June 2016

trouble 135

xt Daniel Moynihan

CONTENTS COMICS FACE

Ive Sorocuk ..............................................................................................

THE MADNESS OF ART: BETTER CALL SALTZ

Jim Kempner ...........................................................................................

A GLASS OF WINK

Darby Hudson .........................................................................................

PJ COLLINS SAVES THE WORLD

Interview by Steve Proposch photos by Kyle Ford .................................

A MOMENT WITH MARILYN

Inga Walton ...............................................................................................

JUNE SALON

Jeepers! ...................................................................................................

FINDING THE ART IN PHUKET

Anthony S. Cameron ................................................................................

05 06 07 08 18 36 42

COVER: Kyle FORD, PJ Collins Saves the World 2015, photograph of P.J. Collins as Sir Les Patterson, commissioned by Trouble magazine © Kyle Ford.

Issue 135 JUNE 2016 trouble is an independent monthly mag for promotion of arts and culture Published by Trouble Magazine Pty Ltd. ISSN 1449-3926 EDITOR Steve Proposch CONTRIBUTORS Ive Sorocuk, Jim Kempner, Inga Walton, Anthony S. Cameron, Kyle Ford, love.

GET from AppStore FOLLOW on issuu & twitter SUBSCRIBE at troublemag.com READER ADVICE: Trouble magazine contains artistic content that may include nudity, adult concepts, coarse language, and the names, images or artworks of deceased Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people. Treat Trouble intelligently, as you expect to be treated by others. Collect or dispose of thoughtfully.

DIS IS DE DISCLAIMER! The views and opinions expressed herein are not necessarily those of the publisher. To the best of our knowledge all details in this magazine were correct at the time of publication. The publisher does not accept responsibility for errors or omissions. All content in this publication is copyright and may not be reproduced in whole or in part in any form without prior permission of the publisher. Trouble is distributed online from the first of every month of publication but accepts no responsibility for any inconvenience or financial loss in the event of delays. Phew!

This comic first appeared in Trouble September 2013

art comedy series

Better Call Saltz Jim explains to Dru his special connection with Jerry Saltz and then calls the famed art critic to encourage a review.

visit: themadnessofart.com/

COVER STORY Interview Steve Proposch Photography Kyle Ford Hair & makeup Margo Regan

PJ COLLINS: Saves the World

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Our audience needs no introduction to the ‘whys’ of the Arts Party, so when we interviewed its Leader, Patrick James Collins, we wanted to concentrate more on the ‘wheretofores’. Here, after all, is a serious political party standing candidates in the coming Federal Election, which was concepted as half-drunken pub banter and is currently being run on credit card and crowdfunding.

What’s more Australian than that!

Give us the origin story of The Arts Party - how long ago were you exposed to radioactive waste, and what kind of superpowers did it give you?

PJ COLLINS: We came up with the idea of the Arts Party over beers at the Coogee Bay Hotel in Sydney. I was involved for quite a few years in running the Coogee Arts Festival and the Australian Film Festival up the road. Barry Watterson and I (Baz was also the founder of both events) were moaning about the state of support for the Arts, the Aussie film industry, and how hard it was to get any kind of funding from local or state governments for cultural, musical and arts-based community events. I think it was after the third jug of beer that the idea of starting a political party struck us. Perhaps there was something radioactive in that beer!

A few days later we started a crowdfunding campaign to see if we could find 500 people on the electoral roll willing to join us as founding members of the Arts Party, paying $20 each. In 4 weeks we had over 600 members and we’ve well over 2000 now. We were officially registered as a federal party in August 2014 and are standing candidates in the 2016 Federal Election.

Crowdfunding, of course, is not for the faint-hearted but the reward is twofold. You receive both the actual cash you’re after, as well as clear validation that there’s people who believe in what you’re doing. Plus, we attracted more attention generally from the media. We still have hardly any money (what we’re spending on our entire campaign is roughly the same as what one of the major parties spends on a single candidate), but we have enough to stand candidates across the country, against Malcolm Turnbull, Tony Abbott, and plenty of others, which is great.

PJ Collins Saves the World

“

It's time to give our politicians a good hard kick up the Arts!

�

4

Taxes are a bit like crowdfunding anyway - your comments?

PJ: Absolutely! Though it’s mostly unwilling contributions and the amount given varies a lot!

As we found with crowdfunding for this election, those with the least often give the most, which sadly also mirrors the overall tax system. But in the end what we are talking about are the schools and hospitals and community support that should benefit each and every one of us. For example we need to see education, not as some selfish investment, but rather as something that increases the overall IQ and ability of the community, which benefits us all.

Most if not all of the money we pay in tax should be invested directly back into the Australian people and our communities to help us be the best we can be.

That’s the point isn’t it?

PJ Collins Saves the World

“

... to see education, not as some selfish investment, but rather as something that increases the overall IQ and ability of the community ...

”

ARTS PARTY

POLICY

SMACK

DOWN

“We want quality, affordable and lifelong learning opportunities for all Australians.

Education improves us as individuals, and in turn strengthens us as a people. It is the ultimate WIN-WIN.”

EDUCATION

- http://www.artsparty.org/education_access

“A fairer system is key. We’ve come up with ideas to raise over $22bn more each year AND makes the system fairer.”

