Et Alors? Magazine 4
Et Alors? Magazine is an ongoing research project, focused on documenting contemporary queer art and LGBT creativity, solely written and designed by Fleur Pierets & Julian P. Boom. Married and female. By using the conventional magazine format as a creative platform to publish in-depth interviews and positive portraits on musicians, visual artists, writers and performers, they challenge and expand the mainstream understandings on the specific niche of queer art. The project both highlights contemporary artists and the many creative individuals who have put their unique stamp on art history. Et Alors? Magazine is a time document that continually captures the zeitgeist of a changing world, supporting the creation, the research and the development of projects that explore diversity, gender, feminism and queer topics on an optimistic, cultural, artistic and intellectual level.
Et Alors? Magazine is an ongoing research project, focused on documenting contemporary queer art and LGBT creativity, solely written and designed by Fleur Pierets & Julian P. Boom. Married and female. By using the conventional magazine format as a creative platform to publish in-depth interviews and positive portraits on musicians, visual artists, writers and performers, they challenge and expand the mainstream understandings on the specific niche of queer art. The project both highlights contemporary artists and the many creative individuals who have put their unique stamp on art history. Et Alors? Magazine is a time document that continually captures the zeitgeist of a changing world, supporting the creation, the research and the development of projects that explore diversity, gender, feminism and queer topics on an optimistic, cultural, artistic and intellectual level.
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ET ALORS?<br />
A F L A M B O Y A N T M A G A Z I N E<br />
EUR9,95€ - UK7,65£ - USA12,25$
editorial 04<br />
Darlings!<br />
Let me tell you, making <strong>Et</strong> <strong>Alors</strong>? <strong>Magazine</strong> is one of the best things to<br />
do in the world. In times when headlines about crisis, bankruptcy and<br />
the slow but irreversible death of print media scare the hell out of most<br />
people, we decided to stay positive. Why? Because as long as there are<br />
reasons to celebrate, we’ll keep on popping the bottles. And what’s not<br />
to celebrate when we created a brand new issue?<br />
2012 continued to unfold as a year in which everybody had to take a<br />
good look at themselves. Countless shifts in our economical landscape<br />
made us check out the Where, What and How factor of our- what turned<br />
out to be so called - careers. Nevertheless, it also looks like a time when<br />
creativity is everywhere, transformations are swiftly made and there is<br />
no time whatsoever to counterfeit your ambitions.<br />
Consequently this issue is about change and opportunities. Femaleto-male<br />
transsexual Buck Angel who’s an advocate, educator, lecturer<br />
and writer. Pierre Garroudi who chose for flash mobs instead of runway<br />
shows. Female director Erika Lust who changes the face of porn. And<br />
ultimate proof of our tenacious addiction to all things upbeat and<br />
optimistic: Paul Hartfleet, the artist who’s planting pansies on spots<br />
where he’s been assaulted for being gay, turning the whole experience<br />
into pure positivity.<br />
Yet there is one thing that hasn’t changed over the last year. And that’s<br />
our basic principle to feature topics that contribute to raise awareness<br />
about the wonderful diversity of life. Hope instead of negativity. Open<br />
heartedness instead of alienation. A place where there is no room for<br />
cynicism but with enough space for sheer beauty.<br />
So let’s feast, celebrate and toast to issue 4, now online so available to<br />
all of you around the globe. Because that’s the change we wanted to<br />
make.<br />
Wishing you tons of luck, creativity, beauty and happiness in 2013.<br />
It’s going to be great. Let me tell you.<br />
Keep Safe, Stay Gorgeous<br />
Love,<br />
Fleur & Julian<br />
ET ALORS? 003
EDITOR IN CHIEF FLEUR PIERETS<br />
ART DIRECTOR JULIAN P. BOOM<br />
COVER<br />
Concept & DESIGN LMDP MEDIA GROUP<br />
PHOTO & RETOUCHE ELLIE VDB AT IC-UC MODEL judith van dongen<br />
make up judith van dongen for ELLIS FAAS hair dyan van<br />
staveren for kevin murphy<br />
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS<br />
AKIM A.J. WILLEMS FIONA J. ROBERTSON FLEUR PIERETS LEONOOR<br />
ZWARTEVOOGHEL nikki heartache SUSAN MACDONALD YOANN QU<br />
E VEN-LAMAND E<br />
CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS<br />
CAMILLA STORGAARD DARREN BRADE jULIAN P. BOOM MALC STONE<br />
PAUL HARFLEET STEPHANE ROY<br />
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EDITOR IN CHIEF FLEUR PIERETS<br />
WEB DESIGN and layout JULIAN P. BOOM<br />
WEB DEVELOPER JIM CABUS JULIAN P. BOOM<br />
ET ALORS? MAGAZINE IS PUBLISHED BY<br />
LMDP MEDIA GROUP BVBA<br />
2012 - ISSN 2034-5429<br />
T +32 (0) 477881752<br />
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ET ALORS? IS A REGISTERED TRADEMARK. ALL OF THE ET ALORS?<br />
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004 ET ALORS?
table of contents<br />
EDITORIAL 003<br />
the pansy project 009<br />
erika lust 014<br />
crochet dark and decadent 018<br />
the shop around the corner 027<br />
the dreamscapes of edward d. wood jr. 037<br />
short story - the victim 045<br />
paul buijs 051<br />
column by nikki heartache 058<br />
buck angel 061<br />
pierre garroudi 066<br />
stephane roy 087<br />
camilla storgaard 099<br />
kobi levi 106<br />
dr.a.g. 107<br />
cabinet curieux 108<br />
short story - as passionate as eventually 108<br />
Websites 118<br />
SPECIAL THANKS TO<br />
MARIEKE OSSENDRIJVER FOR ETERNAL POSITIVE THOUGHTS AND B&B ARRANGEMENTS IN THE MANSION RENATE<br />
BREUER GREAT TALKS, GREAT WRITING, LOTS OF FUN, BIG TIME GIRLFRIEND INGRID VAN DEN BOSSCHE FOR BELIEVING<br />
AND CREATING THE OPPORTUNITY TO HAVE BIG DREAMS BART VANDERBIESEN GEOFFREY DE BEER OUR WELL DRESSED,<br />
GORGEOUS MIAMI, BILBAO AND ANTWERP CORRESPONDENTS. BIG LOVE martine coene love, friendship and don’t<br />
forget: you can beat gravity! JUDITH VAN DONGEN SO HAPPY SHE SAID YES WHEN WE ASKED HER TO BE ON THE<br />
