It was the evening when Venus and Jupiter were perfectly aligned and reached its closest point to the human eye. I was getting ready for dinner with the “godfather” of American avant-garde cinema – Jonas Mekas. Filmmaker, poet and curator, Mekas is a living monument. He fled his native Lithuania at age 22, trying to avoid German arrest at home for anti-Nazi activities. During war, he spent time in various forced labor camps until immigrating to America in 1949. It was only in New York that he picked up his first camera, a Bolex, and ever since he’s been capturing “fragments of paradise” of the world around him. His diary films encompass a wide range of experiences and events, from his early experiences at the Warhol Factory to frenetic glimpses of a summer spent with Jackie Kennedy.  He also co-founded The Anthology Film Archives, a cathedral of independent cinema housing over 70,000 historic avant-garde films.

In his numerous interviews and appearances, Jonas answered pretty much any question one can think of so it seemed redundant to take a formal interview as an approach. Instead, I abandoned any mental script of this encounter and tipsy with awe and wine I just sat back, watching and listening to Jonas and his “holy madness” unravel before me to the cadence of a meal.

Written, filmed and edited by Barbara Anastacio
Sound by Marcelo Oliveira

Who is Eleanor Friedberger?  A musician, we think.

More importantly, who was Eleanor Friedberger’s miniature on-stage ingenue-companion during her March 24 performance at the Crowley Theater in Marfa, Texas? (Ballroom Marfa invited Eleanor to partake in a weeklong residency and recording session at the Marfa Recording Company which culminated in the performance at the Crowley).

Known formally as Ms. Olive Ingrid Leiss, this four-and-a-half-year-old O(racle) has shared deep wisdom and a conceptual sense of humor with her fellow townspeople since words first left her tiny voicebox. Olive speaks, dresses, moves and shakes her tiny fists with a perfectly balanced cocktail of compassionate and thoughtful ambition. She knows a lot of yoga and if she’s feeling up to it, she’ll demonstrate that knowledge on a whim – maybe it will be in her kitchen, or maybe it will be in the front yard of Marfa City Hall. When she looks at you, your heart and soul are simultaneously demolished and rebuilt, your lungs collapse and refill, you start thinking about Better Things, start remembering why you Like The World, start talking about Who Makes Magic, etc, etc…n Olive Ingrid Leiss is here to change her World, (obviously) starting with the town of Marfa.

Naturally, when Ms. Leiss agreed to take the stage with Ms. Friedberger, help her warm up the audience, shepherd Eleanor’s precarious path from the Outer depths to the Inner, we all breathed a deep sigh of relief. No better MC to guarantee a safe passing, Olive broke the ice for Eleanor with some perfectly selected knock-knock-based stand up comedy. Please review at your leisure and notice that although Eleanor flits in and out of a semi-assured stage persona, Olive stands still and strong throughout the length of her performance, delivering sharp wit and tender inflection with an unblinking calmness and sense of purpose.

Olive Ingrid Leiss, we are your biggest fans.

Text by Ryann Bosetti
Video by Alberto Halpern

Tanlines. The word, the name, conjures up not just the literal stain of the sun on your skin, but also that end-of-summer feeling when the traces of those hot nights, and sun-drenched days at the beach fade away and nostalgia for it all kicks in almost as soon as September rears its head. Tanlines, the band, evoke something similar. Already a familiar pair in Brooklyn, Jesse Cohen and Eric Emm who make up the band, have been working together since 2008, in which time they’ve proffered steadfast remixes for the likes of Glasser, Telepathy and Au Revoir Simone, played sold out shows at heavyweight art institutions around New York and toured extensively through Europe and the U.S, often sharing the bill with peers including Yeasayer, Julian Casablancas and Delorean. Their sound is synonymous not with summer, but with that idle feeling of wild abandon that is simply at its most visceral when you walk through New York in August. Go to a steamy, sweaty Tanlines show at Glasslands in mid-winter and you’re instantly transported. Since 2008, they have been on a lean curve of musical deviations, experimentation and collaborations – all of which led them to ‘Mixed Emotions’ – their debut album, released on True Panther Sounds this week. Building on their past two EPs; ‘Volume On’ (2009) and ‘Settings’ (2010), in both length and production value, this album is Tanlines at their most transparent and personal yet, with their past experience translating into a work that is decidedly mature and confident. Still dance-y, yes and still as compulsive as their previous work, but also inflected with something that might one day be called a classic Tanlines sound.

Eric’s songwriting and singing is more prevalent on this record and his baritone voice tempers out Jesse’s enraptured percussion. The two qualities are as distinct in personality as are Jesse and Eric themselves but the harmony between the two is apparent. It can’t be a coincidence that the lead track is called ‘Brothers’.
The clean and open production of the tracks showcase every instrument – guitar, synth, vocal, drums – as though each declared itself the lead role – allowing for compelling melodies that mar the pop, electro and dance tones with precision. Though well versed in production themselves, the man at the helm this time round was legendary producer Jimmy Douglass whose ability to make a hit just that has been showcased by the likes of AC/DC, Timbaland, Aaliyah, Television and Missy Elliot…suffice to say he has a few Grammy’s under his belt too. Not bad company. Half the record was made in New York, and midway through they switched it up, disbanding the city for Miami, which is where Jimmy came in to play. Perhaps it’s these two backdrops that helped spur the duality in sound.

Inviting someone with a unique vision to come on board can be daunting, particularly when that someone is as experienced as Jimmy Douglass. But despite (or maybe because of) their clear vision and willingness to be involved on all fronts, such a collaborative pairing is no anomaly for Jesse and Eric, with their visual output acting as an aesthetic continuation of their musical daring. Having played shows at the Guggenheim, the Whitney as well as MOMA PS1, Tanlines have somehow found themselves in the art world fold, a position they’re able to recognize with a heavy dose of self-deprecation and the objective view that such shows are designed to be mutually beneficial. Nevertheless, the pair show no signs of disingenuity when it comes to the visual talent that surrounds them and have called on the likes of artist Marisa Olsen and funnyman Julian Barratt to inject something unique into their music videos, allowing for a loose and evolving sense of image. As with the music, there is an willingness to experiment with technology. The video for ‘Brothers’ uses a new interactive panning tool – a bit like using Google Street view to navigate your way through a music video. Such attention paid to their visual output is Tanlines’ recognition that being in a band is a whole lot more than just putting out a 12-inch. The Internet music phenomenon, social networking, You Tube and the access to home spun video technology means you can’t afford to sit back and let someone else do the talking. Being actively involved on all fronts means you are, of course, closer to the people who listen to your music or watch your videos – and are therefore more aware of criticism and praise. For their online endeavors, Tanlines racked up a Village Voice Award last year for best Twitter band. I’m not sure what needs to be tweeted to receive such a contemporary accolade but whether it be winning Twitter awards, filming videos, playing museum shows or above all making music and stirring a crowd – Tanlines are clearly doing something right.

