HONK!05 The Dictatorship

H NK! Kiril Bikov Steed Lord Tom Van der Borght Benny Nero Ragnar Persson Karl Slater Susann Bosslau 1 Stefan F盲hler Dusan Pejcic Masha Sadari Neda Rajabi George Tot Ocean Reid Mara Sommer Hiro Kimura Zsu Szab贸 Linus Morales Jasmin Schuller Cover: Pascale Jean-Louis Model: Paul Brock

#05

The

Dictatorship

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#01 #05

EDITOR IN CHIEF MARCEL SCHLUTT ART EDITOR AMANDA M JANSSON EMMA E. K. JONES MUSIC EDITOR NATALIE G GUNNARSDOTTIR PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR MARCEL SCHLUTT FASHION EDITOR SUSANN BOSSLAU MOVIE EDITOR CLAUDIO ALVARGONZALES Christo Mitov, Polys Avraam, Nina Kharytonova, Denise Dahinten, Nicolas Simoneau Larisa Cantano, Shel Fuller, Stefan Springer, Coco Meurer, Pascale Jean Louis, Suzana Holtgrave COVER BY PASCALE JEAN LOUIS COVER MODEL PAUL BROCK LAYOUT MARCEL SCHLUTT RETOUCHING NICOLAS SIMONEAU TRANSLATION AMANDA M JANSSON 6 SARAH REDFERN ALL COPYRIGHTS @ MARCEL SCHLUTT HONK!Magazine Ebelingstr. 1 10249 Berlin Published by Marcel Schlutt

HONK! is based In Berlin / Germany

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I am a dictator !

OH YES! I am! You don´t believe me? Then you just have to ask my work mates. They will tell you how I am. If I want something I´ll get it.

No matter how much others have to work for me.

Why choose dictatorship as an issue theme? Just take a look at your life! Are you feeling free? Be honest to yourself!! You are so not free!!

Oh no!

Do you have a wife and children? Hm hm your are not the master at home!

You are gay? In a relationship? Oops sorry. One of you is the strong one and he is telling you what to do and I guess you are not the one.

School? I think we don´t have to speak about teachers. Most of them are assholes and you get it every day, they are the ones with power.

The State and the Goverment in your country are probely the biggest dicators around. Democracy 2011 is nothing more than a fraud. Politics are not what they should be.

Let´s talk about the fashion industry. They dictate what you have to wear and when. Why do they tell you now what you have to wear in 7 months? Come on people ! We can´t even buy those pieces right now.

Why are all the magazines filled with them! We just don´t get it.

So! Life is a dictatorship!

Thats why we present an issue with that theme. Welcome to our number 5 !!! More then 300 pages around this theme. We hope you will like what we did.

Dearest greetings Marcel Schlutt

C NT Photo /Art

#05

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Abyssus Abyssum Invocat

by Zsu Sab贸

70 Ango

by Kiril Bikov 94 Guilty Pleasures

by Nouveau Noir 136 Ragnar Persson 154 Cock VS Brain

by Stefan F盲hler 136 Nuba by Dusan Pejcic 270 The Art of Food

by Christo Mitov

Topic

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by Coco Meurer 44 Dictatorship of Time

by Nina Kharytonova 100 Mickitler

by Benny Nero 166 The Journalist

by Marcel Schlutt 194 Gaze as Dictatorship

by Kevin Jung 334 The underclass in revolt by Marco Scalvini

TENT Fashion

24 A Kingdoms Future

by Karl Slater

94 A Dynasty - little rooms

by Hiro Kimura 68 A Honk! should wear 74 Transformama

by Tom Van der Borght 232 Berlin Bohème

by Marcel Schlutt 254 Delusions of Beauty

by Suzana Holtgrave 318 Black - Impossible to be mistaken

Music

by Fernando Mazza Abámgt

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Interview: Steed Lord

55 I Wanna Cher! Muisc preview

by Yamaho 186 We are the sound of 2011 Artist of the year 132 Interview Ocean Reid

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ABYSSUS ABYSSUM INVOCAT

Deep calleth unto deep

Photography & Concept by Zsu Szab贸 www.nebelundkraehe.de Hair & Make up: Janine Mannheim/Hamburg Model:Nicki Kaminski Post aldo design

INVOCAT!

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MENS ET MANUS

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Mind and Hand

HOMO 12

HOMINIS

LUPUS

EST

man is a wolf to [his fellow] man

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AMEN

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Contemporary Dictatorship Aka Self-Inicted Restraint

Are we all free?

Or at least most of us?

Text by Coco Meurer

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Lets begin with the social conditions to be found in Europe, and lets say that the dark ages of dictatorships belong surely to the past. We could say, that right now, right here we are free people. And yet, there are those who insist: “Only the ignorant one believes to be free in our country.” And most people would be quick to protest: “Excuse me, but we are no longer sporting a star sewed on our clothes to demonstrate our religion and to be set apart.”

The desire to be different and to live at the outskirts of society’s commands is as old as society itself. And yet, the individual can’t manage to build him/herself his/her own shelf.

Either you belong to the so-called normal ones, also happily labeled as Mainstream, or you belong to the so-called hipsters, those that always look so perfectly stylish un-stylish. Berlin is full of people trying to shine in their individuality and still manage to be just the same as anybody else.

Do you feel free today?

What is restricting you? Is there anything restricting you? Or are there no borders anymore?

The same goes for nature loving people, environmentalists. The code they have opted for is loose linen trousers that want to scream out how independent they are from million companies that have their fabrics manufactured in Taiwan. They are trying to be different by resisting the dictatorship of fabrics- and fashion-industry, by opposing factory farming, climate change, the extinction of animal species, and... everything else.

Borders have changed. Perhaps, most people wouldn’t even call them borders any longer. They are self-imposed necessities, laying heavy on humanity’s bent backbone. Too long working shifts, dress codes, behavioural codes, this code, that code. Success expectations and life expectations, prestige, looks and inter-personal relations. You have to be that, to look that, to do that! And for Christ’s sake you have to stay away from THAT! The creator of these rules remains a mystery. The fact that these rules might have been useful sometime in the past but can no longer apply to us is something most people seem to fail to realize. Mrs and Mr Normal curtsy to the invisible regime. Whatever it asks of them.

The list of groups of people that are struggling to define themselves through clothing, opinion, preferences and behaviour is endlessly long. With this very decision and realization of belonging to a Group they just make themselves subjects to a new dictatorship. The dictatorship of labels. Labels that man himself has created.

All that talk of different people and what they do in order to stick out as different seems Being normal means obeying the guidelines. to have buried the original question about Abiding the law and fitting the pattern as qui- whether YOU feel free. et and modest as possible. Does this make them less free than people who choose to be So? Do you feel free? not “normal”? A good job, a marriage, two children and the suburban fenced home. We feel free, as we can ponder and wonder Is this supposed to be considered normal, about it, about whether we are free. If you when more that one third of marriages end get bored of your skinny jeans in the mornup in divorce and about 30% of Berlin’s ing, take them off. You want to be a punk population (19-50 years old) are single? And from now on, so be it. Maybe it helps us all what about all the gays and lesbians? Are be a little less enslaved and a little more free, they more free than good citizens leading a if we tear down the labels and shut away all “normal” life? No, all this can’t be the answer the boxes, leaving others the possibility of choosing to be who they want to be. to the question: Are we free?

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BE F

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REE!

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A KINGDOMS FUTURE Met 5 of the best new and young fashion designers from UK!

A KINGDOMS FUTURE

by Karl Slater

Photography: Karl Slater www.karlslater.com Stylist: Rickardo Mattocks - Maxwell Hair : Adam Bennett Photography: Karl Slater www.karlslater.com Make up: Catherine Cather Stylist: Mattocks MaxwellSelect Model: Jonas@ D1,Rickardo Monique Burrell @ D1,- Sienna@

Hair : Adam Bennett Make up: Catherine Cather Models: Jonas@ D1 ,Monique Burrell @ D1 Sienna@ Select

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Jonas wears Ralph Joseph Marcos Rovero

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Jonas wears Astrid Anderson Astrid Anderson is highly tipped for greatness ever since graduating from the prestigious Royal Academy of Arts with a number of industry Awards under her belt. Astrid is a true breath of fresh air when discussing menswear as there isn’t many words to describe her approach to design.

She will also be showing during Man day at London Fashion Week in partnership with FashionEast.

Monique wears Rachel Freize Rachel Freize has gone from strength to strength since graduating at CSM in 2006. Her passion and inuences stems from her love for historical costumes which have seen Rachel produce extremely dramatic and androgynous garments in previous seasons. Rachel will be showcasing a private presentation during London Fashion Week.

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Sienna wears Agi & Sam

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Jonas wears Ralph Joseph Marcos Rovero Ralph Joseph Marcos Rovero has only graduated earlier this year with the most incredible collection which has seen the young designer receive interest from Lady Gaga’s stylist Nicola Formichetti and Topman. Ralph is all about referencing bright bold colours, shapes with influences including Pokemon and children’s toys. Ralph will be showing a private exhibition during Fashion week. www.behance.net/IAMRALPH

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Monique wears Melanie Rebecca Melanie’s collections are unique inspirations from shapes and the human body, fusing together hard and soft textures to reďŹ ne and promote masculine and feminine elements of human beauty. Clean, luxurious and classic is what resonates through every single collection. Melanie will be present at Vauxhall Fashion Scout during London Fashion Week.

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Jonas wears Astrid Anderson

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Jonas wears Agi & Sam Agi&Sam will be showcasing there latest collection in partnership with FashionEast for the second season at Man day during London Fashion Week. Combining humor, contemporary designs with bespoke print the duo have developed a strong following already including music producer Labrinth and the Red Hot Chilli Peppers.

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TOP

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It is getting cold outside. So, why not reading a book? Here is our Top 5 of books with the theme : Dictatorship!

Enjoy!

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5. Dictator Style: Lifestyles of the World’s Most Colorful Despots by Peter York Welcome to the fabulous lifestyles of the cruel and despotic. Running with the idea that our homes are where we are truly ourselves, Peter York’s wildly original and scathingly funny look at the interior decorating tastes of some of history’s most alarming dictators proves that absolute power corrupts absolutely, right down to the drapes. Mining rare, jaw-dropping photographs of interiors now mostly (thankfully) destroyed, York’s hilarious profiles of 16 inner sanctums of the scary leaves no endangered tiger pelt unturned, from Saddam Hussein’s creepy private art collection to General Noriega’s Christmas tree to the strange tube and knob contraption in the Ceausescu bathroom. All your favorite dictators are here: Hitler, Lenin, Stalin, Tito, Mussolini, Mobutu, Idi Amin, Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos— each with their own uniquely frightful chic. An interior decorating book like no other, Dictator Style is a welcome tonic for a world in need of a good laugh at the expense of the all-powerful.

Publisher: Chronicle Books; First Edition edition ISBN-10: 0811853144 ISBN-13: 978-0811853149 www.amazon.com

4. How to Rule the World: A Handbook for the Aspiring Dictator by Andre de Guillaume Everyone wants to rule the world, but only a precious few have the skills to create an ironclad plan of attack. Simple, direct, and delightfully unprincipled, this guide contains tales of global power mongering from every age and endeavors to show dilettante dictators and tyrants-to-be just how it’s done. Tips are provided on creating a personal flag, what type of puppet government to establish, how to squelch free speech, and, most important, how to handle enemies. Also included are humorous full-color illustrations, sidebars on admirable despots, and self-quizzes that allow readers to see if they have what it takes to conquer the world.

Publisher: Chicago Review Press Language: English ISBN-10: 1556525877 ISBN-13: 978-1556525872 www.amazon.com

3.From Dictatorship to Democracy by Gene Sharp From Democracy to Dictatorship was a small pamphlet, printed and distributed by Dr Gene Sharp and is based on his study, over a period of forty years, on non-violent methods of demonstration. Now in its fourth edition, it was originally handed out by the Albert Einstein Peace Institution, and although never actively promoted, to date it has been translated into thirty-one languages. Now in its twenty-first year, it is being published for the first time in the English language. This astonishing book travelled as a photocopied pamphlet from Burma to Indonesia, Serbia and most recently Egypt, Tunisia and Syria, with dissent in China also reported.

Surreptitiously handed out amongst youth uprisings the world over - how the ‘how-to’ guide came about and its role in the recent Arab uprisings is an extraordinary tale.Once read you’ll find yourself urging others to read it and indeed want to gift it. It has been likened to Karl Marx’s, Manifesto and Mao Tse Tung’s, The Little Red Book in its historic importance and has played a pivotal role in the recent and ongoing uprisings of the Arab Spring.

Publisher: Serpent’s Tail ASIN: B005CHQNC0 www.amazon.com

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2.The Dictator’s Shadow: Life Under Augusto Pinochet

by Heraldo Munozp Augusto Pinochet was the most important Third World dictator of the Cold War, and perhaps the most ruthless. In The Dictator’s Shadow, United Nations Ambassador Heraldo Muñoz takes advantage of his unmatched set of perspectives—as a former revolutionary who fought the Pinochet regime, as a respected scholar, and as a diplomat—to tell what this extraordinary figure meant to Chile, the United States, and the world.

Pinochet’s American backers saw his regime as a bulwark against Communism; his nation was a testing ground for U.S.-inspired economic theories. Countries desiring World Bank support were told to emulate Pinochet’s free-market policies, and Chile’s government pension even inspired President George W. Bush’s plan to privatize Social Security. The other baggage—the assassinations, tortures, people thrown out of airplanes, mass murders of political prisoners—was simply the price to be paid for building a modern state. But the questions raised by Pinochet’s rule still remain: Are such dictators somehow necessary?Horrifying but also inspiring, The Dictator’s Shadow is a unique tale of how geopolitical rivalries can profoundly affect everyday life.

Publisher: Basic Books ISBN-10: 0465002501 www.amazon.com

1.Front Row: Anna Wintour: What Lies Beneath the Chic Exterior of Vogue’s Editor in Chief

by Jerry Oppenheimer She’s ambitious, driven, insecure, needy, a perfectionist--and she’s considered the most powerful force in the more than $100 billion fashion industry. She’s Anna Wintour, editor in chief of Vogue, the world’s fashion bible. With her signature Louise Brooks bob, trademark sunglasses, and glamorous furs, she’s a sexy international diva, gossiped about the world over. As famed designed Oscar de la Renta declares, “She’s a star.”

Front Row is the scrupulously researched, often shocking life story of this enigmatic icon--a candid portrait of a fashion-obsessed teenager in Swinging Sixties London who claws her way up the ivory tower in New York. It is also an intimate examination of Wintour’s personal passions and needs.

Publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin ISBN-10: 0312323115 ISBN-13: 978-0312323110 www.amazon.com

http://facebook.com/jewelsbyjools

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JOSHUA Hamburg

>> hidden assets << available at cream www.saintcream.com

hand “big coin”

Photos by Felix Krüger / Model: Jan (thespecial)

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Jacket - Emporio Armani, Body suit - Vintage, Skirt - Free People, Shoes - ASH

Beautiful Sorrow PHOTOGRAPHY FLORENCE LEUNG WWW.FLOTOGRAPHY.CA MODEL BRITT S. FOR NEXT MODELS WARDROBE STYLIST MICHELLE LAW MAKE UP OZ ZANDIYEH USING MAC COSMETICS HAIR JENINE LEHFELDT PHOTOGRAPHY ASSISTANT FRANK YEH VIDEO BY HARRY MA

WATCH THE MAKING OF VIDEO HERE: http://vimeo.com/30883515

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White dress - Herve Leger, Blazer - BCBGMAXAZRIA, Necklaces -Expression

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Right: Beaded dress worn as cape - Halston Heritage, White dress - Herve Leger, Head piece - Stylist own Left: Jacket - Emporio Armani, Body suit - Vintage, Skirt - Free People, Shoes - ASH

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Backless dress - Riche, Leggings - Robert Rodriguez, Shoes - ASH, Head piece - H&M

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DICTATORSHIP OF TIME !

Text by Nina Kharytonova

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I am too late, always and everywhere. No matter the effort I am bound to lose against the merciless ticking time. Chronopsychology – a science responsible for explaining the organizing and handling of time by living creatures claims this to be a trait of my personality type. So this science divides people into two kinds: the through timer – the well organized and disciplined planner and the in timer – the chaotic person living for the very moment. The relation of those two types is that of 50:3. Well to those last ones it must be that I belong. Hail to modern science; now I don’t have to be embarrassed for being late anymore.

I’m coming back to that later. First of all we have to figure out what this dictator-like time is, where it comes from and where it speeds to, unstoppably.

Time is a human invented physical notion that in correlation to space embodies a fourth dimension. Its SI base symbol is t (from the Latin: Tempus = time) and its SI base unit is one second –s. It describes a series of events and follows naturally as expected a one way, irreversible direction. For us it has the property to flow.

Witnessed from a philosophical perspective time is the progress of presence from presence into future, as well as the continued duration of a sequence of now-moments. But even scholars seem to have very split opinions around time and the ways we perceive it.

The first systematic reflections on time reach back to Platon. He introduces the theory of ideas, according to which ideas live forever in a timeless space of non-change, while their representations, which show up in our human surrounding time and space, are nothing but shadows of the original ones.

Which leads to the conclusion that time is only a depiction of eternity. For Heraclitus time represents being, the true being of a whole reality, All is flux, nothing stays still (Heraclitismus). Aristotle also did agree to this conception, except for him time is unchangeable, not really a motion in itself but actually a unit.

This idea of a continuation and connection of space and time is still examined by physics today. Augustine, using Aristotle defines time as a unit of past, presence and future, but he thinks time is intertwined with human experience, specifically the human soul. Only presence acquires the right to an autonomous existence outside the soul, while past and future can only exist in connection to the human soul. Augustine was also the first to draw a line between physically measurable time and psychological time.

Quid est ergo tempus? si nemo ex me quaerat, scio; si quaerenti explicare velim, nescio. fidenter tamen dico scire me quod, si nihil praeteriret,non esset praeteritum tempus, et si nihil adveniret, non esset futurum tempus, et si nihil esset, non esset praesens tempus. duo ergo illa tempora, praeteritum et futurum, quomodo sunt, quando et praeteritum iam non est et futurum nondum est?” Augustinus, Confessiones XI, 14 So what is time? When nobody asks me about it, I know it, but when I have to explain it to someone asking me, then I don’t know.

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In caution I can at least say that I know, that if nothing passed there would be no past time and if nothing is awaiting then there is no future time. Yet these two kinds of time, past and future, how can we say they exist when the past is already gone and the future is not there yet?)

Isaac Newton talks of an absolute, mathematically defined time, which is uniform by nature and exists regardless of any outside object.”Time is, and it is ticking evenly from moment to moment. This definition has managed to prevail in science.

On the contrary, for Immanuel Kant, time is subject to pure perspective, allowing us an entrance to the world and enabling a relation to before and after. He views the cause-andeffect chain as time-bound. Modern philosophy differentiates between total time-definition such as Augustine’s, relative time-definition such as Kant’s and modern natural science’s definition. By the way now, according to modern findings lasts ca. 2-3 seconds, then it dissolves into past.

The most interesting part about time, is that our first encounter with it in school. Children are oblivious to time, they are preoccupied with something as long as they are having fun doing so. After they get into school they face time obligations and realize the sense of time.

And this is where all evil begins.

Our interest in time keeps growing, the English term “time” counts 204 million entries on Google, way more than sex. Literature and cinema also gift this subject its well deserved attention. Some examples include:

The film “Lola rennt” http://youtu.be/Mx8XPYbMuXA The novel “Momo” by Michael Ende http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Momo Yet all this hasn’t always been the case. During Stone Age and antiquity people used to live in a set and stable time surrounding, ruled and marked by long sequences such as day, week, month and year, subject to the astronomic arrangements.

However, in the last 4000 years our time surroundings have changed dramatically, mainly due to the cultural changes and most of all because of the industrial revolution.

The invention of the electric light bulb and the cheap power plants have led to shift work and always faster spinning conveyor belts.