COVER AKIM A.J. WILLEMS FOURTH COLLABORATION IN A ROW AND VERY HAPPY ABOUT THAT. LOVE YOUR STYLE ELLIE<br />
VDB LOOKING FORWARD TO THE COVER EXPO! FIONA J. ROBERTSON HOPE THE TRANSLATION OF AKIM’S STORY DIDN’T<br />
COST YOU YOUR NIGHT’S SLEEP. THANKS GIRL ALL THOSE WONDERFUL PEOPLE OUT THERE – YES WE ARE TALKING TO<br />
YOU! – WHO ARE ON THE VERGE OF READING THIS ISSUE. LAST BUT NOT LEAST A BILLION KISSES TOWARDS THE GREAT<br />
WRITERS, PHOTOGRAPHERS, STYLISTS, MAKE UP ARTISTS, MODELS AND FRIENDS WHO MADE OUR 4TH POSSIBLE!<br />
ET ALORS? 005
The Pansy Project<br />
PHOTO MALC STONE PANSY PHOTOS PAUL HARFLEET
‘The Pansy Project’ is an on-going initiative<br />
and artwork devised by Paul Harfleet in 2005.<br />
He revisits locations where homophobia<br />
was experienced and plants self seeding<br />
pansies to mark the spot. They act as a<br />
living memorial to the abuse and operate as<br />
an antidote to it. After they are individually<br />
planted, the pansy’s location is photographed<br />
and named after the abuse received.<br />
The Pansy Project has had many incarnations; from small<br />
scale unmarked individual plantings to free pansy ‘Hand<br />
Outs’ where the artist speaks to passers-by about the project.<br />
Additionally, installations of thousands of plants at the site<br />
of homophobia and exhibitions of the photographs the artist<br />
has made over the last seven years. The Pansy Project has<br />
garnered a worldwide following and has featured in various<br />
festivals and exhibitions internationally from New York to<br />
London.<br />
How it all began.<br />
A string of homophobic abuse on a warm summer’s day<br />
was the catalyst for this project. Two builders shouting “It’s<br />
about time we went gay bashing again, isn’t it?” is how that<br />
day began. It continued with a gang of guys throwing abuse<br />
and stones at the artist and his then boyfriend, to end with a<br />
bizarre and unsettling confrontation with a man who called<br />
them ‘ladies’ under his breath.<br />
Over the years Harfleet became accustomed to this kind<br />
of behavior, but later realised it was a shocking concept to<br />
most of his friends and colleagues. It was in this context that<br />
Harfleet began to ponder the nature of these verbal attacks<br />
and their influence on his life. Realizing that he felt differently<br />
about these experiences depending on his mental state, he<br />
decided to explore the way he was made to feel at the location<br />
where these incidents occurred. What interested Harfleet<br />
was the way that the locations later acted as a prompt for<br />
exploration of the memories associated with that place.<br />
In order to feel differently about the location and the<br />
memories it summoned, the artist wanted to manipulate<br />
these associations somehow. Planting unmarked pansies<br />
as close as possible to where the verbal homophobic abuse<br />
had occurred became his strategy. He would entitle the<br />
photograph after the abuse and post an image of the pansy<br />
alongside the quoted abuse online.<br />
A positive action versus a negative incident.<br />
Harfleet did not feel it would be appropriate to equate his<br />
own personal experience of verbal homophobic abuse with a<br />
death or fatal accident; he felt that planting a small unmarked<br />
living plant at the site would correspond with the nature of the<br />
abuse. A plant continues to grow through experience, as the<br />
protagonist does. Sowing a live plant felt like a positive action,<br />
it was a comment on the abuse and a potential ‘remedy’. He<br />
was interested in the public nature of these incidents and the<br />
way one was forced into reacting publicly to a crime that often<br />
occurred during the day and in full view of passers-by. He had<br />
observed that the tendency to place flowers at the scene<br />
of a crime or accident had become an accepted ritual and<br />
considered a similar response. Floral tributes subtly augment<br />
the reading of a space that encourages a passer-by to ponder<br />
past events generally understood as a crime or accident. The<br />
ET ALORS? 009
artist’s particular intervention could encourage a passer-by to<br />
query the reason for his own ritualistic action.<br />
Very quiet yet extremely visible.<br />
Without civic permission to plant one unmarked pansy to<br />
mark his own and latterly other’s experiences of homophobia,<br />
Harfleet continued as The Pansy Project developed.<br />
As growing numbers of pansies were planted with titles<br />
such as “Let’s kill the Batty-Man!” and “Fucking Faggot!” a<br />
particular view of gay experience which often goes unreported<br />
to authorities became apparent. When verbal homophobic<br />
abuse is experienced the assailant forces the unwilling<br />
participant to assimilate and respond to this public verbal<br />
attack; ignore or retaliate? The Pansy Project acts as a formula<br />
which prevents the ‘victim’ from internalizing the incident.<br />
The strategy becomes a conceptual shield; a behavior that<br />
enables the experience to be processed via the public domain,<br />
in this case the location where the incident occurred and,<br />
latterly, the website which collates and presents the incidents<br />
and operates as a virtual location of quiet resistance.<br />
Pansy.<br />
Which plant to use was of course vitally important and the<br />
pansy instantly seemed perfect. The name of the flower<br />
originates from the French verb Penser (to think), as the<br />
bowing head of the flower was seen to visually echo a<br />
person in deep thought, hence its Victorian association with<br />
effeminate or gay men. The subtle and elegiac quality of the<br />
flower was ideal for The Pansy Project’s requirements. The<br />
action of planting reinforced these qualities, as kneeling in<br />
the street and digging in the often neglected hedgerows felt<br />
like a sorrowful act. The bowing heads of the flowers became<br />
mournful symbols of indignant acceptance.<br />
How it evolved.<br />
What was originally an autobiographical work has become<br />
a project that has been somewhat embraced by the gay<br />
community who see the project as a strategy that explores a<br />
shared experience. Many statistics reveal that large numbers<br />
of the LGBT community have at some time experienced<br />
varying levels of homophobic abuse.<br />
In association with festivals, Harfleet also regularly hosts<br />
events where pansies are often handed out to the general<br />
public. At these events the pansies are donated to the public<br />
in exchange for hearing about the project. This subtle ‘gift’<br />
presents itself as ‘Free Pansies’ with no catch.<br />
However the people receiving the flower take the story of The<br />
Pansy Project with them, enabling it to be communicated to a<br />
much wider, non-specific, audience.<br />
The various on-line presences of The Pansy Project, such as<br />
blog, website, Twitter and Facebook profiles, enable the<br />
images of these - mostly ephemeral - acts to be bundled and<br />
presented to a wide on-line audience who are then vicariously<br />
able to explore and engage with the nature of this artwork and<br />
the incidents it documents. The juxtaposition of the images<br />
of delicate flowers placed in urban settings with offensive<br />
and hurtful abuse creates a complex yet anecdotal anthology<br />
of homophobic abuse as experienced by a gay population.<br />
The humbly planted pansy becomes a record; a trace of this<br />
public occurrence which is deeply personal and concurrently<br />
accessible to the public on the street and on-line.<br />
After seven years of The Pansy Project Paul Harfleet has<br />
planted over ten thousand pansies: Sometimes sowing two<br />
thousand at a time as he did for ‘Memorial to the Un-Named’<br />
at the Homotopia Festival in Liverpool, 2008.<br />
Four thousand were planted in the Gold Medal winning<br />
‘Conceptual Garden’ at the RHS Hampton Court Palace Flower<br />
Show, 2010, and he continues to seek out locations and plant<br />
individual flowers such as the one he recently placed at the<br />
British Embassy in Istanbul. Often unsanctioned - though<br />
frequently in association with festivals, organizations and even<br />
police forces - Harfleet continues to intuit his way through<br />
The Pansy Project. In 2011 he collaborated with London<br />
based jewelry making company Tatty Devine; together they<br />
created a small wooden pin. A hand painted pansy, adorned<br />
with “Fucking Faggot”, is a subtle embodiment of The Pansy<br />
Project so far.<br />
In September 2012 The Pansy Project featured at the<br />
Steirischer Herbst festival in Graz; ‘Truth is Concrete’ was a<br />
24/7 marathon camp attended by over a hundred international<br />
artists where Paul planted pansies of historical significance<br />
around Graz and spoke about his work alongside Richard<br />
Reynolds of ‘On Guerrilla Gardening’; a publication that charts<br />
the evolution of guerrilla gardening and features The Pansy<br />
Project.<br />
The image exclusively included here is taken by Malc Stone<br />
and will be the cover image of The Pansy Project publication<br />
Paul Harfleet is currently working on. For more information<br />
and background visit:<br />
www.thepansyproject.com<br />
ET ALORS? 011
In conversation with<br />
ERIKA LUST<br />
ET ALORS? 013
Someone once told her that she must be the cutest porn<br />
director he ever met. She thought that was a good thing,<br />
because most people still think you have to be a freak to<br />
make this kind of movies. We’re in Barcelona, in a huge loft.<br />
During lunchtime we talk to the woman on top of Lust –<br />
productions. “I’m so normal it almost becomes controversial.”<br />
In conversation with Erika Lust.<br />
INTERVIEW FLEUR PIERETS PHOTOS JULIAN P. BOOM<br />
We’re sitting amongst camera’s, a bed and a woman<br />
performing with all kinds of toys. What are you doing?<br />
It’s quite a premiere you’re witnessing here. We are selling<br />
all different kinds of sex toys on our website but no one<br />
ever thought about the idea of showing all the different<br />
ways to use them. It’s strange when you start to think of it;<br />
all those toys, all those producers and not a single explicit<br />
educational movie on what you can do with it.<br />
How did a sweet looking girl like you…?<br />
It’s a long story so let’s try to make it a little short. I studied<br />
political science at the university in Sweden and during<br />
the summer I came to Barcelona to study Spanish. In 2000<br />
I met my husband Pablo and decided to stay.<br />
It was almost impossible to get a job in political science<br />
because of the Catalan politics in Barcelona so I was<br />
looking for extra jobs. I had a friend who worked in the<br />
audiovisual sector; movies, television and advertising and I<br />
started doing the most basic jobs. I was driving actors from<br />
the airport, making coffee, you know the drill. Little by<br />
little I got better opportunities so I started as a production<br />
assistant, then a location manager and afterwards as a<br />
production manager. During this process I learned how<br />
to make movies. Film has always been my passion so it<br />
was quite natural that I started to take evening courses in<br />
directing actors, film technics and camerawork.<br />
And then….then I had the chance to make a short movie.<br />
During that process I came back to the idea I had many<br />
years ago in university. Ideas about pornography with<br />
the main question being: “Would it be possible to make a<br />
movie that was exciting but still had all my values?”. When<br />
I looked at porn I always found it physically intriguing<br />
because my body responded but my brain didn’t like it.<br />
I was quite mixed up because of this huge discrepancy<br />
between my body and my brain so I wanted to find a way<br />
to make this kind of movie but without losing my esthetics.<br />
So what’s the big difference between male and female<br />
porn?<br />
Male producers and directors are all alike. They’re<br />
mostly middle-aged straight white guys with a taste<br />
in big-breasted blonde airheads. It stands to reason<br />
that a homogeneous group is going to create a<br />
homogeneous product and that makes those movies<br />
very indistinguishable. Women care more about the story<br />
014 ET ALORS?
that is being told. And also “who” is telling the story? In<br />
this case it’s me as a woman, as a feminist, as a mother,<br />
as an entrepreneur. For decades men had a monopoly on<br />
defining what porn is and in this world of ours, whatever is<br />
male-oriented becomes the standard. So it’s time to stand<br />
up because it’s not healthy that the only people making<br />
pornography are men. Well, at least 99% of it.<br />
And why is that?<br />
It has to do with many things. Men had an easier time to<br />
take pleasure in sexuality. Ours has always been closely<br />
tied to reproduction. And not only that, mind you that<br />
even today there are cultures that are still using barbaric<br />
practices like clitoridectomy to nip female sexual desire<br />
in the bud. There’s also the structure of society; men go<br />
to work, make money, they explore different things. They<br />
got into audiovisuals long before women did. When you<br />
look at our female history, it’s not so many years ago since<br />
we got the right to vote or started to earn our own money.<br />
And isn’t that initially the base of independence? If you<br />
don’t earn your own money you can’t take a decision,<br />
that’s the way it is. There’s been a huge development<br />
regarding female sexuality since we started caring for our<br />
own pleasure and not only for anybody else’s. And also –<br />
and that’s a very important evolution - we are starting to<br />
become consumers of things that have to do with sex.<br />
And when did all this change?<br />
It started in the 60’s and the 70’s with the sexual revolution<br />
and the liberty to take the pill. But when we are talking<br />
about pornography, it’s quite recent. The first woman who<br />
started to make this kind of films is Candida Royalle and<br />
she started in ‘83 – ‘84. After her there came more and<br />
more female directors but still very very little. Maybe we<br />
can count 10 at the most. Yet we live in a world where there<br />
are thousands and thousands of male pornographers.<br />
Why? Are women afraid to do so?<br />
I think we are a little afraid in one way because it is difficult<br />
to stand in society and say: “Hey! I make porn.” You have<br />
to stand up against people attacking you from different<br />
corners; from feminists to pornographers to Catholics.<br />
So many different groups who don’t want us, women, to<br />
get involved in that kind of business. But this is where I<br />
“Male directors<br />
are all alike. They’re mostly<br />
middle-aged white guys with<br />
a taste in big-breasted<br />
airheads.”<br />
stand up and say that it’s really important. You have<br />
to look at pornography as a discourse. It’s a discourse<br />
about sexuality, femininity, masculinity and women don’t<br />
participate in that debate because we don’t have anything<br />
to say. It’s like we don’t have a voice. So I want us - not<br />
only me - but women in general to get into this industry,<br />
taking power and starting to make our own movies.<br />
Telling the stories we want to be told. We have to express<br />
our own sexuality and the only way of doing this, is that<br />
a lot of women get into the pool. We have to become a<br />
critical mass to be able to change things. In politics we are<br />
talking about the 30% rule, meaning that when women<br />
are starting to take part of the governments and the<br />
parliaments, we have to be 30% of the group. That is when<br />
you’re starting to have some power, when your voices will<br />
be heard. So let’s work on that quota because otherwise,<br />
nothing is going to happen.<br />
But you are pretty busy trying to change things.<br />
I have to. Because I believe we can benefit from watching<br />
sexually explicit films. We’re very liberated these days and<br />
porn can help us spice up our fantasies and discover tastes<br />
we never even knew we had. Porn in and of itself is not<br />
a bad thing and believe me if I say that our tastes are as<br />
varied as men’s are. So hold the flowers and fireplaces, the<br />
candles and novels by Danielle Steele. We want sexually<br />
explicit images, but we want to call the shots when it<br />
comes to how they’re made.<br />
ET ALORS? 017
In your book ‘A woman’s guide to good porn’ you have<br />
a chapter called ‘Indephony, predictable porn made by<br />
men’. I really laughed out loud reading Nr. 7: Beautiful<br />
young women just love to have good sex with fat ugly<br />
middle-aged men. Nr. 13: Asian men do not exist and<br />
Nr. 22: When a woman is sucking a man’s cock, it’s<br />
important for him to give her constant reminders about<br />
