This is the longest title I have ever used. And it is one of the most absurd of historical fictions. And yet. Is it possible in some other dimension? In some other possible universe? The image itself might well spin out an entire novel. In the viewer.

‘Shoot the crisis!

Quoting from the site: “It’s been so long since the crisis has begun shooting us. Someone tells it’s not running now, but someone else disagrees completely. And other people never felt it. Surely if you have fallen into crisis and don’t want to sink, you had better to understand that you need to SHOOT THE CRISIS, before the crisis shoots you”.

Here’s the link to the website.

This contest was perfectly made for my research. As I usually face the creation of  images, I don’t look for answers but try to suggest questions.

This contest suggested me a few questions:

How is supposed to be understood the word CRISIS for all the 80’s bourgeois kids who grew up like me with the security of being born in the right side of the world, in a paradise where nothing wrong and dangerous would never happen? We can’t complain, we’ll always have  something to eat, to heat and to wear anyway.                                                                                                                                                                                                                    Do we have  just to give up with our plans of being  forever rich and honest (but guilty with the rest of the world)?.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     Is this word meaning just “quit the superfluous and live with the necessary“? Whatever,  I like taking pictures around a table. That’s it.

About the title: I grew up in the North of Italy. There is a legend there (but everybody knows it’s not) that, during the bad patches in the countries with heavy lack of food, the farmers, our grannies actually, used to catch and eat cats, instead of rabbits and birds. This started to sound wild and savage in our post war culture which consecrated cats to elegant pieces of furniture.

Should we start to think to catch once more our wonderful furry friends sleeping on the couch and put them on our tables? Are really the times so bad? Is the word CRISIS really meaning something more?

I choosed to explore the boundaries between allucination and reality. Of course my reality. I think the  only answer should be: irony.

Here is my submission to this competition promoted by Lib Lab, an italian creative laboratory:

“Mangiagatti”*

© all rights reserved.

*The cat has not been put through any kind of stress during the shooting. Obviously.

Here’s  also the link to the gallery of the contest: Enjoy!

Tony Iommi just had surgery because he had no cartilidge in the thumb of his picking hands. Dio has been diagnosed with cancer. Vinny Appice is having surgery on his shoulder tomorrow. And Geezer Butler’s a vegan. Iommi’s 61, Dio’s 67, Appice’s 50 and Geezer’s 60.

This is the second version of the Savannah Churchill piece.

The fascination of curiosity – a passion so strong it urges the explorer-scientist to push boundaries, physical and imaginary, while suffering the deprivations of exhaustion, starvation, homesickness, seasickness and disease.

See these quotes by Jean Painlevé, Alexander von Humboldt and Charles Darwin; they are all enraptured by the marvellous flora and fauna they encounter, by novelty and wonder – so much so that physical pain doesn’t seem to matter any more.

JEAN PAINLEVÉ, HYPNOTISED BY UNDERWATER FAUNA

Wading around in water up to your ankles or navel, day and night, in all kinds of weather, even in areas where one is sure to find nothing, digging about everywhere for algae or octopus, getting hypnotised by a sinister pond where everything seems to promise marvels although nothing lives there. This is the ecstasy of any addict, including any hunting-dog bounding across a field, criss-crossing it with euphoric expectation, even though each hidden crevice it stumbles over reveals, at most, a rotten potato.

Jean Painlevé, ‘Les Pieds dans l’eau’, in Voilà, 4 May 1935.

ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT, TORMENTED BY JUNGLE WILDLIFE

We have finally arrived in the most divine and marvellous country. Extraordinary plants, electric eels, tigers, armadillos, monkeys, parrots and a number, a great number of unspoilt Indians, half-savage, a very beautiful and interesting human race… So far we have been strolling around like mad men. Bonpland says he will lose his mind if the marvels do not cease soon… I feel that I will be happy here and that these impressions will still exhilarate me in the future. [...] But the lack of food, the mosquitoes, the ants, the acarians (a small mite that perforates the skin and ploughs it like a field); the desire to refresh oneself with a bath and the impossibility of taking a swim, given the ferocity of the caimans; the sting of the rays and the bite of the little fish: it takes young age and much resignation to suffer all this.

Alexander von Humboldt in a letter sent to his brother after his arrival in Cumaná, Venezuela, in 1799.

DARWIN, SEASICK ON THE H.M.S. BEAGLE

In the Bay of Biscay there was a long & continued swell & the misery I endured from sea-sickness is far far beyond what I ever guessed at. [...] Nobody but a person fond of Nat: history, can imagine the pleasure of strolling under Cocoa nuts in a thicket of Bananas & Coffee plants, & an endless number of wild flowers.— And this Island [St Jago] that has given me so much instruction & delight…

Charles Darwin in a letter to his father, 8 & 26 February and 1 March 1832.

