Fashion For The Free Mind

Early February of 2016 I went to the SCADFASH Museum of Fashion and Film in Midtown to see the latest exhibition, Daniel Lismore - Be Yourself; Everyone Else Is Taken. I was not familiar with the designs of Lismore and I was not sure what to expect. The exhibition turned out to be a great and worthwhile suprise.

The exhibition was a spectacle of the outrageous and a marvel of exuberant style. Initially I thought of Boy George and Leigh Bowery while walking among the mannequins all done up in these marvelous outfits. While there might be some influence, Lismore has his own unique style; the work was original and meticulous down to the tiniest details. After the initial viewing of an outfit I would have to go back and study it again to see what was missed, as there were plenty of surprises to be found in these elaborate garments.

Here are a few highlights from the exhibition:

Visually there is so much for the eye take in. You have think about what is on display and admire the creativity and craftsmanship. The Coke logo adjacent to the skull is a nice touch of humor.

This might have been my favorite. I loved the magazine cover around the mannequin's head and the painting over the eyelids. This might be speaking to the commodification of the self with the barcode and the marketing slogan.

A brilliant piece of art. I cannot imagine how much it weighs.

Nods to Andy Warhol with the large Marilyn Monroe print and the Campbell's Tomato Soup can atop the head.

I thought this design was quite beautiful. It reminded me of a more extravagant vision of a bridal outfit that Madonna might have worn in the 1980s.

Another one of my favorites.

I spy Boy George. The textures on these fabrics are incredible.

"I'm not trying to seduce you. Would you like me to seduce you?" That entered my mind as I stood before this. The line is from the film The Graduate and was sampled in the 1992 George Michael song Too Funky. My answer was, "yes."

Daniel Lismore is creative director for Sorapol, a London-based atelier. He was raised in England and studied photography and fashion design. His clothes have been worn by numerous celebrities and he's had his work featured by H&M.

During the Atlanta show, Vogue Magazine reviewed the exhibit which consisted of over three thousand pieces. After it left Atlanta it appeared in Miami in late 2016 as part of a SCAD event there.

Out of all the exhibitions I went to see in 2016 this was my favorite. I left there eyes wide open and couldn't stop thinking and talking about it.


*All photos taken by me in February 2016.

In The Naked Winter

Photo by me, January 2017.

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he rain approached from the north, rolling over the mountains of the Cohutta Wilderness of North Georgia. I did not have much time atop the mountain; with the rain comes the wind. 

 

If I had been on this spot a week earlier I would have been standing in the snow and bitter cold. By the time I made it up there, the snow was melted and it was me and the skeletal trees in winter hibernation. There may not be a prettier spot in the Georgia mountains, at least there was not on that day. 

 

I hike to think, I stand on top of mountains and I look at the stars every clear night to dream and wish. In those brief moments the world is all mine like the early morning.

Photo by me, January 2017.

The walks taken in the valleys through the adverse conditions are worth it for the peaks in life, no matter how brief they may be.

Coming Out In East Berlin

 

Every so often I am fortunate enough to come across some obscure film that turns out to be a gem. I'm always on the lookout to find some film that few know about and often times these are foreign films or films from decades ago. I was lucky enough to find a film that was both foreign and from the past, Coming Out. The film is East German and was released in 1989.

I will admit that I have this fascination with Berlin in the 1980s and especially East Berlin. A city divided by an armed wall that separated two worlds so vastly different in most every way compels my mind to want to know more. The stark contrasts between the vibrant west versus the drab east of the GDR (German Democratic Republic) were images that I saw quite often on American television news growing up. Visually the east appeared gray and cold and those are two attributes that I find appealing. Though I know life was more difficult in the east at least from a purely aesthetic perspective I found it attractive and have romanticized the isolation.

Scenes of gay life in East Berlin.

Coming Out gives a rare look over the other side of the Berlin Wall into a not very well documented part of what life must have been like being gay in East Berlin. The film shows us the gay bars and the colorful and lively environment inside that was a shelter against the outward grayness of the city. There were the drag shows and bar staff in drag which reminded me greatly of where I live in Atlanta where drag or cabaret as some would call it, is very popular. You see doormen standing behind a sliding window in a door inspecting customers before allowing them inside to make sure they weren't there to cause trouble. American gay life wasn't so different as this tactic was often used to stop or delay police from raiding and arresting patrons. In the film there is the park cruising that would go on and that too was common in the United States during that time. So there were similarities between gay life in East Berlin and in the United States in how underground the scene was back then. There might not have been Gay Pride parades but you find out that gay life in East Berlin in the 1980s wasn't all that different from gay life in America and that is surprising.


