Anthony Haden-Guest is an author, art critic, poet and reporter who divides his time between London and New York. Having penned The Last Party: Studio 54, Disco, and the Culture of the Night, a history of New York revelry published in 1997, and written extensively for publications including New York, Vanity Fair, and the Financial Times, his personal recollections about the life and work of Richard Hambleton (as commissioned in 2009) provide remarkable insight.
Through the 80s Richard Hambleton had just been an artist I would glimpse here and there downtown: a kind of well-known unknown. Quite literally, a shadow-man. Then somebody – I no longer remember who – took me to Hambleton’s studio, a cavernous loft on Chrystie Street in that apparently ungentrifiable segment of the Lower East Side which a streetwise girl I knew called “Heroinburg.” I was astonished by the work he was doing, so jewel-like, so very off-the-street. Or so I thought. It was the first of several visits. There was usually a cute, frail girl around. Did the place have two floors? Three? Four? I no longer remember that either. I do remember the mounds of … well, stuff. I also remember quite a large gathering – Banafsheh Zand Zand, then with Threadwaxing Space, was there, as was Marcia Resnick, the terrific Punk photographer, and the critic Thomas McEvilley. Each time, Hambleton, weaving between articulacy and a halting shyness, had fresh, remarkable art on hand. But then, all of a sudden, he was no longer on Chrystie Street. It was as if the shadows had swallowed Richard Hambleton up. Until now. Street art, uncommissioned art, outlaw art, interventionist art has been presences in the art world from the beginning of Modernism, but the history of today’s public art begins … well, where exactly? Perhaps with Christo, shoving up his Iron Curtain of oil-drums with cyclonic energy on a Paris street in 1961? Or with the subversive seductions of the Situationist slogans – “Beneath the paving stones, the beach” – scrawled in the same city in 1968? But it was the Wow! factor of the graffiti writers of New York’s South Bronx – Norman Mailer’s The Faith of Graffiti was published in 1973 – that opened up public art both as a media phenomenon and a rawly exciting arena. Suddenly the streets seemed more available, the white cube galleries less impregnable. Stefan Eins, an artist from Vienna, started Fashion Monda in the Bronx to channel the energies. Fred Brathwaite, aka Fab Five Freddy, had tagged subway trains as a kid and saw the possibilities. “My painting a Soup Can train was a homage to Andy as well as a message that people doing these pieces were not all the scoundrels that we were painted. And from there I began to make moves and meet other artists,” he says. Artists from a non-graffiti background felt the current too. In 1977 the Conceptualist Sherrie Levine saw a multi- facetted diamond shape that Paul McMahon had made in his studio. “There should be one of those in the middle of every traffic intersection in SoHo,” she told him. So, they got a stencil and some white paint and did just that. Christie Rupp painted rats. Dan Witz painted birds, Charles Simonds left small models of buildings around. Daniel Buren painted one of his stripes outside Lawrence Weiner’s wall on Bleecker and Jenny Holzer pasted paper strips, printed with aphorisms. But the art world is deft at sorting through such group manifestations as Cubism, TheAb Exes and Pop and here it swiftly homed in on the three to watch. Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring and Richard Hambleton. Of the three, Hambleton was the first to get lift-off. The art world in which he increasingly made his mark was one of steadily increasing prosperity and one in Through the 80s Richard Hambleton had just been an artist I would glimpse here and there downtown: a kind of well-known unknown. Quite literally, a shadow-man. Then somebody – I no longer remember who – took me to Hambleton’s studio, a cavernous loft on Chrystie Street in that apparently ungentrifiable segment of the Lower East Side which a streetwise girl I knew called “Heroinburg.” I was astonished by the work he was doing, so jew l-like, s very off-the-street. Or so I th ught. It was the first of several visits. There was usually a cute, frail girl around. Did the place have two floors? Three? Four? I no longer remember that either. I do remember the mounds of … well, stuff. I also remember quite a large gathering – Banafsheh Zand Zand, then with Threadwaxing Space, was