This guy is eloquent and lovely. He reminds me a lot of George Ballen, who is obviously a favorite. Below is an interview off too much chocolate ( http://toomuchchocolate.org/?p=2496 ) that is just ( I know I already said it, but) Lovelllly.
Michael Pigneguy: In an email just prior to this interview you threatened me with Heinrich Mahler… if things got a little “weird”. Besides henchman, can you explain how Mr. Mahler figures within your work and life. Is he aware of your quote “Doubt……[that] is a particularly instrumental and inherent aspect of what the work is about. The same can be said about life in general.” Can you explain more fully why ‘doubt’ plays such a pivotal role in your work and life ?
Michael Napper: Heinrich Mahler is an imaginary friend and muse, born in Poland to poor potato farmers but ran away to Berlin at an early age….made strange musique concert compositions, which have inspired me visually. He’s a sort of “polar opposite doppeldanger” to myself, he depressed and dark Northern European, me, born in all-too-sunny Southern California.
Doubt, well, I’m not sure. Doubt is with me all the time….having had no formal training in the arts of photography besides my own autodidactic strivings, I’m never sure if the path I’m on is right. Never sure if the pigment is the right consistency, if the framing is good on a particular photograph. Doubt either leads to paralysis or a determination to keep looking. Doubt is man’s best friend after fear. It keeps one humble. That’s important for me.
Michael Pigneguy: If Heinrich is an imaginary friend are we viewing self portraits taken by you ? And is Heinrich as imaginary a friend as Jesus Christ ? And to what extent does faith play with playmates such as ‘doubt’ and ‘fear’ at the party ?
Michael Napper: Yes, they are self-portraits, but self-portraits of a particular facet of myself, one of desire for a “rootedness” that I’ve always felt a yearning for. Heinrich Mahler has a rich history and ancestry that, as an American, is not something I possess. He has a scarred and complicated history behind him, which shows up in the portraits, full of blurs and scratched film and graininess.
As regards Jesus, a case can be made that he is not imaginary, that he was a historical figure, before the mythic Christ figure emerged. He was probably an interesting guy, albeit probably a bit too earnest . Might be the sort you’d want to leave off the guest list for parties. Faith “plays” with doubt and fear in an interesting way….Faith scares certain people, on both the left and on the right. It scares the lefties as they can’t “prove” the existence of a over-riding spiritual power and suggests something irrational, and it scares the righties as they think of hell as something that exists on a different, future plane. Faith, doubt, fear….all necessary components for mystery. Take any one of those components out of the equation and mystery is deflated. What you are then left with is the worst and most banal aspects of contemporary Western society……Aren’t you going to ask me about film speeds and f-stops?
Michael Pigneguy: Easy fella, easy! I’m a Londoner, we like a bit of foreplay, a bit of banter before we steam into the acrobatics, besides, shouldn’t we leave f-stops and film speeds to the professionals ? Anyways, I’m glad you cleared up the faith issue. Far too much zealotry in the U.S for my liking, and I wanted to prepare myself in case Heinrich metamorphosed into another form of savior.
You touched on ‘rootedness’. Many of your constructions have the appearance of makeshift domiciles, itinerant dwellings or disaster relief shelter provided by some perversely benevolent nation. The shot above, in particular, brings to mind “Spirit of the Beehive” a film made in the time of a regime already in advanced decay. Those barren empty landscapes symbolized a form of isolation. Can you talk about the symbolism, if any, behind your constructions and the role of photography in that process ?
MN: Forgive me for rushing in like that, it appears you’ve retained your Old World ideas of courtship and foreplay, kindly see my trampling and fondling as simply an impassioned eagerness to respond to your pointed queries….nevertheless, thank you for introducing me to the film Spirit of the Beehive, a film I hadn’t heard of before. I must see it. Upon reading a synopsis on-line of the film, I’m fascinated that it uses the original Frankenstein film as part of the plot. Frankenstein is one of my favorites, and I would even go as far as saying that it has elements that are pivotal and influential to my own photography, namely black and white film, a certain texture of primitive fables, and most importantly aspects of “the other” and the emotion of enchantment.