what to do: “Oh, yeah-suck it!”. Isn’t that too much of<br />
a cliché?<br />
I don’t think it is. Young people learn about sexuality from<br />
porn. And there we have a problem. I don’t want Rocco<br />
Siffredi telling my girls how to have sex. I don’t want him<br />
involved in this. I want to have the chance to tell my vision<br />
on sexuality. And that doesn’t happen when we don’t<br />
participate. Then we will end up with all these porn studs,<br />
these macho porn guys, telling our children how to have<br />
sex. I want them to take away positive messages about<br />
sexuality. With feminist values and discourses. But don’t<br />
get me wrong, it’s not that I want to impose some kind<br />
of censorship, I just want diversity and the freedom to<br />
choose what suits you.<br />
The problem regarding young children is that the school<br />
education on sexuality is very bad or non-existent. In<br />
some countries it’s even called family planning. And what<br />
happens when education doesn’t take their responsibility<br />
and when still too many parents are afraid to speak to<br />
their kids about it? Then kids look at free porn on the<br />
internet. And what do they learn? An Italian macho fucks<br />
10 Bulgarian girls in the butt and that’s normal. When<br />
you, as an adult, watch this movie, you will have some<br />
references. So if you want to see this kind of porn, please<br />
do and I hope you enjoy it. But children at that age are not<br />
so developed that they can think critically. I think it’s very<br />
important to inform and to teach young people how to be<br />
critical because it’s not only about porn, it’s also about the<br />
models, being really really slim, it’s about television series<br />
where we most of the time see men as main characters.<br />
We have to be critical towards fashion, photography,<br />
because all of it is fake. My point of view might sound<br />
quite heavy but it’s true and it’s important that we start to<br />
speak about this.<br />
Your message is very clear, but why use porn as your<br />
outlet?<br />
Because I love film and I have a base to stand on.<br />
018 ET ALORS?
I’m not only doing this because the fun or for the money<br />
but because I want to see good movie. And that’s another<br />
part of it, the esthetics. I find most porn very ugly. And<br />
because I like film and I like beautiful things, I want to<br />
see a beautiful movie that is well developed, a story that<br />
is interesting, characters I can identify with. I don’t want<br />
them to be stereotypes like the nightclub singer and the<br />
stripper, the babysitters and the desperate housewife.<br />
I’m not interested in seeing that kind of women. Neither<br />
am I interested in the mafia guy or the pizza delivery boy.<br />
Those stereotypes really set my nerves on edge.<br />
You’re not working with actors?<br />
I want normal people to be in my movies so I try to use<br />
the less “pornified” looks that I can find. Making an adult<br />
movie is not very different than making regular cinema.<br />
The main thing with the actors, when they are professional<br />
adult performers, is to erase their porn attitude, and make<br />
them act and feel naturally. It’s not an impossible mission,<br />
it can be done if you treat them with respect and you<br />
teach them to relax and forget those strange positions<br />
and the athletic sex they do for a living. Nevertheless, I<br />
keep looking for the non-transformed bodies. For people<br />
who look good and feel fresh and natural.<br />
Lately I’ve been very lucky because as my name is kind<br />
of growing, people are coming to me. I don’t have to find<br />
them, they find me. All those people who were never<br />
involved in the adult filmmaking suddenly want to be in my<br />
movies. And that’s wonderful, but I also realize this comes<br />
with big responsibilities because those people are really<br />
having sex and they show every inch of their body in front<br />
of the camera. For me it’s very important to get to know<br />
the actors. Who are they, what do they like, why do they<br />
do this? I don’t want someone doing a scene just because<br />
they are in an economic crisis and they don’t have any<br />
other way to earn money. Nor do I work with 18 year olds<br />
because they cannot fully understand the consequences<br />
of what they are doing. I want people to enjoy being in<br />
front of a camera. Who are sex positive because believe<br />
me, there are a lot of people out there who like doing this.<br />
020 ET ALORS?
Do you know your customers?<br />
Yes I do because we have the Lust cinema and the Lust<br />
store online. Therefor we can see who’s buying and I can<br />
tell you it’s more or less 50/50. 50% men and 50% women.<br />
I’m very happy I don’t exclude men from our audience<br />
because that was never my intention.<br />
Would you describe it as female porn, or femfriendly porn?<br />
It’s really difficult to find a good word. Sometimes I call<br />
it porn, sometimes I call it erotic movies but also Adult<br />
independent film. It depends a little on the circumstances.<br />
The problem with the word porn is that it’s very ugly. When<br />
you say it and you close your eyes, you see something.<br />
Something very specific because the norm on what<br />
pornography is, is rooted into our minds. Therefor you see<br />
something that has nothing to do with my movies. When I<br />
use the term porn, you probably see something ugly, most<br />
of the time aggressive and violent male dominant. When<br />
I’m watching the scenes I shot, I see passion, intimacy.<br />
Sometimes I wish I could wash the word pornography.<br />
Putting it in the washing machine and take it out all fresh<br />
and removed from any negativity because I want to use<br />
that word. What else should I call it? Contemporary porn<br />
maybe, yet I don’t really think I belong in Tate modern. So<br />
yes, I must admit I’m a little lost when it comes to put a<br />
word on what I’m doing.<br />
Are you a feminist?<br />
Yes I am, but all too often I realize that a lot of people don’t<br />
know what feminism is.<br />
We live in a world where men and women don’t have the<br />
same possibilities, rights and opportunities. A world in<br />
which women as a group have less power than a group of<br />
men. Being a feminist means acknowledging this situation<br />
and believing it should change. And the only way we can<br />
change something is when we can be specific about what<br />
the differences actually are.<br />
We are modern women in a modern society and yet we<br />
are not represented in the mainstream pornography, we<br />
are not there. So let’s start making our own porn movies<br />
because if we do, we can start choosing what we like most.<br />
How did you get so liberated?<br />
Well, I’m not. I’m still struggling but I think all of us are.<br />
I’m a very normal person and I don’t have this super strong<br />
sexuality going. I’m quite down to earth and vanilla. But<br />
it helps that I’m Swedish. I had the opportunity to grow<br />
up in a country that is very liberated when you compare it<br />
to others. Sweden was also one of the first countries who<br />
started school sex education in 1952. When I talk to people<br />
I realize I am very privileged on the subject matter.<br />
When I was 12 we had sexologists coming to our school<br />
and talking about not only the technical stuff but they<br />
also spoke about feelings and butterflies. The good part of<br />
sexuality was explained to us as a part of your health and<br />
happiness. This kind of approach changes things, it opens<br />
up your mind.<br />
Do you feel excepted?<br />
It goes in two different directions. The male porn industry<br />
has a very difficult time right now, accepting that<br />
suddenly there are young women deciding that they want<br />
something else. Bottom-line is that I think a lot of men are<br />
afraid of losing their jobs.<br />
Regarding my own kind I can feel that the feminist<br />
movement starts to accept the idea of women getting<br />
into this. In the beginning they were quite chocked but<br />
now it’s getting better. They are clever enough to see why<br />
this is important.<br />
And in your personal habitat?<br />
Yes I do feel accepted. And that’s because I’m not ashamed<br />
of what I’m doing. If you’re ashamed you will have a<br />
problem explaining it. People should be ashamed when<br />
they are doing bad things, stealing money or dealing<br />
drugs. Not because they are making adult movies. For<br />
example my mother is 70 but she accepts it, understands<br />
it. We’ve been speaking a lot about the message behind it.<br />
But of course she would have been a lot happier if I would<br />
have become a lawyer or a teacher. Because yes, this is a<br />
little more complicated to tell your friends. Nevertheless,<br />
everybody responds really well to what I am doing. I can<br />
see that people feel the same way, that there is a need<br />
for this new niche. Also the parents at my girls’ school<br />
are great about it, they love what I do and they certainly<br />
don’t say that there kids can’t come to my house because<br />
I’m a pornographer. Acceptance lies with you. People<br />
understand what you communicate.<br />
www.erikalust.com<br />
ET ALORS? 021
Crochet<br />
Dark & Decadent<br />
They say only grannies crochet but Diane Goldie gives it a whole new<br />
swing. Crochet Dark and Decadent is a place where she can indulge her<br />
passion for making all things delightfully creepy and darkly, deliciously<br />
decadent and beautiful. Being a painter but using her newly learned skill<br />
of crochet and injecting a good dose of healthy humor, she started to<br />
make her Diva Dollies after meeting performance artist extraordinaire<br />
Marnie Scarlett. Pushing boundaries of body image and performance<br />
art, Marnie was a real source of inspiration and instantly became<br />
Diane’s muse for the dollies. The very first Marnie doll was quite a hit<br />
in Marnie’s circle of many fans so she decided to create others as there<br />
were so many inspirational outfits and moods to recreate in dolly form:<br />
“I take special joy in making pretty raspberry nipples even if they won’t<br />
be seen immediately and I particularly enjoy making a pair or two of<br />
sparkly high heels should they be part of the creation. I find the joy is in<br />
detail, so my dollies have expressive hands and stand in jaunty poses.”<br />
Every dolly is unique, being handmade. The ‘dollies’ are all around 14<br />
inches ( 36cm) tall and feature carefully considered details. Amsterdam<br />
based toyshop ‘Heelgoed Speelgoed’ has a very limited range of 5 dolls<br />
that are currently available for purchase.<br />
www.facebook.com/CrochetDarkAndDecadent<br />
dianespuppetsproducts.wordpress.com<br />
ET ALORS? 023
The shop around<br />
the corner<br />
starring Margaret Sullavan & James Stewart - 1940<br />
The Editor’s Choice<br />
Dazzling presents to see you smoothly and<br />
sizzling through the Christmas holidays in four<br />
movie themes.
Affair in Trinidad<br />
starring Rita Hayworth & Glenn Ford<br />
1952<br />
The Suitcase Chair<br />
South African designer Katie Thompson aims to<br />
make the ordinary rather extraordinary.<br />
www.recreate.za.net<br />
026 ET ALORS?
Wall Montréal<br />
Orgy Scarf Grey<br />
French Letter<br />
Brick wall photo print on cushion. Made in<br />
Belgium. www.nottooarty.be<br />
Wearable luxury scarves, with a playful punk<br />
twist. www.age-of-reason-studios.com<br />
The first FairDeal condoms for courageous<br />
creatures who care about FairPlay.<br />
www.frenchlettercondoms.co.uk<br />
Leather Covered Binoculars<br />
La Femme Amoureuse<br />
The Love/Hate Model<br />
A stylish pair of binoculars for the gentleman or<br />
gentlewoman. www.hermes.com<br />
Embroidered canvas book-clutch, by Olympia<br />
Le-Tan. www.olympialetan.com<br />
Handmade gloves by Dutch artist Silvia B.<br />
www.skinover.biz
All that heaven<br />
allows<br />
starring Jane Wyman & Rock Hudson<br />
1955<br />
Mormon Missionary Positions<br />
Photographer Neil DaCosta’s sexual field guide for<br />
the Latter Day Saints.<br />
mormonmissionarypositions.com<br />
028 ET ALORS?
Afterglow<br />
Bombshell<br />
Champagne Marquis de Sade<br />
He or she will absolutely love this dark vanilla<br />
massage candle. www.jimmyjane.com<br />
Pin Ups Bombshell Orgasm Balm Mint.<br />
www.coco-de-mer.com<br />
Ideal for parties that start slowly and where you<br />
never know when they will finish.<br />
www.champagne-marquis-de-sade.com<br />
Designer Handcuffs<br />
Playful Mask<br />
Ina 2<br />
Classy leather handcuffs as bracelets by Louis<br />
Vuitton.<br />
www.louisvuitton.com<br />
Harnesses and masks in the sexually playful<br />
signature collection ‘Restraint’ by Fleet Ilya.<br />
www.fleetilya.com<br />
The new and improved version of LELO’s<br />
bestselling dual-action vibrator.<br />
www.lelo.com
La cage aux<br />
folles<br />
starring Ugo Tognazzi & Michel Serrault<br />
1978<br />
Furry Cheetah<br />
Furry Cheetah Designer Nail Wrap.<br />
www.nailrock.com<br />
030 ET ALORS?
Drag Queen Barbie<br />
That Bad Eartha<br />
Ponytail Wig<br />
Made to resemble her cross-dressing designer,<br />
Phillipe Blond. www.matel.com<br />
An 1954 studio album by Eartha Kitt, her debut<br />
12” vinyl album issued on the RCA Victor label.<br />
tuneuprecords.blogspot.be<br />
Paper wigs by Nikki Salk and Amy Flurry.<br />
www.paper-cut-project.com<br />
White Diamonds<br />
Under The Sea<br />
Viva Glam<br />
White Diamonds Perfume by Elizabeth Taylor for<br />
Women. www.elizabetharden.com<br />
London-based design firm Paperself has taken<br />
faux lashes to a whole new level.<br />
www.paperself.com<br />
M.A.C Cosmetics makes an effort for HIV/AIDS.<br />
www.maccosmetics.com
All the King’s<br />
men<br />
starring Broderick Crawford & John Ireland<br />
1949<br />
Mustache Cufflinks<br />
”Movember” is a moustache growing charity event<br />
that raises funds and awareness for mens health.<br />
www.movember.com<br />
032 ET ALORS?
Aravinda Rodenburg<br />
aussieBum<br />
Mount Gay Rum<br />
Suits created according to the client’s<br />
measurements & choices. Made in Belgium.<br />
www.acesoir.be/aravindarodenburg<br />
Australian men’s swimwear and underwear<br />
manufacturer. www.aussiebum.com<br />
The finest, oldest brand of rum in existence, has<br />
been produced in Barbados since 1703.<br />
www.mountgayrum.com<br />
Hiking Staff<br />
Tuscan Leather<br />
A Rebours – Huysmans<br />
Custom made hiking staff by Boris Palatnik.<br />
www.borispalatnik.com<br />
Highly refined and beautifully packaged Tuscan<br />
Leather Holiday Set. www.tomford.com<br />
Novel about Jean Des Esseintes, an aesthete who<br />
tries to retreat into his own creation.<br />
www.amazon.com
www.nonon.de
The<br />
Dreamscapes<br />
of Edward D. Wood Jr.<br />
TEXT SUSAN MACDONALD
Since the biopic ‘Ed Wood’<br />
starring Johnny Depp, the<br />
for nearly two decades<br />
forgotten eccentric of the<br />
1950s, Edward D. Wood Jr.<br />
enjoyed a success that quite<br />
escaped him in life. His<br />
technically inept, but oddly<br />
fascinating films are shown<br />
at midnight screenings in offbeat<br />
picture theatres around<br />
the world.<br />
This revival is largely due to his being presented to a new<br />
audience by Michael Medved’s 1981 book The Golden<br />
Turkey Awards, a volume which attempted to satirise the<br />
Academy awards by presenting nominations and awards<br />
for lack of quality. In a Ben Hur-like performance, Ed Wood<br />
won both the award for the worst director of all time and<br />
the award for the worst film of all time, which was given to<br />
his magnum opus, Plan 9 from Outer Space.<br />
Ed Wood had his own troupe of players: a bizarre entourage<br />
of friends which included the flamboyant newspaper and<br />
television seer Criswell, blond cowlick spit-stuck to his<br />
forehead, whose dramatic future predictions were nearly<br />
always wrong. (“I predict that in 1980 public executions<br />
will be shown on television, sponsored by your local gas<br />
company!”)<br />
Criswell (his full name was Jerome King Criswell ) lived his<br />
childhood at the rear of his father’s mortuary business,<br />
and for the rest of his life he preferred sleeping in satinlined<br />
coffins, because he found them so comfortable (as<br />
one Ed Wood acquaintance commented, “Where does Ed<br />
find them?”)<br />
Another famous member was the Gothic spider-woman<br />
Vampira (Maila Nurmi), whose raven-black hair, dark<br />
make-up, and bloodless pallor marked her as the heiress<br />
to a tradition going back to the early Victorian age,<br />
through the female vampires in Dracula, the silent film<br />
temptress Theda Bara, Morticia Addams of the New<br />
Yorker’s cartoons, and the villainesses of a thousand<br />
forgotten radio and Saturday matinee serials. Even<br />
Natasha, from the Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoon series, is<br />
