tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/david-bowie-18483/articles
David Bowie – The Conversation
2024-03-22T01:42:23Z
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/226116
2024-03-22T01:42:23Z
2024-03-22T01:42:23Z
Theatrical, camp and truly original: glam-rock pioneer Steve Harley’s influence lives on
<p>Musician Steve Harley’s death last week came as a shock to me. After four months analysing his music and visual performances for my doctoral thesis on British glam rock, I’d come to feel like I somehow knew him. </p>
<p>The feeling was compounded by the fact Harley had answered some questions for me some years earlier and wished me well in my studies. To me, then, he was a nice, approachable person, generous with his time. He was also a unique and innovative musician, beginning with albums The Human Menagerie (1973) and The Psychomodo (1974), whose influence has extended well beyond the 1970s.</p>
<p>But Harley has received much less scholarly attention than his glam-rock-era peers. David Bowie, in particular, has (rightfully) been the subject of books, symposiums and university courses. And scholars around the world have analysed glam rock itself in its various forms and incarnations. </p>
<p>Harley, however, is notably absent from these discussions. One reason is that glam-rock scholarship is still growing, with much still to do. Another reason may be that Harley is not as easily categorised as other glam-rock musicians.</p>
<p>While many were androgynous, for instance, Harley was relatively understated. Musically, too, Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel broke the rock ‘n’ roll mould, opting for an electric violin instead of electric guitars. </p>
<p>Without the electric guitar, there was room for Harley to perform with a certain theatricality, both vocally and as reflected in the band’s often lush instrumentation. In 1974’s <a href="https://youtu.be/msNpHDaD32I?si=O6B7ilwvcj7no3JS">Tumbling Down</a>, Harley laments what’s been done to the blues, accompanied by a full choir, orchestra and sentimental flourishes. </p>
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<h2>Musical melodrama</h2>
<p>While glam-era Bowie was theatrical in a stagey, physical sense – the Ziggy Stardust live concerts being the prime example – Harley’s theatricality was different. He drew from Berlin cabaret, among other such influences, but went beyond that, offering shimmering, shivering musical melodrama that departed from the usual glam-rock formulas. </p>
<p>While glam band The Sweet were campy in a comedic way, Steve Harley’s camp lay in his <a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/f/fin-de-siecle">fin de siècle</a>, dramatic excess. Imagine the orchestral flourish of Bowie’s Life On Mars? (1971), but filtered through a candlelit, absinthe-driven night in Paris. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/david-bowie-pop-star-who-fell-to-earth-to-teach-outsiders-they-can-be-heroes-52995">David Bowie: pop star who fell to earth to teach outsiders they can be heroes</a>
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<p>Even his more upbeat tracks – <a href="https://youtu.be/HJI1Mt73rNM?si=60ZTbJVo_JpXF2Sg">Sweet Dreams</a> (1974) or <a href="https://youtu.be/VZ7kQwa6X7g?si=gi8VgSIivPvF9mSM">Psychomodo</a> (1974), for example – embody a quirky angularity that recalls the visual style of a German Expressionist film. </p>
<p>At the same time, such songs anticipated the vocal styles of later art-rock, punk and new-wave singers. Harley’s sense of camp can also be found in his key influences: Busby Berkeley musicals and Marlene Dietrich.</p>
<p>Filmmaker Todd Haynes insightfully layered Harley’s musical melodrama into the more decadently theatrical moments of his 1998 glam-rock film <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120879/">Velvet Goldmine</a>. Actor Jonathan Rhys Meyers performs Tumbling Down in blue-green body paint and pastel feather boa on an elaborate staircase and, finally, on top of an ornate chandelier. </p>
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<h2>Make Me Smile</h2>
<p>Harley is most remembered, of course, for the 1975 hit <a href="https://youtu.be/dAoaVU3-ve0?si=mqdInFJvNgJg8Vel">Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me)</a>, his most upbeat, conventionally “pop” single. Its welcoming acoustic guitar strum and catchy melody – replete with “ooh la la la la” backing vocals – has been covered more than 100 times, notably as the B-side to Duran Duran’s The Reflex in 1984. </p>
<p>Cheerful, charming and representative of Harley’s poppier sensibilities, Make Me Smile is also an exception. It departs from the often dark elegance of The Human Menagerie or The Psychomodo albums, and from the off-kilter circus-cabaret of his other glam-era pop single <a href="https://youtu.be/Z5NPfHk5Ycs?si=F5aCqwt5sVLcWTb8">Mr. Soft</a> (1974). </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kisss-debut-album-at-50-how-the-rock-legends-went-from-clowns-to-becoming-immortalised-222284">Kiss’s debut album at 50: how the rock legends went from 'clowns' to becoming immortalised</a>
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<p>Like the other “serious” glam rockers of the era – such as Roxy Music’s Brian Eno – Harley didn’t really think of himself as a glam-rock artist. Nevertheless, he’s considered a key figure in “high glam” – the artier type, embodied by David Bowie and early Roxy Music. </p>
<p>High glam required a sort of intellectualism, and an intellectual distance from the broader glam-rock genre. It was a world away from Slade’s Cum On Feel The Noize or The Sweet’s party-rock stompers. Its cerebral artiness – including its denial of being glam rock at all – was what defined it. </p>
<h2>Once and future glam</h2>
<p>British glam rock met the end of its cycle in the mid-1970s. Bowie moved on, Eno left Roxy Music, and The Sweet broke up with their songwriters to become the hard-rock band they always wanted to be. </p>
<p>Like Bowie, Harley endured – releasing new music and touring regularly. Glam rock has both morphed and echoed throughout the decades, emerging in new wave, glam metal and Britpop’s more glamorous, Bowie-influenced artists (Suede, Pulp). Most recently, glam has resurfaced in decadent Italian rockers <a href="https://maneskin.com/">Måneskin</a>. </p>
<p>Until late last year, Harley had planned to tour. He cancelled on receiving a cancer diagnosis, and his death was swift. Along with Bowie, <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/t-rex-guitarist-marc-bolan-dies-in-car-accident-204436/">Marc Bolan</a> and most of the original members of The Sweet, Steve Harley has joined that growing pantheon of glam-era musicians who are no longer with us. </p>
<p>With Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me) now played in his honour, we should also remember him as a key and innovative figure in a pivotal rock era.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/226116/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alison Blair does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Steve Harley, who died last week, deserves greater recognition for his contribution to the glam-rock genre and to music in general.
Alison Blair, Teaching Fellow in Music, University of Otago
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/224661
2024-02-28T16:52:45Z
2024-02-28T16:52:45Z
Odysseus moon landing: Jeff Koons has pulled off one of the great art stunts of the century
<p>To <a href="https://www.creativereview.co.uk/refreshes-the-parts-other-beers-cannot-reach/">paraphrase</a> an old advertising slogan, <a href="https://www.guggenheim.org/artwork/artist/jeff-koons">Jeff Koons</a> is the Heineken of the art world – a maverick who has always done his utmost to refresh the parts other arts cannot reach. Born in Pennsylvania in 1955, Koons has now achieved something truly out of this world: sending his art into space as part of the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/2024/feb/22/us-moon-landing-odysseus-intuitive-machines">Odysseus moon landing</a> last week.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.pacegallery.com/journal/jeff-koons-moon-phases/#:%7E:text=The%20list%20of%20names%20is,and%20Helen%20Keller%20among%20them.">Moon Phases</a>, a cube-shaped transparent box containing 125 spherical mini-sculptures (each approximately 2.5cm in diameter) over five levels, landed on the lunar surface on February 22, on board the US spacecraft.</p>
<p>Each sphere contains the name of a (dead) human luminary, ranging from Aristotle to Ghandi, Ada Lovelace and David Bowie, all decided on solely by Koons. You can see the full list <a href="https://jeffkoonsmoonphases.com/explore">here</a>.</p>
<p>Moon Phases is now being described as the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/jeff-koons-sculpture-first-artwork-on-the-moon-notable-figures-2024-2?r=US&IR=T">first “authorised” work of art on the moon</a>. Digital arts and technology company NFMoon and 4Space, a space company with strong links to NASA, approached Koons with the idea of sending his artwork to the moon <a href="https://www.pacegallery.com/journal/jeff-koons-moon-phases/">because</a> of “his ability to bridge art and science, reflecting the expansive possibilities of the humanities”. </p>
<p>Or perhaps the two companies understood well that the controversial American artist would provide some extra rocket fuel for their project. Koons is, after all, the man who <a href="https://www.theartstory.org/artist/koons-jeff/#:%7E:text=%22The%20job%20of%20the%20artist,That's%20where%20the%20art%20happens.%22">proclaimed</a>: “The job of the artist is to make a gesture and really show people what their potential is. It’s not about the object, and it’s not about the image; it’s about the viewer. That’s where the art happens.” </p>
<p>Still, it is hard to imagine – even ignoring the practical challenges – that this will lead to a whole host of artists queuing up and begging NASA to send their art into space, but it makes perfect sense for the hero of the hour.</p>
<p>Koons, who currently holds the world auction record for a living artist, courtesy of his <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/jeff-koons-rabbit-breaks-auction-record-most-expensive-work-living-artist-180972219/">Rabbit sculpture</a>, which sold for US$91.1 million (£72m) in 2019, has always been as much a media phenomenon as anything else. He is arguably more famous for having been married to Cicciolina, the Italian former porn star-turned politician, than for any of his creations. </p>
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<span class="caption">The Odysseus lunar landing craft.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IM-1#/media/File:Intuitive_Machines%E2%80%99_Nova-C_lunar_lander_(IM_00309)_(cropped).jpg">NASA Marshall Space Flight Center/Intuitive Machines / Wiki Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
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<p>He may sound kitschy and a bit ridiculous, but he is hard to resist. Having borrowed one of his pieces – Basketball (1985) – for a history of bronze sculpture over the last 5,000 years exhibition I organised at the Royal Academy in London in 2012, I ought to know. </p>
<p>However, recently his prices (as measured by auction sales, prices achieved in private sales are not in the public domain) have plummeted. In fact, last year almost 40% of the 292 Koons lots offered at auction <a href="https://news.artnet.com/market/jeff-koonss-art-is-on-the-moon-but-his-prices-have-cratered-can-power-players-reignite-his-market-2436175#:%7E:text=Last%20year%20was%20particularly%20bad,offered%20failed%20to%20find%20buyers.">failed to find buyers</a>. So he has every reason to want to revitalise his professional fortunes – his actual fortunes are probably less of a worry, given that estimates of his personal wealth hover around $400 million.</p>
<p>What’s more, terrestrial equivalents of the moon sculptures in the form of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are being offered by his gallery, Pace, and it may be assumed they are not exactly being given away. </p>
<h2>So who’s on the list?</h2>
<p>Arguably the most interesting thing about the whole circus is the fact that each sculpture carries somebody’s name (with the exception of one called Atom). At some level, the idea is that if aliens come upon Moon Phases, they will be equipped with a handy list of the best of the best in human history. In the meantime, the rest of us can brood on Koons’s choices. </p>
<p>The work itself explains neither their selection nor their configuration, but the vast majority fall into straightforward enough categories, such as religious leaders, rulers, philosophers and scientists. But there is also a striking US emphasis on abolitionists and black leaders. In the performers category – with the exception of Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova – are all either from the US or the UK.</p>
<p>Within each category, many of the choices are predictable enough (Jesus and Buddha, Plato and Aristotle, and so on), but others are more baffling. In the context of the arts, there are only four composers (JS Bach, Mozart, Beethoven and Tchaikovsky), there are no novelists from the periods between Austen and Proust, and there is room for <a href="https://www.nga.gov/features/verrocchio-closer-look.html">Andrea del Verrocchio</a>, an important but slightly obscure 15th century Italian sculptor, but none for old masters like Vermeer or Velázquez.</p>
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<p>Last but not least, a very small section is avowedly given over to personal favourites, a selection that includes such oddities as actor Lucille Ball and art dealer Ileana Sonnabend.</p>
<p>The obvious party game here is compiling one’s own top 125 and seeing where it agrees and disagrees with Koons’. And it would be no less fascinating to speculate who might have made the list had one accompanied Neil Armstrong’s “one giant leap for mankind” on 20 July 1969. Intriguingly, explorers Columbus and Magellan, flight pioneer Amelia Earhart and 19th century Native American guide <a href="https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/sacagawea#:%7E:text=Sacagawea%20was%20an%20interpreter%20and,River%20to%20the%20Pacific%20Coast.">Sacagawea</a> are in for Koons – but Armstrong doesn’t make the cut.</p>
<p>What is abundantly clear is that 55 years ago there would undoubtedly have been fewer women and people of colour included. Perhaps it could be said that our far-from-perfect species has managed to improve itself over the past half-century or so. </p>
<p>But in terms of art itself, this is a masterstroke of self-promotion on the part of Jeff Koons, and perhaps an achievement that will inspire the next generation of artists to view space as a new frontier for their work.</p>
<p>For the 69-year-old Koons, clearly fame is a seductive experience – perhaps wealth is not enough if you no longer feel relevant or important. It seems the kitschy New York artist has pulled off one of the great art stunts of the century. So far.</p>
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<p><em>Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight, on Fridays. <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/newsletters/something-good-156">Sign up here</a>.</em></p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Ekserdjian does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Has Jeff Koons’ latest high-profile stunt just proved that space is the new frontier for art?
David Ekserdjian, Professor of History of Art and Film, University of Leicester
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/204836
2023-05-03T15:07:31Z
2023-05-03T15:07:31Z
How King Charles III’s coronation robes – and other historical garments – are conserved
<p>Ahead of King Charles III’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/king-charles-iii-coronation-what-to-expect-this-coronation-weekend-202183">coronation</a> on May 6 2023, textile conservators based at <a href="https://www.hrp.org.uk/about-us/conservation-and-collections/conservation-research/#gs.v3t2if">Historic Royal Palaces</a> are hard at work. For the occasion, the sovereign is set to don historic ceremonial robes, heavy with history and symbolism.</p>
<p>The first piece is the <a href="https://www.rct.uk/collection/31793/king-george-vs-coronation-supertunica-also-worn-by-king-george-vi-and-queen">Supertunica</a>, a full-length coat of golden silk, lined with red. It was designed for George V on the occasion of his coronation on June 22 1911 and subsequently worn by George VI in 1937 and Queen Elizabeth II in 1953.</p>
<p>Around his neck, the king will wear the Royal Stole, a thin band of golden silk generously embroidered with heraldry and foliage. And draped over his shoulders will be the <a href="https://www.rct.uk/collection/31794/the-imperial-mantle-worn-by-king-george-iv-king-george-v-king-george-vi-and-queen">Imperial Mantle</a>. </p>
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<p><em>This piece is part of our coverage of <a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/coronation-of-king-charles-iii-134594?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=Coronation2023&utm_content=InArticleTop">King Charles III’s coronation</a>. The first coronation of a British monarch since 1953 comes at a time of reckoning for the monarchy, the royal family and the Commonwealth.</em></p>
<p><em>For more royal analysis, revisit our coverage of Queen Elizabeth II’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/platinum-jubilee-116056?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=Coronation2023&utm_content=InArticleTop">Platinum jubilee</a>, and her <a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/death-of-queen-elizabeth-ii-126761?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=Coronation2023&utm_content=InArticleTop">death in September 2022</a>.</em></p>
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<p>Created for George IV’s coronation in 1821 and referencing both priestly garments and Tudor designs, the mantel is an opulent cape, also red-lined, that pools on the floor, fringed with gold. It sports a pattern of embroidered crowns, eagles, roses, thistles, shamrock, fleur-de-lis and other foliage. And it fastens on the chest with an eagle-shaped clasp.</p>
<p>If you have ever travelled from afar to the Tower of London to see royal garments or the V&A to see historic fashions, you might have been frustrated at the low lighting, or the barriers in place which make taking a closer look difficult. Conserving textiles is all the more challenging when the textiles in question are not just to be displayed but also worn, as these coronation robes are. Conservators apply tremendous skill and knowledge to keep such items intact. </p>
<h2>Designed to last</h2>
<p>Ahead of <a href="https://theconversation.com/ring-for-the-king-the-long-history-of-englands-bellringing-tradition-203952">the big day</a>, the king will have likely done some fittings. A garment designed for a 46-year-old in 1911 won’t necessarily fit a 75-year-old in 2023. So conservators will have suggested alterations to suit the king’s preferences. In concert with textile specialists, they might have applied hidden loops on the inside of the robes so they do not slip when worn. </p>
<p>When the royal coronation garments are not in active use, they are held in the <a href="https://www.hrp.org.uk/about-us/conservation-and-collections/royal-ceremonial-dress-collection/">Royal Ceremonial Dress Collection</a> at Historical Royal Palaces and Kensington Palace. This archive offers tangible evidence of dress worn by the royal family since the 18th century. </p>
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<p>Conservators there work to identify and protect areas of weakness in the materials the garments are made of. They can be heavy in some areas, which makes the threads more fragile. This can stretch and damage the material, when not supported. Care is taken that elaborate decorations, mostly made with silk and precious-metal thread, like gold and silver, do not snag. </p>
<p>Traditional materials, like the gold silk used to make the coronation robes, are stronger and thus more durable – they can keep their shape and often their colour too. Ensuring this, however, involves thorough environmental monitoring to achieve optimum conditions – regular humidity levels, cool temperatures, low light levels. When transporting or otherwise handling historic textiles, you have to use materials that do not react chemically. </p>
<p>In contrast to these garments designed to last, pop culture treasures like the costumes held among the <a href="https://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/david-bowie#:%7E:text=The%20V%26A%20holds%20a%20unique,influential%20performers%20of%20modern%20times">80,000-piece collection</a> of Bowie memorabilia the V&A recently acquired, present different challenges. </p>
<p>Conservators at the museum <a href="https://theconversation.com/david-bowie-five-must-have-items-for-the-vandas-new-centre-200765">will now be tasked</a> with tending to many of the artist’s memorable costumes: the 1972 Ziggy Stardust ensembles by Freddie Burretti; Kansai Yamamoto’s flamboyant creations for the Aladdin Sane tour in 1973; the Union Jack coat designed by Alexander McQueen for the Earthling album cover in 1997. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/IvBSESuppgY?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>The kinds of modern materials used in these creations often <a href="https://www.science.org/content/article/museums-are-race-against-time-keep-plastic-art-falling-apart">degrade</a> sooner rather than later, as amateur trainer collectors and <a href="https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/exhibitions/rise_of_sneaker_culture/">professional trainer conservators</a> alike know. Plastics and rubbers may start to degrade in less than 10 years, depending on when they were made, how they were manufactured and used.</p>
<h2>Textile stories</h2>
<p>Despite this, fashion conservators do not consider modern fabrics of any less value than costly historic textiles. This is because new materials have often inspired designers to create <a href="https://www.designhistorysociety.org/blog/view/report-dhs-conference-bursary-by-leanne-tonkin-postconservation-model-in-contemporary-textile-and-fashion-conservation">new things</a>. Polyurethane, polyvinyl chloride and synthetic rubber, developed in the early 20th century, gave artists different surfaces to work with, allowing for both glossy and matt looks. Bowie’s <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0160ql6/p0160pqf">Kabuki jumpsuit</a>, that Yamamoto designed for the 1973 Aladdin Sane tour, is a prime example. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="David Bowie in a black and white striped suit." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524107/original/file-20230503-578-zau23q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524107/original/file-20230503-578-zau23q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=718&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524107/original/file-20230503-578-zau23q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=718&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524107/original/file-20230503-578-zau23q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=718&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524107/original/file-20230503-578-zau23q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524107/original/file-20230503-578-zau23q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524107/original/file-20230503-578-zau23q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Bowie in Yamamoto’s kabuki jumpsuit.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/tomronworldwide/49354583116">Ron Frazier/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Conserving a garment of historical importance isn’t only about the fabric and design, but the occasions when it was used. Conservators will thus also document, and in some cases preserve evidence that Bowie actually wore these clothes – even stains from his sweat. It’s about keeping the essence of Bowie during those iconic moments of his stage performances. </p>
<p>It is also about recording the link between the person who wore the garment and the designers. Yamamoto materialised Bowie’s vision of being, as curators Victoria Broaches and Geoffrey March <a href="https://www.vam.ac.uk/shop/exhibition-ranges/david-bowie-is/david-bowie-is---official-exhibition-book-deluxe-hardback-119209.html">once put it</a>, “an alien rock messiah, leader of a band of space invaders”. </p>
<p>Preserving what conservators term “designer intent”, here, is crucial. Each item bears witness to how its creator’s ideas developed, their material choices and their creative engagement. </p>
<p>Similarly, the royal robes <a href="https://www.royal.uk/news-and-activity/2023-04-29/a-first-glimpse-at-their-majesties-coronation-robes">can show</a> intended social and political changes through the history of how they have been repaired, adjusted or reworked, to suit the taste of each successive royal wearer.</p>
<p>Ensuring the survival of historic textile and dress artefacts allows stories and histories to be shared from generation to generation. As one curator <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvBSESuppgY">has put it</a> of Bowie’s many suits: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>These were used costumes and they absolutely have lived lives, and they’re continuing to do so. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Bowie’s <a href="https://shapersofthe80s.com/2020/07/28/%E2%9E%A4-farewell-kansai-the-fashion-genius-who-breathed-the-same-colours-as-bowie/">flowing white cape</a> covered in Japanese kanji, also by Yamamoto, helped to stage his creative output. Similarly, the coronation robes mark, and frame, King Charles III as <a href="https://theconversation.com/cosmati-pavement-walk-on-the-755-year-old-floor-where-king-charles-iii-will-be-crowned-but-take-off-your-shoes-first-198194">he embarks</a> on his reign.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/204836/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Leanne Tonkin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
From the coronation robes, made of gold to last centuries, to David Bowie’s jumpsuits created from the newest materials, dress archives have stories to tell.
Leanne Tonkin, Nottingham Trent University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/200765
2023-03-03T12:51:03Z
2023-03-03T12:51:03Z
David Bowie: five must-have items for the V&A’s new centre
<p>The Victoria and Albert Museum in London has <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-64729309">announced</a> the opening of a new David Bowie Centre for the Performing Arts in 2025 at V&A East Storehouse in east London. This follows the news that the museum has acquired – <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/feb/23/va-lands-huge-archive-of-david-bowie-memorabilia">through donation</a> – the artist’s fabled archive. </p>
<p>This collection of over 80,000 objects formed the basis of the museum’s 2013 exhibition <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/mar/24/david-bowie-is-exhibition-review">David Bowie Is</a>. It includes personal correspondence, lyric sheets, photographs, costumes, set designs, music awards, films, album artwork, instruments and plans for unrealised projects. </p>
<p>The show’s curators, Victoria Broackes and Geoffrey Marsh, described it as “one of the most, if not the most, complete archive of any pop music artist” of all time, </p>
<iframe style="border-radius:12px" src="https://open.spotify.com/embed/playlist/4wyp6TmKmF6XnQBXvGnfCO?utm_source=generator" width="100%" height="352" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="" allow="autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; fullscreen; picture-in-picture" loading="lazy"></iframe>
<p>In 2020, I was <a href="https://ahc.leeds.ac.uk/english/news/article/1707/the-cambridge-companion-to-david-bowie">commissioned</a> to edit The Cambridge Companion to David Bowie, having long researched <a href="https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/123490/">the artist’s</a> (often ghostly) presence in both <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10486801.2014.885902">contemporary theatre</a> and <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10304312.2017.1334384">recent cinema</a>. </p>
<p>Here are my top five Bowie treasures, with a playlist that sounds out his <a href="https://theconversation.com/back-then-and-now-just-who-is-david-bowie-42052">playful curiosity</a> about how we occupy our bodies and <a href="https://theconversation.com/bowie-and-gender-transgression-what-a-drag-44569">genders</a>, his tender sense of our need for beauty and his passionate respect for <a href="https://theconversation.com/bowies-magical-wardrobe-led-his-fans-into-strange-new-musical-landscapes-53120">style</a>. </p>
<h2>1. Jockstrap</h2>
<p>During the 1973 Ziggy Stardust tour, <a href="https://www.snapgalleries.com/portfolio-items/david-bowie-by-masayoshi-sukita/">Masayoshi Sukita</a> photographed a <a href="https://www.snapgalleries.com/product/masayoshi-sukita-david-bowie-gimmie-your-hands/">near-naked Bowie</a> performing before a joyously crazed Japanese crowd, wearing only a <a href="https://slate.com/culture/2005/07/where-have-all-the-jockstraps-gone.html">jockstrap</a>. </p>
<p>This piece of athletic kit, so evocative of <a href="https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/304335047.pdf">sport’s homosocial energies</a> and of <a href="https://eprints.mdx.ac.uk/6517/1/Humberstone-older_people_sexualities.phd.pdf">working-class culture</a>, creates an irreverent tension with the androgyny and strangeness of the costumes fashion designer Kansai Yamamoto created for that same tour. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="David Bowie on stage wearing red boxing gloves." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512902/original/file-20230301-16-3ttafv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512902/original/file-20230301-16-3ttafv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512902/original/file-20230301-16-3ttafv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512902/original/file-20230301-16-3ttafv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512902/original/file-20230301-16-3ttafv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512902/original/file-20230301-16-3ttafv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512902/original/file-20230301-16-3ttafv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Diamond Dogs tour in 1974.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/hdport/3329403108/in/photostream/">Hunter Desportes/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Bowie was at his most gloriously <a href="https://core.ac.uk/works/9206049">queer</a> when trafficking in images of iconic, traditional (and intensely vulnerable) masculinity. Other notable accessories include the red boxing gloves he wore during live performances of his 1973 track Panic in Detroit and the darker gloves he sports on the cover of 1983’s Let’s Dance.</p>
<h2>2. The 1973 Hammersmith Odeon dressing table</h2>
<p>In <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/music/reviews/c9mq/">Ziggy Stardust: The Motion Picture</a>, the 1973 Donn Alan Pennebaker documentary about Bowie’s final Ziggy gig, we see the artist preparing for the stage. As he sits in front of a mirrored dressing table, his makeup artist applies rouge, eyeshadow and eyeliner, transforming him from a pallid young man into a feminine icon. </p>
<p>I’d like the new centre to recreate the dressing table: the two bottles of wine (one opened), the white plastic cups, the boxes of tissues, the large tin of hairspray, the container of Johnson & Johnson baby powder, the well-used green ashtray.</p>
<p>This gentle display of the mundane paraphernalia of 1970s femininity speaks to Bowie’s lifelong preoccupation with what English literature expert Shelton Walderp terms an <a href="https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/the-aesthetics-of-self-invention">“aesthetics of self-invention”</a>, stretching from Bowie back to Oscar Wilde, and beyond to Shakespeare and Japanese Kabuki theatre. </p>
<h2>3. Bowie’s copy of George Orwell’s 1984 – and other books</h2>
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<p>One installation in the 2013 V&A show featured a faceless mannequin with outstretched arms, high, high up in the space. It was draped in a cloak designed by Yamamoto in 1973, a white floor-length garment, made in the <a href="https://www2.ntj.jac.go.jp/unesco/kabuki/en/production/performance1.html">Japanese hikinuki tradition</a> and designed to be ripped off in a speedy onstage costume change. It is covered in red and black <a href="https://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2046.html">kanji</a> which translate as “one who spits out words in a fiery manner”. </p>
<p>Suspended around it in the V&A, like so many birds in flight, were 20-odd books from Bowie’s personal library by authors including RD Laing, Vladimir Nabokov and Hubert Selby Jr. </p>
<p>I’d love to see Bowie’s copy of George Orwell’s 1984 feature – a novel I read, aged 12, after I had heard Bowie was writing a musical based on it. Also, anything he owned by French writer Jean Genet, whose name inspired the title of the 1972 single, The Jean Genie, and whose final book, Prisoner of Love (1986) inspired the eponymous song Bowie recorded with Tin Machine in 1989. </p>
<h2>4. The Hedi Slimane three piece suit – and other blue suits</h2>
<p>On 1977’s Sound and Vision, Bowie <a href="https://pure.hud.ac.uk/en/publications/sound-and-vision">famously sang</a>: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Blue, blue, electric blue<br>
That’s the colour of my room </p>
</blockquote>
<p>This sentiment chimes with the filmmaker, <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/why-derek-jarman-s-life-was-even-more-influential-than-his-films-9137025.html">Derek Jarman</a>’s own take on the colour (in Chroma: A Book of Colour):</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Blue, an open door to the soul<br>
An infinite possibility<br>
Becoming tangible</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Bowie greatly admired Jarman, an extract of whose film, <a href="https://mubi.com/films/blue">Blue</a>, was played during the pre-show music for the 1995 Outside tour. Like Jarman, Bowie loved the colour blue, maybe, in part, because he knew how good he looked in it. </p>
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<p>Like he did in the turquoise suit Freddi Burretti designed for his 1973 Life on Mars? video, whose vivid hue echoed Bowie’s eye make-up; or the powder-blue suit designed by Peter Hall that featured regularly on the 1983 Serious Moonlight tour; and the gorgeous petrol-blue three-piece, designed by Hedi Slimane, that he wore on his 2002 Heathen tour. </p>
<h2>5. The white Supro guitar – and other instruments</h2>
<p>One of the most compelling photographs in the David Bowie Is catalogue is of the <a href="https://dshowmusic.com/supro-david-bowie-1961-dual-tone-guitar/">white Supro 1961 Dual Tone</a> electric guitar that Bowie played on his final tour, in support of the 2003 Reality album. The image remains emblematic of Bowie’s dogged commitment to the possibilities, and actual making of music.</p>
<p>Other instruments of note would include the <a href="https://www.kingston.ac.uk/news/article/2028/14-mar-2018-esteemed-music-producer-tony-visconti-shares-tips-on-working-with-artists-including-david-bowie-and/">12-string acoustic guitar</a> he turned to throughout his career; the <a href="https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/the-david-bowie-song-inspired-by-kyoto-japan/">Japanese koto</a> he plays on the 1977 track Moss Garden; the <a href="https://research.tees.ac.uk/ws/portalfiles/portal/6359081/344409.pdf">saxophone</a> he had played since he was a teenager; and the harmonicas that followed him from 1969’s song Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed to 2016’s I Can’t Give Everything Away, the final track on <a href="https://theconversation.com/david-bowies-late-revival-belongs-to-a-grand-tradition-dating-back-to-beethoven-71031">Blackstar</a>, his final album.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200765/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Denis Flannery does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
The artist’s fabled archive spans his entire career, showcasing his playful curiosity, his need for beauty and his respect for style.
