We're Born Naked ... Notes on Simon Doonan's Complete Story of Drag (Part 1: On Glamour Drag and Art Drag)

(Laurence King Publishing, 2024)

 

 

I.

 

Firstly, I should point out that the above is a concise edition. And so, whether it's quite as comprehensive as the story told in the complete (hardback) edition, published in 2019, I don't know. 

 

However, I'm guessing by the shared number of pages, that it is and that this (paperback) edition is therefore just smaller in size, but not scope; a book to be carried and read on the tube, rather than left at home sitting on one's coffee table. 

 

I believe the only real textual difference is that this mini-edition comes with a Foreword by Fenton Bailey, the award-winning British producer, director and author of Screen Age: How TV Shaped Our Reality ... (2022) - a book that I have not read, but which, as a Baudrillardian and one who forages "the detritus of popular culture" [a], has a title that interests.   

 

As Bailey points out, Doonan aims to give drag historical context in the hope that this will give drag queens a greater understanding of themselves, thus providing "a creative boost and a sense of empowerment" (2). 

 

Obviously, I'm tempted, as a Foucauldian, to insert a rolling eye emoji here, as this clichéd notion of empowerment is one that triggers a certain amount of irritation and disdain. But I shall resist the urge to do so, even though it pains me to see how this concept continues to be employed by the very people it was designed to further entrap by providing a false sense of agency that hides the real functioning of power.  

 

Bailey also insists that we live in performative times and that drag is thus the perfect medium or art form for the 21st century: 

 

"We are children of the screen [...] we have grown up [...] watching countless performances. It makes sense that we would explore and express ourselves in the same way, playing and performing as the star of our own musical/drama/sitcom - or all three." (3)

 

That's an interesting point of view and one I'm broadly sympathetic with. 

 

However, I smiled to see Bailey end his Foreword by suggesting that it's conservatives who have "failed to address any of the serious issues facing America and the world" (3) - not drag queens and trans activists who subscribe to this playful and performative ideology. 

 

That seems a little partisan and sectarian to me ... And I'm surprised that after eighteen seasons of RuPaul's Drag Race - Bailey and his partner Randy Barbato are executive producers - he's still subscribing to a repressive hypothesis and speaking about attempts to erase the LGBTQ community [b].   

 

To demonise conservatives and posit a simulated political struggle is to avoid looking at how drag itself has been institutionalised and robbed of its subversive character by the corporate-media machine that Bailey himself plays a leading role within. What is the drag queen today if not just another neo-liberal subject within a commercial universe ...? 

 

 

II.  

 

To be fair, Simon Doonan is alert to the dangers of corporate assimilation. As he notes in his Introduction, the mainstreaming of drag over recent years "seemed like a death knell" (7). 

 

However, thanks to the success of RuPaul's Drag Race and the new generation of queens, drag has been reinvented and the future looks even more fabulous than the past. The gender revolution has also transformed everything for the better; gender fluidity results in a revival of interest in drag. 

 

"And who could have anticipated the vigorous politicizing and reinvigoration of drag that would be triggered by the election of Donald Trump?" (9) 

 

Who indeed? It seems that conservatism can be catalysing and not just repressive, then. Doonan kind of gives the game away by acknowledging that the politics of resistance is symbiotic with oppression.   

 

Like Bailey, Doonan quickly falls into a trap of his own making. On the one hand, he insists that we must cast aside old definitions and preconceived notions; learn to accept that the rules have changed: "In fact, there are no rules." (10)

 

But, on the other hand, he is obliged to apologise in advance to the rule-enforcing pronoun police: "I have done my best to use the correct pronouns and to dot all my i's and cross all my gender-identity t's" (11), so any offensive faux pas are "completely unintentional" (11).

 

Unfortunately, I'm not sure, Simon, ignorance of the new morality is a defence in woke law ...

      

 

III. 

 

The first chapter is on what Doonan calls Glamour Drag ... One of the defining characteristics of which is fierceness and the ability to deliver "taboo-busting spectacle" (13); something a bit Medusa-like. Having said that, Doonan wants to backtrack a little: "It would be a mistake, however, to think of glamour drag as being nihilistic" (16). 

 

To which one can only say, that's a shame - but worse is to follow; ultimately, says Doonan, drag is not a confrontation with the terrifying aspect of womanhood, it's a way of "satirizing our gender confusion, misogyny and castration anxieties [...] thereby mitigating our hang-ups" (16). 

 

In other words: "Drag is profoundly therapeutic." (16)  

 

At this point, I can no longer resist inserting the emoji I thought about inserting earlier: 🙄

 

If this is true, then drag is not an art and nor is it transgressive; it is rather a queer form of self-help (or self-empowerment to use that term again). 

 

But perhaps it isn't true: Doonan himself later quotes Holly Brubach (author of the 1999 study Girlfriend) who sees glamour drag "as less of a psycho-therapeutic" (40) phenomenon and more an attempt by men to to enter the 'realm of appearances' and so enjoy "'the privilege of not being accountable to truth or meaning or content, of dwelling entirely on the surface'" (40). 

 

Somewhat surprisingly, Doonan says this point is essentially true - thereby moving across from the sexual politics of desire to the fetishistic politics of seduction; i.e., a magical and ritualistic form of artifice that challenges the modern obsession with truth, transparency, and sexual liberation. Again, as a Baudrillardian, this makes happy. 

 

Moving on, one comes across other problematic claims: "The Victorian and Edwardian eras were noteworthy for their extreme prudishness." (18). Again, if the author only bothered to read a little Foucault, then he'd know not to say such silly things [c]; no woman ever fainted at the sight of a piano leg. 

 

Doonan is much better at simply giving us names, dates, and other details concerning actual drag queens from days gone by (and the book comes with many fantastic images). Though I'd have liked to have heard a little more about this claim: "The sexualization of drag [in the 1950s] was propelled by working-class gay men, living out fantasies of seducing heterosexual men and thereby becoming 'real women'." (23)

 

If that's true, then it feeds into (and arguably justifies) the so-called Lavender Scare which - along with the fear of communist infiltration - defined American culture in the post-War period [d]. 