The history of measuring time is just as much a technological success story, beginning with sun dials around 6000 B.C. The demand to measure time follows the development of man from hunter and collector to resident man. Soon after the sun dials, water and sand clocks followed up, and for the first time during the Middle Ages a mechanic time clock appears in order to discipline the folk according to the structured religion. Soon the technological process brought spring- and pendulum clocks and finally Quarz- and atomic clocks and watches used world wide to count time.

This very cultural and technical development has lead us to a sheer inevitable Dictatorship of Time. The more precise we can take down time, the more aware we became of the loss of it.

Time begins to get saved, managed and then eventually still lost. This explains plenty of sayings emerging today and sealing our frantic times, such as “time is money”, “win or lose time”, “time flies by”. In a continuously dynamic society, which keeps reinventing and creating new chances, objective time becomes somewhat of a thorn since it is not subject to control and continues to pass by uniformly and inexorably. This easily explains the undying wish for the invention of a time machine and the possibility to stop or master time.

People experience this immense desire to stop time in danger situations mostly, when their bodies are pushed to the limits, or well for Buddhist monks while meditating. All in all our feeling of time is contradicting mathematical time whenever possible. This issue has been keeping scientists busy all over the world for many centuries now. Albert Einstein, for instance, discovered his theory of relativity to say in short that everything is only relative, just as our feeling of time as well.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_relativity

The relativity of perception is easily displayed in a simple example: when a guy spends one minute with his girl, then this minute lasts just a moment, while had the same guy spent this same minute sitting on a hot burning board it would seem to last forever. The remarkable about time is the fact that a period of time that has been spent eventfully, is being registered afterwards as a much longer period that it actually was.

Which is to say: if you want a long full life, you should make sure you get plenty of variety and excitement.

By the way in 20 seconds of reading time following happens in our body: Our heart has been beating 25 times Our lungs has ventilated 3 ltr of air 5-6 ltr of blood have been pumped through the body.

200 mg CO2 have been exhaled by an adult.

There are many factors responsible for the differences in time perception â&#x20AC;&#x201C;inner factors, such as body temperature, age, sex, attention, activity, drugs, intelligence, tiredness, brain damage, and psychological disease, and outer factors such as speed of an event, number of stimuli, familiarity with whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s happening, complexity and structure, circumstances and danger. Perception is something as individual as men themselves.

It embraces a spectrum of a few milliseconds up to several decades. Our feeling of time consists of experiences of simultaneity and non-simultaneity, experiences of a time-set order, sequenced events, experiencing the presence but also experiencing duration. Its origin is in the brain.

In 5 minutes reading time: 275 ltr of water are being exchanged in our blood vessels 3.9 ltr of blood are ďŹ&#x201A;oating through the cerebral cortex.

Which brings us back to an issue, that seems to have been forgotten behind by our modern hectic society. I am speaking of the biological notion of time as it is experienced by all living creatures.

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The branch of science dealing with it is Chronobiology and the resulting Chronomedicin.

Chronobiology is examining the cycles of our inner clocks, the ones our body is subject to In 8 minutes reading time: Our long-term memory has stored 50 Bit of information, our short-term memory has already forgotten the first paragraphs.

In the meantime following parallels have been drawn: millisecond rhythm – nerve impulse; second rhythm – heartbeat, blood pressure; minute rhythm – peripheral perfusion; ultradian rhythm (one to more hours) – realization of sleeping stages, endocrine glands; circadian rhythm (24 hours) – sleep-/wake rhythm, cell division rhythm; infradian rhythm (longer time spans) – menstrual cycle; circannual rhythm (year cycle) – annual rhythms.

Our inner clock is governed by the so called circadian rhythm, the nerve bundles, located between the retina and the optic nerves triggered by the hormone melatonin.Yet what happens when our inner clock comes off due to the constantly faster speeding world? Researchers have found out that a disruption of the 24-hour-rhythm, apart from a difficulty in performing and attention, can also lead to serious diseasing such as depression or even cancer. Man is completely unbalanced and regaining it can be a very long and boring process. http://www.shiatsu-austria.at/einfuehrung/wissen_26.html

Using all our knowledge about time perception and our inner clock there could be political action that would lead to a more matching time management and a general satisfaction and a rise in productivity and efficiency.

However, while all this remains daydreaming there are plenty of things we can do to escape the Dictatorship of Time, at least temporarily. Yoga practitioners, for example, reach the point of melting in with time, the stage where time loses its existence through bodily exercise, meditation, and breathing. Eckhart Tolle, in his book “Jetzt” promises help with simple mental strength.

http://eckharttolle.de/

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Our concentration is steered toward presence, since past and future do no really exist as anything but vague surroundings of the present time. After a while, our mind shuts down and we are able to experience pure joy in the presence, removed from time pressure or lack of time.

As Albert Einstein always used to say: Time is only what you can read off a clock!

Nothing more and nothing less!

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A Dynasty lit tle room s Photography by Hiro Kimura Direction Sh Kojima Styling Toru Nagoshi Hair Takashi Yusa Make Up U-Ki Nakamura Lighting Kouki Takezawa Setdesign Sachiko Kamiya Models: Alise Shoemaker, Lisa Cady, Madaline Blake @Click N,Y

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Dress left: Elie Saab Dress middle: Alberta Ferretti Dress right: Emilio Pucci Earrings & Necklace: Swarovski Crystal Bracelets: Stylist own

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Dress: Elie Saab Necklace: Swarovski Crystal Bracelets: Stylist own

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Dress left: Elie Saab Necklace: Swarovski Crystal Bracelets: Stylist own

Jacket right: American Apparel Necklace: Swarovski Crystal Bracelets: Stylist own

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Blouse: Vintage Lingerie: Lise Charmel

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Dress Alberta Ferretti Blouse: Vintage Necklace: Swarovski Crystal Bracelets: Stylist own

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Lingerie Corset: Louis Vuitton Rings: Chanel Necklace & Bracelets: Stylist own

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A DICTATOR

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IS A RULER

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I WANNA

CHER!

by Yamaho

MUSIC

Yamaho is known for her versatile music style. People have trusted her taste since 1999 when she started spinning on the one´s & two´s. Like never before she is picking out the cream of the crop and all she want´s to do is cher.

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ACTIVE CHILD !

Active Child a.k.a Pat Grossi Gracing the music world with his presence in 2010 Active Child came out with his first EP, Curtis Lane with a wide ranging soundscape bringing him to various collaborations. Varying from dub step producer James Blake to indie rock bands such as White lies and White Rabbit. Now one year later he expands his realm and delivers us his Debut album “You are all i see”. An intimate dialogue between him and the listener where the discussion is” heartbreak, lost love and rediscovered, battles with monogamy and identity” as he describes it himself and hints in the title. “Hanging on” is the song that truly pulls you in to his world of love and sorrow. With floating synthesizers, subtle harp accompanied by beautifully sequenced strings and layers of his angelic but haunting falsetto. Leaving you depending on the state, in tears or joy. Something so true can only be gifted with healing powers. If you have not yet discovered Active child now is the time.

Call me Tonight http://youtu.be/QpeJHHngzas www.activechildmusic.com

CONFORCE !

Dance music nowadays has so many releases daily it can be hard to keep track of what is complete crap and what is not.

This EP being a fine example of the latter.

Conforce a.k.a Boris Bunnik a Dutch producer, is well known to the techno community for his unique style, delivering well produced soundscapes and a tight beat and bass. Last august he released the Ep Dystopian Elements where he slows things down a bit. Delivering this four track ep with dark and electric elements. Each song has its own individual character but still leaving you in the realm on refined techno.

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None the less his signature sound is to be found with his force of beat consturction carefully infiltrating his minimal synthized sounds, “Vaccum” last song on the ep bearing that good wittnes. Not everybody can listen to a 9 min long techno track, but with the breathingspace they are given you only long for more. If his music was a drug it would not be legal. Conforce records are havens for high production values, but they wouldn’t be nearly as successful if Bunnik didn’t give his sounds so much breathing room.

The Dystopian Elements EP doesn’t just feature great sounds placed artfully and sparingly in a stereo image, however. It also gives them four very different sorts of knots to get all tangled up in. Opener “Luminous” and “Lonely Run,” though techno to the core, both positively slink: despite the crispness of their drums, these beats are nevertheless impervious to the sticky-tack of gorgeously weighty basslines. The latter, whose bouncy heft recalls Peter Van Hoesen, plays with the relatively slow tempo.

Lonely run http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVQsSO6g9kg www.soundcloud.com/conforce www.Rushhour.nl

MOVE D !

Workshop has yet again released a brilliant Ep featuring Move D. The name, Workshop 13, referencing their 12 releases before this one. All releases that one should check out by the by. Distributed by the infamous Berlin Hardwax record store which right a way has a quality stamp of it´s own. Move D is no amateur to the game has releases going back to 1994. A true innovator to new sounds and a name to give a second look when seen on albums, whether it be a track by him or a remix. Move D delivers three amazing tracks. Ranging from a sexy, slow beat, baby making track “Untitled 3” to more upbeat cooked with delicious old school house flavors, carefully spiced with his electronic melodies “Untitled 2” Leaving us with the third but ever so sweet track “untitled 2” where he arranges gentle beats with a mix of strings and a melodic voice for the finishing touch.

A http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r81glGiSc_w contact: records@workshopsound.com www.hardwax.com

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CONNAN MOCKASIN !

Connan Mockasin-Forever-dolphin love Rmx A young New zelander named Connan Mockasin released a album yearlier this year called Forever Dolphin love, which took the indie music scene by storm for it´s gentle guitar sounds and captivating melodies. Duly noted this is a album review of the music section but not a remix section. That said, after listening to the the Rmx of “Forever Dolphin love” i had no choice but to cher this with you. An amazing ensamble of the original song and two remixes made by Erol Alkan & Mickey moonlight. Taking this dreamlike and airy experimental track into new levels of musical experience. Erol Alkan giving the track an extra push with a 4 by 4 beat and putting the focus on the beautiful guitar sounds and melodic keyboard action. Making it the perfect beginning of the night , middle of the night, end of the night track. Mickey Moonlight is no rookie when it comes to delivering a good remix takes the track a different direction and slows the party down. Giving an already dreamy track an even more utopian feel to it.

With a dub that could easily belong on a trojan compilation. Such a treat for all music lovers.

Forever Dolphin Love http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qC0EsI3RYG8 www.Myspace.com/connanmockasin www.Connanmockasin.tumblr.com

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CAVALIER !

Agnés a.k.a Cavalier deep house producer released “A million Horses” a staggering 19 track album last august. Now don´t go running quite yet. Even though deep house is not everybodys cup of tea or hot cup of java as i choose to call it hear me out.

Cavalier puts the D in deep house for sure giving us the full range of this music genre in one album. Some like it fast, some like it slow. With that said having 19 tracks to choose from you are bound to find what you are looking for, if you are looking at all. “A million horses” is a mix between songs in full length with shorter interludes and skits.

The beat craftsmith that Agnes is, he takes us from fully formed tracks to more of what would seem an idea but still a good idea. Programming all his beats individually giving it his signature deep house sound. Mixed with classic house vocals “ umadoshi” being a obvious party flavor. This album gives a good spectrum of the deep house genre and for those who want to explore that realm, this is the perfect opportunity.

Napoletano http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1jKT0q7uM8 http://www.compost-rec.com/

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YOKO DUO !

A duo ensambled by Berlin based Holger Zilske techno & electronica maestro (Smash TV) which is known for his avant garde beat ensembles and Swedish August Landelius giving us beautifully smooth operated vocals.Founded in 2010 deliver us there Debut album „Behaving Like A Widower“. A perfect harmony between obscure electronic beats, airy synthesizers and heavenly melancholic vocals. Bringing an ecologically balanced entity to the table. Tracks with slow filtered beats with songs like “blowfish” with an indie,hip hop feel to a more subtle electronic sound with an experimental twist with songs such as “ half awake”. All tracks have individual characters so it is very hard pointing out any favorites. But the vocals being delivered with such certainty that when you listen to “lack of comfort” and he says “time is going to make things better” it is hard not to believe.

If you feel happy or sad or just simply wanna discover something new, interesting and beautiful this album is well worth pressing play.

Behaving Like a Widower hhttp://vimeo.com/26800783 http://www.fauxpasmusik.de/ www.soundcloud.com/yokoduo

A HO

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H&M Women

should

Editorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Choice by

Libertine

MIU MIU

Phillip Lim

ONK!

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Bottega Veneta

d Wear

y Susann Bosslau

Uncommon Creatures

Junya Watanabe

Versace for

H&M

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ANGO

by Kiril Bikov

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Kiril Bikov Born in Bourgas, Bulgaria, Kiril Bikov moved to Sofia at the age of seventeen, and studied Visual Arts in the New Bulgarian University. Specializing in photography, his Bachelorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s degree explored a diverse range of artistic mediums, including: spatial interventions, performance art, installation, and mixed-media work.

Bikovâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s recent work reflects a critical engagement with his interests in thanatology (the study of death), Judeo-Christian mysticism, eroticism, and allegorical critiques of anthropocentrism. He has contributed with his photographs and performances to exhibitions in art spaces and festivals across Europe.

He currently lives and works in Berlin. http://www.bikov.de

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TRANSFO

ON THE

COLLECTION: TOM

ORMAMA

E RUN

M VAN dER BORGHT

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TOM VAN dER BROUGHT http://tomvanderborght.blogspot.com Interview by Coco Meurer Tom Van der Borght, born 1978, is a Belgium Fashiondesign Student at the Acadmy of Fine Arts of Sint-Niklaas. 3 years ago he starts his fashion education and just a year later he works as an intern for Maureen Declerq. In 2011 he wins the Belgian Final of the Triumph Inspiration Award and competes in the world final.

His work is worn by Lily Cole and we are sure there will be soon more Celbrities wearing Tom van der Brought. His last collection Transformama is very color full and everybody should have a piece of his collection. Let s find out who he is and what makes him so special!

HONK!: Tom how was your day? Was it full of creativity and new ideas?

Tom: I’m having a chaotic yet productive day. I’m in the middle of doing the research and startup for my graduation collection. So it’s one big chaotic bubble of ideas, questions, images and input...overdrive hahaha. But I thrive on it. Iit’s like creating a new little universe.

HONK!: Please explain what sets your fashion apart! And how it differs from that of other designers?

Tom: I think my own personal story which translates into my work, makes me unique. I come from a very classical background - my mother was a sewing teacher. Being brought up in a very small place in the northeast of Belgium, in my early twenties i discovered a much broader world. I first worked as a social worker, and in the meanwhile I discovered the underground psychedelic trance scene of the late nineties.

This made me think a lot about society, social structures, mainstream and underground. All these influences speak out it through my work now as a designer I think. My motivation to become a social worker was to change the world or to change systems, and in a way I think that’s still my dream and vision, translated into my fashion. I think i don’t see fashion as beauty, but I view my work more as expression. In that light my work could come across as more unconventional.

HONK!: Other designers find inspiration in the city they live in or their surroundings.

Your designs don’t make us think of Belgium that much. Your style reminds us more of Tokyo and Mangas. How come?

Tom: Haha. First of all I ask myself what is typical Belgian. Maybe living in Belgium is a very big reason why everything in my work is so bright and colorful. My work always tells a story of breaking out of the conventional. I’m obsessed with making bad things look good, or ugly things look beautiful. So the happy bright almost exotic atmospheres in my work also stand in a contrast with darker elements ... I like for example the contrast between my manga style digital print and the old-skool crossstitched jewelry I produced with the same images, this mix of unexpected things together excites me.

HONK!: Are you bored of the fashion and trends that you come across in your city or on catwalks even?

Tom: In fashion there is always this tension between looking back and looking forward. In a world where everything is changing more rapidly than ever before in human history, I sometimes spot the tendency to go back in time, and people may tend to go for safer options. But at the same time, when i am out on the streets, I can also be very much inspired by the things I see around.

Fashion always is a way of people to express how they feel and who they are.

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Tom: In that way I would say that it would be great if more people would dare to step out of that safe zone and just have fun again expressing themselves more freely :-) HONK!: In summer 2011 you presented your collection “Transformama” in the Berlin Fashion Week. How did you come up with this name? What does it mean?

But the collection as an expression is the most important for me.

HONK!: Art or fashion? Or is fashion art?

What do you think?

Tom: Euh ... tough one. I’d say fart!! haha. No seriously, I don’t really believe in boxes.

Tom: It all started with ancient indian Kathakali dancers. Before a performance, they get dressed troughout a long ritual and transform into these superhuman creatures. I found the build-up of these costumes so interesting that I decided to work further on this concept of transforming. In the same period my mother also asked me, partly as a joke, if I couldn’t restyle her. There I got the main idea for the collection. Based on old pictures of my mother, in combination with lots of street style elements, I began to transform my own mum into some kind of superwoman. That’s how I came up with the title “Transformama”.

HONK!: What is in your scrapbook right now? What kind of music, what kind of art, or other kind of inspiration?

HONK!: How do you think people would react seeing a woman wearing your 6 sleeved jacket, getting on the metro?

Tom: Thank you! COCO AND HONK!

Tom: Haha ... I can imagine it could trigger people to some crazy reactions. But it’s amazing to wear it! You feel strong, and also safe in a way.

At least you will have more space for yourself on the metro :-). And the good thing is that it consists of two separate jackets on top of each other ... so you could always help out someone who’s cold. So acually it’s a very social jacket, although it might come across a bit impressive :-) HONK!: Your designs are so much “outside form and box” that it seems really hard work producing them! How do you think you will deal with the production part?

Tom: Up untill now I do all my production myself. As long as I’m a student I want to keep on working like this. Because next to designing my things, I also love to make them myself ... and it’s the whole process I want to do. I like this craftsman oldskool approach the best. In my graduation collection, I’m working on now, I wanna search further for ways in which (parts of) my collections can be transformed into more daily wearable items.

Tom: I’m listening to the cd of Prince Rama (check them out!), mixed with Björks amazing album ‘Biophilia’, reading a book about Charles Manson and am very intrigued at the moment by native Mexican art ... but shhh before I give away.

HONK!: Thank you very much for the interview. Coco!

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TRANSFORMAMA Photos by Alexander Popelier Make Up/Hair by Adelien De Puysseleyr Models: Joanne Chalon, Hector Mary, Jules & Leonie Borgs Production: Tini Cleemput Assistent photos: Lieven Dirckx Special thanks to Caroline Bosmans, George, Vispoel-Van Rentergem family

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WHAT NEEDS TO

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O BE DONE ? http://www.icrc.org/eng/index.jsp

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Photography: Nouveau Noir www.nouveaunoir.nl Model: Anniek Vermeulen Layout: Caro Meyer

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JOSHUA Hamburg

>> hidden assets << available at cream www.saintcream.com

neck “the key : the secret” and “I GING : der Friede”

Photos by Felix Krüger / Model: Jan (thespecial)

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BENNY NERO “MICKITLER” Mickitl er

by Benny Nero

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â&#x20AC;&#x153; I am interested in

the concept of

propaganda â&#x20AC;?

BENNY NER O

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www.bennynero.com

Benny Nero is an artist the way I like it! His art is provoking, you have to be able to think outside the box when looking at it. The 25 year old Austrian is holding a mirror against society’s face, like nobody else would dare lately. He is using symbols of a dictatorship that has caused great suffering to the world, without insulting anyone. This is what art has to be.

HONK!: You are from Austria, yet living in Berlin.

When and why did you move?

Benny: I moved in 2005 in order to work as an illustrator and animator. In the mean time I’m making a living as an independent artist, and Berlin is the right city to do this,.

HONK!: What inspires you in this city?

Benny: The Germans and their lifestyle. Very much is suppressed here, held in the dark. This impotent dealing with reality is a rich field of inspiration for my work. And when this begins to piss me off, the city is filled with people from everywhere in the world and you can still calm down somehow.

Benny: This love culture seems to be having towards pornography doesn’t seem to be much more than a cover to allow us to stop fearing our bodies.

I don’t think it can make anybody think. Way I see it, it is easy to use something vulgar as a symbol for joy in life, in order to avoid any real feelings. I don’t think this is good or bad but it is a fact that you have to face.

HONK!: Is there a dictatorship in art? I could imagine some galleries might be hesitant when it comes to exhibiting your work.

