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Friday, Jul 3, 2009
And all I got was this documentary. Paul H-O on his film about the iconic photographer and the perils of being an art world sidekick.
By Joy Press
Read more: Movies, Interviews, Arts & Entertainment, Joy Press, Tribeca Film Festival, Salon Conversations
Spencer Tunick
Paul and Cindy discuss her new work in "Guest of Cindy Sherman."
May 2, 2008 | It sounds like a highbrow fairy tale: an unsuccessful artist turned cable TV host snags an interview with one of the world's most reclusive and glamorous art stars, Cindy Sherman -- and the two fall in love. This is what actually happened to Paul Hasegawa-Overacker, aka Paul H-O, who uses it as the premise for the documentary he co-directed, "Guest of Cindy Sherman." But to cling too tightly to that romantic story line is to seriously misrepresent this movie, which is screening this week at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York and is slated to run eventually on the Sundance Channel.
In fact, "Guest of Cindy Sherman," which was co-directed by Tom Donahue, feels more like three or four docs fused into one entertaining (and sometimes squirm-inducing) concoction. We get a sidelong view of the art world and its symbiotic relationship with commerce and celebrity, as well as an exploration of the awkward life of a famous person's "plus one." (H-O's own complaints are bulked up by an amusing interview with Elton John's companion, David Furnish.) At the center of it all is Sherman, in a fragmented portrait of a woman H-O calls "the most famous mystery girl of art," a photographer who has used her own image as the basis for a hugely influential body of work.
All this is strung together with H-O's confessional voice-overs, which present him as a goofy dude who has stumbled into the force field of a radiant, powerful woman and found himself devastated by his own lack of stature and lost sense of self. "I'd sort of been swallowed up," he complains. For five years he tags along as Sherman attends galas, hobnobs with celebs and collectors and jet-sets around the globe, spending his days as "the person hardly anyone wants to talk to." The final blow, at least as he represents it, may just be when H-O brings Sherman to see his therapist in an attempt to save their five-year relationship, and the therapist chooses to take her on as a client, jettisoning him. "Even my shrink would rather be with Cindy!" They eventually break up, though he carefully avoids showing any of the actual drama on-screen.
"Guest of Cindy Sherman" arrived at Tribeca wreathed in controversy: Sherman has officially disassociated herself from the doc, even going so far as to apologize to friends who are interviewed in the film for involving them. However, Sherman herself comes off surprisingly well -- whether working in her studio (where we watch her experiment with an endless permutation of outfits and makeup until she finds the perfect amalgam) or chatting with her sister. H-O says that Sherman got something close to final cut (at least as far as her own appearances are concerned). But for an artist whose work revolves around manipulating her own image, and yet who has very deliberately shielded herself from the publicity machine, it must feel like very unwelcome exposure -- by an ex-boyfriend, no less.
Paul H-O spoke to Salon at the Tribeca Film Festival. Watch video from the interview here:
I had been an artist for 25 years, and I'll tell you, I took a real beating from that experience. The art world is extremely psychologically brutal on the psyche of the artist. It's like "Survivor." You come out of art school and, immediately, half of the people just drop off the list of "I want to be an artist" because they just take a look at it and go, "Ah! Not prepared." Almost everybody else is gone within five years.
By 1993, you had been through the insane '80s art world boom and then there was this big bust -- egos weren't running as high.No, and "Gallery Beat" was just rocking. I shed my artist mask. I could just say, I am done with "the art." Because you know, as an artist, I was just so tired of having to deal with the competition and having to kiss the asses of dealers, collectors, curators. And in a lot of ways, these people are just really boring. Artists are a lot more exciting, interesting, beautiful and sexy.
So "Gallery Beat" really put the focus on the artists, and at a certain point you met Cindy Sherman. What did she represent to you?I'd been doing the show for quite a few years. And public access [cable TV] is a labor of love. We did have sponsors, but we only made about $10,000 a year. I was a carpenter! So, yeah, Cindy Sherman represented the top of the heap. And mysterious. She was the most famous mystery girl of art. Not only was she the heavyweight, the 800-pound gorilla, but she was also inaccessible. She and her dealers had brilliantly developed this image, which was so smart. And that basically was, "Don't talk to the press."
That was something that she had decided to do?Well, it was easier for her to do, because she's a shy person. And actually her dealers are pretty low-key people, too, so it was a pretty brilliant plan by pretty brilliant people. You know, "Cindy, don't talk to anybody. Don't even title your work!" Do you know her work's not titled? All of the titles that have been given to the work, "Film Stills" and "Centerfolds," have been given by other people. It's all just untitled with a number.
It wouldn't be so weird, except that her work is so focused on her own image. You start to desperately want to know who Cindy Sherman is.Well, especially someone who becomes such a celebrity figure within the art world and beyond.
You ended up doing a series of interviews with her [for "Gallery Beat"]. Did you ever discuss with her later why she let you into her studio when she wasn't talking to anybody else?She liked "Gallery Beat," thought it was a funny show. She thought I was cute, and when I saw her, I thought she was cute, too. I think it was a little bit of love at first sight. At least it was for me.
In the film, you and Walter Robinson discuss her like she's such a babe, which felt kind of weird to me. Even though she is obviously a beautiful woman, we don't usually think of her as a babe, since so much of her work is about camouflage and armor.Yeah, but some of those pictures are really hot! [Laughter] Come on, the garter belt -- I definitely had fantasies about her years before I'd been exposed to her. And Walter and I enjoyed being guys. We enjoyed being non-p.c.
It's pretty obvious that we weren't taking this stuff seriously, and both of us -- as artists and as media people too -- we were pretty angry. We kind of felt like the system kept us out. We felt a little burned, so there are definitely hints of that skepticism over what goes on in the art world.
Next page: "I know what it feels like to be a wife that no one pays attention to"
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