  

I'm hoping Doonan might also say a bit more at some point about the relationship between drag queens and trans women - one might imagine certain tensions arising amongst those for whom femininity is pure artifice and performance (i.e., about the clothes and the makeup and the wigs and about the way you walk and talk) and those for whom it is born of hormonal drugs and gender affirming surgery.    

 

This paragraph, referring to the world after Wigstock - a drag festival founded in 1984 in Manhattan's East Village - certainly caught my attention:

 

"The post-punk era saw an explosive growth in a new kind of drag queen culture. Suddenly drag became much hipper, smarter, and, yes, postmodern. Glamour drag queens began to graze on perverse aspects of pop culture, mashing it up and spewing it back at their audience with knowing vigour. Judy and Marilyn were fine for the old gin-swilling gay audiences of the 1950s, but the Wigstock generation craved fresh sources of dragspiration." (33)

 

Doonan explains how the "new wave dragsters were inspired by a broad range of camp cultural offerings" (35), drawn from the worlds of film and popular music, and "propelled drag out of the gay ghetto and into broader culture" (35). In other words - and these are Doonan's words - the tacky gave way to the trendy. 

 

Drag culture formed a close alliance with the growing Harlem ball scene (i.e., the world of voguing) and it was "only a matter of time before drag hit the runways" (35) of the fashion world; the supermodels were, argues Doonan, essentially a type of drag queen - and Billy Beyond was a type of supermodel.   

 

Finally, Doonan closes his first chapter by inviting readers to meet the look queens ... 

 

"Look queens are glamour drag queens who generate shock and awe through extreme levels of cosmetic artistry. [...] They take that shimmering feminine visual realm that Brubach talked about, and magnify it for the age of Insta selfies and social media." (43)

 

Again, it was Jean Baudrillard who got there first and provides the best description of these look queens: 

 

"Everyone seeks their look. Since it is no longer possible to base any claim on one's own existence, there is nothing for it but to perform an appearing act without concerning oneself with being - or even with being seen. So it is not: I exist, I am here! but rather: I am visible, I am an image - look! look! This is not even narcissism, merely an extraversion without depth, a sort of self-promot­ing ingenuousness whereby everyone becomes the manager of their own appearance." [e]

 

There is, as we have mentioned, a politics attached to this - but it's a politics of seduction and not the politics of empowerment - a term that Doonan tediously returns to. To seduce, is to disempower the subject who exerts their gaze - it's the revenge of the object (something we have discussed many times on Torpedo the Ark).   

 

But seduction requires a certain horror and Doonan insists that the look queens have "helped to expunge any sordid and sinister overtones" (43) associated with drag; "constructing a creative, welcoming environment for cis females and young kids" (43). It's glamour drag for all - which is very democratic and inclusive, but also very boring; just another form of good clean fun for all the family. 

 

 

IV. 

 

Chapter two is on art drag. But readers who hope this will mean I reproduce a picture of Grayson Perry - the patron saint of such - are going to be disappointed. For I do not like Grayson Perry and do not recognise him as a "beloved public intellectual" (45). 

 

I'm a bit suspicious of this bold claim: "The incendiary nature of drag telegraphs edgy avant-gardism ..." (45) - particularly as it comes just a couple of pages after Doonan has told us that drag is now free of any danger or threat. You can't have it both ways, Simon. 

 

And, ultimately, there's a world of difference between Duchamp and Grayson Perry. As there is, indeed, between Warhol and Perry. The latter may be indebted to these two - who isn't? - but while Perry works within the conceptual framework they established, he seems keen to place art back on a more traditional basis (i.e., as something involving craftsmanship rather than just amusing ideas, ready-made objects, and mass production).     

 

Whilst I'm not overly keen on Grayson Perry, I really dislike someone else that Doonan seems to think the business - Leigh Bowery. 

 

Did Bowery really achieve "unimaginable levels of artistic originality, perversity and creativity" (57), or, ultimately, was he not just a self-indulgent narcissist looking to shock via crude provocation? 

 

One can't deny he had a talent for this - and that he was influential on the work of many talented individuals - but I think we need to keep things in critical perspective when it comes to figures who are regarded as iconic and/or legendary (though I appreciate that the curbing of enthusiasm is not a concept understood within the world of drag; a world wherein everyone and everything is fierce and fabulous all of the time).      

 

Doonan says that in comparison to someone such as Bowery, Duchamp's "early forays into art drag now seem quite genteel" (61). And I suppose that's true. But - Barthesian criticisms of gentility aside - I think I prefer some degree of refinement and self-restraint and see these as vital components of art (and society). I don't like vulgar individuals whether they are seeking to naturalise bourgeois values or passing themselves off as transgressive. 

 

One might even build a case arguing that in the current age good manners and good taste might ironically be seen as avant-garde (because countercultural) - and that it just might be more interesting to be charming and delightful than "appalling and provocative" (63). 

 

But that's another post, for another day ...  

 

  

Notes

 

[a] Fenton Bailey, Foreword to Simon Doonan's Drag: The Complete Story (Laurence King Publishing, 2024), p. 2. Please note that all future page references to Doonan's book will be given directly in the main text (in round brackets). 

 

[b] Not only has RuPaul's Drag Race aired for eighteen seasons in the US, but it has inspired many spin-off shows and numerous international franchises. The show has also earned multiple Emmy Awards, including the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Reality-Competition Program, for four consecutive years (2018 to 2021). 

      So I'm not quite sure why Bailey continues to speak only of the repression and erasure of his community by mainstream (heteronormative) society.      

 

[c] I'm thinking of L'Histoire de la sexualité 1: La volonté de savoir (1976) and Foucault's famous interrogation of the repressive hypothesis; i.e., the idea that Western society suppressed sexuality from the 17th to the mid-20th century. Foucault argues that discourse on sexuality in fact proliferated during this period, during which experts began to examine sexuality in a scientific manner and encouraged people to confess their sexual feelings and actions. 

      Interestingly, Foucault also shows how in the 18th and 19th centuries society took an increasing interest in sexualities that did not fit within the heteronormative framework; this included the sexuality of children, the mentally ill, the criminal, and the homosexual.   

 

[d] See the post titled 'Cocksuckers and Communists' (21 May 2015): click here.  

 

[e] Jean Baudrillard, 'Transsexuality', in The Transparency of Evil, trans. James Benedict (Verso, 1993), p. 23.  

