapers since the late 1950s). Here the working class figure is rendered with his iconic pose: cap tipped down and cigarette dangling from his lips. Rødland located this drawing printed onto a souvenir mirror. The mirror was then applied to make a rhythmic reappearance of the same motif, but also to serve as a tool to tweak the logic of photographic flatness and pictorial space. Throughout these twelve photographs Rødland seeks to obscure the relationship between foreground and background, while never extending this play beyond the limits of analogue photographic techniques.
"Andy Capp Variations" could both be seen as a hard return to repetition and as an attempt to dissolve the classical genres that Rødland has been preoccupied with in recent years: the still life, the portrait and the landscape photography. These recent photographs apparently relish the arbitrary combination of elements from all the above genres. In isolating this pleasure from reason, Rødland would claim, these photographs are 'perverted': "Perverted photography doesn't sell a product or communicate a message. It's not meant to be decoded, but to keep you in the process of looking. It's layered and complex. It mirrors and triggers you without end and for no good reason, and that is erotic". Thus these photographs take an obvious interest in a limited play: the staccato insistence on the same image on the one hand and the continuous and restless re-contextualizing of the very same image on the other.
The choice of Andy Capp as the centre of this play could partly be explained by an interest in Andy Capp as a representation of the 'common man' or the comic strip as a representation of 'common sense'. Being about the people and for the people it does not rely on any education or esoteric knowledge."
Torbjørn Rødland (b. 1970) has exhibited extensively in Europe at venues such as the Centre Pompidou, Paris; the 48th Venice Biennale, Venice; Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Reina Sofia Museum, Madrid, and Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. Recent and upcoming solo exhibitions include Air de Paris, Paris; Michael Benevento, Los Angeles; Sørlandets Art Museum, Kristiansand, and Galerie Rodolphe Janssen, Brussels. Recent group exhibitions includ Mai 36 Galerie, Zürich; Musée d'Art Contemporain de Lyon, Lyon; Andrew Kreps Gallery, New York; and Malmö Art Museum, Malmö.
To reserve or have a signed copy of the book shipped: orders@familylosangeles.com
posted by kramer at 1:38 AM
0 comments
The Heavy Hand
In an opening sequence as good as anywhere that displays the simple pleasures of reading comics, we watch a silent character in a lab coat build a machine and drink coffee, till he abruptly pulls out his dick and pisses all over the machine, short circuiting it, then gathering the electrified fluid back into his coffee cop. A satisfyingly random act, yet one with some apparent hidden meaning. It's an auspicious opening.
A book length story told in episodic, individually titled pieces-some no more than a single panel, some entirely wordless, The Heavy Hand (Sparkplug Books), gives Chris Cilla space to move around and continually build, both texturally and emotionally on a narrative that always feels a step or two ahead of the reader. Relationships feel fully realized, plans already in motion, a world moving, and in my favorite sequence that follows the sad demise and rebirth of an abused donkey, it extends into the mythic and the spiritual.
A beautifully casual scene of farewell between lovers ends with three empty panels of a dumpy apartment, conveying a bittersweet note of early morning clarity and emotional distance. It's a subtle touch, but not unnoticed. Throughout the book, Cilla places off handedly touching moments and bits of dialogue where you least expect them, contextualizing all the petty backstabbing and drunken theorizing. Every character in the book feels alive, each with their own way of talking, their own idiosyncrasies, obsessions. Alvin, the main character, stranded at a gas-less gasoline station in the middle of nowhere, chomps angrily on a couple of microwave cooked hot dogs between slices of wheat bread as he plots revenge on his friend who just stole $60 bucks and his ride to a promised far away job. That's the kind of beautifully convoluted cartooning I can rally behind-plot, humor, pathos, detail, all in that hotdog on wheat sandwich. Many of the characters come across as self serving in oddly endearing ways, talking about their pet projects, bitching, scheming, their giant noses a physical manifestation of over developed ego. That self serving motivation comes through in the environments as well, as the streets, cars and homes on display are usually trash strewn, dirty, and cluttered. It's a hell of a world. Cilla is interested in ideas as much as he is in the chaos of people, so there's always new things being brought up and being wrestled with. It makes for an engaging read and with Cilla's excellent cartooning, where each character feels fully alive and motivated, it really comes alive. The drawing, though rougher, reminds me of the great cartoonists of the past like King and Grey, where every incidental character that pops up looks like a potential lead, they are so visually distinct.