TAXATION

- http://www.artsparty.org/revenue_raising

“The infrastructure we care most about are the cultural venues, theatres, music stages, galleries, halls and community centres where we come together to laugh, cry and learn.”

INFRASTRUCTURE - http://www.artsparty.org/venue_policy

ENVIRONMENT

“We’re as green as the greens when it come to protecting the environment and artistic too!”

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On policy matters outside of the arts, how will you cope with discussions on areas as disparate as immigration and corrupt banking practices?

PJ: Arts, culture, creative industries, education and community are our core issues, but these are all built on working together, a sense of fairness and opportunity for all. We’re a lucky country but some are luckier than others. You’d put the banks at the top of the list ($100m profit a day anyone?) and refugees at the very bottom. We’ve actually got a well developed refugee approach, which is essentially about treating people with respect, processing them more quickly, and doing that on the mainland. We think off-shore detention is just a terrible way to treat people, and it’s incredibly expensive. To spend $1 billion a year locking up less than 2,000 people who are guilty only of seeking asylum – it would literally be cheaper to house them in the Hilton!

How do you plan to get those messages across to the public when you will most likely be seen as a one-issue party?

PJ: I think that one issue, of supporting the arts and the creativity of everyone, is a worthy cause in itself. These things feed into all areas of our lives: health, education, community-building, and basic human happiness.

Every business starts with a bright idea and only turns into reality through having the right skills to develop that idea into something profitable. We need to be digging more value out of our minds, not our mines, if we’re going to have the shared future we all deserve.

Put simply, if you like films, tv drama, music, theatre, fashion, writing, visual arts, design, gaming, radio or live performance of any kind, then you’re already a supporter.

PJ Collins Saves the World

“

We need to be digging more value out of our minds, not our mines ...

�

4

“

... $1 billion a year locking up less than 2,000 people who are guilty only of seeking asylum – it would literally be cheaper to house them in the Hilton!

”

Your target is to gain a million votes for the coming election - what do you think that will prove?

PJ: Like the crowdfunding, it will prove that looking after the Arts and investing in our future is actually a vote winner! We reckon that the only thing that every politician of every party absolutely cares about is votes. If we can show that there are votes in supporting the Arts, we can get a better deal for us all, as artists, audiences and communities from every party. So it doesn’t matter who wins the election, because we all win!

Specifically, tell me how The Arts Party - if it gains a Federal or State seat - may help support, for example, a small, regional art magazine down on its luck ;) PJ: Mate, small regional art magazines are the lifeblood of this great nation!

We’ll be looking at special funding streams from the Australia Council just for you guys!! The “Cultural Publishing Fund” sounds like a great fit.

The Federal Election is around the corner and we want to get A MILLION AUSSIES to give A MILLION VOTES to the Arts this year. A million votes will be something no political party can ignore. Whichever one wins doesn't matter, because we can all win. By supporting us, then together, we can change the future of Australia - artsparty.org

Interview Steve Proposch | Photography Kyle Ford | Hair & makeup Margo Regan

4

a moment with

Marilyn

part two

Inga Walton

“I

was full of a strange feeling, as if I were two people.

One of them was Norma Jeane from the orphanage who belonged to nobody. The other was someone whose name I didn’t know. But I knew where she belonged. She belonged to the ocean and the sky and the whole world.” - Marilyn Monroe.1

The celebrated English photographer, diarist, and designer Sir Cecil Beaton (1904-80) photographed Monroe at arguably the height of her fame for American Harper’s Bazaar. Beaton used the Ambassador Hotel as his base while working in New York, and wrote, “However, the tornado visit of Marilyn Monroe [22 February, 1956] was the greatest fun. Although two-and-ahalf hours late, Marilyn was instantly forgiven for her disarming, childlike freshness, her ingenuity and irresistible mischievousness”.2 Beaton, whose character assessments could be as withering as his observations were often acerbic, was nonetheless won over by Monroe, who by that time had a reputation for being chronically late, unprepared, and ‘difficult’ to work with.

The session with Beaton produced the image that became Monroe’s favourite, Marilyn Monroe (VI) (1956), also known as ‘the Bed Sitting’, or the ‘Japanese photo’. It was from a series of improvised shots of the actress lying down, and holding a carnation pressed to her chest. A wall-hanging depicting a Japanese scene was used as a back-drop: it was the image Monroe sent to her fans, and was found in multiples amongst her personal belongings. Seven images from this famous series are included in the touring exhibition Marilyn: Celebrating An American Icon, seen recently at Murray Art Museum Albury (MAMA), and the single frame in Marilyn Monroe at Bendigo Art Gallery (until 10 July, 2016). Beaton’s shots of Monroe, “showed him at his most inventive, and pays tribute to the amazing rapport a great icon can engender in a great photographer ... [and] elicited from the star the vulnerable seductiveness that best characterised much of Monroe’s appeal”.3 In June, 1956 Beaton wrote an article recalling his impressions of the photoshoot with Monroe, and sent her a handwritten copy. She had a threepanelled silver picture frame, given to her by Joshua Logan (1908-88), who directed her to great acclaim in Bus Stop (1956), and his wife, actress Nedda Harrigan (1899-1989). Monroe framed the pages either side of this beloved photograph, which sat on a side-table in the living room of the apartment at East 57th Street in New York she shared with her third husband, playwright

PREVIOUS SPREAD: Film still from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (Howard Hawks, 1953). ©1953 and 2016 Twentieth Century Fox. ABOVE: Sir Cecil (Walter Hardy) BEATON, CBE (1904-80), Marilyn Monroe III (1956/2005) detail, silver gelatin print, 62 x 62 cm, © Cecil Beaton Studio Archive/Sothebys.