Un Chien Andalou put both Salvador Dali and Luis Buñuel on the map with its opening scene of a young woman passively submitting as her eyeball is sliced open with a razor. An eye-opener even today, in 1929 it was positively shocking – resulting in the movie running in theatres for nearly a year.

One can only imagine what audiences made of the ‘story’ that follows, a surrealistic dreamscape of murder, mishap, severed limbs and ants. Buñuel appears as the eyeball slicer and Dali as a priest dragged across the floor ahead of two pianos weighted with rotting, dead donkeys. Considering its popularity, one can only assume audiences were far more sophisticated than they are today. We demand logical story arcs that rise and fall, resulting in a satisfactory ending. This little flick makes me want to pick up a camera and make a film of my own and is a must-see for anyone with those aspirations.

Look for the two-disc DVD release. Also included on disc one – a 1986 British doco on the life and work of Salvador Dali, which serves as a fine introduction for those unfamiliar with the surrealist master – whose life mirrored his art – right until the end. We could however, have lived without the Alka Seltzer ads.

The second disc features Buñuel’s only documentary, Las Hurdes (1933) the story of a remote Spanish village where he first examines the corruption of the Catholic Church, a theme he continued to explore throughout his career.  Also included is a doco from 2000 spanning his tumultuous career.

Between his early years as a surrealist filmmaker and his triumphant late-life career that began with Viridiana in 1961, Luis Buñuel made a dozen or so small-budget movies that were largely ignored by critics and audiences alike. Some were dreadful – a 1953 version of Wuthering Heights, where the producer insisted he use a cast comprised mostly of stock car drivers who had been prepped for a comedy. However, The Young One is the best of the lot and might be considered an overlooked masterpiece. Released in 1960, the year before Viridiana, it sits on the cusp of greatness – but you have to get your head around Buñuel working with an American cast in the deep South.

Bernie Hamilton plays Traver, a northern Black man on the run after a white woman accused him of rape. He escapes on a small boat and ends up on a game preserve island, managed by Mr Miller (Zachary Scott). Miller is dealing with the death of his handyman – and wondering what to do with the deceased’s granddaughter, Evvie (Key Meersman.) At first he considers packing her off to the mainland – but suddenly notices she is not the child he had thought. Indeed, with her pouty lips, long legs and casually swaying hips she is very appealing.

Hugo Butler’s brilliant and subtle script slowly intertwines Miller and Traver’s paths – shifting the balance of power as it is revealed that Traver is in fact innocent of rape and Miller, despite soothing his conscience trying to convince himself the illiterate Evvie is little more than a savage – guilty. It would sit well alongside the brilliant Tennessee Williams movies of the 50s and 60s. No special features on the disc, but the package comes with a sixteen page booklet containing a brilliant analysis of the film.

As good as The Young One was, it gave no indication of what was to follow. Viridiana took the  Palme d’Or at Cannes in 1961 and was promptly banned by both the Spanish government (who had financed the film) and the Vatican for its devious exploration of evil and, well, more evil.

Viridiana (Silvia Pinal) is a beautiful young nun who hasn’t taken her final vows who visits her uncle and benefactor, the wealthy Don Jaime (Francisco Rabal). Struck by Viridiana’s resemblance to her late aunt, who died before consummating their marriage, Jaime becomes obsessed and ultimately drugs and rapes her.

Viridiana decides she can never return to the convent and opts to stay in the house with Jaime and save the world on her own, starting with the local beggars and homeless. She soon discovers that she cannot change what these people really are and is livid when they ultimately turn on her. Buñuel’s genius is in the exposition of Viridiana – she is not the pious young woman she at first appears, but an arrogant sycophant who ultimately has earned her downfall.

Luis Bunuel in Un Chien Andelou

Buñuel followed this with seven masterpieces, including That Obscure Object of Desire and The Discreet Charm of the Bourgiousie. I’m waiting for them to arrive as a box set sometime soon…

Winter Wonders just started yesterday here in Brussels. Today I walked around and tried to capture some first impressions. this is a remarkable ‘toy’. Very arty and surreal as everything Belgian tents to be. Viewable until the 3rd January 2010. The event takes place at the Grand Place in Brussels and around the Bourse, the Place Sainte-Catherine and the Marché aux Poissons.

merry-go-rounds

This is the alternate version for the Betty Hutton piece I created.

Dio was diagnosed with the early stages of stomach cancer this week after his European tour was cancelled and he was admitted to the hospital. He’s 67 now, and says he’s already changed his diet, wanting only to get back on stage. This is exciting, as word is there will be another Black Sabbath w/ Dio (Heaven and Hell) album and two more Dio albums (at least). Let’s all hope and pray.

