“Just feel that good clean power surging in from the dark…Ah, but listen to her! She’s driving in, she knows what she wants, there’s no hero or devil on earth that can talk back to her…Come on in, girl!” The man talks over his beloved sea to “The Voice”; both having isolated themselves out there, away from the City and its people. This is one of my favorite lines from “The city wears a slouch hat”, a radio play written by Kenneth Patchen with a score by John Cage. It was broadcast on May 31, 1942 by WBBM radio station (Columbia Broadcasting System in Chicago) and is the Voice’s surreal journey through the City, culminating in a message for humanity in a time of World War.


“The city wears a slouch hat”, a radio play written by Kenneth Patchen with a score by John Cage. Cover art by Patchen.

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Bumped into a great interview with writer Alan Moore (but aren’t they all, though?) on The Quietus, which is coincidental because I am currently swimming upstream through Moore’s Dodgem Logic #3. It arrived by slow boat two days ago:


Wraparound cover art for Dodgem Logic #3 (April/May 2010), drawn by Moore himself.

My reaction to The Quietus article’s title - referring to Moore as a hipster - was knee-jerkishly negative until I read through the interview and now understand the connotation: Moore as autodidact and not Fauxhemian (I prefer “Doucheoisie”):

[Hipsterism] used to be a fashion statement, but it was information as a fashion statement which is probably going to do you more good than the clothing you wear. I got an incredible education starting from the point at which I was thrown out of school. Now, I could probably hold my own intellectually with most people who have had university or college educations. And indeed some of them will have done courses on my books. So, despite the fact my ‘education’ ended at 16, I had hipsterism, which was wanting to be hip, and that led me to read this incredibly diverse array of books on science, mysticism, science fiction, literature, art… I would find out about these movements that I had heard about, and it’s given me a pretty comprehensive education. Now I am an autodidact, which is a great word… I learned it myself.

“Information as a fashion statement”? Can self-education be fashionable if it can’t be commodified; if it can’t be worn, drunk or tattooed on? (Interestingly, Moore is listed as a “Notable Autodidact” in the Wikipedia entry for “Autodidacticism”.)

Look at THIS fucking hipster. Photo of Alan Moore from “Hipster Priest: A Quietus Interview With Alan Moore”.

The Space Needle as interpreted by Sean Dietrich

Couldn’t make it to Emerald City ComiCon and was informed I missed Sean Dietrich - one of my favorite artists/writers. (My husband came home with some of his original art so I didn’t totally miss out.) I met Dietrich three years ago at ComiCon and remember him being approachable and a pleasure to talk to. For folks in San Diego, he live paints in various clubs downtown. He’ll be painting along side My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult at the Beauty Bar May 26th.

Beauty Bar flyer

I apologize for not updating the website more often, but for the past couple of months I’ve been working on a comic, “Endhouse Angst”. Hopefully my art will improve with time…

As I’ve mentioned in the past, I’m a big fan of designs coming out of Australia and the surrounding area because of their wearability. The s/s 2006/7 collection from New Zealand designer Kate Sylvester is a good example of this fine-tuned practicality. Inspired by the fusion of East meets West in Shanghai and Hong Kong, Sylvester’s “Young Ideas Go West” collection draws in part from the Shanghai Moderne culture of the 20s and 30s, complete with variations on the cheongsam.

Kate Sylvester’s “Jade Dress”, s/s 2006/7 www.vogue.com.au

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What makes a street style website stand out is originality of the looks and good photography. These qualities define the fixed point at which sites stop bleeding together, my interest anchors and vision comes back into focus. Liisa Jokinen and Sampo Karjalainen’s HEL LOOKS is one of those fixed points. Begun as a tribute to Shoichi Aoki’s FRUiTS and STREET magazines, HEL LOOKS documents individual style on the streets of Helsinki. “In our opinion original and personal looks are much more interesting than mainstream trends/fashion. Original looks are about creativity and self-expression.”

Kirsi (25)

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One of the many reasons I enjoyed living in San Francisco was the variety of independent shops and the resources they provided me. A frequent haunt was Kayo Books, where I would burrow into their inventory to study the style of pulp cover art, which successfully pulls off doom & distress smothered in erotic overtones. This is the holiday season in which weak attempts are made at erotic doom & distress by a hard-partying zombie army of girls in scary makeup and vinyl nurse outfits. It may seem that the spirit of Halloween is as cheap and empty as that six foot inflatable skull that sits on the doorstep warning kids in a scratchy metallic moan to, Beware! Turn back! Thankfully there is real substance to be found inside pulpmags like Weird Tales, complete with frequent contributions from Lovecraft and envelope-pushing cover art by Margaret Brundage.

Brundage’s cover for Weird Tales, October 1933

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David Lynch’s television series, “Twins Peaks” embraces the noir of the Pacific Northwest with its mood, mythos and style. A foil exists between the Pacific Northwest logger/grunge type and the classic detective with a Brylcreem coiffure. Pale skin with red lips, pencil skirts and classic Pendleton plaids establish the Twin Peaks style.

Audrey at One-Eyed Jack’s, from David Lynch’s “Twin Peaks”

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