 

 

Readers who enjoyed this post might like to see a very early post on TTA - dated 26 December 2012 - and titled 'Life's a Drag' - click here.  

 

 

Part two of this post will follow shortly.   

 

 

Calimocho: On the Politics of Wine and Cola (Redux)

Roland Barthes & Andy Warhol

George Costanza & Jeremy Usbourne 

 

  

I. 

 

Recently, I was at an event with an American friend who doesn't drink; she prefers to sip mineral water rather than Champagne - although, on a hot summer's day, it's been known for her to ask for a Diet Coke with ice and lemon.  

 

Listening to her explain her secular preference to another guest reminded me of a post written back in 2014 on the politics of wine and cola [1], in which I considered the idea that opting for a soft drink over a glass of wine is in some sense a rejection of the snobbery and social complexity inherent in European culture.   

 

In the post, whilst I mentioned Warhol and George Costanza, I don't recall bringing Roland Barthes into the conversation and that is something I'd now like to do in an alternative version of the text; one that considers the concept of wine as a totem-drink and magical substance that transforms any occasion (even if it fails to tick the right boxes for those who value equity, inclusion, and sobriety above all things).  

II.  

  

Probably the most powerful argument for choosing a cool can of Coke over a fine glass of wine remains the one made by Andy Warhol. It's a cultural-political argument which posits the former as the embodiment of American democracy [2] and which stands in stark contrast to Roland Barthes's idea of wine as a quintessential sign of Frenchness - "just like its three hundred and sixty types of cheese" [3].  

 

The Germans have their beer; the Russians their vodka; and the English their cups of tea. But the French - of all classes - have their wine. Manual workers and intellectuals alike, enjoy a glass of wine with their lunch, says Barthes, thereby challenging the belief that it's something enjoyed only by a privileged elite.  

 

However, Barthes admits that wine is a foundational liquid that it grants the drinker a certain social belonging. Thus, to refuse a glass of wine and choose Perrier or Pepsi instead - certainly in a French (or European) context - is not just to exercise a preference, it is to commit an immoral (and incomprehensible) faux pas.   

 

This explains why George Costanza’s robust defence of Pepsi seems so (amusingly) outrageous [3]. When George exclaims 'No way is wine better than Pepsi', he is rejecting the idea that drinking wine is a moral imperative. George isn't just choosing a soft beverage, he's refusing to participate in the Old World ceremony where wine serves as a signifier of adulthood and civilisation. 

 

Warhol's argument for Coca-Cola communism - where the President and the bum drink the exact same product - strips away the mystical qualities that the French, according to Barthes, attribute to wine. While wine varies by terroir and price (creating the very hierarchies that George detests), Coke is a universal constant, requiring no expertise to consume.

 

This brings us rather nicely to the character of Jeremy Usbourne in the British sitcom Peep Show, whose discomfort at ordering a bottle of Barolo isn't just about the price - though that's a very real factor - it's due also to his knowledge of his own inability to perform the role of the wine drinker. Jeremy lacks the habits of the heart - i.e., that unearned cultural capital - that Barthes says allow a person to master wine's complexity. 

 

For Jeremy, wine belongs to a world he hasn't been initiated into. It's not simply that he doesn't know which wine to ask for, he doesn't know how to drink it and ordering a bottle doesn't transform the meal with Big Suze, it simply exposes him as someone who doesn't belong to her class [5]. 

 

Thus his preference for hot chocolate or Coke isn't merely juvenile - it's an unconscious alignment with Warhol's democratic Americanism over the performative demands of European wine culture. Ultimately, Jeremy feels he can drink hot chocolate or Coke without feeling judged, or looking like a dick in the eyes of those who, like Suze, have been initiated into the way of the grape.   

 

 

Notes

 

[1] See 'Calimocho: On the Politics of Wine and Cola' (19 Sept 2014): click here. 

 

[2] See Andy Warhol, The Philosophy of Andy Warhol (From A to B & Back Again) (Harcourt, 1975), pp. 100-101. The section in which Warhol praises the greatness of American society in terms of Coca-Cola (and ballpark hot dogs) can be read here. 

      What Warhol writes here is undeniably true and one senses something of this same patriotism and ironic egalitarianism of the market place born of a New World dislike for Old World snobbery in George Costanza's privileging of Pepsi over wine (see note 4 below).  

 

[3] Roland Barthes, 'Wine and Milk', in Mythologies, trans. Annette Lavers (Paladin Books, 1973), p. 65.

      Obviously, the Greeks, Italians, and Spanish feel exactly the same about wine; that it's not just as an alcoholic drink, but as an essential part of their daily life, culture, and cuisine (they also love their own cheeses just as much as the French, even if they don't produce as many types or consume as much).  

 

[4] See the fifth season episode of Seinfeld titled 'The Dinner Party' (1994), dir. Tom Cherones and written by Larry David. Click here to watch the relevant scene on YouTube. 

 

[5] Click here to watch the scene with Jeremy and Big Suze at the restaurant in the fifth season episode of Peep Show titled 'Burgling' (2008), dir. Becky Martin, written by Jesse Armstrong, Sam Bain, and David Mitchell.   

 

 

Why Me Contra So What

 

 

Even if receiving the most dire news from a doctor, the one question I would hope never to ask is: Why me?

 

For no question is more metaphysically naïve and egocentric than this request not only for meaning, but for a coherent narrative that unfolds in relation specifically to one's self. This may be all too human, but it's all too shameful for a philosopher.

For a philosopher should know better than attempt to explain, justify and integrate a random event into a personal life story, or start asking crypto-theological questions of the universe.

 

And even if the question is more rhetorical than anything else - a venting of natural emotion - it should still never pass the lips of a philosopher; i.e., one who always remains stoical, always refuses to take things tragically, and always favours the Warholian response when given terrible news: So what? [1]        

   

 

Notes

 

[1] See The Philosophy of Andy Warhol (From A to B & Back Again), (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1975), in which he writes:   

      "Sometimes people let the same problem make them miserable for years when they could just say, 'So what.' That's one of my favorite things to say. 'So what.'  [...] I don’t know how I made it through all the years before I learned how to do that trick. It took a long time for me to learn it, but once you do, you never forget." (Ch. 7)

Bob & Vivien & Nick & Young: Thoughts on a Post Screening Discussion

L-R: Nick Egan, Vivien Goldman, Bob Gruen, and Young Kim

Malcolm Mclaren: Worlds End Paris Catwalk Shows 

+ Duck Rock Post Screening Discussion and Q&A 

Click here to watch on YouTube 

 

 

I. 