I have this poster on the wall in my office, and occasionally people ask me about it. Babaouo is the name of a Salvador Dali film that was never finished. Actually, aside from some designs, a screenplay and this poster, it was barely started. Dali’s script was intended as a completion of a trilogy of surrealist works started with Un Chien Andalou (1929) and L’Age d’Or (1930). It was eventually filmed by Manuel Cussó-Ferrer in 1998, and tells the story of Babaouo, who sets out to rescue his lover, who has been imprisoned in a castle. The plot sounds like an excuse for a journey that incorporates plenty of surrealist imagery, but it’s difficult to say how closely the poster relates to the film itself – it has plenty of his trademarks, such as the ants crawling on skin, and the melting clock, which has been cut and pasted from The Persistence of Memory (1931). Is this Dali’s sly commentary on the marketing of the celebrity artist, pre-empting the film’s production with recognisable but irrelevant iconography? Or did he do it to try and raise some money for the production? It’s interesting that he began with the publicity long before the shooting had begun, relishing the chance to pre-visualise it as a finished property.

This is the back up illustration for my Ethel Waters piece.

“Oh, Donald. I want to spend the rest of my life with you!”

“Baby, we’ll be together forever! I promise to love and cherish you for the rest of my life.”

I chuckled softly to myself as the couple kissed, the crowd behind them cheered, and the credits began to roll slowly on the fading television screen. Sitcoms were notorious for being corny and presenting a very unrealistic version of life, but romantic comedies were the worst of them all. If someone were to watch them with no prior romantic experience, they would probably think there is someone out there just waiting to bump into them in some “chance encounter”. What a crock.

Then again, I wasn’t the best person to dole out opinions when it came to anything romantic. Love was always a very tricky thing for me, much like algebra. In both instances, there were particular formulas required to fully comprehend everything, and I couldn’t understand any of them for the life of me. However, I’d rather attempt to solve one hundred thousand quadratic functions than be on the receiving end of another breakup line.

Hearing the words, “Leighton, I think you’re a nice guy, but maybe we should just be friends.” was the story of my life. I had heard that line so many times that I could actually pinpoint the time and place my phone would ring and I would receive the call that would end it all. The reasons they gave for ending the relationships were varied, but I’m sure all of the problems stemmed from the one thing I could not provide them—most of my attention.

Since my mother Yumi passed, all of the financial and parental responsibilities for the household were passed onto me. Learning to adapt to not having her there to lean on as a crutch was the hardest thing I ever experienced. Juggling double shifts as a police officer while trying to properly raise a rambunctious two year old didn’t leave much time to spend with anyone else, but it didn’t mean I was unable to do so.

My friends have said it’s “Just not the right time in my life to begin a serious relationship.” If not now, then when?

Not wanting to prolong my moment of self-loathing, I turned off the television and went to go pick up Sam. His cheerful nature always had an ability to bring a smile to my face when I was at my lowest.

I could never say I did not know what it felt like to be loved, because that’s all I felt when I held him in my arms.

_________________________
Nothing really happened in this part, sorry. Things will pick up in the next chapter. I guess this could be considered a prologue of sorts. (And yes, I did change Leighton’s career since I hate the athletic career in TS3)

My throat admitted it all: two hundred pounds in cash and a belly dancing hip scarf, coins and all. I had no problem with the notes; they were slightly hard to chew, bitter to the taste, probably enriched with germs from exotic lands I had never dreamt of visiting. The scarf was a different story. The red muslin felt rough and dry, the edges of the golden coins, bluntly cut, scratched the soft fleshy mucosa inside my throat. Halfway through, I tried to pull it out, regurgitate it fakir fashion. I imagined myself about to swallow a glittering cutlass in the midst of a colourful crowd, veiled women, turbaned men, tanned children with furiously white smiles and eyes like pools of liquid tar. The more I pulled, the harder the coins stuck to my insides, digging on the delicate pink flesh, invisible to my eyes but which I could picture clearly in my mind. My swelling, bleeding epiglottis, filled with a deafened jingling treasure. With horror, which soon yielded to resignation, I realized that I was choking. With clumsy fingers, I opened a little ivory coffer stuffed with pearls the size of a pigeon’s egg, sculpted silver rings, threads of ghostly coloured glass beads. One by one, I gorged on these delights, until their edges and threads, sticking and coiling their way down, strangled the remnants of my voice. Stuffed to the brim with these precious secrets, I thought ‘When they cut me open, I will burst on the slab like a pomegranate’.

I don’t have much information about Belgian photographer Raoul Ubac, but I was just looking at a few of his pieces that I saved.

A favorite…

I would like to find more surreal photography created before the advent of digital editing software. Suggestions?

(instead of the semicolon.  that’ll be subsequent.)  i’m getting just the text, on my foot.  BECAUSE MY FOOT ISN’T A PIPE, EITHER!  omfg.