If so, how do you deal with it?

Benny: It has never happened to me, they are all pretty excited.

HONK!: Your work is provoking! The imagery of political propaganda is a recurring HONK!: Your series „Mickitler“ is for me, as a German, very bold. I am certain that a Gertheme. What’s up with it? man creating this series would have lots of Are you a political person? trouble.

Benny: I am too much of an idealist to be a po- Did you have to go through that? litical person. I am interested in the concept of propaganda and its influence on people. The globally accepted image of society is nothing but Benny: First of all, causing this „Oh god, Nazis“ propaganda in itself, an advertisement for a non- cramp reaction was one of the goals when creating this series. I want the viewer’s first impresexistent lifestyle that has been agreed on.

I am only painting reality the way it reveals itself sion to be a shock that forces him/her to go to a to me, and this means: with a thick layer of pro- deeper level. Then again I try to make it easier on them by using so much irony in the pictures. paganda.

This helps you notice your psychological barriHONK!: You are also using pornography. In ers. Of course there are people not willing to fol2011, do you think it is possible to shock low to the next step, they just remain shocked, people through pornography, to make them but I don’t get real trouble. I think it is obvious in the paintings that I am not idolizing anything. think? Or are we already numbed?

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”

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HONK!: What is the message behind “Mickitler”?

Benny: Look, as a German speaking individual, the face you see most in all your life is that of Hitler. It ceases to be a face and becomes a symbol. Same as the face of Micky Maus is only a symbol nowadays. Hitler is Micky Maus, only a darker version, the shadow – Monstermicky.

This sinking into the symbols is the basis on which I have built everything else. But every single picture in the series is approaching a different subject. Mickitler is just opening the door each time.

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HONK!: How, where, when can we see more of your work? What project are you working on at the moment?

Benny: Regarding exhibitions, you can always find information on my website www.bennynero. com. Hm, projects I am working on at the moment… I am busy with Body-Politics right now. Lets see what comes of it. But just for a change it’s something including no swastikas this time.

Interview by Marcel Schlutt

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Televized Photography: Neda Rajabi Assistant: Doro Schwartzmann Styling: Aude Jamier Make Up & Hair: Patricia Makosch Model: Su Shien @Mega Models

</LEATHER

JACKET: ALL

SAINTS SILVER/_CHOKER: WEEKDAY/_CAP: VINTAGE >

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</BRA:TRÈS BONJOUR> </BRACELET: SABRINA DEHOFF> </SKIRT:VINTAGE>

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</TURTLE

NECK TOP AND MULTI RINGS NECKLAGE: MONKI/_SHORT: TOPSHOP/_BRACELET: WEEKDAY>

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</”NEDA RAJABI”> </BORN:1982 IN SHIRAZ> </BASED IN BERLIN> </PRODUCT DESIGNER AND PHOTOGRAPHER> </FAVORITE COLOR:GREY>

HONK!: HELLO NEDA. I REALLY LIKE YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY WORK. AND I THINK YOU ARE A BIG BIG TALENT. WHEN DID YOU START WITH PHOTOGRAPHY? AND WHY? NEDA: THANK YOU! I STARTED SPENDING MY POCKET MONEY ON VOGUE AND ELLE MAGAZINES QUITE EARLY. I WAS SO INTRIGUED BY BEAUTY AND THE DIVERSITY OF APPROACHES HOW TO REVEAL BEAUTY. WELL, AT THAT TIME I WOULD RATHER NOT HAVE EXPRESSED MYSELF THAT WAY BUT I KNOW NOW, THAT THIS WAS EXACTLY HOW I FELT. BEAUTY CAN BE ANYTHING. AMAZING. HONK!: LOOKING AT YOUR PICTURES , I CAN SEE DIRECTLY THAT YOU ALREADY FOUND YOUR OWN STYLE. HOW WOULD YOU DISCRIBE YOUR STYLE?

HONK!: IS THERE YOU? AND WHY?

ANY PHOTOGRAPHER WHO INSPIRES

NEDA: THERE ARE MANY THAT I ADORE, OF COURSE AVEDON AND LINDBERGH. I LOVE THE WORK OF JÜRGEN TELLER. THE WAY HE DARES COMPOSITIONS IS JUST AMAZING. AND I NEVER GET TIRED OF THE DRAMA IN HEDI SLIMANE’S WORK. HONK!: I ALSO DO PHOTOGRAPHY AND I HATE WORKING IN THE STUDIO. I NEED THE NATURAL LIGHT. WHAT DO YOU PREFER? NEDA: I

LOVE DAYLIGHT.

BUT

DEPENDING ON THE PROJ-

ECT, ARTIFICIAL LIGHT CAN BE INTERESTING, TOO.

NEDA: I LIKE STYLISTIC INCONSISTENCY. I ALWAYS TRY TO LET ATTRIBUTES PLAY AGAINST EACH OTHER. A STRONG

HONK!: FASHION OR ART? WHAT DO YOU LIKE MORE?

EXPRESSION OR POSE ON A SOFT LOOKING GIRL OR VICE

NEDA: I

VERSA.

TWEEN CHOCOLATE AND PANCAKES.

WORKING

ON A CONCEPT

I

LIKE THIS EFFECT TO

CAN’T TELL

–

LT’S LIKE

I

HAVE TO CHOOSE BE-

THEY

GO WELL TO-

BE INTENSIFIED WITH MAKE UP AND STYLING.

GETHER.

HONK!: HOW MUCH OF YOUR OWN PERSONALITY IS IN YOUR WORK? WHEN I AM LOOKING AT YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY , I HAVE THE FEELING YOU ARE A VERY SENSITIV PERSON.

HONK!: IS THERE ANY ARTIST OR MODEL YOU WOULD LIKE TO WORK WITH?

NEDA: OF

NEDA: DEFINITELY. THIS IS WHAT I LOVE ABOUT THIS JOB: YOU MEET FANTASTIC PEOPLE ALL THE TIME.

COURSE PICTURES REFLECT SOMEONES PER-

SONALITY BECAUSE THEY SHOW WHAT YOU SEE – THROUGH

I ENABLE OTHERS TO LOOK THROUGH MY THEY MIGHT EVEN SHOW HOW I THINK. BESIDE OF THAT TO ME THE CONCEPT IS IMPORTANT. THINKING ABOUT DICTATOR SHIP FOR INSTANCE I QUESTIONED MYSELF IF WE ARE AFFECTED BY DICTATOR SHIP AT ALL AND HOW. BEING MY PICTURES

HONK!: WHERE DO YOU SEE YOURSELF AND YOUR WORK IN 10 YEARS. WHAT ARE NEDA´S DREAMS?

EYES.

NEDA: TO BE IN PROGRESS. INTERVIEW BY MARCEL SCHLUTT

HERE IN THE COSY AND NEAT WESTERN WORLD THE MOST COMMON WAY TO BE CONFRONTED WITH DICTATORSHIP IS THROUGH THE SCREEN.

IT’S

TWISTED BECAUSE AT THE

I BELIEVE THAT WE ARE ACTUALLY DICTATED BY VISUAL MEDIA. AND THIS IS THE WAY I WANTED THE STORY TO LOOK LIKE: THROUGH THE SCREEN. SAME TIME

http://cargocollective.com/nedarajabi/

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STEED LORD

They came together by mere coincidence the Icelandic band Steed Lord consists of three individuals: Kali, (singer/songwriter/ stylist) and Mega (producer/director/designer) and Eddie House (producer/composer).

Steed lord is a musical performance art project, making, as they would best describe it, “emotional electronic dance music “. Steed Lord have released their music and remixes on labels such as Get Physical, Ed Banger and Dim Mak as well as releasing on their own label. Successfully collaborating with the italian legends Crookers, Steed Lord have also been remixed by artists such as Jack Beats, Dj Mehdi, Reset! and Mustard Pimp to name a few.

After having established solid ground in their home town they relocated to Los Angeles where they continue to grow and push their limits by giving us powerful & energetic sounds that makes the bass bounce off your ass. Being a 100% “do it yourself” project, they refuse to be dictated by the music industry so they produce their own music and videos releasing them under their own label called New Crack City Records. They work hard for the money and take crap from no one. Giving cool a run for it, their style will make your head turn 180 degrees. Which didn’t go unnoticed by the H&M giant where they were asked to design their own fashion line. Their mantra being: “Don´t compromise your art, stay true to yourself “. With out further a due I give you: Steed Lord.

Interview by Natalie G Gunnarsdottir Self Portraits by Steed Lord Make-up- Hildur Ársælsdóttir Styling by Steed Lord

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HONK!: Mega & Kali how long have you been a couple and when did you first meet?

Kali: We first met at this icelandic nightclub called Tunglid (The Moon) on new years eve, 1993. I was 16 years old and Mega was 15. I was partying that night with some friends and saw him and he saw me. It was love at first sight. We both had bleached hair and were totally into the rave dance scene and our style was kinda similar.

Mega: Couple of weeks later we started hanging out, we had mutual friends. I had a huge crush on her but I was really shy when it came to girls. I didn´t really know how to ask her to be my girlfriend cause she was older and she made me a bit nervous so I just stayed cool.

Kali: But one fateful evening at another club in Reykjavik, I was singing house music with my then band Scope and that was the night we became a couple. It was march 4th 1994. We have been together ever since. We broke up a couple of times but started living together in january 2002 and have been living together since then.

Mega: Kali is my soulmate and couldn’t function without her. I asked her to marry me a couple of months ago and she said YES ;) so we are getting married next year in Iceland... very exciting!

We can´t wait to go back to Iceland and spend our special day with all our family and friends that we love. It´s gonna be an epic and unforgettable day !

HONK!: When and how did Steed Lord become a reality?

Eddie: On february 8th 2006 I gave Kali a beat for her birthday and she wrote a song to it called “You” and from there is just started. I had been making beats since I was 12 and studied piano and percussions and just loved making music.

Kali had been recording and releasing albums since she was 8 years old or something so she was a real professional when it came to writing and recording.

Kali: When Eddie gave me that beat I just knew that this kid, that I used to babysit by the way when he was 5 years old, was really talented and kind of a wonder kid at writing music.

Mega: I had been a DJ for a long time in Iceland but never really made beats, well I made a few rave tunes in ‘91 on my Amiga computer when I was 13, so I learned about sequencing and basic music production very young. And being a computer nerd I remember giving Eddie my old Mac computer and Ableton Live 2 and he started producing some ill beats on it so I was inspired to do the same and kinda went back to my roots and made Dirty Mutha in a couple of hours one night. And we just got hooked on creating music and we knew we had something special going on when the three of us started writing and recording together, and it just exploded from there.

Kali: There was no stopping us, the songs just kept coming and a couple of months after we starting working together we were booked to do gigs in Iceland and from there we became Steed Lord. It was kinda an accident that Steed Lord happened cause we had never planned to start a band, and before we knew it we were touring all over the world through myspace bookings.

HONK!: Steed Lord is a combination of family and love.

How do you manage to keep a good relationship with each other as brothers and as boyfriend and girlfriend?

Mega: Correct family and love! It´s a challenge of course because I’m in a band with my younger brother and my girlfriend. But our creative relationship is very strong because we´re all so like minded so it´s very natural for us to work together even though we´re a family.

Kali: We of course fight and have heated discussions about our music and about the band but we have enormous respect for one another and we always want to find a way to work things out so everyone is heard in the band cause each opinion matters to us all.

Eddie: I love that I can be totally honest and open with my bandmates in a way that I can´t really be with others. We all have our personal opinions and we have to be critical of each other to be able to grow as a band and keep on evolving.

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Kali: I´m just super happy to be able to live and work with the love of my life and my little brother.

Eddie: I´m truly blessed to be able to tour the world and make music with two of my best friends and people that I love to death. We are a team and we enjoy being in Steed Lord together.

Steed Lord is our baby.

HONK!: What are your music inspirations, and are there any heroines that affected you in a big way?

Eddie: Michael Jackson is my idol number one.

He has inspired me musically and style wise since I was a little kid. Vangelis and Giorgio Moroder have also been a big inspiriation to me and the way I compose music. 9th Wonder, DJ Premier, RZA and other legendary hip hop producers also made me want to produce beats. I listen to all genres of music and I´m always discovering something new that I dig.

Mega: So many great minds and musicians inspire me. I grew up on listening to what my grandmother put on when she was cleaning the house and thankfully she put some Eurythmics and Grace Jones along with Aretha Franklin!

I discovered Stevie Wonder and Quincy Jones through my dad and weird folk music. Later my older brother gave me NWA and the Posse on cassette when I was 9 years old and that changed my life. From that day on my mom who was a flight attendant bought me all the rap music I needed and she didn’t care about the explicit content and I´m very thankful for that!

She even surprised me and bought me the first Brand Nubian and De La Soul records because I asked her to buy some gangsta rap, yeah a 10 year old white kid from Iceland. I could write pages and pages about musical influences and good shit. Let´s just say I dig good music wether it´s classic pop, 80s funk, rap, disco, or bluegrass.

As far as heroines I guess Prince is somewhat of an icon to me, seen him twice in concert and I have so much respect for his musical entity.

Such a genius and pioneer but I also respect many others like Dr. Dre for instance.

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Kali: I´m a huge classical music fan and I listen to a lot of instrumental movie scores and have done so since I was very young. Barbra Streisand, Stevie Nicks, Patsy Cline, Karen Carpenter, Diana Ross and Cher have been major influences while growing up. Also Aretha Franklin and soul music in general is a favorite of mine.

I listen to a lot of old music and I´m not really into mainstream popular music of today. I adore Teena Marie and all the disco divas from back in the day. Robin S and all the 90´s dance music. I adore Dolly Parton, Eagles and Bryan Ferry and Springsteen. I´m also very inspired by icelandic music, old and new. Icelandic music is pretty unique and it has always influenced me in a big way.

HONK!: Since we are discussing dictatorship in this issue, do you feel there is dictatorship in the music industry today? And if so is that the reason you choose to release everything yourself and have total creative control over the band´s image?

Mega: Money and greed has always been the evil dictator of the music industry so with the internet and the mp3 there was sort of a revolution when people started downloading illegal music to rebel against the industry. But good things came from it because independent artists and labels were able to become successful without the majors which is great and now you can reach so many people online with your music, art, videos and design and you don´t need a middle man to do it for you. You can make a hit record without a major record deal by the power of the internet.

So maybe the internet is our savior from the evil greedy dictator who is putting out shitty pop music with no quality control but what happens if the internet shuts down? Are we all fucked then?

I feel kids today are getting disconnected from the real world by always being online no matter where they are, they are online at concerts even.

Sometimes I do miss the old times of no internet and real social networking but then again I wouldn´t be answering this interview in LA on my computer if we didn´t have internet. The future of the music industry is so uncertain because all content is becoming so worthless money wise so the majors don´t care about quality just exposure.

Yeah technology is taking over the world, before you know it you will be experiencing a virtual concert or a DJ set in your living room with smell-o-vision and super duper HD Hologram video with your friends logged in with their virtual beers… but don´t get me wrong Im not against that… I love Kali: I remember when I was signed as a solo artist with EMI/Priority Records for 4 years back in 1999, I didn´t have any control over the way my album was suppose to sound, I was lucky that I actually got to co-write 6 songs on my own album. I didn´t have a say in anything. They picked the video director and picked the cover art and all the press photos and my stylist. Everything went through them, when I gained a little weight they told me to go on a diet. I hated it. I loved the traveling and being able to tour all over and meet amazing people but in my professional career I wasn´t happy and everything I was doing wasn´t the real me. It was someone they created to be able to sell albums and make money. Cause the label was only in it for the money. Not for the love of music and art and creating things. It was all about the money. After 4 years of this I was really happy to be out of that and being in control and being able to be me.

Eddie: I´m just lucky to be in a band where we have the final say and we are our own bosses. I could never go through what Kali went through.

Some old guys telling me how to dress and how to cut my hair and how to write music. No fucking way. When you are an artist you wanna be your own person and be totally free to create from your heart and soul and always be true to who you are. Otherwise you´re just fooling yourself and everyone else.

Mega: Don´t compromise your art.

Stay true to yourself !

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Money and greed 130 has always been the evil dictator of the music industry..

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HONK!: Some things are simply meant to be.

Since you came together your path has only been upwards, apart from the music being stellar what do you think is the key to you’re success?

Mega: We have never considered ourselves being super successful really. We are still a struggling underground band. And I guess success to us means that we can live off of our music and art, pay our rent and not be slaves to the industry. To be able to have 100% control of our projects and also have a personal life that doesn´t involve our band. That´s important to us cause we live and breath Steed Lord but you always have to have that extra time out to just do silly shit and enjoy life.

Kali: The key to success for everything in life is hard work and if you do that you´ll enjoy success.

Nothing comes for free and you better work for it. We are really thankful and blessed to be able to live off of Steed Lord and have adventures everyday but like I said we work fucking hard for it. We wouldn´t wanna do it any other way.

HONK!: Sometimes life throws you a card that no one expects. In 2008 you had a serious car accident that shook the core of your fans and the Icelandic nation. Can you tell the readers of Honk what happened?

Mega: Yes we were going on a tour in Scandinavia and our dad was driving us to the airport in Iceland. It was snowing and the roads were icy. A car from the opposite direction lost control and hit our car head on. It was an almost fatal car crash. Really serious and horrific. Me, Eddie and Kali were injured in a very serious way and our dad and other brother Elli had other minor injuries. The three of us had very dangerous internal bleedings because we were sitting in the back with no air bags and some of our injuries were close to fatal. We all had to be in the intensive care unit and me and Eddie both had emergency surgeries. Thank god for the talented doctors and nurses working the most important job on the planet, to take care of other people.

Kali: Mega was in the hospital for 4 months and was badly injured internally and that´s something he has to deal with for the rest of his life.

Eddie and I were in the hospital for about a week and we also have permanent health problems today.

We were very lucky that day cause someone could have easily died or been paralyzed. I believe strongly that we were blessed and someone was watching over us.

Eddie: I think we were supposed to go through all this for a reason.

HONK!: What impact did that have on you and the way you approach live today?

Eddie: To go through something so horrible and life threatening really changes your outlook on life. You just don´t sweat the small stuff and try to remember to enjoy every single day cause it could be your last. This car accident happened in a split second and our lives flashed before us and I almost lost my brother. We are just glad to be alive and although we have health problems from the accident, we can´t really complain cause we are here today. It only made us stronger and made us love our families, friends and fans even more. And our message to everyone reading this is to ALWAYS wear seat belts, also in the back!!! because that saved our lives that day!

HONK!: You relocated to Los Angeles. How is it for an Icelandic band to live and thrive in the city of angels?

Mega: It´s great, we love it here. We have always loved California because Kali lived here for a year and half back in early 2000 and she and I had been going there to visit ever since she moved back to Iceland. We always loved the city and many of our friends live here so when we got the chance to move out here again we went for it. And the city has treated us well.

Kali: We just wanted to change the scenery and live somewhere else and when Eddie was more than willing to move with us we just went ahead and did it. These 2 years have been amazing and wonderful. We have made a beautiful home here in LA and the band has flourished since moving. We have all spent a lot of time in the US while growing up, I used to spend my summers at my aunts house in Jacksonville with my family when I was little and the guys used to spend their summers at their parents vacation house in Longboat Key, Florida with their family. So moving to the US wasn´t such a big thing for us cause it has always felt like our second home

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Mega: But being a band in LA you of course feel like a small fish in a big pond because there are so many bands and artists here fighting over the same thing so you have to work extra hard to get heard and noticed, but we love a good challenge. No one said it was gonna be easy so we just take one day at a time, do our thing and go with the flow.

HONK!: What would be your all time dream music collaboration dead or alive, and why?

Mega: Prince! Working with him would be something out of this world and we would learn so much just being in the presence of his greatness.

And Dr. Dre we would love to pick his brains! So Prince and Dre holler at us, let´s do this!

Eddie: Michael Jackson of course.

Kali: I would love to work with Roisin Murphy. I think we could do a mean duet together. She´s truly mind blowing. I also really dig Beth Ditto, her voice is killer and she´s so true to herself.