Denis Flannery, Associate Professor in American Literature, University of Leeds
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/189486
2023-01-31T12:55:28Z
2023-01-31T12:55:28Z
The artist formerly known as Camille – Prince’s lost album ‘comes out’
<p>When Prince Rogers Nelson <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/apr/22/prince-obituary">died</a> at the age of 57 on April 21, 2016, it sent shockwaves around the world. Tributes from fans flooded social media, vigils sprang up across the US, and key landmarks, including the Lowry Bridge in Prince’s hometown of Minneapolis, <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-36109110">turned purple</a> to mark his passing. Yet the end of Prince’s earthly existence by no means marks the end of his enduring musical and artistic impact.</p>
<p>The legacies of beloved artists have long transcended their lifetimes. Socially, politically, sexually, and ideologically speaking, Prince is no exception. A remarkably productive and always cryptic figure, he continues to incite fascination from beyond the grave. However, his most incendiary and relevant album has yet to be released.</p>
<p>Pop has long been a rich space for subverting gendered stereotypes and Prince consistently challenged the rigidity of binary gender roles. At once hyper-masculine and delicately feminine, he cuts a distinctive and enigmatic figure within queer pop history. </p>
<p>Now, a cancelled 1987 album that explores all these elements is finally about to see the light of day.</p>
<p>The tracklist and songs that make up this lost release have been available in various guises for several decades, some existing on compilations, albums, and unofficial leaks. We have analysed all the available evidence and musical fragments ahead of their much anticipated reunion to present the most accurate picture possible of this elusive work.</p>
<p>Dearly beloved, we are gathered here to introduce <a href="https://www.nme.com/news/music/unreleased-prince-album-camille-to-be-issued-by-third-man-records-3183499">Camille</a>.</p>
<h2>Purple reign</h2>
<p>By 1986 Prince was already cemented as a potent force in popular music. After the success of the <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087957/">Purple Rain movie</a> 18 months earlier and a slew of successful mould-breaking singles under his belt, including When Doves Cry, Let’s Go Crazy, Raspberry Beret, and Kiss, Prince returned to the recording studio with his sound engineer <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/nov/09/princes-sound-engineer-susan-rogers-he-needed-to-be-the-alpha-male-to-get-things-done">Susan Rogers</a> to embark on a new project.</p>
<figure>
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</figure>
<p>It revolved around one core concept that Prince wanted to explore: his voice. Through processing his vocals in the studio, Prince and Rogers were able to increase the pitch of his voice so it no longer sounded what we might call “male”. The process was actually the same as on the “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmjrTcYMqBM&ab_channel=patrickdcyau">Chipmunk</a>” records of the late 1950s, but done to a much more subtle degree. This more “feminine” or “female” voice was christened Camille by Prince and became the centre of his new project.</p>
<p>By November 1986, the whole album (also called Camille) was finalised and a few vinyl demos were pressed in preparation for release the following year. Controversially, Prince decided to attribute the whole album to Camille rather than himself, and his name would not appear on the packaging. But, for reasons that are not known, the release was cancelled – most likely because the record label <a href="https://thequietus.com/articles/03663-prince-revolutionary-transmissions-from-beyond-the-greatest-hits-comp">baulked</a> at the idea of a Prince-less Prince album. Camille lived on for a short time beyond the cancelled release, with three tracks repurposed for the legendary <a href="https://open.spotify.com/album/1XsXHctYSQNyAd9BANCk2B?si=diYohXf7SnC3GdL1iCd-NQ">Sign ‘O’ The Times</a>, specifically If I Was Your Girlfriend, Housequake, and Strange Relationship. After this, Camille was never heard from again.</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><strong><em>This story is part of Conversation Insights</em></strong>
<br><em>The Insights team generates <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/insights-series-71218">long-form journalism</a> and is working with academics from different backgrounds who have been engaged in projects to tackle societal and scientific challenges.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>In the intervening years, rumours, fan theories, album sleeve notes, tour programmes, and biographies have all hinted at the possible Camille album. But it was not until Prince’s former production manager Karen Krattinger offered one of the demo copies of the album at an <a href="https://www.rrauction.com/auctions/lot-detail/337420505166116--prince-1986-39-camille-39-advance-pressing/?cat=0">auction in 2016</a> that the record was confirmed as actually “real”. Now, seven years later, Jack White’s Third Man Records has reached an <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/prince-camille-third-man-records-jack-white-release-1322029/">agreement with Prince’s estate</a> to release the full album.</p>
<h2>Queer histories</h2>
<p>The story of Camille fits into the wider narrative and rediscovery of the hidden histories of queer and trans people, mapping the blank spaces where they were erased from history. Many examples spring to mind, but perhaps soul singer <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/feb/25/jackie-shane-groundbreaking-trans-soul-singer">Jackie Shane’s</a> slow rediscovery over the past decade is a perfect example of the treasure trove of music and figures that have been obscured from music history. When shared, these histories can empower marginalised groups within broader society. Imagine the potential impact had Camille been released and received as a queer persona in 1987. What would have happened if “His Royal Badness” had been “Her” four decades ago?</p>
<p>In many ways it is futile to speculate around lost impact. Yet it is worth reflecting on what it would have meant to have an artist of colour – who was also a bastion of male sexuality – playing with gender, femininity and sexuality. Would it have pushed further aspects of queerness into popular culture? After all, Prince was a mainstream megastar, selling millions upon millions of records throughout the 1980s.</p>
<p>Conversely, imagine pop without the gender-bending and provocatively queer moments that we now hold up as legendary. What would our history be if we lost David Bowie and Mick Ronson’s shocking “<a href="https://sfae.com/Artists/Mick-Rock/David-Bowie-and-Mick-Ronson-Guitar-Fellatio-1972">oral guitar solo</a>”, the winking audacity of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4Mc-NYPHaQ">I Want to Break Free</a> video, Frankie telling us to “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yem_iEHiyJ0">relax</a>”, or Lil Nas X offering the devil a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6swmTBVI83k">lapdance</a>? Camille should have been among this list of cultural touchstone moments that make up our collective conception of popular music.</p>
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<p>Several highly-acclaimed recent television series’ have also focused on queer history at a time contemporaneous with Camille’s original planned release date. Russell T Davies’ mini-drama <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9140342/">It’s A Sin</a> focused on the lives of young queer Brits during the AIDS epidemic that decimated the community. Equally lauded was FX’s <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7562112/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">Pose</a>, which explored the lives of LGBTQ+ people of colour in the New York ballroom scene of the 1980s. The resurgence and reinsertion of the ballroom scene documentary <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100332/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">Paris Is Burning</a> (filmed again in the mid-late 1980s) into public consciousness points to a wide and continued fascination with this period of queer history.</p>
<p>Among today’s so-called “culture wars”, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/trans-rights-and-political-backlash-five-key-moments-in-history-187476">denigration of the trans community</a>, and the recent rise in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/dec/03/recorded-homophobic-hate-crimes-soared-in-pandemic-figures-show">homophobic and queerphobic hate</a>, a celebration of the diversity of gender performances is surely as welcome as ever. In recent years the unique perspectives of queer, trans and non-binary artists have been praised by popular music fans and pundits alike. Sophie, Mikki Blanco, Kim Petras, Julianna Huxtable, Anohni, Honey Dijon, Arca, and many more have greatly increased the audibility of queer voices for the broader pop music fan base.</p>
<p>So with Camille finally about to “come out” (in every sense of the phrase), it seems like the right time to ask what impact she might have had in 1987, how she was created, and why now is the perfect moment for her debut.</p>
<h2>I Wanna Be Your Lover</h2>
<p>Prince was sexy. Not necessarily just as an object of desire, but his persona, music, lyrics, dance moves, album covers, and public image oozed sex, ambiguous sexuality, and overt sensuality. He was a cheeky champion of all things kinky. The lyrics to Darling Nikki, Get Off, Soft and Wet, Head, and Dirty Mind, among others, should be enough to convince you of his sexual credentials.</p>
<p>Prince’s particular form of musical sexuality was unique and often hard to define. His approach to sex, in general public consciousness, was masculine, straight, tough, and naughty. But it could also be feminine, queer, tender and spiritually chaste. Wesley Morris sums up this sexual ambiguity perfectly in his <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/23/arts/music/prince-sex.html">New York Times</a> piece, saying that the focus of Prince’s sexual orientation was always oriented towards “you” – that is, the listener.</p>
<p>Here we are of course conflating aspects of gender, sexuality, and sex. But with Prince, it’s hard to untangle those elements. Prince was at his most interesting and successful when he wrapped himself in ambiguity and androgyny. The opening lines to <a href="https://youtu.be/SVEFRQavTNI?t=167">I Would Die 4 U</a> specifically tell us this:</p>
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<p>I’m not a woman. I’m not a man. I am something that you’ll never understand.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>He left us other clues about the way he viewed race, sex and sexuality in tracks like <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gazNwzC4H0&ab_channel=Prince">Controversy</a>, where he played with the media’s portrayal of celebrity. </p>
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<p>Am I Black or white? Am I straight or gay?</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Of course, he wasn’t the first to play with these ideas. Western popular music has a rich history of genderplay. Cast your mind back to the decadence of glam rock, the unabashed sweaty sexiness of disco, or the glittery flamboyance of the New Romantics. A degree of <a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-British-Pop-Dandy-Masculinity-Popular-Music-and-Culture/Hawkins/p/book/9781138259614">dandyism</a> has long allowed the male rock star to challenge the codes of reserved, stoic, western masculinity. The term “dandy” in this case refers to those lavishly dressed, ostentatiously extravagant male artists of the latter half of the 20th century. Rock stars like Marc Almond, David Bowie and Mick Jagger used elaborate fashion and exaggerated movements to free themselves of conservative expectations around <a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-British-Pop-Dandy-Masculinity-Popular-Music-and-Culture/Hawkins/p/book/9781138259614">how men “should” behave</a>.</p>
<p>Yet, Prince’s androgyny always felt different. As author <a href="https://www.vulture.com/article/glitter-up-the-dark-sasha-geffen-book-review.html">Sasha Geffen</a> wrote, it went beyond costume, it was “a part of who he was, reflected not only in his clothes but in his voice, mannerisms and presence”. He often played with a hypersexual mode of masculine musicality, as documented by songs like Erotic City, while his visual persona could easily be described as “soft” or “pretty”, as he appears on the cover of his <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_(album)">eponymous album</a>. So Prince’s ambiguity is entangled within his entire persona. Nowhere is this clearer than on this currently unreleased gem. </p>
<h2>The voice</h2>
<p>If Prince is hard to pigeonhole, then Camille proves even more elusive.</p>
<p>The Camille persona did not just arrive fully formed. Rogers was instrumental in bringing Camille to life. As Prince’s sound engineer for Purple Rain and Sign ‘O’ The Times, she facilitated his performances and helped craft his most seminal albums. <a href="http://anthropology.mit.edu/sites/default/files/documents/helmreich_tape_prince_and_the_studio.pdf">She has described</a> Camille as a figure “who might have been male, might have been female, it wasn’t really clear – might have been kind of ghostly, might have been kind of humanoid”. </p>
<p>However, the technology used to create Camille’s voice from that of Prince was rudimentary. In 1986, “realistic” male-to-female voice modification in a recording studio was not possible, and still poses challenges for technology companies today. But the limitations of the technology are one of the most revealing aspects of Camille.</p>
<p>A study from the <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28844651/">Journal of Voice</a> illustrates that voices that are manipulated in this way are perceived as “non-male”. The study also points to the “gender ambiguity” of a voice treated similarly to Camille. There are <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0892199704001729">several studies</a> that present <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23415148/">similar findings</a>. In essence, this research shows that altering the voice can have an impact on how we perceive someone’s gender. But more importantly, the processing of Prince/Camille’s voice is done to a degree that defies the gender binary.</p>
<p>It’s not just the pitch of Camille’s voice that sheds light on her possible persona. On the track Good Love we can hear Camille offering us a half-spoken/half-sung vocal mimicking the “valley girl” delivery made famous in the teen classic <a href="https://youtu.be/-UOcp9ydcM0?t=50">Clueless</a>. By using elements of the stereotypical creaky-voiced “vocal fry”, Camille is telling us to what tribe she might belong. Plus, the squeals of girlish delight we hear throughout the song point to something other than the machismo one might expect from a 1980s male sex symbol.</p>
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<p>If, as originally intended, we didn’t know that this album was produced by Prince, we might have a very different perspective on the singer. In essence, there is evidence to say that Camille might be best perceived female, or possibly as queer or trans – at least in terms of her voice. Yet, her voice and delivery aren’t our only clues to her identity. It can also be found in what she says.</p>
<h2>Camille comes out</h2>
<p>If I Was Your Girlfriend is one of the songs which survived and made it on to Sign ‘O’ The Times, and in some early releases is even <a href="https://www.discogs.com/release/6806791-Prince-Sign-O-The-Times">credited</a> to Camille. The song is perhaps where the combination of lyrics and artificial vocal manipulation are most striking. Opening with six bars of falsetto sighs and screams, the song introduces us to a more vulnerable Camille. This vulnerability soon gives way to something more urgent.</p>
<p>The meaning of “girlfriend” is as ambiguous as we have come to expect from Prince. The opening verses describe our narrator and the addressee doing arguably platonic activities, like choosing outfits and swapping stories about those who have wronged them. It is not long, however, until Camille sings of the sexual gratification that might result from such closeness and promises of long baths and kisses “down there, where it counts” soon follow. </p>
<p>The shifting perspectives of the narrator make it difficult to work out who is being addressed and who does the addressing in this song. Camille makes reference early on to having been the former “man” of the person she sings to and suggestions of children occur in the spoken section. Yet her pleas to girlfriend status make up the majority of the song. All elements are sung in Camille’s distinctive timbre. Jumping between male and female signifiers throughout, Camille could be said to occupy an ambiguous space here, leaving us little in the way of explanation. </p>
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<p>The track might be presenting Camille as a transgender persona. Alternatively, there is an argument to be made that Prince is simply asking the object of his affections for the kind of emotional intimacy common in close female friendships. Yet, the hypersexual male rock star making such a plea is striking, particularly in combination with the vocal manipulation. Perhaps Prince is challenging the tough, promiscuous persona that might be expected of the rock god? </p>
<p>On the track’s original B-side, Shockadelica, we find Camille in a less melancholic mood. As on If I Was Your Girlfriend, the identity of our narrator is not immediately apparent. Prince sings about Camille, but in her voice. Is Prince talking about this mysterious, bewitching woman, or is Camille singing in the third person, as befits a diva? </p>
<p>Either way, Shockadelica is an unapologetic celebration of Camille and her allure: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>She must be a witch, she got your mind, body, and soul hitched!</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Where If I Was Your Girlfriend challenged gendered stereotypes through its emotional openness, Shockadelica is a paean to female sexuality. This is a woman who is fully aware of her appeal and in total control of it, rendering her admirer completely helpless.</p>
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<p>Feel U Up would also find its home as a B-side, in this case for 1989’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjY8HvpNu6o">Partyman</a>. Feel U Up is classic Prince hedonism. Camille urges the object of her affections to enjoy the moment – any subsequent relationship, however fleeting, is not of concern here. Camille prioritises the other person’s pleasure in this song, encapsulating Morris’ points about Prince’s focus on “you” with lyrics like: “I ain’t looking for a one night stand, I only wanna feel you up.”</p>
<p>In this collection of songs, Camille is a fully fleshed-out character. She contains multitudes in her desires and her insecurities, and her complexities are consistent with the complexities in all of us. </p>
<h2>Strange relationship</h2>
<p>You may have noticed us refer to Camille as she/her and this is quite deliberate. In the lyrics there are scant references to pronouns, but when they are used she is consistently referred to as “she” or “that girl”, or directly by name. Although she is female on this album, she is referred to as the “boy named Camille” in the LoveSexy tourbook (and in French, the name is unisex). There is also <a href="https://thevioletreality.com/there-was-a-boy-named-camille-exploring-princes-elusive-alter-ego-3e1c6e1daec0">evidence</a> to suggest that aspects of Camille were inspired by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herculine_Barbin">Herculine Adélaïde Barbin</a>, a 19th-century French intersex person who identified as female. Due to the imminent release of the album in which Camille seems to be tangibly female, we call her “she” in this context, with the caveat that she appears more fluid in other instances.</p>
<p>The deeper into this album we have gone, the more apparent Camille’s separation from Prince has become. We think it is fair to say that Prince never thought of Camille as some form of fleeting sonic drag. Rather, Camille is an entire alter ego, or a new frontier for Prince to explore.</p>
<p>With Camille, we can hear Prince parsing experiences of sex and the sexual between his own experience and that of his female alter ego. Prince is interested in all things erotic, and that extends as far as donning a female or queer persona to allow a full range of experiences. Camille tells us so on Feel U Up: “I don’t really want to be your man, I only want to feel you up.”</p>
<p>And Camille seems to spark a broader fascination for Prince, particularly concerning the idea of two opposites or binaries existing together. In 1986 it was Camille and the exploration of the male and female. A few years later, he’d don a superhero and supervillain costume simultaneously (divided down the middle, of course) and call himself Gemini for the soundtrack album for 1989’s Batman. You can even see Gemini in the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulOLYnOthIw&ab_channel=Prince">Bat Dance</a> video. Writer <a href="https://thevioletreality.com/there-was-a-boy-named-camille-exploring-princes-elusive-alter-ego-3e1c6e1daec0">Lucas Cava</a> offers a fascinating deep dive into the dual personalities and interwoven origin stories of Gemini and Camille, guiding us through their development in videos, songs, films and extracts from tour programmes. </p>
<p>It isn’t coincidental that Prince wanted to explore these binaries between man and woman, evil and good. An interest in dichotomies seems to have been a theme in Prince’s life and career. His patented <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBr6H75DBsU">Minneapolis sound</a> is a blend of working-class white rock and queer Black disco. Life and death crops up regularly in Prince’s lyrics. Even his Dandyish fashion draws together elements of masculine and feminine together.</p>
<p>Whereas Prince and Camille played with the dichotomies of male and female, Prince’s contemporaries explored the spaces in-between and along the spectrum of gender. Bowie was at various points dandy-ish (look at the Hunky Dory and The Man Who Sold the World album covers), a glittery bisexual alien (the Aladdin Sane and Ziggy Stardust personas), and an emblem of sneering masculinity (The Thin White Duke). Boy George and Annie Lennox proudly danced in the middle, gazing out at you from the cover of <a href="https://calendar.songfacts.com/january/23/20756">Newsweek</a>. Grace Jones’ statuesque coolness defied conventions of demure femininity, while Sylvester’s brand of queer joy flew in the face of stoic masculinity. </p>
<p>Taking a more aggressive tone, the heavy metal fraternity (see <a href="https://i2.wp.com/stonemusic.it/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/603497891511.jpg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1">Twisted Sister</a> and <a href="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/59496a481b10e371ac6e294f/1610658361917-F8TEECSM9MYHNE83DI2T/1mTLc7.jpg">Mötley Crüe</a>) of the 1980s applied makeup and Lycra in an attempt to shock crowds, parents and topple the status quo. The earlier <a href="https://img.apmcdn.org/d122c4b59af1c352e04d53badbcced2a67e652d9/uncropped/4ea853-20140804-stones-drag.jpg">Rolling Stones attempt</a> at provoking audiences with similar drag appears (retrospectively at least) more <a href="https://youtu.be/uyORbG3I5Ys?t=8">Monty Python</a> than scandalising, more churchgoing Sunday best than skintight spandex.</p>
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<p>Prince and Camille sit apart from these artists. They don’t revel in the innumerable gradations along the spectrum of gender and they certainly do not mock any interpretation thereof. Rather, they represent the polar positions, singing back and forth to one another across the expanse.</p>
<h2>A sign of the times</h2>
<p>In the process of listening to and revisiting the songs made for the album, we have found ourselves running in circles trying to define this mysterious and intriguing persona. Each time one of us thought we had found a definition we could pin down, it would slip from our grasp on a second listen. In light of this, we decided that it would be more valuable to celebrate her ambiguity and ask what the release of the album means now, rather than trying to pigeonhole or categorise her.</p>
<p>Freed from her four decades in <a href="https://www.facebook.com/60minutes/videos/a-team-of-archivists-is-going-through-princes-unreleased-music-and-proposing-new/4243364925696171/">the vault</a>, Camille will finally be allowed to come out. The question now is how and where to situate Camille within a queer pop history. Will she be lauded as an important lost voice in music history, or cast aside as a novelty for Prince completists?</p>
<p>Camille’s long absence leaves us only able to speculate on the impact she might have had. Had the Camille album been released as planned, could she have contributed to the wider representation of queer artists earlier in our pop culture past? What kind of ruminations around gender could she have provoked in the public consciousness? What would a Camille tour have looked like? There are surely queer elements that might have become part of broader public discourse, at least among Prince’s established fanbase, as a consequence of Camille’s presence. </p>
<p>The history of androgyny and genderplay in pop is a rich one, but Camille embodies something that eludes neat compartmentalisation. While we can’t know for sure what kind of impact Camille would have had at her inception, she belongs to a vibrant hidden history of queer artists. Personally speaking, we like the fact that Camille is so challenging to define. She brings ambiguity, playfulness, and queerness to bear in a way that few artists ever explore. That androgyny and otherness is, to us, where her real power and contribution comes from.</p>
<p>It is fair to say that Camille would not have been a cure-all for queer rights and discrimination and we must be careful not to overestimate her impact. She would not have been the straw that broke the camel’s back, ushering in a new age of fraternal love, but she may have added another high-profile voice to the growing number of queer artists presenting important and publicly relevant work. </p>
<p>We can only hypothesise what she would have meant to listeners in 1987. However, that doesn’t negate or diminish her contribution and importance to audiences today, particularly audiences who may see themselves reflected in her enigmatic sensuality.</p>
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<p><em>To hear about new Insights articles, join the hundreds of thousands of people who value The Conversation’s evidence-based news. <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/newsletters/the-daily-newsletter-2?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=InsightsUK"><strong>Subscribe to our newsletter</strong></a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/189486/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
A lost album by the late Prince, set for release in 2023, promises to highlight how the pop pioneer played with gender roles.
Liam Maloney, Programme Leader for Music & Sound Recording, University of York
Alice Masterson, Visiting Music Lecturer, University of York
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/196793
2023-01-26T19:05:37Z
2023-01-26T19:05:37Z
Molly Meldrum at 80: how the ‘artfully incoherent’ presenter changed Australian music – and Australian music journalism
<p>Ian Alexander “Molly” Meldrum is 80 on January 29 2023. </p>
<p>The Australian music industry would not be where it is today without his work as a talent scout, DJ, record producer, journalist, broadcaster and professional fan. </p>
<p>His legacy has been acknowledged by the ARIAs, APRA, the Logies, an Order of Australia and even a <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-will-molly-help-us-remember-australian-culture-54117">mini-series</a>. </p>
<p>Just a couple of weeks ago, Meldrum made headlines again for an appearance at Elton John’s farewell concert in Melbourne when he <a href="https://themusic.com.au/news/molly-meldrum-bares-his-bum-at-elton-john-concert/oL24srW0t7Y/14-01-23">“mooned” the crowd</a> in a playful display of rock and roll rebellion. He later <a href="https://www.nme.com/en_au/news/music/molly-meldrum-apologises-for-mooning-audiences-at-elton-johns-melbourne-concert-3381156">apologised</a> to the audience and old friend Elton, keen to make sure no one else was blamed. </p>
<p>It was an irreverence typical of Meldrum’s long career. But his legacy is not just in the musical acts he supported. It is also in the taste makers who followed in his footsteps.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/countdown-just-nostalgia-or-still-breaking-new-ground-83963">Countdown - just nostalgia, or still breaking new ground?</a>
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<h2>‘Artfully incoherent’</h2>
<p>A journalist at pioneering music magazine Go-Set, a presenter and record producer, Meldrum became a household name with the ABC TV music show Countdown (1974-87). Countdown was a weekly touchstone for the industry and fans, promoting local acts alongside the best in the world.</p>
<p>Meldrum’s approach to interviewing and commentary is legendary. ABC historian Ken Inglis called his interviewing style “artfully incoherent”. </p>
<p>Importantly, his charm put artists and fans at ease. </p>
<p>Meldrum is not a slick player, but a fan. This fandom is felt so deeply that, at times, he became overwhelmed. </p>
<p>One of Meldrum’s most famous interviews was in 1977 when the then Prince Of Wales appeared on Countdown to launch a charity record and event. The presenter became increasingly flustered. </p>
<p>Even now, watching back, it’s hard not to side with Meldrum rather than his famous guest. Pomp, ceremony and hierarchy really didn’t make sense in this rock and pop oasis. </p>
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<p>In another interview, Meldrum spoke to David Bowie on a tennis court. Both men casually talked and smoked (it was the ‘70s!), talking seriously about the work but not much else. </p>
<p>As Meldrum handed Bowie a tennis racket to demonstrate how the iconic track, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vkLE1Gno724">Fame</a> (with John Lennon) was born, the Starman was given space to be hilariously human.</p>
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<p>When meeting a sedate Stevie Nicks, Meldrum met her on her level. </p>
<p>Nicks told Meldrum she was only happy “sometimes”, and rather than probing, he just listened. When Meldrum asked about the dog Nicks had in her lap, she opened up: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>I got her way before I had any money, I didn’t have near enough money to buy her […] She’s one of the things I’ve had to give up for Fleetwood Mac, because you’re not home.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Meldrum approached this, and all his guests, with humanity. This is how his insights into the reality of rock royalty are effortlessly uncovered. </p>
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<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-will-molly-help-us-remember-australian-culture-54117">How will 'Molly' help us remember Australian culture?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>New taste makers</h2>
<p>A country boy who came to the city, Meldrum studied music and the growing local industry much more attentively than his law degree. He passionately supported (and continues to support) Australian popular music – and Australian music fans.</p>
<p>He speaks a love language for music that musicians and fans share, and a language which has continued in other presenters.</p>
<p>Following in Meldrum’s footsteps we have seen distinct critical voices like Myf Warhurst, Julia Zemiro and Zan Rowe. </p>
<p>Each of these women have approached the music industry with charm like Meldrum, but also their own perspectives: Zemiro with a love of international influence; Warhurst with pop as a language to connect us to the everyday; Rowe with a way to connect audiences and musicians through conversations about their own processes and passions. </p>
<p>Our best music critics, and musicians, have embraced an unapologetic energy Meldrum made acceptable.</p>
<p>Meldrum is also a pioneer in the LGBTQ+ community, weathering the storms of prejudice during his early career. Today, members of the media and musical community have greater protection from the prejudice common when his career began. </p>
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</figure>
<h2>The music, of course, the music</h2>
<p>The Australian music industry would not be what it is had Molly Meldrum gone on to be a lawyer. </p>
<p>Through the pages of Go-Set and on Countdown he worked to promote new talent, believing in and developing acts like AC/DC, Split Enz, Paul Kelly, Do Re Mi, Australian Crawl and Kylie Minogue before the rest of the industry knew what to do with them. </p>
<p>He did the same for international artists. ABBA, Elton John, KISS, Madonna and many other now mega-names were first presented to Australian audiences via Meldrum’s wonderful ear.</p>
<p>Today, Australian music encompasses pop, dance, electro and hip hop, and artists from all walks of life. Meldrum’s willingness to listen has contributed to this, and he encouraged others to do the same. </p>
<p>Meldrum remains revered not just for nostalgia but as an example of what putting energy into the local scene can achieve. </p>
<p>Most importantly, Meldrum continues to be a music fan. He loves the mainstream, the place where the majority of the audience also resides. He has never bought into the idea of a “guilty” pleasure – if it works, it works, no music snobbery here. </p>
<p>His catch-cry – “do yourself a favour” – really does sum up the importance of music. It is not a luxury, but something to really keep us going. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/molly-is-lacking-as-a-tv-show-but-millions-including-me-are-hooked-54471">Molly is lacking as a TV show but millions, including me, are hooked</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/196793/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Liz Giuffre does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Molly Meldrum is not a slick player, but a fan.
