The Top 100 (Remixed)

The Top 100 (Remixed) is a forthcoming exhibition at Tempus Projects in Tampa, Florida from August 4 until September 21, 2017. The exhibition, curated by Jade Dellinger, will feature hundreds of works from my Top 100 Archive. Jade and myself have spent many hours selecting and organizing works found in my studio for inclusion in the exhibit. It was fun to open box after box of old top 100 material and many half forgotten works surfaced in the process. Just yesterday I found in a bow with miscellaneous stuff this lovely portrait of Billy Karren. 

 Billy Karren
6 x 6 inches, oil on wood, c. 2005.

The interesting thing about this portrait is that I didn't know at the time that Billy Karren is a man, not a woman. I thought then that Bikini Kill was an all-girl band and that I was painting one of them. The Top 100 Remixed exhibit will be organized following thematic and topical top 10 lists. I selected this portrait for the Riot Grrrl top 10. Huggy Bear, another favorite Riot Grrrl band, also consists of men and women, so Billy is not the only guy represented in the Riot Grrrl top 10. About gender: The portrait paintings in the exhibit are about equal, where in the early days I painted more men, the last decade has seen more portraits of female musicians. The one top 10 that is strictly male: Men with beards. The portrait of Roky Erickson that I've just completed (see previous post) is part of this select group of outlaws and freaks (David Allan Coe is represented with a big painting here.)

Rebel Girls

Tobi Vail (Bikini Kill)
24" x 16", oil on canvas paper, 2014

The first painting class in the new season at the Alliance for the Arts I named A Means to Meaning. Usually I introduce the class with a slide lecture, and for the occasion I had prepared a talk in which I would introduce the theme of meaning through the topic of punk rock. The second second class then I brought with me a selection of my punk rock records, and especially those that come with the customary artwork insert. I brought with me all my Bikini Kill records along with the Dead Kennedys, Huggy Bear, and some others. Included was Bikini Kill's album Pussy Whipped (which features Rebel Girl) as well the single version of Rebel Girl on which Joan Jett makes a guest appearance. The previous class had the (Bikini Kill's) artwork for the song embedded in the presentation, and I was actually flabbergasted to find precisely that image (but in the color red) tucked in to the 45 single. Rebel Girl is a sort of anthem of the Riot Grrrl movement and the song yet again made my list of 100 this year. Most paintings I've done for Bikini Kill songs featured a portrait of Kathleen Hanna, but this time I chose (drummer and sometimes singer) Tobi Vail. I had just watched the documentary movie Her Noise (a nice anagram of the word "heroines") about punk rock music and art made by women. Tobi Vail's current band The Spider and the Webs make an appearance in that movie. See for yourself: http://ubu.com/film/her_noise.html

Bikini Kill, Rebel Girl

Kathleen Hanna

Kathleen Hanna
24" x 12"
oil on luan, 2013

I can't remember the precise circumstances but Kathleen Hanna appeared in a dream I had on New Year's. The only other time that I remember a musician appearing in a dream was about twenty years ago when the Belgian-French composer Cesar Franck took me for a ride on a moped. All I remember about the Hanna dream was that it was situated at a party and she offered me something to eat, but I grabbed a beer instead. Kathleen Hanna came to the forefront in my 2012 music year several times. She was an outspoken supporter of the Russian group Pussy Riot in their controversial trial versus the state, and lauded their music in the process. Earlier in the year I had watched a La Tigre documentary film and earlier yet I brought the CD The Singles by Bikini Kill with me on a long drive traversing the country. I don't play that CD too often anymore but on the rare occasions that I do I play it loud and enjoy every second of it. New Radio, a single from 1993, produced by Joan Jett, was the song that stood out most on the occasion. It was in the top 100 before but that was 12 years ago. Tobi Vail, Billy Karen, and Kathy Wilcox, were besides Hanna the other musicians on this recording. Bikini Kill was a pioneer of the riot grrrl movement. The band is from from Olympia, Washington, where they formed in 1990.

The 100 Greatest Recordings Ever: #69, Bikini Kill