Helmut Newton Solo Show, Selected Works

Helmut Newton was born Helmut Neustädter in Berlin in 1920 to a German-Jewish button-factory owner and an American mother.  He started his photographic career at sixteen working for renowned Berlin photographer Iva. From there, after immigrating too and traveling back from Australia, he photographed fashion for Vogue and other  magazines developing a style that is both instantly recognizable and imitable. An exhibition in London, at the Hamiltons Gallery, includes a selection of rare prints, polaroids from famous photoshoots from Newtons oeuvre, many rare or never seen before.  Helmut Newton 'Selected Works' run until May 15. www.hamiltonsgallery.com

Sad Lover's Eyes

William S. Burroughs looking serious, sad lover’s eyes, afternoon light in window, cover of just-published Junkie propped in shadow above right shoulder, Japanese kite against Lower East Side hot water flat’s old wallpaper. He’d come up from South America & Mexico to stay with me editing Yage Letters and Queer manuscripts. New York Fall 1953. ~ Allen Ginsburg

Openings: Artist, Syd Barret, Man of Letters, Acid Casualty?

Despite what you've heard about Syd Barret if you bet against your life it was all true you would certainly lose. If you asked Syd Barret why he was famous he probably couldn't answer you - despite the fact that he was the founding member of the legendary band Pink Floyd. But who is the real Syd Barret? If you asked Syd, who is now dead, he would certainly say artist before musician. A new show opens today at the Idea Gallery in London that explores the enigmatic inner life of Syd Barret. For the first time, the largest collection of unseen photographs, personal love letters and original artworks will go on display offering an unprecedented insight into the inspired life of this rock legend. gallery.ideageneration.co.uk

Warpaint Live in San Francisco, California

photo by Oliver Kupper

Warpaint played at the Independent last night in San Francisco. I was hooked a few years back with the below demo - hooked since they were merely just another LA garage band - albeit with John Frusciante (formerly of the Red Hot Chile Peppers) as a their record producer and the actress Shannon Sossaman as their drummer (by the way, they're new drummer Stella Mozgawa is simply incredible). It also worth it to mention that all members of Warpaint are all stunningly gorgeous, but with a certain sensuality that makes you take them seriously - their tremendous musical talent demands notice.  A  little bit Black Sabbath meets The Virgin Suicides, Warpaint closed the show with a 15 minute long encore that had most of the band in a trance they couldn't figure out how to get out of - which was awkward, but entertaining, because did anyone really want them to stop?  Warpaint has released two official albums, the most recent, The Fool, came out on Rough Trade Records last October. Visit their site to see all tour dates: www.warpaintwarpaint.com

Painting the King

Ouyang Chun - Painting The King is the first institutional one-man show to present the artist, who was born in Beijing in 1974, outside of China. His cycle (Wang/King) consists of thirty paintings, some of which are more than five metres long. It relates episodes from the life of a king in a breathtakingly painterly diversity, telling about his victories and defeats, about love and death. The pictures, which are partly crowded with figures and rendered in minute detail and partly feature an expressive and impasto brushwork, amalgamate history and fiction, as well as the search for beauty and the description of moral failure.  Painting The King is on view until June 12 2011 at the Augarten Contemporary at the Gustinus Ambrosi Museum in Vienne. www.belvedere.at

UNDERCOVER

Silk and leather bag, metal clasp, metal and silk strap. Collection entitled "Underman" and built around an imaginary theme, The year is 20XX, the world in which the souls of the people have been incapacitated by the forces of evil, is empty. UNDERMAN is born to restore these lost souls. The battle against sorrow wages on.  Spring / Summer collection 2011. www.colette.fr

Cartier: The Power of Style

María Félix wearing her Serpent Clip earrings, 1971

The Cartier Collection reflects the evolution of Cartier's artistic and stylistic creation. Cartier: The Power of Style traces 160 years in the jeweler's glorious history. Three hundred and sixty-two pieces from the Cartier Collection--accessories, masterpieces of jewelry and watchmaking from the end of the nineteenth century to the present day--and four exceptional pieces from the Prince's Palace of Monaco are featured. These exceptional items offer insight into the royal jeweler's treasures and the sources of inspiration that lead to their creation. Commissioned photographs of these rare pieces, exclusive archival images, and biographical stories about their prestigious owners comprise this handsome volume.

Pair of Tiger ear clips, Cartier Paris, special order, 1961

Daisy Fellowes wearing the Tuttie Frutti necklace made of emeralds, rubies, sapphires, and diamonds, made in 1936 Cigarette case, Cartier Paris, 1931, Platinum, modified baguette-cut diamond, The back of the lid is engraved with twenty signatures such as “Coco” for Coco Chanel, “Misia” for Misia Sert, “Fellowes” for Daisy Fellowes, “Vera” for Vera de Bosset, “Peggy” for Peggy Guggenheim, “Etienne” for Etienne de Beaumont, inside the case “Cécile” for Cécile Sorel, “Elsie” for Elsie de Wolfe, “Johnnie” for Prince Jean-Louis de Faucigny- Lucinge, and other friends unfortunately impossible to identify today. Sold to the Baron de Meyer, photographer Snake necklace, Cartier Paris, special order, 1968, Platinum, white gold and yellow gold, 2,473 brilliant- and baguette-cut diamonds weighing 178.21 carats in total, two pear-shaped emeralds (eyes), green, red, and black enamel, Made as a special order for María Félix

Sir Yadavindra Singh, wearing a ceremonial necklace, Cartier, created in 1936

You can find Cartier: The Power of Style here.

Rolla and Marion

Henri Gervex's 1878 painting Rolla was deemed immoral, as it depicted a scene from a poem by Alfred de Musset about a man who goes to bed with a very pricey prostitute, " . . .Marion was expensive. To pay for one night he had spent everything . . .. Rolla peered with a melancholy eye over the rooftops, he saw the sun coming up. He moved to the edge of the window. Rolla glanced back to Marie, she was tired and had fallen asleep again..." Whilst sprawled out and pillaged, Marion lays out on the bed panting, eyes closed, out of breath, satiated.....

Required Reading: Lautréamont's Maldoror

"The deadly uses of this book will lap up his soul as water does sugar." In 1917 French writer Philippe Soupault discovered a copy of Comte de Lautréamont's manuscript Les Chants de Maldor in the mathematics section of a small Parisian bookshop, near the military hospital to which he had been admitted.. Lautréamont, which was the pseudonym of Isidore Lucien Ducasse, born in Uruguay 1846 and died in Paris in 1870, was immediately canonized as a surrealist god - in the pantheon of Baudelaire, Rimbaud, and Mallarme.  "Chants de Maldoror unveils a world, half vision, half nightmare, of angels and gravediggers, hermaphrodites, and homosexuals, madmen and strange children."  Right now at the Galerie Anais in the Bergamont art space in Santa Monica, California a small exhibit of inspired drawings by the the similarly morbid artist Hans Bellmer - The Songs of Maldoror and Erotic Series is on view until March 31st. www.galerieanaisla.com