Elle Muliarchyk Interview Part Two
Before we delve deeply into the brilliant mind of Elle Muliarchyk once more, it’s only fair that you catch up by reading Elle Muliarchyk Interview Part One. A bit of background: we discussed her extremist escapades into dressing rooms to take self-portraits in expensive designer clothes, her work for Bella Freud, her secret identity, and her mysterious double life line. Go here to read more. And now, we journey deeper into the ever-fascinating mind of Elle Muliarchyk: new-age artist, and ultra-inspiration to uncouth details of her new project, Begotten.
TT: What are some of your favorite items in your closet at the moment?
EM: A very very puffy jacket from Alaska. It’s the warmest thing in the world. I wear it on my research trips. It’s so hideous! It makes me look like a pimp from the Bronx. A couple of times I ran into some fabulous fashion people I know wearing it, and i wanted to fall through Earth! I screamed covering my face- “No, No! Don’t look at me please! It’s not the real me!”
“I discovered so many fascinating Saints and Martyrs whose achievements AND terrible scandals would make today’s Pop icons like Kate Moss and Lindsay Lohan seem terribly boring.”
TT: Your ideas are like dreamscapes. I can’t imagine how you imagine. Where do you get inspiration or where do these ideas come from?
EM: You are absolutely right about word “dreamscapes”. At least half of my pictures come from my dreams. I dream very vividly and make drawings when I wake up. You know - sometimes when you dream and it’s so full or wonder and beauty, and sometimes terror, but you are still half aware in your dream that you are safe, and you don’t want to wake up? Like seeing yourself dead and not freaking out? Well, I want to recreate those dreams for myself (and that feeling) into reality. I have a whole book of those drawings. I guess I’m lucky - just like Mendeleev dreamed up periodic table. It’s my new project - to recreate my dreams as precisely as I can,
When I feel inspired it’s not by particular visual stimuli, I don’t come out of the movie or a show and say - Oh- I wanna do a shoot based on this. But collectively they all go into my head, like ingredients for a cake, bake for a while and come out when they are ready.
I do find connection between my work and my favorite works of art. Like colors in Turner (they are psychedelic, yet they all exist together in nature. It’s like when you see an amazing sunset and try to photograph it but it never comes out as you see it! Well, I actually try to create images that show colors that are not photographable, that are usually possible only in paintings). I also love Edward Munch - his (lesser known to general public) black and white sketches - much more than his paintings. I saw them at Moma last year, and they were something incredible!
In general I love the Impressionists, Art Deco and Pre-Raphaelites. I love the haunting quality of the earliest photographs, Daguerreotypes. I love sensual portrayals of beautiful women that show them vulnerable and seductive (and therefore strong), When women look like Goddesses.
I also loove Theatre and Opera for the esthetics of sets (especially when it looks like a fake set). I love the feeling of a micro-world existing on the stage of a larger world. It’s like giving you a power of God - as if you were a Giant looking at the small world in the Snow Globe in your hands. When I was little my biggest dream was about teletransportation of people and things and ability to change size of any objects. I think I’m trying to do it in my work. When I take a picture I hope it looks like it was taken on a different planet or in a parallel Universe.
“When I came to the US I was overwhelmed by all these fantastical ‘types’ of Christianity. It was crazy fun but pretty confusing. I lived with New Born Christians, where, like in “Borat”, they’d put hands on my forehead and I was supposed to fall down and speak in tongues… I also lived in a Mormon family…”
TT: If there is one message you would like to tell people with your work, what would it be?
EM: I don’t have any political message (not yet maybe?) I think I answered this question above.
TT: How did you come up with a name for this new project? What do you mean by “Begotten”?
EM: It’s a play on words. First of all, everyone knows Begotten as classic expression in the Bible. Like in “Jesus- God’s only begotten son”, it actually means creating something very important that has never been before, and only exclusive to humans and gods! Secondly, since the Saints are wearing the hottest latest fashion, luxury items that many fashionistas would die for, these object are To-Be-Gotten - you gotta have it!!!! I want this word to become the new hottest word for people - to replace “divine”, “amazing”, “heavenly” etc, -since even these are originally religious words!!! You use the word for anything that implies decadence and “sin”… But a sin that you can’t resist committing…
TT: Most things you do seem to be controversial. Do you search for that element of controversy? And do you feel this project is controversial at all?
EM: As a person, I like to get involved into controversial things. I love being in the middle of a war, of a conflict. I never walk the middle road. I was just reading William Blake and he says that new things are created only after clashes of the opposites, out of conflict. But I don’t really have any controversial or rebellious messages INSIDE my photographs, I think I’m a total girl in this sense - I want a person let out a deep sigh looking at my work, just be mesmerized and transfixed for a reason that is not politically explanatory. I want people to be speechless..:-)
EM: I’ve been to 400 churches in New York area, scouting for the statues of beautiful saints, then I work with designers and ask them to create unique pieces for their favorite saints, as if they were a living muse. My next step was to get access to the statues. For that I had to become a devout Catholic - attending all the services, clean the churches, work in the soup kitchen. My days began around 6am! Very important! It’s not about dressing the statues up like christmas trees - anyone can do it!! It’s not still life fashion photography where statues are the cool background. Each of those saints is my “baby”, and I dress them with so much respect and fascination!
“I’m attempting to create new icons where a contemporary fashion object is a symbol revealing the story of the saint - just like it was done in 15th century art.”
TT: I’ve written a little spiel about Iconography the other day. This is how I feel: “Icons are people who do what they love, and pursue it with every thought in their mind, every feeling of their spirit. They are the people who don’t care what you think but have the guts to say what’s on their mind. They are the people who inspire creation. They are the people who can take you on such an emotional ride that your thoughts cannot escape them. They are the people who don’t forget, because they are unforgettable.” What do you feel an icon is? And who do you think deserves such status?
EM: Wow- I like your passionate description. I have a very different view on that though. The number one that makes me worship a person is their mind, not pure passion or love for what they do (I never met a person like that. I’d like to believe they exist though. New York is a place where you survive only with the right combination or genius and practicality - business mind, Which inevitably involves a compromise in your work, which of course, makes the Passion - “impure”)
I am also totally fascinated by the people who can use their talent in combination with a great opportunity and become the greatest in their field - like the greatest scientists and businessmen. Or dictators! (I don’t LIKE them, but I am mesmerized by them!) Like, probably the evilest politician on Earth - Mao Tse Tung. I was literally crying when I was reading about atrocities that he personally masterminded and crafted in his biography… He killed way more people than Stalin and Hitler combined! Not for the sake of some ideology, but for the sake of Egoism! The pure EVIL, all the intricate political games that he played, the power he held, was genius! Maybe that’s why he was one of Andy Warhol’s Icons? But why is he up there together with Marilyn Monroe, who is neither ugly, nor evil? What do they have in common? The bottom line is, I think this Icon quality is some kind of magic. The Iconic person, whoever this person is, like Kate Moss today for example, is like a Messiah. They can be anyone turning up at the right time in the right place, with some kind or purpose they have to fulfill.
Thanks! Once again Elle you really surprise me, pushing the limits of fashion. Bringing new perspectives. I hope you always have the chance to create, and never stop those dreamscapes from being imagined! g
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