VANCAF x Goethe-Institut Toronto
VANCAF & the Goethe-Institut Toronto are pleased to present legendary Canadian filmmaker Bruce LaBruce in conversation with Berlin based artist and publisher Christian Gfeller. They will speak about LaBruce’s recent work Death Book II, published by Baron Books and available in Canada via SOOPSOOP.
Designed by German artist Max Sidentopf, Death Book II brings together a body of work together for the first time, combining LaBruce’s performances, actions, film production stills and photography that explicitly outline his obsessions, with never-before exhibited archival works from projects including Hustler White, Otto; or Up with Dead People, and L.A. Zombie.
Starting Sunday @ 3PM EST, watch here,
Watch!
Bruce Labruce
Bruce LaBruce is an internationally acclaimed filmmaker, photographer, writer, and artist based in Toronto. Along with a number of short films, he has written and directed nine feature films, including his most recent, Gerontophilia, which won the Grand Prix at the Festival du Nouveau Cinema in Montreal in 2013, and Pierrot Lunaire, which won the Teddy Award Special Jury Prize at the Berlinale in 2014. As a visual artist he is represented by Peres Projects in Berlin, and has had numerous gallery shows around the world, the latest of which, called Obscenity, a photography exhibit, caused a national ruckus in Spain in 2011.His feature film L.A. Zombie was notably banned in Australia in 2010 after having been programmed at the Melbourne International Film Festival. It later premiered in competition at the Locarno Film Festival, Switzerland that same year. LaBruce has written and directed three theatrical works at the Hau Theater in Berlin, including a production of Arnold Schoenberg’s avant-garde piece Pierrot Lunaire at the legendary Hebbel am Ufer Theater. He adapted the latter project into an experimental film, incorporating footage from the stage production combined with additional material shot on location in Berlin. He has also directed theatrical works at the Theater Neumarkt in Zurich, Switzerland, and he participated as a director in the Hau Theater’s ambitious X-Homes project in Johannesburg, South Africa. LaBruce has written a premature memoir called The Reluctant Pornographer, and has had two books published about his work: Ride, Queer, Ride, from Plug-In Gallery in Winnipeg, and Bruce(x)ploitation, a monograph from his Italian distributor, Atlantide Entertainment. LaBruce has contributed to a variety of international magazines, newspapers and websites as both a writer and photographer, including index magazine, for which he also acted as a contributing editor, Vice, The National Post, Purple Fashion, The Guardian UK, and many others. He has also been a regular columnist over the years for Eye, Exclaim! and Vice magazines. Additionally, LaBruce has directed a number of music videos, two of which won him MuchMusic Video Awards in Canada. Most recently, LaBruce has been honoured with film retrospectives at both TIFF/Bell Lightbox 2014, and at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, 2015. The MoMA retrospective featured all nine of LaBruce’s features as well as a program of short films. All of the films have now become part of MoMA’s permanent film collection.
Christian Gfeller
"We have been exploring screen-printing for over 20 years. From experimental zines, we slowly shifted to unique artists' books, monotypes and paintings, but we always felt there was more to be done. We wanted to go to the essence of the process, push the boundaries of the medium, be radical. We were looking for a way to transcend the rigidity of the technique. So we had to rethink and simplify, to finally get the form and content in adequacy. That's how we started doing monumental minimal printing."
In 1995 while studying at Ecole Supérieur des Arts Décoratifs de Strasbourg, Christian Gfeller (born 1973, Alsace) started publishing screen-printed graph'zines and artists' books under the moniker Bongoût (good taste).
Bongoût found it's roots in the french D.I.Y art punk scene and, together with an handful of people, also organised concerts, party's and performances in an old warehouse named Lactina in Kehl, across the Rhine from France. The location became cult with its first techno parties, noise concerts and art performances, as well as exhibitions. Christian's first screen-print studio was located in Lactina and beside zine and book making, he designed and printed posters for the events as well as record covers for the cult garage trash punk label Yakisakana Rcds. In 2000, FLTMSTPC in Paris published a polaroid book by Christian, where this vivid time at Lactina was well documented. During this period Christian also played in several local bands: Pitfall, Elcamino and The Cheeraks.
Christian Gfeller met Anna Hellsgård (born 1980, Stockholm) at a concert in Berlin on September 11th 2001. After Anna's short art study at Konstskolan in Stockholm, she was eager to develop her photographic interest and become an assistant to a commercial photographer for 2 years. In the meantine Anna also was Dj-ing in several clubs and bars in Stockholm. A vague memory from 1991 of her first Berlin visit and her music interest draw her to move to Berlin in 2001. There she continued with her B/W photographs and shot hundreds of pictures during her first time in Berlin. When she met Christian, she got immediately drawn to the french underground scene and its subversive graphic art content. Whenever she visited Christian in Strasbourg she would help him with his printing at the Lactina studio.
Over the years, the duo released over 200 screen-printed zines and artists' books, some by themselves and others in collaboration with artists from around the world: David Sandlin, Brent Wadden, Manuel Ocampo, Stéphane Blanquet, Jean-Louis Costes, Atak, Mathieu Desjardins, Arnaud Loumeau, Antoine Bernhart... They continued to design record covers, prints and gig posters for bands like Sonic Youth, Billy Childish, the Ex, Psychic TV, Pj Harvey, Nick Cave, Boredoms, Animal Collective, Wolf Eyes, Black Dice and many more. Alongside this they createdads and packaging for major brands like Converse, Camel, Sony Music, Playstation, Mazda, Vice and L&M.
2008 saw the opening of "Bongoût Gallery", an art space in Berlin-Mitte. This on-going project is an extension of Gfeller + Hellsgård's art praxis, building bridges and blurring boundaries between mediums and artists, navigating from contemporary art to underground illustration, graphic design, outsider art or music. The space held solo and group exhibitions, presenting the work from international artists like Harmony Korine, Richard Kern, Damien Deroubaix, Manuel Ocampo, Stu Mead, Christoph Ruckhäberle, Gregory Jacobsen, Antoine Bernhart, Atak and Henning Wagenbreth.
In 2012, they decided to close the chapter Bongoût and their project was renamed Re:Surgo / In:Surgo! The space became a curated art space together with the screen-printing publishing. The same year the Library of the University of Minnesota acquired the complete Bongoût 1995 - 2012 publishing archive. In 2015, the Mediathèque André Malraux in Strasbourg acquired the entire Bongoût / Re:Surgo! publishing archive and the same year hosted a retrospective exhibition, celebrating the 20 year anniversary (1995 - 2015).
Since 2011, the duo have started to focus on producing unique art works under their own names "Gfeller + Hellsgård". The first series of works were 12 oversized unique abstract monoprint books, each one titled after a chapter of "Alice In Wonderland", and playing with the conceptual idea of Alice's labyrinthal mise-en-abîme. Represented by Booklyn Artists Alliance, each book was bought by different notorious public collections across the world: Standford University, The Librairy of Congress in Washington DC, The British Library, the Fine Art Museum of San Fransisco and the Bibliotheque Nationale du Luxembourg, to mention a few.
Back