 

If I could have been anywhere in the world this week it would have been New York City - despite the subzero temperatures - in order to attend a programme of events put on by the Anthology Film Archives to honour Malcolm Mclaren and organised in collaboration with Young Kim, his creative and romantic partner for the last twelve years of his life and the executor of his estate. 

 

Essentially a series of screenings, the week-long event explored McLaren's relationship to film and surveyed his rarely seen or discussed contributions to the world of the moving-image.

 

Following the screening of a 60 minute video of the Worlds End Paris Catwalk shows (1981-84) and the 42 minute long-form music video made to accompany the album Duck Rock (1983), there was a post-screening discussion and Q&A moderated by the the British writer, musician, and punk scholar Vivien Goldman and featuring the American photographer Bob Gruen and the English visual artist and self-styled creative vandal Nick Egan, alongside Young Kim. 

 

And, having now twice watched a recording of this discussion uploaded to YouTube, I thought I'd share some thoughts (and impressions) on what was said (since I wasn't invited to attend and chip in my tuppence ha'p'orth in person). 

 

II.

Vivien Goldman sounds fun and seems keen to infuse a little liveliness into events, which is what you need, I suppose, from a moderator. Her remark re Malcolm's heavenly status (0:26) made me smile; for if he has indeed ascended to the Kingdom of God then the angels had better tie him to a tree, or he'll begin to roam and soon you know where he will be.  

 

Young sounds smart and serious, though one might raise an eyebrow at some of her claims; was Duck Rock really an 'anthropological study of world dance cultures' (3:22)? I mean, it's more than just an amusing pop record, but that's over-egging the pudding somewhat.

 

Let's just say rather that it's an imaginative and pioneering work of ethnomusicological curation - albeit one that conveniently and commercially packages things for a Western audience. Malcolm certainly did his research and Duck Rock displays creative genius, but he wasn't an attempting a serious study of world music nor trying to faithfully document such.          

 

 

III. 

 

It's interesting to hear it confirmed by Kim that there is, in fact, not a huge archive of material left behind by McLaren (6:41); I know some people like to think he was England's Andy Warhol [1], but here he absolutely differed from his hero. 

 

For Warhol, of course, left behind an outrageously large and detailed archive of material, consisting of approximately half a million objects, including his personal and artistic belongings from the 1950s until his death in 1987, and filling a space of some 8,000 cubic feet. 

 

Amusingly, The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts donated the vast majority of this material to The Andy Warhol Museum, giving them the Herculean task of cataloguing the contents (whilst they hold on to the massive collection of paintings, drawings, and prints).        

 

One suspects that the Malcolm McLaren Estate will soon exhaust whatever materials have not yet been placed into the public arena and that defending his legacy will be Kim's main role, rather than adding to it in any significant manner. 

 

 

IV.     

 

Nick Egan I'm always going to think fondly of, as he was kind and helpful to me back in 1983 [2]. 

 

But his claim that Malcolm was 'not a nostalgic person' (7:11) is laughably false; his entire project might be summed up as an attempt to live yesterday tomorrow (to reverse the past into the future). 

 

He may have been quickly bored and always looked to radically shake up the present (his history in relation to 430 Kings Road is evidence of that), but McLaren was a man haunted by ghosts and childhood memories his entire life and was even nostalgic for mud; i.e., some form of primal and primitive authenticity.  

 

Let's just say that his relationship with nostalgia was complex and that he viewed the lost promise of the past as potentially subversive rather than something to get sentimental about.     

 

 

V.  

 

Bob Gruen - whom I've never met or had any contact with - seems like a nice chap and I enjoyed listening to his anecdotes from back in the day, be they about the New York Dolls or suckling pigs (15:30). 

 

And his initial impression of McLaren as odd (9:45) is not wrong; Malcolm was nothing if not an odd duck, although some may prefer to idiomatically label him a queer fish. 

 

Either way, Malcolm was a member of the punk 1% - i.e., those who don't fit in and don't care (as it says on a Seditionaries shirt) [3].  

 

 

VI. 

 

Interesting also to hear from Nick that Malcolm had 'a bubble around him' (17:37) and wasn't always aware that other people didn't see things as he saw them and didn't always realise when he had overstepped the mark or outstayed his welcome. 

 

Hearing how he managed to piss off the mountain folk in Tennessee (16:42) reminds one of that time when, in 2007, he managed to antagonise the good people of Gardenstown, a small fishing village in Aberdeenshire, by informing them that Jesus Christ was a sausage [4].   

 

Is this a sign of McLaren's egoism, or narcissism, or solipsism ...? 

 

I don't know. 

 

But let's call it innocence. 

 

 

VII. 

 

Interestingly, in answering an audience question about accessing the McLaren archive Kim - who obviously has legal control - makes it clear she also wants complete control. Thus, whilst she plans to make Malcolm's work available, it will be at a time of her choosing and according to the terms and conditions she sets: 

 

'I don't really want [things] just everywhere right away. I want to do something with them, but I want to control kind of how it goes out to be honest.' (30:00 - 30:15) 

      

That's understandable, I suppose, but one does have concerns that Kim is also trying to determine the critical reception of McLaren's work and coordinate his entire story from her perspective (I suspect this is what Vivien Goldman refers to as Kim being a 'really fierce defender' (1:31) of Malcolm's legacy.   

 

 

VIII. 

 

Where Young is spot on - and right to contradict Egan - is in her claim that Malcolm always viewed things ultimately from a British perspective (33:13); thus, for example, his album Paris (1994) was very much a love letter to the city and to French pop culture written by an Englishman.     

 

He once told me that Paris is for living in; New York is for playing in; but London is where he always returns to work and bring ideas together (and it's Highgate, of course, where he has his final resting place, not Père Lachaise).   

 

 

IX.

 

Is Nick right to argue that Duck Rock has had more influence than Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols (1977) (41:02)?

