Das stille Leben des Sammlers Kempinski

You are cordially invited to the inaugural Private Viewing of the imaginary collection of Mr Kempinski. This exhibition brings together works by over 60 artists, now presented for the very first time for collective viewing.

New York-based curator Mr Miller and Berlin-based Mr Siekmeier were asked by Mr. Kempinski to create a collage of artworks that reflects upon the relationship between art and collecting.

The Kempinski collection is by definition fluctuant and can move freely from one context to the next.

Exhibition events:

Sat, May 31, 7pm
Kinga Kielczynska: Power point lecture introducing
ARP- Art Related Progress. A business proposal for an art residency program to be set up in Colombia on a self-sustainable property

Sat, June 7, 7pm
Film screening with curator Billy Miller

Fri, June 13, 7pm
Martin Kohout: One-year anniversary of Kohout’s Gotthard Tunnel Run in Switzerland during LISTE Basel in 2013 and artist booklaunch

Participating Artists: Nadja Abt, Aggtelek, Joseph Akel, Peggy Ahwesh, Anonymous, Francisco Berna, Douglas Boatwright, Matt Borruso, Matthew Burcaw, Elijah Burgher, Luke Butler, Anders Clausen, TM Davy, Mark Dilks, Discoteca Flaming Star, Paul Gabrielli, Robin Graubard, Markus Guschelbauer, Frank Hauschildt &Valentin Hertweck, Adrian Hermanides, Dan Herschlein, Benjamin Alexander Huseby, Monika Paulina Jagoda, Stephan Jung, Vytautas Jurevicius, Renata Kaminska, Saman Kamyab, Kinga Kiełczyńska, Lisa Kirk, Martin Kohout, Marcus Knupp, Ulrich Lamsfuss, Cary Leibowitz, Hanne Lippard, Mahony, Katharina Marszewski, Darrin Martin, Rachel Mason, Howard McCalebb, Kazuko Miyamoto, Bob Mizer, Erik Niedling, Hugh O’Rourke, Joel Otterson, Rob Pruitt, Johannes Paul Raether, Annika Rixen, Matteusz Sadowski, Salvor, Dean Sameshima, Pietro Sanguineti, Fette Sans, Wilken Schade, Jason Seder, Barbara Sullivan, Gwenn Thomas, Goran Tomcic , Rein Vollenga, Jan Wandrag, Fresh White, Tara White, Norbert Witzgall, Carrie Yamaoka

 

Summer Camp II

This July and August EXILE presents its second annual Summer Camp curated by New York based artist, writer, editor and independent publisher Billy Miller. For this year’s SummerCamp Miller curated two simultaneous exhibitions entitled Head Shop and Lost Horizon:

Head Shop is both a nod to legendary ‘60s bohemian boutiques like Granny Takes A Trip, and an evocation of the idea of the mind as a storehouse of images and potentialities.

Artists: Dan Acton, The Agitators, Assume Vivid Astro Focus, Brian Belott, Nina Bovasso, Matt Borruso, Larry Carlson, Ryan Cummings, TM Davy, Michael Economy, Krista Figacz, Janie Geiser, Fritz Haeg, Christian Holstad, Brian Kenny, Paul Kopkau, Steve LaFreniere, Justin Lowe, Noah Lyon, Michael Magnan, Rachel Mason, Glynnis McDaris, Ashleigh Nankivell, Mary Nicholson, Darinka Novitovic, Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, Jason Peters, Kevin Regan, Alex Rose, Desi Santiago, Barbara Sullivan, Jan Wandrag, David West, Justin Yockel

Lost Horizon takes its title from the book and film of the same name, and suggests aspects of American Western mythology and “lost” possibilities – ecological, cultural, personal and otherwise.

Artists: D-L Alvarez, Rachel Beach, Michael Bilsborough, Colby Bird, Matthew Burcaw, Kathe Burkhart, Luke Butler, Brendan Carroll, Walt Cassidy, Wayne Coe, Reuben Cox, Pia Dehne, Peter Eide, Carl Ferrero, Jonah Freeman, Janine Gordon, Jonah Groeneboer, Marcus Gruendel, Tina Hejtmanek, Scott Hug, Stephen Irwin, Item Idem + Paul Mpagi Sepuya, Pat Keesey, Lisa Kirk, Lewis Klahr, Martin Kohout, Kristian Kozul, Paul Lee, Peter Maloney, Glynnis McDaris, Dean Sameshima, Florent Tillon, Frank Webster, Ken Warneke