ther , as was Marcia Resnick, the terrific Punk photographer, and the critic Thomas McEvilley. Each time, Hambleton, weaving bet een articulacy and a halting s yness, had fresh, remarkable rt o han . But then, all of a sudden, he was no longer on Chrystie Street. It was as if the shadows had swallowed Richard Hambleton up. Until now. Street art, uncommissio ed art, outlaw art, interventionist rt have been presences in th art world from the beginning of Mod r ism, but the history of today’s public art begins…well, where ex ctly? Perhaps with Christo, shoving up his Iron Curtain of oil-drums with cyclonic energy on a Paris street in 1961? Or with the subversive seductions of the Situationist slogans – “Beneath the paving stones, the beach” – scrawled in the same city in 1968? But it was the Wow! factor of the graffiti writers of New York’s South Bronx – Norman Mailer’s The Faith of Graffiti was published in 1973 – that opened up public art both as a med a phenomenon and a rawly exciting rena. Suddenly the streets seemed more available, the white cube galleries less impregnable. Stefan Eins, an artist from Vienna, started Fashion Monda in the Bronx to channel the energies. Fred Brathwaite, aka Fab Five Freddy, had tagged subway trains as a kid and saw the possibilities. “My painting a Soup Can train was a homage to Andy as well as a messa e that people doing these pieces were not all the scoundrels hat we were painted. And from there I b gan to make moves and meet other artists,” he says. Artists from a non-graffiti background felt the current too. In 1977 the Conceptualist Sherrie Levine saw a multifaceted diamond shape that Paul McMahon had made in his studio. “There should be one of those in the middl of every traffic intersection in SoHo,” she told him. So, th y got a stencil and some white paint and di j st that. Christie Rupp painted rats. Dan Witz painted birds, Charles Simonds left small models of buildings around. Daniel Buren painted one of his stripes outside Lawrence Weiner’s wall on Bleecker and Jenny Holzer pasted paper strips, printed with aphorisms. But the art world is deft at sorting through such group manifestations as Cubism, The Ab Exes and Pop and here it swiftly homed in on the three to watch. Jean-Michel Basquiat, K ith Haring and Richard Hambleton. Of the three, Hambleton was the first to get lift-off. The art world in which he increasingly made his mark was one of steadily increasing prosperity and one in which being an artist was a serious career.
which being an artist was a serious career. The self-destructive excesses which had been part of art world myth from Caravaggio through the Vie de Boheme to Jackson Pollock seemed suddenly out of date. Indeed “bohemianism” seemed a pretension. It was now a world in which a successful artist could expect to buy a building, perhaps a castle, and to be profiled in up-scale magazines. Well, this pleasant paradigm didn’t fit Basquiat, God knows, nor even Keith Haring. But of The Three, Richard Hambleton, the sole survivor, was born under a peculiarly dark star. Its rays soon engulfed him so that, of his own compulsive volition, he did not so much disappear – at his most crabbed and cagey, Richard Hambleton never ever disappeared – as become an enigma, a rumor, a presence flickering at the edge of vision. But – and this is the anomaly, actually the miracle – Richard Hambleton, unlike most other furious engines of their self-destruction, has not only kept on steadily working but preserved his gift intact, continually finding new places to take it. “If I’ve got nothing else at least I’ve got my art,” he told me that evening in the ramshackle studio. “Which keeps me happy in a way. But it’s not a therapy process. It never has been. Just to be able to do it.” Well, this pleasant paradigm di n’t fit Basqui t, God knows, nor even Keith Haring. But of The Three, Richard Hambleton, was born under a peculiarly dark star. Its rays soon engulfed him so that, of his own compulsive volition, he did not so much disappear – at his most crabbed and cagey, Richard Hambleton never ever disappeared – as became an enigma, a rumour, a presence flickering at the edge of vision. But – and this is the anomaly, actually the miracle – Richard Hambleton, unlike most oth r furious engines of their self-destruction, not only kept on steadily working but preserved his gift intact, continually finding new places to take it. “If I’ve got nothing else at least I’ve got my art,” he told me that evening in the ramshackle