Beautiful Vagabond: A Glimpse Into the Turbulent Life of the Late Edwige Belmore

Edwige Belmore, “the queen of punk” has died at the age of 58 in Miami. A great many things can be said of the nightlife maven, musician and model, and yet it seems that the complexity of her journey through life remains all too mysterious. What we do know is that she touched the lives of the twentieth century’s greatest cultural influencers, from Helmut Newton, to agnès b., to Andy Warhol, and many more. We also know that her life was a long, beautiful, rags-to-riches-and-back-to-rags-again tale of heartbreak and obscurity. Starting with her familial abandonment, to her discovery by the world of high fashion and art, and ending with her final chapter as resident artist and landscaper of the Vagabond Hotel in Miami—her LinkedIn account lists “landscaping hobo” and “palm tree studies” as her duties. Little is known about her sojourn in Japan or the years that she spent at a Hindu ashram in India, and few would want to sit through the documentary that recounts her years as tastemaker to the Starck Club in Dallas. However, these are the chapters that defined her as an icon whose flame burned white hot, then flickered indefatigably, only to be extinguished prematurely by a blood-borne illness while few aside from her inner circle were looking.

“Edwige Will Die, and Edwige Will Be Born”

Abandoned by her parents and raised in a Parisian convent, Belmore came into her formative years with an unwavering determination to forge her own path. In 1976, at nineteen years old, she saw the Sex Pistols perform live for the very first time. Mind blown and loins roused, she was changed completely, telling everyone that on November 6, 1979, “Edwige will die, and Edwige will be born.” Friends assumed she was planning her suicide, but what she had in mind was more like what later generations would call a re-brand. She burned all of her clothes, and bought one outfit that was definitively hers. “I had completely this amazon look: riding pants, high heels, white shirt with a skinny tie, with a big old beaten leather jacket that’s so cool, shaved head … I was some kind of alien, amazon, dominatrix or something.”

Edwige is dubbed the “Queen of Punk”

Photograph by Farida Khelfa

Springing into the Parisian punk circuit like an androgynous bat out of hell, Belmore was approached by two girls in a club who asked if she would play drums in their band. Having never played a musical instrument, she accepted, and their band, L.U.V. (for Ladies United Violently, or Lipsticks Used Viciously) was born. As the punk movement started to gain recognition in the media, she was asked to do interviews for Vogue, Elle, Nouvel Observateur and the like. Within no time she became the leader of a movement and was crowned the “Queen of Punk.”

A Foray into Modeling

Photograph by Philippe Morillon

Due to the perpetual stream of press, her notoriety grew rapidly and Edwige found herself unwittingly shepherded into the inner circles of haute couture. Catching the eye of Helmut Newton at a party chez Paloma Picasso, the louche photographer followed her incessantly throughout the night begging to take her picture. Without any experience or ambition for modeling, the gender-bending ingénue made history posing for everyone from Helmut Newton, to Pierre et Gilles, Maripol, Andy Warhol, et al.

Cover of Façade Magazine with Andy Warhol

Photograph by Alain Benoist

As a symbol of counterculture, establishment-fucking fracas, as well as muse to the fulcrums of the art and fashion worlds, Belmore was the perfect companion to Andy Warhol for the cover of Façade. It was an underground, paper magazine that sought intriguing binaries to juxtapose on their covers, and this one would go down in art publication history with the headline: Pope of Pop Meets the Queen of Punk.

Walking for Jean-Paul Gaultier and Thierry Mugler

Edwige never called herself a model, and didn’t want anybody else to, which is why asking her to walk had to be approached delicately. “Jean-Paul Gaultier came to me and said, ‘You look amazing. Do you want to be in my show?’ … he was like ‘do you want to be in my SHOW,’ which is whole different meaning.” Gaultier was curating looks from the street (a practice unheard of at the time), and putting street kids on the runway. Belmore drank champagne and got high throughout the entire presentation, yet she still managed to finish the show in a pair of towering stiletto heels singing Sid Vicious’s reprise of “My Way.”