Arthur Miller (1915-2005) from 1956 to 1960.4 Beaton gives an evocative account of Monroe’s infectious joie de vivre, and is full of admiration for her sheer tenacity; he is equally perceptive as to her inner doubts and often crippling insecurities, Miss Marilyn Monroe calls to mind the bouquet of a fireworks display, eliciting from her awed spectators an open mouthed chorus of ohs and ahs. She is as spectacular as the silvery shower of a Vesuvius fountain; she has rocketed from obscurity to become our post war sex-symbol; the pinup girl of an age. And whatever press agentry or manufactured illusion may have lit the fuse, it is her own weird genius that has sustained her flight. Transfigured by the garish marvel of Technicolor cinemascope,

4

she walks like an undulating basilisk, scorching everything in her path but the rosemary bushes. Her voice has the sensuality of silk or velvet ... The puzzling truth is that Miss Monroe is a make-believe siren, unsophisticated as a Rhine maiden, innocent as a sleepwalker. She is an urchin pretending to be grown-up ...

In her presence, you are startled, then disarmed, by her lack of inhibition.

What might at first seem like exhibitionism is yet counterbalanced by a wistful incertitude beneath the surface. If this star is an abandoned sprite, she touchingly looks to her audience for approval. She is strikingly like an overexcited child asked downstairs after tea. The initial shyness over, excitement has now gotten the better of her. She romps, she squeals with delight, she leaps onto the sofa. She puts a flower stem in her mouth, puffing on a daisy as though it were a cigarette. It is an artless, impromptu, high-spirited, infectiously gay performance. It may end in tears.

Equally impromptu is her general appearance. This canary blond nymph has been so sufficiently endowed by nature as to pay no attention to the way she looks. Her hair, her nails, her make-up, have a makeshift, spontaneous attractiveness. It is all very contemporary.5 What Beaton could not know was that his somewhat florid description of Monroe would prove sadly prescient: “This, then, is the wonder of the age – a dreaming somnambular, a composite of Alice in Wonderland, Trilby, or a Minsky artist. Perhaps she was born the post war day we had need of her.

Certainly she has no knowledge of the past. Like [Jean] Giraudoux’s Ondine [1938], she is only fifteen years old; and she will never die”.6 Having previously helmed three Shakespeare adaptations for the screen (194455), Lord Laurence Olivier (1907-89) chose as his next directorial venture The Prince and the Showgirl (1957). Sir Terence Rattigan (1911-77) wrote the screenplay based on his own comedic work The Sleeping Prince: An Occasional Fairy Tale (1953). Olivier had starred in the first production of the play, opposite his then wife Vivien Leigh (1913-67), in London’s West End, but it was not destined to be another filmic outing for ‘the Oliviers’. Monroe had acquired the film rights to the play for her recently established Marilyn Monroe Productions (MMP). The role of the young actress ‘Elsie Marina’ who captivates the pompous Regent, ‘Prince Charles of Carpathia’, was well suited to Monroe’s deft comedic abilities. She served as an executive producer of the film with Milton H. Greene, whom Miller was wary of and resented. The relationship between Monroe and Greene would all but disintegrate during filming, adding to the atmosphere of professional and personal enmity that seemed to envelop the production. > Ed FEINGERSH (1925-61), Marilyn with Chanel No.5 (1955/2003), Silver gelatin print, 37 x 32.5 cm, © Ed Feingersh/Archives Alive Ltd. (Private Collection Germany).

During pre-production, Olivier insisted on a meeting with Beaton at the Ambassador Hotel to ask him if he would design Monroe’s costumes for the film. These two giants of the theatre world had fallen out in 1948 while working on the Old Vic touring production of Sheridan’s The School for Scandal (1777) for Australia and New Zealand, for which Beaton had been engaged as the designer. Beaton was nonplussed by their lunch, relating, “I believe Larry was disappointed I was not more impressed. But when I saw the play in London, I disliked it intensely ... I love Marilyn Monroe and would put up with a great deal of trouble, delays and indecisions for this adorable person, and the pre-World War I period is one that I can hardly ever resist, but probably under the circumstances this time I could ...” 7 Resentful that Olivier had still not made suitable amends for what Beaton perceived as his disrespect towards him, he decided to play hard-to-get.

“Only the next day did I ring Arnold Weissberger [1907-81], my friend and attorney. I told him to ask for the highest fee that any designer in the history of entertainment has ever been given. As I never heard another word from Larry – and not even a thank-you for the lunch – I imagined my demands were considered insufferable”.8 Beaton would reach the pinnacle of his film career in the following years, winning the Academy Award for Best Costume Design for Gigi (Vincente Minnelli, 1958), followed by Best Art DirectionSet Decoration (colour) and Best Costume Design (colour) for My Fair Lady (George Cukor, 1964). After the missed opportunity of The Prince and the Showgirl, Beaton and Monroe never worked together again.