 

Additional Events

July 18, 9pm: Screening at Wowsville, Ohlauer Str 33, Berlin

July 20, 9pm: Screening at Basso, Köpenicker Straße 187/188, Berlin

July 31, 7-10pm: STH #67 Launch, EXILE

 

Reviews

→ Diane Pernet (PDF, 2MB)

→ Frieze (PDF, 250 kb)

→ art21.org (PDF, 600 kb)

Straight To Hell

Straight To Hell (a.k.a. The Manhattan Review of Unnatural Acts) is a living legend. Conceived and founded by cult writer Boyd McDonald in the early 1970s, it quickly gained a large following and underground notoriety due to a combination of graphic sexual content, radical politics and stinging wit. The unique concept of Straight To Hell remains unchanged until today: via a New York City P.O. Box, readers are invited to send their accounts of true sexual experiences to the editor.

Over the decades Straight To Hell has become an infamously comprehensive and uncensored library of homosexual practice and identity. The resulting series is a uniquely democratic and powerful collection of bizarre, funny, scary, and raunchy stories documenting the real and often embarrassing sex lives of a wide range of men – detailing a continuous chronology spanning nearly a century.

Exile is honored to inaugurate its new space with an exhibition curated by current editor Billy Miller. The exhibition Straight To Hell presents an eclectic, and in some cases never before seen, selection of vintage and contemporary materials from the archives of Straight To Hell and the personal collection of Billy Miller.

This particular exhibit is specifically not intended to be a historical overview over the complete story of the magazine, but rather a sample of the range of material featured on its pages. Along with an exhibit of photography from Straight to Hell contributors, the show includes rare editions and ephemera – plus samples from edited anthologies, which will be made available for research during opening hours. Exile will also present a very special limited-edition artwork in honor of the occasion.

Participating Artists: Adam Kozik, Alvin Baltrop, Bob Mizer (A.M.G.), Brian Brennan (Latino Fan Club), Bruce La Bruce, Dan Acton, Darren Ankenbauer (Handbook Magazine), David Hurles (Old Reliable), Gary Indiana, Jan Wandrag, Janine Gordon, Joe Ovelman, Michael Alago, Michael Economy, Nico Urquiza, Paul Mpagi Sepuya, Rick Castro (Antebellum), Scott Hug, Slava Mogutin, Stash Buttinski, Steve LaFreniere, Walt Cessna, Will Munro, Xavier Stentz and others.

 

Additional Events
Sunday, October 19, 2008: 6:00 PM
Twilight of the Lemurs
Short Films from the collection of Billy Miller. including films by Michael Economy, Steve LaFreniere, Kristian Kozul, Tony Feyer and others.

Pier Photographs 1975-1986

EXILE is extremely honored to present the very first solo exhibition of Alvin Baltrop’s work in Europe. Alvin Baltrop: Pier Photographs 1975-1986 will present a rare selection of vintage and modern prints.

Alvin Baltrop was born in the Bronx in 1948 and passed away in 2004. From 1975 to 1986 he photographed the crumbling piers and their inhabitants on the west side of Manhattan. He photographed obsessively and created an incredible archive of thousands of photographs that show a captivating mélange of intimacy, decay, violence, creativity and anarchy.

Without ever being nostalgic Baltrop’s photographs portray the end of a legendary era; the architectural destruction of the piers and, even more, the emotional and physical destruction brought by the impact of the AIDS crisis. However, his photographs are so much more than historical documents. His passion and personality are visible in the prints. Each of his photographs offers a well-constructed, intimate, and moving glimpse into this fascinating time and place.

During his lifetime, there was little artistic appreciation of his photography and only in recent years has his work slowly emerged to greater awareness. In February 2008 Artforum Magazine devoted its cover and a comprehensive visual essay to his work accompanied by a text by respected art-critic Douglas Crimp. His work has also recently been shown at the Fotomuseum Winterthur as part of the exhibition Darkside, together with artists such as Bill Jacobson, and Nan Goldin among others.

The exhibition is curated by New York based artist, publisher and curator Billy Miller.

Select Private Works 1942 – 1992

EXILE is pleased to present Bob Mizer: Select Private Works 1942-1992, featuring a special selection of private photos by American photographer and visual mastermind Bob Mizer, exhibited now for the very first time. This show launches not only Exile’s new location but also an ongoing collaboration with the newly formed Bob Mizer Foundation. Consisting of 26 modern custom Cibachrome prints carefully produced in strictly limited editions from never before seen vintage Kodachrome film positives, the exhibition gives an initial insight into this artist’s extensive personal work and creative process.