Siobhan Bohnacker: ‘Mixed Emotions’ is your first full-length album, but you’ve been together in Tanlines since 2008. This was awhile coming it seems. What sets this record apart from your previous EPs other than the format style? Has it allowed you to veer in a different direction creatively?

Tanlines: This album, for the most part, represents a period of time in our career. I know that it is our first album, but it really feels to us more like a second. A lot of times, a group’s first album is all of the material they had written up to the point that they got signed or decided to record something. It could be 4 years of material. The second album is the one that they have to figure out what they want to do and then sit down and write it. That is how we approached this album, and it was something we had never done before.

Siobhan: You worked on this record alone in NYC before heading to Florida to work with the prolific producer Jimmy Douglass. You’re both well versed in the aspects of production, having acted as producers yourselves, so do you find it hard when someone comes on board midway to hone what you have already worked on so closely together? Was this confounded by the change in location?

Tanlines: Well, we had already spent a year writing, producing and mixing the album ourselves. When Jimmy said he loved the album and wanted to mix it over the course of 10 days in Miami, it was a great opportunity. Mixing is a really subtle art, especially in the digital era, where we are bringing tons of sounds that we produced and mixed already to the session. We wanted to take everything out of our comfort zone and just sort of inject some additional magic into it. Jimmy’s career is absolutely amazing and his ears have heard everything. I think he really helped elevate our sound to a new level. As for Miami, working down there was about as far away from home as possible, which I think was great for us. It was also great to drive around Miami at 3 in the morning listening to new mixes on our car’s CD player.

Siobhan: When you played The Whitney there were a few Upper East Side types peering in from outside who seemed bemused but enraptured by your performance. It’s hard to contain the desire to dance to your songs. How does it feel to play to an audience in a museum environment, and how did this art world association come about?

Tanlines: That show at the Whitney was fantastic. I remember turning around and looking out the window behind us and seeing all kinds of people peering in from the street. It was really fun. The first museum that we played was a benefit at the New Museum, really early on in our career. Then we did the Guggenheim, opening for Yeasayer. At that point, we decided a goal of ours would be to play every museum in New York. I would love to say that we fit in at these places because we really art-y but also fun and interesting, but I believe it probably has just as much to do with the trend of booking parties at museums to bring in younger crowds… Still, I get to say that we’ve “shown our work” at the Guggenheim, Whitney, and PS1. Also, the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, Connecticut was amazing. Definitely the place where were closest to the artwork. My drum sticks were dangerously close to a Max Ernst painting.

Siobhan: I think Ernst might have appreciated the scene. So the art museum shows aren’t necessarily reflective of any desire to be designated art world darlings, but your own visual output certainly has a purposeful sense of aesthetic. Is the visual aspect to being in and promoting your band one that you enjoy being involved with?

Tanlines: Definitely. Music has a life of it’s own, but sometimes you want people to have a sense of who you are and where you are coming from. Your artwork, music videos, Internet presence, etc are ways that you can tell people a little bit more about who you are, what your aesthetic is, and where you are coming from. You can deliver a little bit of your personality that is hard to put into music. I think twitter is the best for this, but we have always tried to use visuals in the same way. For the artwork for the cover of this album, for example, we decided a long time ago that we just wanted a simple photograph of ourselves. Everything else we have always done has had lots of different layers and we wanted something that was as simple and honest and straightforward as possible with our album. I think it was important to us to not try to hide anything behind a layer of irony or anything like that. With the album, we wanted to say “this is who we are” and the artwork reflected that.

Siobhan: Tell me a bit about video for ‘Brothers.’ It uses a 360 degree camera allowing the viewer to move through the video. How did the concept come about?

Tanlines: Well, using the specific 360 degree camera was Dean from True Panther’s idea. When he brought it to us, we thought about how we could use it in a way that was interesting to us and honest and true to our personalities. We decided early on that we wanted something really simple and subtle and nothing too “crazy.” We talked about how unless you are Adele, you can’t really make a video that is just someone singing the song anymore. The whole Internet music video challenge is to make something that people will watch for about a minute or so, sadly. We knew that with the technology, people would watch the video for it’s novelty. We knew they’d hear the song, so we felt like we could make something really simple that we otherwise couldn’t get away with.

Siobhan: Has it set the tone for the next music video?

Tanlines: Actually, we shot a video in London for “All of Me” with Julian Barratt from the Mighty Boosh. It was all his idea and we just trusted that he would make something really unique and weird and funny. I think that’s what he did. I haven’t seen it yet, it’s not done, but I know that just based on our one day shooting with him that he assembled a super talented crew of people and I’m sure it will be really special thing when it is done.

Siobhan: Last year you won a Village Voice award for best NYC Twitter band. What did you tweet that put you above and beyond other bands? It must be nice to know people actually like what you write…

Tanlines: Sometimes, on the Internet, even with commenting and all that, you never really know if people are paying attention to you for more than one second at a time, so that was nice. On twitter, I just try to deliver a bit of my personality.

Siobhan: Jesse, you once said that you want to make music in a way that reflects that way you consume music, Is that something you still stand by?

Tanlines: We mostly listen to music on headphones, or while making breakfast, or out of a laptop, or while watching videos, and occasionally live. I think the music that we make works really well in all of those contexts.

Siobhan: The new record sounds somehow more rooted than your earlier work and I gather it was a true labor of love. Thoughtful, nostalgic and timeless yet still fresh and looking-forward. What do you feel makes a good song?