Following Olivier’s unsatisfactory meeting with Beaton, British designer Beatrice Dawson (1908-76) was retained to design the ladies costumes. She had worked with Leigh on Caesar and Cleopatra (Gabriel Pascal, 1945), and was nominated for the Academy Award for her work on The Pickwick Papers (Noel Langley, 1952). On display at Bendigo Art Gallery is the white beaded Edwardian‐style Evening gown (1957) Monroe wears for most of the film. It is thought that anywhere from three to five identical copies were made for the production: small pinholes in the garment indicate it was used in scenes after ‘Elsie’ has been invested with the lavender badge and sash of the ‘Royal Carpathian Order of Perseverance’ (2nd Class) to attend the coronation of George V, and the evening ball, with the Carpathian royal family. The blue and dusty rose coloured chiffon Evening jacket (1957), with embroidered rose motifs and flared trim, worn by Monroe over the dress is now part of the permanent collection at the Museum of Style Icons in County Kildare, Éire.

Colin Clark (1932-2002) was employed on The Prince and the Showgirl at the suggestion of Vivien Leigh. He was the younger son of the renowned art

LEFT: William (Jack) TRAVILLA (1920-90), designer: (background) Sequinned pant suit and matching cloak (1955), silk, sequins, worn by Monroe in The Seven Year Itch (Billy Wilder, 1955) & (foreground) Evening gown (1954), silk, tulle, glass beads; Academy Award nominee for Best Costume Design (Colour, 1955), worn by Monroe in There’s No Business Like Show Business (Walter Lang, 1954). (Colección Maite Minguez Ricart, Barcelona). Installation photo: Inga Walton. RIGHT: (foreground) Charles Le MAIRE (1897-1985), designer, Evening gown (1952), silk, bugle beads, fringing; originally made for The Snows of Kilimanjaro (Henry King, 1952); worn by Monroe in publicity photos, 1953. (middle) William (Jack) Travilla (1920-90), designer, Evening gown (1953), silver lamé; made for Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (Howard Hawks, 1953); worn by Monroe to the Los Angeles Herald Examiner Charity Event, 1953 and the Photoplay Magazine Awards,1954. (Collection of Greg Schreiner, Los Angeles). (rear) Gold lamé gown (replica) of one designed by Travilla, worn by Monroe in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. (Americana Silver Screen Collection, Los Angeles). Installation photo: Inga Walton.

historian and author Sir Kenneth Clark, later Baron Clark of Saltwood, and his parents were friends of ‘the Oliviers’. Clark was nominally the 3rd Assistant Director on the film, a role he described as “a kind of superior messenger boy”, working principally for Olivier.9 Nonetheless, his position offered an insider’s view of the production, which he later published in two books.

Clark’s memoirs formed the basis of the film My Week With Marilyn (Simon Curtis, 2011), and he gave this recollection of Monroe’s costume, We had only seen MM wrapped in chiffon so far. She [Dawson] need not have worried. MM finally appeared in a long white dress that suited her perfectly. It made her walk with an amazing wiggle, but a wiggle which is somehow naïve not brazen. It also showed just enough of the famous Monroe bosom. Bumble [Dawson] made various tiny alterations and then announced that two more fittings would be needed to get it right ... MM did some twirls for the camera, but this time no one held their breath and Jack [Cardiff, the Cinematographer] hardly bothered to adjust the lights.

We all know what it will look like – ravishing.10

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When not needed on set, Dawson would accompany Monroe on shopping expeditions around London, helping her select outfits and assisting her to dress for public appearances.11 This included the show-stopping burnished gold lamé gown and cape Monroe wore to the Royal Film première of The Battle of the River Plate (Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger, 1956), held at the Empire Theatre in Leicester Square (29 October, 1956), where she was presented to Elizabeth II and Princess Margaret.12 In any case, Monroe and Olivier’s collaboration proved to be a strained one, characterised by disillusionment, antipathy and mutual dread. She found him condescending and unsympathetic; he was infuriated by her lateness, opposed to the ‘Method’ acting approach, and resentful of Monroe’s dependence on her acting coach, Lee Strasberg’s wife, Paula (1909-66). “It can be no news to anyone to say that she [Monroe] was difficult to work with. Her work frightened her, and although she had undoubted talent, I think she had a subconscious resistance to the exercise of being an actress”, Olivier sniffed. “But she was intrigued by its mystique and happy as a child when being photographed; she managed all the business of stardom with uncanny, clever, apparent ease”.13 When questioned about the film by George Barris, Monroe did not equivocate either, responding, “I think Larry at his best is a great actor. It’s what you get up there on the screen – he was my choice [as the lead] because I felt there was something incongruous and it would make it interesting. But frankly, he wasn’t my choice as a director – but he wanted to direct”.14 Although Monroe’s relationship with Olivier deteriorated rapidly over the course of filming, Beaton was by no means the only bastion of British arts and culture to feel great affection for her; she also struck up a somewhat unlikely friendship with Dame Edith Sitwell (1887-1964). They first met in January, 1953 when Sitwell visited Hollywood at the suggestion of director George Cukor (1899-1983) when it appeared that her historical biography of Elizabeth I, Fanfare For Elizabeth (1946), might be optioned for a film. Life magazine asked Sitwell to write an article for them about her visit, and arranged to bring the two women together. Clearly the editors hoped that this disparate pairing might produce a news-worthy spat, and sent New Zealand-born photojournalist George Silk (1916-2004) to document the moment. As Sitwell drily noted, “But, still more important to them [Life], was that Miss Monroe and I should be brought face to face, since it was obvious that we were born to hate each other, would do so at first sight, and that our subsequent insults to each other would cause a commotion when reported. They were mistaken”.15 > Beatrice DAWSON (1908-76), designer, Evening jacket (1957), chiffon, embroidered silk flowers; worn by Monroe in The Prince and the Showgirl (Lord Laurence Olivier, 1957). (Collection of the Museum of Style Icons, County Kildare, Éire).