Liz Giuffre, Senior Lecturer in Communication, University of Technology Sydney
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/190347
2022-09-14T01:30:05Z
2022-09-14T01:30:05Z
Moonage Daydream: brilliant Bowie film takes big risks to create something truly new
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484452/original/file-20220913-3993-hu7z7.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=4%2C0%2C1473%2C797&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Universal Pictures</span></span></figcaption></figure><blockquote>
<p>Don’t fake it baby, lay the real thing on me</p>
</blockquote>
<p><strong>– David Bowie, Moonage Daydream (1971)</strong></p>
<p>Hypnotic, immersive, kaleidoscopic, sublime: Brett Morgen’s film <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUvjaPIEIBs">Moonage Daydream</a> has been described as an “<a href="https://www.nme.com/en_au/news/film/watch-new-trailer-for-david-bowie-documentary-moonage-daydream-3278359">experiential cinematic odyssey</a>” and a “<a href="https://letterboxd.com/nextbestpicture/film/moonage-daydream/">colossal tidal wave</a> of vibrant images and overpowering sound”. </p>
<p>But as a Bowie fan of 40 years, this film was a transformative experience for me because of the integrity with which Morgen reassembled “the real thing” to make something authentic and new.</p>
<p>Inspired by <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNrvd_c9jn0">Bowie’s cautionary words</a> about comfort and his philosophy to “always go further into the water than you feel you’re capable of being in”, Morgen embarked on a mission that would take him far outside his comfort zone.</p>
<p>Boldly eschewing the conventional biopic format, he immersed himself in a seven-year creative process – one that has led to a subjective but respectful representation of the artist who helped him navigate his own teenage journeys.</p>
<p>Propelling the biographical music documentary form beyond the expected conventions of talking heads and expert analysis, Morgen combines a documentary style with <a href="https://books.google.co.nz/books/about/David_Bowie_and_the_Art_of_Music_Video.html?id=LlKSzQEACAAJ&redir_esc=y">music video aesthetics</a> and <a href="https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/intellect/ap3/2019/00000008/00000001/art00006">surrealist assemblage methods</a> to craft a new form.</p>
<p>Employing an even more extensive collage approach than he’d used for his Kurt Cobain film <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4229236/">Montage of Heck (2015)</a>, Morgen treats Moonage Daydream as an audiovisual tapestry, woven from numerous archival materials: songs, vocal recordings, still photographs and film footage derived from music videos, theatrical films, televised interviews and live performance.</p>
<p>Morgen brings these things to life by punctuating them with sonic and visual effects. Bravely facing the potential wrath of Bowie devotees, he takes the creative liberty of disassembling and reanimating Bowie’s hand-drawn sketches, storyboards and paintings.</p>
<figure>
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</figure>
<h2>Ziggy Stardust lives</h2>
<p>A risky way to treat the work of a deceased artist, the approach nonetheless works because Morgen is channelling the Bowie “on his shoulder”. This is his reality of Bowie, but it allows space for viewers to fill in the gaps. As he <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/afternoons/audio/2018857805/the-director-of-the-new-david-bowie-documentary">explained recently</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Bowie invited us the way kabuki does, to kind of project and fill in the blanks. And so I tried to create a film in that manner […] We all have our own Bowie. You have your Bowie, I have my Bowie. I wanted the canvas to reflect back to each viewer their own Bowie, and ultimately themselves.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Taking two years to familiarise himself with millions of archival pieces, Morgen developed an intuitive sense about which materials to use and how they would project when blown up on a cinema screen. By allowing this raw material to retain flaws such as scratches, camera shake and blur, he conjures nostalgia for a moment in time.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/space-oddity-at-50-the-novelty-song-that-became-a-cultural-touchstone-120071">Space Oddity at 50: the 'novelty song' that became a cultural touchstone</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Transported to the Hammersmith Odeon in 1973, I marvelled at the grainy texture of the film stock used to shoot <a href="https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/book/im-not-a-film-star-david-bowie-as-actor/ch1-ziggy-stardust-direct-cinema-and-the-multimodal-performance-of-gesamtkunstwerk">D.A. Pennebaker’s film</a> of the famous last <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmmmqGsi-iw">Ziggy Stardust</a> concert. I absorbed the texture of Bowie’s hair and the colour of his mismatched eyes in extreme closeups from Mick Rock’s music video <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZKcl4-tcuo">Life On Mars?</a> from the same year.</p>
<p>Grounding the film in reality, the rawness and heightened proximity of these projections enhance the sensory experience. One moment I was on stage with Bowie, just behind his shoulder, experiencing his exhilaration as he stepped towards throngs of adoring fans. Next, I was one of those fans in full Ziggy garb, reaching out to touch Bowie on that stage.</p>
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</figure>
<h2>Cut-up and collage</h2>
<p>This sense of intimacy and immersion in Bowie’s life explains why Moonage Daydream is such a treat for fans. But why did Bowie’s estate give their wholehearted approval to this film and not others?</p>
<p>Firstly, rather than relying on actors or expert commentators, the film allows Bowie to tell his story through his own words and his own art. Secondly, Morgen has taken more than inspiration from Bowie’s philosophy about life and creativity. He approached Moonage Daydream in a way that mirrors Bowie’s own <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10304312.2017.1334380">creative process</a>.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/david-bowies-late-revival-belongs-to-a-grand-tradition-dating-back-to-beethoven-71031">David Bowie's late revival belongs to a grand tradition dating back to Beethoven</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Often described as a cultural magpie, Bowie was a rampant forager who used methods such as cut-up and collage to weave together a diverse array of inspirations and found materials. Morgen uses similar methods with archive material from across Bowie’s expansive oeuvre.</p>
<p>He shows how Bowie synthesised the gestures of <a href="https://theconversation.com/bowie-and-gender-transgression-what-a-drag-44569">Hollywood starlets</a>, visual motifs gleaned from kabuki theatre and noh mask traditions, protopunk style and a Kubrick-esque science fiction aesthetic. </p>
<p>Morgen also uses cut-up and collage methods to show how Bowie fused the Pierrot persona (derived from the <a href="https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/comm/hd_comm.htm">Commedia dell'arte</a> performance form) with visual references derived from surrealist and German expressionist films, along with the aesthetics of the fledgling New Romantic subculture.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484445/original/file-20220913-5031-1bqo63.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484445/original/file-20220913-5031-1bqo63.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484445/original/file-20220913-5031-1bqo63.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484445/original/file-20220913-5031-1bqo63.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484445/original/file-20220913-5031-1bqo63.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484445/original/file-20220913-5031-1bqo63.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484445/original/file-20220913-5031-1bqo63.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fan tributes in Brixton, London, after the death of David Bowie in 2016.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Getty Images</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Time and space</h2>
<p>Mirroring Bowie’s creative process, the approach also replicates the artist’s treatment of time as medium, and his penchant for time travel. His songs, music videos and performances portray a constant, dizzying transit between past, present and future – something Bowie described as “<a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/19392397.2018.1559125">future nostalgia</a>”.</p>
<p>Ironically, Morgen’s non-linear editing works in tension with the film’s overarching linear chronology. This complex structure is appropriate, since it portrays the temporal fluidity and “<a href="https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/book/transmedia-directors-artistry-industry-and-new-audiovisual-aesthetics/ch14-the-alchemical-union-of-david-bowie-and-floria-sigismondi-transmedia-surrealism-and-loose-continuity">loose continuity</a>” that Bowie wove across five decades and several mediums.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/which-lazarus-was-bowie-really-referring-to-in-his-mesmerising-swan-song-53127">Which Lazarus was Bowie really referring to in his mesmerising swan song?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>This sense of time travel extends to the treatment of the songs, too. Morgen worked with Bowie’s long-time friend and collaborator Tony Visconti, who uses cut-up and collage to create new soundscapes by merging isolated tracks from the original song recordings.</p>
<p>At one point, Blackstar (2016) gradually begins to merge with parts of Memory of a Free Festival (1970) and other songs. Combined with visual collage, this surprising mashup forms a densely layered audiovisual bricolage that takes the audience on an exhilarating trip through time and space.</p>
<p>Recalling the liberating experience of dancing up the red carpet at the premiere for Moonage Daydream, and the creative process behind this almost psychedelic filmic experience, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3HDr3UM1hI">Morgen told one interviewer</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>If you ingest Bowie into your veins for seven years, you’re probably going to be a better person at the end of it than you were when you started […] It’s like having a natural high, I mean it’s like the endorphins are all alert.</p>
<p>I would never have arrived at that perspective without embracing his teachings, his philosophies towards creation.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Creating this film was a life changing experience for Morgen. Moonage Daydream is a bold work of art that promises a transformative experience for all of us. I saw <a href="https://books.google.co.nz/books/about/David_Bowie_and_the_Art_of_Music_Video.html?id=LlKSzQEACAAJ&redir_esc=y">my Bowie</a> reflected back from Morgen’s canvas. Will you see your Bowie? </p>
<hr>
<p><em>Moonage Daydream opens in cinemas worldwide on September 15.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/190347/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lisa Perrott does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Like the artist himself, Brett Morgen’s film about David Bowie defies convention to create an extraordinary audiovisual tapestry of an endlessly creative life.
Lisa Perrott, Senior Lecturer & Researcher in Screen and Media Studies, University of Waikato
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/181033
2022-05-23T10:51:06Z
2022-05-23T10:51:06Z
David Bowie and the birth of environmentalism: 50 years on, how Ziggy Stardust and the first UN climate summit changed our vision of the future
<p>David Bowie released his seminal album <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-album-reviews/the-rise-fall-of-ziggy-stardust-and-the-spiders-from-mars-95636/">The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars</a> 50 years ago, on June 16, 1972. It was an artsy and ambitious rock album which captured the time’s sense of being on the cusp of new technological and cultural frontiers.</p>
<p>In the early 1970s, the US Apollo programme was, briefly, making men visiting the moon seem like a <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/slideshow/12-men-who-walked-moon-n707951">routine event</a>. The possibilities of computer power were <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bbqt8MSFM2Y">beginning to unfold</a>, and the countercultural youth revolt was challenging prevailing values and norms. Bowie’s <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/ziggy-stardust-how-bowie-created-the-alter-ego-that-changed-rock-55254/">fictional alter ego</a> encapsulated all these groundbreaking developments: an androgynous rockstar from outer space with, in the words of the album’s title song, “a god-given ass”. Bowie-Ziggy wore heavy makeup, dyed his hair red, and dressed in clothes inspired by Japanese kabuki theatre.</p>
<p>But coupled with its playful fascination for space technology, the Ziggy Stardust album also described a dread of the Pandora’s box that might be opened as a result. Its opening track, Five Years, warned listeners that “Earth was really dying”. During the <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/cold-war-4087">cold war</a>, the prospect of man-made armageddon through nuclear war was never far away. And by the early 1970s, fears of an ecological crisis and overpopulation were starting to take on similar apocalyptic proportions.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/stockholm-50-sweden-hosts-major-un-environment-conference-yet-is-losing-its-own-green-credentials-184086">Stockholm+50: Sweden hosts major UN environment conference, yet is losing its own green credentials</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Indeed, the day of Ziggy Stardust’s release coincided with the final day of a landmark gathering in Sweden to discuss the future of the planet. The <a href="https://www.un.org/en/conferences/environment/stockholm1972">Stockholm Conference</a>, which began on June 5, 1972, was the first United Nations conference on the human environment, and the starting point for global environmental governance.</p>
<p>Today’s global climate summits, most recently <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/cop26-80762">COP 26</a> in Glasgow last November, are its direct descendants. And like Bowie’s album, the Stockholm Conference began amid conflicting emotions: hopes of a new dawn of environmental awareness and technological possibility set against fears of global conflict and planetary collapse.</p>
<h2>Moonage daydream</h2>
<p>Bowie’s obsession with outer space predated the creation of Ziggy Stardust. In June 1969, what would become his first major hit single, <a href="https://www.radiox.co.uk/artists/david-bowie/story-behind-space-oddity-david-bowie/">Space Oddity</a>, was released. It told the story of an astronaut losing contact with Ground Control while gazing at the Earth from afar in his “tin can”. In July 1969, the BBC used the song in its broadcast of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyOhPpDLiwg">first moon landing</a>, apparently unaware of the tragic lyrics.</p>
<p>As Bowie clearly grasped, the <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/apollo/missions/index.html">Apollo space programme</a> was central to the birth and early growth of the global environmental movement. It was during the manned moon expeditions that Earth was first photographed from space. The most iconic image, “<a href="https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/apollo-8-earthrise">Earthrise</a>” – taken over Christmas 1968 with a Hasselblad camera by the crew of Apollo 8 – shows our planet rising over the lifeless landscape of the moon, like a sun at the horizon. It has become one of the most widely shared and reproduced photographs of all time.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463751/original/file-20220517-27-b2b281.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Earth from the Moon" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463751/original/file-20220517-27-b2b281.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463751/original/file-20220517-27-b2b281.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463751/original/file-20220517-27-b2b281.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463751/original/file-20220517-27-b2b281.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463751/original/file-20220517-27-b2b281.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463751/original/file-20220517-27-b2b281.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463751/original/file-20220517-27-b2b281.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The original Earthrise photograph taken from Apollo 8.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/apollo-8-earthrise">Nasa</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Astronauts Frank Borman, James Lovell and William Anders had become the first humans to venture outside the Earth’s orbit. New satellite technology also made it possible for their space adventures to be followed via television broadcasts. On Christmas Eve, they <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEEpHmC1jzo">read the opening verses of Genesis</a> and sent festive greetings to an estimated one billion people watching around the world. Six months later, the first moon landing drew an <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/15/business/media/apollo-11-television-media.html">even greater audience</a>, offering those watching further spectacular views of the Earth.</p>
<p>Such images resonated among the new breed of environmentalists. In the words of historian <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/robert-poole-804224">Robert Poole</a>, “It gave people a picture to think with.” Other scholars talked about the “overview effect”: by seeing the Earth from space, people became aware that life on their planet was interconnected, limited and vulnerable – giving impetus to the emerging <a href="https://theconversation.com/living-with-bunker-builders-doomsday-prepping-in-the-age-of-coronavirus-136635">survivalism movement</a>.</p>
<p>The opening track of Ziggy Stardust, Five Years, echoes some of the survivalist debate’s darker sentiments, with its weeping “newsguy” confirming the end of the world is nigh. Yet just five years earlier, during 1967’s utopian <a href="https://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2012/07/lsd-drugs-summer-of-love-sixties">summer of love</a>, this message would hardly have resonated in popular culture.</p>
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<p><strong><em>This story is part of Conversation Insights</em></strong>
<br><em>The Insights team generates <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/insights-series-71218">long-form journalism</a> and is working with academics from different backgrounds who have been engaged in projects to tackle societal and scientific challenges.</em></p>
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<p>In Swedish history, the pivotal moment for the awakening of environmental consciousness came in the <a href="https://www.manchesteropenhive.com/view/9789198557749/9789198557749.00005.xml">autumn of 1967</a>. At that time, a choir of prominent Swedish scientists publicly warned of an impending global environmental crisis. Foremost among them was the chemist Hans Palmstierna, whose book <a href="https://www.uio.no/studier/emner/hf/ifikk/KUN4500/blogg/s2016/ida-kamilla-lie/what-can-a-swedish-environmentalist-tell-us-about-.html">Plundering, Starvation, Poisoning</a> became an instant bestseller. Palmstierna argued there was an urgent need to act “before the hourglass expires for humanity”. He linked environmental destruction to other global issues, including world poverty, war and overpopulation – thereby emphasising that environmental hazards were just as severe a threat to humankind. </p>
<p>The impact of Palmstierna’s and other scientists’ collective intervention was powerful. There was talk of a general environmental awakening in Sweden, as the national press, radio and television reported on mercury-poisoned fish, biocides and acid rain with unprecedented intensity.</p>
<p>In the words of the Swedish historian Lars J Lundgren, it was as if a “new continent of problems” had been discovered. Where previously, environmental hazards had been regarded as individual problems to be solved in isolation, more and more people were beginning to see them as connected – and constituting a severe crisis.</p>
<h2>Five years</h2>
<p>From an international perspective, Sweden’s breakthrough of environmental concern occurred remarkably early. Intrinsic to this reorientation was the very concept of “the environment” (in Swedish, <em>miljö</em>).</p>
<p>The word had not been used in the early 1960s – for example, during the intense debate sparked by Rachel Carson’s book <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/may/27/rachel-carson-silent-spring-anniversary">Silent Spring</a>, which awakened public understanding of the links between industrial pesticides and the die-out of insects and wildlife in the US. At that point, people discussed nature, conservation and the threat modern industrial civilisation posed to wild birds and animals. But the environmental debate which arose in Sweden in the late 1960s put the threat to humankind at the forefront.</p>
<p>The discovery of <a href="https://www.ivl.se/download/18.14bae12b164a305ba11108ff/1537538019862/C327.pdf">acid rain</a> was of particular importance. The finding that it was being caused by sulphur dioxide emissions from across Europe was first reported in October 1967, in an article in Sweden’s largest morning paper, Dagens Nyheter, by the scientist Svante Odén. The story caused an immediate stir and frantic political action. </p>
<p>Inspired by the debate at home, Swedish diplomats suggested to the United Nations that a large environmental conference should be organised. Their initiative set the ball rolling towards what would eventually become the 1972 Stockholm Conference, the UN’s first global Conference on the Human Environment.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/457223/original/file-20220410-32519-8108ds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/457223/original/file-20220410-32519-8108ds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457223/original/file-20220410-32519-8108ds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457223/original/file-20220410-32519-8108ds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457223/original/file-20220410-32519-8108ds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457223/original/file-20220410-32519-8108ds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457223/original/file-20220410-32519-8108ds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Delegates gather at the 1972 Stockholm Conference. UN.org.</span>
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<p>Over the intervening five years, the Swedish public became acutely aware of the Earth’s environmental crisis – a chain of events I examine in <a href="https://www.manchesteropenhive.com/view/9789198557749/9789198557749.xml">my book</a>, The Environmental Turn in Postwar Sweden: A New History of Knowledge. A key voice in this national debate was <a href="https://portal.research.lu.se/en/publications/knowledge-of-the-future-in-circulation-g%C3%B6sta-ehrensv%C3%A4rds-diagnosi">Gösta Ehrensvärd</a>, professor of biochemistry at Lund University, who calculated that the depletion of the planet’s limited resources, combined with accelerating population growth, would lead to a global crisis in around 2050 – followed by centuries of famine and anarchy.</p>
<p>Ehrensvärd was accused by his opponents of being a gloomy doomsday prophet. But he saw it differently: “Planning to clean up the Earth’s affairs in the long term is realism, not pessimism.” What was needed, he said, was to steer development in new directions, and to take precautions against overexploitation and natural destruction. This would require “an array of technological expertise, wisdom, humanity and foresight” – and he hoped the Stockholm Conference would be a step in the right direction. </p>
<h2>It ain’t easy</h2>
<p>Half a century ago, in the summer of 1972, the future of humanity was looking increasingly precarious in many other ways, too. In the US, the racial divide and ongoing Vietnam war spurred civil unrest. On a global scale, in addition to the cold war, the process of decolonisation highlighted stark differences between the global north and south. Threats of overpopulation and dwindling natural resources were made real by catastrophic famines in India and Biafra.</p>
<p>Despite the Stockholm Conference’s focus on humankind’s shared destiny, it – like the world – was deeply polarised. With East Germany barred from participating because it was not a member of the UN, most of the Eastern Bloc announced they would boycott the event. (The only communist countries to attend were Yugoslavia, China and Romania.) The conference was also sharply criticised by emerging environmental movements who argued it was a top-down, inadequate and purely symbolic event. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1972/06/05/archives/environment-conference-will-offer-some-sideshows.html">Parallel environmental conferences</a> were organised in Stockholm, such as the radical left-wing People’s Forum.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Prime Minister Olof Palme’s speech at the 1972 Stockholm Conference.</span></figcaption>
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<p>The main conference’s inaugural speech by Sweden’s prime minister, Olof Palme, was also controversial. He highlighted the “tremendous destruction caused by indiscriminate bombing” and “the large-scale use of bulldozers and herbicides”. Although not stated explicitly, there was no doubt his remarks were aimed at US conduct in Vietnam, which included use of chemical herbicides and weather modification technologies that were elsewhere described as “<a href="https://www.environmentandsociety.org/arcadia/origins-ecocide-revisiting-ho-chi-minh-trail-vietnam-war">ecocide</a>”.</p>
<p>Palme’s speech was not appreciated in Washington. A spokesperson for the US state department said that “deep unease” was felt over the way the prime minister of the host country had raised this issue, which (in US eyes, at least) had nothing to do with an environmental protection conference.</p>
<p>The discussions in Stockholm went on for two hot June weeks, based on a growing realisation that humans were on the verge of destroying their own living environment. While the assembled world leaders sought to instil hope and spark international commitments, some environmental activists objected that the conference was excluding the general public. It only existed, one wrote, so that “the real decision-makers” could meet and discuss “the problems they themselves have caused”. On a diplomatic level, however, there were reasons for optimism, with the People’s Republic of China – having been <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_General_Assembly_Resolution_2758">admitted to the UN</a> in October 1971 – making its first appearance on the global scene.</p>
<p>Two concrete results of the conference were the <a href="https://www.soas.ac.uk/cedep-demos/000_P514_IEL_K3736-Demo/treaties/media/1972%20Stockholm%201972%20-%20Declaration%20of%20the%20United%20Nations%20Conference%20on%20the%20Human%20Environment%20-%20UNEP.pdf">Stockholm Declaration</a>, which laid the groundwork for international environmental jurisdiction, and the foundation of the <a href="https://www.unep.org/about-un-environment">United Nations Environmental Programme</a> (UNEP). Based in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, UNEP became responsible for coordinating international responses to environmental issues, and was the first UN body located in the developing world.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
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<p>Much of the conference’s focus ended up being on the global north-south divide. The western world’s efforts to deal with environmental degradation and overpopulation were pitted against developing countries’ desire for industrialisation and prosperity. Knowledge of an ongoing environmental crisis was circulating globally by now, but it was understood and handled in very different ways by the conference’s various power blocs and countries. </p>
<p>To an observer in 2022, with last year’s COP26 still fresh in the memory, the dividing lines of Stockholm 1972 look eerily familiar. Then, as now, young environmental activists viewed the conference as a slow and insufficient way of dealing with urgent problems. Greta Thunberg’s famous <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-59165781">“blah, blah, blah” speech</a> could have been spoken by protesters in 1972. Fifty years on, we have grown accustomed to recurring meetings, declarations, goals, bleak scenarios and calls from scientists and environmental activists to change the system. Much of this was present at the birth of global environmental politics.</p>
<h2>Starman</h2>
<p>Göran Bäckstrand had not long been working at the Swedish foreign ministry when a telegram from the Swedish delegation to the United Nations landed on his desk. They had just put forward the idea of a UN-led conference focused on the environment. Over the next five years, Bäckstrand was directly involved in the preparation and organisation of the 1972 Stockholm Conference.</p>
<p>Now in his mid-80s, Bäckstrand remains a vigorous and politically engaged figure. Over the last five years, we have discussed environmental history and contemporary concerns both in-person and over the telephone. He is a joyous soul who does not seem to despair – even though the road ahead has proven “far longer and more complicated than we imagined in 1972”.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="Göran Bäckstrand" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463733/original/file-20220517-26-d9ayze.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463733/original/file-20220517-26-d9ayze.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463733/original/file-20220517-26-d9ayze.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463733/original/file-20220517-26-d9ayze.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463733/original/file-20220517-26-d9ayze.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463733/original/file-20220517-26-d9ayze.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463733/original/file-20220517-26-d9ayze.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Göran Bäckstrand.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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<p>“My vocation for international relations got an essential new twist by being part of the Swedish team preparing the substantial scientific input for that conference,” Bäckstrand recently told me. “At one point, Professor Bert Bolin [who later became the first chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)] presented a preliminary report to our minister for the environment. He asked Bolin if he was 100% sure about the predictions in the report. Bolin said ‘no’ as there were too many variables to consider, and the minister remarked that he had always to be 100% convinced in proposing political action. </p>
<p>"To me, this illustrates why decisive political action on climate change has been neglected.”</p>
<p>Looking back, Bäckstrand thinks the most important result of the Stockholm Conference was helping to build a “global environmental consciousness”. It also created a framework for environmental governance at an international level, and indirectly led to the founding in most states of national environmental authorities.</p>
<p>This June 2-3, the 1972 event will be commemorated in the Swedish capital during <a href="https://www.stockholm50.global/about/about">Stockholm+50</a>, a UN conference jointly organised by Sweden and Kenya. Its organisers are seeking to highlight the importance of multilateralism in tackling what they call “Earth’s triple planetary crisis”: climate, nature and pollution. But just as collective action proved difficult at the original Stockholm Conference, is it possible for the nations of the world to act any more decisively now?</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/climate-scientists-concept-of-net-zero-is-a-dangerous-trap-157368">Climate scientists: concept of net zero is a dangerous trap</a>
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<p>Bäckstrand’s expectations are set low – hardened by recurring experiences of gruelling international climate negotiations. Pondering the developments of the last 50 years, he told me: “In 1972, there existed some kind of harmony between certain aspects of science and politics, and there was a mild confidence among the participating nations of the environmental crisis as a unifying mission.”</p>
<p>Today, he says, the relationship between politics and science is much more problematic, and the environment has become polarising. “There are two parallel processes of the last 50 years: the exploitation of natural resources has accelerated, and trust in the international system, and the constructive role of the UN, has gradually disintegrated.”</p>
<p>Before our latest conversation ended, I had to ask one more question of this lifetime civil servant and globally minded environmentalist. “Did you listen to the new Ziggy Stardust album when it came out that year? And did you feel any resonance with the messages you were discussing in Stockholm?”</p>
<p>“No,” Bäckstrand confessed. “In fact, I have never heard of it until you told me about it now. But I am glad you have made the connection to music history. I think it is an important one.”</p>
<h2>Blackstar</h2>
<p>The final day of the Stockholm Conference – June 16, 1972 – was the day that Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders of Mars was released to the world. Fifty years on, the hopes and fears evoked in this album, like the conference, still feel disturbingly relevant – particularly amid the heightened nuclear tensions following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The Blackstar video directed by Johan Renck.</span></figcaption>
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<p>So what would Bowie have made of the way things have turned out for the planet? He may have left some clues in his final album, Blackstar, released two days before his death in January 2016. The music videos for the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kszLwBaC4Sw">title song</a> and second single, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-JqH1M4Ya8">Lazarus</a>, were directed by another Swede, Johan Renck. At the centre of the Blackstar video is an empty space suit, blinking back to the Major Tom character in Space Oddity and Ashes to Ashes – a distinctly gloomy echo of that groundbreaking time when men first walked on the moon.</p>
<p>Bowie’s death coincided with a renewed interest in outer space. In our time, however, it is not superpower states that are leading the way to the final frontier, but <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/06/08/space-tourism-wealthy-bezos-musk-branson/">superwealthy individuals</a> such as Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, who have made their billions through the digital revolution of the 21st century – and whose companies and personal fortunes arguably epitomise the staggering inequalities that new technologies emerging in the 1970s have enabled.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/billionaire-space-race-the-ultimate-symbol-of-capitalisms-flawed-obsession-with-growth-164511">Billionaire space race: the ultimate symbol of capitalism’s flawed obsession with growth</a>
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<p>Environmentally, the picture feels similarly bleak. This November’s <a href="https://sdg.iisd.org/events/2021-un-climate-change-conference-unfccc-cop-27/">COP 27</a> will return to Africa in Sharm El-Sheik, Egypt. The continent, despite contributing a <a href="https://www.cdp.net/en/research/global-reports/africa-report">mere 4%</a> to global emissions of greenhouse gases, is bearing the brunt of their impacts, with the combined effects of severe drought, flooding and pestilence – along with conflict in Africa and Ukraine – now threatening a “<a href="https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/many-28-million-people-across-east-africa-risk-extreme-hunger-if-rains-fail-again">full-scale catastrophe</a>” across East Africa.</p>
<p>The challenges facing those following in the footsteps of Bäckstrand and his fellow attendees of the 1972 Stockholm Conference appear daunting, to say the least.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=112&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=112&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=112&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Larsson Heidenblad has received funding for his research from the Crafoord Foundation. </span></em></p>
In June 1972, the first United Nations conference on the human environment coincided with the release of David Bowie’s iconic Ziggy Stardust album. Both still feel disturbingly relevant today
David Larsson Heidenblad, Associate Professor, History, Lund University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/120071
2019-07-10T20:18:57Z
2019-07-10T20:18:57Z
Space Oddity at 50: the ‘novelty song’ that became a cultural touchstone
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283217/original/file-20190709-51258-1t3ofue.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">David Bowie in the film clip for Space Oddity: the song would become an anthem for space exploration with an enduring appeal.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">YouTube</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>When the 22-year-old David Bowie penned Space Oddity, a song that would ultimately become a <a href="https://bowiesongs.wordpress.com/2009/11/11/space-oddity/">recognised</a> classic, he was a burgeoning pop artist without a record deal. A folk singer without a gig, a sometime mime, and a purveyor of <a href="https://youtu.be/NUiboPRPOzo">ice creams</a>. His first serious relationship, with the actress <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/01/david-bowie-girl-mousy-hair-muse">Hermione Farthingale</a>, was in free fall. </p>
<p>It was December 1968, and Bowie’s manager Kenneth Pitt was collating a promotional film to pimp his client’s wares to London television and film producers. He requested Bowie pen a “special piece of new material” to contemporise the otherwise retrospective nature of the film. </p>
<p>And then, on Christmas Eve, astronaut Bill Anders captured his iconic photograph of Earth from the Apollo 8 spacecraft while circumnavigating the Moon.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283205/original/file-20190709-51262-1brzz2s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283205/original/file-20190709-51262-1brzz2s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283205/original/file-20190709-51262-1brzz2s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283205/original/file-20190709-51262-1brzz2s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283205/original/file-20190709-51262-1brzz2s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283205/original/file-20190709-51262-1brzz2s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283205/original/file-20190709-51262-1brzz2s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283205/original/file-20190709-51262-1brzz2s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Earthrise, December 25, 1968</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">NASA</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Earthrise image was still resonating in the public’s imagination when Bowie retreated to his room in Clareville Grove, London to write his space cabaret. Composing on a 12-string Hagstrom guitar with a little sonic weirdness from a Stylophone given to him by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Bolan">Marc Bolan</a>, he came up with Space Oddity.</p>
<p>A blatant commercial object, a “pragmatic” turn by a fledgling artist, the song would become an anthem for space exploration for decades (and for TV news obituaries on the occasion of Bowie’s <a href="https://youtu.be/mH3-HV2WDdQ">death</a> in 2016). </p>
<p>Space Oddity tells of an astronaut Major Tom, launched into space in a manner akin to the Apollo missions. Yet in this instance all does not go according to plan and he is left adrift in the abyss of space, “floating ‘round my tin can, far above the Moon.”</p>
<p>At the time it was considered a “novelty song” to hang alongside other opportunists riding the vapor trails of the <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/5-8/features/nasa-knows/what-was-the-saturn-v-58.html">Saturn V</a>. (<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/29/fashion/watches-omega-speedmaster-moonwatch-anniversary.html">Omega</a> watches, <a href="https://www.orlandosentinel.com/space/apollo-11-anniversary/os-ne-apollo-11-tang-20190704-ahrgsi5hmfdunfy4ldazrgvkr4-story.html">Tang</a>, <a href="https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/first-energy-bar">Space Food Sticks</a> etc). Bowie was acutely aware of the commercialisation of the space exploration story, of course. “You have really made the grade, and the papers want to know whose shirts you wear,” exalts ground control as Tom hurtles towards the heavens.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/iYYRH4apXDo?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Eschewing the typical pop song template, Bowie designed the piece as if it was a dramatic play. “I think I wanted to write a new kind of musical,” he <a href="https://slate.com/culture/2015/12/david-bowie-and-enda-walsh-musical-lazarus-reviewed.html">reflected</a> in 2002, “and that’s how I saw my future at the time.”</p>
<p>The song – one of his earliest and perhaps most outrageous musical assemblages – is also indicative of the artist he would become, a restless creative magpie perched by the wireless, plucking phrases and vocal stylings from the inbound radio waves. </p>
<p>The definitive version, recorded in late June 1969 at Trident Studios, was pressed and released as a single within three weeks – on July 11 – to leverage the hype of the impending Apollo moon landing. It also sealed a new recording deal with Mercury Records. Bowie was back.</p>
<p>However, his long-time producing partner <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Visconti">Tony Visconti</a> refused to work on the song, citing it as a distasteful departure from the singer’s hippie folk leanings. Visconti’s unease led him to recommend <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gus_Dudgeon">Gus Dudgeon</a> (who would later work with Elton John) as producer. The song’s adventurous orchestration and unsettling harmonics owe much to Dudgeon’s ambition.</p>
<p>Through resonance, tone and unexpected harmonic shifts Bowie and Dudgeon achieved a meta-pop song full of cultural and musical references. There are lyrical and tonal references to the Bee Gees’ <a href="https://youtu.be/S43YhQ_eGTw">New York Mining Disaster 1941</a> while an acoustic passage signposts <a href="https://youtu.be/gP3-TU6xPvc">Old Friends</a> by Simon & Garfunkel. Even the metallic chimes of the Stylophone recall the pulsating intro of the Beatles’ <a href="https://youtu.be/t1Jm5epJr10">I Am The Walrus</a>. This was music for space, both inside and out, an experimental sonic palette that would open up a whole <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/s/613762/space-music-drugs/">new genre</a> of musical art direction. </p>
<p>Of course, Kubrick’s <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062622/">2001: A Space Odyssey</a> hangs heavily over proceedings. The two works are not only linked by name, but by their respective critiques of the cultural zeitgeist of “space fever”. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-3m-Zu3qgM4?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>A sense of melancholia and detachment permeates Bowie’s recording. Yet, Major Tom’s predicament – floating in a tin can far above the world – is perhaps not the perilous event we might suspect. He seems quite OK with it all. Even his observation that there is “nothing I can do” comes across as somewhat of a relief.</p>
<p>We are never really sure whether the communication breakdown with ground control was accidental or by design. In Norman Mailer’s Apollo 11 chronicle <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/238970.Of_a_Fire_on_the_Moon">Of a Fire on the Moon</a>, he notes that the “obvious pleasure” of the astronaut, “was to be alone in the sky”.</p>
<h2>Rushing towards the stars</h2>
<p>Still, in a 1980 <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2017/10/06/555850186/how-ashes-to-ashes-put-the-first-act-of-david-bowies-career-to-rest">interview</a>, Bowie revealed Major Tom’s dilemma was a comment on what he saw at the time as the limits of American exceptionalism: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Here we had the great blast of American technological know-how shoving this guy up into space, but once he gets there, he’s not quite sure why he’s there. And that’s where I left him.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>For such a challenging work, the press reaction in Britain to Space Oddity was largely positive, Tony Palmer, writing in the Observer, appreciated the song’s cynical air at a time when “we cling pathetically to every moonman’s dribbling joke, when we admire unquestioningly the so-called achievement of our helmeted heroes.” </p>
<p>Music journalist Penny Valentine’s review for the ensuing album, which would feature Space Oddity as the lead track, observed that Bowie had captured “the rather frightening atmosphere we all live in as the backdrop to his songs.”</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283248/original/file-20190709-44505-1fqa54u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283248/original/file-20190709-44505-1fqa54u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283248/original/file-20190709-44505-1fqa54u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283248/original/file-20190709-44505-1fqa54u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283248/original/file-20190709-44505-1fqa54u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283248/original/file-20190709-44505-1fqa54u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283248/original/file-20190709-44505-1fqa54u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283248/original/file-20190709-44505-1fqa54u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cover of Space Oddity, the album.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Indeed, come July 1969, the promise of the Sixties and the hippy trip of the free love movement were a few festivals and a bunch of ghoulish murders away from coming to an end. The sense of being adrift like Major Tom was not just a fantasy construction any more. </p>
<p>The song’s television debut would be on July 20 when the BBC aired the track during the Apollo broadcast, albeit after the Lunar Module had safely touched down. A scenario that even surprised Bowie – “of course, I was overjoyed that they did”.</p>
<p>Despite its contrived beginnings, Bowie designed a cultural touchstone for a historic moment of human engineering and blind courage. Even 50 years hence, he appears to us fully formed on Space Oddity as a moonstruck balladeer and completely in sync with the times.</p>
<p>The immaculately dressed changeling who would go on to hit the glam rock jackpot with his alien stage persona <a href="https://youtu.be/3qrOvBuWJ-c">Ziggy Stardust</a>. A character who captured the abrasive temperament of the moment as he straddled the jet-trails of our collective rushing towards the stars.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/120071/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mitch Goodwin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Fifty years ago, on July 11, 1969, David Bowie released Space Oddity. With its adventurous orchestration, unsettling harmonics and melancholy narrative, the now classic song captured a moment.