 

Young looks as if she wants to interject and challenge the idea and, if I'd been there, I think I might also have challenged that. For while both albums are seminal works, the comparison is inappropriate (maybe even odious), for their influence operates in very different spheres. 

 

Push comes to shove, however, I think Never Mind the Bollocks is the more culturally significant and broadly influential work, having defined the punk movement and its global aesthetic - but this is not to deny or downplay Duck Rock's innovations and the latter album has perhaps proven to be more prophetic (some critics arguing that it not only brought hip-hop into the mainstream, but that it anticipated developments in the 21st century, such as sampling, for example). 

  

 

Notes

 

[1] See the post titled 'The Talented Malcolm McLaren and the Visionary Andy Warhol' (21 Jan 2026): click here. 

 

[2] See the post titled 'Memories of a Duck Rocker' (17 Mar 2025): click here. 

 

[3] I'm referring to the Anarchist Punk Gang' shirt designed by McLaren and Westwood for Seditionaries c. 1979. Click here to view an example of such held by the Met Museum. And click here for a forthcoming post discussing the shirt and in praise of the 1% who don't fit and don't care. 

 

[4] See the post titled 'Don't You Know Jesus Christ is a Sausage?' (18 April 2020): click here.  

 

 

The Talented Malcolm McLaren and the Visionary Andy Warhol

Image posted on Instagram by Young Kim 

(12 Jan 2026) @youngkim.xyz

 

 

I.

 

It's sixteen years ago this coming April that Malcolm McLaren died [1] ... and it's ten years ago this coming May that the ICA hosted an event in memoriam [2]. 

 

Essentially, the argument advanced by Young Kim and other speakers was that Malcolm was a uniquely gifted individual and that not only did he exert a seminal influence on fashion, music, and the arts during his lifetime, but that his ghost continues to haunt contemporary practice [3].    

 

Indeed, the claim was made that McLaren is England's answer to Andy Warhol ...  

 

 

II. 

 

Today, on the occasion of what would have been his 80th birthday, I'd like to endorse the above argument, agreeing that there needs to be a fundamental reappraisal of McLaren's legacy and that the (now boring) idea that he was a mere charlatan or talentless swindler, needs to be dispelled once and for all. 

 

For this image of him - which, admittedly, he is largely responsible for inventing [3] - obscures his significance as an artist and sells short his multidisciplinary body of work predicated on the radical manipulation of media and the staging of situations.

 

Having said that, the claim that McLaren was England's Warhol is, whilst bold and interesting, an imperfect analogy. 

 

For whilst there are certain similarities and points of comparison - both postioned themselves as creative directors rather than traditional artists and both understood how art was absolutely tied to commerce and commodification - Warhol and McLaren were rooted in very different cultures and I think their aesthetic and world view was, in key respects, disparate. 

 

I also suspect that (if pushed) McLaren himself would concede from beyond the grave that Warhol, who had left an indelible impression on him as a teenager in the early 1960s, was a far more profound artist, full of darkness.

 

Ultimately, whilst Malcolm hit targets no one else could hit, Warhol hit a target no one else could envision ... [5]      

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Malcolm McLaren, born 22 January, 1946, died of peritoneal mesothelioma in a Swiss hospital on 8 April 2010, aged 64.  

 

[2] The two-day ICA event consisted of The Legacy of Malcolm McLaren: The Clothes (20 May 2016), followed by The Legacy of Malcolm McLaren: The Art (21 May 2016).

      The first was a panel discussion chaired by McLaren's long-term partner (and heir to his Estate) Young Kim, was meant to feature writer Paul Gorman, fashion designer Kim Jones, and magazine editor Ben Reardon, and address Malcolm's life-long obsession with clothes and his frequent forays into fashion design. Unfortunately, Jones and Reardon couldn't attend the event, so Gorman persuaded Simon Withers onto the stage to contribute, which he did with great success. Click here for more details.  

      The latter was a panel discussion between ICA Executive Director Gregor Muir, Young Kim, author Michael Bracewell, and curator Andrew Wilson, followed by a screening of McLaren's 86 minute film Shallow 1-21 (2008). Click here for more details.  

 

[3] Supporters of McLaren (like me) will point to the fact that via his conceptual boutiques operated in partnership with Vivienne Westwood, McLaren left his sartorial signature on the fashion world and effectively invented the visual language of punk; that with the release of his pioneering first solo album, Duck Rock (1983), McLaren introduced hip-hop and world music to a British audience; and that the moving-image works made at the end of his career saw a fascinating return to his art-school roots, utilising a distinctive concept of musical paintings.  

 

[4] Mclaren is largely responsible for his own negative reputation due to the role he adopted in The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (dir. Julien Temple, 1980). As he himself later confessed, he thought everybody would understand it was meant to be comical and self-mocking, but, unfortunately, people took it seriously: 'I was too good an actor'.  

 

[5] I'm paraphrasing Schopenhauer here who makes this distinction when discussing talent contra genius in Vol. 2, Ch. 31 of The World as Will and Representation (Cambridge University Press, 2018), pp. 393-415. 

      According to Schopenhauer, whilst a talented individual thinks faster and more accurately than most people; the person of genius sees a different world, although only insofar as they look more deeply into this world. 

 

 

 Thanks to Paul Gorman for providing information on the ICA event. 

 

 

The Velvet Underground Versus the Sex Pistols: a Postscript

The Velvet Underground (Sterling Morrison / Maureen Tucker / Lou Reed / John Cale) 

Photo by Gerard Malanga (1966)

The Sex Pistols (Steve Jones / Glen Matlock / Johnny Rotten / Paul Cook)

Photo by Peter Vernon (1976) 

 

I. 

 

As conceded in a recent post contrasting 'Venus in Furs' by the Velvet Underground with 'Submission' by the Sex Pistols [1], the former song is undoubtedly the more interesting of the two. However, that's not to say I would agree with this which arrived in my inbox in response:   

 

Quite why anyone would choose the scuzzy little marketing joke of Sex Pistols over the catastrophic beauty and kinetic mystique of The Velvets is beyond me . . . 

 

 

II. 

