Press release
Replay: Sphere Punk
Exhibition from 22 January to 7 May 2006
This show at Le Magasin features three installations, all being
seen in France for the first time.
This exhibition is an indirect homage to the
visual identity forged by the English and North American punk scenes in the
1970s and 80s, whose considerable influence on the visual arts has been mediated
by a number of figures, Mike Kelley being the best known of these.
1. Kim
Gordon (Sonic Youth) & Jutta Koether
Reverse Karaoke, 2005
Mixed
media: canvas, plaster, sequins, velvet, acrylic fur, various musical instruments,
recording and video equipment.
Courtesy Electra Productions, London.
Description of the installation: a tent painted by the two artists. Inside:
lo-tech rehearsal equipment.
Visitors are invited to make their own recordings
around the pre-recorded voice of Kim Gordon, which they can accompany on the
instruments set out for them (guitar, drums, percussion, etc.). Their song
will be recorded live and two copies of the CD burned next to the tent. One
of these CDs will become an integral part of the work, the other will be given
to the visitor, who will also find materials to make their own cover.
Kim Gordon
Born in Rochester in 1953, lives and works in New
York.
After art school, she moved to New York. This was the heyday of punk.
Inspired, among others, by women artists and groups such as The Slits, The
Raincoats and Lydia Lunch, she formed the group Sonic Youth with Thurston Moore
and Lee Ranaldo. Together, they made a total of 16 albums. She also worked
with other groups (Free Kitten, The Breeders) as well as artists such as Raymond
Pettibon, Dan Graham, Mike Kelley and Cameron Jamie. En 2005 she made an appearance
in the Gus Van Sant film Last Days. Current projects include her own
line of clothes, XGirl.
Recent exhibitions:
2003: Participant
Inc, New York
Club
in the Shadow (avec Jutta Koether), Kenny Schacter’s Contemporary
Gallery, New York
2000: Kim’s Bedroom, Paris, Musée National
d’Art
Moderne
Jutta Koether
Born in 1958, lives and works in New York.
Selection of personal recent
exhibitions:
2005: Simultanhalle,
Köln
Tate
Modern (avec Kim Gordon), London
2004: 371 Grand Street, New York
2002: Galerie
Daniel Buchholz, Köln
1999: Pat Hearn Gallery, New York
2. Mike Kelley, Cary Loren & Jim
Shaw (Destroy All Monsters)
Strange Früt : Rock Apocrypha, 2000-2001
Collective
installation, 4 acrylics on canvas, 2 videos.
Artists’ collection, Courtesy
Patrick Painter Gallery, Santa Monica.
This collective installation is a homage to Detroit, where Mike Kelley, Cary
Loren, Jim Shaw and Niagara founded the punk group Destroy all Monsters in
the early 1970s. According to Mike Kelley, the paintings he and Jim Shaw made
are “historical in that they take an interest in figures from the Detroit
area subculture of the late 1960s and early 70s.” The two smallest paintings
represent the founding members of the group and the legendary producer John
Sinclair.
Cary Loren’s video features archive films, TV excerpts and
interviews documenting the Detroit music scene.
“This local culture,
which used to be marginalised and highly eccentric, has now become perfectly
respectable, and even dominant,” observes Kelley. “We
decided to make some large-scale history paintings about small-scale local
history.”
Amazing Freaks of the Motor City, 2000
Acrylic
on canvas, 304 x 518 cm
Courtesy of the artists
Grow Live Monsters, 1995
Video, colour, sound, 60’
Courtesy of the artists
The Heart of Detroit by Moonlight, 2000
Acrylic on canvas, 291 x
550 cm
Courtesy of the artists
Strange Früt : Rock Apocrypha, 2000
Video, colour, sound, 60’
Courtesy of the artists
Mall Culture, 2000
Acrylic on canvas, 243 x 352 cm
Courtesy of the artists
Greetings from Detroit, 2000
Acrylic on canvas, 242 x 348 cm
Courtesy of the artists
Mike Kelley
Born in Detroit in 1954, lives and works in Los Angeles.
Selection of
personal recent exhibitions:
2005: Day
is Done, Gagosian, New York
2004: The
Uncanny, Tate Liverpool ; Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung, Museum
Ludwig, Wien
2003: The
Poetics Project 1977-1997 (avec Tony Oursler), Barbican Center, London
2002: Metro
Pictures, New York
Cary Loren
Born in Detroit in 1955, lives and works in Detroit.
Film director and
producer, editor, he also makes exhibitions, performances, music…
Jim Shaw
Born in Midland, Michigan in 1952, lives and works in
Los Angeles.
Selection of personal recent exhibitions:
2005: Patrick Painter Gallery, Santa
Monica
2004: « 0 », Kunsthaus, Glarus
2003: Le MAGASIN-Cnac,
Grenoble
2002: Massimo De Carlo Galleria, Milano
2001: Emily Tsingou Gallery, London
3. Linder (Morrissey, Buzzcocks)
Graphics, photography and film by musician and artist Linder Sterling.
Linder
Born 1954 in Liverpool. Lives and works near Morecambe,
Lancashire.
Known for her photographic collaborations with Morrissey as well
as for her musical performances and photomontages, Linder Sterling played a major
part in shaping the visual identity of the punk era in Britain. The biographer
of the Sex Pistols, Jon savage, describes her as “the first radical feminist
punk”. In 1977 she designed the cover of the Buzzcocks album Orgasm
Addict and the following year, set up her own group, Ludus, with Ian Devine.
Before they split up in 1983, Ludus produced six albums and played some memorable
gigs at Manchester’s Hacienda Club, during which pornographic images
were projected while Sterling appeared in a dress made of meat and the bar
served “menstrual” cocktails called “Bloody Linders”.
Since
the early 1990s, a great deal of her work has been with Morrissey: she photographs
his tours and produces images for his albums and videos. Morrissey invited
her to give two performances at the Royal Festival Hall when he curated the
2004 Meltdown Festival.
Selection of personal exhibitions:
2004: The Lives of Women Dreaming,
Futura Gallery, Prague
2000: The Return of Linderland, Cornerhouse, Manchester
The
Working Class Goes To Paradise, Manchester (performance)
1997: What Did
You Do in the Punk War, Mummy ?, Cleveland Gallery,
London
Selection of group exhibitions:
2003: Glamour, Windows Gallery, Prague
2001: DEAD, The Roundhouse,
London
1998: Destroy: Punk Graphic Design in Great Britain, Royal Festival
Hall, London