HONK!: If you’re studio was on fire and you could only save 3 things. What would they be?

Eddie: The computer would be the first thing I’d grab. Also our analog synths, but they weigh so much that we would need to call some beefcake to help us out! And all our hard drives! I would try to stuff as much shit on me and run out. Oh and Mega and Kali, I would carry them on my back if I had to, that’s a lot more than 3 things, shit.

Mega: Our cat Precious, my computers and our Dave Smith Tetra synthesizer.

Kali: Since our studio is in our apartment I would take Precious our cat and try to take some of my fav clothing. I would want to take them all but that would take weeks cause I have too much clothing.

HONK!:Your last album heart 2 heart has brought us yet again the energy and power of Steed Lord and you have been touring the world getting rave reviews.

Can it get any better than this?

Mega: Thank you, but oh yes! We feel like the best stuff is yet to come! We just became a three piece band a couple of months after moving to LA while we were in the midst of making Heart II Heart after being four in the band. Now we have a new direction of where we want to take the band and our artistry. We kinda feel like the music we made together from the beginning was like our growing pains and now we feel all grown up and sexy. We intend to take Steed Lord much further and explore new territories in our sound, videos, art and design. We also had this self discovery kinda late that Steed Lord is a musical performance art project because we have always done much more than just music.

Kali: Yes like Mega said we´ve only just begun.

We feel like in the last year or so we have been growing so much together as a band and the future for Steed Lord is bright and exiting. There are lots more adventures to be had.

Eddie: You ain´t seen nothing yet.

HONK!: If you where to describe you’re music to a person who has never heard a track, how would you?

Mega: This one is always kinds tricky. I actually would love to hear what the person had to say rather than describing it myself. But if I was at gun point I would probably scream our “emotional electronic dance music with a soulful diva-ish gangster lean”.

Kali: Just good quality music.

HONK!: What is happening in the near future for Steed Lord?

Mega: We are putting the finishing touches on our new music video at the moment for “Bed Of Needles” that we have been working on all summer. We also have another dope video project coming out soon but we can´t talk about it yet and a dope hat collaboration with our homie Fresh.I.Am. Then by fall we’re taking a break from the crazyness and recording our next album and we can´t wait to get back into the studio and tour after that! And of course more music videos and film stuff and just all sorts of creative experiments.

133 If you want to step into our world and follow our daily adventures go to

www.steedlord.com peace yall!

STEED LORD www.steedlord.com facebook.com/steedlord myspace.com/steedlord twitter.com/steedlord vimeo.com/steedlord soundcloud.com/steedlord youtube.com/steedlordvideos

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bauhaus archiv berlin

museum of design

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The Bauhaus Collection Classic Modern Originals The Bauhaus Archive/Museum of Design in Berlin is devoted to the research and presentation of the history and influence of the Bauhaus (1919-1933), the most important school of architecture, design and art in the 20th century.

The entire spectrum of the school’s activities is represented in the Bauhaus Collection: architecture, furniture, ceramics, metalwork, photography, stage pieces and student work from the preliminary course, as well as works created by the school’s famous teachers, including Walter Gropius, Johannes Itten, Paul Klee, Lyonel Feininger, Vasily Kandinsky, Josef Albers, Oskar Schlemmer, László Moholy-Nagy and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. Even today, the ‘Bauhaus Lamp’, the ‘Vasily’ armchair and Bauhaus wallpaper designs are regarded as modern classics.

This presentation of paintings, drawings, sculptures and models by Bauhaus masters and students, comprising a selection from the world’s largest collection of Bauhaus artefacts, illustrates the lasting influence of the Bauhaus.

The museum building is a late work of Walter Gropius, the founder of the Bauhaus. It was planned 1964 for Darmstadt and was built 1976-79 in modified form in Berlin. Today, its characteristic silhouette is one of Berlin’s landmarks.

Bauhaus 1919-33 The Bauhaus began with an utopian definition: “The building of the future” was to combine all the arts in ideal unity. This required a new type of artist beyond academic specialisation, for whom the Bauhaus would offer adequate education.

In order to reach this goal, the founder, Walter Gropius, saw the necessity to develop new teaching methods and was convinced that the base for any art was to be found in handcraft: “the school will gradually turn into a workshop”. Indeed, artists and craftsmen directed classes and production together at the Bauhaus in Weimar. This was intended to remove any distinction between fine arts and applied arts.

The reality of technical civilisation, however, led to requirements that could not only be fulfilled by a revalorisation of handcraft. In 1923, the Bauhaus reacted with a changed program, which was to mark its future image under the motto: “art and technology - a new unity”. Industrial potentials were to be applied to satisfactory design standards, regarding both functional and aesthetic aspects. The Bauhaus workshops produced prototypes for mass production: from a single lamp to a complete dwelling.

Of course, the educational and social claim to a new configuration of life and its environment could not always be achieved. And the Bauhaus was not alone with this goal, but the name became a near synonym for this trend.The history of the Bauhaus is by no means linear. The changes in directorship and amongst the teachers, artistic influence from far and wide, in combination with the political situation in which the Bauhaus experiment was staged, led to permanent transformation. The numerous consequences of this experiment still today flow into contemporary life.

Bauhaus-Archiv,Klingelhöferstraße 14, D - 10785 Berlin Telephone: +49 30 - 25 40 02 0,E-mail: bauhaus@bauhaus.de Admission Charges Saturday, Sunday and Monday 7,- € / 4,- € Wednesday, Thursday and Friday 6,- € / 3,- €

www.bauhaus.de

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RAGNAR PERSSON Interview by Amanda M. Jansson & Emma E.K.Jones www.ragnarpersson.com

WE LIVE IN

DARK TIMES

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Ragnar Persson is a special one. One of my favourite illustrators, the 30 year old Swede is an artist that feels embarrassed to draw and do things “the right way”. His work, be it illustrations or collages, is a feast of black metal, bats, crosses, blood, woods, cigarettes, animals, girls, scribbling, human bones, and ink blotches. A graduate of Sweden’s most important university for arts, Ragnar knows how to trigger the eye. You look once and you just can’t resist looking twice, for a little longer, until you get completely drawn in a world of authenticity, youth, melancholia, nostalgia, DIY lust, and true genius. A humble pencil user, he doesn’t day dream or obsess about becoming stinking rich from drawing. Instead, he is working hard- even when drunk, he prints his own zine, which is a marvel to hold, and has already published 3 books: Sarcofago, Heart Full of Napalm and Feel The Darkness.

Right before departing for his exhibition in France I managed to ask him a few questions.

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HONK!: Ragnar, you are still pretty young.

When and how did you know you want to be an illustrator?

Ragnar: Don`t know about young really. Im 30!!!

But anyhow, I kind of don`t see me as an illustrator ( never have ) , I see it more like I make drawings, and that is something I always loved doing, it is sort of like a diary ( some is true and some not…) it is just something I do every day!

It’s very rare that I make illustrations, I don’t get any offers, and it is something that I am really bad at, I can’t make a drawing on demand… I’ve tried a few times but it is really hard! But to answer your question, I don`t know really… I always made drawings but I never thought of it as work, you know.

HONK!: What material do you prefer to use when you draw?

Ragnar: Any really, whatever is laying around, sometimes you make your best drawings on a napkin and sometimes on the bench waiting for a bus, and sometimes on nice expensive paper you bought for your hard earned money.

HONK!: Your work is kinda dark most of the times, where do you get inspiration from?

HONK!: Which dictatorships existing bother you when creating?

Ragnar: So many… Hitler, Mussolini, Al Gadafffi, Franko, Saddam, Pol Pot, Kim II-sung, and the list just gets longer… You get the point! Any violation of human rights bothers me, I know a few of these dictators are dead and so on, but I really think it is important to not forget and keep on struggling for a better world. If you can help someone, that is bigger than art.

HONK!: Do you think your illustrations are governed by some kind of scheme?

Ragnar: Yes, maybe. I don`t really have an answer for that, but I guess I have a way of seeing things under a romantic light… Both good and bad.

HONK!: What are you afraid people fail to see when they look at you work? What do you want them to see?

Ragnar: Sometimes people just see an image and they think good or bad and move on, but it really doesn`t bother me ( I make art for me! And if some like it, it is good and if some don`t it is also good!)

Yet sometimes people get inspired and go home and do something creative themselves, and that is a true honour if I can get them going!

Ragnar: We live in dark times so then the drawing gets dark…

HONK!: Are you reading anything at the moment?

HONK!: Do you think art today is as free as you would like it to be?

Ragnar: “The american girl” (don`t know if that is the English translation….) by Monika Fagerholm, fantastic book!!!! Go get her books!

Ragnar: No and yes… As always there are people that really stand out as truly originals and people that don`t.

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let´s play WAR let´s play WAR Photos by Pascale jean-Louis Photos

by Pascale jean-Louis Styling Marcel schlutt, Models: Paul Brock, Styling Marcel schlutt, Models: Paul, Marley Jean-Louis, karl@ izaio models marley, karl@ izaio models Karl is wearing Moga e mago Karl is wearing Moga e mago

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t´s play WAR Photos by Pascale jean-Louis

Styling Marcel schlutt, Models: Paul, marley, karl@ izaio models Karl is wearing Moga e mago

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Put your toy soldiers aside.

Now it’s time for the real thing.

Read the instructions bell o w.

World domination is yours.

1.First of all make sure you get elected. Yes, there have been very successful dictatorships in Roman times and in the Middle Ages, during Renaissance but ever since man was foolish enough to trust in democracy, the easiest, most effortless way to claim the power of a state is to have your masses make you into their rightful leader. It means they already trust you to do whatever your heart desires and there is nobody likely to do anything about it.

As an elected tyrant, in the 20th century manner, you need shed no blood yet and can focus on seeing to that in the proper way later on.

Guidelines

2.Lie, lie and then lie some more. Lie about your mother, lie about the money, lie about your enemies, lie about the drains, lie about wages, lie about the dead, lie about crimes, lie about your teeth, lie about security, lie about the law, lie about the bugs.

Tell them they have to walk on their hands, tell them they can’t breathe without gasoline, tell them pain is salvation, tell them the poor are just lazy, the ugly are just evil, the disobedient pose a threat.

Tell them you have to wash your hands in sodium peroxide, tell them guns grow on trees. Explore the whole gamma of propaganda. Lie till you die, and lie when you’re dead still. They must be prepared to die for a lie.

3.Censorship is a liar’s best friend. Single out the books that contradict you and make a feast out of burning them at the stake till every single copy is whipped out. Then feel free to rewrite anything that suits you. Turn schools into your messengers and breeding places for devoted little clones. Spend as much time and money as it takes to build your censorship troops to make sure no one dares to speak what you want left unspoken. Help everyone find their way back to the church, priests are always loyal dogs willing to take some work off your hands when it comes to money. You can be sure they will teach obedience to the master.

4.Unite the masses. Ignore the differences of the individuals. Maximize the few things you can find that set your folk apart, be it big eyes, a fascination for trumpets, poverty, you figure that out. Idolize those features and make them believe you are the personification of them all, even if you have to build yourself a clown mask. Once you’ve got them into one piece, hypnotize them.

to the virgin

dictator!!!

Text & Artwork by Amanda and Emma Elina Keira Jon

a M. Jansson nes

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Thank modern technology you have plenty of means handy: radio, television, the press, the world wide web. The mass’s love and fear is a much bigger weapon that an h-bomb

5.Murder thousands, the more the better. The masses you are successfully suppressing need some outlet for their hatred and anger. Give them one. Best applicants for this witch hunt are groups that don’t fit in, all sorts of minorities will do (homosexuals, anyone who is different, drug addicts, cat lovers, blacks, Jews, trainspotters, handicapped ones, artists, intelligent individuals, stamp collectors, feminists, it’s an endless list). Find any excuse and then rake them. Make it into a spectacle. Celebrate. The more the camps and the mass graves, the bigger the awe, the more successful your leadership.

6.If you can’t convince, distract and confuse. Create imaginary needs your people hadn’t known they actually had.

Then boldly step in to satisfy those. Football is a good one, keep them focused on it. Build roads, build skyscrapers, build a circus in midair. Drop their wages, raise their wages. Make them interested in consuming. Produce cars, houses, electric stoves, tree houses, hats that turn into monkeys. Invent diseases to terrorize them, invent antidotes to save them. Experiment and advance science.

7.Experiment and advance science. You have a great lab at your hands so make good use of it. Your army of scientists has thousands of subjects to experiment on (camps, weird people who suddenly disappear, prisoners) and nobody to justify to, so invent some good medicines and some good remedies and impress your folk. You can lobotomize, grow 7 ears, gas poison 1000s, create human spider hybrids, anything is possible and could lead to a blinding new discovery.

8.Make up legislation. Nobody can accuse you of violating the law when you are the law. See what you don’t like or could stand in your way and replace it. You can surely come up with a good name and context for genocide. Or if you are allergic to cherries you can come up with a law that will forbid cherry trees or consumption of cherries (punishable by execution). This is your playfield so be creative.

9.Trust no one. Many great men have fallen victim to their foolishness by trusting into their sidekicks. Do not make the same mistake. Carefully examine the people you work with and remember that you have no friends, since every man is lusting over absolute power. For all you know you could get bitten by a malicious ladybug. Even your shadow is your potential enemy.

10.You can never have enough power. Look at all these neighbouring countries or even planets perhaps waiting for you to conquer them. You have just the perfect conditions to go for it. Enhance your military and come up with an incredible story and everybody will be dying to fight for the cause. Bleed dry your new possessions and go for more. Even when you own the sun and the moon, there are plenty of galaxies out there. Keep going, keep go-

ing and keep killing.

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COCK

VS BRAIN

BY STEFAN FÄHLER www.stefanfaehler.blogspot.com

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INFLUENCE

IN THE OUTER

OFFICE OF

LEADERSHIP Text by Juergen Hirsch Translation by Sarah Redfern

They have colonised the Berlin Reichstag, they come and go equipped with their credentials and in the mean time are regarded, after the press, as the fifth power of the state.

The Lobbyists.

Lobbying is a form of representation of interests in politics and society. The groups of lobbies try to influence the executive and legislative through personal contacts, gifts or financial contributions. On top of that, through mass media they steer public opinion, and with that target pressure on the legislators.

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According to the Bundestag’s official lobby list, as of June last year, there were 2136 corporation representatives, associations, unions and political initiatives registered. They all have unrestricted access to the outer offices and to all politically relevant decision makers. The term lobbyist is generally seen rather negatively; never refer to a pressure group as a lobby. They camouflage their activities with terminologies like public affairs, political communication or simply as political consulting. Their main purpose consists of supplying politicians with information.

Because most politicians are not experts in the lobbyist’s respective fields, they are thankful for every bit of information and guidance that the lobbyists give them. Lobbyists take on this task all to willingly and generally function as unofficial consultants to the government. Furthermore, that these consultants remain in the employ of their organisations, which for the most part stem from industry, therein lies, the suspicion that political manipulation is not too far away. It is obvious that by all discussions of atom and solar energy, bio technology and health care reforms, anti smoking laws or can deposits, the lobbyist doesn’t primarily have the interests of the consumer, rather and understandably so, the interests of their employers at heart.

But where do we draw the line between necessary representation of interests for the economy and manipulation of politics?

Lobbying can lead to corruption, and with that unauthorised exertion of influence. From junkets organised by their companies, that are incorporated with complimentary board and lodging and also could include, party donations, presents, benefits or the possibility of job on the board of directors after the politicians political career has come to an end are all significant factors. RWE hired Joschka Fischer, where Wolfgang Clement already sits on the board of directors.

“

The bigger the mightier

“

Lobbying is not an invention of our time. Already in ancient Greece and in the Roman Empire the court drudges sat in the outer offices of politics and reminded the parliamentarians that they could face re-election or lose their seat in office, depending what benefits, advantages or disadvantages they proposed.

The ex Chancellor Gerhard Schröder is involved with Gazprom, and Roland Koch found a job in free enterprise. Next to the pharmaceutical industry the energy corporations pertain to be the branch with an especially keen lobby power. For example, the energy corporations tenaciously intervened at the nuclear consensus in 2002 of phasing out of nuclear energy for a lifetime extension of German nuclear power stations, and ultimately succeeded in autumn 2010. This determination of the atomic lobby is only too understandable, at the end of the day a lifetime extension is a billion euro business.

When you take todays price of electricity as base, the branch giants EnBW, RWE and E.ON would make in surplus of 50 billion euro with a lifetime extension of just eight years. If the nuclear power stations stay on the grid for another 28 years their profit margin would rise to 225 billion Euros.

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CONGRATU

YOUR SYST

FUCKE

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ULATIONS

TEM IS ALL

ED UP !

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How strong the influence of the tobacco lobby on the legislative power is exemplified by the prohibition of tobacco advertising. Surprisingly it is the ministry of heath that at the beginning of 1990 voted against a general advertising ban for tobacco products. That at its peak of the then debate the tobacco industry distributed donations to all parties. It could also be the reason why in 1997 the then minister of health, Horst Seehofer, anew campaigned against the ban, and kept a study about the effects on adolescents through tobacco advertising locked away. Finally, as the European Union threatened to make Germany pay substantial penalties was the corresponding bill passed. A watered down ban was taken over by the ministry of health later pre-formulated directly from the union of the cigarette industry.

The pharmaceutical lobby has, on the other hand, in the last 10 years equally failed to pass five proposed health reforms in Germany. Still in the time of Gerhard Schöder a was bill drawn stating that patient protected medicines should decrease in price, tantamount with a multi billion loss for the pharmaceutical industry. But the bill disappeared from Gerhard Schröders desk, after the lobbyists of the pharmaceutical industry paid 200 million euros into state health insurance and were allowed after that to determine their prices freely. Admittedly, this is peanuts in an industry that is worth around 260 billion euros. However the pharmaceutical industry goes about influencing a completely different way.

It doesn’t only use the press and advertising to manipulate public opinion, but organises doctor’s strikes and demonstrations. And they do this scrupulously. The association of Statutory Health insurance Physicians rented around 170 students and unemployed to demonstrate in Berlin in 2006.

When lobby representatives influence the powerful, it doesn’t always have to be at a loss of democracy. Not just industrial corporations seek the proximity of politics. There are many charitable associations that have the welfare of everybody on their agenda. Greenpeace is probably the most prominent of them all. Alongside their campaigns and actions, Greenpeace is always looking to come into dialogue with parliament.

Even Amnesty International lobbies for prisoners, human rights and against the death penalty.

And this lobby is the reason why, over the years, many bills have been passed for the benefit of human rights. The Social Association VdK represents the interests of pensioners, people with disabilities and the socially disadvantaged. Even children have a lobby; the Kinderschutzbund has been fighting since 1953 for the little one’s rights.

With organisations like Transparency International or Lobby Control there are even Lobbies that make fun of the scheming of other lobbies, and with that gives them a needed slap across their knuckles. Their whole objective is to throw light on undesirable developments in politics through too much, or not serious influence from the lobbyists for the general public.

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Artwork by Andrea Berretta www.pepperdesign.it A3 or 50x70 cm print (signed) 29 â&#x201A;Ź + shipping (worldwide)

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SUSANN BOSSLAU is

THE JOURNALIST Enemy Of The State

Starring

Pascale Jean Louis, Nicolas Simoneau Photography by Marcel Schlutt Make www.marcel-schlutt.com Up/Hair: Coco Meurer Styling Susann Bosslau/Coco Meurer Set: Nina Kharytonova Credits Susann: Brown Leather Skirt: Vintage HUMANA BERLIN Blouse: MONK! Coat: MTWTFSS WEEKDAY Shoes : Paris Hilton Shoes Hat: Julia Mogwitz Jewelry/Accessories : VINTAGE, Pascale: is wearing Rick Owens Nicolas: is wearing Emporio Armini and Jean Paul Gaultier, Shoes by Bjรถrn Borg Special Thx to Mike Kรถder und Andre Richter

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THE END

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A LETTER FROM

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WE A

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HONK! Music Art

decide from. Unfortunatly at the end we can on in our opinion. Now it is up to you! Go to our h

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tist Of The Year...

nly choose six. And the following stood most out homepage and vote for your artist of the year.