Mitch Goodwin, Faculty of Arts, The University of Melbourne
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/110830
2019-02-20T15:13:58Z
2019-02-20T15:13:58Z
Donald Trump: less a politician than an iconoclast, a 21st-century punk
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/257982/original/file-20190208-174880-1h16dof.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/washington-dc-april-27-2018-us-1082158661?src=oTOHC8Cm5V7yXsNlQ0QIow-1-0">Shuttrstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The appeal of Donald Trump mystifies many people. How can this monstrous egotist, this apparent man-baby, be <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-trumps-win-means-for-the-rest-of-the-world-68249">president of the United States</a>, they wonder. But perhaps people are looking in the wrong places for answers and explanations. </p>
<p>They compare him to other politicians, and find that he is so different to his White House predecessors that such comparisons make no sense. But what if we were to think of Trump not as a politician, but as a kind of artist, unconsciously channelling a long legacy of radical provocation? </p>
<p>In this way, perhaps, he becomes more comprehensible. After all, Trump’s whole modus operandi is based on shock and confrontation.</p>
<p>Such an approach to life can be traced back to many historical figures, like the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Marquis-de-Sade">Marquis de Sade</a> or, in the 19th century, the painter <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/James-McNeill-Whistler">James McNeill Whistler</a>. Whistler’s painting, Nocturne in Black and Gold: The Falling Rocket, incensed the critic John Ruskin who believed it was slapdash and meaningless. He accused the artist of “impudence” and “flinging a pot of paint in the public’s face”.</p>
<p>Whistler <a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-britain/exhibition/turner-whistler-monet/turner-whistler-monet-who-what-when/turner-1">sued Ruskin for libel</a>, leading to one of the most notorious court cases of the time. The jury decided in Whistler’s favour, but awarded him a farthing in damages, which bankrupted him. </p>
<p>This wasn’t just about personal reputation, it was a battle for the soul of art, with Ruskin defending its traditional social responsibilities and value, and Whistler believing in “<a href="https://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/articles/aestheticism-and-decadence">art for art’s sake</a>” – a belief shared by Whistler’s friend Oscar Wilde. </p>
<h2>Art for art’s sake</h2>
<p>The nihilistic violence of art without social responsibility found its strongest expression in the French writer <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=nLQRXzQ4NgoC&pg=PA154&lpg=PA154&dq=The+simplest+Surrealist+act+consists+of+dashing+down+the+street,+pistol+in+hand,+and+firing+blindly,+as+fast+as+you+can+pull+the+trigger,+into+the+crowd&source=bl&ots=FVZKAjJgik&sig=ACfU3U2k6lSR_coRIrZgRrd1lcdurRpbPQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjh9cjzl7vgAhULUxUIHbwBBpgQ6AEwCnoECAIQAQ#v=onepage&q=The%20simplest%20Surrealist%20act%20consists%20of%20dashing%20down%20the%20street%2C%20pistol%20in%20hand%2C%20and%20firing%20blindly%2C%20as%20fast%20as%20you%20can%20pull%20the%20trigger%2C%20into%20the%20crowd&f=false">Andre Breton’s proclamation</a>: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>The simplest Surrealist act consists of dashing down the street, pistol in hand, and firing blindly, as fast as you can pull the trigger, into the crowd.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The German critic <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Walter-Benjamin">Walter Benjamin</a> believed that art for art’s sake led to the idea of war as a kind of pure, aesthetic experience, as proclaimed and celebrated by Fascism. Writing in the mid-1930s, he was aghast at what he described as the “aestheticisation of politics”, most explicitly manifested in the spectacular displays of power in Nazi Germany.</p>
<p>The appalling tragedy of Nazi spectacle repeats itself as farce in the 1970s, with the emergence of rock music as pure spectacle, devoid of all 1960s idealism – particularly in the glam rock of Alice Cooper and David Bowie.</p>
<p>Bowie went on to make the connection between rock as spectacle and fascism explicit. As far back as 1969, he had <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=vk-I_ZM_PfwC&pg=PA36&lpg=PA36&dq=david+bowie+and+enoch+powell+and+crying+out+for+a+leader&source=bl&ots=nRt49aKzDZ&sig=ACfU3U0tmMlShPh0-Nus0hqUZjVwXDR1rQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiT4InkmLvgAhVZVBUIHbXHAwgQ6AEwB3oECAcQAQ#v=onepage&q=david%20bowie%20and%20enoch%20powell%20and%20crying%20out%20for%20a%20leader&f=false">proclaimed in an interview</a> that Britain was “crying out for a leader” and named Enoch Powell as a potential candidate. In later interviews, he compared (his alter ego) Ziggy Stardust to Hitler. Then, in 1976, in Rolling Stone magazine, <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/david-bowie-7-wild-quotes-from-the-station-to-station-era-231332/">he proclaimed</a>: “I could have been Hitler in England… I think I might have been a bloody good Hitler. I’d be an excellent dictator.”</p>
<p>It was in the same year that he returned to England on the Orient Express, arriving at Victoria Station to be met by an open-top Mercedes, a favoured form of transport for the Nazis. This was the notorious occasion when he <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturepicturegalleries/12092387/David-Bowie-1947-2016-life-and-career-in-pictures.html?frame=2445716">may or may not</a> have made a Nazi salute to the crowd, a time he later <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=nSuGDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT115&lpg=PT115&dq=At+the+time+I+was+interested+in+ideas+of+the+mythological+Arthurian+Britain+.+.+.+it+was+more+the+mythology+than+the+actualisation,+or+the+formation+of+such+a+horrendous+thing+as+the+new+Nazi+Party.+Now+I+look+back+and+I+think+%27how+incredibly+irresponsible.+But+I+was+in+no+state+to+be+responsible.+I+was+the+least+responsible+person+I+can+imagine+at+the+time.&source=bl&ots=Eduz8PDmc2&sig=ACfU3U3PUBPLpnY-PCT58i4mFmoTWbPYcg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjmyurxy8rgAhVuUxUIHQtmAQYQ6AEwA3oECAMQAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false">looked back on with regret</a>.</p>
<p>Perhaps the strangest thing about reading these proclamations by Bowie is how reminiscent they are of Trump. In a sense, Trump is the heir of Bowie, in a journey from Whistler’s 19th century aestheticism to the sometimes <a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/f/futurism">right wing nihilism</a> of the early 20th century, and onto the current occupant of the White House. </p>
<p>Trump (born June 1947) and Bowie (born January 1947) were of the same generation. They even both hung out at nightclub <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/studio-54-10-wild-stories-from-clubs-debauched-heyday-198626/">Studio 54</a> in New York in the 1970s and 80s, though I do not know if they were ever there at the same time. Whatever the truth of Bowie’s politics, or Trump’s for that matter, both understood something profound about our contemporary culture – that image is everything. </p>
<p>The rock band Alice Cooper also understood this and their 1972 single Elected explicitly relates to politics. Watching the video in 2019 is an eerie experience, given the degree to which it seems to predict the emergence of politics as showbiz, and the rise of Trump.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/cSvy8HpxFxo?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>But perhaps Trump is less like Bowie or Cooper, and more like one of Bowie’s most notorious fans – Sid Vicious, the ultimate punk, and inheritor of the mantle of avant-garde nihilism and violence. </p>
<p>The alt-right provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos often invoked punk rock in talking about his shock strategies. “Being a Donald Trump supporter is the new punk,” he <a href="https://www.breitbart.com/social-justice/2016/09/22/milo-louisiana-state-being-a-trump-supporter-is-the-new-punk/">once proclaimed</a>, adding: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>It’s the new cool thing to do. What do you do if you wanna piss off your teachers, piss off your parents, piss off your friends, be ejected from polite society, and in all other ways be thought of as an untouchable miscreant? Vote for Donald Trump.</p>
</blockquote><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/110830/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Charlie Gere has received funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Board (now Council)</span></em></p>
The US president as avant-garde provocateur.
Charlie Gere, Professor of Media Theory and History, Lancaster University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/111225
2019-02-06T09:44:56Z
2019-02-06T09:44:56Z
BBC Icons: Alan Turing was a worthy winner – but where were the women?
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/257448/original/file-20190206-174851-ppm020.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Let us now praise famous men.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">BBC/72 Films</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Who was the greatest icon of the 20th century? The <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/TftBcdwzpP4y7qlzXmXRTy/about-the-show">BBC2 Icons</a> show reminded us of people who had struggled against adversity to fight for a better, fairer, more inclusive world. But whatever you thought of the <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3Tk2LpLg755Js0LQF7t3TQ2/the-finalists">line up</a> for the grand final on February 5, one thing was striking – there were no women on the list. Not one. The most iconic leader, activist, artist or writer, explorer, entertainer, scientist and sports star were all deemed to be men.</p>
<p>So what happened to the women? How could it be that not one woman ended up in the final? Usually in these situations we would blame the programme makers. However, to do so in this case would be rather unfair. I speak with some experience here, as I sat on the shortlisting panel in two of the categories (leaders and activists). </p>
<p>The production company was aware of diversity and was careful to include balance both in the longlists that we were given to consider, and the composition of the panels that considered them.</p>
<p>This is further evidenced in the shortlists that emerged from those panels, and upon which the public voted to produce the final (all-male) line up. There were outstanding women on every single one of those shortlists. Women who achieved great things, changed the world, reached the very zenith of their careers. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/257451/original/file-20190206-174870-zg3ogq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/257451/original/file-20190206-174870-zg3ogq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/257451/original/file-20190206-174870-zg3ogq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/257451/original/file-20190206-174870-zg3ogq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/257451/original/file-20190206-174870-zg3ogq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=583&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/257451/original/file-20190206-174870-zg3ogq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=583&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/257451/original/file-20190206-174870-zg3ogq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=583&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">What would Emmeline Pankhurst have said?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">BBC/72 Films/Alamy</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Women such as Marie Curie or Helen Keller, without whom the world would be a much poorer place. Women such as Billie Jean King or Tanni Grey-Thompson who dominated their field. Brilliant women such as Agatha Christie, Beatrix Potter, Enid Blyton, Ella Fitzgerald, Tina Turner, Rosa Parks, and many many more who didn’t even make it to the shortlists.</p>
<h2>Social prejudice</h2>
<p>So why, in the face of so many iconic women, did the final feature only men?</p>
<p>To answer this, we have to move beyond the shortlists and think more broadly about our collective attitudes. As a society, we do not always reward merit when we see it, sometimes blinded by our own prejudice. </p>
<p>The declaration of Alan Turing as the overall winner came as recognition both of his outstanding achievement and of the failure of society to acknowledge his contribution in his own lifetime, due to attitudes at that time towards autism and homosexuality. While many of us are now able to see past such prejudice, other forms of bias endure.</p>
<p>For example, while we rightly celebrate Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King Jr for standing up to racial discrimination, we have seen recent evidence from other televised contests such as <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/dec/16/black-strictly-come-dancing">Strictly Come Dancing</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/jan/30/the-disturbing-racial-bias-of-the-greatest-dancer">The Greatest Dancer</a> that racial bias still influences public voting. But for the Icons show, the voting public comprised at least as many women as men. So why were men preferred systematically over women?</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/2c9sCWlQbk4?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>There is some truth to the claim made by presenter Clare Balding that women were not given as much opportunity as men to flourish in the 20th century. For example, on the leaders panel, we shortlisted more men than women for the simple reason that there were few female world leaders. But many of the women who did make it onto the various shortlists did so in spite of the restrictions placed upon them and the barriers that they encountered, and their stories of triumph over adversity were at least as inspiring as those of the men who were chosen over them.</p>
<h2>Everyday sexism</h2>
<p>So we need to dig deeper and consider how we, as a society, still treat people differently depending on whether they are male or female. Both historically and today, we are more likely to praise, celebrate and remember men’s achievements. In contrast, many of the achievements of women – even when, as was the case for many of the women who did not make the Icons final, those achievements were spectacular – are more likely to be downplayed, overlooked, and ultimately forgotten. In a show that asks the public to vote based on our collective awareness and memory of achievement, it is perhaps not so surprising after all that we more easily accord iconic status to men than to women.</p>
<p>And this inequality really matters. It matters symbolically – every girl and young woman who watched that final will be left with the false impression that all of the most important figures of recent history were men. This might curtail their own ambition and sense of self-worth.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/257452/original/file-20190206-174887-44ulh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/257452/original/file-20190206-174887-44ulh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=829&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/257452/original/file-20190206-174887-44ulh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=829&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/257452/original/file-20190206-174887-44ulh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=829&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/257452/original/file-20190206-174887-44ulh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1042&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/257452/original/file-20190206-174887-44ulh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1042&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/257452/original/file-20190206-174887-44ulh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1042&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Alan Turing: also a victim of prejudice.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">BBC/72 Films/Elliott & Fry/NPG</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But it also matters substantively. There is repeated evidence that people rate men more highly than women on things like <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1018839203698">job applications</a>, <a href="https://news.yale.edu/2012/09/24/scientists-not-immune-gender-bias-yale-study-shows">salary evaluations</a> and <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1559-1816.2011.00781.x">political candidate evaluations</a>. This is the case even when fictional examples are used where the candidates are identical in everything except assigned gender. In other words, where all other things really are equal, we are still more likely to think that men are worth employing, promoting, even electing, rather than women.</p>
<p>It doesn’t end there. The <a href="https://everydaysexism.com/">#EverydaySexism</a> project documents thousands of testimonies of women being patronised, insulted, harassed and even assaulted in routine, everyday contexts. From the summit of achievement to daily lived experience, women are accorded less worth and status than men. The incidences of everyday sexism are so common as to be perceived as banal – and yet they are very real in the way that they undermine women, silence them or render them invisible.</p>
<p>What can we learn from all this? First, that it is not women’s lack of achievement, but our collective inability to give adequate recognition to that achievement, that is at fault. Second, that we are not yet as meritocratic a society as we might imagine ourselves to be. Third, that we need to do all that we can to acknowledge the true contribution of women, past, present and future, because one of the most important lessons of a historical show is to ensure that the errors of the past are not repeated.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/111225/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rainbow Murray was an advisor to the BBC series, The Icons.</span></em></p>
Several outstanding women were nominated, but Rainbow Murray, an adviser to the series, says the public vote showed how we’re still more inclined to recognise male achievement.
Rainbow Murray, Professor of Politics, Queen Mary University of London
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/101200
2018-08-08T16:09:56Z
2018-08-08T16:09:56Z
Music hasn’t had a defining #MeToo moment … yet
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231155/original/file-20180808-160647-1dyu20t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Righting wrongs.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GrandeDuc/Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It’s now ten months since the #MeToo wave broke over Hollywood, with Harvey Weinstein at its centre. Similar revelations have shaken comedy – with <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-36371741">Bill Cosby</a> the most notable example – and sexism in the political realm has also been in the spotlight, ending the cabinet career of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/commentisfree/2017/nov/04/michael-fallon-lunged-at-me-jane-merrick">Sir Michael Fallon</a> amid <a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/01/britains-metoo-movement-is-uncovering-a-culture-of-rampant-sexism-and-harassment-in-londons-corridors-of-power.html">wider concerns</a> about a culture of harrassment and abuse in Westminster.</p>
<p>With R&B star R Kelly’s recent release of the defiant 19-minute song <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-44929744">I Admit</a> in response to numerous allegations against him, questions are being asked about why the music industries have not yet faced a watershed moment comparable to Weinstein or Cosby’s downfall.</p>
<p>There have been some moves to highlight harassment in music, with demonstrations of solidarity at both the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2018/feb/17/music-industry-sexual-harassment-brit-awards-white-roses">BRIT and Grammy</a> awards. But there has yet to be a focal, Weinstein-style watershed moment in the music business. The reason for this is not straightforward. First of all, it’s something of a misnomer to describe the “<a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/popular-music/article/rethinking-the-music-industry/CE6B71D475494901F49767CCE130718A">music industry</a>” as a monolithic whole, as opposed to distinct – if related – activities: publishing, tours, recordings and so forth. And while there are different segments of the film industry, a movie is a unified product in the way that a song, an album and a gig aren’t.</p>
<p>So legends and heroes have evolved in music differently to cinema. Alongside the power imbalance that also pervades Hollywood, there’s the additional issue of errant behaviour being baked into the rebel credentials of “rock'n'roll” and the closer relationship between fans and stars in music than in cinema. It’s hard to disentangle hell-raising stories of life on the road from the array of questionable acts under the spotlight of #MeToo.</p>
<p>Separating the art from the artist might sometimes be necessary when the cult of the “musical genius” is tied up with <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10304312.2018.1483009">instances of problematic conduct</a>. Hugely iconic stars such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-do-you-remember-a-rock-god-the-complicated-legacy-of-chuck-berry-74835">Chuck Berry</a>, <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/yamma-brown-on-father-james-brown-s-domestic-abuse-i-hated-him-during-those-times-9746826.html">James Brown</a> and <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/cynthia-lennon-the-first-wife-of-john-lennon-whose-steadfastness-was-rewarded-by-cruel-treatment-at-10150200.html">John Lennon</a> are on record as having committed offences from voyeurism to domestic abuse. </p>
<p>Numerous others are alleged to have slept with <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2018/mar/15/i-wouldnt-want-this-for-anybodys-daughter-will-metoo-kill-off-the-rocknroll-groupie">underage girls</a> – illegal whatever “consent” was implied, even in the heyday of the rock era.</p>
<p>It’s also harder to “blacklist” artists, who can keep producing music and streaming directly to fans. So when, for instance, Spotify moved to <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-24/spotify-said-to-plan-to-restore-xxxtentacion-music-after-outcry">pull XXXTentacion and R Kelly from playlists</a>, it ended up rowing back on the decision on the grounds that it would have been impossible to properly police. </p>
<h2>Change from the ground up</h2>
<p>Fixing all of this will be difficult to achieve quickly. The possibility of powerful female artists taking a stand (as <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/taylor-swift-talks-symbolic-lawsuit-groping-trial-sexual-assault-197764/">Taylor Swift did</a> in her court victory over the DJ who had groped her in 2003) provides one point of focus. But it’s not just a matter of policing the behaviour of prominent individuals – systemic, back-of-house, changes are needed.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231079/original/file-20180808-191041-10lcqy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231079/original/file-20180808-191041-10lcqy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231079/original/file-20180808-191041-10lcqy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231079/original/file-20180808-191041-10lcqy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231079/original/file-20180808-191041-10lcqy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231079/original/file-20180808-191041-10lcqy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231079/original/file-20180808-191041-10lcqy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ike and Tina Turner: one of pop music’s well-documented cases of domestic violence.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Nationaal Archief via Wikimedia Commons</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="http://uklivemusiccensus.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/UK-Live-Music-Census-2017-full-report.pdf">The UK Live Music Census</a> showed a broad gender imbalance across different categories of musician, becoming more pronounced in the professional realm. 68% of respondents to a survey of musicians identifying as professional, 81% as semi-professional, were male. This echoes <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2017/oct/12/tonights-live-music-acts-will-mostly-be-male-only-whats-holding-women-back">an analysis by The Guardian in October 2017</a> which calculated that of the 370 gigs listed for one night in October on the Ents24 listings website, 69% of the acts were made up entirely of men, while just 9% were female-only – and half of these were solo artists.</p>
<p>Similarly, <a href="https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/7655118/uk-music-industry-diversity-study-findings">UK Music’s Diversity survey</a> showed women making up 60% of intern positions but only 30% of senior executive roles. Overall, women aged between 25 and 34 make up 54% of the UK music business, but they tend to leave the industry in greater numbers than male colleagues and women aged between 45 and 64 represent just 33% of the workforce.</p>
<p>But work is underway to develop strategies to combat sexism and harrassment in the industry. The Musicians’ Union and Incorporated Society of Musicians recently launched a <a href="http://www.completemusicupdate.com/article/the-ism-and-mus-new-code-of-practice/">joint code of practice</a> to tackle harassment and bullying, with <a href="https://www.ukmusic.org/help-and-advice/harassment-in-the-workplace/">UK Music helping to promote their “safe space” email account</a> for reporting harrassment, anonymously if necessary.</p>
<p>Problems among audience members are also moving up the agenda – organisations such as <a href="https://sgfw.org.uk/">Safe Gigs for Women</a> have identified actions for venues and festivals to reduce assault and associated predatory behaviour. Likewise, the <a href="http://musicvenuetrust.com/2018/03/fightback-grassroots-promoter/">Music Venue Trust and Music Planet Live’s initiative</a> to bring more young women into gig promotion is aimed at fostering change at the grassroots.</p>
<p>If the #MeToo movement has driven change in the music industries, it’s less about claiming a high-profile scalp such as Weinstein than (hopefully) encouraging research into the scale of the problem and developing ways to address it from the ground up. This takes longer than a media storm – a storm that is all too often followed by business as usual – and it is more of an ongoing challenge. But lasting change requires thorough work over the long term – not just hashtags and speeches.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/101200/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Adam Behr receives funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council. He is a co-investigator on the UK Live Music Census.</span></em></p>
Rock'n'Roll has long been associated with sexual misconduct but there are signs the industry is waking up to this.
