Video-Installation „Shallow 1-21“ Malcolm McLaren: from punk impresario to media artist

He is the great manipulator of pop music, but his actual influence is hotly disputed: we are talking about Malcolm McLaren, the artist, musician and music manager who, in 1975, ignited the career of the British punk band Sex Pistols, and thus made an important contribution to the transformation of a small music scene into an international music phenomenon. Depending on the source, his actual role is described as anything from “the Sex Pistols are McLaren’s vehicle for realizing his student ideas of Situationism” to “McLaren is nothing more than a manager”.

Today, McLaren works as an artist in New York and Paris. His current projects include the video installation “Shallow 1-21”, in which he edits together excerpts from amateur sex films from the 1960s to create a collage dealing with the melancholic realization that youthful urges often go unsatisfied – a fundamental impulse of pop music in his view. Next year, his musical about the life of Christian Dior will also be shown.

There is an interesting interview with McLaren in the De:Bug magazine, stills from the Shallow series are available at artnet, and on Facebook, McLaren can be heard explaining his approach to “Shallow 1-21”.

The most interesting thing about his idea: he uses the scenes that the amateur actors show before they have sex. So his work becomes more of a study of what goes on in people’s minds in this situation, coupled with the thoughts that go through the mind of a frustrated viewer.