In a nameless city deluged by a continuous rain… three rabbits live with a fearful mystery
Tomorrow night I’ll be performing a new piece devised especially for The Double R Club. It’s inspired by the series David Lynch released through his website – Rabbits – and incorperates some elements I’ve been exploring in performances for a while now.
It doesn’t have a title yet, in my head I’m calling it Red Rabbit after the sinister character that appears part way through the series, so that might stick. We’ll see.
I’ve been a bit concerned about the slow, still, non-narrative nature of this piece, and how that will get over with an audience more used to surreal cabaret. Then I re-read this essay on Rabbits and found this quote from Mr. David Lynch:
“They want things to move fast, but it’s like water-skiing : when you go fast, you stay on top – you never get below the surface.”
I’m going to bare that in mind.
[For more info on The Double R Club, click here - and come along, I fully recommend it.]
My partner in crime and I drove down to Bournemouth for the bank holiday weekend to join Louis of AMF for a fashion show at Pandora’s Box fetish & burlesque event. It was great to catch up with Mr. Fleischauer and get hooked up for the occasion.
A few weekends back I was wearing a dress at some party that called for a formal dress code and felt very embarrassed and self concious about the suspension & hook scars across my back. You can see them in this picture, the older ones have faded but the most recent ones (from May) are still raised and pink. This weekend I realised I should stop being ashamed of them – they’re signs of strength after all.
“For a period of time, while we believe it to be perfectly still, lifeless flesh responds, stirs and contorts in a final macabre ballet. Are these spasms merely erratic motions or do they echo the chaotic twists and turns of a past life?”
Haunting and beautiful, this trailer for Danse Macabre leaves me desperate to see the full version, but I can find annoyingly little info about it. Looks like it’s showing at festivals only at the moment.
A Friday round up of links and other lovely internet things. This ones a bit of a lazy edition as I’ve posted a lot of these on my Twitter recently.
++ The image above is from the incredible Car Crash Study series by Nicolai Howalt. His close ups of dents and scratches, studies of spent airbags and shots of destroyed and shattered windscreens turn the violence of a car crash into something still and quite beautiful
++ Bunnylicious – A blog that solely displays pictures of bunnies, and I don’t mean CuteOverload style pictures of rabbits being adorable, I mean Bunnylicious finds surreal, disturbing, cute and sexy artwork with one thing in common – it features bunnies.
++ A rare fashion-related link, I’m not usually a fan of personal style blogs but I do think that fetish model/artist/stylist Sohui has crazyhot style and I’m into her white-blonde har and lack of eyebrows. Her blog – Filth in the Beauty – is pretty new but I think, worth following.
++ Interview with the legendary Marina Abramovic regarding her recent endurance piece ‘The Artist Is Present’ in New York.
++ Piece by one of the artists who recreated Marina’s work during her retrospective at MOMA: The Artist Laid Bare. The idea of recreating other peoples performances is strange and fascinating to me. Want to explore my thoughts on it all.
I’ve been living in a beautiful new flat for the past month and have only just got our own internet access sorted. I can finally start updating here regularly and share some awesomeness.
I’m currently alone in the new flat (dubbed Bunny HQ due to my and my house mates shared love of wearing bunny ears on bad days)which is a rare occurrence and I’m enjoying it. The sun is shining, the doors from my room to the balcony (balcony!) are open and I can hear the sounds of the Lovebox festival spilling from the local park. It’s lush and so relaxing. I’ll have to post some pictures here soon.
I’ve been crazy busy since Torture Garden and as much as I’ve wanted to update with the many, amazing photos from the two shows I did there, I just haven’t been able to find the time. That said, I simply had to find a minute to post these two awesome bits of coverage of my suspension during the Rachel Friere fashion show.
The show was a total blast, very professionally organised, and a lot of fun backstage. Her clothes are so, so beautiful. I’d found them very striking in images I’d seen online but when you see them up close, they’re something else. The subtleties and details are amazing, and everything looks a lot more delicate and feminine than I’d expected.
All hair for the show was done by the incomparable Robert Masciave, who also shot video footage of the show. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen video of a suspension I’ve done and I love it.
Rachel also got some excellent coverage of the show over at Tank Magazine’s blog, where there’s a write up of the show, interview with Rachel and many photos from the performance and backstage. It’s really interesting for me to see how people outside the modification and fetish world see suspension. Check out Tank’s opinion here: Rachel Friere Couture Show
In addition to the Car Crash Clan piece I’ll be appearing in with Suka Off, I’ll be on the Torture Garden stage earlier in the night for Rachel Freire’s fashion show/catwalk performance.
Rachel’s last show at Torture Garden was a collaboration with Lady Lucie latex and was basically unlike any fashion show I’d seen before. Check the video to see what I mean, it’s not the best quality but you get a few glimpses of the striking stigmatic special effects.
This time round Rachel is working with both myself and French body modification artist Lukas Zpira, hopefully we will create a piece that’s even more memorable than her Easter show.
Super excited to post this flyer from Suka Off advertising 3 new performances that will take place in the ‘Crash play area’ at this years Torture Garden Birthday Ball. It’s a stunning image and I’m really excited to be collaborating with Suka Off once again on a new piece Car Crash Clan – for someone as Ballard/Cronenberg obsessed as I it’s a bit of a dream come true to be performing Crash-inspired work amongst ruined car parts. Can’t wait!