I could go on at length here about enchantment, a word that has gotten sullied and stained by the new age movement over the years, but that in it’s original meaning, to influence by charms and incantations, bewitch, is at the heart of intention in both my photography and painting. Enchantment, if I rounded up all my favorite books/films/paintings/travels/relationships/experiences, is at the core. And I believe everyone is looking for that moment, and there are various ways to get there, through drugs, alcohol, sex, art.
As regards symbolism in my constructions, and the role of photography in that process…Hmm, well, I can’t say that I consciously construct these little structures and devices with a specific meaning to be conveyed. I come across certain materials, often found on the street, or ones in my studio (abandoned drawings or canvas’), and the history of them starts to suggest certain ideas to me. The material, the fragility of found wire, the pentimento of old sketches of mine, glue, tape, stains, dust, disintegrating rubber, string, etc., is for me incredibly rich with an unknown and ridiculously insignificant history. I then assemble all these orphaned bits into something. I find myself enchanted in the process of building these little shrines, as when in childhood, growing up in a predominately Mexican-American neighborhood, I would attend the little church Our Lady of Guadalupe, or visit a friends house and see his Mother’s little home-made shrine to the Virgin Mary.
I’m certainly what would be considered a “more than lapsed” Catholic, but the rituals still intrigue me. Any ritual is fascinating on a certain level, whether it be the collection a homeless person assembles, the sand paintings of Buddhists, or the objects of certain fetishes. It seems as humans we have a great need for certain rituals, a desire for mystery. I would say on a basic level all my work symbolizes this desire…then it goes out from there for the viewer to construct a little kernel of meaning for themselves.
Michael Pigneguy: Yes, the monster can be found by simply closing one’s eyes. I noticed you capitalized ‘Mother’ when speaking of your childhood friend’s house and her shrine. Was that intentional ? Did you grow up in Los Angeles ?
Supposedly the best way to overcome stereotypes is to encounter the ‘other’. Do you think Los Angeles achieves this ? And i know you had a gallery show a couple of nights back how did that go ?
Michael Napper: No, the capitalization was unconscious, and here I fear you’ll run off into an Oedipal related thread…but really, if anything deserves capitalization, shouldn’t motherhood (and you’ll notice that the concept “motherhood” I didn’t capitalize….I prefer actuality over concept)?
Yes, I grew up in Los Angeles, the suburbs, and I’m still getting over that. Fled home early to live farther away from people and closer to the sea. Surfing and sailing kept me sane for quite some time, but then the leash for surfboards was invented, and the water became increasingly crowded with people who now didn’t have to swim for their boards when they fell off. Why that min-tangent just erupted I’m not sure….but I do love the ocean. I miss surfing, but surfing here in Southern California now, it would be like trying to listen to Bach inside a Wal-Mart. You’d still here the strains of Bach, but you’d get overwhelmed from the smell of hot dogs and caramel corn.
I’m not sure what Los Angeles achieves, let me go fix another espresso quickly and think on that. OK, I’m back…Los Angeles is an odd mish-mash of cultures, and it’s inherent sprawl is the very thing that I think prevents it from achieving what it might. I love big cities, I love getting lost and just wandering in large crazy cities like Manhattan, Calcutta, Paris. But those are places where you can walk through various neighborhoods and see the culture change. L.A. is so spread out that you can’t traverse neighborhoods and cultures without getting in a car, and that inherently puts a distance between oneself and the culture. And the car culture here I believe insulates people from one another….there is a social discomfort and awkwardness amongst strangers here, that in other cities where you have to deal with people in close proximity (buses, subways, walking) on a daily basis I don’t feel as much. So, I’m not sure what this place
“achieves” as regards stereotypes. I think the film industry and television have become so powerful in this country that they are in charge of what most people think of stereotypically. Yes, I had some work in a group show the other night. It went well.
Exhibition receptions are odd little moments….it’s one little fragmentary conversation after another. I’d rather be in my studio working, but I did meet an interesting fellow who runs a small little gallery and makes shoes! A shoemaker! I love shoes, not so much to collect or to wear, but some shoes, particularly women’s shoes, are incredible little sculptures.