Having endured a dysfunctional aristocratic childhood, the grande dame seemed to empathise with the paradoxical nature of Monroe’s life, Such are the contrasts between the lives of those who by natural gifts have overcome all obstacles, and the half-death, the misery of those poor wretches who had been ‘damned by the rainbow’ and who, without talent, had come to Hollywood – misled, perhaps, by the fact that in early youth they had some good looks – to make their fortune, since, they believed, the streets were paved with gold. On the day on which I first met Miss Monroe, I was brought face to face with these contrasts.16 When Monroe and Miller travelled to England for the production of The Prince and the Showgirl, she and Sitwell met up again at The Sesame & Imperial Pioneer Club in Grosvenor street (27 October, 1956). Sitwell also expressed her “very great admiration” for Miller, who was supervising the two-act version of his play, A View From the Bridge (1955). It premièred 12 October, 1956 at the New Watergate Club/Comedy Theatre in London’s West End under the direction of Peter Brook, CBE. Interviewed in 1959, Sitwell appeared unaware that Monroe had no control over how Tom Kelley’s nude photographs of her, taken in 1949, were used, but she is otherwise touching in her stout defence of the star, She was brought to see me in Hollywood [in 1953], and I thought her a very nice girl. I thought that she had been disgracefully treated, most unchivalrously treated. If people have never been poor, perhaps they don’t know what it is like to be hungry. That girl allowed a calendar to be made of her, you see. Well, there have been nude models before now, it means nothing against a person’s moral character at all. This poor girl was absolutely persecuted by people. I mean she has, or had, an unfortunate attraction for an extremely unpleasant kind of man whom she avoided assiduously, I have seen her do that ... she behaved like a lady. 17 For her part, Monroe seems to have reciprocated Sitwell’s warmth of feeling. Found amongst her possessions was a framed black-and-white portrait of Sitwell (1958), signed and gifted to Monroe by its photographer, Philippe Halsman (1906-79).18 Halsman first photographed Monroe in 1949 for a Life magazine story about starlets and their acting skills, and worked with her on several photo spreads up to 1959, including his famous Jumps series, commenced in the early 1950s. “I saw the amazing phenomenon of Hollywood being out-smarted by a < Beatrice DAWSON (1908-76), designer, Evening gown (1957), silk satin, chiffon, glass beads, sequins; worn by Monroe in The Prince and the Showgirl (Lord Laurence Olivier, 1957). (Collection of Greg Schreiner, Los Angeles). (rear) Unknown, Brocade evening cape (c.1955), silk; worn by Monroe to an Actor’s Studio benefit screening of East of Eden (Elia Kazan, 1955) in New York, 1955. (Scott Fortner, The Marilyn Monroe Collection, California).

Installation photo: Inga Walton.

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girl whom it itself characterised as a dumb blonde”, he observed of Monroe.19 As Professor Lois Banner has pointed out, photography offered Monroe a creative outlet with none of the pressures associated with film-making.

“Most fashion photographers – including eminent photographers like Greene and Beaton – were gentle, unlike tough Hollywood producers and directors ... Marilyn didn’t have to remember lines for them, or watch for key lights or marks on the floor. Producers weren’t there enforcing time constraints.