The plot of the movie is that of a twenty-something high school teacher named Philipp that begins a relationship with a fellow teacher (Tanja) that had had a crush on him for years. Soon after they begin dating he meets a friend of his girlfriend that turns out to be his gay lover from his adolescence. This chance encounter reawakens his own gay feelings and he is soon out in the East Berlin gay bars exploring his homosexual desires. This is where he meets Matthias and they quickly fall in love. Philipp begins to lead an unhappy double life deciding between breaking it off with his girlfriend or to follow his true love with Matthias.

Matthias

Matthias is somewhat younger at nineteen and soon to be twenty he says and for him Philipp is his first love and he's like a puppy with big eyes following Philipp around. Matthias falls head over heels in love with Philipp and eagerly wants to start a serious relationship with him. Matthias is an innocent character and though he's spent some time in the gay nightlife of East Berlin he isn't jaded like someone with more experience would be. He's very much a refreshing character and you are cheering for him not to have his heart broken. Matthias is the sweet, charming and curious character that I adore.

Philipp

Philipp just coming to terms with his sexuality is the character that is coming out as the title implies. Though he had had adolescent love with another boy he is attempting in his adult life to suppress his true identity and live as a heterosexual man. His family is pressuring him in many ways from family household obligations even though he no lives at home to settling down with a woman. Once he does move in with his girlfriend the pressure weighs more heavily on him that he isn't happy and that he is living a lie.

Through the film we watch as Philipp struggles with his identity in his career and in his personal life. The writing captures well what it is like to first enter the gay scene and how one must find their way into being embraced by your community. It also depicts well how the community can be very accepting and at the same time very shallow and harsh. One of the better scenes in the movie is when Philipp is confronted by an older gentlemen that helps guide him onto the path of self acceptance and beginning to live life in a more healthy way. By the end of the movie, which takes a few unexpected turns to get there, you see Philipp making progress to finding his own path to personal freedom.

One piece of trivia about this film is that on the night the movie premiered in the theatre it was the same night that began the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9th, 1989. GDR officials announced as the film was playing that the gates to the west were open and residents of the east could freely travel. The announcement on the news that night was cause for a huge celebration and so people rushed to the wall and overwhelmed the guards and police on duty. The crowds were so large that finally officials gave up on checking the documents of everyone that wanted to cross and this lead to the fall of the wall. So on the same night that a film about a gay man finding his own personal freedom premiered it was also the same night an entire country found its freedom.

Surrealism in East Atlanta

Photo by me, March 2014.

Joe's Coffee was my first stop that morning in the East Atlanta Village for coffee and conversation and then I set off on foot to do some photography. Up from the shop on Flat Shoals Avenue was the Argosy and I peered around the side to find this remarkable mural. The mural was painted in 2012 by the higly-regarded Ukrainian artists AEC and WAONE who go by the name Interesni Kazki. The two have done incredible murals all across the globe.

Photo by me, March 2014.

There is much to digest in this mural and I cannot pretend to understand it.

Looking at it from the left there is the older man opening a box set atop a book and another human form with a bird coming out of the top. A face in the front of the box is projecting a pink rose and from that comes a night sky which leads to the ocean and fish swimming.

Photo by me, March 2014.

Going further to the right the mural evolves with different levels of people supporting each other and a large man at the center with a woman inside set in a pastoral scene. At the very top is an arm outstretched carrying a lantern as if to lead the way. More to the right the largest man holds a geometric shape that has a town or village painted on it with fish entering on the reverse side as if going upstream.

Contained in the mural we have trees, birds, fish, a flower, the stars, the ocean and humans. For me the mural evokes thoughts of evolution of man and nature and how we should support one another in our existence. I could be entirely wrong in my interpretation but that's the intriguing part of art is coming up with our own interpretations.

More about surrealism.

The Old Decatur Waterworks

Photo by me, February 2011.

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ake me to a place that is old, falling down and covered in graffiti and I am at home. Perhaps it is the speck of the fragment of the inner anarchist in me or I just like the graffiti and it reminds me of the Berlin Wall. The B-52's Roam ricocheted through my brain too many times when I was a teenager and here I am.

 

This is the old Decatur Waterworks complex located in DeKalb County in the Atlanta inner suburbs. This is a very nice upper-middle class area despite what one might think of a park that has graffiti covered ruins. The bored youth of soccer moms and daddy occupied with a backyard grill that is too complicated and big for a family of three have colorful angst.

Modern society may take a dim view of graffiti but did you know that it has been around since Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece and the Roman Empire. The word etymology tells us that word originates from the Greek word 'graphein' and means to scribble. Graffiti can have a legitimate purpose is often intended to express political thoughts and to voice anger against repression. This isn't always the case of course and sometimes it is used just as a creative outlet.

Look at all those empty spray paint cans.