a parody of this interesting genre and bears an especially<br />
striking resemblance to Vampira.<br />
In the early 1950s she was a late night horror film<br />
hostess in Los Angeles, with an enormous cult following<br />
throughout America, and her own sub-retinue of flunkies<br />
and minders. Just before his untimely death James Dean<br />
036 ET ALORS?
had been having a love affair with her. With the popularity<br />
of the Goth look in more recent times, Vampira was forty<br />
years ahead of her time.<br />
John Breckenridge (“Bunny”) was the scion of a wealthy<br />
European family. He was transsexual and dreamed of<br />
having a ‘Christine Jorgensen’ procedure to change his<br />
gender. For several years he was an acquaintance of Ed<br />
Wood’s but made one film appearance only, as the alien<br />
Ruler in Plan 9 from Outer Space. It is a performance of<br />
such outrageous and hilarious world-weary camp that one<br />
regrets he did not appear in more movies.<br />
There were others: Loretta King, who could not drink any<br />
liquids because she was “allergic to water”, the growling<br />
Swedish professional wrestler Tor Johnson, hack actors<br />
Paul Marco and Conrad Brooks (the latter is nicknamed by<br />
enthusiasts “the John Geilgud of bad movies”), and Bela<br />
Lugosi, who had starred in Dracula in 1931, but who was<br />
now forgotten, depressed, and a narcotics addict.<br />
Ed Wood gave Bela Lugosi something to live for again. The<br />
two became friends, and Bela was overjoyed to be making<br />
films once more, and with a much more interesting crew<br />
than he had ever known at the major studios.<br />
And there was another interesting sidelight to Ed Wood’s<br />
film career. He was a very public cross-dresser. This<br />
would be unusual today, but in the 1950s it was unique.<br />
There were female impersonators of course, but Ed was a<br />
genuine transvestite. He found women’s clothes and their<br />
soft fabrics sexually enticing, and extremely relaxing. If<br />
there was stress on the film set – and there often is – he<br />
would disappear, and return wearing a wig, a skirt, nylon<br />
stockings, and a fluffy sweater and beret knitted from<br />
angora, his favourite fibre.<br />
Of course the members of his outlandish menagerie were<br />
not put off by this at all. In order to raise money for his<br />
pictures however, Ed had to deal with the wider world<br />
too. He confronted a great deal of misunderstanding and<br />
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prejudice, and one of his films, Glen or Glenda (1953), is<br />