Vote here http://honk-mag.com/artist-of-the-year-2011/

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J贸nsi Album: Go

Debuting his solo album GO he orchestrated not only his Voice is his weapon. Indie electronica he delivered a thrilling album with powerful performances. Leaving us in no doubt to choose as on of our favorites.

Animal Arithmetic http://vimeo.com/12355484 http://jonsi.com/

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aMinus a.k.a Valentin Plessy presenting his ďŹ rst solo project coming from the punk band Plateau Repas. Clearly showing inďŹ&#x201A;uences from synth pop, funky house, minimal just to name a few. Combining them in an inspirational and attractive manner proving that powerful music can be created even though mixing different styles.

Billy http://youtu.be/S8rEIc9d1To http://www.myspace.com/heyminus

aMinus Album: Almost and Maybe

Vote here http://honk-mag.com/artist-of-the-year-2011/

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MEN Album: Talk about Body

The art and performance collective MEN Speaking about important issues such as trans awareness, wartime, economics, sexual compromise and demanding liberty.

Deliveri their infectious, arty, punk-tinged disco house. Loaded with force it caught our attention.

Simultaneously http://youtu.be/eaCvpgGSBWk http://www.myspace.com/men

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When saints go Machine Mini album “Fail and forever” and “konkylie”

VOTE HERE Vote here http://honk-mag.com/artist-of-the-year-2011/

Another band who made it beyond ther borders of Denmark. Giving us strange and fascinating music. A sound hard to pin down giving us a realm worth entering.

Fail Forever http://youtu.be/EhzcJIRHlNc http://www.myspace.com/whensaintsgomachine

Vote here http://honk-mag.com/artist-of-the-year-2011/

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Austra Album : Feel It Break

A spicy cocktail og intense and powerful ingredients that makes you feel all warm inside. Mergeing strings of sound inďŹ&#x201A;uenced by the singer / pianist Katie Stelmanis only to deliver a unique sound that can only be called Austra.

Lose It http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xikgbn_austra-lose-it_music http://www.austramusic.com/

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Gus Gus Album : Arabian horse

The Icelandic band showcasing there years of experience and versatility, they released Arabian horse. Fronting the band not one but three singers all with outstanding voices giving the techno album a beautiful harmonic feel. Mature approach for these electronic giants.

Over http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K703vlIgens http://gusgus.com/

Vote here http://honk-mag.com/artist-of-the-year-2011/

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GAZE AS DICTATORSHIP ! „Sluts, objects, expactations.“

Dictatorship: the word seems to demand someone you can blame, someone in charge, someone to judge: the dicator. Thinking about gaze as a sort of dicatorship may seem odd, but it is a productive and empowering way to treat the world.

In order to go beyond normative assumptions and to gain kind of a autonomy we have to understand what it really means to be seen, how the gaze shapes our selfimage what we can do to cure ourselves from the disease spread by the gaze dictator.

There‘s definitely no logic in human behaviour‘ as Björk teached us. As obvious as this quotation seems, the tention between gaze and dictatorship will show us how illogic human behaviour actually can be.

The first question that rises is: what is gaze? The second question we will try to respond to is: could it be possible that we are influenced by gaze or even worse: might gaze be a dictatorship? The obvious fact, that we are a visible object, is not that simple, as French philosopher Jacques Lacan stated.

For him gaze is more then just being visible. It is something more disturbing and beyond our controll. By being exposed to someone elses view, according to Lacan, we as a subject lose the sense of autonomy. This uncanny effect of being observed influences our behaviour, the way we dress and the way we see ourselves.

Text by Kevin Jung Photos by Sarah St

This may sound rather abstract, so let‘s try to put it into a more profane picture: an actor, standing on the stage, is totally aware of being observed by a crowd, the spectators, and even though he does not know each person, he constructs an expactation according to which he tries to act in a right manner. Maybe he tries to subvert the expactations in order to disturb the spectators.

But he never could escape being observed.

He is ruled by the gaze of the anonymous and by that imagined expactation of the spectators. As an actor, we are exposed to the view of others, even though we don‘t know all of them by person. But the relation between gaze and subject is not equal.

French philosopher Michel Foucault argues that gaze is something that constructs and regulates power relations, it‘s a disciplinary mechanism. This leads us to the second question: how free are we, even though we are always - or feel - exposed to the view of an anonymous, imagined other?

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If we want to argue that gaze is a dicatorship, we should make clear, what aspects are congruent between both of them. Dicatorship implies a dictator, a person who is at least symbolically in charge of everything and the centre of power and appraisal. A group would also work, but power is concentrated, without any legitimation from outside. The rest is propaganda and ideology. The individual has to step back in order to be part of the big thing, society, the Volk, etc. In order to maintain power, the dicatorship needs violence and aggressive power. Let‘s keep this in mind, when we go through some examples.

How disturbing, even violent, gaze can be shows the slutwalk movement, that started this year in Toronto and spread around the world. All kinds of people and bodies started to protest against the heteronormative male-domintated view of women, especially victims of sexual harazement.

g teffen www.sarahsteffen.com

The slutwalk movement fights back and raises solidary power against a politic of gaze that claims it‘s a woman‘s fault if they get raped.

Feminist blogger Jessica Valenti shows her „Study in comments“ why Slutwalk is necessary and what kind of prejudies and ressentiments are virulent in western societies. Quotes from CNN like: “Do not just blame the person doing the assaulting if you are going to run around strutting your stuff.”

Or “Behave like ladies, and maybe more men will behave like gentlemen.”

I participated the Slutwalk in Berlin myself and saw some disturbing scenes. There were a lot of people of all genders showing there bodies, shouting slogans like „Yes means yes, no means no“ and holding signs with sentences like „My dress is not an invitation“ written on them.

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That‘s not the disturbing part, this was just fleshy empowerment and resistance to something which is called ,male gaze‘ among the feminist academia. ,Male gaze‘ as a term is coined as the idea that the power relations between the ordinary genders male - female are organized by gaze.

Gaze, e.g. the view of a camera in a mainstream pornmovie is conditioned by a male perspective. So gaze is almost always a (heterosexual) male one. The quatiotns from Jessica Valenti‘s blog show clearly: a lot of opinions are shaped by this idea, the idea that a woman is always exposed to men and they have behave in propper way not to be raped. It‘s there fault, they just shouldn‘t wear something slutty.

So all the sluts claim the streets around the globe, and this is what I observed in Berlin: a lot of elderly men, equipped with cameras, taking photos of the bodies slutwalking through Berlin Mitte. The organizers tried to encourage the participators of the demonstration to intervene and disturb the male gaze. Some of them resisted and spit into the face of the hobby porndirectors. One of them even confessed that he just took some pictures for his private collection. This insane incidents make clear, what‘s happening if we talk about gaze as dictatiorship, esp. from a (queer-)feminist perspective.

Being a heterosexual male viewers allows you to be on the good side of the power, you‘re the spectator, part of the audience.

As a female body you‘re always already on the stage. You have to act as you‘re supposed to do in the little piece called heteronormativity. In order the break the rules, you have to manipulate the expactations.

They don‘t expect you to call yourselve a slut, and this might be even misleading, but it‘s seems to work.

There are Slutwalks basically everywhere, with all gender ing the onesided view. The expose their bodies and reclaim We are not an object.

How to turn the tables shows the amusing blog ,You are a bros like girls‘. This might not be the most political correc I see you, which makes you an object. I don‘t give a damn a vast range of tumblr repostings showing more or less cu snapshots up to selfmade webcam pictures. Every object of the blog kind of tries to inscribe itself in a weird amalga do the same thing, only in caves and with sculptures and whatever. I Googled it.‘ But still: it shows vice versa how t mass, here the readers of the blog, who just by gazing con real, but in the blogosphere they just exist as an illustratio

rs claiming public space with their slutty bodies resistming them at the same time. The statement is clear:

an object‘, which describes itself as a ,place to treat ct statement, but as rough as it is, the title makes clear: n that you‘re male, you‘re hot. The blog is nothing but ute guys in different contexts, from editorials to old will find a subject that will be fond of it. The editor amated queer history by stating ,The Greeks used to stuff--there’s books about it. It’s like a whole thing or the politics of the gaze work. There is an anonymous nstruct an object. The guys on the pictures might be on of a bigger ideal of male beauty

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They contribute to a naive but still nice attempt to resist the male gaze and install a male object exposed to an ungendered gaze.

The examples I tried to arrange in order to make my point clear may not have been the best. But gaze, the fact that we fucking know that we‘re exposed to the world, whoever that is and whatever this means, scares the shit out of us. So much, that we try to dress in a way we want to be seen, try to have a nice haircut which highlights the way we want to be recognized.

Empowerment and resistance against the dicatorship of the gaze demands creativity, a sense for aesthetics and a slight hint of guts just to do whatever you want to do.

Please don‘t fit my expactations, I‘m not the anonymous other plus that is boring and the worst thing that could happen. If Björk is right and there is no logic in human behaviour, we should at least try not to fit into the ennui of everyday illogic grind. The mean anonymous dictator does not even have a voice, just imagined dumb eyes.

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NUBA

by DUSAN PEJCIC

Dusan is a visual artist from Belgrade but now he lives in Germany. He moved from Serbia to Berlin in February 2004. This was a period of political instability combined with civil commotion and riots. After the Serbian prime minister was shoot, he made his decision and moved to Berlin. And probably it was time for him to start again in a new town.

Now he is coming up with a great project called: Nuba !

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There is also

this special

atmosphere

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DUSAN PEJCIC http://dusanpejcic.blogspot.com/ Interview by Marcel Schlutt

HONK!: Have you studied fashion? Are you a professional designer or are you a career changer?

Dusan: When I came to Berlin I designed some costumes, which were used for performances in clubs. I also started to study Photography and Video at the UDK. My painting skills and graphic design studies in Serbia were a major help for this study and maybe this brought the idea of studying to me. I wouldn’t be content with saying I am a typical fashion designer, my creations are more art than fashion. But I work not only on my own projects, I can do a “normal” job too, for example the costumes I created for the Dirty Dancing Musical. The most important thing about my work is to create a character not only a costume.

HONK!: Do you think Berlin is a good city for a newcomer artist to stay and to let the creativity flow?

Dusan: For sure, Berlin is a quite cheap city, when you compare it with other European capitals. So you don’t have to think about your rent all the time and what to eat in the next days and it’s very easy to find some part time job to hold your head above water. There is also this special atmosphere around the city right now. Lot’s of artists and creative people are coming here to be a part of something unique.

HONK!: Let’s talk about your video art. We saw your project “Nuba”, which by the way is very exciting, so tell us a little bit more about it.

Dusan: Nuba people are inhabitants of the Nuba Mountains, which are located in Sudan, Africa. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuba.

The most fascinating thing about them is that they really take time to dress up - it’s not the result, which is important there, but the way. And they don’t follow any strict rules in their way to dress up.

So their make up is always different and very original. I like this idea of being free, without borders and rules and so the idea of digital fashion came to me. Where endless creativity meets unlimited possibilities and even the laws of physics could be broken. And you can’t touch it, only watch.

HONK!: This brings us to my next question: is there somebody, who will pay for your digital fashion, maybe it could be used for avatars in some social games? And can you finance your life with your art?

Dusan: Not yet. The idea of digital fashion is quite new, so I still haven’t figured out how to earn some money with it. But I think the era of digital fashion is starting now, so maybe there will be more possibilities to use this fashion art, other than to dress a social games avatar. And it’s still better to have a shitty job and to follow your dreams than to have no dreams at all!

HONK!: Where do you get your ideas for the design?

Dusan: I am using 3 D programs on the Internet for my design, but I would say I am still learning, as the options are endless when you work digitally. I also like to combine my analogue and digital skills, connecting painting, costume design and digital video together. When I start a new project I never know what it will look like, it’s like a journey to some new place, where you have never been before.

HONK!: Was it always clear for you, that you will find your place in this world as an artist?

Dusan: No, not always. I was dealing with graphic design since I was 15 in Serbia, so it was quite early clear to me, that I will do something creative I just follow the flow and try to stay as flexible as I can.

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HONK!: Is there some other artist who inspired you or who stands as a role model in your life?

Dusan: Yes of course, there are a lot of people who inspired me. The music was always something special for me and it’s inspiring me all the time

HONK!: So do you have some plans to combine visual arts with music?

Dusan: Yes, I do, one of my really good friends is a musician and we are collaborating together on a video for his music. So soon I will come up with a new video music project

HONK!: Let’s talk more about your homeland. How was the experience of Milosevic’s dictatorship for you?

Dusan: Since I was a teenager, I was active at the resistance and it was horrible, dictatorship is no fun. You can’t feel free, you can’t even say or think what you want and you fear for your life and for your family. Nowadays there is still lots of corruption, but things in my country are getting better now.

HONK!: Where do you see yourself in 20 years? What are your wishes for the next years?

Dusan: Laughs. To be somewhere near a sunny beach. But I don’t think so far, I better live in the moment. Don’t want to be pessimistic, but I don’t think it’s good to make plans for the distant future.

My wishes for the next 20 years are to do something different and to discover some other sides in me and in the world. I don’t want to do the same thing till the end of my days, it’s better just to follow the flow of life and to take what you get.

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Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m sorry, but I don emperor. Thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s no

nâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t want to be an ot my business !!

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THE GHOST

MELANCOLIA Photos by Masha Sadari Models: Devon Storm, Cathy Kiin, and self-portraits.

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“SOME OF MY SHOTS ARE

E PHYSICALLY DIFFICULT”

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MASHA SADARI www.ďŹ&#x201A;ickr.com/gomophotography Interview by Marcel Schlutt

Masha is one of those young artist, I have found in the internet, when i was searching for new talents. She is just 17 years old and already a very good photographer. Yes, some people are simple gifted. She is one of them.

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HONK!: Hello Masha... Your photography is stunning and just beautiful. You are a big talent. When did you realize that photography is what you like?

Masha: Thank you very much. I began to really fall in love with photography about halfway through my 365 days project in 2010. I love what I do and I am incredibly happy that I discovered this wonderful form of art.

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HONK!: When i am looking at your pictures , i am really touched and i can feel a melancholic energy. Are you a melancholic girl? Can we see in your photography who you are?

For artwork I definitely prefer digital because it allows me to manipulate the photo and create almost any effect in post processing.

Masha: Generally I am a very happy person. I guess some part of me is portrayed in my work since all of it comes from my mind but I believe that everything I create is purely fictiona,l although sometimes I do use real life events.

HONK!: Which artist is inspiring you? And why?

HONK!: You are living in Moldova, one of the most beautiful countries. Tell us something about your life and culture there ?

Masha: I am originally from Moldova and it is very beautiful but I now live in Florida, United States. I moved a few years ago so I still remember what it was like. It was definitely a simple life and I wasn’t very interested in art except for the occasional drawing I did in school. The culture is very westernised and it is not very different from many other countries. I believe that in modern times it is not so important where an artist lives anymore. I share my artwork through art sites so it does not matter where I am. The thing is that Moldova is a very interesting country and is certainly a huge inspiration to me so I suppose it isn’t a bad place for a young artist.

HONK!: How do you create your photos?

How long do you need to make them?

Masha: Well first I come up with a concept, which is probably the most challenging part of the entire process. Then I set up a day and time, usually depending on the availability of my models.

Once I’m at the location it takes anywhere from 20 min to 3 hours to shoot, depending on how much preparation is required. After the shoot I sort through the photos, I tend to take less that 100 and most of them are filler images. Editing takes anywhere from 2 hours to a few days also depending on the difficulty of the image.

HONK!: Analog or Digital? What do you prefer?

Masha: I love analog but I only use it to take photos of my friends and family on a regular basis.

Masha: I am mostly inspired by Brooke Shaden and her unbelievable photographs. I also draw some inspiration from painters such as Rembrandt. Brooke inspires me because her art is very unique and full of wonderful stories that cannot help but stay in my mind. Her processing is also a large influence because I love the HONK!: What are your dreams for your future? Where do you see yourself in 20 years?

Masha: My dream is to do fine art photography and be able to teach others and actually have the ability to make a living off of what I love to do. But I don’t think I can completely rely on that so I’m planning on attending university for fine arts and education so that I can become an art teacher in High School or even College. roughness of the images and the painterly feel.

www.flickr.com/gomophotography

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www.peterpapenberg.de

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It has been over 20 years since Germany used to be divided into 2 different countries, and yet these wounds remain open sores. The injustice suffered by a great number of East-Germany citizens is going to need plenty of years before it can be healed. It is very important for papers to remember all this and to let us be part of these memories and experiences. Because one day these voices will be silenced. This is why we met Edwin, a man who has lived through what most will know from history books only.

HONK!: Edwin, you have been born and raised in the GDR (DDR). You are so to speak the first generation of East Germany’s children. How was your youth back then?

H: Then you were sentenced to prison. For how long did you have to sit there and what was your experience as an „Enemy of the State“?

Edwin: I am the oldest of 5 children. My parents had a small farm. To the age of 12, I could say my childhood was really beautiful. After that I had to help with everything, milk the cows, feed them and do anything a kid my age was capable of actually doing. It was rather pleasant to me since I’ve always loved animals. I much preferred to skip school in order to be with the animals.

Edwin: I was sentenced to 48 months incarceration (1 year in jail, the rest in confinement in Berlin-Rummelsburg)

HONK!: As a young man, have you felt the pressure of living in a dictatorship?

Edwin: Yes, there was this one event that came to challenge my thought and actions regarding the system. My father was arrested over something he was not responsible for. Two friends and I discovered weapons and munition from WWII. It was in August of 1968. Due to being only 13, not much happened to me or my friends. My father was let go, but I never managed to understand what he was arrested for in the first place. After that my father got only trouble. This injustice was something I could not deal with.

Because of that, I couldn’t join the FDG (a youth movement of the time) and had plenty of trouble at school.

HONK!: So in your youth, you wanted to flee and get out of East Germany. Why? Edwin: The main reason was this injustice that had been done to my father.

HONK!: What did your escape plan look like back then?

Edwin: I had a friend whose father had managed to leave the GDR (DDR) before they closes the borders. He used to live in Frankfurt am Main and had a shipping agency.

We met him in Rostock. That’s where we decided to cross the Ostsee with an inflatable boat and get out.

HONK!: Sadly, the escape didnt work out. How and where did you get arrested?

Edwin: The State’s Security got to know about it somehow. Both of my friends got arrested. So I had to try it on my own. I tried to take the train to the Ostsee. The train was stopped midway and I was picked out of the compartment and arrested. Today, we still do not know how the Stasi was so well informed about this.

HONK!: Have you been physically or psychologically abused? If so, how?

Edwin: In the JVA the pshysical abuse was frequent. They wanted to belittle us through this. For example, we had to run for hours or do press ups till we fainted. In the correctional they tried to break you in a psychological way.

In solitary confinement (I spent over 200 days in solitary confinement) I had for 2 years absolutely no contact to the outside world. Also, nobody in my family (parents or siblings) had any idea on where I was in those 2 years.

HONK!: What was your life like in a system such as that of East Germany (DDR), after your release? I know that the state kept an eye on you and you didn’t feel like you belonged.

Edwin: While still in confinement I tried to issue a travel pass but my application was declined for no apparent reason. After my release I was placed under surveillance.

This means I was not allowed to leave my municipality, I was not allowed to meet specific people and I had to report to the local police station daily, for 2 years. .

HONK!: Today do you have any idea as to who it was that told on you back then?

Edwin: I still don’t know who did such thing, who revealed my plans to the state and made them come after me. I always tried to push this away because I’m afraid it might have been someone in my family.

HONK!: 20 years after the downfall of the GDR (DDR), do you feel free? Are the old wounds nothing but forgotten scars? Or are there moments when these old stories are as present as ever?

Edwin: These old wounds will never heal, 4 whole years of my life have been taken from me, simply because I had a different ideology and opinion than the System thought I should have. And what is freedom really? Are we actually free people today?