Marilyn had a lot of control in these situations. She was so good at posing that she often set the pace, and the photographer followed her lead”.20 Numerous photographers have attested to Monroe’s dedication and flexibility as a subject, but it was perhaps Magnum photographer Eve Arnold, OBE, who best described Monroe’s innate aptitude for the medium, I found myself in the privileged position of photographing somebody who I had first thought had a gift for the camera, but who turned out had a genius for it. She had a naïve quality, but she also had a great sense of showmanship and self-promotion. She was very clever. She was able to assess each photographer. Even if it was only an amateur with a box camera, she worked with the same intensity and diligence that she would have if she were working with a top professional. She would photograph ten pounds lighter which is against every rule in the book. The smile was brilliant. Her skin was translucent, white, luminous. She was always sort of golden-looking, and because she had a down of just very fine golden hairs on her face it trapped the light and caused an aureole to form, giving her a faint glow. It was extraordinary. I’ve never seen it before. It was a nimbus, so that she looked almost angelic. 21 Monroe had admired a series of stark, documentary-style photographs Arnold had taken of Marlene Dietrich in 1952 at the recording studios of Columbia Records in New York, and published in Esquire magazine.22 The spread was brought to Monroe’s attention by the photographer, and later film producer, Sam Shaw (1912-99). He had met Monroe on the set of Viva Zapata! (Elia Kazan, 1952) where he was working as the stills photographer, and became one of her most trusted confidantes. Shaw introduced Monroe to Arnold at a party given for John Huston in New York that same year, whereupon Monroe exclaimed, “If you could do that well with Marlene, can you imagine what you can do with me?”23 However, it was not until 1955 that Arnold began her professional association with Monroe. The results were unguarded and fresh, subtly repositioning Monroe’s image as a sex-pot to that of a dedicated young actress, as she sat in a playground on Long Island reading Joyce’s Ulysses. Their friendship would last a > Wardrobe test for How To Marry a Millionaire (Jean Negulesco, 1953) ©1953 and 2016 Twentieth Century Fox.

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decade and extend to six photo sessions: seven of Arnold’s images are included at Bendigo Art Gallery, including those taken during her two-month stint on the set of Monroe’s last completed film, The Misfits (John Huston, 1961).

A photographer who had only one session with Monroe, but certainly felt the force of her particular ‘photographic alchemy’ was Carl Perutz (1921-81).

Perutz began taking photos as a youngster in the 1930’s, and served in the American 8th Army Air Force during WWII, taking reconnaissance photos over France and Germany from a B17 ‘Flying Fortress’ heavy bomber. By 1945, he had risen to the rank of Captain, and was then deployed to take photos on the ground behind enemy lines.

Following WWII, Perutz shared an apartment in Paris with the co-founder of Magnum Photos, photojournalist Robert Capa (1913-54). For years Perutz used a MAGNUM rubber stamp on his photos, which followed him through studios in Paris (1947-52) and New York (1952-58). “In 1982, Cornell Capa [1918-2008], who founded the International Center for Photography in 1974, and who was Robert’s [younger] brother, confirmed to me that Carl was a Magnum photographer”, Perutz’s son, Pete Livingston, asserts. “So did Inge Morath [1923-2002, Arthur Miller’s third wife], albeit indirectly, through an article in the New York Post, in which she placed Carl at the scene of the art.24 Some years back, executives at Magnum denied Carl’s membership despite dozens of photos, by-lines, and several testimonials to the contrary. Factbased reporting just isn’t what it used to be!”, Livingston says ruefully.

Perutz, who worked as an independent contractor, was asked by the Hearst Corporation to conduct a photo-shoot with Monroe for a feature in their Sunday newspaper supplement The American Weekly, which ran from 1896 to 1966. The 1958 cover-story, “Milady’s Easter Bonnet”, asked six leading milliners to provide a hat for six well-known women. Laddie Northridge, who was assigned to Monroe, declared, “Marilyn Monroe is the feminine symbol of our time- the complete woman- gay, loving, distracting, and mysterious.

This big Italian straw [hat] provides an exciting frame for her and the roses add a simple touch of drama”.25 Monroe appeared on the cover of The American Weekly for 25 September, 1955, but in this case she was not the cover subject.

“Several famous women- Kathy Grant Crosby, Lucille Ball, Elsa Maxwell, and Eleanor Roosevelt- were featured wearing hats, but Mamie Eisenhower, the wife of the President, Dwight D. Eisenhower, was chosen over Marilyn for the cover. Not a strange preference for 1958, but imagine how shocking it would be if Mamie were chosen over Marilyn today!”, Livingston remarks. > Carl PERUTZ (1921-81), Marilyn wearing a white, floppy hat (Perutz-002), from Marilyn Monroe, Easter Hat series (1958), © 2004, Courtesy of Pete Livingston.

Livingston relates that Perutz shot about sixty frames during this session in which Monroe wore several hats from Northridge’s salon, including a black unblocked felt hat worn low over one eye. The frame chosen by the publication, Marilyn wearing a white, floppy hat (Perutz-002) (1958), shows a breathtakingly elegant Monroe in a plain black coat, with roses from the hat cascading over one shoulder. Her slightly mussed hair and minimal make-up, set off by pear-shaped drop earrings, makes for a study where the particular radiance Monroe generated for the camera could not be more evident.

Silver prints were produced, some of which were sold to Monroe herself, although these beautiful images were not seen by the wider public. “In this specific case, Carl’s photos weren’t even published. They were used so that painter Jon Whitcomb [1906-88] could create a derivative illustration using Carl’s work as reference. The photographs were never legally published until about 2007, although they did leak out into the world prior to that, thanks to their ‘liberation’ by mystery persons from Carl’s studio, circa 1979. All of the images in The American Weekly ‘Easter hat’ edition were paintings, at least one derived from a photograph”, Livingston explains.