partly a documentary explained by a psychiatrist and<br />
overseen by a kind of Science God played by Bela Lugosi.<br />
It’s also partly a fictional story of courtship, with the<br />
purpose to help people understand and empathise with<br />
the phenomenon of cross-dressing.<br />
Ed Wood even played the lead role himself. He wanted<br />
there to be no doubt in the minds of the audience that the<br />
difficulties the hero encountered were based on personal<br />
experience. It was probably the most courageous film of<br />
the 1950s, and still remains the only main stream movie<br />
about genuine transvestism from any English-speaking<br />
country. As Ed Wood himself explained, “If you want to<br />
know me, see Glen or Glenda, that’s me, that’s my story.<br />
No question. But Plan 9 from Outer Space is my pride and<br />
joy.”<br />
But, for the business that hired Ed, Glen or Glenda was<br />
meant to be a sensationalist work of mild pornography.<br />
When the producer saw it, he was furious.<br />
Three years later Ed Wood made the movie which<br />
discriminating film scholars regard as the pinnacle of his<br />
career: Plan 9 from Outer Space (shot in 1956, it was not<br />
released until 1959). The film was financed by the Baptist<br />
Church of Beverley Hills. Ed had convinced them that they<br />
should finance a film with the teenage appeal of the time,<br />
and that this film would then generate the money needed<br />
to make twelve films about the apostles of Christ - which<br />
were the movies that the Baptist Church of Beverley Hills<br />
really wanted to make.<br />
The cast included the best collection of Wood regulars<br />
that he ever assembled. The credits music, which develops<br />
into a theme as the film progresses, was Alexandr<br />
Mossolov’s Iron Foundry, a brilliant choice, full of menace<br />
and foreboding. The web site listed below states, “Iron<br />
Foundry enjoys an oddity reputation, and is rarely heard.<br />
Recordings have been few and far between.” Ed Wood<br />
was a classical music enthusiast, and any aficionado of<br />
Plan 9 would recognise the music at once.<br />
It might be of interest to compare the real Ed Wood ‘stock<br />
company’ with the modern actors who portrayed them.<br />
Documentaries were made about Ed Wood’s life and<br />
ET ALORS? 039
career: Look Back in Angora, Flying Saucers over<br />
Hollywood, and one biography, Nightmare of Ecstasy.<br />
There has even been a rock video in the Ed Wood manner.<br />
But the zenith of the renewed interest in Ed Wood’s films<br />
was the superb biopic released in 1994, Ed Wood, directed<br />
by Tim Burton.<br />
It is an affectionate homage of notable accuracy, and was<br />
probably the best film made in the 1990s. At the time of<br />
writing, it is certainly the last great film made in gleaming<br />
black and white – a decision which Tim Burton fought hard<br />
for, but which was exactly right.<br />
Unfortunately, the use of black and white harmed the film<br />
at the box office. It made little money, because these days<br />
young filmgoers especially do not understand that black<br />
and white cinema has its own special beauty. But film<br />
critics and film magazines gave it the highest praise. It is<br />
a bitter-sweet fact that, even accounting for inflation, any<br />
fifteen minutes of Tim Burton’s film cost more to make<br />
than all the films Ed Wood made over a period of 25 years.<br />
The casting of the film is exemplary. Lisa Marie is<br />
amazingly good as Vampira, and Jeffrey Jones is wonderful<br />
as Criswell. He brings a skein of warm comedy to the role<br />
which the real Criswell lacked. Johnny Depp in the title role<br />
projects Wood’s infectious enthusiasm and joi-de-vivre,<br />
and Bill Murray has fun as Bunny Breckenridge, although<br />
no mere actor could adequately display the real Bunny’s<br />
jaded, droll, contrived ennui.<br />
Martin Landau, such a wooden actor in so many films,<br />
won a well-deserved Oscar for his brilliant portrayal of<br />
Bela Lugosi in his final years.<br />
Edward D. Wood was unique. Is there any explanation<br />
for his strange life? Tim Burton, the director of the 1994<br />
film, concluded that Ed had wanted to be a film producer<br />
and director ever since he was given a movie camera as a<br />
boy, and was bewitched from that moment on. When he<br />
040 ET ALORS?
was 17 years old, probably the most impressionable age<br />
in a person’s life, he saw Citizen Kane, when it was first<br />
released. (Ed was born October 10, 1924.)<br />
The youthful Ed Wood wanted to make films. But his<br />
idea of a film director was a cartoon idea. In cartoons the<br />
director habitually wears jodhpurs, shiny black boots, and<br />
carries a horsewhip. He sits in a simple canvas-backed<br />
chair, and shouts directions from an old-fashioned<br />
megaphone. He is frequently portrayed with a pencil-thin<br />
moustache, and sporting a beret.<br />
it is today. The major studios have lost their iron grip on<br />
Hollywood. Amazing sets and technical effects are just<br />
a software package away, and just about everybody<br />
in cinema boastfully announces themselves as an<br />
“independent”.<br />
One can glimpse behind those films a special mind of<br />
dark, surreal mysteries and obsessions. After all, there<br />
were other ultra-cheap directors in the 1950s and 1960s,<br />
but their films are about as interesting as the people next<br />
door’s home movies.<br />
While making his films Ed always used the megaphone,<br />
even though directors at the major studios had long<br />
abandoned its use. He never went for the jodhpurs or<br />
boots, or the horsewhip, but such affectations predated<br />
his memory: they had vanished at the end of the silent<br />
era (the earliest directors dressed this way as a protection<br />
against snakes and scorpions – in the silent days, films<br />
were usually shot on outdoor locations, and often in the<br />
desert).<br />
Tim Burton believes that this is the key to understanding<br />
Ed Wood’s style. Ed was in love with the idea of directing<br />
films…the romance, the persona of the admired but<br />
unpredictable martinet, and the artistic adventure. He<br />
enjoyed sitting in the canvas-backed chair, and shouting<br />
“Cut!” He wanted nothing to do with the tedious side of<br />
film directing: the careful attention to continuity (in his<br />
own films characters can drive away from a house in broad<br />
daylight and, after a trip of a mile or so, arrive in pitchblack,<br />
foggy night), the re-shooting of scenes in which bits<br />
of set protruded, or even fell over, the repetitive rehearsal<br />
of important scenes with the actors. In Ed’s films it was<br />
one take, or two at the most. He couldn’t wait to get on to<br />
the next scene, and play director again.<br />
The best answer to those who have nothing to offer the<br />
Ed Wood renaissance except derisive laughter, is the films<br />
themselves. Ed did try to get a job with the major studios,<br />
but none of them were interested. Anybody else would<br />
have gone home and taken a clerical job, but Ed went<br />
ahead and made his own films . . . shoestring budgets,<br />
fantastically strange actors, and technically inept . . . but<br />
they were made, and released.<br />
In death, Ed Wood found the intellectual acclaim which<br />
had so painfully eluded him while he was alive and<br />
working. All of the chief members of his repertory are<br />
now dead, with the exception of Vampira. Maila Nurmi<br />
used to run a business preparing signed gravestone<br />
rubbings of Hollywood stars, but today she has time for<br />
little else except attending Ed Wood film festivals and<br />
special screenings. She speaks with heartfelt admiration<br />
of Ed’s kindness, and his brightening the last years of Bela<br />
Lugosi’s life, when the rest of Hollywood had turned their<br />
backs on him.<br />
Ed Wood died on December 10, 1978.<br />
He was not only kind; he was one of a kind.<br />
MAIN FILMS<br />
Glen or Glenda 1953<br />
Jailbait 1954<br />
Bride of the Monster 1955 (Bela Lugosi’s last film)<br />
Plan 9 from Outer Space 1956<br />
Final Curtain 1957<br />
Night of the Ghouls 1958<br />
This film was lost until 1983, because Ed Wood never<br />
had the money to pay the film developer’s bill. Finally<br />
recovered and released when the Ed Wood renaissance<br />
was well under way, it was immediately acclaimed an ‘Ed<br />
Wood masterpiece.’<br />
The Sinister Urge 1960<br />
Orgy of the Dead 1965<br />
Take it out in Trade 1970<br />
And that was much harder to achieve fifty years ago than<br />
WWW.PETTICOATED.COM<br />
ET ALORS? 041
short story<br />
the<br />
victim<br />
WRITTEN BY AKIM A.J. WILLEMS<br />
Rape me<br />
Rape me, my friend<br />
Rape me<br />
Rape me again<br />
[Nirvana]<br />
“Goodness… gracious…me! What happened? You look terrible!”<br />
He had been waiting up all night waiting for her to come home.<br />
She had been going out on the town alone quite often these<br />
past few weeks. Feelings of jealousy and anxious suspicion<br />
would dominate his evening. Tonight had been no different.<br />
Agitatedly he had been reading Anke Bernau’s ‘Virgins.<br />
A Cultural History’ and Edith Maude Hull’s ‘The Sheik’. But<br />
his agitation instantly makes way for panic as he answers<br />
the front door. His wife leans against the doorpost, panting.<br />
Tousled hair rests on a grazed right arm. Her lipstick is smeared<br />
in greasy streaks around her mouth. Eyeliner runs in jagged<br />
streaks to her cheek bones. She’s missing one of her diamond<br />
’special occasion’ earrings, he notices. Under her open coat<br />
she is practically naked, her breasts heaving up and down<br />
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short story<br />
rhythmically. Bruises on her belly, legs and buttocks. A crack of<br />
dried blood caked on her bottom lip.<br />
The victim looked quite plain. It didn’t turn heads in the streets<br />
anymore, but you wouldn’t shriek and kick it out of bed either,<br />
were you to wake up next to it after a drunken night. It had no<br />
passions to speak of, or special hobbies. It had, besides a job<br />
in human resources, a run of the mill family with two children<br />
( products of the passion in the first three years of marriage),<br />
the accompanying station wagon and a semi detached house<br />
in a pleasant suburb. And also: a terminal sex life. At most,<br />
once a week the marital duty was fulfilled, and had been for 12<br />
years, swiftly and without much ado, usually on Saturdays. The<br />
husband was then tender. And passion- and inspiration-free.<br />
“What happened?” he repeats himself as he leads in the mother<br />
of his children. He lays an arm around her waist, and straightens<br />
her hair and coat with his free hand.<br />
I will tell you what happened: exactly ninety one days earlier the<br />
victim had first approached me. A friend had ‘recommended’<br />
me. Via e-mail I had grudgingly been told a story of dark<br />
sides and sinister longings. Of shame, too. And the soothing<br />
knowledge that it is not that unusual apparently, because<br />
had the friend not done it? And did literature not describe<br />
countless similar cases? I couldn’t deny it. I knew them too: the<br />
publications that, in the name of scientific research, described<br />
such fantasies in juicy detail, but categorized them as ‘perverse’.<br />
The pseudo-psychological and populist ‘journalistic’ articles<br />
that touched upon the theme. But most of all the countless<br />
women that had passed before the victim and contacted me to<br />
bring to life their most secret fantasy. The modus operandi was<br />
the usual: the victim would reveal its identity to me – I myself<br />
remained anonymous of course – and received a spreadsheet<br />
with times, dates and places for the victim to report to. A total<br />
of fifty two. One for every week. Within the year – Guaranteed.<br />
Not satisfied? Money back. Its dream would come true. When<br />
exactly: only I would know.<br />
In the background, the eighteenth century Hochdeutsch<br />
044 ET ALORS?
short story<br />
version of Johan Gottfried Herder of ‘Anke van Tharaw’ by Fritz<br />
Wunderlich. ‘Meine Seele, mein Fleisch und mein Blut’. “Who<br />
did this to you?” With trembling hands he plunges into his<br />
pockets to retrieve his cell phone. “I’m calling the police.” His<br />
wife lays her hand on his phone to stop him. ‘No!’ she shakes<br />
her head. “Darling…!” She pauses.<br />
Short skirt, lace undies, snug top and boots halfway up the calf.<br />
This is the outfit the victim is wearing when it arrives at the<br />
stroke of midnight at the location set for this date: a parking<br />
spot in the woods, next to a large fishing pond where many<br />
paths cross. ‘Follow the red route’ the instructions had read.<br />
The day had been hot and sunny, but it had turned quite cold<br />
by now. The nipples point the way. A cold shiver runs down its<br />
spine. But that could also be nerves. Every time the victim had<br />
left the house with a pounding heart: would it happen this time?<br />
At a pick-nick bench, halfway down the path, a cigarette break is<br />
taken. The nicotine brings calm to the body. The victim notices<br />
that the lace unmentionables are wet. The idea becomes<br />
more delicious week after week. Even during office hours,<br />
almost every day, fifteen minutes are spent in the bathroom to<br />
masturbate in the knowledge that it will finally happen soon.<br />
The ashes are tapped off. The cigarette is brought back to the<br />
mouth. But she will not touch lips again. The assailant comes up<br />
behind the victim and lays his hand over the frightened mouth,<br />
flashes the blade of his knife in the light of the full moon and<br />
forces his prey down into a lying position. The back of its head<br />
bangs into the pick-nick table. All sound leaves the ears of the<br />
victim. There is only the sound of the heart beating that echoes<br />
through the chest like a drum roll. The lips of the assailant are<br />
moving: ‘Not a sound or I’ll finish you!’ With his free hand he<br />
lifts up the miniskirt. The blade feels ice cold as he slips it under<br />
the panties. In two fluent moves it is cut away. The hand comes<br />
off the mouth. The victim screams like there’s no tomorrow and<br />
is immediately punished by two hard smacks in the face. The<br />
sliver of textile is mashed into a ball and shoved into the mouth<br />
of the victim to muffle the sound. With a knee on either side<br />
of the victim – to control the protesting arms – he positions<br />
himself on the table. The eyes of the victim are closed stiff, the<br />
ET ALORS? 045
short story<br />
nipples are protruding at him.<br />
He pinches them incredibly hard between his thumb and index<br />
finger before ripping the top to shreds with both hands. With<br />
the left hand he kneads the C-cup which, despite two rounds<br />
of breastfeeding, still feels firm. With the right hand he gropes<br />
around behind him to the freshly shaven pussy and shoves three<br />
fingers in. A muffled groan writhes its way past the panties in<br />
the mouth. In the victim’s mind thoughts are jumping to and<br />
fro. Panic is at the foreground. Even though this is staged, it is<br />
pretty fucking overwhelming and frightening. Was this a good<br />
idea after all? Instinct takes over, the victim pushes the 80 kilos<br />
off itself and tries to run off. The assailant jumps up, grabs the<br />
long locks, drags the fugitive to the ground, throws himself on<br />
it again and wrestles both arms behind the back. The skirt goes<br />
up, the buttocks exposed. He spits in the ‘rosebud’. ‘Citizen<br />
Kane’, he thinks and pushes his cock in the back entrance. The<br />
exclamations of pain follow his pounding rhythm. Legs kick<br />
wildly behind his back. The molested arse writhes about like an<br />
eel, defenceless. When the times comes, he flips his victim over,<br />
holds it down by the throat, squirts his semen in its face and hair<br />
and leaves.<br />
It takes fifteen minutes for the victim to get up. As good as<br />
naked – only the skirt and the boots survived the fantasy – it<br />
jogs back to the car. On the back seat lies an overcoat. That<br />
goes on. A second cigarette is lit. The pain in the anus is still<br />
waning and there is semen in the hair, but that doesn’t matter.<br />
A wish has been granted.<br />
“Honey...!”<br />
She pauses, looks at her husband with big, wild eyes. “I’ve been<br />
raped!”<br />
Ecstasy shrieks through her voice.<br />
“And... it... was...abso-fucking-lutely fan-tàs-tic!!!”<br />
The next morning I find an e-mail in my inbox. Thanking me.<br />
I am flabbergasted. The victim doesn’t appear in my planning<br />
for another three weeks.<br />
TRANSLATION FIONA J. ROBERTSON<br />
046 ET ALORS?
make-up artist<br />
www.judithvandongen.com
WWW.IC-UC.BE<br />
CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY
PAUL<br />
BUIJS<br />
TEXT FLEUR PIERETS
Young, reckless and fresh from the<br />
Arnhem art academy. In order to find<br />
a suitable subject for his graduation<br />
project, Paul Buijs went where no<br />
other student would follow; the shady<br />
underworld of gay darkrooms and sex<br />
parties. Hovering unsettlingly between<br />
fiction and reality, documentary style<br />
and art photography, Buijs’ work is of<br />
an unedited realism. What normally<br />
stays in the shades is now brightly lit<br />
up in an uncomfortable, confronting<br />
way. It reveals a curious and previously<br />
unexamined aspect of the gay scene, and<br />
provides a window into the collision of<br />
the club life, kinky sex and dark cellars<br />
that color the streets of Amsterdam.<br />
Paul just returned from his exhibition and lecture at<br />
the Berlin Porn Film Festival when we meet. He’s once<br />
again flabbergasted by the way people react when<br />
confronted with his pictures. “It’s weird to experience<br />
that people are still to be shocked since it was never<br />
my intention to provoke. When searching for ideas that<br />
would suit my graduation project, I was a frequent visitor<br />
of the Warmoesstraat and the Regulierdwarsstraat in<br />
Amsterdam. The gay areas, so to speak. I started to take<br />
pictures and soon my teachers pointed out that I was on<br />
to something.”<br />
During that time, Paul got very much intrigued by an<br />
article called ‘Life When The party is over’. Written by a<br />
psychologist who had made a study on gay men in their<br />
mid 30’s - 40’s and published in Wink magazine. He stated<br />
that a lot of gay men weren’t able to enjoy their teenage<br />
years because of their family for whom they only came<br />
out of the closet when they were already in their 20’s.<br />
Due to the social impact of such oppression, they started<br />
their outgoing life when most straight people in society<br />
started to settle. A phenomenon that in a lot a cases leads<br />
to heavy party life and the drug use that often goes along<br />
ET ALORS? 051
“I always wonder<br />
what<br />
lies behind the surface<br />
of a fashionable<br />
appearance. ”