Tanlines: I think we spent the first two years or so of our career figuring out a palette of sounds that we like, lots of drums, certain snare sounds, synth sounds, guitar sounds, vocals, etc. When we started to write this album, we reached for that palette and didn’t really have to think about what kinds of sounds we like, so we could write whatever kinds of songs we wanted. When we wrote “Green Grass,” which is a fuzzy kind of rock/new wave song, we were like “does this sound like a Tanlines song?” and the answer we decided was always yes. We wrote it, we think it’s really good, so it’s us, and so it sounds like us. I hope people will trust us and listen to us with open ears in that way.

Siobhan: Tell me a little about your relationship with Dean Bein, head of True Panther Sounds. He’s certainly cultivated a very choice community of artists that in a collective sense seems to be gaining momentum. Do you feel at home with this label?

Tanlines: Dean was our first fan. He was at the very first performance we ever gave, which was absolutely horrible, but he loved it. You always want to work with people who are true fans of what you are doing because they “get it” and they can talk convincingly about what they like about what you do. It’s something you really can’t fake. Dean is really successful at what he does because he is a fan of everything he puts out. He also has a really unique style, he’s really smart, and everyone who meets him likes him. I would love to work more people like him, but I don’t think very many exist.

Siobhan: When interviewing a band and/or talking about a particular record, it’s easy to assume that making music is simply what you do, without thinking too much about why you do it, and to focus on the specifics. But to wake up and want to make sounds and record them is not something that comes naturally to everyone and is quite a unique gift. PJ Harvey once told me that making music was like breathing and it was something she had to do every day. In the most abstract sense, what is it you really love about making music and why do you make it?

Tanlines: There are two moments I think that are really amazing when you write music. One is when you are writing and you enter a strange zone where your right brain is super active and things come out of you that are outside of your control. Sometimes that stuff turns out to be not so good, but sometimes it is truly magical. It’s like how you can’t make up a dream that is as good as a real dream that you didn’t even have to try to make up. I think a good goal is to put yourself to be in a position to be in that zone as often as you can. Every day would be amazing, but life does get in the way. The other moment is when you perform a song for people or even when you play a recording for someone and you get to hear it through their ears. It is amazing how different something sounds when you play it for them. When people respond to it positively, when you feel like you have made something that means something to someone else, it is a great feeling.

Siobhan: Other than the release of the record, do you guys have anything else planned for 2012 in terms of musical offerings? Are you interested in writing with other people?

Tanlines: We would love to be writing as much as possible, and we would love to write with other people. We’ve done a little of that, but it’s definitely something we want to do more of in our career.

All photos by Jenny Hueston.

Who would think a former Miss Teen Wisconsin’s pearly whites would extend from ear to ear when talking about bathing in blood or starting a cult? But this sums up the complex, varied and arguably balanced nature of artist and Ford model Myla DalBesio.

The modeling industry has pegged her as the next Crystal Renn while the art world has tossed around names such as Marina Abramovic when describing the emerging artist’s fiercely ambitious and honest performance work. Myla caught major attention a few months ago during the Chelsea Art Walk for her show entitled Young Money, where she gave willing participants bare-breasted, “faith-healing” lap dances while doused in cheap champagne. Now, she moves closer to the religious aspect of her work with the first piece in a new series entitled Holy Ghost, presented at the SPRING/BREAK Art Show (a new curator-driven art fair during the Armory Arts Week, March 6 – 11)

After rushing to arrive from a long day on set, Myla punctured the stillness of a quiet room with a surge of colorful energy, greeting me with a huge hug and a bottle of wine. In conversation and in practice, she seems to have a firm grip on the balance between the lighter and darker sides of life, as she jumped from beautifully painted tales of frolicking nude in South American oceans under the veil of psychedelic substances to the death of both of her parents.

While it’s interesting that Myla’s plus-sized modeling career is soaring in the absence of Crystal Renn, I would rather talk about enchanted herbs and sacred rituals than fashion, body image or modeling because, if I have learned anything from Myla’s work, it’s that you’re allowed to curate the world in which you would like to exist. You decide what it looks like and who gets to live there, and today Myla is my favorite visitor. If her adorable Betty Page smile and endearing Wisconsin accent (Oh my gaad!) do not mesmerize you, perhaps her ideas will.

Jacquelyn Gallo: Tell me about your new work.

Myla DalBesio: I’m showing a sculptural and photo installation.  It’s the first piece in what I intend to be a series called Holy Ghost. This one specifically is called Holy Ghost: We Can Make You Pure. Its all about purity and protection. I was really thinking a lot about the idea of baptism going into this.

Jacquelyn: Were you baptized?

Myla: No, I was not raised in a very religious household. For many years we practiced in a Unitarian Universalist church which makes you open to everything. Then we stopped going. My mother had cancer and when she was nearing the end she adopted a Christian Science faith. I put a lot of faith in that and then she died. I think I lost every sense of faith in God that I had for a long time. I remember being like, “I don’t believe in God, I’m an atheist!” which I don’t find to be true anymore. I guess I would say I am “spiritual.” But I am still fascinated by religion of all types, specifically Catholicism and its ties to Pagan religion, like with Voodoo and Santeria, and the parallel between the two like the worshipping of different saints and deities. That’s where this piece is coming from. What I’m trying to do is create what I’ve colloquially been calling “spirit saints.” This is the first of that series. I shot the photo in Pennsylvania last summer, it’s my boyfriend in the photo.

Jacquelyn: Is he a spirit saint?

Myla: (laughs) I wouldn’t call him a saint. He gives a lot to me, more on a partner level than an idolizing level.

Jacquelyn: So the spirit saints, how did that form in your head? Do you see these saints? Is it only a creative thing or something you feel spiritually inclined to do or both?

Myla: I don’t see myself ever worshipping at the alter of these saints. It’s more an expression of these different focuses and energies that I feel and sense in nature and in the world. It’s a manifestation of that and less of something to be worshipped. Although, the way that I’m presenting it, is more in the vein of something that’s being worshipped. Basically, I’m building an altar to the spirit saint. A lot of materials I used are coming from the reference of magical herbs like grass and pine. Also what I find purifying like salt, the ocean, crystals. But also I feel this strange connection to other materials like fake nails and horse hair and eyeshadows. I like the idea of these everyday things that you become obsessed with.

