Jim Jarmusch can't stop collapsed. The famous independent filmmaker, known for films such as the winner of the Cannes Grand Prix “Broken Flowers” and “Stranger Than Paradise”, has been entering the art form for decades, accumulating hundreds of works.
Creating Collages is almost a compulsion, a way for Jarmusch escape from the world and looks at self -reflection. Walk newspapers on faces, start with your hands and mount them with few solid color funds. Jarmusch never imagined that no one would see the works, but in 2021, he had his debut in the art world with an exhibition, “some collages”, in the James Fuentes gallery in New York. That show coincided with a Book of the same namePosted by Anthology.
Since then, Jarmusch has entered the art world. Your SQürl band, a collaboration with its producer and composer Carter Logan, created A new original score for a restored quartet of experimental short films by Man Ray, launching “Music for Man Ray” last May. In November, Jarmusch added curator to his list of multi -capital talents: celebrate The 100th Anniversary of Surrealism, selected 34 images from the Grand Palais collection to highlight in PHOTO OF PARISOne of the most recognized photography fairs in the world.
And, of course, Jarmusch has continued to gather. In recent years, their collages have acquired a darker tone, figuratively and literally, since it now fixes its delicate compositions to the black paper instead of a warm Manila, and has sent them to art fairs in France, Hong Kong and Los Angeles. Now he is presenting his second formal exhibition, “Some more collages“Which opens on March 29 at the James Fuentes gallery in Los Angeles with a book firm. We meet Jarmusch to ask about his collage process, surrealism and his future as an artist.
The following questions and answers have been edited for clarity.
You have cured a show and now you have had two art exhibitions. Do you feel that you are officially in the art world?
I move through different worlds. I grew up in rock 'N' Roll clubs, I went through hip-hop worlds and obviously went through the world of cinema. I have had many friends who are artists since I was young, so I am in that world without being part of him.
Jim Jarmusch's title collage, 2023
(All the artist's courtesy and James Fuentes, Los Angeles and New York)
What encouraged you to make another collage exposure?
My first book was “Some Collages”, which I could design with Arielle by Saint Phalle and the people of Anthology, who published it. I did not expect to have a book or a show, but Arielle by Saint Phalle encouraged me during the pandemic. I have been making these minimum collages of newspapers for many years, and I did it mainly for a kind of solitary escape, a form of automatic writing, but with reappropriate visual things. I wanted a new show and I wait for a new small book. The previous program was about reappropriate things and replacements, mainly heads. The new ones I have been doing during the last year or so are a bit more gloomy and involve black extraction. They are a kind of different sensation. But I don't analyze them. They are what they are. I also have some lithographs in the program.
Why did they get more bleak? Are you affected by the state of the world?
I am sure that it has some effect, but they are created quite intuitively. I don't like to think about them when I'm doing them. They leave somewhere that is not analyzed. When I opened my first show, if the collages seemed openly political or proselytizing in some way, I would eliminate them. I tried not to be too obvious about anything
Why are all faces eliminated?
I am interested in juxtapositions that are not obvious. I worked on a movie about William Burroughs many years ago, at the end of the 70s, by Howard Brookner, called “Burroughs.” We spent a lot of time, more than a year or more, with Burroughs, and I used to sit with him when I worked on his cuts of cuts, which were cuts of newspapers, magazines and different sources. I would find these unexpected juxtapositions. That was a persistent inspiration.
I have always loved surrealism. I love the interruption of logic. I love masks, and when I changed the heads, it was like playing with masks too. But now, eliminating [the heads]They seem stronger. I like my new program more than the previous one, but I don't look at anything I do. For example, once my films are completed, they have reached an audience that pays and [are] Distributed, I never look at them again.
Jim Jarmusch's Title collage, 2023
(All the artist's courtesy and James Fuentes, Los Angeles and New York).
There is only one collage in the program that has faces. Could you talk more about that job?
That got into the show, and perhaps it is a small door to the next series. Always use text from where the image is obtained. There are two faces, I think they are a kind of billionaire, IA entrepreneurs. The text refers to them. I don't know what they mean. I think EE Cummings said you can understand the poem without knowing what it means. That is probably all my work.
Are you starting the faces with your hands or are you using a tool?
My little tool kit can fit in a briefcase. It has tweezers, any fund with which I am working and the cutting tools that are generally pens that have run out of ink.
What materials do you use?
I love the newspaper, because when I was very young, my parents gave me a microscope and the first thing I looked was was the edge of a torn newspaper. It was a thread jungle. It was very striking, and I still have the image in my head. The fragility of the newspaper attracts me as a tactile substance.
Where are the newspapers obtaining?
Mainly from New York Times, but I will take them from anywhere. For a while I was doing some of the Chinese newspapers that I got from Chinatown. I like the idea that I am subverting the idea of information and doing something else.
What attracts you to this minimalist and highly edited approach?
I love the idea of taking things from other places and doing more about them, so I love sampling and hip-hop or certain poetry schools that involve game structures. I have always loved this elimination of the head and replacements that I find in many artists that I love, such as Bruce Conner, Richard Prince, Ray Johnson, John Baldesari and David Wojnarowicz.
Jim Jarmusch's Title collage, 2023
(All the artist's courtesy and James Fuentes, Los Angeles and New York)
I saw that one of the lithographs uses “Les demoiselles d'Avignon” by Picasso. Could you talk about that?
Many of my collages refer to art. There is a reference by Frank Stella in my book and several references of Warhol. I use art images and then damage basically. I am not a big fan of Picasso, I respect him, but he is too ego oriented to me as an artist, but that is one of his most beautiful paintings.
I wanted to make some bigger images of the small newspaper collages. In Los Angeles, the original little ones are part of the show, and then you can see the lithographs, which are extensions. Maurice [Sanchez of Derriere L’Etoile Studios] He does them with a very special technique. Recreational the collages and then fix them in the black funds in a similar way to the way I believe. Maurice creates lithos in Long Island City for all. Every artist you have heard goes to him.
The whole newspaper [collages] They are original, and they are very delicate, very small. There are no multiples of any of them. I like the idea of making some bigger ones that could reproduce.
Is there any surreal or Dadaist that really inspires you in particular?
As for collage, Max Ernst is probably my favorite. Recently there was a show at the Pompidou Center, a really exhaustive retrospective of surrealism. The first schools of the Max Ernst were taken from the catalogs, and there was an entire wall of them. Create a dream world. You interrupt the perceived logic of things in a very minimal way. I love unexpected repetition and connections.
Do your collage themess Does it happen again in your poetry, music or movies?
I really don't think about issues, sincerely. When I write a script, I don't start with the story. I start with characters and actors. I begin to collect details, small pieces of dialogue, small ideas, places, and the re -re -time for a long time, sometimes for years. Then I write the scripts very fast. I do the same with music, because I am not a trained musician and the structure is not my strength. Sometimes I go to bed, for example, a kind of psychedelic guitar track, and then put a second track without listening first. Then I see what they become. When is the structure aligned? When does it go? It seems that everything I do has something similar, and the collages are just the smallest illustration of my procedure.
What is the plan for the new collages?
I would love to make a new book. The only thing I would change [about my first book] Did I put too many collages?
Something else you would like to share?
I am not hierarchical about things. I am a self -proclaimed dilettante. What is high art, which is under art, all that means anything to me. There is something about collages, they are very accessible. They can be primitive or sophisticated or can be complicated or dark. I love the collage shape because it is very universal. I have made collages next to the children, and we are all in the same boat.