Adam Behr, Lecturer in Popular and Contemporary Music, Newcastle University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/84319
2017-09-28T10:53:06Z
2017-09-28T10:53:06Z
David Bowie, a latter-day Romantic, was a modern-day Lord Byron
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187829/original/file-20170927-24154-1ydjitw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jean-Luc via Wikimedia Commons</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Before he <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-38533901">died in January 2016</a>, David Bowie was universally regarded as one of the seminal rock stars of the modern age. He sold <a href="http://www.vintagevinylnews.com/2017/08/david-bowie-has-been-streamed-more-that.html">millions of records</a>, won <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/music/2017/02/12/david-bowie-grammy-awards-blackstar/97827398/">countless awards</a>, and influenced numberless followers. </p>
<p>Almost without fail, <a href="https://theconversation.com/david-bowie-innovator-extraordinaire-52998">tributes after his death</a> lauded Bowie as a pioneer, particularly when it came to questioning ideas about gender and identity. But although Bowie’s willingness to challenge norms and boldness in doing so are undeniable, his position as a pioneer is more questionable. </p>
<p>Bowie is, in fact, directly linked to the Romantics, the writers and intellectuals who challenged similar norms some 200 years ago. And this link reveals not only the weight of Bowie’s work, but also the continuing influence of Romantic thought today. </p>
<p>My favourite version of David Bowie is the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/gallery/2016/aug/25/david-bowie-tour-thin-white-duke-photos">Thin White Duke</a> of 1975 and 1976. As skinny as a thread and with a laser-cut profile, the Duke wore his snowy shirt and black waistcoat with an icy hauteur that inspired both my fascination and my envy. </p>
<p>But it wasn’t until recently that I realised that the Thin White Duke has roots that go deeper than David Bowie’s <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/bowies-last-single-said-to-be-a-tribute-to-kabbalah/">fascination with cocaine and kabbalah</a> (his 1976 album Station to Station makes direct use of kabbalistic words and concepts). He is also a direct descendant of English Romanticism’s most alluring poet, <a href="https://theconversation.com/love-letters-from-joyces-dirty-missive-to-keatss-paeans-37500">Lord Byron</a>. </p>
<p>Like Byron, Bowie lived and worked in a time of enormous social and intellectual upheaval. And also like Byron, he embraced that upheaval eagerly, becoming its best-known symbol. </p>
<p>Byron travelled to then-mysterious lands in the early 1800s, bringing back stories of exotic scenes and events. He wove this strangeness into tales whose fictional heroes – boldly and successfully defying moral and social expectations, embracing personal morality and liberty – seemed based on himself. Childe Harold, The Giaour, The Corsair were all poems whose eponymous heroes were taken as versions of Byron himself.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/KYJgK13Wong?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Bowie picked up on precisely these elements of Byronism when he adopted the persona of <a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/music/features/ziggy-stardust-how-bowie-created-the-alter-ego-that-changed-rock-20160616">Ziggy Stardust</a>, alien liberator and 1970s counterculture personified, but who shared the physical characteristics of David Bowie.</p>
<p>Bowie’s connection to Byron runs deeper still. Both explored the question of identity in their works, while in their real lives suggesting that identity might be nothing more than a surface. They happily created themselves as brands, delighting in making fans puzzle over what was real and what was not, who was singing or speaking. </p>
<p>For this, both men earned accusations that their work was shallow. In fact, such frankness confronts the very deepest questions about how to define identity. Do people have a single “self”? What even is self, really? What if identity is really just a series of masks, donned at the appropriate moments?</p>
<p>The more I considered Bowie, the more I realised that he wasn’t linked just to Byron. Bowie is a prime example of how all of <a href="https://www.britannica.com/art/Romanticism">Romanticism</a> continues to influence our culture. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187003/original/file-20170921-8199-1j24xzb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187003/original/file-20170921-8199-1j24xzb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=786&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187003/original/file-20170921-8199-1j24xzb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=786&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187003/original/file-20170921-8199-1j24xzb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=786&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187003/original/file-20170921-8199-1j24xzb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=988&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187003/original/file-20170921-8199-1j24xzb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=988&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187003/original/file-20170921-8199-1j24xzb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=988&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Byron - lord of the romance.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/lord-byron-1800s-252139615?src=_xA6yoE78G8wBIjoW4JexA-1-4">Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Bowie’s cross-dressing and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2006/jan/22/popandrock.davidbowie">his announcement</a> that he was “gay, and I always have been” were brave statements in England in the early 1970s. (The parents of Bowie’s guitarist Mick Ronson were publicly harassed simply because of their son’s association.) </p>
<p>But 150 years earlier, John Keats confused the gender boundaries of his time, and had his work dismissed with contempt and his career destroyed because <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=1C0HDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA1&lpg=PA1&dq=keats+and+effeminate&source=bl&ots=N2GD7sTBpP&sig=sg9rPYotsv9wOG71mH-SyouKaA4&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiQ_-De-rXWAhVFKMAKHYUBBj4Q6AEIPTAH#v=onepage&q=keats%20and%20effeminate&f=false">critics thought</a> his poetry was effeminate. Bowie tapped into the same fear that Keats embodied, and his gender questioning links to concerns that lurk in the corners of many Romantic books and poems.</p>
<h2>Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes</h2>
<p>What’s more, while Bowie can be seen as rock ’n’ roll’s master of apocalypse and dystopia (his <a href="http://www.davidbowie.com/album/diamond-dogs-0">Diamond Dogs</a> album opens with an image of a world full of “fleas the size of rats sucking on rats the size of cats” and doesn’t get much more positive from there), that vision can trace its roots back to <a href="http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/blke/hd_blke.htm">William Blake’s highly symbolic</a> and post-apocalyptic poetic visions, detailed in works such as Jerusalem and The Four Zoas.</p>
<p>In fact, a great deal of Bowie’s work links back to the genre of so-called “<a href="https://www.routledge.com/Sublime-Conclusions-Last-Man-Narratives-from-Apocalypse-to-Death-of-God/Weninger/p/book/9781910887219">last-man narratives</a>”, which envisioned the end of the world through the eyes of a last survivor and were very popular in the Romantic period. The songs “Space Oddity” and “Ashes to Ashes”, for instance, are the spiritual children of <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1179/ksr.1989.4.1.1">Mary Shelley’s The Last Man</a> and <a href="https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/alastor-by-p-b-shelley">Percy Shelley’s Alastor</a>. These connections to Romanticism show that Bowie’s work can’t be dismissed as “just” pop music. </p>
<p>Furthermore, Bowie’s work shows that Romanticism still has an influence on the contemporary world. The Romantic Era, that grand and distant epoch, is not remote history, but a continuing influence on how we understand our own world. Bowie demonstrates that in some cases we are still Romantics, wrestling with the same questions that writers and thinkers grappled with more than a century ago: Who am I? How many “selves” do I have? Am I sure if I’m a boy or a girl? What will become of my world, of <em>the</em> world? </p>
<p>In an intellectual game of Chinese Whispers, these same Romantic questions and concerns appear in Bowie’s songs, and sometimes in our own minds, just in different words. In this way, it turns out, the Thin White Duke’s slender thread ties the present to the past, knots Bowie to Romanticism, and shows that Romanticism is knitted into our contemporary selves.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/84319/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Emily Bernhard Jackson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
The singer had Romantic notions in common with the poet – as well as with William Blake, Mary Shelley, and John Keats.
Emily Bernhard Jackson, Lecturer in English, University of Exeter
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/84047
2017-09-24T20:02:53Z
2017-09-24T20:02:53Z
My favourite album: David Bowie’s Diamond Dogs
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186699/original/file-20170920-22604-m72ffj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">David Bowie performs on his 1974 Diamond Dogs world tour. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/hdport/3329403108">Hunter Desportes/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Diamond Dogs, David Bowie’s eighth studio album released in 1974, was the first Bowie album I heard. I had just turned 13. </p>
<p>The album represents Bowie’s attempt to create his own post-apocalyptic soundscape after the George Orwell estate refused him the rights to 1984 for a <a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/david-bowies-failed-george-orwell-1984-adaptation-w489470">TV musical</a>. However, Bowie references Orwell through songs like Big Brother, We Are the Dead and, of course, 1984: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>They’ll split your pretty cranium, and fill it full of air, and tell you that you’re 80, but brother, you won’t care, you’ll be shooting up on anything, tomorrow’s never there.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>But despite its dystopian themes there is something wonderfully hopeful about Diamond Dogs. The album followed Aladdin Sane (1973) and Ziggy Stardust (1972), the latter having established Bowie as a star(man), come to deliver us from the emptiness, the dreariness, the heteronormative fetters of English suburban life. Like these albums, only more so, Diamond Dogs homed in on that other-worldly quality that Bowie seemed both to embody and so sublimely express.</p>
<p>As was typical of Bowie, sound was preceded by vision. On Diamond Dogs, the extraterrestrial messiah that was Ziggy is gone and we encounter Bowie as half-man, half-dog. Perhaps more preternatural than supernatural (though in European times past the dog symbolised the devil), the image is arresting. Yet, in Bowie’s hands, somehow urgent, necessary. Through the image he appears to embrace hybridity, difference, to move beyond our limited conception of what it means to be human. </p>
<p>And how he delighted in it! He did ambiguity with such certainty and style that it no longer seemed adequate to be “normal”, which was fine and dandy with me. Bowie carved out a space for us freaks and it was both overwhelming and delicious.</p>
<p>As a young trans person, long before “trans” had any real cultural currency, that is, before I could name myself, listening to Diamond Dogs changed everything. Like Bowie, I’d “found a door which let’s me out” (When You Rock ‘n’ Roll With Me). At first, I was semantically shocked (“something kind of hit me today” – We Are the Dead), then undone. It was simultaneously: recognition, connection and hope, that moment when we sense something more, something different, something richer.</p>
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<p>Musically, the album creates a tension between dark and light, sinister, yet seductive. Positioned somewhere between glam rock (or in Bowie’s case art rock), soul/funk and the soon-to-arrive punk, Diamond Dogs is a transitional album. Bowie was always on the move.</p>
<p>It’s not an album for purists or genre-junkies, but that was never Bowie’s shtick. Rather, Diamond Dogs is an assemblage of styles, a montage. It is symphony and cacophony. It opens with spoken word accompanied by synths (Future Legend), pays homage to the Stones (Diamond Dogs), and closes with the hypnotic Chant of the Ever Circling Skeletal Family. In betwixt, we move from Frank Sinatra-like crooning to German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen. When you listen to Diamond Dogs, it ain’t just your mother who’s in a whirl.</p>
<p>The best part of Diamond Dogs, and arguably the greatest piece of music Bowie ever produced, is the nine-minute triptych that lies in the middle of side one: Sweet Thing, Candidate, Sweet Thing (Reprise). These songs are highly emotional. They trade in vulnerability and longing, but they also transport and delight. This is Bowie at his best, accompanied by Mike Garson’s sublime piano. “If you want it, boys, get it here, thing.”</p>
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<p>Diamond Dogs creates a sense of vertigo, an out-of-kilter state through which we gain access to something sacred. Vocally, Bowie sweeps from a deep register to a soaring falsetto. </p>
<p>The album is lyrically opaque. In the past Bowie had relied on his own dreams, a practice that was both instinctive (think Hunky Dory 1971) and consolidated by his familiarity with the writings of psychoanalyst Carl Jung (see Memory, Dreams, Reflections 1965). Diamond Dogs marked a shift in Bowie’s approach to writing. From here on in he would adopt the cut-up technique (where a previous text is rearranged) popularised by William Burroughs. </p>
<p>Bowie is the tasteful thief and the studied faker, laughing at the hubris of the hippies and the prog rockers, at their illusions of “authenticity”. Yet, while preferring surface to depth, he captures a deeper embodied truth, one we feel riff after riff. It just feels so right. The fragmentation of his music and his lyrics are us. They point both to the multiplicity of who we are and who we might become. They call us to move beyond ourselves, our received identities. This is especially so in relation to gender and sexuality, themes that loom large on the album. </p>
<p>For me, Diamond Dogs was a mirror experience. Listening to it today, “I’m in tears again” (When You Rock ‘n’ Roll With Me).</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/84047/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alex Sharpe does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
David Bowie was the tasteful thief and practised faker, and his 1974 album Diamond Dogs borrowed from everything to create a sublime post-apocalyptic soundscape.
Alex Sharpe, Professor of Law, Keele University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/73240
2017-02-23T11:32:49Z
2017-02-23T11:32:49Z
A Clockwork Orange: ultraviolence, Russian spies and fake news
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158066/original/image-20170223-24090-1ha9jj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A painting of Alex played by Malcolm McDowell in Stanley Kubrick's film of A Clockwork Orange.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/nossreh/10788576943/in/photolist-hrmh4i-a3hiMe-5HkADe-kjdoG4-qpev96-qpebYi-GuDoMM-bDgqZX-qn8aoy-qphcPa-bmgf65-q82Prz-q81Mjx-q7Z3EM-ebfyR2-6s9p18-6WiAbf-psEDvP-qpqyLZ-qpqZUe-49znPR-qpqJ7c-jhHPDv-4q9gbY-b1hmFV-4BqKVo-q7XHrZ-6NSk1D-q7TUm3-qpfBvH-qph9ue-qpexCK-q7Rqb9-qprZb8-qpqr3c-awG2mJ-6T8D43-qpmXbo-RLWSav-qn7Y5S-q81cx2-qpfiNP-q81HMT-qn9Mih-qppsQx-b1gPUk-qn97Uy-qpmRUG-q7RdpS-pPPao1">Alex DeLarge/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The writer Anthony Burgess is most famous for his novel, <a href="https://www.anthonyburgess.org/a-clockwork-orange/">A Clockwork Orange</a>. This month marks the centenary of the writer’s birth and his dystopian vision still casts a long shadow over popular culture. But what is perhaps more intriguing is how the book was once drawn into a world of Russian espionage, fake news and paranoia.</p>
<p>During his lifetime, Burgess wrote over 30 novels, 25 non-fiction books, three symphonies and countless other musical works. But 55 years after its publication, it’s still A Clockwork Orange which has the most enduring influence.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158069/original/image-20170223-24069-1b6bq5e.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158069/original/image-20170223-24069-1b6bq5e.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158069/original/image-20170223-24069-1b6bq5e.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158069/original/image-20170223-24069-1b6bq5e.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158069/original/image-20170223-24069-1b6bq5e.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=524&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158069/original/image-20170223-24069-1b6bq5e.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=524&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158069/original/image-20170223-24069-1b6bq5e.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=524&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Anthony Burgess.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/markhillary/13880336105/in/photolist-o163Lo-RLVwFN-8iR9VZ-r7gcCH-sKro4-8k5o2E-nYSVTq-pyN6Qr-nYV6jK-hrmh4i-n9ymkK-CMMkJ4-ctaCoE-HxRwA-JeeWDz-9cMzkC-2oCBDj-ctaBR7-awG2mJ-hBqiL1-7SL7NW-hBq9EK-asYndC-9kixTJ-3snvph-7HSBEN-78efe6-oRKZnd-Ne8h4g-9oZTYw-C8Hp2V-BFAa63-xw4JWE-xuyzXf-wA1HWp-xfoeBT-xwTevn-PyGRgh-NRfqE5-t5XkhS-7yDMpo-62ok9R-4SpLFM">Mark Hillary/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>One of the more unusual examples of this influence was the novel’s appropriation by the espionage community. During the 1970s, the title supposedly became the codename for an <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Q6NTDAAAQBAJ">alleged campaign</a> to undermine the prime minister, Harold Wilson. Prompted, apparently, by fears that Wilson was a Soviet agent and that he’d been placed in office after the KGB had poisoned the previous Labour leader Hugh Gaitskell.</p>
<p>Elements within the British secret service are alleged to have bugged his staff’s phones, burgled their houses and instigated a campaign to spread false rumours about him through the media. All of this was intended as a precursor to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/mar/15/comment.labour1">a coup</a> which would see the army seize Heathrow airport and Buckingham Palace and put an interim prime minster in place. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158068/original/image-20170223-24069-1hqbsal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158068/original/image-20170223-24069-1hqbsal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158068/original/image-20170223-24069-1hqbsal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158068/original/image-20170223-24069-1hqbsal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158068/original/image-20170223-24069-1hqbsal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158068/original/image-20170223-24069-1hqbsal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158068/original/image-20170223-24069-1hqbsal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/bluesmuse/3990612536/in/photolist-75CW5q-nYV6jK-9FzHi-q7Ta8j-fcVZWp-98aS95-nY9JWn-7KLqt7-CMMkJ4-68NJ1m-5izAWS-A6MxW-2gAtam-jsQcTt-qhiHy1-FaM2m-7Djxem-7Z7K7n-eruDvh-DkEHA-4MvSPo-4mFX7x-fdbjhS-7HSBEN-7FU5HR-5yHDQA-D5Dd3-fdbj3d-8usmkU-FaM2o-ctaCoE-bne7jH-7yDMpo-4oMvBb-8EasUc-73CZjH-9cMzkC-5oQeWm-aCu6hf-4vbkXL-fWpfY8-8vmgVj-6bCcBm-dCafZ-NgJ5f-7xXesw-ctaBR7-bw96ft-6arB9-5yX6GV">Simon Zirkunow/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
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<p>The symbolism of the use of this title – of a novel about state brainwashing and civil disorder – is inventive, to say the least. It also has a strange resonance today, where again there’s rampant speculation about the way fake news and the use of “kompromat” (compromising material) is being used to manipulate Donald Trump who some fear is under the control of the Russian secret service.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"832238070460186625"}"></div></p>
<p>This story may appear as something of an outlier in the influence the book has had. But politics and culture have rubbed shoulders throughout its history.</p>
<p>Someone else who was greatly influenced by the book was David Bowie. In the early 1970s, he’d wanted to make a musical of another famous work of dystopian fiction, 1984, but George Orwell’s widow, Sonia, <a href="http://www.openculture.com/2016/04/david-bowie-dreamed-of-turning-george-orwells-1984-into-a-musical.html">refused him the rights</a>. Instead, he adapted his ideas into Diamond Dogs and created his own dystopian world: a broken society where “<a href="http://www.fabulousfreaks.uk/diamond-dogs-album-info">a disaffected youth … lived as gangs on roofs and … had the city to themselves</a>”. </p>
<p>In the Britain of that time, with its food shortages, power cuts and IRA bombings, an artistic fascination with these ideas isn’t that surprising. The bleakness of the social landscape shared much of the <a href="https://bowiesongs.wordpress.com/2010/08/26/1984-dodo/">mood and outlook</a> of the post-war period in which Orwell was writing. But the world that Bowie ended up imagining arguably has as much to do with Burgess’s “<a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Clockwork-Orange-Music-Modern-Plays/dp/0413735907">world of adolescent violence and governmental retribution</a>” depicted in A Clockwork Orange. </p>
<p>Coincidentally, Sonia Orwell also played a bit part in an incident which was formative in the inception of the novel. In 1944, when Burgess was stationed with the army in Gibraltar, it was Sonia Orwell who <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/clockwork-orange-1124980.html">sent the letter</a> informing him that his wife, Lynne, had been attacked in London by four GIs. Lynne suffered a miscarriage and it seems likely that the incident contributed to her later ill-health and early death. </p>
<h2>Violence and catharsis</h2>
<p>Not only does A Clockwork Orange explore a society overrun by random acts of recreational violence but Burgess also includes a scene in which an unnamed writer is attacked and forced to watch while his wife is raped. In his <a href="https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/57023/a-clockwork-orange/">introduction</a> to the novel, Blake Morrison suggests that writing this was a form of catharsis for Burgess – although later in his life Burgess spoke of the dejection he felt at the accusations that his artwork was some sort of promo glamorising violence. </p>
<p>Following a failed attempt by the <a href="http://psychobabble200.blogspot.co.uk/2010/07/august-14-2009-lost-world-rolling_25.html">Rolling Stones to film the novel</a> and Andy Warhol’s highly <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0059880/">experimental take on it</a>, Stanley Kubrick’s celebrated adaptation came out in 1971. This further bolstered the cultural impact. Bowie, for example, borrowed from both its visual style and soundtrack for his <a href="https://bowiesongs.wordpress.com/category/the-rise-and-fall-of-ziggy-stardust-and-the-spiders-from-mars-1972/">live shows</a>, while his <a href="http://www.5years.com/countdown30th.htm">fascination</a> with Burgess’s invented language, Nadsat, was to continue right up until his final album Blackstar, which features a song <a href="https://genius.com/David-bowie-girl-loves-me-lyrics">mostly written in it</a>. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">David Bowie - Girl Loves Me (Audio)</span></figcaption>
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<p>In 1973 – around the same time as the Wilson plot was first being hatched – Kubrick withdrew his film version of the novel from British cinemas, following several high-profile cases of supposed copycat violence. For Burgess, the film had always been a mixed blessing. When the novel came out in America, his publishers decided to cut the final chapter, which shows the protagonist grown up and wishing to settle down and start a family. Instead, it ends with him unrepentant and returned to the psychotic mindset that he’d had prior to his brainwashing treatment. It was this version that Kubrick filmed.</p>
<p>Burgess felt this prevented the book from working properly as a novel, where moral growth is a part of the essence of narrative. He saw the decision as symptomatic of the politics of the times – his book was Kennedyan, he wrote, when what was wanted was something Nixonian, “<a href="http://wwnorton.tumblr.com/post/3971470377/a-clockwork-orange-resucked">with no shred of optimism in it</a>”. He <a href="http://www.johncoulthart.com/feuilleton/2007/01/23/juice-from-a-clockwork-orange/">concluded</a>: “America prefers the other, more violent, ending. Who am I to say America is wrong? It’s all a matter of choice.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/73240/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Philip Seargeant does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
On the centenary of Anthony Burgess’s birth – A Clockwork Orange had a profound influence on the cultural and political landscape.
Philip Seargeant, Senior Lecturer in Applied Linguistics, The Open University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/71852
2017-01-25T10:16:57Z
2017-01-25T10:16:57Z
Anthill 9: When scientists experiment on themselves
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/154099/original/image-20170124-16089-n9xoy8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Self-experimentation is something scientists have done since, well, science began. Throughout history, testing a theory on one’s own body was the easiest route to getting an answer. </p>
<p>You may be forgiven for thinking that this is a thing of the past. For starters, a sample size of one is rarely conclusive. Then there are pesky ethical review boards that need to be cleared. </p>
<p>But it turns out self-experimentation is alive and well and the ninth episode of The Anthill features researchers who have engaged in the practice. </p>
<p>First, our health editor Clint Witchalls looks into a field where self-experimentation seems to be growing in popularity – if not respectability. He talks to King’s College London’s Tim Spector about <a href="http://www.tim-spector.co.uk/the-diet-myth/">the many diets he’s tried</a> and why more people should get on board <a href="https://mapmygut.com/">with testing out different food regimes</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p><strong>This month we’re launching a short survey to find out what you, our listeners, think of <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/podcasts/the-anthill">The Anthill</a> so far. We’d be grateful if you could spare a few minutes of your time to answer a couple of questions about the podcast <a href="https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/QR7WVMF">here</a>.</strong></p>
<hr>
<p>The second part of the podcast features an academic who took on the persona of the man <a href="https://theconversation.com/i-spent-a-year-as-david-bowie-and-had-some-very-strange-days-70920">he was researching</a>. Overwhelmed by the existing number of books written about David Bowie, Kingston University’s Will Brooker decided to take a different approach to learning about his hero.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/154107/original/image-20170124-16080-x36ks9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/154107/original/image-20170124-16080-x36ks9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=712&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/154107/original/image-20170124-16080-x36ks9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=712&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/154107/original/image-20170124-16080-x36ks9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=712&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/154107/original/image-20170124-16080-x36ks9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=895&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/154107/original/image-20170124-16080-x36ks9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=895&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/154107/original/image-20170124-16080-x36ks9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=895&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Brooker or Bowie?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Will Brooker</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Instead of just reading about him, Brooker lived as Bowie for a year. He read the books Bowie read, listened to the music he listened to, spent time in the places he lived, and copied his diet at different times in his life. He even employed a vocal coach and performed with tribute band The Thin White Duke. Hear them play, as Brooker shares his experiences of walking in Bowie’s shoes with our arts and culture editor Josephine Lethbridge.</p>
<p>Part three of the podcast returns to science and the efficacy of researchers taking mind-altering substances. Peter Kinderman, a clinical psychologist at the University of Liverpool, tells our science editor Miriam Frankel about how common this kind of self-experimentation is in his field. And Sorcha Uí Chonnachtaigh, a lecturer in ethics and law at Keele University, discusses the ethics of it.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>The Anthill theme music is by <a href="http://www.melodyloops.com/search/How+to+Steal+a+Million+Dollars/">Alex Grey for Melody Loops</a>. Background music during the nutrition segment is <a href="http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/?keywords=Parisian">Parisian</a> and <a href="http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/?keywords=Parisian">Spy Glass</a>, both by Kevin MacLeod. David Bowie music is performed by tribute band <a href="http://www.thinwhiteduke.biz">The Thin White Duke</a>, with vocals by Will Brooker in the song Let’s Dance. Music during the psychology segment is <a href="http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Six_Umbrellas/The_Psychadelic_And/3_Six_Umbrellas_-_The_Psychedelic_And">The Psychedelic And by Six Umbrellas</a>.</em> </p>
<p><em>A big thanks to City University London’s Department of Journalism for letting us use their studios.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/71852/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Three stories about researchers who have dabbled in self-experimentation – with varying results.
To complete a short survey about the podcast, please click here https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/QR7WVMF
Annabel Bligh, Business & Economy Editor and Podcast Producer, The Conversation UK
Gemma Ware, Head of Audio
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/71031
2017-01-10T10:52:19Z
2017-01-10T10:52:19Z
David Bowie’s late revival belongs to a grand tradition dating back to Beethoven
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/152237/original/image-20170110-29041-17godvu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'Look up here I'm in heaven'. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/drust/2736892055/in/photolist-5aRhE4-aq29ku-3NYPfc-CWju5G-59DMQh-CjkW-e9hNjw-fjiPEw-9jrUa9-HcLiXB-qEEisz-eosGCw-pXiqni-cXgCC1-C6YXhr-5Zn12H-pXjTmK-fgYVQV-fhV3JJ-fhV3uS-fhELx4-fheapo-fhV3xd-fhV3N9-4c6avV-4domSo-H9QssJ-aNqfsn-qLdjTq-6bjWsp-qxXMFe-CVX2ED-CYSGZU-7oa2Zh-akUvsS-9ezBjR-896foR-Cw9MhP-31oxo-agqhCR-H9TRd-xpQ171-4PupDP-4PupkD-avEdjq-EeyJ-4Q3Ct5-EeyK-4SrXMh-apGmfo">Derek Rust</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>It’s now already a year since the death of David Bowie. Combined with the <a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/lists/in-memoriam-2016-artists-entertainers-athletes-who-died-w457321/arnold-palmer-w457369">recent deaths</a> of other musical greats like Prince, Leonard Cohen and George Michael, we have now reached the stage where we are witnessing the decline of the mass culture of the 1960s, 70s and 80s. </p>
<p>The consolation is that we could be in for a very rich creative period as a result. Francis Whately’s <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b088ktm6/david-bowie-the-last-five-years">new documentary</a> David Bowie: The Last Five Years, which premiered on UK television just ahead of the anniversary, pays tribute to Bowie’s late creative renaissance. </p>
<p>He produced two acclaimed albums, The Next Day and, particularly, Blackstar, as well as a Broadway musical, Lazarus – an EP of the tracks written specially for the musical has just <a href="http://www.nme.com/news/music/new-david-bowie-no-plan-ep-video-released-mark-birthday-1937158">been released</a>. The quality of this output was remarkable, but also in line with what happens to many great artists in their final years. </p>
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<h2>You want it darker</h2>
<p>Bowie was looking back on his career in this material. Blackstar was a self-composed epitaph, written as he faced his mortality head-on. Leonard Cohen’s <a href="http://www.leonardcohen.com/music/you-want-it-darker">You Want it Darker</a> is very much in the same vein. Also released shortly before his death last November, it sees Cohen facing death in his signature style, combining maudlin piano melodies with his distinctive vocals and wit. Like Bowie, he approached his art with more urgency towards the end, releasing three albums in four years after a long period of wide gaps between new material. </p>
<p>In 2010, Gil Scott-Heron issued I’m New Here, his first new album in 16 years. It received <a href="http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/13893-im-new-here/">great reviews</a> for its themes of regret and redemption. It generated much excitement about the prospect of a new prolific period for the American singer/poet following years of addiction, but this was cut short when he died the following year. </p>
<p>Johnny Cash may not have been releasing new material at the time of his death in 2003, but he had recently returned to prominence with similarly reflective subject matter. His 2002 single <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k9IfHDi-2EA">The Man Comes Around</a>, which he had written a few years earlier and re-recorded for the <a href="http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/1331-american-iv-the-man-comes-around/">America IV</a> album, is all about judgement and the Book of Revelation. Then came the double A-side <a href="https://www.discogs.com/Johnny-Cash-Hurt-Personal-Jesus/release/652597">Hurt/Personal Jesus</a>, which highlighted his failing health, devout Christianity and reconciled him to death. </p>
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<p>Bowie and these other examples echo what happened to Ludvig van Beethoven, whose late period was famously examined by the German thinker <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/831019?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">Theodor W Adorno</a>. His ideas were developed more recently by the American literary professor and critic <a href="http://www.lrb.co.uk/v26/n15/edward-said/thoughts-on-late-style">Edward Said</a>. </p>
<p>Adorno thought there was something distinct about the late style of artistic geniuses like Beethoven (and the writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe). He identified two common moods: either resolution and reconciliation or anger and dissonance. Adorno sees Beethoven’s 1823 mass <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGNthTj3Hzk">Missa Solemnis</a> as an “alienated masterpiece”, in which the internal struggle of the artist’s impending death and need for creative resolution results in a work riddled with contradictions and intrigue. </p>
<h2>I’m a Blackstar</h2>
<p>In a similar way, Bowie alludes to his past works in Blackstar while continuing to develop, alongside composition that incorporates both convention and dissonance. Bowie was of course a master of reinvention – as suggested by the title of the 2013 Victoria and Albert Museum exhibition <a href="http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/exhibitions/david-bowie-is/">David Bowie Is</a>. He made a career of changing personas, with the likes of Major Tom, Ziggy Stardust, the Thin White Duke and the “Serious Moonlight” Bowie of the Let’s Dance era. </p>
<p>There was even reinvention within his 2010s renaissance, with Blackstar <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/music/what-to-listen-to/david-bowie-blackstar-first-listen-extraordinary/">a departure</a> from the rockier The Next Day. Yet by looking back over his career in this material, Bowie’s many reinventions were also one more thing he reappraised. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/152182/original/image-20170109-23473-oz0ask.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/152182/original/image-20170109-23473-oz0ask.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/152182/original/image-20170109-23473-oz0ask.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=610&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/152182/original/image-20170109-23473-oz0ask.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=610&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/152182/original/image-20170109-23473-oz0ask.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=610&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/152182/original/image-20170109-23473-oz0ask.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=766&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/152182/original/image-20170109-23473-oz0ask.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=766&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/152182/original/image-20170109-23473-oz0ask.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=766&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">2013 album cover.</span>
</figcaption>
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<p>Whately’s film showed Bowie and his design partner experimenting with subverting various iconic pictures of the singer for the cover of The Next Day – including a black star obscuring the Aladdin Sane cover – before settling on the Heroes lead image from 1977. </p>
<p>The strongly jazz-influenced Blackstar followed in 2016 and was <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/03/16/david-bowies-last-release-lazarus-was-parting-gift-for-fans-in-c/">viewed by many</a> as a final poetic gesture and parting gift when he died two days later. The Whately film suggested Bowie did not know his illness was terminal when he made the record, though the pattern of reckoning with mortality and life lived was clear enough. The voice emerges from the spectral, quasi-devotional title track, but its range is restricted – producer Tony Visconti talks in the Whately film about a shared desire to “mangle the voice”. </p>
<p>But it is the third track, Lazarus, that provides the greatest insight into Bowie’s vision. The song’s lyrical content seems to speak from beyond the grave: “Look up here, I’m in heaven”, he sings. The video shows a hospitalised Bowie bandaged and with button eyes. </p>
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<p>It toys with the very possibility of closure, as Bowie retreats into a wardrobe – dressed in the diagonally striped black body suit seen on the <a href="https://www.discogs.com/David-Bowie-Station-To-Station/release/1033850">1991 CD reissue</a> of Station to Station. But then it stops with the door ajar, speaking to the permanence of art. </p>
<h2>Changes</h2>
<p>The same motif continues in the final track of the album, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZscv36UUHo">I Can’t Give Everything Away</a>. It reads as a summary of Bowie’s artistic principles, indicating his need to retain something of himself behind his personas. The track reuses the harmonica from the sinister yet optimistic instrumental <a href="https://bowiesongs.wordpress.com/2011/02/22/a-new-career-in-a-new-town/">A New Career in a New Town</a>, which concludes side one of his seminal 1977 album Low. </p>
<p>This returns us to his creative peak, while suggesting the apprehension that accompanies new experiences. And despite being one of the smoothest tracks on the album, it avoids the conventional stability of the chord resolution of the title track in favour of Lazarus’s more unsettled tonality, concluding with a minor sixth. This suggests a trailing off; something to be continued.</p>
<p>With this immense final statement, David Bowie has set the tone for a period in which major rock artists are conspicuously and consciously producing late works. In death as in life he set a benchmark. As many other contemporary artists reach the end of their lives, it is to Bowie’s works that their own late output will be compared.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/71031/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
The great polymath’s late output reads like a manual for artists saying goodbye.