Jacquelyn: You’re attracted to rituals?

Myla: Yes, the ritualistic aspects of these kinds of things. I’ve always been obsessed with this idea of creating a religion, creating something totally different but incorporating all of my interests. Like when Evangelicals get possessed by the holy spirit and they speak in tongues, that’s something I find really attractive, and saint candles, alters, things like that. So, taking little pieces from all of these practices and combining them into one imaginary practice.

Jacquelyn: And the name Holy Ghost?

Myla: I’m so attached to that name. It holds so much power, it’s creepy but amazing. In Evangelical practices they talk about washing in the blood of Jesus. This is an amazing blessing where you feel clean afterward but really what they’re talking about is bathing in blood.

Rosalie Knox (photographer): That is so metal!

Myla: (laughs) I mean obviously they don’t mean it in a literal sense but when you break it down in the literal sense it is so creepy!

Jacquelyn: And awesome.

Myla: And awesome!

Jacquelyn: You mentioned Voodoo and Santeria. Some people think that it’s a darker side of magic. Are you attracted to a darker element and how does that play out in your work?

Myla: Absolutely, I’m definitely attracted to the darker aspect of life in general. What’s interesting about Voodoo is that it gets this loose rap of being terrible, like this Hollywood zombie/Voodoo doll thing but really, it’s not like that at all, it’s a practiced religion.

Jacquelyn: Do you think that magic can have a real influence though?

Myla: I think it’s more about energies. I’m really into symbolism and how to practice magic with herbs by enchanting them. I think mostly what it is is a concentration of energies. The most important thing is visualizing and focusing all of your energy on this thing that you want to achieve. The way I look at it is, if you’re focusing constantly on this thing you want to achieve you’re going to achieve it anyway because that’s what you’re putting all of your time and energy into. It’s a reminder, think about this thing that you want, work towards it. Put out that energy into the universe and then you can reap the benefits from it.

Jacquelyn: Have you heard of the laws of attraction?

Myla: Yeah, or The Secret (laughs). I was researching cults for a few months. I had this idea in the future, in the same vein of creating this religion, of creating a Jim Jones cult type of thing. I just always thought it would be so interesting to approach it like it was real. I told a friend of mine, if I really get into this you have to make sure that I don’t start believing what I was saying. No one ever starts something going “I’m gonna start a cult, then we’re gonna get all freaky and then I’m gonna tell everybody to kill themselves.” I think everything starts with the best intentions and then it turns when you get power, when you realize how much you are influencing people. It really fucks with your head when you realize you can get away with anything and when you have no limits or boundaries. What that can do to a person I think is really interesting… and terrifying.

Jacquelyn: What motivates you to want that power?

Myla: I don’t want that power! It’s tough and that’s why I was warning my friend to keep me in check. I don’t feel that desire to be in control of people. I mean I’m really bossy and I’ll give advice to everyone on what I think is right, but I’m not a puppet master and I don’t aspire to be that. But I do find that personality really fascinating so I’m interested in pursuing that. I think I haven’t taken it there because I’m not strong enough to do that yet, to push the art side of it as far as I possibly can without letting it change me and who I really am. But I do have it all planned out!

Jacquelyn: You do?!

Myla: Yeah, I started writing the manifesto. But I also have 8 million projects going at one time because I’m so ADD.

Jacquelyn: Well, the most important part is knowing what the cult followers are going to wear, so I hope you have that down.

Myla: Clearly! The other thing I’m working on right now is trying to meld what I see as two different sides of my artistic interests. One of those sides is this religious, mystical, spiritual, hippie shit. And the other side is this obsession with all the gross, awesome, crazy shit that happens in our everyday lives, and that’s where Young Money came from.

Jacquelyn: Yes, tell me about Young Money. I thought it was amazing… unless you don’t want to talk about it?

Myla: I said the other day that anytime someone asks me about it in an interview I’m just going to say, “I’m not talking about it anymore!” (laughs), but I’m just being whiny because that’s all anyone ever asks me about. As soon as you take your tits out, that’s what everyone wants to hear about. What’s funny is that it was not my intention to be topless. I bought a swimsuit that was purposely way too small for me because I wanted it to cut into my fat in an unappealing way. The goal was to try to make myself as ugly as possible (note: during the piece Myla wore heavily applied fake tanner, makeup and a tight bathing suit) and then  everything gets stripped away. The fake tanner came off all over the walls, on the people I was touching and the pillow and clearly my swimsuit came off. It is interesting because while that wasn’t the intention going into it, what came out of it was so much more than that not just for the piece itself but for me personally. The growth that I experienced through that piece was something that I was not expecting and it was really hard to deal with.

Jacquelyn: How did you feel after?

Myla: Really fucked up. I was physically fucked up because I consumed so much champagne, but also mentally. For an hour I was sobbing in the shower. There was so much emotion and so much connection to so many different individuals that were complete strangers. When I was sitting with someone in the performance I was really focused on giving myself to that person and really being true to the connection that we were sharing and trying to illicit the same from them. That is really emotionally draining and afterwards it was like I had nothing left inside of me. I’ve never really experienced that feeling before. It was so powerful to be that exposed and raw with complete strangers.

Jacquelyn: To me it seemed like you were working out a lot of issues with shame. Did you feel shameful afterward?

Myla: I definitely felt shame. That’s interesting that you say that, I guess maybe I haven’t really addressed that before. Looking back, watching the footage, the feeling that I get is the same kind of feeling when I walk down the street and guys are hollering at me. That kind of experience always makes me close up, I find myself slouching down, almost cowering. But I still feel proud of this piece because I’ve gotten a lot of feedback from people who participated in it and they really picked up on what I was trying to do.

Jacquelyn: Both men and women?

Myla: Yeah, both men and women. The shame really comes from the people who didn’t get it. It’s not that I am ashamed of myself or what I did. It’s just a feeling of being uncomfortable because someone is taking advantage of you, taking advantage of the situation and taking it totally out of context. And that’s really disappointing. There was a guy who sat down towards the end of the piece who was constantly trying to grab my breasts and that is so offensive to me.

Jacquelyn: It’s important though.

Myla: Yeah, and I’m glad that I had that experience.