A Hop Across the Pond to Studio 54

Edwige Belmore, Maripol & Bianca Jagger @ Studio 54, photograph by Duggie Fields

Having taken Paris by storm within the span of a single year, Warhol was anxious to introduce Belmore to the elite influencers of New York—or rather, he took it upon himself to introduce New York to the Queen of Punk. Approaching the illustrious nightclub, swaths of partiers parted like the Red Sea as she entered the club for her very first time, arm-in-arm with her regal, rebel counterpart. She was suddenly a member of the elite New York underground with contemporaries such as Bianca Jagger, Keith Haring, Debbie Harry, Kenny Scharf, and Jean-Michel Basquiat.

Ambiance creator to Le Palace in Paris

Upon her return to Paris, Belmore was approached by ‘The Prince of the Night,’ Fabrice Emaer, and asked if she would work the door at his new nightclub, Le Palace. It was the Studio 54 of Paris, and Edwige made the perfect doorman. She was a 20-year-old Amazonian punk with six bodyguards facing hoards of anxious scenesters. Belmore claimed that she would look them in the eyes and feel immediately whether or not they were right for that evening’s ambiance. She once refused the King of Sweden because “obviously, he must have been an asshole.” It was during this chapter that she married her friend Jean Louis Jorge, a Dominican filmmaker fifteen years her senior, because in the age of free love, getting married was the most punk thing to do. Her wedding dress was a mock Chanel gown made from white terrycloth towels stitched by a friend who worked for the heritage house.

Music and Film

Cover image by Pierre et Gilles

From 1978-1988 Edwige acted in seven short and feature-length films, the first of which was a role in Jean-Marie Perier's 1978 film, Sale Rêveur with Lea Massari and Jacques Dutronc. She also played herself in the 2011 feature film Des Jeunes Gens Mödernes or Kids of Today. In 1979, Claude Arto introduced Belmore to the exhilarating sounds of the synthesizer and they started their Parisian Cold Wave band (referred to as New Wave by the Anglophones), Mathémathiques Modernes. Throughout the ‘80s she traveled back and forth between Paris and New York singing and playing sax with her lesser-known band, Jungle Geisha.

‘Maitresse de Maison’ at agnès b., New York

Photograph by Pierre et Gilles

Edwige met agnès back in 1976 when at the opening of agnès b. in Paris. Years later, when agnès opened the very first gallery/boutique in New York City, she asked Belmore to be the lady of the house. It was her job to fuse the worlds of fine art and fashion so that the crowd would flow seamlessly from one side to the other without any sense of awkwardness or separation. agnès hung an enormous photograph of Edwige (taken by Pierre et Gilles) that she had bought years prior behind the cash register, and placed a much smaller photo of herself below it to the right. In the early ‘80s, Belmore met the mellifluous, Nigerian-born, British singer Sade and the two engaged in a passional tryst. It is rumored that her hit single “Sweetest Taboo” was inspired by the Queen of Punk.

Photograph by Maripol

Edwige Finds Photography

Photograph by Edwige Belmore

In the final years of her life, Edwige created a photographic series called The I Within Your Imagination, which she planned to present in a group show called 7 Deadly Sins. The location of the intended exhibition and whether or not it happened is unknown. The series comprised 500 photographs taken of the same mysterious object at various different angles with varying sources of light. The effect seems a perfect representation of who she was to the myriad worlds in which she interacted. Having absolutely no training as a model, actress, singer, musician, or any of her other assorted professions, she seamlessly assumed those roles without any hesitation or fear of failure—she simply did and was everything that was asked of her.