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EDWIN S:

„I have spent over 200 days in solitary confinement.“

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MARA SOMMER

YOU DO NOT SEE ME

AS I SEE MYSELF Photography by Mara Sommer www.marasommer.com Styling/Make Up: Margaret Petchell www.margaretpetchellmakeup.com Model: Lauren @Clyne Model Management

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Blue shoes: Mi Piaci Fake fur jacket: First scene costume hire garage sale box Shawl: $2 shop Brooches: Victorian Gilt

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Yellow knit dress split and stuck with masking tape: Garage sale box, Retro bathing cap: Victorian Gilt

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Original 1959 newspaper

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Dress from garage sale customized with a bodice of clear plastic disposable gloves Gloves disposable secured around wrist with cellotape Shoes: Victorian Gilt Head scarf made from painters masking plastic Plastic 1950â&#x20AC;&#x2122;s handbag -Victorian Gilt

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Pink polo neck: Hospice shop Skirt: Garage sale box Hat, made from old gloves: Victorian gilt

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Striped shirt and nylon slip: Church charity shop Hat stack: Victorian Gilt secured with masking tape

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Black knit polo neck: Savemart Black Bathers and shoes: Victorian Gilt Head scarf black rubbish bag

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When did it start?

Text by Maria Büttner Photos from Masha Sadari

She’s crying. She hadn’t since more than five month.

In fact, that’s not long for somebody who almost never cries. Let’s say – a lot happened. Now, while reading a book, Christa Wolf’s “Stadt der Engel oder The overcoat of Dr. Freud” – they came. She’s turning her face on to the window – she doesn’t like it, when somebody else’s seeing her tears. By the way, she’s riding a train right now. Let’s see how it goes when emotion and reason clashing. Because this is supposed be a text about dictatorship.

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Dictatorship of emotions, remembrance – emotions while reading about somebody recalling a meeting and the physical backlash (fainting) of being emotionally overwhelmed by memories in a setting of suppression which once promised to be freedom. There are different ways of emotions which could be suppressive. During the last century we learned a lot about it, about war, terrorism and how it is connected with emotions sent through TV, internet, Twitter – picturing them, rereading them, (re)creating them. In 2006 Dominique Moisi wrote an article named “The Clash of Civilisations is Really One of Emotions” in Daily Star. Does this mean we are all mere subjects of our emotions?:

Whichever is true, it made her wonder. Can emotions, feelings possibly be wrong? Maybe they won’t fit the situation or are biased – but false? Aren’t those the only ones you are able to feel during this moment? Aren’t you at the mercy of them, even if you want to feel another way – it’s you in this moment. How could those be wrong. Later – looking back – they may appear to have been useless, unrealistic, even pathetic – it won’t change the fact they were true the moment you felt them. If it makes you feel frightened, irritated or angry – react again, correct while thinking about it – it will already be the next moment, span of life, split second.

No, it shouldn’t be that way !

Her situation isn’t as half as dramatic as Wolf’s protagonist’s, not life-threatening, not political emphasized – just a plain personal matter. But Christa Wolf managed to write in a way which responded to herself. And she’s one of the few author’s making her cry occasionally. Her hands were shaking after he came this near. Her mind went blank when he kissed her eyes, lips. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy’s entry about “emotion” states two important facts:

So she thought, staring out of this window. Letting pass by the landscape while letting pictures of the past weeks pop up in her mind. Laughing, dancing looking up to the sky, feeling herself. So when did it start? The promised freedom being suppression. When were emotions starting to get oppressive?

Maybe already at this day, seems like summers ago – when the first eye-contact (making her think about a kiss – just for a split second) didn’t lead to anything. Maybe month ago when she got shocked and thrown out of balance by a shaking earth. Not too long ago, she promised she would stay. Now everything in her wants to run. From the reality she’s living in.

If we are talking about behavior, Aristotle comes in. In his definition, emotions are not something separated.

They bear a great importance, notably for moral aspects of our life. Our capacity for which Aristotle regarded as largely a result of learning to feel the right emotions in the right circumstances.

Wolf writes something about “falsche Empfindungen” – does she mean “false” or “wrong”?

Does she mean “emotions” or “feelings”?

”No aspect of our mental life is more important to the quality and meaning of our existence than emotions.

They are what make life worth living, or sometimes ending. So it is not surprising that most of the great classical philosophers—Plato, Aristotle, Spinoza, Descartes, Hobbes, Hume—had recognizable theories of emotion, conceived as responses to certain sorts of events of concern to a subject, triggering bodily changes and typically motivating characteristic behavior.”

2 Going further onto this subject the author has to admit, that the know-itall-20th-century wasn’t able to create such theories. Maybe it’s not rational enough, maybe they – we – were afraid of it’s content.

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An entry in one of the most considerable onlinelexica of philosophy starting like this, should make one wonder. Such importance, therefor we are still pretty fast to try making something rational out of it. Feelings of guilt, shame, jealousy, aren’t those one would like to cover up.

Feelings of joy for something we should not have done – it is nice to get some pretext for not being moral:

”Emotions also raise normative questions: about the extent to which they can be said to be rational, or can contribute to rationality. In that regard the question of our knowledge of our own emotions is especially problematic, as it seems they are both the object of our most immediate awareness and the most powerful source of our capacity for self-deception. This results in a particularly ambivalent relation between emotions and morality.”

She always could remember her first kisses, the strength, awkwardness or knowledge. This first time, she refused and left. In the end, Slowly regaining conscious after an intense dream gradually remembering where she is, one morning there was this sudden sadness. Not because it was her own but it wasn’t his place. A shock.

Healing, kind of – it drove her out of this “dictatorship”.

The realization of her being trapped into emotions she couldn’t handle. Something she couldn’t stand, not being able to control herself – she left.

She wanted to wake up next to a dream from which she decided to wake up upon. Yet, she’s still sitting in this train. Saying it with Descartes: Slowly regaining conscious after an intense dream gradually remembering where she is, one morning there was this sudden sadness.

Not because it was her own but it wasn’t his place. A shock. Healing, kind of – it drove her out of this “dictatorship”. The realization of her being trapped into emotions she couldn’t handle.

Something she couldn’t stand, not being able to control herself – she left. She wanted to wake up next to a dream from which she decided to wake up upon. Yet, she’s still sitting in this train.

Saying it with Descartes:

“It is impossible for the soul to feel a passion without that passion being truly as one feels it.”

But reading just a bit further he has to admit:

“Those that are most agitated by their passions are not those who know them best”

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Therefore what do we do about this? Sitting it out, maybe letting it out. And waiting for another theory to clear whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s going on when one looses track of itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s self-awareness.

Where the unconscious is, self-deception necessarily threatens.

When did it start?

?

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BERLIN BOHÉME Les hommes de «Karl Marx Allee» Photography by Marcel Schlutt www.marcel-schlutt.com Styling by Susann Bosslau Hair & Make up: Pascale Jean-Louis Models: Karl, Vince, Vedran and Paul @Izaio Models Berlin

Karl Shirt: Schiesser Pants: Kilian Kerner

Vince Longsleeve: Schiesser Pants: Acne Vedran Longsleeve: Schiesser Pants: Tiger of Sweden Paul Shirt: Schiesser Pants: Tiger of Sweden Braces: Models own

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Karl - Jacket: Kilian Kerner, Pants:Tiger of Sweden, Shoes: Zign

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Paul - Coat: Kilian Kerner, Shirt: Schiesser, Braces: Models own, Pants: Tiger of Sweden, Shoes: Zign

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Vince - Coat: Kilian Kerner Shirt: Schiesser Pants: Acne

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Vedran - Coat: Kilian Kerner Shirt: Schiesser Pants: Kilian Kerner Shoes: Zign

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Vedran - Suit: Tiger of Sweden Shirt: Schiesser Shoes: Zign

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Paul - CJacket: Tiger of Sweden Shirt: Schiesser Braces: Models own Pants: Tiger of sweden Shoes: Zign Bag: Models own

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Karl - Shirt: Schiesser Jacket : Tiger of Sweden

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Vince - Pants: Kilian Kerner

Karl - Pants: Tiger of Sweden

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Vince - Pants: Vintage Shoes: Docs Sunglasses: Vintage

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Paul - Shirt: Schiesser Pants: Tiger of Sweden Braces: Vintage Sunglasses: Vintage

Pauk246 -Cardigan: Kilian Kerner Scarf: Kilian Kerner Uderwear: Schiesser

Vedran -Jacket: Tiger of Sweden Underwear. Schiesser

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Vince -Shirt: Schiesser Pants: Vintage

Karl -Pullover: Tiger of Sweden Underwear: Schiesser

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by Nina Kharytonova

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1.Jacob Bilabel Jacob is fighting for our planet, for the environment and probably for our lives. Together with his partner Guido Axmann he is running Thema 1 – an independent Berlin based company, which issue is a an accelerated transition to a low-carbon society. One of his projects is “The Green Music Initiative” which is coordinating the music and entertainment industry’s efforts to minimise their climate impact, which is really enormous, especially here in Berlin. But that’s not all – Product Carbon Footprint (PCF) Project, Klimapartner 2020, just to name a few of them. So thank god there is somebody doing something while I am still talking or writing about that. And this is probably the company’s motto – “Talk without action means nothing”. http://www.thema1.de/

2.Jackie Taylor Miss Taylor is a perfect example of her art. She is not only creating amazing costumes, but she is also wearing her designs by herself, making an unforgettable and sexy performances. She is also a freelance stylist with a free and creative spirit. Born in Ireland, traveling through Europe, where she was having done stint in art school in London and making a short stop in New York, she finally landed in Berlin, where she started evolving through many adventures and hard work into designer, she is today. Her work, inspired by many things, different places, where she has been brings some colour and beautiful glamour madness to our lives. If you want to check out something different or you are just curious to check her stuff out -go to. http://jackietaylor.net/

3. Melanie Pfister 100und1 is a family based company – a creative network made up for free branches: Interior, Fashion & Media. Melanie Pfister runs 100und1 together with Jacob, Julia and Lukas, where everybody is responsible for his own section. Everything started with Interior, working on planning, design and construction of not only interiors, but also art objects and prototypes. Even your own ideas could be realized on a very high and creative level. The second pillar is Fashion, where 100und1 acts as a contemporary clothing distributor, with an elaborate selection of labels of newcomer designers from streetwear to Haute Couture. It’s a communicating agency with a bright field from Graphic design over to Art direction and Advertising. This special combination is groundbreaking in the generation of new media and will surely have soon plenty of followers. http://www.100und1.com/

4. Jan Breus Fresh wind is blowing from Russia and he brought us not only a bad weather front but also a styling genie Jan Breus. Born and raised in the Soviet Union, he came in the latest 90’s to Germany. Now he founded his way to our capital and spreads his fashionable point of view, which is truly exquisite, through the city. Maybe inspired by wide fields or by white winters of Russia, his styles are always pure and unforgettable at the same time. This talent brought him already a plenty of opportunities to prove that his style rocks. His clients are coming from all over the world, Madonna’s ex-toy Jesus Luz was just only one of them. Sometimes he also gives styling tips on public TV. And if there is nothing special in your wardrobe, he could even create you a fancy outfit from a plastic garbage bag. http://janbreusfashionstyling.daportfolio.com/

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Delusions of Beauty Photos and Concept by Suzana Holtgrave Hair & Make Up by Helena Kapidzic Styling by Susann Bosslau Model: Teresa Stark

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ChiďŹ&#x20AC;on Dress by Susann Bosslau

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Top by Jana Hipp Shoulder pieces : G端nes Dericioglu

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Shoulder pieces : Photographers own

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Lace Body Suit by Susann Bosslau

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Top by Franziskus Pummer

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THE ART OF FOOD

by Christo Mitov

If you ask any French chef about the art of food, also known as gourmet, they would spend hours and hours on telling you the history of preparing food, the love you have to inject in every little detail in order to achieve perfection in every bite. Luckily, we donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have so much time and I am more impressed by an Oreo turned into a portrait than a kangaroo stake with a side of asparagus.

Recently it came to my attention that almost everywhere I looked - at most art fairs, small and large scale exhibitions - there was always a corner saved for art made of food products. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the most consumable form of art - you can not only look at it, but actually in the very sense of the words, digest it, too.

So I decided to take you on a speed date with 4 of the hottest aspiring food artists right now. The setting is online casual; we get background infos on every artist beforehand; the outcome is yet unknown - we ask the questions and assess at the end which piece we want to eat and which should be put in a museum.

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The first artist in the food speed dating series features big names in the fashion industry with low quality products from the fast food world. Chanel sausage links, fried Fendi fish sticks, raw meat Gucci and toasty Louis Vuitton bread - Swedish photographer LINUS MORALES’ FABULOUS FOOD series uses luxury logos to brand food in an inspiring way. Before rushing to conclusions about the limits and boundaries of commercialization and starting an endless discussion on commercialization of art, I am here to inform you that this comprises a rather unique concept, for shooting purposes only. More on food and art directly from Linus: Name: Linus Morales (Art) School: Gamleby Photography school Sweden.

Based in: Sweden/London Making art since: 2002 www.linusmorales.se

Why did you choose to work with food?

I liked the thought of simple swedish fast food mixed with famous designer brands. Do you eat your pieces after you have photographed them? I ate the Chanel sausages and the LV toast.

How do you feel about fashion meeting food? Dresses and other garments made of meat, tofu, etc.?

Hm, hard question. I think it’s kind of cool in one way but kind of gross in another. It’s almost a bit too much.

What food product gets you mostly inspired?

Fast food in funny packages.

Do you cook?

Yes but very simple meals, unfortunately I’m a bad chef.

Linus Morales

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The Great Dictator: Chaplin vs Hitler Text by Claudio Alvargonzalez

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JUDITH G. KLAUSNER is a Somerville, MA artist with a love for small, intricate, and overloo constructing her thesis primarily out of insects, and has since continued to search the det ally and professionally. About her work Judith says: â&#x20AC;&#x153;My latest series (now in progress) use intertwined histories of gender and craft have shaped one another and our everyday lives and question what defines these things as ephemeral at all. What becomes mythologized, and unremarkable become valued craft simply based on a shift in cultural perspective?â&#x20AC;?

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oked things. She received her degree in Studio Art from Wesleyan University in 2007 after tails of her surroundings for inspiration. She enjoys playing with her food, both recreationes Victorian handicraft processes to transform modern packaged foods, exploring how the s. I hope to change the way people see the small and often disregarded ephemera of life, , and what is discarded as mundane? Can the same set of skills that were once obligatory

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Why exactly Oreos?

Oreos are a quintessential American packaged food, that also have some lovely aesthetic qualities.

Do you eat your pieces after you have photographed them or do you keep them somewhere in a box?

I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t eat the pieces - they would be very stale! When they are not on display, the cameos are kept climate controlled (and the preservatives in the Oreos keep them quite well).

How do you feel about fashion meeting food? Dresses and other garments made of meat, tofu, etc.?

Given how essential it is, I think food it is a natural realm of exploration for creative pursuits of all kinds.

Are you currently working with any other kind of food products?

The whole From Scratch series works works with a variety of packaged foods, from the Oreo Cameos to embroidered toast, cross-stitched Chex cereal, and condiment wallpaper paintings.

Do you cook?

I really enjoy cooking, especially on weekends when I have the time and energy to be creative. I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t usually follow a recipe, I like to cook how I make art and make it up as I go!

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Name: Judith Klausner Age: 25 Based in: Somerville, Massachusetts, USA Making art since: I can remember! web: http://jgklausner.com/

Judith Klausner

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Jasmin Schuller

JASMIN SCHULLER is an editorial, fashion and portrait photographer from Austria. She has envisioned and captured every vegetarianâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s nightmare - sweets, cakes and chocolates made solely of meat products. Take plenty of meat scraps and two liters of blood, a bucket of grease and five kilos of meat, process it, and you have made SWEET MEAT.

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Why did you choose to work with food? And is it real meat it your Sweet Meat project?

First of all, I like sweets and I also fancy a good steak. Wouldn’t it be nice to have it all in one?

That and my vegan roommate were mostly the inspiration for the series. I didn’t imagine Sweet Meats to taste good, but my aim was to make them look compellingly delicious.

Did you eat your pieces after you have photographed them?

No, but it was my dog’s second birthday this year...

How do you feel about fashion meeting food? Dresses and other garments made of meat, tofu, etc.?

The hunting days are over and gone for good. Today you identify yourself with the choices you make at the market, also concerning food. To eat consciously and healthy is not only important but also getting fashionable.

Are you planning to work with food again?

To me, eating is a way to cherish the joyful things in life. This point of view gets pretty obvious when you look at “sweet meat”. So I wouldn’t except of working with food again. It was a great challenge.

Do you cook?

For sure and sweet meat is my master piece, would you like to taste?

Name: Jasmin Schuller Age: 18.03.1980 Based in: Graz, Austria Making art since: I am taking pictures since I can remember, in 2009 I opened my own studio.

http://jasminschuller.com/

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CHARLIE CHAPLIN MOVIES

THE Great Dictator!

by Claudio Alvargonzalez

1940. Europe was divided by a war that left the continent torn apart. Half of it destroyed and the other half invaded. Adolf Hitler continued his task to attack the British Islands knowing the United Kingdom and The Commonwealth were the only nations able to stop the Nazi army those days as The US and The Soviet Union were still just a selected audience of the Theatre of War that occidental Europeans were playing over the fields. Benito Mussolini became Hitler’s best ally dreaming of a stronger and “purified” Europe but also signing his own death sentence for the same reason. Down the Pyrenees things worked as usual in a different way.

Francisco Franco decided not to take part in the conflict. After three years of civil war the country was literally turned into ashes with half of the Spanish population death and the other half looking for something to eat. Although Franco believed in Hitler’s ideas the Spanish dictator couldn’t find the material way to support them specially after their unsuccessful meeting in the French-Spanish border.

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While this “Rat Pack” of dictatorship was happily killing what was left of their own population, somewhere across the ocean there was a short but intelligent man who seemed to be the only one caring about all the mess going on in this so called “Old Continent” probably because he was not American but British. His name was Charles Chaplin.

1940 was the year of “The Great Dictator”. The film was released in October in New York City and in December in London. The film was Chaplin’s first true talking picture and also his biggest box office success . It got five nominations for the Academy Awards (including Best Actor) winning none but although the film is a masterpiece the competition that year was wild with “Rebecca” (Alfred Hitchcock), “The Grapes of Wrath” (John Ford) or “The Philadelphia Story” (George Cukor) getting most of them.

I am not going to tell you much about the plot because I hate spoilers and for those of you who never watched even a minute of it just let me remind you this is one of the must-see movies of all time.

Anyway, the story is about two look alike people, one is a Jewish barber living in a Ghetto and the second one is Adenoid Hynkel, the cruel dictator of an invented country called Tomainia. Chaplin plays both roles. Let just add the barber and some other Jewish people get placed in a concentration camp and as the story goes by there is a casual change of identities which leads into the final speech of the movie. If you have read “The Prince and the Pauper” (Mark Twain, 1881) you already know what I’m talking about. For the rest of you who doesn’t, forget about this article and go find the dvd… and the book!

We can’t forget the film is a comedy. It contains several of Chaplin’s most famous sequences. He shows the dictator role as a caricature of the real Hitler and his oratory style. In fact, the language used in the picture is not real German. It’s an improvised slang that may sound like German but it isn’t. The film started to be shot in 1937 and during that time there was no real reason to offend or ridicule so aggressively the Germans. Also the language shown in the posters, sets, etc is not German but Esperanto, an artificial language created by a Polish Jewish called Dr. Zamenhof and which Hitler condemned as a Jewish plot willing to destroy German culture.

Two of my favorite sequences of the film apart from the final speech of course are the one when the absent minded barber tries to shave Hannah (the female role played by Paulette Goddard who was Chaplin’s wife and worked with him in “Modern Times”) where you can see again the classic Chaplin’s role “The Tramp”.

But what people will always remember is the one where Hynkel dances with a balloon globe in his office while listening Richard Wagner’s Lohengrin Overture which is also used at the end of the film while making the victory speech by one of the characters.

There are many legends and stories about the film. It is said that Chaplin thought about making this film when he knew Adolf Hitler had approximately the same age, height and weight and also that Hitler’s famous moustache was in fact a copy of Chaplin’s. It is also said that Hitler requested to see the film and he watched it more than a couple of times.