Jacquelyn: You’re taking one for the team.

Myla: I mean, I definitely did. I needed someone to sit down in that chair and be a total asshole. But you know what is so funny?  The next day he added me on Facebook! I was like are you fucking serious? No, I will not be your friend! But I’m glad he was a dick because it made the experience more powerful. Something that I find really tricky about this is that I almost feel like I’m exploiting these women that do this on an everyday basis. It’s tough because that is never my intention, to exploit women like that in any way. I felt an ounce of what they must experience constantly and it was just so hard. I can only imagine you have to make yourself numb in the same way that I am now numb to all of these assholes who yell at me when I walk down the street. You just have to put on your headphones and block it out.

Jacquelyn: Now your work is really focused on spirituality. How does ego, control and realization of the self play into it, does that come out in your work?

Myla: Sure. Honestly I really feel like any artist that’s practicing and willing to put their shit out there has to have some kind of major ego, otherwise how are you going to have the balls to do it because you face so much criticism every time you do anything. We all suffer from insecurities but you have to really believe in what you’re doing in order to get it out there and I do.

Jacquelyn: Before our interview you were telling me that you were going to do a performance piece but because of issues with the church and the space you weren’t able to. Can you tell me a little about what happened with the performance you had planned but are now unable to do?

Myla: Oh yeah, it’s not anyone’s fault, there’s no blame to be cast anywhere. The space that the show is in is an old Catholic school and it’s still in control of the church. The people that run it were concerned. Honestly, I respect the church. A lot of what I say or do and what I intend to do in the future could easily be interpreted as anti-religious or anti-Catholic but it’s not. I hold these religions and these practices in the highest regard and I respect what they’re doing and I wouldn’t want to be in their own space stepping on their toes. What I had originally planned was a performance that was going to tie into the piece that I have installed involving acts of contrition, group purification and baptism. It seems like that might have been a little too touchy to move forward with so the piece changed into something else involving the social construct of what makes a woman feminine and desirable. I hang out with a lot of girls that don’t feel the need to embrace that kind of acceptable femininity. I was going to take over this giant boy’s bathroom in the school. I was really inspired by a road trip I took through Appalachia with some very dear friends of mine all of whom had very short hair and one of whom looks very androgynous. She used to live as a boy when she was younger. She’s no longer doing that but she still has some masculine features in her face. Going through the rural parts of Appalachia, she had to basically masquerade as a boy because that’s what everyone was addressing her as and there was such an air of aggression and hostility towards anyone that wasn’t known. It became really terrifying after a while to the point where she felt she had to use the boy’s bathroom. So I was really thinking a lot about girls in the boy’s bathroom. That’s where this piece that is no longer happening came from. But that didn’t take place because of spatial restrictions. I was asked to make a number of compromises which, because I’m such a dick about how I want my work presented, I wasn’t willing to make.

Jacquelyn: So will this work take place somewhere else?

Myla: Hopefully, and maybe even in the same building just under different circumstances.

Jacquelyn: Is there anything else coming up that you want to plug or talk about?

Myla: I’m in the process of confirming a performance for a show in Europe, possibly to take place at the beginning of next year. It’s focused on the American ideal of the perfect woman and how it’s been recycled. I think of it as very 1970s/80s but this Americana woman is still being recycled through all of the young hip kids’ work, like chicks in jean jackets in front of American flags, drinking beer. I don’t hate that image – I think of myself as an American fucking chick! I have an American flag shirt and jean jacket and I love to drink beer, but it’s more about this idea that’s being forced upon you. When I think about making work, what comes easiest to me is the feminist bullshit because I come from that point of view, I am a woman and I work in the (fashion) industry. But I’m also interested in so many other things I have to remind to take it a step further and not just go with what’s easiest. I really respect and admire where the feminist artists have taken us but I also feel this desire to take it further. It would be an injustice to keep spitting out the same work.

Jacquelyn: How do you juggle mainstream modeling with your artist’s life?

Myla: Modeling is a job. What makes it wonderful is when I get to do things that are really creative, like editorial. I shot with Jeff Bark for Dazed and Confused a few months ago and watching him work was an experience that I probably would have paid for because I learned so much. But as for the stuff that’s not so interesting or exciting, it’s just a job. As for my art, part of my obsession with being totally in control of everything that I make and how I present my work, is because in the fashion and modeling industry I have no control over anything. It’s someone else’s concept that I’m trying to make happen and I really have no control over my own image. So I feel a strong desire in the other part of my life to have full control.

Photographs by Rosalie Knox

Neal Medlyn took up residence at The Kitchen this past weekend with his badass show Wicked Clown Love. Based on the Detroit rap duo Insane Clown Posse (ICP) and their followers, known as Juggalos and Juggalettes, Medlyn performed with his two main sidekicks, Farris Craddock and Carmine Covelli, and a cast of Juggalos. This is a continuation of Medlyn’s performance work in which he takes pop music icons, such as Beyonce, Britney Spears, or Phil Collins, and creates an entire piece based on them. ICP provides ready-made mythology and rituals based on their highly developed sub-cult following. Medlyn serves it all up: lunatic clown aesthetic, Faygo showers (ICP drink of choice that’s constantly sprayed on fans and themselves), and recreating their yearly music festival gathering in the woods complete with wrestling and other debaucherous activity. Everything in the world of ICP happens in The Dark Carnival, a space in which the battle between good and evil is proselytized. It’s a space centered upon male bonding and shared knowledge of rituals. At one point in the show Medlyn creates a safe circle for any member to step up and share about anything they need to get off their chest or throw out some rhymes, but first he purifies the space with a spray can of Old Spice.

Breaking character, Medlyn diverged into stories of his early 20’s in Texas, like writing hot checks at Wal-Mart in the middle of the night while high. The structure of his work is very closely tied to that of performance artist Ann Liv Young. They both share a love for singing over other people’s songs, using those songs as a story telling means to push along a narrative, and they break into highly confessional personal monologues that implore the audience to feel a close connection to their lives.