with it. Not to speak of a low career expectation. “This<br />
article explained what I questioned: what lies behind<br />
the surface of that fashionable, sexual and glamourous<br />
appearance. What was behind the mask of the people<br />
involved in this scene?”<br />
Still in the stream of perfectioning his art school<br />
assignment, his teachers advised him to focus on his<br />
signature. Being a huge fan of the Disney and populair<br />
culture he swiftly found a symbiosis between the<br />
personages that populate his work and the alienation of<br />
mainstream entertainment. “All Disney characters are<br />
drawn in a certain, monotonic way. They all have the same<br />
glance, facial expression and are very similar in style. It<br />
stroke me that a lot of my fellow party people wore the<br />
same Fred Perry shirt, the same Bikkemberg shoes and<br />
had the same hair-do. By asking to wear a mask I wanted<br />
to underline the oneness of a certain scene, by making it<br />
half a mask, I made a pairing between the monotony of<br />
the public statement and their own private personality. “<br />
With the best will in the world you can’t say that Buijs’<br />
work is approachable or reassuring, hence the numerous<br />
galleries who rejected his work for being too shocking and<br />
the multiple reactions of viewers who found his images<br />
to confronting, to surreal, to raw and to bright. “I had<br />
no idea my work would have such an impact. I have the<br />
upmost respect for my models and I always show them<br />
their picture before I make it public because they still<br />
can be recognized despite of the mask and I shoot them<br />
while we both experience an autobiographical moment of<br />
obsession and dependency. The images are viewed like a<br />
private journal made public and it works out to be a little<br />
too much to handle for a lot of spectators. For example I<br />
got fired as a teacher because they thought my work to be<br />
too dangerous for the children and their parents. I don’t<br />
quite get it, but let me tell you that I’m too passionate<br />
and too engaged to just give up. I invariably believe that<br />
somewhere, sometime my work will be acknowledged so<br />
I keep on going”.<br />
www.experiencedbypaul.com<br />
054 ET ALORS?
COLUMN<br />
NIKKI<br />
HEARTACHE<br />
Nikki Heartache (aka Cornelia van Lierop, Jade 4u, Darling Nikkie) has<br />
toured the globe with bands such as Lords Of Acid and Praga Khan.<br />
Leaving the dance scene behind as a thing of the past, this singer/<br />
producer is back in the studio working on new material. A few years<br />
ago she decided to collect and share her memoirs with the world.<br />
Draped over a chaise longue she dictates her wild adventures to her<br />
blushing secretary whilst nipping on a trendy cocktail. This is one of<br />
her stories.<br />
‘THE devil’s child’<br />
When I was eleven years young I spent my weekdays in a<br />
boarding school that was run by nuns. The building was<br />
a convent and could be quite daunting at times. It was a<br />
dark place and the nuns had loose hands, to say the least.<br />
I can’t even count the number of times I got smacked for<br />
no apparent reason at all. They probably believed I was the<br />
devil’s child born from a whore’s womb, not in the least<br />
because of my being left handed (which was a sure sign<br />
of said devil!). Nothing I did helped to change their views<br />
and every time my mother brought me there I could see<br />
the disdain they were trying to hide. True, my mom didn’t<br />
really do anything to make them feel better as she was<br />
usually made up and dressed to kill. I think they actually<br />
feared her and were always happy to see her walk out the<br />
gate and hear the clicking of her stiletto heels disappear<br />
from the curb. Needless to say that the first day of my<br />
week was also my worst… .<br />
It’s probably a good thing they never met my aunt Sylvie.<br />
She was a transvestite and didn’t have what one might call<br />
a conventional job. She, her sister and my mom worked<br />
at cabarets, you see. I once saw them in action and it left<br />
me star struck. Not only were they the most glamorous<br />
women ever, but the things they could do with their body<br />
parts amazed me! The three of them never went anywhere<br />
unnoticed as you can imagine. They were loud, as were<br />
their clothes and every man in the street would look at<br />
them with lust in his eyes. Several times I saw jealous wives<br />
swing their purses at their lusty, untrustworthy husbands.<br />
Aunt Sylvie was a true sex bomb! They never knew she was<br />
actually uncle Jerry, that’s how good she was at being a<br />
woman. She was - dare I say it – wittier than Mae West and<br />
could easily wrap any guy around her little finger.<br />
She often told me not to let the nuns get to me, so I tried<br />
to keep myself to myself but they sadistically sought me<br />
out time after time. That is, until the day the sexton started<br />
coming around every week on Tuesday evenings. The nuns<br />
would get all flustered on those days. Hot cocoa would be<br />
prepared and the smell of pancakes baking would fill the<br />
halls and rooms in the entire convent, making our mouths<br />
water. Of course us girls didn’t get any of that. The man<br />
played the church organ and decided the school needed<br />
a choir in the hopes of more people coming to mass. The<br />
nuns were thrilled at the idea. In fact, they were thrilled at<br />
anything the man said. I’m pretty sure some of the sisters<br />
had a crush on him and some possibly had wet dreams<br />
056 ET ALORS?
about him when they were alone in their beds. After all,<br />
deep down inside, they were human. I think.<br />
Anyway, one day we were all summoned to sing for him<br />
so he could put his choir together. When my turn was over<br />
he told the nuns I should do the solos. Boy, was I a happy<br />
puppy but my joy didn’t last very long because the nuns<br />
didn’t want me in the choir and told him I was too young.<br />
Lucky for me the sexton seemed to be the boss and from<br />
that day on my life became somewhat easier. I got to stay<br />
up longer than the other girls on Tuesdays so he and I could<br />
practise. Believe me when I say I did the best I could. The<br />
hymns were boring as hell but I couldn’t care less. Singing<br />
always set me free, even if for a short while.<br />
When the day finally came that I got to sing in church the<br />
weirdest thing happened. There I stood, high above the<br />
crowd - well, ten nuns and a few old people make a crowd,<br />
don’t they? - right next to the sexton who was hammering<br />
his organ. The choir started to sing and I was so nervous I<br />
wanted to scream. But then a ray of sunlight shone through<br />
the colourful windows. It was as if someone had put a huge<br />
spot light on me! The moment that light touched my face<br />
I became a star! For a short while I was Shirley Bassey, no,<br />
I was aunt Sylvie in a glittery dress, ready to perform and I<br />
knew right then that I would never ever become a sales girl,<br />
a secretary or a bank clerk. No, I would become something<br />
way more glamorous than that! I sang my heart out on that<br />
stupid hymn, I sang as though there were thousands of<br />
people there just to listen to me! Yes, me, the devil’s child,<br />
born from a whore’s womb!<br />
When I was done there was no ecstatic applause. No flowers<br />
were thrown onto my stage. Gone was my glitzy dress. The<br />
light that shone so bright before had disappeared behind<br />
the clouds. Instead there was an eerie silence. One could<br />
have dropped a needle and it would’ve made everyone<br />
jump up from their slumber. Someone coughed. My heart<br />
beat so loud I thought everyone could hear it. The priest<br />
continued his long, seemingly endless sermon about hell<br />
and damnation.<br />
That weekend my aunt Sylvie showed me how to put on<br />
make up and how to walk in high heels. “If you’re going to<br />
be a star”, she said, “you’ll have to start looking like one”.<br />
Education comes in many forms.<br />
ET ALORS? 057
ANGEL<br />
BUCK<br />
INTERVIEW FLEUR PIERETS
Buck Angel is a female-to-male transsexual and founder of Buck<br />
Angel Entertainment. As an adult actor, he was able to create a<br />
unique niche, calling himself “The Man With a Pussy”, as he had<br />
not had any genital surgery and still possessed a vulva. In 2007<br />
he received the AVN Award as Transsexual Performer of the Year<br />
and in April 2008 he was presented with a “Feminist Porn Award”<br />
for “Boundary Breaker of the Year”. Today, he travels the world<br />
as an inspiring advocate, educator, lecturer and writer.<br />
A tête a tête with an inspiring personality.<br />
In an interview I read that you always wanted to be a<br />
man. Nowadays, your individual self is your brand. How<br />
does it feel to be looked at as something special when<br />
for you it was inevitable?<br />
I always felt like a man, so of course I wanted to be looked<br />
at as a man. I felt this way my whole life, but so many<br />
people did not see me that way when I was younger. As<br />
I got older it made me feel horrible about myself. When I<br />
was able to change my physical appearance to match how<br />
I felt on the inside, it made me the happiest person in the<br />
world!<br />
I am so happy that now people see me for the man I am<br />
and it makes people realize that you can become whoever<br />
you want to be. Society should not put limitations on you<br />
just because they do not understand. So I like that the<br />
world views me as something special; I think this is a good<br />
thing.<br />
Transwomen are more visible than transmen. Why do<br />
you think that is?<br />
Well I cannot speak for transwomen or transmen, really.<br />
I think we are all different in how we want to be visible in<br />
the world. Though I do think the visibility of transwomen<br />
has been more widespread because they have been<br />
around longer as a community. Transmen have just<br />
started to become more visible because the community is<br />
now becoming larger and more active.<br />
You are - amongst many other things - a pornstar, an<br />
educator and a writer. Yet, there’s a very fragile glance<br />
in your eyes.<br />
I am indeed all the above, though I’d like to think of myself<br />
more as someone who motivates people to think outside<br />
the box and to become themselves, like I have.<br />
My eyes…well I have lived through some rough times<br />
060 ET ALORS?
efore my change. I was homeless and suicidal, and I was<br />
a drug addict. My past was sad in many ways, but I like to<br />
think that I have overcome it. Maybe my eyes still show<br />
the hurt that was in my soul for so many years? I know that<br />
this pain has helped me to have compassion for others.<br />
I feel very blessed and grateful for the happy life I have<br />
now, and I hope that I have the ability to inspire others to<br />
overcome the pain.<br />
You just started a dating site for transmen. “Buck<br />
Angel Dating. A safe environment for those seeking out<br />
relationships or just fun with transmen and the people<br />
who love them”. What if it turns out to be a site for<br />
fetishists? Would that bother you?<br />
Interesting question. Why do people think that fetishizing<br />
something is bad? I am not saying that this site was<br />
intended to do that—I just opened the site for people to<br />
have a place to meet because there was clearly a lot of<br />
demand. It isn’t just for people looking to have a partner<br />
but to also for those who want to meet to have sex without<br />
having to explain their transgender status. On my dating<br />
site that is not an issue, so you can just get on with having<br />
a good time. Some people enjoy being fetishized; I do. So<br />
maybe some people will go there with that intention?<br />
You know there are some in the trans community who<br />
call themselves “activist” and they hate that I am a<br />
pornographer. They think it hurts the trans community.<br />
I think that is so sad, because my whole life changed for<br />
the better when I finally learned to love my body and<br />
have sex without feeling guilty. Many trans people feel<br />
that someone will never want have sex with them or they<br />
don’t feel sexy because their bodies are different than<br />
what society tells us is sexy and normal. My work helps to<br />
change that and show that if you love yourself (and yes,<br />
that includes sex) then others will too!<br />
ET ALORS? 061
“I hope that I have<br />
the ability to inspire<br />
others to overcome their<br />
pain.”<br />
I think you are right about that. Maybe I should rephrase<br />
it for the mainstream and say something more like,<br />
“Showing you that becoming yourself and loving yourself<br />
can make you happier.” This is really the message I want<br />
to project. Since I have learned to love myself and create<br />
the body that I always wanted to have, I am so happy<br />
and comfortable with myself. It can be quite tiresome to<br />
always worry what people think of you and it can make life<br />
miserable—not just for trans people but anyone.<br />
I have all kinds of friends and fans who ask me all the time,<br />
“How can I live life like you do, without a care of what<br />
other people think?” I would always say that “Just learn to<br />
love yourself and become yourself.”<br />
You are a pioneer and an educator. I think that comes<br />
with large responsibilities? When did you decide to talk<br />
to people about your experiences?<br />
You are right—it came with a bigger responsibility than<br />
I thought. I have learned so much by putting myself out<br />
there. I have had some in the trans community tell me<br />
that I am a bad person for saying things that I felt were<br />
important. But you know I think that by talking about my<br />
experiences some people (or maybe many people) can<br />
relate to me and feel less alone. I had a tough time in the<br />
beginning of my change as I had no community and no<br />
one to talk to or identify with. I think by me talking about<br />
this I can show how far I have come just because I had<br />
determination to be myself.<br />
The other reason I feel passionate to talk and educate is<br />
because some people in the trans community say there is<br />
only one specific way to be a trans person. This makes me<br />
even more passionate and I want to help the people who<br />
are individuals and who want become their true selves,<br />
and not have to fit how the community wants them to be.<br />
Your website reads that you are “re- defining gender<br />
and educating an entire generation on the fluidity of<br />
sexuality and identity politics.” I guess that sounds very<br />
complicated to someone who’s not into the subject<br />
matter. How would you rephrase your message to the<br />
mainstream public?<br />
The overriding theme of your work is about self-love<br />
and acceptance. Are you a positive & optimistic person?<br />
For sure I am! This is truly one of the keys to being happy.<br />
It took me many years to learn this but with determination<br />
and the desire not to have hate in my life, I have done it.<br />
The odd thing is that I notice the more “popular” I become,<br />
the more of a target of hate and envy I become for some<br />
in the trans community. Their hateful words kind of shock<br />
me sometimes, but I learned to not take these comments<br />
personally. I know that these people have not learned<br />
to love themselves like I have. They experience these<br />
reactions towards a person like myself who is free of that.<br />
“A day in the life of Buck Angel”. What to expect?<br />
Ok, you will be shocked! I think people think I have some<br />
crazy lifestyle but really I am pretty mellow. My days are<br />
spent at my awesome home in Mexico (if I am not on the<br />
road working). I am married and have 7 rescue dogs and<br />
spend my time with them. I love to read and also workout<br />
everyday. I am also very much into health and fitness.<br />
I think this is a very important part of loving yourself.<br />
It was great talking to you. Thank you very much and I<br />
wish you lots and lots of success.<br />
Thank you so much for the interview and I hope that my<br />
work can help to inspire some of your readers.<br />
www.buckangel.com<br />
062 ET ALORS?
IN 20 QUESTIONS<br />
PIERRE<br />
GARROUDI<br />
QUESTIONS FLEUR PIERETS PHOTOS DARREN BRADE<br />
His intricate designs merge the lines between art & fashion<br />
and have been worn by some of the world’s biggest<br />
style icons from Naomi Campbell to Kate Moss, Scarlet<br />
Johansson and Sarah Jessica Parker. He walks the streets<br />
of London with his flashmobs and has the tendency to<br />
approach his fabrics with the eye of a scientist.<br />
Your résumé reads like a travel trip.<br />
I was born in Iran, lived in Paris for 5 years, 2 years in Lyon,<br />
then Shanghai. In Manhattan I ran a Garroudi shop/gallery<br />
and stayed there for 14 years. After inhabiting Boca Raton for<br />
another year I made my way to London.<br />
How does such a journey influence a person?<br />
I’m a sponge. I try to absorb everything. Having a multicultural<br />
background gives me wisdom and inspiration. Knowledge is<br />
like light, it opens your eyes to the world.<br />
Why did you end up in London?<br />
London is magical. You should see how the people dress up<br />
when they go out. It’s a vessel of inspiration.<br />
When did your carreer start?<br />
I studied in Paris, while working as a hairdresser in my spare<br />
time. I moved to New York in 1986. There I joined the Fashion<br />
Institute of Technology after working at various retail and<br />
design houses. I started my own label in 1993.<br />
Why fashion?<br />
I think fashion is a way of expressing yourself and showing<br />
your beliefs and identity because clothes can tell you a lot<br />
about a person.<br />
What’s your message?<br />
It’s about being passionate, I believe whatever you put out<br />
you get back. My collections are expressions of my own<br />
experiences. It’s like looking into a mirror.<br />
Let’s talk technical; you manipulate all your fabric?<br />
Yes. You can’t buy any of my fabric because it doesn’t exist.<br />
I love to look at it with the eye of a scientist. The multi-layered<br />
matte and sheen silks become second skin to the wearer.<br />
Some call it pioneering fabric-folding work.<br />
It’s all done by hand, which creates an origami effect. I guess<br />
it’s quite unique, yes. I believe fabric manipulation it the next<br />
evolution in fashion.<br />
064 ET ALORS?
And very time consuming.<br />
It is. And you have to be extremely patient to do so. Sometimes<br />
it takes me a month to make one dress, but then you create an<br />
entirely piece unique. They are one of a kind.<br />
You are known for using interesting and diverse models,<br />
which is a breath of fresh air in the fashion industry.<br />
I think it’s generally better to have a diverse selection of<br />
models. We live in a world that’s mixed, I mean half of the<br />
world is Asian, and only, maybe twenty percent of the world<br />
is white.<br />
Where do you get your inspiration?<br />
I’m inspired by talented and creative people and by the sheer<br />
beauty of humanity. I try to learn from every person I meet.<br />
