Gerard Malanga

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Gerard Malanga, 2007

Gerard Joseph Malanga (born March 20, 1943 in Bronxdale , New York ) is an American writer , photographer and filmmaker .

Life

Malanga became known as the first assistant to the pop art artist Andy Warhol . Warhol had ended his career as a commercial artist in the early 1960s and turned to free art. For the production of the screen prints he preferred , he was looking for a colleague whom he found in Malanga in June 1963, at the time a student at Wagner College in Staten Island . Malanga, an avid poetry writer in the tradition of the Beat Generation , had already published a few verses in student magazines.

The first jointly produced image was screen print by Elizabeth Taylor , Silver Liz . In January 1964 the company moved to the second studio, which later became world-famous as The Factory . As the only assistant, later the most important assistant, he a. Responsible for the numerous screen prints that have become famous by Warhol ( Marilyn Monroe , Elvis , Brillo-Boxes and many others). His whip dance with Mary Woronov at Warhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable - multimedia performances for the Velvet Underground song Venus in Furs - is unforgettable .

Between 1964 and 1966, Malanga Warhol assisted in the so-called screen tests , a total of more than 300 short portraits (each a 16 mm film roll of three minutes); There are also recordings of Malanga from this series. He himself was often seen as an actor in front of Warhol's camera in the early experimental films. In 1964 he had his first role in Kiss , where he acted with Mark Lancaster according to the film's title. He also had roles in Batman Dracula , Couch (both July 1964), and Vinyl (March 1965), an underground film adaptation of A Clockwork Orange . Sometimes Malanga also took over the camerawork instead of Warhol.

Malanga with his cat Archie, 2005

In 1968 Malanga fell out with Warhol, with the end of the “Silver Factory” came the end of his collaboration. Malanga went on a long trip to Italy before moving to Union Square , and Warhol was angry about it; In addition, it became known in February that Malanga tried to sell his counterfeit Warhols in Rome. Years later, Warhol complained in his diary (December 1, 1976, May 6, 1978 and more) that a whole series of fake “Electric Chairs” and “Flowers” ​​were circulating in American and European galleries. Malanga increasingly distanced himself from Warhol's art factory and concentrated on his own artistic work as a photographer . Numerous portraits were made, mostly from rock , literary and underground cultures (e.g. Mick Jagger , William S. Burroughs , Patti Smith or Iggy Pop ). In later years he also devoted himself to nude photography.

Malanga now lives and works in New York City.

Selection of works

Poems
  • Screen Tests: A Diary . Kulchur, New York 1967
  • 3 Poems for Benedetta Barzini . Angel Hair Books, New York 1967
  • Prelude to International Velvet Debutante . Great Lakes Books, Milwaukee 1967
  • Intransit: the Andy Warhol - Gerard Malanga Monster Issue . Toad Press, Eugene, Ore., 1968
  • The Last Benedetta Poems . Black Sparrow Press, Los Angeles 1969
  • 10 poems for 10 poets . Black Sparrow, Los Angeles 1970
    • Self-portrait of a poet . March, Frankfurt / M. 1970
  • Chic Death: Reproductions of the Death Painting Series by Andy Warhol . Pym-Randall, Cambridge, Mass., 1971
  • Wheels of Light White Light Foundation, Upper Dharmsala (India) 1972
  • Light / light . Expanded Media Editions, Göttingen 1973. Bilingual.
  • Rosebud poems . Penmaen Press 1975.
  • Three diamonds . David R. Godine 1991.
  • Mythologies of the Heart . Black Sparrow, Santa Rosa 1996
  • No respect. New & Selected Poems 1964-2000 . Blacks Sparrow Press, Santa Rosa, Calif., 2001. ISBN 1-574-23162-6
    • Arcadia projection, unfinished. 10 poems . AltaQuito, Göttingen 2003. ISBN 3-923588-57-7
Prose, photo books

Filmography

(Unless otherwise stated, the films are from Andy Warhol)

literature

  • Reva Wolf: Andy Warhol, Poetry and Gossip in the 1960s . University of Chicago Press, 1997, ISBN 0-226-90491-1 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Malanga, Gerard
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Malanga, Gerard Joseph (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American writer, photographer, and filmmaker
DATE OF BIRTH March 20, 1943
PLACE OF BIRTH Bronxdale