Half the performance is based on watching Medlyn be a karaoke king in his own show. His persona is extremely convincing and he’s actually a good rapper. Whether you can get into his topic or not, the story he’s telling through ICP is one of camaraderie and the human need to connect with one another. Aggressive and nihilistic at first the story gives way to transformation and miracles. Faygo showers are given the power to turn energy from negative to positive, clearing away the past to give way to the future, that sounds like a good ol’ baptism to me. What becomes clear by the end is that the carnival is a space to encounter God, to make a choice between good and evil, and to participate in a community. Through the story telling structure of the six Joker Cards, you are lead through a personal and social battle of whether you can judge your moral behavior by the ultimate end point of entry to heaven or hell. ICP has oscillated from confirming and denying the intentionality of their “God message”. Medlyn made it very clear in one of his monologues that he wanted to talk to us about negation that night. Having vaguely encountering ICP culture in high school, Medlyn’s performance creates a safe space at which to be a second hand voyeur of his re-enactments of Juggalo behavior. I was only too thrilled at the real life Juggalos in the house.

Photograph by Paula Court

Starting today, the Abrons Art Center is hosting a ten-day long festival of contemporary performance called American Realness. Combining many different aspects of experimental performance art including dance, traditional theater, drag shows and concerts, the festival has over 46 performances of 20 productions. There is also a bookstore and a pop-up cafe to provide respite for those hunkering down for the daily marathon of performance art.

Although all of the artists look like they will prove to be amazing, especially on my radar is The Heather Lang Show by Eleanor Bauer and Vice Versa, which is being billed as a “double one-woman show,” that somehow incorporates QVC, spirituality and drag. Did I mention there is voguing? I am imagining stand up comedy meets Paris is Burning meets Jerry Springer. Let me explain, Heather Lang, by trade is a professional dancer working in tons of the top Broadway shows, who also happens to be one of funniest people I have ever met. She is super pretty but isn’t afraid to get ugly and pour milk on her face to make you laugh. I’ve seen her do this. The press release says to expect talk shows, critiques on cultural identity and of course, drag. I’d put my money on this being a pretty awesome and entertaining show.

Performances are January 5 at 10pm, January 8 at 6pm, January 11 at 11pm and January 15 at 9pm at The Abrons Arts Center, Underground Theater, 466 Grand Street, NYC. Tickets are available here.

Although the Long Island-based quintet Twin Sister just released their first full-length album, In Heaven, this fall, the band has previously released two EPs (Color Your Life in 2010 and Vampires With Dreaming Kids in 2008), and they have enough unofficial material online to create at least two additional albums. The band’s five members—singer Andrea Estella, keyboardist Dev Gupta, bassist Gabel D’Amico, guitarist-singer Eric Cardona and drummer Bryan Ujueta—first met on the Long Island band circuit, where they grew up in adjacent towns. They officially formed a band in the summer of 2008, layering Andrea’s breathy vocals, which range from a suffused whisper to kittenish purring to a ghoulish rasp, with the band’s hypnotic dreamscape sounds. Since then, they have gained worldwide renown and a cult-like following.

As Twin Sister’s European tour was winding down, Andrea sat down before her Parisian show to speak with us about the band’s homegrown approach to making music videos, old versus new songs, her obsession with zany hairstyles and how Nickelodeon led her to her first rock experience.

Sarah Moroz: You played a cover from Italo-disco maestros La Bionda when you played your Paris concert last year. I can’t think of anything more different than your sound, and yet it was one of the most fun and electrifying covers I’ve heard. How did you decide to do that song?

Andrea Estella: I don’t know how we chose that song, actually. I think I or one of us found the video on YouTube. We really liked [it] and were like, “Oh, we could do this!”

Sarah: Are there any other covers you’d be interested in performing?

Andrea: We haven’t really been working on any in a long time. We’ve been playing longer sets now than we used to; we have more music now. We might work on another cover; I don’t know what yet, though.

Sarah: So can you talk a bit more about the new stuff?

Andrea: We’re playing songs from the album In Heaven. So, it’s kind of pushing some of the older ones out of the way, but we’re still keeping a couple—even bringing back one or two that are really old, and then trying to work out the new songs. We’ll practice them when we get home so they’ll be better developed. We started the tour playing “Kimmi in a Ricefield” and then we stopped because we felt it wasn’t ready yet, even though it’s probably fine. We’re just crazy.

Sarah: On your blog, you have work that references both Kimmi and Lady Daydream in the titles. Can you tell me more about your work as a visual artist? What is the relationship between the art you make and the songs—–do the two bleed into each other?

Andrea: They bleed. Originally with Kimmi, I made a story—a short story. It changed a little bit for the lyrics, shortened the story even more. I just made up characters. And then we made it into a video, which is another version of Kimmi. But that original was a very innocent little…like an anime character.

Sarah: Can you talk a bit more about the child-like tropes? I feel like that’s a bit of a theme. In the video for “Bad Street,” there’s a piñata and chalk drawings—there’s a playfulness.

Andrea: Even me and my boyfriend—he’s the bass player [Gabel d’Amico]—we’re really childlike. We’re always talking in baby voices (laughs), being idiots. I think we’re just a bunch of dopey kids, so it just comes through. I love cartoons and toys and kids.

Sarah: What was your first concert?

Andrea: My dad surprised me. I came home from school one day when I was like…nine—eight or nine. I don’t know if you know the show Pete and Pete? It used to be on Nickelodeon II. They’re brothers and they’re both named Pete. And there was a band at the time that was kind of popular, Luscious Jackson…?

Sarah: Yeah! “Naked Eye!”

Andrea: So they were on an episode of Pete and Pete, and I started getting into the band. I came home one day, and my dad loved to surprise me so he just put me in the car and his friend came, and we saw Luscious Jackson. I was like the youngest kid there, and I still have this tank top that has Luscious Jackson written kind of graffiti-style on it. That was my first show.

Sarah: Do you ever try to channel anyone or use other front women as inspiration for being onstage?

Andrea: I don’t think about it too much. I do like Cyndi Lauper, but I’m not really like her ’cause she’s kind of insane and she does really weird dance moves, stuff like that. I also like how Björk is onstage. She doesn’t talk very much. She just kind of dances silly, like I do, but not as weird as Cyndi Lauper.

Sarah: You have had all different types of hairstyles over the years. Even now, your hair is in this really pretty kind of crown braid. Is that part of your style in general, or is that part of your “I’m performing” style?