 

It's a peculiarly affecting line of criticism; one that could only have been written by a fan of the latter - note, for example, the use of the shortened band name to indicate intimacy and insider status (although there was also an early 1960's doo-wop group called The Velvets and one is tempted to feign confusion just to be irritating). 

 

Clearly, the writer prioritises artistic complexity over what they see as crude commercialism. But what is also clear from the sentence structure and grandiloquent language employed, is that this critic is something of an intellectual and cultural elitist - catastrophic beauty ... kinetic mystique - who uses phrases like this without wishing to signal their superiority? 

 

By dismissing the Sex Pistols as no more than Malcolm McLaren's scuzzy little marketing joke, they also position themselves as someone who can see through popular cultural trends such as punk; trends that lack the depth, authenticity, and high aesthetic value of the kind of avant-garde pop (or art rock) produced by the Velvet Underground. 

 

 

III.

 

Of course, this subjective and judgemental style of writing is one that many music journalists have experimented with and, to be fair, it can be entertaining (even if some readers may find it a tad pretentious) [2]. And one is reminded also of a letter written by a teenage Stephen Morrissey to the NME critiquing the Sex Pistols for their shabby appearance and 'discordant music' with 'barely audible' lyrics [3]. 

 

However, before my anonymous correspondent gets too excited by this - for if he loves the Velvet Underground, he's bound to love Morrissey -  he should note that Morrissey also praises the punk band for knowing how to get their audience dancing in the aisles and compares them favourably to his beloved New York Dolls (another scuzzy group managed briefly by McLaren which, I imagine, my correspondent hates just as much as the Sex Pistols). 

 

 

IV.

 

Ultimately, whilst belonging to two very different eras, the Velvet Underground and the Sex Pistols were both seminal bands and it is beyond me why we should be forced to choose between them. 

 

Having said that, my love and loyalty remains with the peculiars of 430 Kings Road rather than Andy Warhol's Factory and I prefer the comic anarcho-nihilism of the Sex Pistols to the dark poetic surrealism of the Velvet Underground.      

 

  

Notes

 

[1] See 'The Velvet Underground Versus the Sex Pistols: Venus in Furs Contra Submission' (6 Jan 2026): click here.

 

[2] I am sympathetic to Thomas Tritchler who calls for a rethinking of the term 'pretension'; see the third and final part of his post 'On the Malign/ed Art of Faking It' (27 Dec 2014): click here.

 

[3] Morrissey's letter was published in the NME on 16 June, 1976. It was written in response to the Sex Pistols' gig at the Lesser Free Trade Hall, in Manchester, on 4 June, 1976. To read the letter on Laughing Squid, click here. See also Alice Vincent's article on the letter in The Telegraph (23 July 2013): click here. 

 

The Velvet Underground Versus the Sex Pistols: Venus in Furs Contra Submission

The Velvet Underground: Venus in Furs (Verve Records, 1967) [1]

The Sex Pistols: Submission (Virgin Records, 1977) [2]

 

 

I. 

 

Back in November 1977, I was one of the few who purchased the 11-track pressing of Never Mind the Bollocks, with 'Submission' included as a bonus 7" (later, this song would be included on the actual album) [3]. 

 

As I disliked the song, however, regarding it as one of the weakest of the thirteen tracks written by Jones, Matlock, Cook and Rotten, I very rarely bothered to play it.   

 

Funnily enough, I still dislike it now; whereas, in contrast, I have grown to increasingly love 'Venus in Furs' by the Velvet Underground, a song which forms an interesting point of comparison ... 

 

 

II.

 

Written by Lou Reed and originally included on The Velvet Underground's debut album in 1967, 'Venus in Furs' was inspired by the novel of the same title by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch (1870). And like the book, the song explores themes to do with BDSM. 

 

It's a great track: featuring Reed on vocals and lead guitar, the disturbing and decadent sound of John Cale's electric viola, and a tambourine played by Moe Tucker, it is rightly considered one of the band's most perfect songs.  

  

 

III. 

Whether Malcolm McLaren had a particular liking for 'Venus in Furs' I don't know. But he was certainly inspired by Andy Warhol and the Velvet Underground and it was McLaren who suggested to Matlock and Rotten that they attempt to come up with a song entitled 'Submission', celebrating the kinkier aspects of human sexuality.  

 

Of course, Rotten being Rotten - more puritan than libertine and ever-ready to display his sophomoric sense of humour - there was no way he would (or could) write a lyrically sophisticated pop song along the lines of Reed's 'Venus in Furs'. And so we get a piss-take song in which the suggested title and theme of submission is taken literally as a 'submarine mission', which is kind of clever and mildly amusing, but not that clever or amusing [4].   

 

McLaren's thoughts on the end result (if he even bothered to listen to the song) are not recorded, but I can't imagine him being impressed with Rotten's little joke. 

 

 

IV.  

 

In sum: the Velvet Underground's 'Venus in Furs' and the Sex Pistols' 'Submission' contrast in their approach to a shared theme; whilst the former is a seductive art-rock exploration of BDSM, the latter is a punk-rock parody that subverts the intended meaning of the title suggested by their manager (I believe this is known as malicious compliance). 

 

In the end, I suppose, it's up to listeners to decide between shiny shiny boots of leather and an octopus rock and whether they favour the atmospheric and experimental music of the Velvet Underground, or the raw but ultimately more conventional sound of the Sex Pistols.  

 

Nine times out of ten, I would choose the latter; but not in this case.  

 

  

Notes

 

[1] This artwork, by Dave Lawson, inspired by the Velvet Underground song 'Venus in Furs', is available to buy from Indieprints: click here. 

 

[2] This is label of the one-sided 7" single 'Submission' given away with copies of the 11-track version of Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols (1977). See note 3 below. 

 

[3] Apparently, the 11-track edition of Never Mind the Bollocks with the 'Submission' single was the result of Virgin rushing to get the album released before a competing version was released in France on the French label Barclay Records, with whom McLaren had legitimately negotiated a separate deal. 

 

[4] It has been suggested by one commentator that the song does, in fact, retain a covertly sexual meaning and describes an act of cunnilingus. See 'The Story Behind the Song: "Submission" by the Sex Pistols', on the music website Rocking in the Norselands (10 March, 2025): click here.  