 The old Decatur Waterworks complex at one time supplied the drinking water for the city of Decatur then to a nearby Naval Air Station (now PDK) and an army hospital. It has been abandoned since the 1940s and since 2006 has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Today the area is a public park.

 The old ruins remind me of a place you would see in some post apocalyptic movie or in a music video from the 1980s and 90s. I love the place.

This is one of the old dams with a hole blown through it from dynamite. The county dynamited the two dams in the mid 1960s that had helped to form two lakes that were on the property.

It's a fun place to go explore and photograph if you are ever in the area and you can enjoy the surrounding nature too.

*All photo taken by me in February 2011.

A Chapter On Beige Window Drapes

Natalie Portman as Jackie.

Upon viewing the film Jackie last night I was surprised and not surprised at how uninteresting and pointless it felt. I approached this film with the hopes it would be an elegant and sophisticated film with nuances and insights into the life of the woman that was known for her elegance and sophistication. Instead what I watched was a film so narrow in its scope and so disjointed that I was disappointed in every way. Even though the film has a running time of less than 100 minutes it felt like it took an eternity to finish. Glaciers have gouged the landscape and melted into the sea faster than this film creeped onward.

At its most basic level this is a film about planning a funeral and that could be an interesting story...maybe... but it wasn't. Okay so it is a film about planning a funeral about a U.S. president which could make it more interesting...but again it wasn't.

There is no meat on the bone with this story because we have had decades to be familiarized with this story. This film is only a chapter in a story and that alone isn't enough to make a film. Watching Portman sweep around in fabulous clothes doesn't a film make. There's nothing here to keep the mind engaged as we already know what happened that Kennedy is killed, there's a funeral and Jackie retreats into a very private life. The plot is so condensed into such a small slice of her life, covering the assassination, the funeral, and the week after that we get no sense of whom Jackie was as a person. You cannot consider this a biopic because it only shows such a small window of time in her life and even during this small glimpse the character is as interesting as beige window drapes. If you are going to make a film about one of the most famous people during one of the most infamous events in American history then you should damn well provide some new insight into the characters or the event. This film does neither.

The film is clearly intended as Oscar bait given that it is a drama, released late in the year and it tackles a heavy historical subject. By gosh the Oscars took the bait nominating this film for three Oscars and not a soul should be surprised. I will say that I am pleased this wasn't given a nomination for Best Picture. If this film had been released in March or April of 2016 then most assuredly it would have been forgotten come Oscar time.

Famous scene from the 1976 film Carrie starring Sissy Spacek.

Who hasn't seen the Zapruder film millions of times and doesn't have the image of John Kennedy's head exploding like a watermelon etched into their brains? It would have been better to have alluded to or to film the blood and brains scene in a more restrained manner. We all know how it looked and so having the slow motion scenes of an exploding head was gratuitous. If you wanted to show that day in Dallas you'd have been better off limiting it to reaction shots of Jackie and only offer glimpses of the gore. A little mystery could have went a long way in keeping this a more sophisticated film. Plus the scene of Jackie in the shower washing off the blood and the water turning red made me think of that scene from Carrie where Sissy Spacek gets a bucket of blood dropped on her head, that scene was completely unnecessary filler.

Natalie Portman as Jackie in a scene shot in France.

I've come to the conclusion that I will never like Natalie Portman as an actor. People praised her to no end in the film Black and White, oh sorry, I mean The Black Swan and I thought they must have watched another film than I had. The Black Swan is a campfest and so literal that I think you'd have to be comatose not to get it. So here is Portman again getting heaps of praise and even an Oscar nomination in a mediocre film. I will say it again but imitation is not the same as acting. It wasn't even a good imitation of Jackie either. Yes, the real Jackie had a very specific manner of speaking but she never looked as though she was suffering a seizure with a taut neck and constantly exposing her teeth. Portman made it seem that Jackie was a stroke survivor. The real Jackie was elegant, unusual and proper but she never looked as if she was in pain while speaking.

The soundtrack is haunting and beautiful and it is too bad that the film itself couldn't match the quality of the music. The film score by Mica Levi transcends this film and it is wasted being attached to it. The music is unnerving, restrained but soars at the right moments and captures the dark and bleak mood that this film couldn't portray with any sophistication. If there is any genuine emotion in this film it comes from the music. Levi was rightfully nominated for an Oscar.

This unfortunate trend in Hollywood continues of making films that are all style over substance. These films look pretty but are so shallow with nothing meaningful to take away with us back to reality. Maybe this film was intended as one last nostalgia trip for the baby boomers and their fantasy Camelot because I have no idea what this film was intended to be about. I could learn more about a person by looking at a stranger's Instagram feed than I could by watching this film.