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TOO FAST TO LIVE, TOO YOUNG TO DIE
Selections from California Punk
February 25 – March 26, 2011
Opening Reception:
Friday, Feb 25th 2011 / 7 – 11 p.m.
Musical performance by OFF! and the Nichemakers at 9pm
Tickets available for in Gallery Purchase starting Feb 21st /$5 CASH ONLY
FEATURING WORK BY EDWARD COLVER, SHEPARD FAIREY, GLEN E. FRIEDMAN, JENNY LENS, DAVE MARKEY, RAYMOND PETTIBON, JORDAN SCHWARTZ, WINSTON SMITH
Original flyers, posters, set lists and more from Bryan Ray Turcotte (Fucked Up + Photocopied)
More information at SUBLIMINALPROJECTS.com
Curated by Katherine B. Cone and Jon Cournoyer
TOO FAST TO LIVE, TOO YOUNG TO DIE is a selection of photography, art and ephemera from the California Punk & Hardcore scene with an emphasis on the explosive period of the late 70’s and early 80’s. This exhibition features creative pioneers who were present for the detonation of the Southern California scene and whose imagery helped capture and craft it’s angles, attitudes, music, fashion and sub-culture. Additionally, reflections of other punk scenes throughout California and contemporary collaborations will be presented that were inspired by one of the most potent and relevant periods of individual expression in California history.
Edward Colver has been a Los Angeles-based photographer for over thirty years creating some of the most iconic images of the L.A. punk scene early in his career. Self-taught he had his first photograph published after just three months. A fixture of the early SoCal scene, its been said, “If you went to a show and Edward Colver wasn’t there shooting pictures, you were at the wrong show.” The retrospective exhibition and publication, “Blight at the End of the Funnel” was hosted by Cal State Fullerton in 2006 and the documentary “American Hardcore” featured many of his images.
Glen E. Friedman is based in New York City and is one of the most revered photographers of his generation, continually capturing rebellious individuals from the musical and youth sub-cultures. In 1982, he photographed, art directed and published the influential punk zine “My Rules”, one of the first comprehensive documents and commercially successful chronicles of the American hardcore punk scene. Continuing through the 1980s and 90’s, he captured classic punk and hip-hop images of Black Flag, Minor Threat, Public Enemy, Run DMC and more, many of which are considered the subject’s definitive portrait. Since 1997 his exhibition, “Fuck You All” has been consistently traveling both nationally and internationally, highlighting important works that span throughout his prolific career. His photographs are in the collections of institutions such as Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Smithsonian Institute and the Experience Music Project Museum.
Shepard Fairey is based in Los Angeles and is the founder of the Obey Giant street art campaign. Obey Giant was largely modeled after the D.I.Y., by any means necessary, ethos of punk rock. Fairey heard the Alternative Tentacles comp “Let Them Eat Jellybeans” in 1984 and was energized by the music including California bands like Black Flag, The Dead Kennedys, Flipper, and the Circle Jerks.
Jenny Lens, MFA, a native Angeleno, immediately rose to prominence with her first photos of the Ramones first west coast tour, August 1976, ending with the Clash, England, July, 1980. She shot revered and iconic photos of X, Germs, Iggy Pop, Blondie, Patti Smith and many more. Her images are extensively seen in and grace the covers of many major punk books, CDs, DVDs, docs, TV. She is hailed as the most published West Coast photographer documenting the early punk scene of 1976-80. In addition, her popular online postings of historical recollections continue to provide accurate first-hand insights into an often under-documented scene, especially from a West Coast woman’s point of view. Her solo book, “Punk Pioneers, When Punk was Fun,” was published by Rizzoli/Universe.
Dave Markey and Jordan Schwartz are the founders of the zine “We Got Power” which documented the Southern California punk scene in the early 1980’s. The subsequent photographs it produced uniquely captured this important period. Schwartz was also a producer for Lovedoll Films and served as press and booking agent for SST Records during this period. According to the 1985 Rolling Stone article he was one of the last people to sleep on the floor of the now-legendary record company, “If you work for SST Records you have to be prepared to sleep on the floor”. Markey’s work in film/video created some of the most important documents of it’s time and included collaborations with Sonic Youth, Raymond Pettibon, Nirvana, Mudhoney, The Ramones, Black Flag and many more. His films have been in festival screenings both national and internationally, including the United Kingdom screening tour entitled “Desperate Cinema” in 2005. A solo exhibition of his films was hosted by Seventeen Gallery in London in 2009. Most recently a selection were included in the Sonic Youth internationally traveling retrospective “Sensational Fix”.
Raymond Pettibon is based in Venice, California and is a leading figure in the international artworld who sprang from the world of California punk and illustration and whose work is now in the permanent collections of galleries and museums throughout the world. His early artistic roots lie in music, specifically in the Los Angeles punk rock scene designing artwork for SST Records and bands such as Black Flag, The Minutemen, and Sonic Youth. He has had museum exhibitions at MOCA, SFMOMA, Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Whitney Museum of American Art, Centro de Arte Contemporaneo de Malaga, Spain and many more. He has been the recipient of numerous awards including the Bucksbaum Award in relation his installation at the 2004 Whitney Biennial.
Winston Smith is a San Francisco-based artist whose roots lie in punk rock album cover design and collage imagery. His early work involves album art for the Dead Kennedys and has gone on to create over 50 record covers and has had numerous international exhibitions of his artwork over the last thirty years. Last Gasp has published a large selection of his work and he recently had a retrospective exhibition “Deep Dimension” in San Francisco, CA.