Like many returned servicemen, Perutz suffered from undiagnosed PTSD, which made his transition back to civilian life traumatic, and his ability to interact with his family was severely impaired. He continued his freelance photographic work, albeit sporadically, into the 1970s. Livingston has battled for decades to track down his father’s output and register copyright over the stolen images, “Carl failed to get his work out of his last studio in Lower Manhattan in a timely manner, presumably because of what were by then a multitude of health issues. In the process of a new tenant coming in, most of his work disappeared – with nary a call to Carl or the police – with the exception of the Marilyn images. Those were taken, and reprinted illegally, numerous times. Our fellow travellers, by and large, seem not to give a damn about the thousands of images Carl produced, or his favourite subject Helen Keller [1880-1968], but they quite literally go mad for Marilyn!”, Livingston admits. “I’ve been slowly working on a story about my virtual relationship to Marilyn Monroe, which has now included two tours of Federal Court, and getting to know my Dad, thirty-five years deceased, via Marilyn”.

NEXT ISSUE: Extend your Moment With Marilyn as the story concludes in Trouble, July 2016

Marilyn Monroe, Bendigo Art Gallery, 42 View Street, Bendigo (VIC), until 10 July 2016 - bendigoartgallery.com.au | The touring exhibition, Marilyn: Celebrating An American Icon, is due to be staged next at The Citadelle Art Foundation (16 September-18 November, 2016), 520 Nelson Avenue, Canadian, Texas, USA - thecitadelle.org | Official web-site of the Estate of Marilyn Monroe - marilynmonroe.com ENDNOTES 1 Lois Banner & Mark Anderson, MM-Personal: From the Private Archive of Marilyn Monroe, Abrams, New York, 2011, p.161. | 2 Sir Cecil Beaton, The Restless Years: Diaries, 1955-63, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1976, p.37. | 3 Terence Pepper, “Beaton’s Forebears and Contemporaries: A Photographic Legacy”, in Terence Pepper, Sir Roy Strong & Peter Conrad, Beaton Portraits, National Portrait Gallery, London, 2004, p.13. | 4 Nancy Valentino (Ed.), The Personal Property of Marilyn Monroe, Christie’s, London, 1999, Lot 22, p.40-43. The triptych sold for USD $145,500. | 5 Ibid, p.42, 40.

6 Ibid, p.40 | 7 Sir Cecil Beaton, op cit, p.126. | 8 Ibid. | 9 Colin Clark, The Prince, the Showgirl, and Me: Six Months on the Set With Marilyn and Olivier, St. Martin’s Press, New York (1995) 1996, p.12. | 10 Ibid, p.73-74. | 11 Christopher Nickens & George Zeno, Marilyn In Fashion: The Enduring Influence of Marilyn Monroe, Running Press, Philadelphia, 2012, p.235.

12 Colin Clark, op cit, p.187-88. | 13 David Willis & Stephen Schmidt, Marilyn Monroe: Metamorphosis, itbooks, New York, 2011, p.185 | 14 George Barris, Marilyn: Her Life In Her Own Words- Marilyn Monroe’s Revealing Last Words and Photographs, Birch Lane Press, New York, 1995, p.117. | 15 Dame Edith Sitwell, Taken Care Of: An Autobiography, Hutchinson, London, 1965, p.183. | 16 Ibid, p.184. | 17 Marilyn Monroe Video Archives (voice recording) online: www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cBdxWVgLE0 | 18 Nancy Valentino (Ed.), op cit, Lot 339, p.240. The portrait sold for USD $4,830. | 19 Lois Banner, Marilyn: The Passion and the Paradox, Bloomsbury, London, 2012, p.271. | 20 Ibid, p.265. | 21 David Willis & Stephen Schmidt, op cit, p.219. | 22 Eve Arnold, Film Journal, Bloomsbury Publishing, London, 2002, p.13-15. | 23 Ibid, p.55. | 4 Jerry Tallmer, “Paris/Magnum in sharp focus”, New York Post, 24 April, 1982, p.10R. | 25 Jon Whitcomb (illustrator), “Milady’s Easter Bonnet”, The American Weekly, 6 April, 1958, p.13.

> Frank Powolny (1901-86), Black Bathing Suit #2 (detail) (1950), silver gelatin print, 70.5 x 50 cm © Edward Weston Collection. (Private Collection Germany).

june salon

PREVIOUS SPREAD: CHEN Man, Miss Wan Studies Hard 2011, archival ink-jet print, 50.0 x 74.0 cm, reproduction courtesy of the artist.

China: grain to pixel, Monash Gallery of Art (MGA), 860 Ferntree Gully Road Wheelers Hill (VIC), 5 June – 28 August 2016 - mga.org.au THIS SPREAD: BJÖRK DIGITAL WORLD PREMIERE EXHIBITION and one night only DJ set and performance curated by Björk, Carriageworks, 245 Wilson St, Eveleigh (NSW), 3 June 2016. Program is part of Vivid Sydney and includes an extensive line-up of music, exhibitions and food from 27 May – 18 June 2016 - carriageworks.com.au or vividsydney.com

ABOVE Bearings, beauty and irrelevance 2015, Performprint.

Photo by Jessica Wyld. Out of the Matrix, RMIT Gallery, Swanston Street Melbourne (VIC), until 11 June 2016 - rmit.edu.au/rmitgallery RIGHT Deb CHIRNSIDE, ‘Nematolepis squamea’ (satinwood) 2015, watercolour. Reproduced courtesy of the artist. Geelong Botanic Gardens revealed, Geelong Gallery, Little Malop Street Geelong (VIC), 30 April to 19 June 2016 - geelonggallery.org.au NEXT SPREAD Arthur STREETON, Land of the Golden Fleece 1926 (detail) oil on canvas, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra.