Michael Pigneguy: Motherhood get’s past capitalization when placed at the beginning of a sentence. We could mention parole but probably best to not go there. Speaking of things Oedipal tho’, I came across one of your posts on “Filmism” which left me wondering if you do indeed believe your camera collection’s a “neurotic defense against pre-oedipal trauma….?” And to which one’s skirt hems do you cling to most ? And whilst we’re here, i’d like to mention Tichy, the venerable old perv we share a common admiration for. What is it exactly, beyond women’s shoes, that you admire in his work ? And how do you reconcile this admiration with His Perviness ?
Michael Napper: Well, I love my camera collection, although it has been pared down significantly over the last 2 or 3 years, but unlike most photographers who downplay publicly their feelings about equipment and don’t want to be seen as geeks or fetishists, I have embraced that part of myself. My collection, or what’s left of it, gives me joy to look at. The old film cameras, some that were made for now-defunct film formats, have a presence as a tool that I don’t see in digital cameras now. I won’t go off on an anti-digital rant here, but film gives me something much more tangible than the digital imaging devices have to offer.
Miroslav Tichy’s work is problematic at times, but the saving grace to his work is that he creates the images with a home-made camera so ridiculously crude that the “perviness” is muted a bit through layers of distance and blur. Imagine if he’d taken those shots with a Nikon digital SLR! We wouldn’t be interested in them, but the cops would be! My affinity with him is almost more with the cameras that he makes, they are in themselves wonderful and poignant works of human desire. The photos themselves with their idiot savant framing and embellishments are hit and miss for me. God bless that musty old nutter.
Michael Pigneguy: Amongst the number of film processes, and chemistries that you experiment with, is there one particular process you are most fond of …or intimidated by ? And is there one piece of work that has shaped the way you currently work or plan to work ?
Michael Napper: Lately I’ve tried to go pretty straight forward with the on-going series I’ve been working on, Structures & Devices. Medium format, either the Mamiya C330 TLR, or the monster, the Mamiya RB67. Usually either Plus-X, or if I want a touch more grain in the image, Tri-X or Fuji Neopan 400. HC-110 developer or Rodinal.
But for another series, The Beautiful and The Lost, I pick up various other cameras, from 99 cent store cameras to an Olympus Pen FT half-frame camera, loaded sometimes with film that I have randomly damaged, then beat the hell out of the film during processing with high temperatures and odd forms of agitation. One of my favorite dinosaur cameras to use is the Conley Kewpie 2A Box camera, made in the 1910-1920’s, for a long-gone film format 616. I’ve modified the camera to take 120 film in it, and sometimes I use close-up filters to shoot with. For a camera made almost 100 years ago, it is amazing.
When I first started working with photography a few years back, I went all over the place with films, developers, cameras, but lately I think the concept of the two series has settled me down a bit. With the Structures and Devices series in particular, the objects that I’m creating and shooting hold my attention enough that I don’t feel any need to embellish the work with some of the methods I’ve used in the past.
I think a pivotal piece for me was either the Widow or the Alembic image. They started me off on the Structures & Devices series, and I felt like I was getting that feeling of invention and enchantment that I get in the best moments of painting. I think that some of the works from that series, even though they are structures or devices, have a sort of personality akin to a strange kind of portraiture, a kind of anthropomorphic feel.
Michael Pigneguy: I’ve enjoyed this very much Michael, thanks for playing. Any last thoughts, words of wisdom, recommendations ….. film, book, music, ladies’s shoe stores, or the perfect crime ?
Michael Napper: Likewise, Michael, thank you, Heinrich and I have enjoyed ourselves, and through this process gotten to know each other a little better. Oh, words of wisdom? Hmmm… How about, keep looking? And there are many books and films that I could list, but the thought of reading “Against Nature” by J.-K. Huysmans while listening to Tetsue Inoue with an espresso at hand seems like a good time. Shoes? If it’s still open, Tootsie Plohound in NYC. Perfect crime?…Well, it wouldn’t remain perfect if I told you.