Andrew Frayn, Lecturer in Twentieth Century Literature and Culture, Edinburgh Napier University
Rachael Durkin, Lecturer in Music, Edinburgh Napier University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/70920
2017-01-10T09:28:02Z
2017-01-10T09:28:02Z
I spent a year as David Bowie – and had some very strange days
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151825/original/image-20170105-29222-x7my4c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Will Brooker</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>I woke up in Los Angeles. That was fine, except I was meant to be 8,000 miles away. I was supposed to be in Melbourne.</p>
<p>I was supposed to be in Melbourne to give the opening talk at the international David Bowie conference, in about 24 hours. The flight time from LA to Melbourne is 14 hours. I didn’t have a flight booked. I didn’t have any luggage.</p>
<p>It was July 2015, and I was in an airport hotel with hair the colour and cut of David Bowie in The Man Who Fell To Earth, circa 1976. I had nothing else except the clothes I was wearing – a suit from 1973 – and a small black carry-on bag.</p>
<p>It had all gone wrong the day before, on a flight from San Diego to LA. The flight was meant to be a short hop, taking an hour. But it took three hours, and so my connection left without me, and my luggage was lost.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151824/original/image-20170105-29222-4dl7nx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151824/original/image-20170105-29222-4dl7nx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151824/original/image-20170105-29222-4dl7nx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151824/original/image-20170105-29222-4dl7nx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151824/original/image-20170105-29222-4dl7nx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151824/original/image-20170105-29222-4dl7nx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151824/original/image-20170105-29222-4dl7nx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">1970s regalia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Will Brooker</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Technically, it had gone wrong. But in a way, it was all going perfectly. I embraced the sense of lostness, of being dislocated out of time and space: the wandering around LAX airport, the glossy anonymity of the airport hotel. I rode the shuttle buses in loops around the 1961, space-age architecture of the Theme Building, the airport’s Futureland-style flying saucer. Staring out of another window at planes taking off and landing, I noticed that a wall was stencilled with the message “GROUND CONTROL”. It was literally a sign. I took it as a good sign. I was doing it right.</p>
<p>I was one month into an <a href="http://www.kingston.ac.uk/news/article/1654/12-may-2016-researcher-professor-will-brooker-raises-the-roof-as-david-bowie-at-kingston-university-ziggy-stardust/">immersive research project</a>, which would ultimately lead to a book. It had started as an attempt to enter into the experiences of David Bowie – to surround myself with the culture he had engaged with, to gain some understanding of his thought processes, and how they shaped his art. </p>
<p>I was listening to nothing but music from the early to mid-1970s, reading the novels of Evelyn Waugh in paperback, and wearing only vintage clothes. The 24 hours in LA gave me an opportunity to consume nothing but coffee. I walked down long, empty corridors, seeing where my sleepless, caffeinated thoughts fell. I sat down and recorded them as fragmented snatches, on scraps of paper tucked into the back of Vile Bodies.</p>
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<p>Bowie, after all, had written <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGQo6zpVzt8">Jean Genie</a> on a Greyhound bus, the rhythm of its wheels between Cleveland, Memphis and Manhattan driving the blues riff. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGcLw_bkh9U">Drive-In Saturday</a> was inspired by a glimpse of silver domes from a train at 2am, somewhere between Seattle and Phoenix. </p>
<p>Bowie’s songs of the period span America’s states and states of mind, from the “New York’s a go-go” of Jean Genie through <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rf0fmqWS-kI">Panic in Detroit</a> to the Hollywood highs of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1loH-YvTDY">Watch that Man</a>. His LPs of the time are travel albums, snapshots of a man stranded and allowing himself to go a little insane: a man abandoning his previous, English self in the new world, a man watching through windows. His own LA period was a spiral into paranoia and hallucination, fuelled by stimulants and insomnia. I let myself explore how it felt to be lost in Los Angeles, if only for a short while.</p>
<p>Next morning, I woke up on a plane. I say “morning” but I’d long since lost track of time and its zones. The plane landed in Melbourne. An academic drove me into town, to my hotel. “Get changed,” he said, “and I’ll be waiting outside”. He wanted to drive me straight to the university, to give my first lecture.</p>
<p>I washed my face, unpacked a cream linen suit. I drank a few cups of coffee. Half an hour later – 90 minutes after landing – I stood in front of a hundred strangers and strung sentences together. They clapped at the end.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"621212235021488128"}"></div></p>
<p>He drove me back to the hotel. “I’ll pick you up at five,” he said. “You’ll want to sleep.”</p>
<p>I thought I wanted to sleep, but it turned out that I couldn’t. My body clock was too screwed up. So I sat on the bed. It wasn’t a glamorous hotel. It wasn’t glamorous at all. It had white walls, a kettle, metal clothes hangers on a rail. After a few hours, I stood up and began to get ready. I unpacked my red wig, my blue suit, my turquoise eyeshadow, my orange blusher. The bathroom was little more than a closet.</p>
<p>When I was finished, I went out to the hotel reception to wait for my new friend, the academic. I was now in full regalia, a tribute to the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v--IqqusnNQ">Life On Mars</a> video of 1971. The guy behind the counter looked at me. “I’m going to a David Bowie thing,” I explained.</p>
<p>“Fair play, mate,” he nodded.</p>
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<p>The academic drove me to the opening of the <a href="http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/t/touring-exhibition-david-bowie-is/">David Bowie Is</a> exhibition, in downtown Melbourne. It was evening now. I realised it also was winter now; it had been summer the day before. I switched from coffee to champagne. People immediately came up to me asking for photographs. I obliged, of course.</p>
<p>A strange thing happens at moments like this. They know you’re not David Bowie, but they want to pretend you are, and they want you to pretend you are. They want you to be an avatar. So you find yourself doing the poses, the pouts. You find yourself preening and standing in an angular fashion, and performing in an airy manner, with an exaggerated version of your own London accent and a pronounced laugh, like he did. The same way he adopted the style and delivery of Anthony Newley: strutting like a peacock, declaiming like a grown-up urchin from Oliver! or an early-70s incarnation of Oscar Wilde.</p>
<p>They know you’re not Bowie, but you’re the nearest substitute at the time. And you act it, until you almost believe it. After a few more glasses of champagne, it becomes easier for everyone to believe it.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151842/original/image-20170105-18659-48pl3v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151842/original/image-20170105-18659-48pl3v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151842/original/image-20170105-18659-48pl3v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151842/original/image-20170105-18659-48pl3v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151842/original/image-20170105-18659-48pl3v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151842/original/image-20170105-18659-48pl3v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151842/original/image-20170105-18659-48pl3v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151842/original/image-20170105-18659-48pl3v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Forever Stardust 1970s.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Samantha LeBas</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Later, I woke up and didn’t know where I was. I searched for my phone – I was cheating, still using a smartphone – and found it somewhere in the white cell of my hotel room. It was still July, and I was still in Melbourne. In an hour, I was due to give two radio interviews. I drank a few cups of coffee. My blue eyeshadow was a strong pigment: it had lasted overnight. I didn’t need to reapply it. I successfully strung together sentences, somehow.</p>
<p><a href="https://2015.acmi.net.au/acmi-channel/2015/bowiesymposium-videos/">I gave another lecture</a>, this time in mid-70s Bowie drag. It was a big lecture to a big audience, in a big theatre. Afterwards, lots of people knew who I was, though I didn’t know them.</p>
<p>When I tried to get away from the crowd, to have a coffee on my own, people would come and sit with me, starting conversations – or just carrying on conversations, as if they’d been talking to me beforehand in their heads. I don’t know if they expected me to know who they were. These strange things happen; these strange dynamics of almost-fame, borrowed celebrity. I didn’t get any peace or privacy. Maybe I asked for that. I didn’t get much sleep. After a while, I stopped trying.</p>
<p>After five days, I caught another flight. It took me via Dubai where, once again, nobody knew me at all – it was a relief.</p>
<p>I woke up. It was still July. It was summer again. I was in London. It was 2015. It was 1975, in my ongoing year of David Bowie. Planning ahead, I booked my tickets for Berlin.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Will Brooker’s year of immersive research into David Bowie resulted in the book <a href="http://www.ibtauris.com/en/Books/Biography%20%20True%20Stories/Biography%20general/Biography%20arts%20%20entertainment/Forever%20Stardust%20David%20Bowie%20Across%20the%20Universe?menuitem=%7BB84D7340-E140-472F-B424-AB2F3175B414%7D">Forever Stardust</a>, published on January 8 by I B Tauris, and the documentary <a href="http://www.necsus-ejms.org/being-bowie/">Being Bowie</a>, published in NECSUS.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/70920/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Will Brooker does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Spending a year living life as David Bowie gave me a better understanding of the pop icon’s mind and work.
Will Brooker, Professor of Film and Cultural Studies, Kingston University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/70996
2017-01-09T19:34:27Z
2017-01-09T19:34:27Z
One year on, we should remember David Bowie as both genius and flawed human
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/152061/original/image-20170109-4268-1ki704b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A Bowie mural in Brixton, London.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Stefan Wermuth/Reuters</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It’s a year today since David Bowie died. His death-day (January 10) and his birthday (he would have been 70 on January 8) are being marked by both small-scale local tributes in <a href="http://gasometer.oztix.com.au/default.aspx?Event=68635">tiny venues</a> and high-profile <a href="http://www.nme.com/news/music/david-bowies-friends-bandmates-announce-london-tribute-show-birthday-1853875">concerts</a> in cities such as London, New York and Los Angeles. </p>
<p>Sydney, where Bowie spent a lot of time during the 1980s and 1990s, will host its tribute concert <a href="http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/music/david-bowies-collaborators-bring-tribute-concert-to-sydney-opera-house/news-story/58c078c47542c9482b7109583e561a57">on January 29 at the Opera House</a>. It will feature local musicians including Sarah Blasko and Bernard Fanning and international artists such as Earl Slick and Adrian Belew who worked with Bowie. </p>
<p>Throughout the year, there have been hundreds of obituaries and articles discussing Bowie’s life and work, as well as a myriad of performances covering his music; graffiti tributes and other artistic homages. Bowie even made it into the <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-12-31/sydney-to-make-it-rain-purple-to-honour-prince/8155836">Sydney new year fireworks display</a>. Fans have also paid tribute with cold hard cash. Bowie’s last album Blackstar was one of the biggest selling albums worldwide in 2016, and best-of compilations of his work featured <a href="http://www.officialcharts.com/chart-news/the-official-top-40-biggest-albums-of-2016__17580/">strongly</a> in <a href="http://www.ariacharts.com.au/annual-charts/2016/albums-chart">end-of-year</a> charts <a href="http://mashable.com/2017/01/03/vinyl-sales-1990s-david-bowie-blackstar/">(especially on vinyl)</a>. </p>
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<span class="caption">An image of David Bowie is projected onstage as Eric Church performs Record Year during the 51st Academy of Country Music Awards in April.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mario Anzuoni/Reuters</span></span>
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<p>At the end of all this commemoration and celebration, though, what type of Bowie are we left with? </p>
<p>When anyone dies, a transformation takes place. The complexity of a living human being – with both good and bad qualities, contradictory and perhaps confusing – is replaced by an idealised version shaped by the memories and narratives of those left behind. </p>
<p>After Bowie’s death (as for many loved musicians) the focus was unsurprisingly on his musical and cultural impact – his influence and genius. This coverage was overwhelmingly positive; an <a href="http://www.vulture.com/2016/01/the-must-read-david-bowie-tributes.html">overview of written tributes</a> to Bowie compiled by the culture website Vulture notes how the media praised him for everything from his music to his willingness to be open about his sexuality, to his championing of African American musicians. </p>
<p>The picture painted here is of someone truly beyond the average human – an idea reinforced by references to the “Starman”. Perhaps not even human at all.</p>
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<p>In the midst of this though, was some disquiet. For some people, remembering Bowie also meant remembering things he had done that might make us feel less comfortable. In particular, his history of sleeping with <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/01/17/david-bowie-and-rock-n-roll-s-statutory-rape-problem.html">underage girls </a>(as young as 14) was noted by some. </p>
<p>People reported being <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/angelina-chapin/why-talking-about-bowies-sexual-misconduct-matters_b_9009230.html">attacked on social media</a> for mentioning this aspect of Bowie, to the point where posts were deleted and the discussion silenced.</p>
<p>On a lighter level, the praising of Bowie also led to a reassessment of some of his music that was usually thought of as a bit on the nose – such as his work with the band Tin Machine in the late 1980s and 1990s.</p>
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<p>A <a href="http://diffuser.fm/tin-machine-ii-album/">critical and commercial failure</a> at the time, even this aspect of Bowie’s work has since been reassessed by some as <a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/inside-david-bowies-challenging-noisy-side-project-tin-machine-20160523">overlooked genius</a>. </p>
<p>A very tricky tightrope needs to be walked when it comes to commemorating dead rock stars. As people grieve – which they did wholeheartedly with Bowie – it may seem heartless to focus on the negative aspects of the character or work of the deceased. At worst, it is a tactic used by internet trolls to try to deliberately upset people further as they mourn their idols. </p>
<p>At the same time, the tendency to only focus on the positives of the recently deceased can sweep under the carpet important issues that could lead to productive discussion if acknowledged openly.</p>
<p>In recent weeks, further challenges to some of the myths being built around Bowie have also emerged. </p>
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<p>A <a href="http://www.uncut.co.uk/blog/inside-david-bowie-last-five-years-98771">new documentary</a> on the last five years of his life has suggested that the widely-accepted interpretations of Blackstar – that it was the farewell message of an artist who knew he had little time left on earth, and that its themes are about Bowie’s own imminent death – are wrong. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/jan/06/david-bowie-didnt-know-he-was-dying-until-last-few-months-documentary-reveals">documentary makers say</a> that while Bowie was sick, he did not know that his illness would be terminal until after the album was complete, and the ideas for the much-praised videos had already been decided upon. </p>
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<p>Are the album and videos perhaps not quite the masterpieces on mortality that they were assumed to be?</p>
<p>The narratives created after the death of a public figure play a strong role in shaping how they are seen into the future. As they become more fixed in the public’s memory and imagination, they get harder to challenge.</p>
<p>With so many important figures in popular music having died recently – a trend that will continue as the stars of the 1960s and 1970s age – it is worth thinking about how we remember the dead. </p>
<p>Are we left with superhumans who guide and inspire us, or flawed, complex people who speak to what it is to be human?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/70996/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Catherine Strong does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Amid the tribute concerts and outpourings of sadness on the anniversary of Bowie’s death, we should be wary of mythologising him.
Catherine Strong, Lecturer, Music Industry, RMIT University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/70613
2016-12-29T10:01:35Z
2016-12-29T10:01:35Z
So you think 2016 was a bad year? There were plenty worse
<p>As early as January, when <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/david-bowie-18483">David Bowie departed the scene</a>, some were already looking dubiously at 2016. Bowie was an icon of the 1970s, the era when what is now the dominant section of the population in most Western societies in terms of spending power – the post-war baby boomers – came to maturity. As more cultural legends from that age also died – many without the last burst of creativity that made Bowie’s death so poignant – 2016 began to feel like the end of an era. </p>
<p>And when <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/brexit-9976">Brexit came in the summer</a>, it was clear that in some ways it was. Articles began to appear listing the horrors of 2016 – from Zika virus to the Turkish coup. By the time <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/2016-us-presidential-election-23653">Donald Trump was elected in November</a>, on the same wave of rejection of established politics as Brexit, the feeling that 2016 had a peculiar quality was entrenched.</p>
<p>This <em>fin de siècle</em> atmosphere was captured in what became the word of the year: post-truth. Both Brexit and Trump suggested it was open season for bare-faced lying and demagoguery. Yet for those social conservatives who voted for Trump he spoke <a href="http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/11/10/american-right-inside-the-sacrifice-zone/">their truths</a> – and tapped into their fear of an unsettling future of rapid cultural and economic change. </p>
<p>Like the <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/italian-referendum-33962">referendum voters in Italy</a>, where Alfio Caruso’s <a href="https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=it&u=http://www.illibraio.it/libri/alfio-caruso-1960-il-migliore-anno-della-nostra-vita-9788830446182/&prev=search">1960: Il Migliore anno della nostra vita</a> (1960: the best year of our lives) was a 2016 bestseller, they nostalgically looked back to an imagined past rather than forward to an uncertain future. Similar fears of rapid change to their communities seem to have been key drivers of the voting behaviour of 2016’s social conservatives, who were if anything more post-trust than <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/post-truth-32226">post-truth</a>.</p>
<p>They were also post-irony, as the notion that Trump was the anti-establishment candidate demonstrated. In another irony, the tide of refugees that sparked some of these social conservative anxieties <a href="http://www.migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/migration-to-the-uk-asylum/">began to recede</a>. Syria nonetheless <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/syria-592">remained a killing field</a>. However, despite fears that Islamic State (IS) are seeking to export their theatrical brand of terrorism to the West through events such as Nice or Berlin, terrorism’s main victims remained in the same five countries of Iraq, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Pakistan and Syria. That 2016 was a particularly bad year is very much a Western narrative.</p>
<h2>Sometimes bad is bad</h2>
<p>How do you measure bad years? The easiest way is probably through human deaths. In that case, the worst year proportionately may well have been the unrecorded one some 75,000 years ago when <a href="http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/journey/toba2.html">Mount Toba erupted</a> with devastating force, causing a “volcanic winter” and nearly killing off humans altogether. The <a href="http://www.historytoday.com/ole-j-benedictow/black-death-greatest-catastrophe-ever">Black Death pandemic</a> of the 1340s is the closest we as a species have come to a similar cataclysm since. </p>
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<span class="caption">You think Brexit was bad?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Dance of Death by Michael Wolgemut (1493)</span></span>
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<p>Within the past 100 years, the worst year in terms of death indices may be 1918, when the closing stages of World War I coincided with the deadly outbreak of so-called “Spanish Flu” which <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/1918-flu-pandemic">killed between 20m and 50m people</a>. Such pandemics are, of course, natural disasters. Human activity can, however, spread them faster and further, as we see by comparing the global impact of the influenza pandemic of 1918-20 with the much more localised effects of the <a href="http://www.ancient.eu/article/782/">541 Plague of Justinian</a>. </p>
<p>So globalisation might seem as risky as 2016’s social conservatives fear – though of course it can also help humanity to intervene against pandemics.</p>
<p>Other human activities, notably wars, have the opposite effect. Wars are only the most obvious of the various anthropogenic ways in which humanity can drive up the death index in a given year, not least because they usually bring in their wake the other horsemen of the apocalypse. On such a measure, 2016 barely registers on the worst year index. </p>
<h2>Shape of things to come</h2>
<p>Humanity’s efforts collectively to win the Darwin Awards through self-destructive warfare were far more noticeable in 1939-1945, the Mongol conquests or the European assault on the Americas. Famines, those other disasters often hastened by anthropogenic mismanagement, have also been far more noticeable in the past, with the estimated 11m deaths of the <a href="http://www.academia.edu/6977392/A_Forgotten_Holocaust_The_Bengal_Famine_of_1770">Great Bengal famine of 1769-1773</a> both absolutely and proportionately a notable example.</p>
<p>So humanity won no <a href="http://www.darwinawards.com/">Darwin Awards</a>, thank goodness, in 2016. The year’s peculiar quality – at least for the West – lay more in the way in which it felt like the end of an era. If so, then it also marks the start of a new one. As is becoming clear with Brexit, it is highly unlikely that this new era will bring the comforting certainties social conservatives crave. Instead, it is worth bearing in mind that the kind of economic nationalism many of them seek has in the past proved a gateway to Darwin Award winning conflicts. </p>
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<p>Meanwhile, unpredictable figures such as Trump now have their fingers on the nuclear trigger – when they are not <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/22/brutal-amoral-ruthless-cheating-trumps-trade-industrial-peter-navarro-views-on-china">busily riling China</a>. If 2016 felt like the end of an era, there are definitely risks that the one about to begin could be a whole lot worse.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/70613/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Pippa Catterall does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
It’s become a popular meme: 2016 was the worst year ever. We’ll be lucky if it was.