And as a long time fan of Cilla, it is a pleasure to finally have a book to soak in all the incidental drawings that he scatters before and after and between the strips. This seems like maybe the first time he has had the space to just let things breath. On first reading the ending came too quick, with much of the plot still left in the air, but on further reading, it feels right for a book that is so much about the unexpected left turn and stilted expectations. Praise to Sparkplug for making this book happen!
Order it online here.
posted by sammy at 2:53 PM
0 comments
In an opening sequence as good as anywhere that displays the simple pleasures of reading comics, we watch a silent character in a lab coat build a machine and drink coffee, till he abruptly pulls out his dick and pisses all over the machine, short circuiting it, then gathering the electrified fluid back into his coffee cop. A satisfyingly random act, yet one with some apparent hidden meaning. It's an auspicious opening.
A book length story told in episodic, individually titled pieces-some no more than a single panel, some entirely wordless, The Heavy Hand (Sparkplug Books), gives Chris Cilla space to move around and continually build, both texturally and emotionally on a narrative that always feels a step or two ahead of the reader. Relationships feel fully realized, plans already in motion, a world moving, and in my favorite sequence that follows the sad demise and rebirth of an abused donkey, it extends into the mythic and the spiritual.
A beautifully casual scene of farewell between lovers ends with three empty panels of a dumpy apartment, conveying a bittersweet note of early morning clarity and emotional distance. It's a subtle touch, but not unnoticed. Throughout the book, Cilla places off handedly touching moments and bits of dialogue where you least expect them, contextualizing all the petty backstabbing and drunken theorizing. Every character in the book feels alive, each with their own way of talking, their own idiosyncrasies, obsessions. Alvin, the main character, stranded at a gas-less gasoline station in the middle of nowhere, chomps angrily on a couple of microwave cooked hot dogs between slices of wheat bread as he plots revenge on his friend who just stole $60 bucks and his ride to a promised far away job. That's the kind of beautifully convoluted cartooning I can rally behind-plot, humor, pathos, detail, all in that hotdog on wheat sandwich. Many of the characters come across as self serving in oddly endearing ways, talking about their pet projects, bitching, scheming, their giant noses a physical manifestation of over developed ego. That self serving motivation comes through in the environments as well, as the streets, cars and homes on display are usually trash strewn, dirty, and cluttered. It's a hell of a world. Cilla is interested in ideas as much as he is in the chaos of people, so there's always new things being brought up and being wrestled with. It makes for an engaging read and with Cilla's excellent cartooning, where each character feels fully alive and motivated, it really comes alive. The drawing, though rougher, reminds me of the great cartoonists of the past like King and Grey, where every incidental character that pops up looks like a potential lead, they are so visually distinct.
And as a long time fan of Cilla, it is a pleasure to finally have a book to soak in all the incidental drawings that he scatters before and after and between the strips. This seems like maybe the first time he has had the space to just let things breath. On first reading the ending came too quick, with much of the plot still left in the air, but on further reading, it feels right for a book that is so much about the unexpected left turn and stilted expectations. Praise to Sparkplug for making this book happen!
Order it online here.
posted by sammy at 2:53 PM
0 comments
MONSTER!
The latest and greatest, edited by Paul Lyons, with a limited print run of 666. It's large, oversized, and thick. Great silkscreen covers by Lyons. New comics from Mat Brinkman, CF, Brian Chippendale,Chuck Forsman, Michael deforge, Brian Ralph, Jim Drain, loads of others. Get it today (online here ) and see what the europeans will be copying next year. $20
posted by sammy at 2:23 PM
0 comments
The latest and greatest, edited by Paul Lyons, with a limited print run of 666. It's large, oversized, and thick. Great silkscreen covers by Lyons. New comics from Mat Brinkman, CF, Brian Chippendale,Chuck Forsman, Michael deforge, Brian Ralph, Jim Drain, loads of others. Get it today (online here ) and see what the europeans will be copying next year. $20
posted by sammy at 2:23 PM
0 comments
