My review of the Lost Films of Charles Ludlam is in the September issue of X-TRA Contemporary Art Quarterly (and now online).
"Mimesis is missing the point, which was pleasure, all along. Revising narrative based, normative cinema, Ludlam produced a revelatory sensation-based cinema without counterpoint in the breadth of avant-garde cinematic production."
I will also be presenting these films at Anthology Film Archives on Thursday, August 19th at 7pm. Immediately following will be a second screening of newly uncovered material - GOOSEBUMPS and THE BACCHAE!
My lengthy over-view of Kelis' musical career timed with the release of her 4/5th lp, Flesh Tone, is available to read over at
The Fanzine.
MEAT Two Videos by Luther Price
Opening Reception Friday May 7, 8:00 – 10:00pm
(Screening at 9pm)
Louis V E.S.P.
140 Jackson St, #4D
Brooklyn, NY 11211
Louis V E.S.P. is excited to announce the installation of MEAT and a screening of the 60-minute film at 9pm, on May 7th. Meat (1990, 1991) is comprised of film, performance documentation, slide projections and sculptural ephemera in which Boston-based filmmaker, Luther Price restages a surgical nightmare he endured in the 1986 political uprising in Nicaragua. Shot at close range, his scarred body is a product of that singular traumatic event, repetitive medical routines, and a total revision of self-consciousness. The single-channel film is comprised of found surgical footage, gay pornography, performance documents and collage interventions. Luther Price’s work hosts a psychology all its own, a state that the viewer enters into, totally affected by this heart (and gut) wrenching body horror.
The installation, organized by Bradford Nordeen, will be accompanied by a complimentary publication of images, illustrations, an essay, and artist writings.
View examples of Price’s work online:
Gar Har Clown
Sodom
The event is organized to contribute to 'Watching, Wounded: Disgust as Psychodrama Luther Price's Meat' in Film Philosophy. Also on the horizon: a creative narrative celebrating Kelis' new album 'Flesh Tone' for thefanzine.com and a review of the Lost Films of Charles Ludlam for the September issue of X-TRA Contemporary Art Quarterly.
Animal Shelter: issue #2 will be on stands in June and will feature my collaboration with Kevin Killian: 'The Cinema of Whitney Houston' as well as new works by Penny Arcade, Veronica Gonzalez, Gary Indiana, Travis Jeppesen, Lorelei Lee, Brian Pera, Katrin Pesch and Marias Viegener.
A special thank you to everyone in attendance at the 'What They Could Do They Did' experimental filmmaker's cooperative screening in North London on December 14th. I was a guest programmer at the event and brought together 5 time-based art works which addressed performance and popular music in an experimental idiom. The evening, organized by Timothy Cooper and Joshua Morrall, was a success and drew in a 30+ crowd.
Please keep checking back as I'm looking forward to some very exciting announcements in the oncoming months.
Read Sean Carnage's writeup of the FEVER PITCH launch.
The launch of FEVER PITCH went splendidly. Performers Ayana Hampton and Cara Elizabeth wowed a packed Peres Projects with their renditions of 'I'm Coming Out', 'Theme From Mahogany (Do You Know Where You're Going To?)', 'I Should Be So Lucky' and 'Can't Get You Out Of My Head'. Thank you to all who were in attendance!
Please visit the book's minisite for a page of video references and a muxtape of all of the songs and performances broached. If you do not yet have a copy of FEVER PITCH, you can acquire it online there as well.
There's all sorts of exciting news in development. In the next couple weeks, I'll post my feature-length commentary of 'The Bodyguard' for your downloading pleasure! Keep checking back for details regarding a collaborative article on the Cinema of Whitney Houston that I'm writing with Kevin Killian that will appear in his forthcoming FANZINE book and in Hedi El Kholti's new magazine "Animal Shelter".
And finally, I'll be leaving the blazing California sunshine this September for a year-long MA course in Contemporary Cinema Cultures at King's College London.
Launch Party with Reading and Performances
Thursday August 7, 6:00-9:00 p.m.
Peres Projects
969 Chung King Rd., Los Angeles, CA 90012
With the refreshing candor of a self-proclaimed fan, FEVER PITCH assesses pop culture and the icons who inspire this cultish adoration.
Using psychoanalysis, post-colonial theory, film theory and pop culture jargon, Bradford Nordeen examines the psychological impulses and sense of community engendered by Victoria and David Beckham, Whitney Houston, Kylie Minogue, Grace Jones and Diana Ross.
Nordeen examines his exhaustive replay of Houston's 'I Will Always Love You' and analyzes the tune's structure, its dependence on The Bodyguard narrative and its stoic emotionality. Grace Jones traipses "from reverence to rape in a single note," while the Posh and Becks issue of W is likely their "highest moment of command over the American pop market." Kylie Minogue "encircles herself with emblems of gayness, but they are merely visual muddles, transgresses that she might rise above."
Purchase Book
More Info