 

 

For a related post to this one - a post that I hadn't remembered writing or publishing until reminded by a torpedophile with a much better memory than mine - click here. And for a postscript to this post on the Velvet Underground and the Sex Pistols, click here. 

 

 

Musical bonus 1: The Velvet Underground, 'Venus in Furs', from the album The Velvet Underground and Nico (Verve Records, 1967): click here. 

 

Musical bonus 2: The Sex Pistols, 'Submission', from the album Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols (Virgin Records, 1977): click here. 

 

 

The Bats Have Left the Bell Tower: Notes on the Life and Death of Bela Lugosi

Bela Lugosi lying in his coffin at a Hollywood funeral home 

Photo by David Katzman

 

 

I. 

 

On this night in 1882, a star was born: the Hungarian-American actor Bela Lugosi, best remembered as Dracula in the 1931 horror classic of that title (dir. Tod Browning); the story of the strangest passion the world has ever known.   

 

It was a role that he had previously played on stage in a 1927 Broadway adaptation of Bram Stoker's novel and one that both defined him as an actor and limited his future opportunities; eventually giving us a comic turn as the Count in Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (dir. Charles Barton, 1948). 

 

This pretty much signalled the end of his career as a serious actor and, addicted to morphine combined with worsening alcoholism, things quickly went from bad to worse and he ended up taking roles in the films of Ed Wood, a filmmaker famously described by critics as the worst director of all time. 

 

 

II. 

 

On August 16, 1956, the news was announced that Bela Lugosi had died, peacefully in his sleep, aged 73.

 

Amusingly, he was typecast to the very end; buried wearing his Dracula costume, including the cape. This was not at his prior request, but done on the instructions of an ex-wife, Lillian, and their son, Bela Lugosi Jr., believing that the old man would've liked it (I'm not entirely sure about that). 

 

Even more amusing is the story of how, when standing by Lugosi's open coffin, Peter Lorre turned to fellow actor Vincent Price and said: 'Do you think we should drive a stake through his heart, just in case?'   

 

III.

  

To be perfectly honest, I can't say I'm a fan: Lugosi certainly had on screen presence as Dracula, but I always thought his performance lacked a little bite. In fact, he didn't even wear fangs for the film, this only becoming a cinematic convention in the 1950s; think Christopher Lee in the Hammer version of Dracula (dir. Terence Fisher, 1958). 

 

And, as a child, I was always more enthralled by other Universal monsters; Boris Karloff's Frankenstein and Lon Chaney Jr.'s Wolf Man, for example. Lugosi's Dracula seemed a little too hammy for my tastes; not that his performance was unskilled, just that it was a little too theatrical and reliant on exaggerated gestures and a heavy foreign accent. 

 

Still, it doesn't really matter what I think: Lugosi has his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame; Andy Warhol made a 1963 silkscreen print titled 'The Kiss (Bela Lugosi)', inspired by a scene from Dracula; and Bauhaus have immortalised the actor in their classic single 'Bela Lugosi's Dead' (Small Wonder Records, 1979): click here.  

Looking, Talking, and Thinking About Art with David Salle (Part 1)

Photo of David Salle by Robert Wright (2016)

 

 

I. 

 

I'm guessing many UK readers of a certain age will remember the 1982 Fun Boy Three hit (ft. Bananarama) 'It Aint What You Do (It's the Way That You Do It)' [a] - and this essentially sums up one of David Salle's main arguments about painting: never mind the content, concern yourself with the question of style:

 

"Subject matter - the what - can of course be a big deal. It's also easy to talk about. But more to the heart of the work, the thing that reveals its nature and quality, is the how, the specific inflection and touch that go into its making." [b]  

 

I obviously wouldn't use the same language as Mr Salle, but, basically, I agree that if you wish "to take a work's psychic temperature, look at its surface energy" [15]. For as Nietzsche says, the trick is to stop courageously at the skin and learn how to adore appearance; to become like those ancient Greeks who delighted in forms and colours and who were superficial out of profundity [c].

 

Art is the stylish representation of form; non-sentimental, ferociously intelligent; and full of a certain immediacy that "leaves one with a feeling of reality refreshed" [21].  

II. 

What makes a picture? 

For D. H. Lawence, it has something to do with purity of spirit and allowing the picture to come "clean out of instinct, intuition, and sheer physical action" [d]. 

 

I'm not sure, but I suspect Salle would agree with this, though he also mentions the importance of pictorial staging and "how forcefully a painting evokes the strangeness of the visual world" [23] [e]. 

Salle further says that it helps if the artist can draw with real confidence; with the arm, not just the wrist. Though that's not something that Lawrence worried about too much and he sneers at those early critics of Cézanne who believed being able to draw a cat accurately enough so it looks like a cat is the most crucial aspect of making pictures [f].    

 

 

III.

I like Salle's contention that: "A spirit of childish refusal runs through the center of the avant-garde impulse [...] No I won't use color; I won't make beautiful things; I won't entertain." [30]

 

Such negativity, when freed from resentment, becomes a kind of active and affirmative nihilism, and will always have a good deal of appeal not to those who subscribe to a utopian vision, as Salle suggests, but - on the contrary - to those who reject such idealism and realise that we are not locked into an established narrative, possessing as we do not only the power to say No, but the option of neutral indifference (thereby baffling the paradigm) [g].  

 

 

IV.

 

"For where there is imagery, a story - implicit or explicit - is not far behind." [44]

 

That sounds like an idea worth discussing - and doubtless it is one that has, in fact, already been discussed at great length. For Salle, it simply means that art can be representational without having to apologise and not only point to things in the world but include personal elements too.

 

The romantic in me would tend to agree; but the classical aspect of my nature makes me slightly wary of where this leads us; a touch of human warmth is one thing, but I do not want art that it is Allzumenschliches ...

 

 

V.

 

Salle contrasts talent and imagination: "Imagination fuels talent and funnels into it, but on its own lacks body" [57]. Talent is the ability to actually do something; it's not merely the possession of knowledge.

 

I suppose it's good if an artist has both - as well as the ability to combine them - although, if I had to choose, then I'd sooner have imagination than talent which, today, thanks to Simon Cowell, is today "easily confused with [...] a desire for attention" [57].