Bob Mizer (1922-1992) founded Athletic Model Guild in 1945 as well as the ground-breaking magazine Physique Pictorial in 1951. Vintage and modern prints from Mizer’s AMG studio are cherished, collected, shared, traded, exhibited and published on endless occasions. But this exhibition introduces a Bob Mizer that has hardly been known and never before exhibited until today.

Over the course of his career he continuously pushed social, political and aesthetic boundaries, and his life and art have had a lasting influence on countless artists and filmmakers as well as on visual culture as a whole. Based in Los Angeles, his photography and filmmaking features a vast social spectrum ranging from Hollywood actors and celebrities to homeless hustlers and porn stars. His models included television and film star Glenn Corbett, actor, Warhol-protégé and Calvin Klein-model Joe Dallessandro, as well as bodybuilder, movie star and recent Governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger… among many others.

Although he worked in both black & white and color, we focus here exclusively on selected color examples. The work is presented in three distinct groups that loosely follow a biographical timeline to give an insight into the depth and breadth of the artist’s research and artistic vision.

Bob Mizer: Select Private Works 1942-1992 begins with documentary-based photographs from Venice Beach, CA from the mid 1940s and a selection of outdoor portraits taken during his first trip to Europe in 1951. During these years, Mizer created his photographic identity as well as his entrepreneurial voice for AMG and Physique Pictorial.

The exhibition continues by examining the artist’s particular use of color. Mizer began experimenting with color photography as early as the mid 1940s and continued to experiment throughout his career. This took several forms, ranging from fashion-based imagery to formal portraiture. Many of these photographs show a subtle understanding and manipulation of color and lighting effects – all imbued with a characteristic style and underlying symbolism.

The exhibition culminates in a selection of works that illustrate the ways in which Mizer constantly challenged his own visual language. These works show how he developed and appropriated many of today’s known stereotypes of masculine visual representation – and then further shows his incessant obsession to push further and further into and beyond his own stereotypes. These particular images are multi-layered fables of embedded visual coding: an angry-looking Marine who has lost his pants, a Jesus on a fabric-clad cross in a state of excitement, and a fake Native-American standing proudly against airplane jet trails in the LAX flight path.

EXILE is excited to show a side of this unique artist’s work and of our collective cultural history that has hitherto been underrated and unexplored. His vast estate consists of about one million negatives and transparencies, countless reels of 8 and 16 mm films, thousands of BetaMax videotapes, as well as large amounts of personal paraphernalia. This exhibition has been curated by Christian Siekmeier and Billy Miller, in conjunction with Dennis Bell and Christopher Trout from the Mizer Foundation.

Additional Events

Saturday, February 26, 2011, 6-8 pm
Bob Mizer Film Screening

EXILE cordially invites you to a screening of rare short films by American photographer, publisher and filmmaker Bob Mizer, selected by the concurrent exhibition’s curator Billy Miller.
Encouraged by his friend and mentor Dick Fontaine, Mizer began releasing an ongoing series of “one-reel” films in the 1950s for mail-order customers. Over the years, these initial films evolved from b&w silent films to full-color sync-sound films exhibited in select movie houses and then later, to longer and more explicit videos which were widely distributed.
For this special screening, Miller presents a taste of the full range and history of the artist’s filmic output; featuring Joe D’Allesandro’s screen debut amongst others.

 

→Full list of works

→Review: Monopol

→Review: Spex

→Review: Artforum

→Review: Eyemazing

HAUS, Vienna

EXILE is pleased to participate in the new exhibition platform HAUS with a solo presentation of historic photographs by African-American, Pittsburgh based photographer Charles “Teenie” Harris (1908–1998) curated by New York based artist and curator Billy Miller.

Charles “Teenie” Harris (1908 – 1998) was an African-American photographer from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. From 1936 to 1975 Harris chronicled life in the black neighborhoods of the city for the Pittsburgh Courier – one of America’s oldest and most important black newspapers. Nicknamed “One Shot Harris” – as he rarely made his subjects sit for retakes due to the necessary frugality of photographic materials – he took more than 80,000 images during his career. 