Edwige never did finish the coffee table book that she and Maripol had hoped to publish, which would encompass photographs from the 75 artists and photographers who called her their muse. There are undoubtedly countless stunning photographs held in private collections that the world has never seen and we can only hope that these lost treasures will surface in the coming years. text by Summer Bowie

Photograph by Ellinor Stigle

[AUTRE PLAYLIST] Late 70s (and Some 80s) Art Damaged Punk Rock From Los Angeles

text by Adam Lehrer

For the first of Friday Autre playlists, I thought it most appropriate to highlight the quintessential Los Angeles-based punk rock bands of the late 1970s (and some '80s). Perhaps this is a cliché move, but Autre is of course a Los Angeles art magazine. The Hollywood punk bands were decidedly art leaning without exactly aspiring towards art. That is the Los Angeles art attitude; a sort of nonchalance that allows for the word to spin out of control and occasionally achieve the transcendental. In another cliché move, X's 'Los Angeles' kicks off the playlist, but c'mon, it''s X. Los Angeles's closeted junkie punk hero, Darby Crash, comes in next with the Germs' 'Communist Eyes.' Many people argue that the LA punk scene was way weirder and more punk than that of New York, and it's easy to see why. Prior to Lydia Lunch, James Chance, and the noise freaks of Brian Eno's No New York compilation, the earliest New York punk bands all had a musicality and professionalism running through the music that the LA bands largely did not (save for X, maybe). The Ramones mastered the few chords they were using, Television was downright groovy at times, and David Byrne is a musical genius. The LA bands devolve to art noise all the time. Take the Germs, who had as much influence on hardcore punk as they would noise rock bands of the 1990s like Harry Pussy and Sightings.

I purposefully left hardcore bands, save for the Middle Class who were on the edge, as they are for another playlist. Also, I love the Screamers and Angry Samoans but there are no good tracks of theirs on Spotify. Musically, there isn't a lot holding the LA bands together other than that they all listened to their own particular favorite types of music and filtered them through lack of musicianship and chaos. Enjoy!

Adam Lehrer is a writer, journalist, and art and fashion critic based in New York City. On top of being Autre’s fashion and art correspondent, he is also a regular contributor to Forbes Magazine. His unique interests in punk, hip hop, skateboarding and subculture have given him a distinctive, discerning eye and voice in the world of culture, et al. Oh, and he also loves The Sopranos. Follow him on Instagram: @adam102287

FOLLOW AUTRE ON INSTAGRAM TO STAY  IN TOUCH: @AUTREMAGAZINE

Ten Things You Need To Know About the Incendiary and Prodigious Poet, Painter, and Musician Lizzy Mercier Descloux

To some, she was France’s answer to Patti Smith, or perhaps a 20th century reincarnation of Arthur Rimbaud – or maybe both. To others, she is virtually unknown. But listen to her track “Fire” off her seminal album Press Color, which is seeing a rerelease this summer, and you’ll wonder why you’ve never heard of her. Instead of being France’s answer to Patti Smith, though, Lizzy Mercier Descloux was more of a soul sister; she was also more punk than no wave – punk in the sense of her rebelliousness. You can find Descloux donning a suit next to Smith, who is barefoot and wearing a tattered dress, in a poetry art book that the duo released together – with contributions from Richard Hell. Born Martine-Elisabeth Mercier Descloux in Paris, Lizzy was a bit of a creative anomaly – she introduced world music into her music before there was such a thing. If it wasn’t for her explorations with world music, there is a chance Paul Simon may not have made Graceland. Whatever the case is, Lizzy Mercier Descloux, who died in the early naughts, is still a force to be reckoned with. Here are ten things you need to know about Lizzy Mercier Descloux.

1. She Grew Up in Paris and Taught Herself How To Play Guitar

Born in 1956, Lizzie Mercier Descloux grew up in Les Halles – the center of Paris. She attended art school at the École des Beaux-Arts and taught herself how to play guitar. By this point – the beginning of the 70s – early examples of punk and no wave music was flowing out of New York and London and making its way to France.