Andrea: Hair is like a hobby in my family. When I was in middle school or even younger, my mom let me dye my hair so I had blue hair and purple. Me and my sister would get into extensions and my brother would have to have a mohawk—we’ve always been into messing with our hair. Whenever I go home, my sister is always getting me to dye my hair.

Sarah: So do you have your eye on a next style?

Andrea: I have a tub of violet hair dye that I want to use but now I’m not so sure because this blonde, with the weather changing, is breaking. But I really want to dye it light, light lilac or violet. Sometimes I have sea foam hair and all of a sudden brown, normal; blonde. And I wear wigs. I mess around with all that stuff. I like looking different every day.

Sarah: Being from New York, does being a “New York band” mean anything to you?

Andrea: I mean, we just are a New York band. We all grew up in New York; we’re all from Long Island. We grew up going to the city as kids. We just are a New York band—it’s not like we moved there for college and met up with other kids from Arizona. My family’s in New York. It must feel different for other bands. They go there looking for whether they’re going to be a painter or model. They go there and they’re like, “Yes, I made it! I’ve been here for four or five years. I’m a New Yorker!” I’ve been going to shows since I was in high school in New York.

Sarah: But does being a New York band have a kind of connotation of creative locality? Do you feel part of a New York music community?

Andrea: I guess there are different pockets of people. My friends have always been New Yorkers because we’ve been going to shows there since we were kids. But then there are other people who go there because it’s a hip place to be and it’s this whole cool, hip scheme to play a certain bar in Williamsburg or whatever. We just play wherever. We like Silent Barn. I don’t know; it’s weird when I talk about Brooklyn… There isn’t much going on on Long Island so you just go and travel to Williamsburg. It’s more popular than it ever was. Now it’s like overload, but it’s cool. Especially from touring around the US, there are a lot of special people that need a special place to go that their hometown can’t give them.

Sarah: You made all these extra mp3s available online: demos, different versions of songs that didn’t make it on the album… It’s quite generous to share all of that. Musicians are usually very careful about what songs they release to the public. Why did you decide to put all these songs in varied stages of completion out there?

Andrea: Originally, we used to show ideas to our friends, because we weren’t a band yet. We just didn’t care. Some of them would jump on that idea and think it was really cool. Then it turned into strangers listening to it. I like some of the earlier ideas, unfinished recordings. People are evolving with music because no one really buys music anymore. It’s also cool because you put it on the website and it’s free and [people] like it. It’s better than them getting it from some rip on YouTube. It’s just nice to see early versions of finished songs too.

Sarah: What about the videos? How much do you get involved in those?

Andrea: Oh, I get in there. I’m bad at letting go. I was a visual artist before being a musician, which became more dominant. [The videos] are my way of getting visual with music, which is so fun. I did the art direction for the music videos that we have so far: “All Around,” “Bad Street” and then “Kimmi in a Ricefield.” “Kimmi in a Ricefield” was a big, nice studio. We got to work with a big, nice open space and a team. That one was a step up. It came out cool. It was a 22-hour day, and I got minor hypothermia from that video. I did the art directing but then I also had to do the acting. Luckily, I had a friend to help me with the art direction while I was acting. I sat in cold water in wet clothes on my knees all day, but it was so much fun. Music videos are so old school—when you’re little, you watch music television. It’s my favorite part. It’s like, “Oh, I can’t wait ‘til the music video comes out!” It’s really important to me.

Sarah: ”All Around and Away We Go” is a really funny video—it doesn’t visually match the sound at all.

Andrea: We were supposed to have a studio space…the guy was supposed to pick up the key, but we got locked out. We ended up going to this house on Long Island that we were living in and using it as a practice space, and we had to shoot it in the house. We didn’t have enough room to pull the camera out far enough, [so] we had to cut a lot of it. Dance scenes don’t look good unless it’s the whole body. We had to do from the knee up, which doesn’t register as much. And then we did a lot of stop-animation. It was really fun.

Sarah: The contrast of the kitschy feel with the ethereal sound is quite unexpected.

Andrea: What inspired us for that video was Teen Dream, this little pop trio. They had a one-hit wonder sort of thing. Their video is really scary, because they have a stop-motion animation of a guy coming in and he has a paper body and his head is an actual photograph and it’s moving and then he falls apart and then he comes back together—and there are clouds going by behind him and weird three-dimensional shapes. Then it goes to three girls dancing with a projection on them… The song is “Let’s Get Busy”, it’s from the ’80s.

Sarah: There’s one line I really like: “Feel the power of my many destinies.” Does it feel like you have many destinies?

Andrea: Already, when I go home I want to work on sculptures. I’m really into food, too. I don’t think music is the only thing for me. I’m a Gemini; I want to do many things. So yeah, there are many destinies for me. There’s a lot of time, so I hope to do more—maybe work on other music videos with other people, like friends who are in bands. Oberhofer, they’re also a Brooklyn band; I’d like to make their music video. They don’t have a music video yet. I’d be a lot of fun. There’s no money in that either (laughs).

Sarah: Right, well, why start now?

Andrea: (Laughs) Yeah, why? I’m going to live with my parents forever!

Image by Shawn Brackbill

As things wind down at Basel, here are some final shots of parties, the fair, and Miami itself.

Above photo: Monday, December 5: Leaving Miami 

Sunday, December 4: Art Basel Miami Beach 

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Sunday, December 4: Art Basel Miami Beach 

Sunday, December 4: She Got Her Man, Art Basel Miami Beach fair

Sunday, December 4: Lazy barbeque, Standard Hotel

Sunday, December 5: Cabaret at the Paris Paris party at the Shelbourne Hotel 

Monday, December 5: Lobby of the Shelbourne Hotel, 4 am

Maybe more interesting than what happens at the Art Basel Miami Beach fair during the day is what happens at night during the parties. Here are photos from some of those events that have taken place over the past few days.