For example, my life won’t be the same after I talked to you<br />
and vise versa.<br />
What kind of women wears your designs?<br />
Naturally the types of women who wear these types of clothes<br />
have to be self-secure and strong, have confidence.<br />
Why?<br />
Because you can’t go out there and wear something creative<br />
and be shy at the same time. The women who like my clothes<br />
use them as a tool to express themselves.<br />
Can I call it wearable art?<br />
I leave it up to you how to call it. I try to make things that are<br />
wearable. Expensive, but wearable.<br />
Everybody is talking about the bad economy. Does it<br />
influence you?<br />
It does, yes, but I think that everything happens for a reason.<br />
Anything good or bad, it teaches you a lesson. Once you<br />
learned the lesson you can move forward.<br />
How?<br />
I’m doing a lot of research. Reading up about the business and<br />
the marketing side of fashion. These days you need to be on<br />
all of the social networks, Facebook, Twitter, Linked-In. I’m<br />
looking for different ways to present my designs.<br />
The fashion industry is changing nowadays.<br />
The new generation want things much faster, right away,<br />
they don’t want to wait, they’re just looking for something<br />
they want, they get it, they move on. We don’t have time. Do<br />
you have time to read all the blogs, do you have time to read<br />
all the fashion magazines? This is going to reflect on fashion<br />
shows, on the fashion industry.<br />
You already took your clothes from the runway into the<br />
streets?<br />
And called it flash-mobs. With my cast of models and dancers,<br />
I took my collection ‘Red-Stopping’ to some of London’s most<br />
distinguished avenues and tubes.<br />
And it became a big success.<br />
I loved it so much I did it again with the ‘Turquoise Collection’/<br />
Beauty of the Sea’ conveying an aesthetically pleasing<br />
experience of creatures born of a mystical island, lost at sea. It<br />
was raining that day. That was nice.<br />
The future looks bright?<br />
I’m sure it does. The more creative the better so feel free to<br />
write that I’m interested in any kind of collaboration. I try to<br />
learn from everybody!<br />
www.pierregarroudi.com<br />
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BEAUTY<br />
FLASHMOB<br />
OF THE SEA
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FLASHMOB<br />
RED-STOPPING
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FASHION SHOW<br />
PURPLE
stephane<br />
PHOTOGRAPHY BY<br />
roy<br />
www.stephaneroyphotographie.unblog.fR
the<br />
don<br />
juan<br />
paradox<br />
This image represents my beginning in photography, with my first<br />
series consisting only of portraits (each with different ideas, themes<br />
and issues).<br />
In the end all my work was like a study of the human species, of<br />
its construction and destruction of identity and behaviour, of its<br />
madness and decadence, but also of all its strength, beauty and<br />
power. This study continues with its relation to others and the<br />
world.<br />
The mask is recurrent in my work, especially in terms of male<br />
identity.<br />
I like that this kind of symbolism provokes fascination; there is so<br />
much to say on this subject.<br />
Whenever possible, my goal is to establish a correspondence<br />
between the choice of the model and the character he or she plays<br />
(by my personal view of course). Here, he’s a person who became a<br />
close friend, we met at various fetish events. Always dressed in a<br />
black suit and white tie, his personal story touched me, as is often<br />
the case with most of my models.<br />
The will of this project of course, by the choice of title, was to lead<br />
the eye to reach a reflection on how we understand the games of<br />
love and seduction.<br />
Beyond a metaphorical figure I’d rather turn my eyes to the<br />
complexity of the human heart, the way it works, sometimes<br />
without a logical reason that leads us to our own destruction.<br />
I see so many people burning for a real love, for the fairer sex, but<br />
still dissolve in their own hatred and disgust for themselves. This<br />
imbalance, caused by this duality of opposite masks, often leads us<br />
to our own destruction.<br />
The reason escapes and a black madness takes place, making us<br />
lose our vision.<br />
Finally, there is the paradox of this kind of Don Juan: a big child,<br />
whose overpoweringly strong love for women often brings him a<br />
significant amount of problems, a general hatred, as a reflection in<br />
his own mirror… .<br />
A child alone and lost, seeking refuge in the warm heart of a<br />
woman, not realizing that his real quest is first of all to find himself.<br />
It’s when we are finding our own balance and unity that we can<br />
appreciate the benefits that life has to offer.<br />
MODEL RAFIK - PARIS 2010<br />
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playground love<br />
This photo is part of the “Schizophrenic Dreams” series. Each<br />
project in this series depicts a universe almost cinematographic,<br />
ranging from dreams, phantasms, strangeness and madness.<br />
For each of the photographs I try to build a narrative, while keeping<br />
it as open as possible so viewers can build their own version, to<br />
appropriate them, to define their ideas, reflections, et cetera.<br />
Here, the initial idea was born with the intention to mix the<br />
childhood and adult worlds. Sometimes it’s difficult to see where<br />
the boundary between these two worlds lies. Each contains a large<br />
instinctual activity that can sometimes turn violent. The risk of the<br />
game is when the overflowing passion becomes uncontrollable…<br />
Each photograph is carefully considered, generally requiring a<br />
staged work (I make most of my sets).<br />
Everything is real. At a time when we have all these tools like Photoshop,<br />
it seems important to me to keep things real. And mostly,<br />
it’s easier for the model to embody a character when she evolves in<br />
a setting that is consistent with the project.<br />
Every detail is calculated, but sometimes fate takes its course and<br />
brings more to the picture. Here, as in each session, my cat prowled<br />
around, very curious about what’s going on. And there he was,<br />
slightly raising himself to get a better view. A little story that brings<br />
more to the final result.<br />
MODEL CHLOE DISARTICULATED DOLL - PARIS 2010<br />
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ikb dress<br />
This photograph is part of a more focussed approach to a fashion<br />
style, while trying to keep the desire to create a special world,<br />
adding my personal touch.<br />
Since over two hundred balloons were inflated and assembled in<br />
order to create a structure, this shoot was certainly one of the<br />
most chaotic ones I did. Not to mention the numerous logistic<br />
problems that came with it. I’m lucky to have a team always ready<br />
to follow me in my madness!<br />
The title refers to Yves Klein, an artist who worked on infinite<br />
and transcendental beauty. This project was built as a tribute to<br />
the beauty of women, and the sublimation process she uses to<br />
transcend this beauty.<br />
Slaying crowds with a simple blink of an eye they are mysteries,<br />
untouchable and unreachable. By a mere glance they can generate<br />
the emergence of a perfect storm in the strongest heart of man.<br />
Being the origin of the world she conceals in her the secrets of<br />
desire and surpasses the standards, causing dreams, creations and<br />
misfortunes.<br />
Protecting that special aura, strong in her excess of passion and<br />
heightened sensitivity, her curves are like a musical score from<br />
which a universal melody of beauty emerges when they are<br />
caressed, yet will forever remain incomprehensible. She is also a<br />
fragile beauty, made with scars and compromises. The way she<br />
looks at herself is always very different from how others perceive<br />
her.<br />
This project also gave me the opportunity to approach the fetish<br />
theme in my work. It’s about the manifestation of a hypersensitivity<br />
by sublimation of the female body and the exacerbation of her<br />
seductive power.<br />
The constitution of the human is a real adventure. We have to find<br />
this balance, the unity between desires, phantasms, impulses,<br />
dreams, nightmares and trauma. The list is long and the universe of<br />
fetish & BDSM continues to be a great inspiration in my work.<br />
As a lover of women, my words can never match the esteem and<br />
admiration I feel for them. That’s why I give my trust to those who<br />
inspire me so much and help me transcribe the words and ideas<br />
that are formed inside my mind until they turn into actual images.<br />
Kay Morgan, the model of this project, is a perfect example.<br />
MODEL KAY MORGAN STYLIST MADEMOISELLE ILO HAIR BÉRÉNICE V ASSISTANT CHLOE - PARIS 2010<br />
090 ET ALORS?
lady yaya<br />
One day the manager of a cultural area in Paris contacted me to be<br />
part of a group show, for the tenth anniversary of the place.<br />
The problem was the need to resume the effigy of the place (a kind<br />
of pin-up) and it pissed me off. After a friend of mine repeatedly<br />
insisted that I should do it I finally caved in, but not before I got his<br />
promise that he’d be my model. That’s how the project materialized.<br />
Twenty photographers brought their pretty pin-up pictures,<br />
and I came up with this.<br />
Many codes are hidden in this picture and everyone can develop<br />
their own thoughts about it, as in each of my photos. The basis<br />
of this work and how I was led to do it, however, was a certain<br />
curiosity of mine about gay culture but also - and mainly - for crossdressing<br />
and fetishism. My priority was to go beyond the traditional<br />
imagery that we know: The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Buffalo Bill,<br />
Silence of the Lambs, et cetera.<br />
I also started looking more and more into the impulse activity and<br />
phantasm of the human being, like the games that were played by<br />
Eros & Thanatos... . Big topics that I will continue to explore later!<br />
Yannick, the model, moved me during this shoot: I think it was his<br />
discretion combined with his complexes (which we all have) that<br />
did it for me.<br />
It’s never easy to get someone to trust you enough for him to unveil<br />
himself and undress in front of the camera, forgetting any notion<br />
of judgments others may have against him. Yannick is very discreet<br />
and shy, but once he found himself in the midst of girls helping him<br />
dress, he was like a child with stars in his eyes. Somehow his selfesteem<br />
was lifted during the change of scene or clothes.<br />
It’s something I found in the final result. I find him graceful in this<br />
picture, releasing something strong. In the end, whatever happens,<br />
it’s often a great adventure.<br />
MODEL YANNICK CHAUVEAU CO MODELS IZZA / THALY / LÉO / SAPHO - PARIS 2011<br />
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us<br />
The personal story of Rick Genest touched me, and triggered the<br />
desire to work with him.<br />
When I collaborate with someone I don’t care whether this person<br />
is famous or not. If he’s the muse of a great brand, or has been<br />
featured in the clip of a world-renowned artist... I don’t care, I only<br />
care about the human encounter, the person behind the mask. Rick<br />
took the exact measure of his personal experience by going beyond<br />
the limit of his thinking and his being. He accepted his scars and<br />
went beyond, building a personal thought for all.<br />
I had many projects in mind, and I had to get away from what<br />
had been done before. I wanted to move beyond the traditional<br />
image of Zombie Boy, or the death messenger so often seen and<br />
reviewed. And there was this picture that turned in my head, him<br />
with a baby in his arms ...<br />
I didn’t want the classical picture of the Grim Reaper holding a<br />
baby in his arms, I wanted to go beyond that and see this human<br />
exchange, a simple touch of love without excess. Something<br />
ephemeral, fragile, leaking naturally when you look at a child. This<br />
is what happened.<br />
In this photo, Rico doesn’t play the model, he stays himself. I<br />
simply asked him to pose his arms while I was doing my tests...<br />
A true sincerity and authenticity ultimately emerges, a warmth<br />
between what appears to be two completely opposite extremes,<br />
but that returns us to our own judgments about ourselves, what we<br />
have been, and what we have become.<br />
This is something I studied and observed the last few years<br />
concerning the structure and behaviour of the human identity: the<br />
difference between the world of the child and the adult. Things<br />
which takes them apart, but what unites them too.<br />
If the tattoo culture is becoming more and more a fad, it still<br />
remains a culture of extreme for some media and much of public<br />
opinion. The judgments that these kind of people undergo are<br />
interesting and show many borders of the human and social relations,<br />
even if they change over time. The tattoo and body modification<br />
are part of the many themes that inspire me in image, as well<br />
as in thoughts.<br />
The road is still long, and I still have many things to express ...<br />
094 ET ALORS?
My Hand,<br />
The Body Grenade<br />
Surrendering.<br />
Epiphany of the body.<br />
It is a story of body, drugs, love.<br />
It is a coming-of-age novel. It is a picaresque tale.<br />
It might also be a story that will bore you – but you are<br />
not obliged to listen.<br />
I always knew it would be like this.
MONDAY<br />
Body as master The beginning of the week (or possibly<br />
end of a hectic week) has in no way undermined the erotic<br />
nonchalance of our protagonist. Serene with regard<br />
to the days to come, she contains her internal turmoil.<br />
There will be more.<br />
098 ET ALORS?
TUESDAY<br />
Body at stake A moment to oneself. The abovementioned<br />
inner turmoil is transmuted into a redeeming sexual<br />
energy. Making any circumvolution unnecessary, the<br />
snapshot focuses on the erotic climax at work here. A<br />
body at stake which reveals itself in the most beautiful<br />
expression of its fierce sexual independence.<br />
ET ALORS? 099
WEDNESDAY<br />
Body as meeting The sexual ballad begun the day<br />
before takes on a new dimension. Rich in what she knows<br />
about herself, animated by a loving, solar passion, our<br />
protagonist opens up, affirms herself and invites us to<br />
follow.<br />
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THURSDAY<br />
Body as intimacy Exquisitely painted lips, the rest is<br />
bared. Difficult awakening, rare sleep. Body overworked,<br />
ready to implode, the painful conversation of the previous<br />
night its trigger.<br />
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FRIDAY<br />
Body as adornment For whom does the bell toll? Friday,<br />
already. It is time to get ready. Body. Makeup. Clothing.<br />
The outer envelope reproduces in its own way the inner<br />
determination. The merger (of soul and body, interior<br />
and exterior) will be danced, sweaty, erectile.<br />
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SATURDAY<br />
Body as eruption Exhausting week. Sisters, saints and<br />
sibyls under a light grey sky on the streets of neukölln.<br />
Surrender to the storgaard lens. Fragile beauty in shifting<br />
territories.<br />
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SUNDAY BODY AS...?<br />
Off screen.<br />
The paradox of the storgaard temporality: its objective<br />
freezes for a moment these bodies at work, in becoming,<br />
in transformation.<br />
The immortalization of their true nature requires this<br />
subterfuge.<br />
These bodies are always subject to change: this is their<br />
basic nature, their purpose. Constituted as works in<br />
progress – due to constitutive (r)evolutions – they flee<br />
boredom (the only enemy), and the normality which it<br />
presupposes, in an ongoing movement of adjustments,<br />
affirmations, appropriations.<br />
Being oneself is a delicate battle, but to not engage in<br />
it would mean to constantly stumble on the same fault<br />
lines. The polymorphic ballad of camilla storgaard –<br />
photographic orlando, middlesex of berlin: beyond faces<br />
and genders, the series of portraits she has created<br />
outline her own above all.<br />
Free bodies sublimated by an accomplice, loving lens.<br />
Without a doubt, the photographer would adopt as her<br />
own –<br />
Without necessarily giving it the exact same meaning –<br />
the beautiful expression of hole (the title of one of their<br />
albums):<br />
My body, the hand grenade.<br />
Our bodies, once they are accepted, espoused,<br />
celebrated, are grenades. Peaceful weapons which<br />
transcribe physically what is going on inside.<br />
Body as outline (attempts).<br />
Body as work (transformations).<br />
Body as marvel (identities).<br />
Our bodies, the hand grenades.<br />
An informal and exciting celebration of our most beautiful<br />
years: the storgaard lens.<br />
TEXT YOANN QU E VEN-LAMAND E<br />
PHOTOS CAMILLA STORGAARD<br />
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DR.A.G.<br />
Drag has become a diverse form of<br />
expression that challenges, entertains, and<br />
educates by pushing boundaries, while<br />
embracing beauty, comedy and glamour.<br />
The hair. The fashion. The makeup.<br />
Christopher Logan recently produced a<br />
coffee table book of top drag performers<br />
from around the world. The performers in<br />
this book are evidence of that diversity,<br />
captured by some of the top photographers<br />
working in today’s world. In Logan’s own<br />
words: “Dealing with a subject like drag and<br />
just presenting it to the audience, without<br />
explanation or instruction, lets people<br />
make up their own mind and have their own<br />
discussions. The reactions have reflected<br />
that this is a book embraced by a mainstream<br />
audience.”<br />
Shot by highly creative fashion and celebrity<br />
photographers, “dr.a.g.” was released to raise<br />
funding for an independent film production<br />
and offers a picturesque look into the artistic<br />
world that is the drag performance.<br />
www.bookthefilm.com<br />
www.tectum.be
WE LOVE<br />
LE CABINET DES CURIEUX<br />
WHY<br />
Whilst in Paris, we instantly fell in love with<br />
this intriguing and simply beautiful little gallery<br />
that contains lots of greatness.<br />
PHILOSOPHY<br />
Thierry Ruby presents his vision of Beauty and<br />
Strangeness through a selection of artworks<br />
belonging to alternative art movements.<br />
He promotes these dreamlike universes in<br />
which the arts interpenetrate: photography,<br />
sculpture, fashion, digital art and so on.<br />
The magic words are: Beauty and the Strangeness.<br />
Artists from all over the globe approach very<br />
powerful themes such as passion and death,<br />
the psyche, the fantasy et cetera.<br />
With the glance of a generation trained by<br />
internet, these artists aim towards a quest of<br />
aestheticism, thwarting the drift of contemporary<br />
standardization.