studio. “Which keeps me happy in a way. But it’s not a therapy process. It never has been. Just to be able to do it.” I asked if he th ught about the future. I was thinking of the work – for instance, the dis ppearance of the street work – but h mis dersto d. Sometimes he spoke with a shy mumble, but sometimes with a clear articulacy. As then. “I don’t worry about my future,” he said firmly. I said I meant the future of the work. “Yeah! I do. I always have,” he said. “That’s the only thing.” Okay. Back to the beginning. “This is the first piece of public art I ever did,” Hambleton said. We were in his second studio – the entire building i a small w rren of st dios – and what we were looking at was a fragment of mirror. “Really?” I said. “Yeah! I stuck little mirrors up all over Vancouver. They were all about the same size. I was R. Dick Trace It. I had a pocket mirror. And I would say: Have you seen this face before?” I asked if he thought about the future. I was thinking of the work – for instance, the disappearance of the street work – but he misunderstood. Sometimes he speaks with a shy mumble, but sometimes with a clear articulacy. As now. “I don’t worry about my future,” he said firmly. I said I meant the future of the work. “Yeah! I do. I always have,” he said. “That’s the only thing.” Okay. Back to the beginning. “This is the first piece of public art I ever did,” Hambleton said. We were in his second studio – the entire building is a small warren of studios – and what we were looking at was a fragment of mirror. “Really?” I said. “Yeah! I stuck little mirrors up all over Vancouver. They were all about the same size. I was R. Dick Trace It. I had a pocket mirror. And I would say: Have you seen this face before?” Vancouver, Canada was where Hambleton grew up, where he went to art school. He speaks little of his family, except to mention that he hadn’t seen his mother for ten years, but one gathers that they were healthy, outdoorsy folk. In 1975, when he was 21, he founded Pumps, a center for alternative arts, and in 1976 had his first solo show there. He moved to San Francisco later that year. These first R. Dick Trace It pieces already have the doubleness which is key to Hambleton’s work. The main art influences he cites are the painterly Ab Exes and the hard-core 70’s Conceptualists. “I liked the idea of aliases, personas. Performance art. And video art. It made a reference to that,” he says. Indeed, he put up a series of TV screen shaped silver stickers in venues like the Punk holy-of- holies, CBGB. These combinations of aggressive thought processes and attractive materials – the tackiest chain store pocket mirror would have been a precious thing in the ancient world – is predictive of his mature art. “I have a whole history of doing work on mirrors,” he said. Right now, for instance, he is attaching mirrors onto city walls. He gives these pieces the self-explanatory title: “Artholes.” V ncouver, Ca ada was where Hambleton grew up, where he went to art school. He speaks little of his family, except to mention th t he hadn’t seen his mother for ten years, but one gathers t at they were h althy, outdoorsy folk. In 1975, when he was 21, he founded Pumps, a centre for alternative arts, and in 1976 had his first solo show there. He moved to San Francisco later that year. These first R. Dick Trace It pieces already have the doubleness which is key to Hambleton’s work. The main art influences he cited are the painterly Ab Exes nd the hard-core 70’s Con p ualists. “I liked the idea of aliases, personas. Performance art. And video art. It made reference to that,” he said. Ind ed, he put up a series of TV screen shaped silver stickers in venues like the Punk holy- ofholies, CBGB. These combinations of aggressive thought processes and attractive materials – the t ckiest ch in store pocket mirror would have b en a precious thing in the ancient world – is predictive of his mature art. “I h v a w ol history of doing ork on mirr rs,” he said. At that point, for instance, he was attaching mirrors onto city walls. He gave these pieces the self-explanatory title: “Artholes”. The self-destructive excesses which had been part of art world myth from Caravaggio through the Vie de Boheme to Jackson Pollock seemed suddenly out of date. Indeed “bohemianism” seemed a pretension. It was now a world in which a successful artist could expect to buy a building, perhaps a castle, and to be profiled in up-scale magazines.
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