Pippa Catterall, Professor of History and Policy, University of Westminster
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/70639
2016-12-25T20:41:50Z
2016-12-25T20:41:50Z
2016, the year that was: Arts and Culture
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151150/original/image-20161221-13180-3qdeqv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Visitors take in Cameron Robbins’ Field Lines at Dark Mofo at the Museum of Old and New Art.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mona/Remi Chauvin</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>2016 was not a good year to be a famous male musician. In January, <a href="https://theconversation.com/david-bowie-in-the-divided-city-of-berlin-53034">David Bowie died</a> at just 69. He was mourned <a href="https://theconversation.com/david-bowie-pop-star-who-fell-to-earth-to-teach-outsiders-they-can-be-heroes-52995">by pretty much everyone</a>, including the German Foreign Office, which tweeted: “You are now among Heroes”.</p>
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<p>In April, Prince went. <a href="https://theconversation.com/princes-passing-bookends-another-chapter-in-the-history-of-music-58286">His death was sudden</a>. He was only 57 – an <a href="https://theconversation.com/an-elusive-virtuoso-who-embraced-ambiguity-and-female-desire-58274">eccentric virtuoso</a>, a brilliant performer and a prodigious songwriter and composer. “Today, the world lost a creative icon,” said President Obama in an official statement.</p>
<p>Then, in November, Leonard Cohen died. He was 82 and as he had written to his muse Marianne, some months earlier, “we are really so old and our bodies are falling apart and I think I will follow you very soon”. Still, for those who had <a href="https://theconversation.com/goodbye-leonard-you-brought-us-so-much-light-68674">spent a lifetime listening to Cohen</a>, his sudden absence was hard to grasp. As <a href="https://theconversation.com/as-a-writer-musician-leonard-cohen-was-a-one-off-68676">David McCooey wrote</a>, Cohen – with his mesmerising baritone voice and “profound sense of playfulness and enigma” – was a one-off. </p>
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<span class="caption">Georgia Blain.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Scribe Publications</span></span>
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<p>Death comes to artists in every genre, of course, and late this year we lost two stellar Australian writers – <a href="https://theconversation.com/goodbye-georgia-blain-a-brave-and-true-chronicler-of-life-70329">Georgia Blain</a> and the remarkable <a href="https://theconversation.com/remembering-shirley-hazzard-art-is-the-only-afterlife-of-which-we-have-evidence-70519">Shirley Hazzard</a> – along with the pioneering Melbourne architect <a href="https://theconversation.com/remembering-peter-corrigan-a-life-of-movement-energy-and-integrity-69868">Peter Corrigan</a>. But there was much more to Arts + Culture in 2016 than sadness. </p>
<p>It was a year of creative foment – from operas fused with circus to hard-hitting feminist memoirs to young, bold festivals such as Adelaide’s OzAsia and Hobart’s Dark Mofo – and as always, intense debate about the importance of the arts to a thriving, democratic society. Here then, is 2016 as we saw it.</p>
<h2>Cultural identity</h2>
<p>In March, the Daily Telegraph informed readers that students at a leading NSW university were “being told to refer to Australia as having been ‘invaded’ instead of settled in a highly controversial rewriting of official Australian history”.</p>
<p>Archaeology professor Bryce Barker offered a much needed <a href="https://theconversation.com/of-course-australia-was-invaded-massacres-happened-here-less-than-90-years-ago-55377">informed perspective on this matter.</a> Detailed historical research on the colonial frontier, he wrote,</p>
<blockquote>
<p>unequivocally supports the idea that Aboriginal people were subject to attack, assault, incursion, conquest and subjugation: all synonyms for the term ‘invasion’.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The culture wars manifested in other ways, too, with Indigenous Australians featuring controversially in the cartoons of Bill Leak. In an <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-white-mans-burden-bill-leak-and-telling-the-truth-about-aboriginal-lives-63524">impassioned response to one cartoon</a>, Chelsea Bond wrote that Leak’s work “continues a long tradition of white men’s fantasies about the inferiority of Aboriginal people”. Philosopher Janna Thompson, meanwhile, pondered whether it was right to <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-racism-and-is-bill-leak-a-controversialist-or-a-racist-67993">accuse Leak of racism</a>. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151135/original/image-20161221-13168-e5dksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151135/original/image-20161221-13168-e5dksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151135/original/image-20161221-13168-e5dksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151135/original/image-20161221-13168-e5dksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151135/original/image-20161221-13168-e5dksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151135/original/image-20161221-13168-e5dksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151135/original/image-20161221-13168-e5dksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151135/original/image-20161221-13168-e5dksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Eric Gaillard</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In a global era dominated by Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google and others, Julianne Schultz argued <a href="https://theconversation.com/australia-must-act-now-to-preserve-its-culture-in-the-face-of-global-tech-giants-58724">in her 2016 Brian Johns lecture</a>, that we needed to find “ways to embrace the particularity of being Australian in a global context and find new ways to express that”. Our cultural institutions were a vital part of this, she wrote. </p>
<p>Yet this year we saw further cuts to <a href="https://theconversation.com/changes-to-radio-national-are-gutting-a-cultural-treasure-trove-69397">specialist programming at Radio National</a>, and continued uncertainty around the question of <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-it-comes-to-books-and-copyright-the-government-should-leave-things-as-they-are-68911">copyright laws and Australian writing</a>. And arts funding continued to be a sore point.</p>
<h2>Arts policy</h2>
<p>As Sasha Grishin noted in March, a change in Prime Minister did not bring a fresh perspective on arts funding - indeed <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-silver-tongued-turnbull-fails-to-woo-the-arts-vote-55132">the urbane and eloquent Malcolm Turnbull</a> had rather spectacularly failed to woo the arts vote.</p>
<p>Arts Minister Mitch Fifield’s Catalyst Fund (a compromise after the furore over the proposed NPEA), began funding “innovative ideas from arts and culture organisations”. But there was a disturbing <a href="https://theconversation.com/where-is-the-balance-and-credibility-in-our-federal-governments-arts-policy-58485">lack of transparency</a> in the decisions it made, wrote Jo Caust. In May, the Australia Council announced who would miss out in its latest funding round. The unlucky included many notable theatre companies and the arts advocacy body NAVA: our <a href="https://theconversation.com/carnage-in-the-arts-experts-respond-to-the-australia-council-cuts-59368">expert panel was unimpressed</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151137/original/image-20161221-13154-lta2ty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151137/original/image-20161221-13154-lta2ty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151137/original/image-20161221-13154-lta2ty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151137/original/image-20161221-13154-lta2ty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151137/original/image-20161221-13154-lta2ty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151137/original/image-20161221-13154-lta2ty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151137/original/image-20161221-13154-lta2ty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The West Australian Ballet, one of the recipients from the Catalyst fund.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Cortlan Bennett/AAP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The arts sector loudly articulated its concerns during the federal election campaign, <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-where-to-now-for-australian-culture-62439">finding its voice as a lobby group</a>. We considered policy solutions to the pressing question of how artists could make a living wage in our series <a href="https://theconversation.com/should-artists-pay-their-taxes-in-art-57669">Making Art Pay</a>. And our crack team of experts compared the <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-price-of-victory-comparing-the-cost-of-olympic-gold-to-an-elite-arts-prize-64159">cost of an Olympic gold to an arts prize</a> (guess which one proved to be better value?)</p>
<h2>Screen</h2>
<p>Mad Max: Fury Road won six Oscars in the fields of Film Editing, Costume Design, Makeup and Hairstyling, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing and Production Design. We considered the implications of this success for <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-do-mad-maxs-six-oscars-mean-for-the-australian-film-industry-55564">our local film industry</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151140/original/image-20161221-13160-q22drj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151140/original/image-20161221-13160-q22drj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151140/original/image-20161221-13160-q22drj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151140/original/image-20161221-13160-q22drj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151140/original/image-20161221-13160-q22drj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=467&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151140/original/image-20161221-13160-q22drj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=467&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151140/original/image-20161221-13160-q22drj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=467&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Mark Mangini and David White react after winning Best Sound Editing for Mad Max Fury Road.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mike Blake/Reuters</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We also reflected on the <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-star-wars-mad-max-and-the-real-vs-digital-effects-furphy-56137">use of CGI </a> in films; Martin Scorsese’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-it-felt-like-a-kiss-movies-popular-music-and-martin-scorsese-59231">cinematic use of music</a>, the work of the masterful <a href="https://theconversation.com/ivan-sens-goldstone-a-taut-layered-exploration-of-what-echoes-in-the-silences-60619">Australian filmmaker Ivan Sen</a> and new local films including <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-tragi-comedy-down-under-appropriates-cronulla-rather-than-offering-insight-63259">Down Under</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/joe-cinques-consolation-violence-delusion-and-the-question-of-guilt-63595">Joe Cinque’s Consolation</a> and the <a href="https://theconversation.com/virtual-reality-film-collisions-is-part-disaster-movie-part-travelogue-and-completely-immersive-66563">virtual reality film Collisons</a>.</p>
<p>Bruce Isaacs dissected the <a href="https://theconversation.com/video-the-five-greatest-scorsese-scenes-episode-5-goodfellas-60170">five greatest Scorsese scenes</a> and began a new video column on <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-great-movie-scenes-antonionis-the-passenger-65395">the great movie scenes</a>. After the death of the influential Australian director Paul Cox, film-maker Jonathan auf der Heide wrote <a href="https://theconversation.com/life-lessons-from-the-editing-suite-of-paul-cox-61578">a beautiful remembrance</a> of his time spent working with this complex, uncompromising auteur who unashamedly wore his heart on his sleeve.</p>
<p>On television, our experts reflected on Australian productions including <a href="https://theconversation.com/molly-is-lacking-as-a-tv-show-but-millions-including-me-are-hooked-54471">Molly</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/bloody-good-tv-how-rake-changed-australian-television-61433">Rake</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/dna-nation-raises-tough-questions-for-indigenous-australians-59877">DNA Nation</a>, the adaptation of Christos Tsiolkas’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/christos-tsiolkas-the-blasphemous-artist-and-barracuda-61434">Barracuda</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/man-up-inspired-genius-or-half-baked-celebrity-expertise-67143">Man Up</a> and Cleverman, which showcased <a href="https://theconversation.com/meet-cleverman-our-first-aboriginal-screen-superhero-with-healing-powers-and-a-political-edge-59813">our first indigenous superhero</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151143/original/image-20161221-13138-lylhgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151143/original/image-20161221-13138-lylhgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151143/original/image-20161221-13138-lylhgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151143/original/image-20161221-13138-lylhgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151143/original/image-20161221-13138-lylhgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151143/original/image-20161221-13138-lylhgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151143/original/image-20161221-13138-lylhgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151143/original/image-20161221-13138-lylhgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Elias Anton as Danny Kelly in Barracuda.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">ABC</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>They considered the impact of <a href="https://theconversation.com/five-ways-reg-grundy-changed-australian-tv-for-better-or-worse-59068">the late Reg Grundy</a>, offered some ideas for the ABC under <a href="https://theconversation.com/memo-to-michelle-guthrie-expert-ideas-for-the-new-abc-era-58929">Michelle Guthrie’s reign</a> and argued that The Bachelor was <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-bachelor-turns-women-into-misogynists-62423">turning women into misogynists</a>. And controversially, Travis Holland declared that after 28 seasons, The Simpsons has now <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-the-simpsons-has-lost-its-way-67845">lost its way</a>.</p>
<p>Game of Thrones remained hugely popular. We examined the series’ <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-from-daenerys-to-yara-the-top-ten-women-of-game-of-thrones-58356">appeal to women</a> and how a Melbourne visual effects firm made its <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-game-of-thrones-emmy-award-winning-battle-scene-was-made-65235">Emmy award-winning battle scene</a>. We also asked Carolyne Larrington, a professor of medieval European literature, for her ideas about <a href="https://theconversation.com/wrapping-up-the-fantasy-how-will-game-of-thrones-end-67245">how the series might end</a>. She predicts the TV show will take a comic rather than tragic option, “contenting itself with a marriage between Jon and Daenerys and finding some quick fix for the White Walker problem”. </p>
<h2>Visual art</h2>
<p>Sadly, it was a year that saw continued terror attacks around the world. After the bombings in Brussels, Kit Messham Muir reflected on the <a href="https://theconversation.com/art-and-terror-a-new-kind-of-memorial-56734">new kinds of memorials being created to honour the dead</a> – from weeping Tintin cartoons to spotlit public buildings – and the selective nature of this mass grieving. </p>
<p>Major exhibitions reviewed included <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-surprising-spectacle-rescues-the-sydney-biennale-from-irrelevance-56417">The Sydney Biennale</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/dark-mofo-and-the-affective-power-of-a-creative-storm-60852">Dark Mofo</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-very-serious-painting-of-barry-humphries-is-a-welcome-prize-winner-62536">The Archibald Prize</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/black-mist-burnt-country-asks-what-remains-after-the-mushroom-cloud-66135">Black Mist, Burnt Country</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/review-the-naked-nude-from-the-tate-68324"> Nude: art from the Tate collection</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/david-hockney-interrogates-space-and-time-68671">David Hockney</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/scientists-ponder-the-evolutionary-urge-to-create-but-where-are-the-women-68414">On the Origin of Art</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151151/original/image-20161221-13138-1x2x3qe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151151/original/image-20161221-13138-1x2x3qe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151151/original/image-20161221-13138-1x2x3qe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151151/original/image-20161221-13138-1x2x3qe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151151/original/image-20161221-13138-1x2x3qe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151151/original/image-20161221-13138-1x2x3qe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151151/original/image-20161221-13138-1x2x3qe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151151/original/image-20161221-13138-1x2x3qe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The winner of this year’s Archibald Prize: Louise Hearman’s Barry, oil paint on masonite 69.5 x 100 cm.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo: © AGNSW, Nick Kreisler</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Our ongoing Here’s Looking At series, meanwhile, considered great works on show here including <a href="https://theconversation.com/heres-looking-at-whistlers-mother-54334">Whistler’s Mother</a>, Cindy Sherman’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/heres-looking-at-cindy-sherman-head-shots-59444">Head Shots</a>, Frida Kahlo’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/heres-looking-at-frida-kahlos-self-portrait-with-monkeys-61141">Self Portrait with Monkeys</a> and Janet Laurence’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/heres-looking-at-deep-breathing-resuscitation-for-the-reef-by-janet-laurence-63408">Deep Breathing: Resuscitation for the Reef</a>.</p>
<h2>Literature</h2>
<p>Camilla Nelson mounted a powerful argument in favor of <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-the-literary-canon-is-exhilarating-and-disturbing-and-we-need-to-read-it-56610">reading the literary canon </a>- if only to critique it. And on the 200th anniversary of Charlotte Bronte’s birth, we <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-charlotte-bronte-still-speaks-to-us-200-years-after-her-birth-57802">paid tribute to</a> “the startlingly modern psychology” of the author’s many memorable characters.</p>
<p>Our writers analysed the impact of funding cuts to <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-meanjin-funding-cuts-a-graceless-coup-59455">Meanjin</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/express-media-is-unique-and-young-people-need-it-59518">Express Media</a> and the need for an overhaul of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-the-prime-ministers-literary-awards-need-an-urgent-overhaul-61300">Prime Minister’s Literary Awards </a>. Jen Webb dived into the novels on <a href="https://theconversation.com/touching-ferocious-and-poetic-the-miles-franklin-shortlist-is-worthy-of-your-attention-64428">the Miles Franklin shortlist</a> and declared all a potentially worthy winner. And Nick Earls told us how the bookshop had <a href="https://theconversation.com/all-hail-the-bookshop-survivor-against-the-odds-63758">survived against the odds</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151152/original/image-20161221-13160-1i2rt1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151152/original/image-20161221-13160-1i2rt1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151152/original/image-20161221-13160-1i2rt1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151152/original/image-20161221-13160-1i2rt1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151152/original/image-20161221-13160-1i2rt1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151152/original/image-20161221-13160-1i2rt1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151152/original/image-20161221-13160-1i2rt1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151152/original/image-20161221-13160-1i2rt1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The survival of Australian bookshops: a good news story in 2016.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Snipergirl/flickr</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Our Guides to the Classics offered a handy primer on great works of literature from Herodotus’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/guide-to-the-classics-the-histories-by-herodotus-53748">The Histories</a> to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/guide-to-the-classics-the-arthurian-legend-64289">Arthurian legend</a>. Also on a classical note, our ongoing series Mythbusting Ancient Rome sorted the facts from the mythology about controversial figures such as the <a href="https://theconversation.com/mythbusting-ancient-rome-the-emperor-nero-65797">Emperor Nero</a>.</p>
<h2>Music</h2>
<p>The release of Beyonce’s Lemonade was a pop cultural phenomenon. Lauren Rosewarne cautioned against a simplistic <a href="https://theconversation.com/beyonces-lemonade-tell-all-or-fizzy-soap-operatic-art-object-58513">autobiographical</a> reading of the album while Blair McDonald looked at the way pop musicians such as Beyonce were <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-the-quest-for-legacy-how-pop-music-is-embracing-high-art-58741">mining contemporary art</a> in their work. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/EtHOmforqxk?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>We analysed the <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-the-sounds-of-kanye-west-54169">sounds of Kanye West</a>; declared Tim Minchin’s Come Home (Cardinal Pell) to be a <a href="https://theconversation.com/tim-minchins-come-home-cardinal-pell-is-a-pitch-perfect-protest-song-54945">pitch-perfect protest song</a>; asked whether <a href="https://theconversation.com/sad-music-and-depression-does-it-help-66123">listening to sad music</a> can help with depression and looked at why learning a musical instrument later in life can be <a href="https://theconversation.com/ageing-in-harmony-why-the-third-act-of-life-should-be-musical-57799">good for the ageing brain</a>. As the music industry continued to be transformed by digital technologies we considered whether professional musicians were <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-the-loss-of-music-68169">an endangered species</a> or <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/richard-vella-52581/dashboard#">not</a>.</p>
<h2>Theatre and the performing arts</h2>
<p>The 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death was commemorated with a year-long party. Shakespeare’s words, <a href="https://theconversation.com/marx-freud-hitler-mandela-greer-shakespeare-influenced-them-all-57872">wrote Robert White</a>, influenced everyone from Karl Marx to Hitler to Nelson Mandela to George Bush. In a fascinating essay, Rachel Buchanan, curator of the Germaine Greer archive at the University of Melbourne, considered how Shakespeare influenced <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-how-shakespeare-helped-shape-germaine-greers-feminist-masterpiece-59880">the writing of Greer’s The Female Eunuch</a>. Still, it was intriguing to hear from Ian Donaldson on why Shakespeare’s death was largely seen as a <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-was-shakespeares-death-such-a-non-event-at-the-time-68713">non-event at the time</a>.</p>
<p>Julian Meyrick began a new series, The Great Australian Plays. While the idea of the canon is contested, his aim is to write about plays <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-are-the-great-australian-plays-refining-our-theatre-canon-64234">from the past 70 years</a> in a way that is “flexible, conditional and, dare I say it, fun”. The series will continue next year.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151145/original/image-20161221-13154-rgzpee.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151145/original/image-20161221-13154-rgzpee.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151145/original/image-20161221-13154-rgzpee.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151145/original/image-20161221-13154-rgzpee.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151145/original/image-20161221-13154-rgzpee.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151145/original/image-20161221-13154-rgzpee.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151145/original/image-20161221-13154-rgzpee.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151145/original/image-20161221-13154-rgzpee.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Cirque de la Symphonie delivered virtuoso performances of both circus and music.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Daniel Aulsebrook</span></span>
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<p>Local productions reviewed included Ayad Akhtar’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/review-disgraced-turns-west-meets-islam-divisions-into-striking-melodrama-58224">Disgraced</a>, Belvoir St’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-wise-mans-art-twelfth-night-and-cross-mobility-casting-63321">Twelfth Night</a>, Victorian Opera’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/banquet-of-secrets-australian-musical-theatre-comes-of-age-55647">Banquet of Secrets</a>, a new production of <a href="https://theconversation.com/one-of-marlowes-finest-plays-roars-into-the-21st-century-63529">Edward II</a>, a spate of classical works <a href="https://theconversation.com/sequins-and-symphonies-how-opera-ran-away-with-the-circus-64125">employing the circus arts</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/gonzo-we-need-to-talk-about-young-men-and-porn-65948">Gonzo</a>, a groundbreaking play exploring young men’s use of porn.
Festivals we covered included those in <a href="https://theconversation.com/spirals-within-spirals-vortex-temporum-at-the-sydney-festival-52687">Sydney</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/absurdist-poignant-slapstick-plus-a-brass-band-in-en-avant-marche-64867">Brisbane</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/death-beauty-and-poetry-come-together-in-ancient-rain-66986">Melbourne</a> and Adelaide’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/from-shakespeare-in-hindi-to-tackling-human-trafficking-the-best-of-ozasia-festival-66385">OzAsia</a>. </p>
<h2>Gender</h2>
<p>Unfortunately, women continued to be under-represented in a range of artforms, from <a href="https://theconversation.com/harder-faster-louder-challenging-sexism-in-the-music-industry-58420">popular</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-sound-of-silence-why-arent-australias-female-composers-being-heard-59743">classical music</a> to <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-science-fictions-women-problem-58626">science fiction</a> to <a href="https://theconversation.com/women-arent-the-problem-in-the-film-industry-men-are-68740">the film industry</a>. We analysed the reasons for this and what could be done about it.</p>
<p>We learned, however, that roller derby is <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-chinese-roller-derby-is-empowering-women-57963">empowering women in China</a> and Australian women historians have (almost) <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-women-historians-smashed-the-glass-ceiling-66778">smashed the glass ceiling</a>.
And as debate continued over public breastfeeding we looked at <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-decent-woman-the-breastfeeding-and-visibility-debate-is-nothing-new-57728">historical attitudes to it</a> in the 18th and 19th centuries and found it wasn’t completely absent from public life during that time.</p>
<h2>Architecture</h2>
<p>Our new architecture columnist, Naomi Stead, wrote beautifully on topics that ranged from visiting <a href="https://theconversation.com/architecture-is-a-performed-art-and-the-eames-house-is-a-pretty-good-show-59511">the Eames House</a> to <a href="https://theconversation.com/cathedrals-of-light-cathedrals-of-ice-cathedrals-of-glass-cathedrals-of-bones-60557">cathedrals as metaphors</a> to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-return-of-the-breeze-block-63264">return of the breeze block</a>.
We reviewed the <a href="https://theconversation.com/venice-biennale-an-exhausting-beautiful-attempt-to-relinquish-architecture-60789">Venice Biennale</a> and assessed the proposal to <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-sydney-opera-house-upgrade-deserves-a-single-guiding-vision-63934">upgrade the Sydney Opera House</a> and the growth of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/opening-doors-and-minds-the-open-house-phenomenon-63717">Open House movement</a>.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151147/original/image-20161221-13147-pum4b7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151147/original/image-20161221-13147-pum4b7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151147/original/image-20161221-13147-pum4b7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151147/original/image-20161221-13147-pum4b7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151147/original/image-20161221-13147-pum4b7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151147/original/image-20161221-13147-pum4b7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151147/original/image-20161221-13147-pum4b7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151147/original/image-20161221-13147-pum4b7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The entrance to the Arsenale at this year’s Venice Biennale.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">provided by William Feuerman</span></span>
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<p>And our Friday essay on the <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-the-australian-mosque-65101">Australian mosque</a> traced the history of mosques here, from the earliest known one – built in South Australia, likely in the 1860s – to recent incarnations such as Glenn Murcutt and Hakan Elevli’s Australian Islamic Centre in the Melbourne suburb of Newport. </p>
<h2>Religion</h2>
<p>After the June terror attack on a gay nightclub in the US state of Florida, Christopher van der Krogt considered what The Koran and The Bible <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-the-quran-the-bible-and-homosexuality-in-islam-61012">had to say about homosexuality</a>. Closer to home, new Australian research found that both <a href="https://theconversation.com/welcoming-but-not-affirming-being-gay-and-christian-64110">LGBT Christians and pastors alike</a> grappled with difficult spiritual questions. And on the eve of the canonisation of Mother Teresa, Philip Almond <a href="https://theconversation.com/questioning-the-miracles-of-saint-teresa-64743">questioned her “miracles”</a>. </p>
<p>Our Friday essays proved extremely popular this year. If you’re looking for a good read over the holidays, I’d recommend <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-the-naked-truth-on-nudity-66763">Ruth Barcan on nudity</a>, Michelle Smith on <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-talking-writing-and-fighting-like-girls-66211">feminist memoirs</a> Julia Kindt on the <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-secrets-of-the-delphic-oracle-and-how-it-speaks-to-us-today-61738">oracle of Delphi</a> or Raimond Gaita <a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-reflections-on-the-idea-of-a-common-humanity-63811">on the idea of a common humanity</a>.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151148/original/image-20161221-13140-23wn4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151148/original/image-20161221-13140-23wn4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/151148/original/image-20161221-13140-23wn4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151148/original/image-20161221-13140-23wn4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151148/original/image-20161221-13140-23wn4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151148/original/image-20161221-13140-23wn4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151148/original/image-20161221-13140-23wn4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/151148/original/image-20161221-13140-23wn4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Bob Dylan performing in October this year.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ki Price/Reuters</span></span>
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<p>Of course my introduction to this article was more than a little misleading. Lots of male musicians had an apparently excellent 2016 (from Flume to Ed Sheeran to Kendrick Lamar to Frank Ocean) – and Bowie and Prince albums sold like hotcakes. Then there was Bob Dylan, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature. </p>
<p>Jen Webb <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-honouring-dylan-the-nobel-prize-judges-have-made-a-category-error-67049">memorably described the choice of Dylan for the prize</a> as “discourteous to members of the field of literature, dismissive of women’s achievements, and fundamentally kinda nostalgic”. David McCooey, however, reminded us of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-are-bob-dylans-songs-literature-67061">ancient link</a> between poetry and music. </p>
<p>The passion this decision generated was extraordinary. It showed how much the arts matter to people. We can’t wait for next year.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/70639/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Many great artists died in 2016: Bowie, Prince, Leonard Cohen, Paul Cox, Shirley Hazzard. It was a year of creative foment and as always, intense debate about the importance of the arts to a thriving, democratic society.
Suzy Freeman-Greene, Books + Ideas Editor
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/59794
2016-08-25T20:21:37Z
2016-08-25T20:21:37Z
Friday essay: From Bowie to Bieber – the under-appreciated art of the music video
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/135439/original/image-20160825-30209-1hx7tai.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The music video for Justin Bieber's Sorry is one of the contenders at Sunday's MTV Music Video Awards.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Justin Bieber Vevo/Youtube</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The spectacular release of Beyoncé’s visual album Lemonade earlier this year, and the critical response to it, has fleetingly put the music video in the spotlight. For a ubiquitous and influential art form, music videos tend to be easily dismissed and under-analysed, which means it took something as extreme as Beyoncé’s approach – an entire album complete with extraordinary visuals and social commentary – to draw attention to them. </p>
<p>This Sunday, <a href="http://time.com/4424498/mtv-video-music-award-nominations-2016/">the MTV music video awards will be held at Madison Square Garden</a>. Beyoncé has received 11 nominations and there is even <a href="http://www.mtv.com.au/vma-2016/news/your-guide-to-the-2016-vmas">a new award category</a> called Breakthrough Long Form Video, suggesting her influence continues to ripple through the industry. Adele has received eight nominations. Two videos featuring the late David Bowie, Lazarus and Blackstar, have been nominated for three awards.</p>
<p>Still, the lack of attention generally paid to music videos was noted <a href="http://clipped.tv/music-video-festival/">at a recent event in Sydney</a>, where a panel of music video directors gathered to discuss the state of the art form, and to celebrate the best examples in Australian video making (including award winning local clips <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0e_HEDoT6yY">Born Dirty by Butter</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atSmcn0nflo">Love is My Disease by The Jezebels</a>, and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gp-lWgUDcKk">You Were Right by RUFUS</a>).</p>
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<p>Discussion of the music video reached its peak in the 1980s and early 1990s when these short, catchy clips accompanying pop songs exploded into popular culture. While promotional clips for songs had been produced in the 1960s and 1970s and collated on television shows like Top of the Pops and Countdown, MTV’s constant 24-hours-a-day broadcasting, (which began in 1981) made music videos all but compulsory viewing and revitalised the music industry. </p>
<p>MTV’s change of focus from music to reality TV in the 1990s and 2000s created a perception that the music video was on the decline. But today, music videos have branched out from 3-minute clips on dedicated music channels to a variety of forms on numerous media platforms. Music video style – attention-grabbing imagery (with or without a proper narrative), fast editing, and (usually) a visual representation of the music it goes with – now influences film, television and all types on visual culture.</p>
<p>Music videos can be long or short, filmic or fragmented, watched on television or the internet, and also folded into feature films and narrative TV (think of the musical sequences in films like Pitch Perfect and TV shows like Glee, Empire, Nashville) and then released online as stand-alone clips. </p>
<p>Pitch Perfect’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weqDCGg0GYs">Cups</a>, for instance, is sung by lead actress Anna Kendrick when her character auditions for the Barden Bellas acapella singing group. The spinoff <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmSbXsFE3l8">music video</a> with Kendrick in character has received more than 280 million views on YouTube. </p>
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<h2>The development of the music video</h2>
<p>The very early days of MTV saw directors grappling with what the medium could do. Directors such as Russel Mulcahey, best known for his work with Duran Duran, created spectacular and often bizarre imagery in their clips.</p>
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<p>In this example of Mulcahey’s work from 1984, we can see what became known as the “MTV aesthetic” clearly. There is fast and constant editing. The images are suggestive of post-apocalyptic visions such as those contained in the Mad Max films. There is, however, no more than a vaguely hinted-at narrative. The visuals respond to the music and lyrics but are not entirely beholden to either. </p>
<p>Not all responses to the rise of MTV were positive. Criticism included the idea that pairing music with images detracted from the music itself. There was also concern about the mode of viewing that MTV promoted, which was interpreted as being more about distraction than traditional forms of television. The non-stop parade of colour, glamour, and disconnected images offered by MTV was seen as a reflection of a superficial, consumer culture.</p>
<p>Concern also arose about the way particular groups were represented in music videos. MTV infamously took a number of years to start playing any <a href="http://www.mtv.com/news/2726379/david-bowie-calls-mtv-out-black-artists-diversity/">videos featuring black artists</a>. (The rise of <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2009/US/06/28/michael.jackson.black.community/index.html">Michael Jackson</a> was a major factor in the change in this area.) The sexualised portrayal of women in music videos also drew criticism – and has continued to do so. They can dehumanised women by reducing them to little more than attractive body parts as the Robin Thicke video for <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/nov/13/blurred-lines-most-controversial-song-decade">Blurred Lines</a> exemplifies.</p>
<p>The 1990s saw the rise of the music video auteur, directors who developed <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directors_Label">more cohesive bodies of work</a>. These pairings enhanced the credibility of both director and band when done well. The most prominent examples of these auteurs were Chris Cunningham, Spike Jonze, Michel Gondry and David Fincher.</p>
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<p>This video to Aphex Twin’s Come To Daddy, directed by Cunningham in 1997, demonstrates how images can be combined with music to create something greater than the sum of its parts. Cunningham draws on imagery from horror films, and uses a bleak urban landscape to match the harsh sounds created by Aphex Twin, with the subordinated sci-fi elements of the narrative echoing the electronic music.</p>
<p>The music and visuals are both simultaneously futuristic and gritty. That this is a music video and not a short film is obvious in the way the sound and vision connect throughout without mirroring one another, with glitches in the vision matching the stammering rhythms. </p>
<p>Many of the features of this video – particularly blue filters and grotesque, distorted or disrupted representations of the human body – can be seen elsewhere in Cunningham’s work, creating a sense of connection between different pieces (for an interesting point of contrast, see his video for Madonna’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zETVr04XUE4">Frozen</a>).</p>
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<h2>The music video moves online</h2>
<p>What almost disappeared – after MTV switched its focus to reality TV – was serious academic analysis of the music video. There are only a small handful of researchers working in this area today. This is problematic because the music video is far from a dead media form, and is no less important in its popular and cultural impact than it was in the 1980s or 1990s. Videos have simply moved to different platforms and taken on new and diverse forms.</p>
<p>YouTube is now the primary location for music videos, with views in the tens of billions, making them one of the main ways music is consumed. Videos are also watched on streaming services, downloaded to personal devices, and can range anywhere from 3-minute clips to Lemonade’s one-hour long premiere on HBO, to Pharrell Williams’ continuous 24-hour music video <a href="http://24hoursofhappy.com/">Happy</a>. </p>
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<p>Music video’s migration from television to the internet has affected its content, aesthetics, and the way we think about pop stardom. As critic <a href="http://tvn.sagepub.com/content/15/4/305.abstract">Maura Edmond points out</a>, music video has been heavily influenced by the media convergence and web 2.0 practices of the last ten years. </p>
<p>In particular, the music video’s economic rationale, distribution, exhibition, reception practices and aesthetics have all been affected by its shift from television to the Internet. </p>
<p>While videos still appear on dedicated music channels and countdown TV shows, integrated distribution and exhibition structures such as syndicated hosting site Vevo are now the norm, as is the supply of music videos on-demand through search functions on YouTube, Tidal and Vimeo. This means participatory culture practices such as sharing, liking, commenting, making, and remaking of videos, are more commonplace for the average music fan.</p>
<p>Edmond argues music videos are the most-watched and “spread” content across YouTube because they fit the aesthetic demands of online video clip culture – they are short, catchy, and visually striking – and are therefore perfect viral content or spreadable media. </p>
<p>Gotye’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UVNT4wvIGY">Somebody That I Used To Know</a> is a good example of the way a simple low-fi video can go viral.</p>
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<p>Meanwhile, comedian Amy Schumer’s Milk Milk Lemonade shows how the parody video (a staple of YouTube culture) can look much like the real thing.</p>
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<p>(See Nicki Minaj’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDZX4ooRsWs">Anaconda</a> for comparison).</p>
<p>This changing landscape has led to new trends in the style and aesthetics of music videos. Very high budget music videos continue to be made for those at the top of the star spectrum, and these increasingly emphasise bright colours or simple colour schemes that translate as well to small screens as large ones (see, for example, Taylor Swift’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcIy9NiNbmo">Bad Blood</a>). </p>
<p>An example of how this type of aesthetic (although not at the high end of the budget scale) can be used in creative and political ways is MIA’s Borders.</p>
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<p>This self-directed video has stark, but beautifully framed and affecting images that use <a href="http://time.com/4160294/mia-borders-apple-music-migrant-crisis-interview/">the bodies of actual refugees</a> to illustrate MIA’s take on the current crisis in Europe. </p>
<p>In one shot, the lurid gold of hypothermia blankets calls to mind the greatest wealth of the West while covering the bodies of those rejected by it. This connects with the lyrics, which ask for an honest evaluation of our society’s values in relation to refugees. </p>
<h2>A new lo-fi aesthetic</h2>
<p>Still, overall budgets for music videos are down. For this reason, and due to technological advances, more bands are making their own lo-fi videos. In turn, even artists who have no need to make cheap videos are drawing on this lo-fi aesthetic to make an impact. </p>
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<p>Kayne West’s video for Only One, for instance, was shot entirely on a phone camera, giving it a DIY, home-movie style well-suited to a song about his daughter. The cutting-edge filmmaker and music video auteur Michel Gondry is the director of this clip.</p>
<p>This changed landscape for music video aesthetics also means shifting narratives of pop music celebrity and stardom. Music videos are the primary place now for selling a musician and their music. </p>
<p>With the new accessibility provided by search engines and video streaming sites, they are a constantly available link to the star presence. This makes it interesting when artists decide not to be in their videos, as <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vjPBrBU-TM">Sia does in most of her clips</a>, which often feature teenage dancer Maddie Ziegler, and Justin Beiber did with most recent album Purpose. </p>
<p>Beiber released a series of dance clips to accompany Purpose, in collaboration with young choreographer Parris Goebel from New Zealand. The clips for <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9Ja9TTQt00">PURPOSE: The Movement</a> were released one at a time, on the hour, every hour, on November 14 2015, but can now be watched as a continuous 40-minute dance film or visual album. It has been nominated at this year’s MTV awards in the Breakthrough Long Form category.</p>
<p>Beiber’s removal of himself from these clips, and Goebel’s free reign on choreography and direction speak to the way music video culture is interacting with other YouTube genres, particularly in relation to dance music and choreography. (See popular choreographer Tricia Miranda’s video for Rihanna’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQraeOG-3L8">Bitch Better Have My Money</a> as an example). </p>
<p>The video for the lead single <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRh_vgS2dFE">Sorry</a> (nominated in three categories at the MTV awards), is extremely simple, featuring just Goebel and her brightly costumed dance crew performing to Beiber’s vocals in a blank, white, infinity space.</p>
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<p>The immense popularity of this video is because this simplicity allows the incredible choreography to shine, rather than relying on Beiber’s star presence. It also attracts a diverse audience outside of Beiber’s dedicated tween fan base, including dance fans and Goebel followers who can watch, rewatch, learn and share the choreography. </p>
<p>While PURPOSE: The Movement is a triumph for Goebel, who has also worked with Nicki Minaj, Jennifer Lopez and Janet Jackson, the popularity of Sorry of course still ultimately promotes Beiber and his music. It is therefore a clever move by Beiber to diversify his fan base and star image through non-traditional means. </p>
<p>As a pop star who was first discovered on YouTube, Beiber is a musician made in the click, like and share era. Purpose was also his “growing up” album as he attempted to put numerous bad-boy image problems behind him. Releasing a dance film that takes the spotlight off himself works with the album’s theme of humility and is part of this rebranding. </p>
<p>As music videos continue to evolve they are influenced by, and influence, other visual art forms. For many people now, they are inseparable from the very experience of music.</p>
<p>They are a place of creative experimentation and an opportunity for <a href="http://www.metacritic.com/feature/music-video-directors-turned-film-directors">film-makers to cut their teeth</a>. They are a key platform for artists to tell us something about who they think they are. </p>
<p>Given the purposes they can fulfil, more thoughtful analysis of them (beyond the frequent outrages that controversial videos can produce) would be good to see.</p>
<p><em>The MTV music video awards will air <a href="http://www.mtv.com.au/tv-guide?page=4">on Foxtel in Australia</a> on Monday August 29</em>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/59794/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
The MTV music video awards will be held on Sunday, putting this under-rated genre in the spotlight. Videos are inseparable from music in the digital age and the best examples deserve to be taken seriously as works of art.