Above photo: Friday, December 2: Gagosian Gallery party at The Standard Hotel

Thursday, December 1: The X-Patsys (Robert Longo, Barbara Sukowa and Jon Kessler) performing at The New World Symphony

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Friday, December 2: Visionaire party at The Delano Hotel 

Thursday, December 1: Le Baron Miami at The Delano Hotel, late night

Thursday, December 1: A Frank Ghery-designed building at the Performa Ten Great Years Celebration

Friday, December 2: Dzine installation launch, hosted by Andre Balazs and with Kanon Vodka at The Standard Hotel

Saturday, December 3: Jerry’s Diner, 5:30 am

“Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” So the idiom goes, anyway. I began to ponder the expression as I watched the real life mannequins of Perfect Prototype, Kinematik’s performance dance piece, scoot crab-like across the floor of the John Ryan Theater in Dumbo. Each of the six women was dressed monochromatically in black, with jet bobs cutting hard against their geisha-powdered faces. Their limbs wrenched robotically as they yanked prosthetic limbs from Tiffany blue bags and tried them on for size.  All the while clips from Nip/Tuck, Access Hollywood, and America’s Next Top Model reeled on an antenna TV in the background.

Was this beautiful, I asked myself—people scrambling for perfection? After all, I have eyes and I believe that as an audience member I qualified as a “beholder.” These mimes were unequivocally creepy. Aesthetically, they were less than pleasing. And what is an idiom, really? It’s just a phrase that is peculiar to a specific demographic, a string of words that has no obvious meaning. Basically, an idiom is just nonsense, charming people with its clever little mask.

Yet, this is the “wisdom” that mothers share with their daughters as they trudge through the psychological quicksand of puberty. Teenage girls look in the mirror and realize that although they’ve grown breasts, they don’t look anything like Barbie, the sham model of the “everywoman” who had been thrust into their hands before they even learned what a breast was.  Barbie, a doll who if brought to life would be anatomically impossible, has become the ideal. With her back-breaking boobs, ridiculous waist-hip and leg-to-body ratios, she’d be unable to stand-up on her own two, slivery feet. Is it any wonder then that in 2010 about 9 million women opted for the knife, needle, or laser—this number accounting for 92% of all cosmetic procedures[1]? Sure, Mom’s recycled 2-cents on beauty is sweet. But, who are we going to believe: a loving parent, or Barbie and her imitators on TV?

The latter, of course. Leggy, anime facial features, double F-cups: that’s the American dream. Beauty, it turns out, isn’t subjective; it’s a standard that is instated by pop culture. We as Americans are so used to Barbie iconoclasm that it actually makes sense to us. Of course we think it’s “normal” for women to want to be toothpicks (yet miraculously busty) and have upturned noses. Have you ever wondered, though, how it looks to an outsider?

A couple of weeks ago, I had the privilege of meeting the young and über-talented Svea Schneider, who is not only a dancer but also the choreographer and the brains behind Perfect Prototype. Originally from the French border town of Landau, Germany, Schneider came to the United States in 2003 to attend class at the Broadway Dance Center, and is now officially a New Yorker thanks to an O1 Visa for People with Extraordinary Ability. Ms. Schneider has had a front row seat to the American media spectacular for over 8 years now and she has a lot to say about the intoxicating deluge of images to which we females are suggested to conform. The dance, which debuted at last year’s Jazz Choreography Enterprises’ annual showcase, is a concerned, satirical portrayal of just that.

“I can definitely say that the obsession for the perfect body aesthetic is much more developed and exaggerated in the US,” states Schneider, a woman who hails from what seems to me to be the motherland of human Aphrodites: Claudia Schiffer, Heidi Klum, Diane Kruger, among others. So, why is she finger-pointing? Is she being hypocritical? No, I decided. She’s not. It’s not that Germany and other countries don’t admire beautiful women, it’s just that they don’t necessarily glorify them. While hairstyles and clothing may be emulated, non-American women are less likely to go to extreme measures to look like a pinup. And Schneider thinks that she may know the reason.

“As far as plastic surgery is concerned, it is most definitely more readily available and popular in the US than I imagine anywhere else in the world,” Schneider says, continuing, “This might have to do with the fact that the big film industry and Hollywood are in the US. I find it kind of scary how alike everyone looks in Hollywood. Yes, some are blonde and some are redheads, but besides these minor differences, mostly everyone looks the same.”

That’s because everyone wants to look like a model—a prototype—eschewing individuality to blend in with the crowd, trading in the genetic for the generic. Even if that means being physically compromised or just straight-up unhealthy. At one point during the show, one of the more petite women hobbles around on a plastic leg that has been plucked from the pelvic socket of a 6-foot tall mannequin. Another mock-vomits in the corner. Is she nauseated by the charade in which she’s participating, or is she just bulimic in pursuit of the magical size 0?

Revolting? Yes, but that’s the point. It’s very much an expressionistic piece. There’s something about the women that reminds me of a post-World War I painting; it’s as if they’ve been peeled from one of George Grosz’s canvasses.  They’re fleshy automatons who have seen the future and they know the devastating capabilities of modern technology. You (women especially) pity these poor creatures because you can relate to them. On the one hand you’re deeply disturbed by what’s going in front of you, but as much as you’d like to say that it’s not an accurate portrayal of life, you can’t help but sympathize. It evokes the most primal of emotions: the need to be loved. You want to look the way the women in magazines look because the physical features of the breathing Barbie dolls are what attract others. Right?

I certainly hope that people would prefer the authentic over the artificial, but it feels like wishful thinking. I mean, there we were: three rows of individuals, most of us women, huddled in a lonely venue in the underskirt of industrial Brooklyn. Before the lights went down, Svea and her cultural comrades stripped to reveal six sweaty bodies, and six mazes of Sharpie sketches—the blueprints of plastic surgeons. As I focused on the far screen, which featured an illuminated image of the Mona Lisa fitted with the same jet bob that the dancers wore, I thought about all the stupid things that I have done in the name of so-called beauty. I thought about Mona Lisa and her infamous smirk. I thought about her mystique, the number one reason why crowds of people flood into the Louvre each and every day. They go, just to be in awe of her gaze.

Whatever happened to that kind of beauty, the one that can’t be bought, the one that can’t be explained? It can only be treasured, it seems.

Svea Schneider and Kinematik Dance Theater’s Perfect Prototype was featured in Week 3 of the 2011 Wave Rising Series. The company’s next performance will take place in the Winter of 2012.  

Above photo: Katie Weinholt