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Well, there are things we will never know. The only thing sure is that The Great Dictator is indeed a strong satire of fascism in general and Adolf Hitler and his National Socialism in particular. Chaplin wasn’t Jewish but his mother was. Some of his relatives ended in camps so he felt somehow the obligation of letting the world know but specially the American people that you can’t be passive and look away when something doesn’t affect you directly. In fact American policy had remained neutral and because of the pressures coming from the German Embassy all anti Hitler movies were not recommended by the government. That is the reason the film was shoot almost secretly. Even United Artists (the production studio) received boycott threats constantly.

Although the film was a big success it didn’t get a great rate from the critics and Chaplin was accused of communism and chased by the HUAC (House Un-American Activities Committee) with no other choice of going into exile some years later.

The film couldn’t be shown in Germany before 1958 and it was a success at the box office. In Spain the movie was censored from 1940 to 1975 and was released in 1976 after Franco’s death. But in Italy it was impossible to see the director’s cut until 2002 because all the previous released versions of the film censored all the scenes with dictator Napoloni (Mussolini’s alter ego or caricature) and his wife Rachele.

But what can it be so dangerous in a film coming from one of the most beloved comedians of all time?

The answer is simple. This short funny man is not speechless anymore. He can talk. And what it’s coming from his mouth it’s something some people may not like. Quotes like: “I’m sorry but I don’t want to be an Emperor, that’s not my business. I don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone if possible, Jew, gentile, black man, white…”, “Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of despairing men, women and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people.

To those who can hear me I say “Do not despair”.”

Or “Soldiers! In the name of democracy, let us all unite!”.

Chaplin didn’t get the Oscar for this role. It is true James Stewart was superb in “The Philadelphia Story” but to hear “Charlot - The Tramp” for the first time which such intensity worth more than a golden statue. He never got one for his roles although he deserved it. He was chased and accused of communism but he almost won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1948 and in his own words: “ My only political creed was always Freedom”.

Finally a “Warning to Sailors”: I know I am writing about something happened in the last century.

Something only your grandparents can remember.

Something you only know from books or movies but the truth is those words Chaplin said can be use today without losing their meaning or value.

I’m writing about Chaplin, Hitler, Franco or Mussolini but I’m thinking about Cuba, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Syria, Morocco, Venezuela, China...

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George Tot is a very gifted emerging artist from Rus when trying to conduct this interview, he is not afra on the political system of his country. His work, m own world. Usually in black and white, it sums up e Moscow and Zhukovsky. The abandonment, the ho past and present, the poverty but also some strang

RUS

BY GEOR

ssia. Unlike most people we have come across aid to talk about anything, including his views mostly analog, is mirroring what he calls his everything he feels and sees on the streets of opelessness, the bleakness, the oppression of ge beauty and a general longing in everything.

SSIA RGE TOT

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HONK!: Your photography is very characteristic and different. What do you think has influenced you most?

George: The greatest impact on me so far had a recording of Bach, which I occasionally listened to in my childhood because of my father. I felt then a grand mixture of fear and delight.

And of course the death of my only girlfriend by a car more than four years ago.

HONK!: Do you experiment with many different cameras? What do you see in analog photography that digital photography lacks?

George: Yes, I often experiment with different cameras. A homemade pinhole, a Diana, a Zenit and other old Soviet cameras. In analog pictures I see the discipline and warmth, which digital photography is lacking. All this noise and grain and other artefacts inherent in analog photography. The very analog camera shutter sound and the sound when rewinding film - it’s like music, this symphony.

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HONK!: Do you prefer to shoot emptiness and portray still life rather than the typical portraits? Who do you enjoy photographing?

George: I prefer to shoot still life and void, because my skill level is not high enough for portraits. I love the works of Russian masters of the twenties and thirties such as Alexander Rodchenko and El Lissitzky. More photography I like is of course in Bresson, Stanley Kubrick and Robert Frank..

HONK!: How do you think that living in Russia is making you different as an artist?

George: I think it is the attitude of society and state towards you as an artist. If you have no money, you will sit in your ďŹ lthy hole until the end of your days, because we all do not care.

Present Russian art is about depression and loss of hope, because Russia is crap and not the best place for artists and this situation is unlikely to change.

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HONK!: Many of your photos are melancholic and empty, do you see this is as part of Modern Russian?

George: Yes, indeed. I’m not going to say this is in the subconscious. Russians drink so much not to see this shit is happening around them. It’s almost unbearable.

HONK!: Do you think people in Russia are really free or live under a disguised dictatorship?

George: I think there is still a dictatorship, but it is not so noticeable, and carefully concealed.

But it is better not to think about it, because we can not change anything it seems.

HONK!: How free do you feel as a Russian photographer in the whole wide world, and how important is communication with the outside world for you or your work?

George: I do not consider myself a photographer, I am only a man with a camera in hand.

Communication with the outside world is very important for me, although not always very interesting. I’, almost cut off from the outside world, I live in my own world. I play guitar in a band we play noise-rock. My communication with the outside world is limited to walking with a camera through deserted places, such as landfills, abandoned houses, etc.

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Interview by Amanda M. Jansson & Emma E.K. Jones

GEORGE TOT http://www.ďŹ&#x201A;ickr.com/photos/o94022/

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The Collection

by Emma E. K. Jones

His favorite game is playing with row eyeballs.

He likes to roll them in his bed.

He likes to wear them on his head.

In fact the king is so fond of them, he even hangs them from the roof as Christmas decoration and then he stares at them all day long.

And every day he needs some more to build up his collection.

And then he calls his only friend, the ram, who knows his way with people.

The ram, whose horns wear the eyes of those whoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve seen, is roaming the streets when mist falls.

Downtown it seems that hell broke loose.

The ones who hid will die at down, the eyeless crowd has bound them.

In every corner a headless man is showing you the way.

In unlit paths the shadows whirl detached from human bodies, to melodies rising from the abyss.

And in your sleep the flies will creep to plunder your illusions.

The king wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t care, he is decorating now his garden.

Two eyeballs here, two eyeballs there.

But things have changed, the king collapsed; the news that struck have filled him with despair.

His ram confirmed all human newborns are pure blind from their birth on.

There is no eyehole, their face is flat as concrete.

The king will have to find a new town again.

Weary enough, but with a little perspiration he rides his ram and starts for a new direction.

He can not be the king of a town of such a terrible mutation.

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E A REID N

Interview by Natalie G Gunnarsdottir

Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m happy to not join that club of moaning dicks !!!

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HONK!: Who is Ocean Reid?

HONK!: How would you describe your music?

Ocean: Ocean Reid is the mind and vigour behind UK Indie outfit ‘The Recovery Position’. I was born in the North of England where I went to school and lived with family. I did my first record deal shortly after finishing school; where I got my first big break working with David Arnold and a host of top producers. My career took off from there and I’ve never looked back.

Ocean: I think ‘The Recovery Position’ sound is a bit of a Hybrid of New York and London Indie. Some people say it’s like ‘The Kooks’ meets ‘The Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ meets ‘The Subways’.

Sonically I like the sound of that mix. Maybe it’s more of a Guitar sound thing, but comparisons aside the material has a nice twist that I haven’t heard before. Tunes that just don’t really fall into a Pigeon hole which I’m proud to have written.

I have a huge list of influences but my music doesn’t sound like any of them. I’m proud to have found my own flavour, but they do say that “if you want to make your own cocktail, you have to try all the drinks!!”

I really got into song writing and started to do different projects around the world. Eventually becoming a shadow writer, my songs became other people’s songs and I spent more and more time away from the stage. Recently I had a change of mind about that and decided to plug my Guitar into a nice loud amp!! I’m ready to go back on tour and be noisy!!

HONK!: Where does the Ocean Reid name come from?

Ocean: Yeah this confuses people; some people think I’m in a band called Ocean Reid. But Ocean Reid is my name. I grew up in a very self-sustaining way. My family was all about making things and growing things. So this naturally lead to a very elemental way of life. Ocean came from the literal translation of the Dalia lama, ‘the Ocean of Wisdom’ and Reid is my family name.

HONK!: Can you describe the energy of your latest album?

Ocean: Energy is really important to the Recovery Position album. I like playing songs with big energy. It just seems to feel more real to my life, more urgent and more expressive. I also happen to enjoy playing these kind of tunes more.

As a benchmark I wouldn’t want to make an album that I wouldn’t buy myself. If I’m not excited by my own music, then why should anyone else be? If I’m not blown away by something; like the records that I heard back in school that made me want to make my own music then it’s all bullshit and I’m not interested!!

HONK!: What inspired you to start your music project?

HONK!: What is your favourite track of the album, and what inspired you to make it?

Ocean: Whilst writing songs for other people I started to feel twitchy. So I decided to write some songs for me instead. I realised I missed the touring life and all the ridiculous bullshit that happens on the road. Parties, inflammable drinks and jumping into hotel pools from balconies. Why not?? Who wouldn’t miss it?? I will probably live longer if I don’t go on tour to be honest with myself, but if you don’t enjoy the ride, don’t get on the bus!!! Road life aside, I just wanted to make the album that I wanted to make!! I wanted to use the desk that ‘The Beatles’ used at ‘Abbey Road’ and I wanted to produce the album my own way. So I did and it feels completely right.

Ocean: I think the track ‘Island Red’ is the song that really got me thinking about the album. The line “I’ve had this sinking feeling, all my life!” was the catalyst to say f**k it, I’m doing it!! I hate it when people complain about stuff and don’t do anything about it. So I’m happy to not join that club of moaning dicks. So I wrote the songs and then took it to the street busking around Brighton and shouted the songs in people’s faces until I was happy with the song arrangements. I took the shouting down a few pegs as nobody wants to listen to an album that sounds like Forest Gump getting wanked off. But the album was basically there, the tunes were solid, it was urgent, I meant it and it was a right now thing!!

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HONK!: Can tell us about your first concert?

An instant breakthrough or do you cry yourself to sleep thinking about it?

Ocean: I remember my first gig in York (UK).

The lights seemed to be amazingly bright and I felt a bit like I was being cooked. Pretty much like a Fly on one of those Insectocutor things.

I’m pretty sure I didn’t change anybody’s life with my music that night. I knew what to do with my Guitar, but I had no experience with Microphones or monitors. So the Guitar side of the gig went ok, but I have no clue if the Vocals were even audible. I didn’t quite cry myself to sleep, but it was a big big learning curve. I did feel a big rush though and I knew I wanted more. On top of that I was pretty pleased to have done the gig. I decided I was going to do a gig and crash or burn I was going to follow it through. Ideas are easy; doing something with an idea is so much harder. Some time you’ve got to just strap on a pair!!

HONK!: Do you have a favourite city to play in, and why?

Ocean: I really enjoy playing festivals as I love that whole chaos element that happens.

It’s hard to say which is my favourite city to play in though. Every city has a different buzz at a different time. It’s a tough draw between Berlin and London. I’m looking forward to coming back to Germany in Jan 2012 as I will get to play in a new host of cities that will be another first for me. All the gigs have been friendly and fun, which is great. Cities have lots to offer but it is always the people that make the city.

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HONK!: You have already played concerts in Germany. How was your experience with the German audience?

Ocean: I had a great time in Germany last time, hence I’m coming back. Every gig was very very different. Most gigs were cities, but I also played in some smaller towns. Everybody seemed to have a good sense of fun and people were very welcoming. There was a great enthusiasm for the music from people listening to people joining in. One gig went through the night; local musicians came up on stage and jammed with me and my backing band. They also introduced us all to Black Beer which turned out to be pretty strong. We left the venue about 6 A.M, drove to the hotel slept for 2 hours and then got up to do 2 sessions of live radio and a full radio broadcasted gig. A long day followed by a long night, but everybody’s enthusiasm and energy made it fun.

HONK!: Sex, drugs & rock and roll. A lifestyle you live or is this a myth that belongs to the past?

Ocean: This is a real band maker and a band breaker. Days of screaming Rock n Roll clichés like “Who threw the TV out of the window?”, “Who called the Police?”, “Where am I??” And the classic cliché “where did we leave the tour bus???” Are unfortunately not myths but hopefully things of the past.

I’ve been in bands where this has been a real problem. I’m not naming any names but previous bands have cancelled Japanese tours due to incarceration. Band members missing from video shoots, bans from hotel chains and day time TV. It really doesn’t take much to make a band implode. I like to party like most people do, but I won’t take anybody on the road that has ambitions to self-destruct on tour. Arrests and Hospital trips cause gig cancellations.

I’ve been on some quite full on tours, but the days of record labels throwing tons of money at bands are over. Which means it’s harder to make money and bands have to work harder.

So the “Rock n roll” era has come to a close for most bands. The digital death of Rock n Roll is here and it’s irreversible!!!

HONK!: Thanks you very much!!!!!

www.TheRecoveryPosition.Co White Queen - Witch Hunt EP http://soundcloud.com/witchhunt/01-white-queen/s-2tYdR

OCEAN REID

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Topshop Girls Dinosaurus Sweatshirt www.topshop.com

Truman Capote In Cold Blood

aMinus Album 2011 Almost and Maybe www.myspace.com/heyminus

YOU CERTAINLY CAN LIVE WITHOUT THESE ITEMS, BUT LIFE IS SO MUCH MORE BEAUTIFUL WITH THEM.

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Hugo Boss Boss Orange Man After Shave Lotion www.hugoboss.com

“OINK!” Handmade Tabac-Bag / Gaffa Tape

by Polys http://de.dawanda.com/shop/fakju Topman TOFFEE CORD SKINNY BLAZER www.topman.com

Wilfredo Rosado Jewellery Sexy Lady Cameo Pendant http://wilfredorosado.com/

Vlieger & Vandam Gunbag www.vliegervandam.com

Topman HUDSON ‘ANGUS’ BROGUE BOOTS www.topman.com

Helena Rubenstein WANTED STELLARS by Baccarat www.helenarubinstein.com

Valentina by Valentino Fragrance www.douglas.de

Mute Watch www.mutewatch.com

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Habitude Photos by www.neoncolour.com Production, Concept & Styling by Denise Dahinten Hair & Make Up: Maria Ehrlich & Miriam G端nther Models: Rosa Claros @Seeds Masel @Vivamodels Raban Schuster @Moccamodels Balazs Wittmann

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Silk scarf: Statement Jacket: Marlene Birger Blouse: Marlene Birger Trousers: Dawid Tomaszewski

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Habitude Silk scarf: Statement Jacket: Marlene Birger Blouse: Marlene Birger Trousers: Dawid Tomaszewski

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Habitude Dress: Dawid Tomaszewski Boys: Fred Perry

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Habitude Pullover: Marlene Birger Jeans: Balmain

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Jacket: Marlene Birger Lingerie: Monki

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Habitude Photos by www.neoncolour.com

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MY LOVE EL COMANDANTE! Text by Shel Fuller

In August 1975, in a small sterile hospital room in Miami under the watchful eyes of doctors and medical student, a young teenage mother was giving birth to her first son. The doctor wore a white coat and tennis shoes and calmly described, step-by-step, the procedure of giving birth. At the same time, 612 km away on the tropical island of Cuba, Fidel Castro (El Comandante) was sitting, enjoying a cigar, ignoring the needs of his people and soaking in his own depraved ego. That is at least what I think he was doing. I can’t really be certain. I was too busy being born.

Miami, currently considered one of “America’s Cleanest City”, for its year-round good air quality, vast green spaces, clean drinking water, clean streets and city-wide recycling programs, is certainly not the worst place to be born. Walking down the street in the summer, picking mangos from the trees. Opening up Christmas presents on the beach with the smell of sizzling barbecue floating on the breeze. As one could imagine, my childhood was rather worry free. Castro’s early years, certainly do not reflect those of my carefree youth but his later years would prove to leave a lasting impact on the city of Miami.

A dictatorship is a government that has the power to govern without consent of those being governed.

Although, the Cuban government describes itself as a socialist state, there really isn’t very much socialist about it.

Human Rights Watch is among international human rights organizations accusing the Cuban government of systematic human rights abuses, including torture, arbitrary imprisonment, unfair trials, and extrajudicial execution. Cuban law limits freedom of expression, association, assembly, movement, and the press.

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Cuba’s largest influence on my life began with the Mariel boatlift which was a mass exodus of Cubans who departed from Cuba for the United States between April 15 and October 31, 1980. Basically, the Cuban government said that anyone who wanted to leave Cuba could leave. In the late 70’s / early 80’s Cuba was in the midst of a horrible economic downturn, therefore many people took this offer of asylum and headed to the shores of the U.S. by any means possible. The U.S. government found out later that the Cuban government also took this opportunity to clean out their prisons and mental hospitals and shipped hundreds of criminals and mentally ill people to the beaches of Florida. By the end of October 1980, 125,000 Cubans had reached the shore of Florida. I was 5 years old.

At this point, not many people realized that the face of Miami was about to change for the better and for the worst. Cuban culture is a very rich carpet of sounds and colors. When most people think of Cuba, they imagine cool cocktails at a beachside bar listening to salsa music and waiting on a cool breeze and for the most part, that would be an accurate description. Cuban cuisine is a fusion of Spanish, African and Caribbean cuisines. A quick drive through Miami’s Little Havana with the windows down and you can expect to smell a mixture of rice, beans, yuca, lime and plantains. People sitting on the corner, playing dominoes and drinking a Modelo. This bohemian lifestyle is the perfect match for a life in Miami.

The negative consequences came over time. Just like in Europe, the issue of integration went unsolved. Cuban, just like most other ethnicities living in the U.S., began to live in their own ghettos.

Many of the new Cuban-Americans put in the effort to learn the English language but many more really could not be bothered with the linguistic challenge.

The result is that, even today, there are many Cubans who cannot and will not speak English. In Miami, you cannot even think of being gainfully employed without speaking Spanish. That means, that many American born citizens began to leave the city to search for work and the hope of a new life.

It is not uncommon to get an evil eye when you ask someone in a store if they can speak English. More often than not, you will get the response, “I live in Miami. I don’t need to speak English.

Politics in Miami is mainly a Cuban American issue which normally results in jobs and opportunities being given to Cuban Americans before anyone else.

America, which is known for it lack of social services, were (and still) are being bled dry by people who never paid into the system.

When my grandmother retired, due to her struggle with diabetes, it took her years of battle to receive the financial assistance that she needed from the Social Security Administration after working for over 30 years at a prominent hospital. At the same time, new immigrants were receiving federal and state financial assistance without much of a problem, even though they had never worked one day in the U.S.

As I reflect upon the years of change that has enveloped Miami, I find it very interesting that a small island, only 151 km from Florida, has always had a huge impact on my life. I cannot begin to even say that I understand what it feels to grow up under such malicious government like the one in Cuba but I can say that their ability to manipulate, control and retain power over social and political life in Miami is rather impressive.

For most people, Miami is just a wonderful city, with beautiful people with beautiful bodies that roam around with Will Smith’s Miami playing on repeat on their headphones. For people who lived and grew up there, we give the city and it new visitors a lot of appreciation and resentment. Mostly, we resent the fact that the impact of Castro’s cunning plan was able to spread. I would be the first to stand up and defend the right of every person on the planet to live anywhere on the planet that they choose but we all have to understand that there are new rules, and new expectations with every jump across a border. My lover Castro sent me the gift of a vibrant and diverse culture which, through its refusal to integrate, eventually lead to me leaving my birthplace to search for my own type of freedom outside of my own country.

Shel Fuller http://www.twitter.com/ShelFuller

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ONE IN A MILLION

BLOGS WE LOVE

www.polyhead.tumblr.com/ By the looks of it Blogging is shaping the future. In the blogging world it is you who decides what the world should look like. Each issue will bring you one blogger that we particularly love and you have deďŹ nitely to watch. Meet Poly Head, our absolute favourite for this month. This is a slice of geometry heaven. Be it architecture, photography, illustration, fashion, or design, it is a feast of perfect lines, dots, triangles and polygons. From the simplest piece of paper to the most bizarre rarity, here is someone with an eye keen enough to spot art anywhere when he sees it.