The presentation in the environment of rarities<br />
intensifies the pleasure of the discovery.<br />
The “Cabinet des Curieux” is located at Passage<br />
Verdeau, in a quarter that was named<br />
“the New Athens” during the XIXth century,<br />
while it was frequented by artists.<br />
Back in those days Montmartre, Montparnasse,<br />
St Germain des Prés had their avantgarde,<br />
and now the Cabinet des Curieux reveals<br />
this new artistic alternative.<br />
WHERE<br />
Thierry Ruby / Cabinet des Curieux<br />
Diplômé de l’Ecole du Louvre<br />
12 Passage Verdeau 75009 Paris<br />
www.cabinetcurieux.com
KOBI LEVI<br />
When did you know you were going to be a<br />
designer?<br />
It has been my passion since childhood. I<br />
started to create shoe designs when I was in<br />
high school. Back then they were made of<br />
cardboard.<br />
What’s your philosophy on shoes?<br />
I treat shoes as though they’re sculptures to<br />
wear. Shoes change the body’s silhouette,<br />
posture and movement and they affect the<br />
sensibility of the way the wearer carries herself.<br />
A shoe should also seem “alive” and look<br />
great when it’s not on the feet.<br />
What do you think about when you create?<br />
When I start a design I think about the new<br />
shoe at hand. I ask myself: “Who is this new<br />
creature, what is the feeling I want to experience<br />
when looking at it?” I focus on that when<br />
developing the new piece, making sure each<br />
choice of lines, shapes, colors, and materials<br />
will be accurate and appropriate for it. When<br />
it is complete I check if the result corresponds<br />
with the initial intention. If it does it’s ready to<br />
be shared with others.<br />
You have to make a shoe for Cinderella. How<br />
does it look?<br />
My starting point would be: this is the shoe<br />
that will change her life! So I’d design it to fit<br />
the character she’d long to be, her dreamcome-true.<br />
I’d design a glamorous princess<br />
shoe, using elements from her ordinary life<br />
shown in a new light. She’d be the same girl<br />
from a different point of view.<br />
Favorite celebrity (dead or alive) you would<br />
love to see wearing your work.<br />
I would have to say Madonna.<br />
WWW.KOBILEVIDESIGN.COM
short story<br />
AS<br />
passionate<br />
AS<br />
‘eventually’<br />
WRITTEN BY LEONOOR ZWARTEVOOGHEL<br />
He’s sitting in front of me in a bistro garden in Brussels, a hot cove<br />
surrounded by giant, stone walls, a hidden paradise, smoothed<br />
by the contrast of the insolence surrounding it. I know what<br />
it must feel like to be a small garden, tiredly observing what I<br />
have become at last after years of impatience: a deeply rooted,<br />
wayward color palette which no longer shies away from the<br />
world outside. I’m unable to understand the French allusions<br />
around us. Aside from the language barrier, I find people just<br />
as incomprehensible as always. They are just as unattainable<br />
as the earth’s core around which we can only circle like a cat<br />
around a hamster cage.<br />
He makes me shy, as his eyes are constantly gazing at me,
short story<br />
his saccades from left to right and from head to toe mentally<br />
ripping off my clothes his desire’s stumbling upon. This man is<br />
amused by the husk that protects my fragile self. I can follow his<br />
glance, as long as I focus my attention solely on him, trusting<br />
the fact that the rest of the environment will yield to me. In his<br />
game I am a frantic deer, ferociously trotting in one direction.<br />
I’m centering the hunter on my retina, fearing the nanosecond<br />
when he will dissolve in my blind angle and I will meet his<br />
deadline. Suddenly he wakes me up, tells me that his plate’s<br />
missing a fork... Obstinately I do not move until he realizes I’m<br />
not as servile as he wishes me to be. Clearly disappointed, he<br />
goes to search for a waiter himself. The child in me hopscotches<br />
from one tile to the other, then suddenly makes place for<br />
audacity crawling up my brittle bones, triumphing in the tips of<br />
my fingers.<br />
Minutes later the tension is almost suffocating me. I can see<br />
us in the glass partition behind him. We exist in a reflected<br />
world as well, but it is only a vague dream in which meaning<br />
fades away and in which we are no longer twenty years apart<br />
in age. I ask what he’s thinking about. He avoids the question<br />
while carefully stroking his fingers through my hair, like tree<br />
branches combing moonlight, but I know that everything is<br />
defined by its opposite. A caressing hand is what it is nót; a<br />
stranglehold or a stigma. Calm comes before the storm and the<br />
tide will continue to turn until lovers too become what they are<br />
not; heart broken. I try to hide the question marks in my eyes<br />
with my eye lids, painted green like the scene around us, but<br />
my uncertainty stimulates him, reminds him of his nature. He<br />
wants to start backing the foal before it is able to carry its rider.<br />
Secretly I screen all exits, hoping to carry this insight with me as<br />
a hidden weapon, but halfway the escape I would miscalculate<br />
my moves anyway. I’d stumble or unexpectedly encounter a<br />
river I did not know it was there. I would choose to be caught,<br />
nevertheless continuing to fight until my tearing joints would<br />
turn against me, pushing away the border between fighting and<br />
surrendering. My strength would slowly ebb away and I would<br />
decide to give him the largest sacrifice possible; nothing more<br />
than a bundle of fears and grieves to ruin, waiting like a row of<br />
110 ET ALORS?
short story<br />
boring, silly pawns. I move myself toward him in this game of<br />
chess called life, move further away from my together-self, and<br />
way too early I picture how his lips softly embrace the word:<br />
‘checkmate’. The loser goes home with… him.<br />
Have you ever seen the light play of late summer clouds?<br />
You know, when the sky is grey and gloomy and the sunlight<br />
suddenly pours over the darkness like a pot of gold falling off<br />
the table. The coins then soon stop clattering and the world is<br />
poor, dim and modest again. This crimson red, precious light on<br />
the terrace behind his house draws lines of shade on our faces,<br />
emphasizing the three-dimensionality of our heads and bodies.<br />
It breaks through the shape of our noses, and makes us feel like<br />
a white screen on which time is refining our faces, after nature<br />
has finished its sketch of us. I can tell that he wants to stop<br />
thinking and talking, that he wants to leave the talking to our<br />
sweaty skins, sighing as they rub against each other. It sounds<br />
like muffled whispering. Children do it in class and get punished<br />
for it. Thinking about life has tired me, therefore body language<br />
could make a fine intermediate stop, because that is the only<br />
way of communicating I’m able to improvise. Conversations<br />
on the other hand, I must consider and weigh up, delete or<br />
embellish. Let alone how exhausting it is to verbally describe<br />
and write about feelings.<br />
I’m observing him as he is sitting on his garden chair, totally<br />
relaxed, staring at the grass. However, I don’t think he is really<br />
looking at it. His legs are crossed. I wonder how such an attitude<br />
could seem careless in its entirety, when one leg is submissively<br />
offering support while the other is profiting from it. Calculation<br />
never equals carelessness. Right now he is calculating how<br />
much time there is left before he will take the initiative and tread<br />
upon God’s sketch of me with all his senses, with an addictive<br />
cadence, a drumming and droning one man orchestra. He is<br />
planning a standing ovation two or three hours later, because<br />
he loves to play long and extensively. He does not need more<br />
than regulation of speed. I will close my eyes as it happens, and<br />
imagine that my tears caused by his painful jolting inside of<br />
me are the signs of brave resistance against giving in. This high<br />
flowing blood pressure would be called mortality’s triumph.<br />
ET ALORS? 111
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The trail of my saliva when he will draw himself from between<br />
my jaws would be a sample of mixed madness. His seeds that<br />
cannot nestle in my abdomen; a beautiful present I would<br />
nevertheless refuse. I do not want everything from him. I am<br />
fine the way I am.<br />
Every time, I am unaware of the moment when simply being<br />
with each other changes into being on top of each other. For<br />
some reason I always end up the first one undressed. I probably<br />
kissed him when he looked me in the eye and detoured me with<br />
his inner peace, moving me further away from chastity. My<br />
clearest memories of this evening will above all concern tactile<br />
experiences; how a button of his undershirt tickles my nipple,<br />
and how his strangled penis tries to escape from his heavily<br />
pregnant briefs when his hips are pushing against me. We are<br />
exactly like summer and winter, I naked and golden like a sh(r)<br />
ine, and he in his dark clothes, storming. His cheek resembles a<br />
winter’s stove, his tongue in my mouth a roll of fleece.<br />
“You look like you are made of porcelain,” he says, carrying me<br />
upstairs to the bedroom.<br />
Gloria, gloria, gloria in excelsis... The beating of my heart<br />
resembles the high notes that echo when the most charming<br />
ladies in the world all laugh together, like pearls bouncing off a<br />
marble staircase. Every possible classic masterpiece resounds<br />
in my head, and all this because of one drummer mercilessly<br />
banging against the vanilla colored skin of his instrument; me.<br />
I haven’t got time to think in full sentences as he uses his hands<br />
and nails so unpredictably. He is as passionate as the word<br />
‘eventually’; he might, or he might not. My mind is reasoning<br />
as if it were sending telegrams: careful – you – that’s so – pain<br />
– don’t – please don’t. He asks if it would be alright that he take<br />
off his clothes, as if being polite now and then justifies his overall<br />
behavior. I tell him that he plays as slopingly as Pergolesi, that<br />
those baroque pieces sound just as questioning, and that in fact<br />
I am not supposed to give answers nor to ask questions. He<br />
simply needs to play my piece until all of the strings snap and<br />
I shiver to the bone like a roadkill Siamese. I don’t even realize<br />
how long it takes for him to undress. I merely notice the cold<br />
rushing over me, teasing the stiff little hairs of my skin, when<br />
112 ET ALORS?
short story<br />
his body is no longer lying on top of me. Yet again I am acting<br />
like foolish Bambi, freezing at the sight of danger even though<br />
it is still possible to escape. I have become a three-course meal<br />
for this older man, whose naked, heavy loins then press my<br />
outlines into the mattress, as if he were drawing a chalk lined<br />
proof that somebody once had lied there and had never stood<br />
up.<br />
He orders me to crouch against the foot of the bed. He ties up<br />
my wrists behind my back with frayed swing rope. It does not<br />
take long before it makes my skin itchy and reddish. Somehow I<br />
missed the moment I got from the bed to the floor. I do remark,<br />
however, the heated combat between his throbbing penis and<br />
my tensed mouth, a hoolahoop dancing around his youngster,<br />
and the contrast with the icy balusters of the bed my back is<br />
being roasted against. Around my almonds sticks a mixture<br />
of his pre-ejaculate, my saliva and digestive juices which rose<br />
up from my stomach when he showed me how much is too<br />
much. I will still remember this taste for years to come. Blurry<br />
flashbacks will make me as sick as then and as lustful an animal<br />
begging for gratification. It is becoming dark outside and the<br />
artificial lighting of his bedroom is casting a shadow over his<br />
genitals like clattering coins, a crimson bridge to summery,<br />
pale passion. Once more I want his cock in my narrow throat to<br />
subsequently want him to pull away again and let me breathe.<br />
This way I can continue to get what I want, again this addictive<br />
cadence of predictability and routine.<br />
He says that I have blown him enough. Rebellious as I am, I blurt<br />
out that it was about time, upon which he slaps me in the face<br />
three times, rock-hard. In a blunt manner he informs me that he<br />
now wants to intrude this corpus of mine, because we have been<br />
postponing it for long enough now. On the way downstairs, I<br />
will especially remember his Kandinsky on the wall along the<br />
spiral staircase. I will reminisce fondly of the tender way he<br />
conducts me to the living room and bends me over a footstool.<br />
I protest, but he firmly pushes me down again. The velvet fabric<br />
caresses my belly and chin so soothingly; it’s such a mockery,<br />
a denial of what comes next. Once again, velvet is what it is<br />
absolutely not… He penetrates me from the back, although it<br />
ET ALORS? 113
short story<br />
feels more like twisting a screw, practically and intuitively like<br />
when you assemble an IKEA-drawer, pretentiously ignoring the<br />
instructions. I whisper that he must be careful. As if the more<br />
quietly I speak to him, the less distressed I will be afterwards,<br />
if it should turn out that he was not listening or allegedly did<br />
not hear me. My words go through him like a train through a<br />
landscape. He registers them but he only wants to arrive at his<br />
destination. His thrusting becomes more driven, more oneway<br />
traffic without interaction, no returning anymore to the<br />
previous step, but we must go ahead, faster and firmer. What<br />
gets in the way and does not fit must recede, or even tear apart.<br />
No more leisure detours, but straight home leaving savage<br />
tracks behind. The telegrams clam up and nothing but alarming,<br />
rhythmic wheezing is being chased out of my throat. I didn’t<br />
know that bodies could imitate the hollow sound of a rumbling<br />
train, but it is possible. The more I hear the sound of carcasses<br />
singing their elegy, the more I yearn for us to crash frontally;<br />
two ghost drivers in a solitary and abandoned country, deeply<br />
‘trained’ into each other, destroyed and resigned.<br />
“Am I hurting you?” he softly asks, unable to sound natural:<br />
above the lips that asked me this question, two eyes filled with<br />
hope are looking at me.<br />
“Not nearly enough,” I whisper, my eyes closed. For the<br />
first time I am frightened by the way he looks at me, of the<br />
precarious growl escaping from the corner of his mouth when<br />
he pounds his flesh against my cervix, whereas in fact it is my<br />
own destroying self which I should dread most. His dominant<br />
being paralyses my whole autonomy, whereby all my nerves<br />
point in the direction of his mass, feeding only on his sensations,<br />
screaming ‘We want more!’ like maniacal fans. Concerned<br />
I wonder whether this is true love, because the agony he is<br />
causing me right now is unbearable, disgusting even. A few<br />
seconds later, I cry out and climax.<br />
I follow him, hopping, to the bed room. It fascinates me how<br />
neutrally and awkwardly we move from one room to another.<br />
In front of me this ordinary man, who has an everyday haircut,<br />
is walking over his common carpet at an average speed. We’re<br />
creating an impasse, a ‘Cut!’ in between two special scenes. It is<br />
114 ET ALORS?
short story<br />
whimsically amusing, ridiculous even. It is reality we are willing<br />
to forget, because we despise triviality. What follows means so<br />
much more. We love dancing on the borders between ‘not done’<br />
and ‘do more’, stretching them ahead of us as if they were elastic.<br />
We ought to push these borders as far as they can be pushed<br />
without bursting. In bed again, he enters me effortlessly due to<br />
the fact that I’m still soaked, although I just came. I am branded<br />
by the steaming hot skin of his neck and shoulders, a bonfire<br />
not nearly extinguished by his drops of sweat. Feeling naughty,<br />
I call him ‘Mr. Beaudry’, telling him what’s so fine about an older<br />
man inside of me, which makes him viciously grind his teeth. I<br />
describe to him how I will always be inferior to him in age and<br />
thereby naturally subordinate. I am experiencing unknown<br />
stimuli like a newborn in the world of lust; stimuli he has already<br />
perceived many times before, stimuli he has learned to channel<br />
and even magnify by perfect touch. I tell him that, through the<br />
way he’s handling me, he indirectly introduces me to all his<br />
former women, that I not only feel his desire to have sex with<br />
a woman, but also this exclusive craving for using, inhabiting<br />
and running down a much younger girl. I sense that he wants to<br />
punish as well as reward me for my immoral ideas: the sign of<br />
a mutually acknowledged power difference, a spindle around<br />
which we circle at suffocating speed. The minute I beg him to<br />
destroy my youthfulness, he hoarsely announces his arrival. It<br />
makes me deaf, so deaf, to all the sounds but his. I hear only<br />
him, groaning and humming in my ears.<br />
Just as briskly darkness alights, silent and sleepy. The world is<br />
poor and gloomy again. His warm sperm drips off his fingers<br />
and in between my buttocks, forming drenched little islands in<br />
the mattress. I can feel his nature, a salted late-summer haze,<br />
sowing into my mouth while I am licking his hands clean. The ice<br />
in my soul has melted. Then I curl myself up purring, no longer<br />
knowing whether I should feel satisfied or ashamed. With two<br />
fingers he pets the valley of my back, in this way soothing the<br />
last vibration of my spine. He proudly puts a wet toilet glove<br />
between my legs where it burns: the echo of his work, a satire<br />
of a sketch that once was pure and pristine, his polluted Lolita.<br />
I am fine the way I am.<br />
ET ALORS? 115
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