2. With Michel Esteban, She Opens a Punk Boutique in Paris Called Harry Cover

Just like Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren ran their iconic boutique and punk mecca, provocatively called Sex on King’s Road in London – Descloux helped run Harry Cover, which became a “temple” for the punk movement in Paris at the time. It sold books, music, clothing and local bands rehearsed in the basement.  She managed the boutique with her boyfriend Michel Esteban who became her closest creative collaborator and partner.

3. Descloux Goes To New York On Assignment For Rock News – Everything Changes

In 1975, her partner Esteban starts a French music magazine called Rock News, which was covering a lot of the punk and no wave scenes that were quickly spreading throughout the world. Descloux visits New York to do a story on the local scene happening on the Bowery. In doing so, she is introduced to Richard Hell and Patti Smith, which would have a profound affect on the young artist’s trajectory as a musician.

4. She Moves to New York Permanently and Buys a Fender Jazzmaster Guitar

Realizing that if she wanted to make it as an artist and a musician, she needed to make New York her home. In 1976, she makes the move and joins a mass migration of artists looking for a new creative environment. The artistic cognoscenti of Downtown New York welcome Descloux with open arms – including Richard Hell, whom she became romantically involved with. She buys a Fender Jazzmaster guitar and starts to work on music.

5. In Collaboration with Richard Hell and Patti Smith, She Publishes a Book of Poetry

With Patti Smith penning the illustrations and the preface, and Richard Hell adding his own contributions, Descloux publishes a book of poetry called “Desiderata.” The title comes from the Latin word, Desiderata, which can be translated into English as, “desired things.” Some of the photographs in the book include photographs of Patti in a dress and Descloux in a man’s suit.

6. She Releases A Mini LP Under the Name Rosa Yemen

Together with guitarist D.J. Barnes, she releases her first EP – mini-album with six tracks, like all-instrumental Decryptated and the improvisational and performative ode to venereal disease Herpese Simplex, which is a good example of one of Descloux’s rawest and most rebelliously minimal songs in her early catalogue. However, it was her debut record on ZE Records – entitled “Colors” – with the electrifying first song, Fire, which really showed Descloux’s true talents as an artist and collagist of musical genres and sounds.

7. Descloux Was Also An Actress

With her distinct look – androgynous facial features and wild swash of hair – she became a muse of the Blank Generation’s film scene. In fact, she can be seen in Amos Poe's “Blank Generation,” which is largely considered to be one of the most important cinematic documents of that era. She can also be found in a short film directed by Seth Tillett.

8. She Loved Multiple Musical Genres and Sounds From Around The World

Descloux’s second album, Mambo Nassau, mixed no wave sounds with funk, soul and African beats. In fact, Descloux was one of the first musical artists to play with the concept of “World Music,” which was an unheard of term in 1980 when Mambo Nassau was released. After a long trip through the African continent, she released an unexpected hit single called "Mais où Sont Passées les Gazelles?,” which had backing vocals from South African musicians. Shortly after this effort, Paul Simon released Graceland, which had an eerily similar approach and sound. In one of Descloux’s later albums, entitled One For the Soul, she teamed up Brazilian musicians with Chet Baker, who she met at a Jazz Festival in Rio De Janeiro.

9. Descloux Went to Africa On The Trail of Arthur Rimbaud

A lot of young artists have had a fascination with the young and brilliant 19th century poet Arthur Rimbaud who gave up writing and moved to Africa where he later died. Although, most young artists don’t follow the same trail as Rimbaud. But Descloux did – she first traveled to Ethiopia and then made her way down to South Africa, which was then still in the throes of the Apartheid.

10. She Is Diagnosed With Cancer and Dies in Corsica

Toward the end of her life, she started to paint more and decided to settle on the beautiful island of Corsica. After being diagnosed with cancer, it was here that she decided to live out her last days – her ashes were scattered at sea in a beautiful and fitting end to a long and fruitfully creative life.

"Press Color," Lizzy Mercier Descloux's seminal album will be rereleased in August by Light In the Attic Records. You can click here to preorder. Text by Oliver Maxwell Kupper. Photos courtesy of Esteban and ZE Records.