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Impo to be Coat Adriana Degreas

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ossible e mistaken

Photos by Fernando Mazza Abamgt Styling by Alessandro Lazaro & Mauricio Mariane Abamgt Make Up/Hair Juliana Munholz Capamgt Art Direction Manuela Sanchez Model Viviane Oliveria / Ello Models

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Dress Pelu Shoes Christian Loubouth Bracelet Opto

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BUTTON-DOWNSHIRT M&GUIA TIE DIO VINTAGE BY JUISI BY LICOUOR ROSARY COLLECTION DRESS MARIA BONITA EXTRA

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Accessories Collection

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Dress Katarina Sternenberg Necklace Opto

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Pants Madame X Belt ZOOMP Rosary Collection

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ΊϘχψϙ ΍ϏωϚχϚϕϘϙ ψϟ Βϙϒχϓ ΣχϝχϝϏ Βϙϒχϓ ΣχϝχϝϏ Ϗϙ χ ϟϕϛϔύ ΐϘχϖώϏω ΊϘϚϏϙϚ ψϕϘϔͥ ϘχϏϙϋϊ χϔϊ ψχϙϋϊ Ϗϔ ΎύϟϖϚͨ ΏϘϕϓ лййм ϚϏϒϒ лййс ώϋ ϙϚϛϊϏϋϊ ΐϘχϖώϏωχϒ ΍ϋϙϏύϔ Ϗϔ ΏϏϔϋ ΊϘϚϙ χϚ Ϛώϋ ΞϔϏϜϋϘϙϏϚϟ ϕό ΑϋϒϝχϔͿΌχϏϘϕͨ ΑϏϙ ΙχϙϙϏϕϔ Ϗϙ Ϛϕ ωϘϋχϚϋ ϝϕϘϑ ϝώϏωώ Ϗϙ ϔϕϚ όϕϒϒϕϝϏϔύ ϚϘχϊϏϚϏϕϔχϒ ύϘχϖώϏω ϊϋϙϏύϔ ϙϚχϔϊχϘϊϙͨ Αϋ ϒϕϜϋϙ Ϛώϋ ωϕϓψϏϔχϚϏϕϔ ϕό ϘϋϚϘϕ χϔϊ ϓϕϊϋϘϔ ϋϒϋ΀ ϓϋϔϚϙͥ ϕϒϊ ϖώϕϚϕύϘχϖώϟ ϝϏϚώ χ ϓϕϊϋϘϔ ϙϚϟϒϋͨ ΑΘΗΔͪͧ ΠώχϚ Ϗϙ Ϛώϋ ϓϋχϔϏϔύ ϕό ϟϕϛϘ ϖϘϕϐϋωϚͧ ΊϘχψϙ ΍ϏωϚχϚϕϘϙͬ Βϙϒχϓͧ Β ϙϖϋϔϚ χϒϒ ϓϟ ϒϏόϋ Ϗϔ Ϛώϋ ϙώχϊϕϝ ϕό ΖϛψχϘχϑИϙ ϘϋύϏϓϋͨ Β ϑϔϕϝ ϝώχϚ ϏϚ όϋϋϒϙ ϒϏϑϋ Ϛϕ ϒϏϜϋ Ϗϔ ϚϋϘϘϕϘ χϔϊ Ϛϕ ψϋ ϙωχϘϋϊͨ Πϋ χϒϒ ϑϔϕϝ ϚώχϚ ϕϚώϋϘ ΊϘχψ ωϕϛϔϚϘϏϋϙ χϘϋ Ϛώϋ ϙχϓϋͨ ΊόϚϋϘ Ϛώϋ ϊϋχϚώ ϕό Δώχϒϋϊ Μχϋϋϊ Β ϚώϕϛύώϚͥ ϚώϏϙ Ϗϙ ύϕϏϔύ Ϛϕϕ όχϘͨ ΒϚ Ϗϙ ϔϕϚ Ϛώϋ όϏϘϙϚ ϚϏϓϋ ϚώχϚ Ϛώϋ ϕϒϊ ϙϟϙϚϋϓ Ϗϔ ΎύϟϖϚ χϔϊ ϕϚώϋϘ ωϕϛϔϚϘϏϋϙ Ϗϔ ϕϛϘ ϘϋύϏϕϔͥ χϘϋ ϚϘϋχϚϏϔύ ϚώϋϏϘ ϖϋϕϖϒϋ ϒϏϑϋ χϔϏϓχϒϙͨ Μϕͥ ϝώϋϔ Β ϙχϝ Ϛώϋ ΝϛϔϏϙϏχϔ χϔϊ ΎύϟϖϚϏχϔ ϘϋϜϕϒϛϚϏϕϔͥ Β ϚώϕϛύώϚ ͧ Β ώχϜϋ Ϛϕ ψϋ ϖχϘϚ ϕό ϏϚͨ ΝϏϒϒ Ϛώϋ ϊχϟ ϝϋ ϝϏϒϒ ύϋϚ ϕϛϘ όϘϋϋϊϕϓ όϘϕϓ ϚώϏϙ ϚϟϘχϔϔϟͨ Β ϝχϙ ϙϋχϘωώϏϔύ όϕϘ χ ϝχϟ Ϛϕ Ϛϕ ϙϕϓϋϚώϏϔύͨ ΝώϏϙ ϝχϙ Ϛώϋ ϓϕϓϋϔϚ ϝώϋϔ Β ωχϓϋ ϛϖ ϝϏϚώ Ϛώϋ Ϗϊϋχ ϕό Ϛώϋ ΊϘχψ ΍ϏωϚχϚϕϘϙ ϙϚϕϘ ϟͨ ϝϝϝͨψϋώχϔωϋͨϔϋϚͿϠχϜχϜϏϏ ϠχϝχϝϏЮϘϋ΀ϜϏϋϝͨϓϋ

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by Christo Mitov Illustration Ango The Meek Dead

A Lady Gaga joke I know that by now I have won the Madonna loathing audience and I am a joke about Lady Gaga away from having all the attention. Frankly, I don’t think I have to make a joke about Lady Gaga - she is a walking mockery of herself this year anyway. While it was very noble and equally populistic of her earlier this year to try to convince the senators to repeal “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” in the US, it’s very hard to be the girl in the meat suit on Sunday and the voice of reason on Tuesday.

Hi, how are you ?

Having made that clear, let’s move on… to you. I haven’t seen you in ages! Ok, only 93 days - but who’s counting? How have you been? What did you do this summer? Did you get cancer from all the sun you were exposed to? I know I didn’t. In Berlin we had only about 35 hours of sun over the last 4 months. However, this helped me retain my aristocratic pasty skin tone. And to those of you who went to the sea, ocean or whatever you call it in your country and on your continent I have a really important question - what was the song of summer 2011?

If I tell you that the last summer song I know is the one by Las Ketchup (Asereje, aha, ajebe, turejebe. abejebe… ring a bell?) you’d guess when was the last time my pale skin saw the light of day during summer. Was it something latino again this year, or was it some ragaton? I could never distinguish both.

It’s like distinguishing all those indie bands with guitars and The in the name - pointless. Thus, find a way to let me know which song it was so I know what NOT to listen to.

You know my mail: cmitov@honk-mag.com

I feel a little bit like on the first day of school writing Revenge of The Nerds right now. You know the feeling - you spent 3 months away from school chasing either girls or boys, stuck in the countryside or staying at home playing video games. The experience of coming back to school has always been for me what I would image a Madonna comeback would feel like - rather an obligation (by contract, in Madonna’s case) than a wish and completely unnecessary (just like in Madonnas case).

Why I haven’t been at the beach since 2006 ?

You may think that I have a secret disease or I am a fairy blood drinking vampire (got THAT reference?) in order not to show my face at the beach for so long. Let me use this opportunity to assure you that everything’s just fine with me. It’s not extreme obesity either. I am not the most slender person walking the streets of Berlin, but I always vomit a little bit in my mouth when I hear people saying “fat people shouldn’t go to the beach and show their bodies” OK, they don’t actually say it. It is more the look they give you and all the whisper-talking behind your back.

That’s when I strike back - for every mean look I start yelling “Go eat something!” or if I am extremely pissed off I just walk by their towels and dig out sand and throw it in their eyes by accident. Then, when they start screaming, I smile like I give a shit and care.

By now you should’ve gotten the fact that I am pretty pissed off at body evangelists. If you haven’t, you’re just waiting for another Lady Gaga joke to come along. Why is it so hard for skinny people to accept that curvy people are actually happier? Because, not only we eat and have healthy lifestyle, but we also have the brains not to judge someone only by their size. It might sound tedious and like a complete framing to the topic of our new issue (Dictatorship, if you haven’t gotten that yet either) but I am done with the dictatorship of skinny people. You should know that, if you don’t like me, I’m going to make you hate me! Oh, and the reason why I haven’t been getting all the recommended sun recently, is that I’ve been busy building a career and digging my way out of the ghetto that I grew up in. It takes time, you know.

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Topping the D-list If you’re a psychologist then you have figured out by now that I have been mocked as a kid for my weight.

Especially in school. It turns out that unfortunately the high-school mentality spreads way further than the hallway. Take the Berlin art scene - it’s pretty childish and sometimes really immature. I make jokes about it being like high school, because it is.

It’s the same hierarchy. You have to know your place, but you could easily be fooled into thinking somebody is your friend when they clearly aren’t. If I am alone with one of the jocks from the football team or the popular girls, sure, the’d talk to me and even ask me for advice. But every time I walk through the hall and be like, “Hi, you popular editor in a small Berlin art magazine!” he’d act like I hadn’t said anything.

Anyway, just like Kathy Griffin, I have no problem to be on the D-list. Because I know they know my name and they secretly love me. Or I am slightly delusional, because I am almost always on painkillers. Forget the last sentence.

I’ve always been the outsider and the nerd at school.

That is also maybe why my column is called like that.

Because I’ve been piling up the shit from everyone all those years and now, it’s time to unload. Sorry for the mess.

Also, don’t get me wrong, I myself prefer lean guys, but that doesn’t mean that I am insulting everyone else, because this would be just straight mean.

Friends of my mother say, “You were that small as a baby! Just like this!” and they make a fist and shake it. “You’ve grown so much over the last years!

But you know what they say - If you can’t beat them, join them. That’s how I decided that next year, I will organize my first exhibition in Berlin. It’s going to be pretty exciting. I may have proved that I am pretty professional in being ironic and snappy, but now the time has come to prove that I am professional about art, too. I will blow your mind with the exhibition. I am excited for all the aspiring artists I am about to curate in the upcoming exhibition.

“Can you imagine? You were so tiny!”

I can’t imagine being that small. It must have been the one time I didn’t worry about my weight. At 4 kilos, I’ve definitely been the Calista Flockhart of the newborn cast. Then my grandma started feeding me salami (when I was 1 year old) and I turned out to become what I am today. And you know what?

I don’t want to be like Calista Flockhart - because all I’ll get to do with my career is play a crazy anorexic lawyer and marry Harrison Ford and call it a day. And we all know that neither is good for your health.

BING BONG !

Oh what’s that sound? It’s the sound of the dispatcher telling me that my flight is boarding. That’s right I finished my work for this issue and am going on a well deserved vacation. And of course, I am choosing the un-coolest time ever. Because I can.

I am excited for another school year with HONK and all the mobbing, elbowing and scratching that expects me. Stick around to watch it happen. And keep your third week of November free. There’s something amazing coming. And it’s better than prom.

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The Underclass in Revolt

by Marco Scalvini

During his recent election campaign, British Prime Minister David Cameron launched a conservative manifesto calling for the advent of a â&#x20AC;&#x153;big societyâ&#x20AC;? or in other words empowered the citizenry and a more responsible society. Following rioting in Tottenham and other British suburbs, Cameron was later forced to admit in the House of Commons that the UK is instead of big a sick society.

Cameron is a product of the Britain upper class, which bases its authority on peerage, gentry, and hereditary privilege. Therefore it is not surprising that the Prime Minister labeled the looting and burning that took place as criminal acts produced by a general national moral decline caused by bad parenting, poor teaching, and a perverse inner-city subculture. However, Cameron is oddly right when he says that this society is sick, but unfortunately, it is not the underclass and those who are marginalized who are ill. Today, it is all of European society that is sick.

Cameron did not understand clearly, however, that today across Europe, there is new serious social unrest, which does not have a single cause. It is fed by three intense factors: the spread of poverty, the retrenchment of social mobility, and a deep distrust, even basic contempt, toward all politics and politicians.

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The West, throughout the Cold War, was convinced - and rightly so – of the superiority of its liberal institutions. These were both democratic and participatory. But in time, those without a strong culture of political morality slowly became the convenient home of sleazy profiteers.

Cameron forgot to mention that among his closest associates there are a dozen, at the end of the last Parliament, who were forced not to run again. They had defrauded the tax authorities and obtained parliamentary illegal reimbursements. As consequence, Cameron did not blame Britain’s recent tabloid phone hacking scandals and the improper relationships between police and journalists. For this Prime Minister, the moral decline of British society is only the fault of the underclass.

When the British social system clearly went into freefall during the riots, thousands of people living in disadvantaged neighborhoods stormed the stores. As Naomi Klein notes, these people “came out pushing shopping carts overflowing with the goods they could no longer afford— clothes, shoes, electronics, food”. Sneakers and TV’s and mobile phones are not luxury products.

It is very hard to argue that excesses of consumerism produced these riots! The rioters did not assault Prada or Harrods.

On the other hand, the ‘condemnation’ of this event by the media establishment was reactionary, a means of escaping and disregarding and excusing the very real and most pertinent questions raised by that outburst of violence. The media simply placed the blame on stereotypical teenagers. British society then reacted through an uneasy populist criminalization of the underclass: Evictions from public housing, threats to cut off communication tools, and outrageous jail terms (three years for a stolen pair of shorts or six months for a bottle of water). Indeed, the government under public opinion pressure wanted and demanded tougher punishments to restore the order.

Ironically, journalists, police officers and politicians - who are now bellowing for more law and order - are those who themselves were caught red-handed, either committing or colluding in systematic criminal acts during the phone-hacking scandal. But in that case, the public opinion did not overreact by asking severe measures against crimes. Why? For understanding what happened it is important to demystify certain interpretations voiced by the mass media and the ruling classes. Avoiding the political dimensions of any riot is clearly an ideological choice.

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It is symptomatic of a widespread trend in neo-liberal societies to presume that ‘the political’ has been either altogether displaced by ‘management’ or ‘technocracy’ and that poor people or uneducated minorities are not able to express political actions or ideas.

What is necessary is a broader, more inclusive, concept of the political, which encompasses any and all social actions or has implications for power relations that will allow anyone to see more clearly the true ‘political’ nature of these riots. As Gary Younge on the Guardian argues, “They were looting, not shop-lifting, and challenging the police for control of the streets, not stealing coppers’ hubcaps.”

The British riots and the draconian reactions to them show that today the political class has lost contact with the real conditions of a large part of the population. Prisons won’t teach the underclass to love society. Cuts to their social benefits or public housing evictions will only marginalize them even more. Social peace has already evaporated far too much. The last thing we need is to return to Charles Dickens’s England. Thus the elite consensus regarding the criminalization of riots shows that there is no longer any language that speaks to a common experience between the underclass and the wealthier classes. Unfortunately, wealth cannot ever be shared if we do not share the language used to speak about it.

However, if we accept a political point of view when we analyze these riots, are we then saying that violence is acceptable? Smashing a window, looting a store, or assaulting police are all “violent acts”, but they can also be understood as clear, pointed effects of a “systemic violence”. According to Slavoi Zizek, Violence is intrinsic to a political-economic system predicated on inequality of wealth.

In short, violence is a key feature of contemporary societies inasmuch as its social disparities are growing in intensity and number.

Therefore, the British rioters were reacting to a violent system, one in which the rioters are systemically excluded from equal access to resources. But then what does “equal’ mean?

Equal opportunity or equal entitlement and the right to grab what you believe you deserve as politicians and bankers constantly do?

Indeed, Antonio Negri is correct in suggesting the recent London riots should be considered for their “radical” diversity. These riots can be characterized as radical because the youth involved rejected an authority that they simply do not or perhaps will not recognize anymore.

And as Ben Whitham has brilliantly observed in a comment: Yes there was “mindless violence” in terms of unplanned resentment that translated into the destruction of property and clashes with the police.

Yes, there was “opportunistic” thieving of the most common commodities that range from the cell phone to sportswear. Yes, the rioters were “enjoying themselves”, drinking and dreaming for a night to be stronger than authority power. And no, there were no a political agenda, no leaders, no engagements with the mainstream political discourse. But these riots were not simply “inexplicable.” They can be explained by a collective rejection of the inevitable poverty, unemployment, discrimination and police abuses.

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These questions - as we all know – rest not just in the UK. Today all of Western society - and especially Europe - is in serious crisis.

The West was entrusted to the myth of endless economic growth, but this system is possible no longer. It is founded on business and consumption, but only fueled huge debt that financial speculators were allowed to use for their own personal advantage. This society was proud of its social status, from cradle to grave, but Europeans now consume more coffins than create cots, and governments grudgingly have to admit that the welfare state is no longer sustainable. So the crisis created by the wealthiest elite can now paying only a small part of the population and not other segments (especially its youth), which has been left sadly sitting ever more hopeless on the edge of society.

The UK riots have unique roots, but British youth’s alienation is similar to the disenfranchisement behind revolts across the Mediterranean. Hence, the recent economic crisis is not just a crisis of one industry.

It is a crisis of the entire economic and thus the entire social structure. We are seeing now the collapse of a whole system in today’s society. For us Europeans, in particular, this crisis has largely destroyed our welfare and our culture of social solidarity. In the future it will be even more difficult to face angry mobs and find solutions that reflect social justice.

Autor: Marco Scalvini is a POLIS-Silverstone Scholar and Graduate Teaching Assistant in the Media and Communication Department of the LSE. He has supported numerous efforts by the international community to promote political dialogue, national reconciliation, and democratization in Kosovo and in Palestine. In 2009, he worked as consultant for the G8 Summit. www.scalvini.eu

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WHAT WHE

WE HAVE SELECTED 6 EVENTS WE WOULD KILL TO GO THERE’S SURELY SOMETHING NEAR YOU THAT YOU W

LONDON, UK

BERLIN, GERMANY

Postmodernism. Style and Subversion 1970-1990.

International Short Film Festival. We HONK!s love

and forms. The exhibition covers the two decades that revolutionized the world of art and design abolishing all rules reaching a newly discovered perfecup to 20 minutes is being shown. The program is di-

vided according to theme so it won’t be that hard to

age was everything can be rediscovered till January

choose. Though you’d probably wanna watch them

15th at the Victoria and Albert Museum.

http://www.vam.ac.uk/

nient cinema near you.

ERE WHEN

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O TO. WE CAN’T AFFORD TRAVELLING THE GLOBE BUT WILL GET EXCITED ABOUT THOUGHTFULLY SELECTED

BY AMANDA M. JANSSON AND EMMA E. K. JONES

STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN

NEW YORK, USA

Another Story –photography from the Moderna Mu-

Recent Photography from Leipzig from the Zabludo-

seet Collection. A complete photography take-over!

wicz Collection. They say living in New York is like

Exclusively! This is something every Stockholmer or visitor should take advantage of. This is the 20th cen-

you want to experience some European Europe check

tury like you have never seen it before. Divided into 3

out these exceptional Leipziger art photographers and the way the use and question their medium. 10 innovative and diverse artists are being exhibited. What

-

http://www.modernamuseet.se/en/Stockholm/ .

http://www.zabludowiczcollection.com/new-york/

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TEL AVIV, ISRAEL

TOKYO, JAPAN

Roundabout: Face to Face. The best things just hap-

Kusama’s Body Festival in 60’s. The work of 60s

pen when cultures mix like that. If you are lucky

pop artist Yayoi Kusama is celebrated here uncen-

enough to be in Tel Aviv you can’t miss this exhibi-

sored and to the fullest. Photography dripping with

as Kusama experienced to the core while in New tual creative artistic expression allowing a journey he gets involved with. Luckily extended till NovemAviv Museum of Art. http://www.tamuseum.com/ http://www.watarium.co.jp/

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