Catherine Strong, Lecturer, Music Industry, RMIT University
Phoebe Macrossan, Ph.D. Candidate, UNSW Sydney
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/59413
2016-06-06T15:03:27Z
2016-06-06T15:03:27Z
Muhammad Ali: mourning another great in the age of social media
<p>In their 1998 song Destiny Calling, British indie band James combined a satirical glance at the contemporary nature of media celebrity with a sense of the more mundane and ordinary: the grim inevitability of getting old.</p>
<p>Tim Booth and the rest of the band are happily still with us, but our relationship with the stars from screen, stage and sporting field has been marked by mourning in 2016. </p>
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<p>Muhammad Ali is the latest public figure whose death has jolted us this year; the peerless boxer inspiring an outpouring of adulation and sadness. It has been a very rapid reminder of the similar response to the deaths of David Bowie and Prince. One Facebook message published in London free newspaper Metro neatly captured the experiences of a generation: </p>
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<p>I feel my childhood is dying all around me – and it’s only April.</p>
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<p>Celebrity might seem like a thoroughly modern and mass-mediated phenomenon, the desire for fame and recognition <a href="https://uk.sagepub.com/en-gb/eur/celebrity-cultures/book238044">can be traced back</a> through history. But the media landscape we live with today is a fascinating and distinctive opportunity to examine the heightened visibility and increasingly intimate relationship between the public and celebrities like Ali, Bowie and Prince.</p>
<h2>In memoriam</h2>
<p>At the 88th Academy Awards in February 2016, musician Dave Grohl took to the stage to perform Paul McCartney’s Blackbird in memory of the notable deaths of the previous year. </p>
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<p>For 2015, <a href="http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/gallery/hollywoods-notable-deaths-2015-764503/">The Hollywood Reporter</a> noted in remembrance 152 names, including a range of different roles and contributions from film critics and music composers, to script supervisors and unit production managers. These <a href="http://www.viewjournal.eu/index.php/view/article/view/JETHC047">“hidden roles” in media industries</a>, which also include <a href="http://tvn.sagepub.com/content/16/3/240.abstract">videogames testers</a>, is vital for recognising the collaborative nature of creative production. Of course though, it is the big names and well-known faces that fill the headlines and are the focus for acts of mass mourning in public places and across social media.</p>
<h2>In media</h2>
<p>Then there is news coverage. Under the title of “Culture stars who died in …”, the Daily Telegraph has published a photo essay for the last three years. There were <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturepicturegalleries/10547314/Culture-stars-who-died-in-2014.html">106 entries in 2014</a>, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/music/news/culture-stars-who-died-in-2015/">124 entries in 2015</a>, and, at the mid point for 2016, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/music/news/culture-stars-who-died-in-20162/">86 entries already</a>. Rather than single out any particular individuals from these burgeoning lists, there is a more overarching set of questions we might consider concerning how we know celebrities, how these deaths can make us feel, and how these feelings are expressed and shared.</p>
<p>The significant public mourning of Princess Diana in 1997 attracted discussion from a number of perspectives. Of particular note was <a href="http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/distributed/D/bo5533413.html">James Thomas’ book Diana’s Mourning</a>, in which he addressed the extensive news media coverage alongside accounts of “ordinary” people collected as part of the <a href="http://www.massobs.org.uk/">Mass Observation project</a>. Thomas’ research revealed greater ambiguity in public responses than the dominant news representation of a nation in mourning seemed to allow for. </p>
<p>This ambiguity was also apparent in research I undertook with Rebecca Feasey of Bath Spa University which explored the death of reality TV celebrity Jade Goody in 2009. Similarly, <a href="http://jou.sagepub.com/content/15/2/237.abstract">our research</a> involved 32 focus groups with over 100 members of the public and revealed a range of public responses to Goody’s mediated illness and dying. For some Goody was “ordinary” and “one of us” and helped to provide much need attention on cervical cancer. For others, the trappings of celebrity meant that her illness somehow seemed staged and lacked authenticity.</p>
<h2>New mourning</h2>
<p>The ambiguity of our responses perhaps comes from the impression from media coverage that we must have a response at all. Social media makes it so very easy to display that response, however fleeting it might have been. News that Ali had died prompted responses from millions. US president Barack Obama led the social media grieving; presidential hopeful Donald Trump tried to join in, <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-elections/donald-trump-muhammad-ali-dead-death-tribute-political-backlash-a7065946.html">not without controversy</a>.</p>
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<p>As we have seen this year, we are not short of prompts. The celebrity firmament continues to expand as pioneers of an era of immense cultural output and sporting achievement reach their late middle age and beyond. In the midst of it all, it is no surprise that we are using social media to create new forms of mourning.</p>
<p>In discussing death and Facebook, <a href="http://www.palgrave.com/br/book/978113739190">Margaret Gibson</a> suggested that messages of remembrance and grief posted to the social media platform were “non-hierarchical”. Family and friends and other members of Facebook (members of the public more generally) are on a level playing field. Their expressions of grief circulate online alongside those from family and friends. Obama’s tweet about Ali is just as big as yours, even if his gets more retweets. One element of this is access. The mourning of celebrity is not limited to particular groups or particular places. As such, an abundance of voices mix together in memory. </p>
<p>Such expressions of remembrance and mourning are also specific to emerging media forms. People might circulate animated GIFs or playlists, as they <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLkDtdY2V7RZB2NcIFiZZ36jcMYi2r5nfR">have done for Bowie</a> and for <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8cFaF2b783Ls-_n2LcW25VzdHXJphxSx">Prince</a>. They might create <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23RIPMuhammadAli&src=typd">hashtags on Twitter</a> and Instagram. These are user-generated acts of mourning that extend public memory beyond dominant news coverage and create opportunities for everyday and expansive celebrity mourning. One key question is whether this has now become endless. Will there be room to memorialise everyone, even with our new forms? </p>
<p>Forms of remembrance and mourning differ and extend across different countries, cultures and time. Social media can be added to this repertoire of ways to share memories and connect experiences. Beyond the obituaries published in newspapers, the showreels that appear at award ceremonies, or the “and finally” announcements at the end of television news, digital media presents ways in which an abundance of voices can be heard. There are then questions of <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Infoglut-How-Too-Much-Information-Is-Changing-the-Way-We-Think-and-Know/Andrejevic/p/book/9780415659086">“information overload”</a> – who gets heard, when and how? Perhaps with mourning though, this matters less than the opportunity for personal, ordinary and everyday remembering.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/59413/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Daniel Ashton does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
The boxer’s death follows hard on the heels of David Bowie and Prince. The world is losing global icons and learning how to grieve using new and democratic tools.
Daniel Ashton, Lecturer in Global Media Management, University of Southampton
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/58741
2016-05-05T19:50:45Z
2016-05-05T19:50:45Z
Friday essay: the quest for legacy – how pop music is embracing high art
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121344/original/image-20160505-19838-5y4f78.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Beyonce's baseball bat wielding spree in Lemonade, left, bears more than a passing resemblance to the work of Swiss video artist Pipilotti Rist.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Left, still from Lemonade (2016), right, still from Ever is Over All (1997) </span></span></figcaption></figure><p>From stadiums to galleries, the new frontier for today’s mega pop star is high art. Mass popularity has its charms – sales, world tours, legions of followers – but the legacy-conferring power of art is now the ultimate sign of one’s status within Western culture.</p>
<p>The rallying cry of “witness me, the artist” is the new mantra of pop royalty – from Beyoncé, Jay-Z and Lady Gaga to Kanye, and even Rihanna. Still, is this embrace of high art a phenomenon worth celebrating? Or, might it be seen more cynically, as a case of superstars using art to bestow credibility on their work in defiance of their own mass appeal?</p>
<p>Admittedly, there has never been a clear, dividing line between the pop and art world – and why should there be? Some of the most creative musicians in recent memory – David Bowie, Keith Richards, David Byrne, Brian Eno to name a few – began to study or pursued training in the visual arts. </p>
<p>In Australia, members of the 80’s band Mental as Anything met at art school in Sydney and Nick Cave studied painting before pursuing his music. More recently, Sia, the daughter of Adelaide artist and art lecturer, Leone Furler, has become recognisable for the giant wigs that cover her face, her remarkable voice and her artful music videos featuring various dance collaborations. </p>
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<p>Nor can we overlook the phenomenon of art rock that emerged in the sixties. Some of the most remarkable turning points in music history have been credited to the artistic turn in the work of The Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds (1966), The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967), and The Velvet Underground & Nico’s eponymous (1967) album under the influence of Andy Warhol’s New York Factory scene.</p>
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<p>While the emergence of the concept album took hold in the 70s, the pioneers of the music video age – Madonna, Michael Jackson and even Prince – understood the visual possibilities of the pop song better than many of their contemporaries. Their work endures for its blend of powerful music and evocative storytelling through videos such as Like a Prayer, Thriller, and When Doves Cry.</p>
<p>But today, the story is different. A song, mostly, is not enough. This is not to say that image is everything, but rather that one’s stake in the pop world depends on musical and visual novelty. For today’s pop leaders, this increasingly means sidestepping the boardrooms of marketing professionals in search of the artistic underground.</p>
<h2>Making art out of Lemonade</h2>
<p>Beyoncé’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/beyonces-lemonade-tell-all-or-fizzy-soap-operatic-art-object-58513">high-concept visual album Lemonade</a>, for instance, takes listeners on a bold new form of musical storytelling in the style of Prince’s Purple Rain (1984), Michael Jackson’s Moonwalker (1988) or, perhaps more recently Kanye West’s 35 minute film Runaway (2010) and Lana Del Rey’s Tropico (2013).</p>
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<p>For years, Beyoncé has been consciously attempting to shed herself of her Destiny’s Child/Top 40 persona. Lemonade accomplishes that. Equal parts high-art and high-profile, it tackles the personal and the political, solitude and sisterhood and the emotional wounds of infidelity against the backdrop of race in America today.</p>
<p>A tapestry of song, visuals and locales, Beyoncé plays the survivor, a women-in-healing, trying to come to terms with the emotional aftermath of a love gone wrong. With cinematic grandeur, the album swims in evocative visuals of nature’s mysterious powers (which have drawn <a href="http://blogs.indiewire.com/criticwire/a-lot-of-people-are-comparing-beyonces-lemonade-to-terrence-malick-20160425">comparisons to the work of Terrence Malick</a>), and spoken word narratives, including <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2016/04/27/entertainment/warsan-shire-beyonce-lemonade/index.html">the poetry of London-based, Kenya-born Somali writer Warsan Shire</a>.</p>
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<p>References to high art abound. Beyoncé infamous <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-3555858/Beyonce-smashes-car-baseball-bat-debuts-new-music-Lemonade-visual-album.html">baseball bat wielding sequence</a> in the song Hold Up pays homage to the work of Swiss artist <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a56RPZ_cbdc">Pipilotti Rist, whose 1997 video installation Ever is Over All</a> featured a woman walking down a street smashing car windows. Some have accused Beyoncé
of appropriation rather than <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/music/beyonce-accused-of-stealing-swiss-artists-work-for-fiery-hold-up-video-clip-20160503-gokwvq.html">homage</a>. </p>
<p>Last year, such concerns were expressed about Drake’s video for <a href="http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2015/10/22/drake_s_hotline_bling_video_resembles_james_turrell_s_light_installations.html">Hotline Bling</a> which was strikingly similar to the light installation pieces of American artist, James Turell.</p>
<p>Beyoncé also collaborated with <a href="http://www.okayafrica.com/news/beyonce-lemonade-laolu-senbanjo-sacred-art-of-the-ori/">Nigerian visual artist Laolu Senbanjo, whose sacred body painting</a> features in the film.</p>
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<span class="caption">Beyonce on the cover of Garage Magazine.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Garage</span></span>
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<p>Observant Instagram followers of Queen Bey, meanwhile, will have noticed signs earlier this year of her increasing contact with the high art world. In collaboration with Swiss-born, New York-based Urs Fischer and Garage magazine (<a href="http://garagemag.com/beyonce-interview/">Spring/Summer 2016 edition</a>), Beyoncé offered her thoughts on art via the magazine’s app. On its cover, she was photographed with cornrows, amidst a thick swirl of pastels painted by Fischer. In the interview, she discussed Andy Warhol and her interest in modern art, name-dropping some of her favourite artists (Tracey Emin, Kara Walker, Aaron Young and Donald Judd).</p>
<p>What’s interesting about this new period of Beyoncé’s work is that she has reinvented herself as the Benjamin Button of the pop world – apparently becoming younger, less bourgeois and more defiant with age.</p>
<p>While most have certainly embraced her newly, empowered voice, other fans, however, wonder if the less complicated, <a href="http://www.gigwise.com/blogs/106621/beyonce-new-album-lemonade-review-no-hit-song-rihanna-kanye-west">radio-friendly Beyoncé</a> will ever return.</p>
<h2>Yellow Basquiat in my kitchen corner</h2>
<p>In his own plea for artistic cred on his 2013 album, Magna Carta, Holy Grail, Beyoncé’s husband Jay Z’s hyper-capitalist dreams come to the fore. In the song Picasso Baby, Jay name-drops icons of the art world (Rothko, Bacon, Basquiat etc).</p>
<p>In homage to the reigning queen of performance art herself, Marina Abramovic, Jay adapted her (2010) MoMA installation, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/31/arts/design/31diva.html">The Artist is Present</a> – in which she sat six days a week, seven hours a day in a chair for a “silent opera”.</p>
<p>Jay did a <a href="http://pitchfork.com/news/51474-jay-z-performing-picasso-baby-for-six-straight-hours-today-apparently/">six-hour performance</a> of his Picasso Baby at at Pace Gallery in NYC. In the video of this, directed by Mark Romanek (who also did his “99 Problems” video and is one of the directors of Beyoncé’s Lemonade), Jay raps to a room full of carefully selected artistic and cultural leaders ranging from actor/director Judd Apatow to filmmaker Jim Jarmusch to artist Andreas Serrano to Abramovic herself.</p>
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<p>Both Jay-Z and Abramovic were on good terms, until in <a href="http://www.spikeartmagazine.com/en/articles/i-will-never-do-it-again">an interview with Spike magazine,</a> she accused Jay of not meeting his end of the business deal – namely, a sizable donation to her new Marina Abramovic institute of performance art in upstate New York. The mutually-contrived deal turned into <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2015/may/20/jay-z-substantial-donation-maria-abramovic">an awkward PR debacle for both camps</a>. (Jay-Z’s people later confirmed that a donation had, in fact, been made and Abramovic apologized for the oversight.)</p>
<p>What’s unique (but slightly predictable) about Jay’s celebration of the art world is how he fantasies about it. Picasso Baby is less homage to great art for art’s sake, more reverence of the reckless spoils of the “good” life. Art is worshipped as a sign of cultural power and extreme wealth:</p>
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<p>Yellow Basquiat in my kitchen corner <br>
Go ahead lean on that shit Blue, you own it.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121329/original/image-20160505-19745-qdnani.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121329/original/image-20160505-19745-qdnani.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121329/original/image-20160505-19745-qdnani.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121329/original/image-20160505-19745-qdnani.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121329/original/image-20160505-19745-qdnani.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121329/original/image-20160505-19745-qdnani.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121329/original/image-20160505-19745-qdnani.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121329/original/image-20160505-19745-qdnani.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jay-Z is a noted collector of street artist Jean Michel Basquiat.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Boy and Dog in a Johnnypump, 1982</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While some might argue that Picasso Baby is a “gateway hit” that opens younger fans up to the history of art, ultimately, the song never really embraces it as anything other than “art consumed by consumerism,” as one NPR commenter suggested.</p>
<p>We are not far away here from 19th century British cultural critic Matthew Arnold’s observations about the elitism of high culture. It is valued, he wrote, out of,</p>
<blockquote>
<p>sheer vanity or else as an engine of social or class distinction separating its holder like a badge or title, from other people who have not got it.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>From Queen Bey to Rhi Rhi</h2>
<p>Recently, Barbadian bad-girl Rihanna has also thrown herself into the art game. On her latest effort, Anti (2016), the art partnerships are numerous: Israeli-born artist <a href="http://www.roynachum.com/">Roy Nachum </a>and poet <a href="http://www.etonline.com/news/173552_rihanna_unveils_groundbreaking_new_album_art_featuring_childhood_photo_is_it_called_anti/">Chloe Mitchell</a> worked on the liner notes, and there were enough producers and writers to staff their own soccer team.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121331/original/image-20160505-19765-njhrrp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121331/original/image-20160505-19765-njhrrp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121331/original/image-20160505-19765-njhrrp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121331/original/image-20160505-19765-njhrrp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121331/original/image-20160505-19765-njhrrp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121331/original/image-20160505-19765-njhrrp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121331/original/image-20160505-19765-njhrrp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121331/original/image-20160505-19765-njhrrp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Album art for Anti (2016).</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The lead single, Work, was highly anticipated and ultimately a head scratcher. Her canoodling with Drake in the song’s video was predictably sexy but missed the feverish mystery suggested by the very powerful Antigone/Oedipal hallucination of <a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/rihanna-cover-artist-on-how-he-crafted-groundbreaking-anti-imagery-20151020">the cover art</a>. (On the album, a young Rihanna – eyes covered by a crown too big for her head – holds a balloon and is smothered by a blood red stain that she cannot see).</p>
<p>With songs like Woo and Work there’s a blatant disconnect between the music and imagery. Arguably, Rhianna appears to be swimming in artistic waters well over her head and not satisfying her <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/music/what-to-listen-to/rihanna-anti-album-review-rihanna-without-the-hits/">Top 40 fan base either</a>.</p>
<p>Still, the recently released video for Needed Me, (directed by indie art renegade <a href="http://www.gagosian.com/artists/harmony-korine">Harmony Korine</a>) has a <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2101441/">Springbreakers</a> meets <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086250/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">Scarface</a> meets Viceland in Miami documentary feel to it, making Korine the perfect accomplice to Rihanna’s nihilistic turn. With a simple, yet devilishly dark storyline, Rihanna plays the elegant, savage murderess, taking care of business the only way she knows how.</p>
<h2>Pablo does Picasso</h2>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121334/original/image-20160505-19779-51no1n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121334/original/image-20160505-19779-51no1n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121334/original/image-20160505-19779-51no1n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121334/original/image-20160505-19779-51no1n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121334/original/image-20160505-19779-51no1n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121334/original/image-20160505-19779-51no1n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121334/original/image-20160505-19779-51no1n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121334/original/image-20160505-19779-51no1n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Kanye West dances during his the presentation of his fashion collection during the 2016 New York Fashion Week, which was also a listening party for his ‘The Life of Pablo’ album.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">REUTERS/Andrew Kelly</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Then there’s Kanye. The insufferable “think” pieces on his latest album, The Life of Pablo (2016), the Twitter meltdowns and ego-mania have reached peak decibel level, but it should be noted that as a former art school student, Kanye embodies the “child-like curiosity” that German philosopher Frederick Nietzsche discusses so fondly in many of <a href="https://philosophynow.org/issues/94/The_Twin_Souls_of_Oscar_Wilde_and_Friedrich_Nietzsche">his aphorisms on art and creation</a>. </p>
<p>In interviews, it would appear that he can’t get his dreams on paper – or into the factory – fast enough. He has also suggested that the paintings of Picasso, Matisse have inspired his work. In a 2013 interview <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/16/arts/music/kanye-west-talks-about-his-career-and-album-yeezus.html">Behind Kanye’s Mask</a> with The New York Times, discussing his recent love for the history of architecture, he refers to himself as “a minimalist in a rapper’s body.”</p>
<p>West’s art idols are a unique blend of European and American artists/innovators (Walt Disney, Steve Jobs, George Condo, Pablo Picasso, Marco Brambilla, Vanessa Beecroft, just to name a few – and let’s not forget his collaboration with Japanese artist Takashi Murakami during his Graduation period either).</p>
<p>For a recent collaboration with filmmaker Steve McQueen, West opened up about <a href="http://www.artnews.com/2015/07/27/kanye-west-would-trade-his-grammys-to-be-in-an-art-context-the-rapper-discusses-his-new-steve-mcqueen-directed-video-at-lacma/">having his work seen primarily as art</a>, adding:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I would trade all my Grammys – or, maybe, two Grammys – to be able to be in an art context.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>For his new album, he collaborated with relatively unknown <a href="http://www.thefader.com/2016/02/11/who-is-peter-de-potter-the-artist-behind-kanye-wests-new-album-cover">Belgian artist Peter de Potter</a> for the cover art. West’s artistic influences, fashion tastes (Givenchy, Balmain, Raf Simons) and interests in design, (The UK’s Daily Mail <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-3482281/Kanye-West-visiting-Ikea-base-Sweden.html">caught him returning from a meeting with IKEA in Sweden earlier this month</a>), suggest an explorer’s spirit and a sense of genuine creative experimentation.</p>
<p>Vanessa Beecroft, one of West’s collaborators for his recent fashion/performance pieces, (the Adidas Yeezus fashion shows, the Yeezus tours, and some Art Basel projects) has spoken positively of the <a href="http://www.highsnobiety.com/2016/03/16/vanessa-beecroft-working-with-kanye-west/">artistic freedom he allows on their projects</a>. Indeed American fashion has been revitalised by his street style alone. Consider the <a href="http://ca.complex.com/sneakers/2016/03/adidas-yeezy-boost-march-line-up">week-long lineup</a> outside any store releasing new editions of his Adidas Yeezus shoes.</p>
<p>West’s tireless quest for artistic perfection and new forms of visual expression is a welcome wake-up call to the increasingly blasé world of both high art and mainstream rap. Even if he raps about anal bleaching and “fame-thirsty” New York models, his obsession with garnering high-art legitimacy has generated some of the most interesting fusions of art, fashion and music in recent years.</p>
<h2>When Koons met Gaga met Botticelli</h2>
<p>Of course it would be impossible to discuss recent pop/high art collaborations without mentioning Lady Gaga’s undervalued 2013 release ARTPOP. The album’s cover art featured a prominent collaboration with Jeff Koons, with fractured pieces of Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus (1484-6) spliced into the background.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121337/original/image-20160505-19747-1biq2ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121337/original/image-20160505-19747-1biq2ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121337/original/image-20160505-19747-1biq2ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121337/original/image-20160505-19747-1biq2ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121337/original/image-20160505-19747-1biq2ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121337/original/image-20160505-19747-1biq2ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121337/original/image-20160505-19747-1biq2ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/121337/original/image-20160505-19747-1biq2ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Album art for ARTPOP (2013).</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In interviews, Gaga appears to be highly articulate on the subject of artistic processes and influences.</p>
<p>She cites Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet as a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/understanding-lady-gaga/2011/02/14/AByv3jH_story.html">major source of artistic inspiration</a> and has a quote of his about the necessity of making art tattooed on her upper left forearm. With ARTPOP, her intention was to <a href="http://pitchfork.com/thepitch/132-lady-gagas-artrave-the-beginning-of-the-end-of-the-extravagant-album-launch/">bridge the world of pop and art</a> in ways that mass culture has never seen before.</p>
<p>Her powerful and unique songs, such as Artpop and Venus realised the goal. However, sales were lacklustre. Critics questioned whether her <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/11/11/artpop-review-lady-gaga-s-album-wants-to-be-everything-but-is-nothing-at-all.html">“art game” was as strong as her marketing prowess</a>, with some all-too-literal songs such as “Donatella” and “Fashion”.</p>
<h2>Legacy building</h2>
<p>Artistic legacy is clearly pop’s new watchword. Still, today’s pop stars might want to pay heed to Aristotle, whose observations about the process of artistic creation still ring true. “The aim of art,” he wrote, “is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance”.</p>
<p>History teaches us that many artistic experiments flourish and fade. The true artists of our day (regardless of the medium) create works that connect with the complexities of the human soul in ways that crass materialism and persona-mongering cannot. </p>
<p>No amount of artistic referencing or posturing will take the place of original, inspired and soul-searching work.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/58741/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Blair McDonald does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
From Beyoncé and Lady Gaga to Kanye and even Rihanna, pop royalty is crazy for high art. Is this a phenomenon worth celebrating or are pop stars mining the art world to gain credibility?
Blair McDonald, Lecturer in Journalism, Communications and New Media, Thompson Rivers University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/55507
2016-03-02T02:23:01Z
2016-03-02T02:23:01Z
Lady Gaga vs Lorde: why both tributes captured the essence of David Bowie
<p>On January 10, 2016, I received a text message from a friend who is a devoted David Bowie fan: “There was an Internet death hoax about Bowie. I’m still shaking,” she exclaimed. Hesitantly, she decided, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>There’s no official news as yet, so I think it’s safe to assume that it is fake.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Her skepticism was warranted, given that Bowie had only two days prior released his 25th – and what would become his final – studio album, <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/jan/07/david-bowie-blackstar-review-a-spellbinding-break-with-his-past">Blackstar</a>. </p>
<p>But of course, the reports were not fake. The news spread like wild fire as headlines across the globe announced the death of an icon. Blackstar would be his parting gift to his fans and to the world of pop that he himself had helped to shape. </p>
<p>Not surprisingly, an <a href="https://theconversation.com/david-bowie-pop-star-who-fell-to-earth-to-teach-outsiders-they-can-be-heroes-52995">outpouring of grief ensued</a>. Bowie-themed nights and tributes began to flow, but the most talked-about homages were the recent performances by <a href="http://consequenceofsound.net/2016/02/lady-gaga-gives-the-academy-awards-a-performance-for-the-ages/">Lady Gaga at the Grammy Awards</a> and <a href="http://musicfeeds.com.au/news/lorde-performed-stirring-bowie-tribute-brits-original-backing-band/">Lorde at the BRIT Awards</a>. </p>
<p>These two performances were polar opposites. Gaga’s tribute showcased a medley of songs, the singer whizzing through many of Bowie’s classics – Suffragette City, Changes, Ziggy Stardust, Rebel Rebel, Fame, Let’s Dance to name a few – at lightning-bolt speed. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3aw_sZvauCw?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Lady Gaga paid tribute with a medley of Bowie’s hits.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The performance – complete with brass section, a dancing robotic electric piano, and references to Bowie’s famous alter egos, Aladdin Sane and Ziggy Stardust – contained all the glitz and glamour one would expect to find at a Grammy Awards performance.</p>
<p>Lorde’s tribute, on the other hand, was much more pared back. Devoid of stage props and Bowie-esque makeup, the singer - alongside Bowie’s band - delivered a haunting rendition of Life on Mars. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/C7l3y7LOzLc?wmode=transparent&start=644" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Lorde at the Brit awards.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Lorde and Lady Gaga have since been pitted against each other, as commentators, fans, and music critics compare the two performances. Many concluded that Lorde’s was the better, more fitting, and more appropriate tribute. The most frustrating aspect of this comparison, however, is the way in which <a href="http://www.stuff.co.nz/entertainment/music/77293349/lordes-david-bowie-tribute-at-the-brit-awards-so-much-better-than-lady-gaga">Lady Gaga’s performance was derided</a>. </p>
<p>Gaga’s tribute was denounced for being “<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/music/what-to-listen-to/lordes-tribute-to-david-bowie-brit-awards-2016-heartbreaking/">over-the-top</a>”, “too superficial”, “too theatrical” and “too strenuously pop”. Bowie’s son, Duncan Jones, tweeted a veiled criticism after Gaga’s performance:</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"699437406873743360"}"></div></p>
<p>Lorde’s performance was, by contrast, described as <a href="http://www.nme.com/blogs/nme-blogs/5-ways-lordes-bowie-tribute-was-better-than-lady-gagas">“subtle”, “real” and “powerful”</a> and was thus celebrated for being more “<a href="http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/music/lordes-brits-tribute-to-david-bowie-so-much-better-than-lady-gaga-at-the-grammys-20160225-gn3e93.html">authentic</a>”. </p>
<p>This commentary spoke volumes about who is deemed worthy of paying tribute to an artist such as Bowie. At the core of the Lady Gaga-vs-Lorde debate is the ideology of authenticity, which is deeply embedded in rock-music discourse. </p>
<p>This ideology situates rock and pop music in opposition to each other: rock is supposedly real, authentic, sincere, and honest, while pop music is supposedly banal, artificial, contrived and vapid. By this understanding, rock is thus viewed as superior to pop.</p>
<p>How can Gaga, a supposedly inauthentic, vapid, and contrived pop star, possibly pay homage to such an authentic and real artist like Bowie? Lorde is deemed more worthy of such a tribute because, in spite of her pop identity, she embodies the ideology of authenticity.</p>
<p>Part of what made Bowie such a great contributor to both pop music and pop culture was his ability to be artificial as well as real, to be theatrical whilst being honest, to be contrived <em>and</em> authentic. </p>
<p>The Lady Gaga-vs-Lorde debate is therefore both unproductive and arbitrary. Both performances showcased a different side to Bowie’s artistry: Gaga’s tribute focused on his performative and theatrical side, highlighting in particular his fascination with technology, artifice, and fantasy worlds (Labyrinth immediately comes to mind). </p>
<p>By stripping these things back, Lorde’s tribute celebrated Bowie’s musicality, highlighting instead his songwriting ability through a predominantly musical performance of one of his greatest songs: Life on Mars. </p>
<p>Both of these tributes captured the essence of Bowie. When considered together, rather than being pitted against each other, they can be seen as capturing what quintessentially made him a truly enigmatic and unique artist.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/55507/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kat Nelligan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Lady Gaga and Lorde have both paid tribute to David Bowie in very different ways. Debating who did it better is rooted in an ideology of authenticity that pits rock against pop. In reality, Bowie embodied both.
Kat Nelligan, PhD candidate, tutor and lecturer in Popular Music Studies , The University of Melbourne
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.