 

For Salle, Dana Schutz is an artist who has both - as well as a slightly perverse sense of humour. I'm not going to argue with that, but would just point out that she's not the first artist to paint people sneezing, yawning, or vomiting. 

 

For example, back in 1928 D. H. Lawrence produced an interesting watercolour entitled Yawning (although, admittedly, the central male and female figures appear to be stretching rather than yawning); the same year that he also produced Dandelions which showed a man pissing [h]. 

 

Both works illustrate how the body is always looking to exert itself and escape the overcoding of the organism and how simple acts, such as yawning, might be conceived as expressive of the intensive forces of bodily sensation. 

 

Whether there is as much fancy (to use Salle's word) in Lawrence's work as Schutz's, I suspect not.

 

 

VI.

 

Just as there still some idiots insisting punk's not dead, so there are those who pretend that pop art is just as vital now as it was back in the Swinging Sixties (a time that most weren't even there to witness). 

 

Salle is not afraid to disillusion such people; "those days aren't here anymore [...] and all the record auction prices paid in the world aren't going to bring them back" [71].  

 

Pop, like punk, is over and it's images must be erased because no longer true for us today. The liberation that it promised has come to be seen for what it is; "an emptying-out process of jumped-up consumer stimulation that left you with very little in the way of tangible values" [68].   

 

Worse: 

 

"By the '70s pop art started to look like an embrace of this new consumer-driven social order; it felt a touch corrupt and compromised, and integrated a little too easily into the middle-high strata of public taste." [68]

 

(This seems to be a pop - no pun intended - at Warhol, rather than at Salle's much admired pal Roy Lichtenstein.) 

 

 

VII.

 

I have to confess: most of the contemporary artists that Salle refers to are not names with which I'm familiar: Alex Katz, Amy Sillman, Christopher Wool, Robert Gober, et al. Indeed, one of the pleasures of reading this book is learning about previously unknown figures and discovering their works. 

 

Of course, there are a few names I do recognise: Jeff Koons, for example; an artist I've discussed (and often defended) in several posts on Torpedo the Ark over the years [i]. And so I was particularly interested to see what he says about the man who has "done more than anyone else to make middle-class American happiness a legitimate subject, as well as the guiding aesthetic principle of his art" [75].  

 

Salle has known Koons since 1979 and clearly admired him from the off:

 

"You could sense the hidden depths: his deep love for and identifcation with art, high art, which is, I think, the source of much that is good in his work. It's the reason he is better than those who would try to be like him. Art is everything to Koons; he has internalised its essence [...] and his art is a combination of all the great things he has ever seen." [75]

 

Putting aside the fact that art has no essence, that's a rather lovely thing to say (I wish my friends were as generous in their praise). 

 

For Salle, major artists are often "a combination of unlikely pairings" [76] and Koons's art "represents the conflation of the readymade with the dream of surrealism" [76]; which is a clever way of saying that Koons has more in common with Duchamp and Dalí than he does with Warhol (despite what most critics think) [j]. 

 

And yet, Salle says Koons is perhaps unique among artists of his acquaintance for rarely speaking about his art in a technical manner; "he uses a civic - rather than an aesthetics or even a critical - language [...] it's all about what it does for the people who look at it" [79]. 

 

Koons wants his audience to feel good about themselves; giving them something they can not only identify with but be proud of. Usually, that would be enough to make me hate any artist, but, for some reason, I've always liked him. Perhaps it's because he also "makes the thingyness of modern life, that is, the way we bond and identify with products-as-images, coherent; he takes the iconic or mythic and makes it local" [82-83]. 

 

Some people might dismiss this as only a minor achievment, but for me, it's an act of magic or alchemy, which Salle labels the poetry of transference. 

 

Like Salle, I also spent time in Bilbao and, as a floraphile, I was equally delighted to see Koons's Puppy standing in front of the Guggenheim: "I was so grateful for its being there; it was such a gift. I never tired of seeing it; I was just happy it existed." [83]       

   

Jeff Koons: Puppy (1992) 

Stainless steel, soil, and flowering plants 

(1240 x 1240 x 820 cm)

guggenheim-bilbao.eus

 

 

Notes

[a] Written by jazz musicians Sy Oliver and Trummy Young back in the day, it was first recorded in 1939 with Ella Fitzgerald on vocals and backed by Chick Webb and his orchestra: click here.

      The Fun Boy Three version with Bananarama was released as a single in January 1982 on Chrysalis Records and reached number 4 in the UK charts. It also appeared on FB3's eponymous debut album released in March of '82. Given a ska/new wave interpretation, it's catchy - if a bit irritating after a while (as most catchy songs are): click here to play.    

 

[b] David Salle, How to See (W. W. Norton, 2018), p. 15. Future page references to this work will be given directly in the post.

[c] Nietzsche, The Gay Science (1887), Preface, 4. 

 

[d] D. H. Lawrence, 'Making Pictures', in Late Essays and Articles, ed. James T. Boulton (Cambridge University Press, 2004), p. 228. 

 

[e] I very much like this idea; later, when discussing the work of the German artist Sigmar Polke, Salle speaks of the "deep pleasure that comes with seeing the familiar [- such as a pair of socks -] as something irrationally strange" [38].

 

[f] See D. H. Lawrence, 'Introduction to These Paintings', in Late Essays and Articles ... p. 205.

 

[g] For a post on the importance of saying No, click here. For a post in gentle praise of the Neutral, click here. 

[h] See D. H. Lawrence's Paintings, ed. with an Introduction by Keith Sagar (Chaucer Press, 2003), pp. 155 and 81. Yawning was one of the pictures seized in the police raid at the Warren Gallery in July 1929.   

[i] See for example the post entitled 'In Defence of Jeff Koons's Easyfun-Ethereal' (16 Feb 2022): click here. Readers who want to read other posts about Koons, or which refer to his work, should go to labels and click on his name (alternatively, they can just click here). 

[j] That's not to deny the importance and influence of Warhol and Koons is, says Salle, the only artist of his generation to be unfazed by Warhol's legacy and to have "the steely determination [...] to take life on Andy's terms" [78]. 

 

To read part 2 of this post, click here. 

 

To read part 3 of this post, click here.

 

And for an earlier post in which I discuss the Introduction to David Salle's How to See (2016), click here.