In addition to his photo essays of daily life in the city, he captured many celebrities who visited Pittsburgh, including Harry Belafonte, Erroll Garner, Duke Ellington, Eartha Kitt, Louis Armstrong, Joe Louis, Sam Cooke, Sarah Vaughan, Martin Luther King, Richard Nixon, Shirley Chisholm, Hank Aaron, Billy Strayhorn, Ralph Abernathy, Lena Horne, Ray Charles, and many, many others. His vast collection of photographs also includes documentation of nightlife, sports & political figures, crime scenes, and a remarkable selection of images portraying the black queer and drag community in Pittsburgh’s Hill District – once an important African American neighborhood and a thriving cultural center of black life, especially for Jazz and underground clubs. 

In 1986 Harris licensed his entire collection of photographs for $3000 to a local entrepreneur, Dennis Morgan. Harris filed a lawsuit in 1998 for unpaid royalties and the return of his collection as he was proven illiterate and conned out of his work. Unfortunately, he only won the case posthumously. Since 2001 the Harris estate is part of the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh. 

In the mid 1980s NYC-based curator Billy Miller purchased a suitcase full of prints and ephemera from a sidewalk flea market on St Marks Street in the East Village. Miller recognized familiar faces from the Jazz and black celebrity scene of the 1930s -1970s in the photographs but was not aware of the context or details of the photographer’s career. Only in 2001, with the advent of the Internet and the first New York Times article published on Harris, did Miller recognize who Harris really was and the scope of his legacy. 

For this site-specific exhibit, Miller and EXILE present an initial small selection of photographs set within the domestic and abandoned location of Haus. At first sight, there are no parallels between Harris, Pittsburgh, Haus and Vienna. Yet both urban locations are predominantly working-class communities, all too often on the margins of urban society. The Hill District, as depicted in many Harris photographs, no longer exists, and the building complex where the photographs are here displayed will also be demolished after the end of this project.

 The provenance of these particular photographs prior to being purchased by Miller is not known. As some of the prints are of very high quality and signed, they were possibly made for an exhibition context. It is likely that they are from the so-called ‘Morgan prints’ and derived from the illegitimate contract Harris signed in 1986. These photographs therefore pay tribute to Harris’ creative authorship and authenticity, and remind us of issues of artistic practices, ownership, and alienation often faced by marginal communities.

WORKS exhibited

Charles “Teenie” Harris: Coal miner leaving underground mine in Library, Pennsylvania, c. 1947, printed later. Toned vintage print signed on front, 28 x 35,5 cm. Carnegie Museum of Art, Charles “Teenie” Harris Archive: 2001.35.3078

Charles “Teenie” Harris: Elder Charles Beck and two other men, holding child, possibly girl, in baptismal pool, surrounded by crowd for large baptism at Kennard Field, Hill District, August 1945, printed later. Toned vintage print signed on front, 28 x 35,5 cm. Carnegie Museum of Art, Charles “Teenie” Harris Archive: 2001.35.4266

Charles “Teenie” Harris: Five hunters gathered around car with woman seated on roof and two dead deer lying on hood, c. 1941-1946, printed later. Toned vintage print, 28 x 35,5 cm. Carnegie Museum of Art, Charles “Teenie” Harris Archive: 2001.35.3115

Charles “Teenie” Harris: Eartha Kitt leaping though poster to launch a Citizens Committee on Hill District Renewal program, with police officer Harvey Adams, Vine and Colwell Streets, Hill District, May 1966. Vintage print, 35,5 x 28 cm. Carnegie Museum of Art, Charles “Teenie” Harris Archive: 2001.35.2509

 

Further reading

Cheryl Finley, Laurence A. Glasco & Joe W. Trotter: Teenie Harris, Photographer: Image, Memory, History. 208 Pages, University of Pittsburgh Press, 2011

Stanley Crouch: One Shot Harris: The Photographs of Charles “Teenie” Harris. 168 pages, Harry N. Abrams, 2002

Charles H Harris: Spirit of a community: The photographs of Charles “Teenie” Harris. 48 pages, Westmoreland Museum of American Art, 2001

 

Online ressources

→haus.wien

→Teenie Harris Archive

→Teenie Harris Wikipedia

→https://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/07/arts/black-life-black-white-court-ruling-frees-legacy-tireless-photographer.html

→https://www.npr.org/sections/pictureshow/2011/12/23/144093524/the-big-legacy-of-charles-teenie-harris-photographer?t=1600680819347

→https://www.post-gazette.com/uncategorized/2007/07/25/Out-on-the-town-Teenie-Harris-exhibit-captures-a-rare-glimpse-of-gay-life/stories/200707250280

→https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/harris-charles-h-teenie-1908-1998/

→https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aa3UBzuDn6Q