The Oscar Paul Collection, Gift of Henriette von Dallwitz and of Richard Paul in honour of his father 1965. Land of the Golden Fleece—Arthur Streeton in the Western District, Geelong Gallery, Little Malop Street Geelong (VIC), until 13 June 2016 geelonggallery.org.au

june salon

FINDING THE ART IN

Phuket Doinâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; time in Phuket Jail Part One

by Anthony S. Cameron

4 4

The last place I was expecting to end up was in jail. And a jail in Phuket, Thailand was definitely not on the list of places I wanted to go to, let alone imagine. Now here I was being body searched by a grinning prison warden under the old arched entrance whilst hundreds of relatives of the imprisoned looked on with the dulled curiosity that comes from waiting in queues for most of your life. And from the other side of the massive steel door came the deafening hum of a thousand captive men. I was given the all clear by the warden with a friendly tap on the shoulder, given back my bag full of audio gear and, as the big doors opened, he said, “Bpai”(Go!). So I did.

Probably not going to forget that walk to the infirmary for a while. I felt like a springbok that had wandered into the lion’s camp by mistake and was trying to be invisible, yet every eye was on me. Every utterance muttered under the breath of the men that lined my journey seemed directed at me, and it was a mix of Southern Thai drawl with Burmese Thai so I wasn’t catching more than the odd word.

Ladyboys whistled and leaned provocatively on doorways, hoping I was going to be incarcerated so they could unleash their charms on me. Hard faced white men swore and spat at my feet, one of whom I recognised as ‘the bull terrier’: a mad English Muai Thai fighter who’d got the cocktails of drugs and ego wrong, ending up with blood on his hands, a body he couldn’t bury quick enough and his face plastered all over the media. I kept my eyes down and focussed on the warden’s fat neck poking out of his skin- tight collar as he walked ahead of me.

The band was already in the sauna-like infirmary when we finally made it through the door, and after the obligatory Wei’s and bowing of heads, we got to work turning the infirmary into a recording space: mattresses were leaned against walls and windows; bed frames tipped on their sides as sound absorption for drums and horn sections; and chairs were laid out in a small arc in front of the stereo microphone for guitars and vocals. We were going at it old school style: one mic with musicians placed in terms of loudness and position in the mix. And there wasn’t going to be any mixdown time to tidy it up. We had to get it as close as we could.

The band started rehearsing, chatting and joking as they got used to the stained prison mattresses standing up like forgotten girlfriends between them. The trumpet guy was way off in the corner, playing into two mattresses 45’d into each other, scratching around for a note and sometimes finding it. The two guitarists either side of the vocalist had tuned up and were looking ready, the drummer had stopped faffing with his stool, the bass player had tripped through a run of ‘Superstition’ as a warm-up and had settled for that. Looked like we were ready. I put on the headphones, gave them the thumbs up, and hit record.

What came through the cans blew me away. The placement had really worked wonders, there was a warmth to the sounds I hadn’t expected, it was well balanced, and they were great players too. The guitarists weaved these little runs through

the groove whilst the drumming was gentle and percussive and the bass a rock to which it all held. The trumpet dude just crouched facing his mattresses and waited.

Then the vocalist came in with his first lines and they were tentative, crackly, not confident at all and I was about to suggest we go for another take when he miraculously found it: He climbed up through his atonal squeaking into the same key as the band and somehow the transition worked, giving it something more, like he had exposed the struggle to get there.

The words themselves were full of remorse and sorrow and guilt and longing for lost love and, even though it was syrupy stuff, the way this guy wailed made me believe him. The look on his scarred and heavily tattooed face was the horror of the streets, it was the horror of a bad decision at the wrong time. The atonement he had sought with the Buddhist tattoos hadnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t keep him out of this zoo, and now he was singing about it. Finding another way through it. And I could see it all in his face.

When the trumpet dude finally let rip all the hairs on the back of my neck stood up immediately. He had a mute in the bell of the trumpet and was pulling these insane notes that ripped my heart out every time he blew; the kind that strip your ordinary world and lay you bare. The kind that you cannot fake. The kind that sound like a soul screaming for attention. He climbed one impossible mountain of riffs after another, all whilst staring at those dirty mattresses in front of him. He was barely moving.

I stared at a spot on the floor and listened to the music that these broken men had made together, and had emerged out of their struggle. Their stories had worked their way into every chord they played, which had given them a reason, and me another glimpse, of the great art that occurs every day in the most bizarre of places.

Underneath it all, I could hear the hum and whir of the washing machines in the distance and the unsettling rumble of a thousand human voices outside this room. And at times I swear I could hear the sound of their feet tapping.

ANTHONY S. CAMERON is an Australian ex-pat living in Phuket, Thailand, and the author of two novels, Driftwood (2014) and Butterfly on Bangla (2015).

Born in Melbourne, he escaped in his early twenties to central Victoria, where he designed and built a sustainable house, raised two sustainable children. His books are available on Amazon here.

Pics by Tony Cameron