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Octogenarian occultist, disciple of Aleister Crowley, Hollywood\u2019s first openly gay avant-garde filmmaker: Kenneth Anger may be many things, but here he is, present one February afternoon in 2013 as he walks into his own \u201cIcons\u201d exhibition at Berlin\u2019s Spr\u00fcth Magers, bringing a red-and-blue vapour trail of myth and mystery with him. The iconic cin\u00e9aste with the literal cult following is looking at the display of his own collection of early Hollywood ephemera, an obsession he\u2019s an authority on, just as he is on Crowley, \u201cthe wickedest man in the world\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It seems like Kenneth Anger is everywhere today, and the man with the giant Lucifer tattoo across his chest has got the art world under a (proverbial) spell. Anger is responsible for some of the most controversial and tantalising experimental films ever made: films which changed visual language forever. His pioneering editing techniques and use of music for conveying narratives have shaped everything from music videos to now-standard practices in visual communication. Yet his subjects are everything but standard: from his early work \u201cInauguration of the Pleasure Dome\u201d to the mesmerising \u201cLucifer Rising\u201d, Anger provided the visual representations of occult themes relating to the writings of Crowley and the Ordo Templi Orientis (O.T.O.), in which he is a Magus.\u00a0<\/p>\n
As often is the case with creative production around underground, counter-culture and subversive material, it takes the art world several decades (and a couple of influential names advocating) to embrace it, put it in travelling shows, biennales and museums, and provide a theoretical framework to underline its significance. For Anger, however, expanding his audience hasn\u2019t changed much about the way he works; he is still making underground films with meagre means. But as he mentioned time and again, he is NOT going to churn out a third edition of his gossip tome \u201cHollywood Babylon\u201d to finance his films as he did with the first two volumes \u2013 not that he doesn\u2019t have enough material for a new scandal-filled paperback. \u00a0<\/p>\n
SLEEK<\/strong> Your show at Spr\u00fcth Magers Berlin is called \u201cIcons\u201d, for the Hollywood icons in it, but also the way it\u2019s set up is like religious iconography, where images are imbued with the spiritual essence of the person depicted. There are some interesting newspaper clippings on view too\u2026 When you were making films in the Fifties and Sixties they were recognised in Europe by Jean Cocteau and other avant-garde filmmakers, but not in America. These same films are receiving art world recognition now \u2013 how do you see the transition from counter culture to more mainstream art world fame? You\u2019re showing a new work here, \u201cAirship\u201d, a collection of footage of Zeppelins, painted in ominous, hazy red and blue. Do you When did you see the actual footage? <\/p>\n K<\/strong>athryn Bigelow cited you as influence for her work recently. \u00a0 Women in your films are mythological, spiritual characters like Lilith, the scarlet woman, Isis\u2026 they\u2019re not necessarily always peaceful.\u00a0 One of your unrealised projects is a film version of Gnostic Mass. Will it ever be completed? Do you not work with digital? Thelema is experiencing a revival now, you see it funnelled into music and trends.<\/strong>\u00a0 It\u2019s susceptible to being superficially dealt with, though. How would you recommend approaching it? Charles Manson believed he was the reincarnation of Aleister Crowley. At the time of the murders, the press quickly leaped to linking the Manson Family and the O.T.O. I read recently that James Franco will star and direct a biopic about Jay Sebring, the Manson Family victim. I think it resurfaced recently because some members of the Manson family are going to be released\u2026
<\/strong>Kenneth Anger: Well, you caught the two sides, Hollywood icons and their essence. The things I\u2019ve chosen for the exhibit reflect the kind of charisma that certain Hollywood stars have, as far as the actors go. I have Rudolf Valentino, and as balance, with a woman I have the star Billie Dove, the romance of Howard Hughes. I knew her when I lived in Palm Springs and she lived nearby in a place called Rancho Mirage, we became friends down there\u2026 she was pleased that I knew so much about her past! (Laughs)<\/p>\n
<\/strong>Yes, there\u2019s a Valentino clipping about his divorce from Natacha Rambova, a very tempestuous woman. And the other one is about Aleister Crowley, he\u2019s a special interest of mine. I have a collection of his books and I went to live in the ruins of his villa in Cefal\u00f9 in Sicily, the Abbey of Thelema, founded in 1920. Unfortunately today it\u2019s a ruin. I\u2019ve been back several times, the first time was in 1950, but now a tree has fallen on the roof. I spent one summer removing the whitewash that was put on by Mussolini\u2019s police. You see, Mussolini didn\u2019t like Englishmen and Crowley particularly. [Crowley] spent two years living in Cefal\u00f9. He was expelled by Mussolini in 1923 and went to Tunisia. But he spent most of his time painting the walls of the villa with magical murals, which were later covered in whitewash. I took colour photos after I uncovered them. He used very bright colours, and good oil paints that he had bought in Paris, so they survived under the whitewash.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/strong>I can\u2019t see any change; personally, I\u2019m still an underground artist. I haven\u2019t sold out to Hollywood \u2013 because I didn\u2019t have any offers! I make short films, cin\u00e9-po\u00e8mes, little film poems, sometimes four minutes long, but I don\u2019t make features \u2013 by choice. I could at some point maybe approach the industry but I decided I\u2019d be an independent filmmaker artist and not work for the studios. Also, it\u2019s highly unlikely I\u2019d be approached. I\u2019m considered too much of a maverick. \u00a0<\/p>\n
remember the Hindenburg exploding?
<\/strong>I was quite young but I remember it yes, my grandmother was fascinated by Zeppelins too, there was a sister craft to the Hindenburg that went on a tour that was called the Graf Zeppelin. In its world tour it flew down the west coast, from San Francisco to Los Angeles and it crossed over us. I remember seeing this big silver fish! And I just love them because, you see, Zeppelins were like an air-ship, like on the water, the same speed as a ship, so it allowed people to see the landscape because they flew quite low. It\u2019s a totally different experience. They used hydrogen gas which led to the fatal explosion in 1937 of the Hindenburg, which was possibly caused by static electricity; there was a thunderstorm, rumour says it might have been sabotage, I don\u2019t think so, no one knows for sure. That adds to the mystery. It was filmed, and that was the end of Zeppelins. There was a crew to film the landing, they (Hindenburg) were coming off from South America to New Jersey, and so there was a cameraman not expecting the explosion when all of a sudden it lit up.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/strong>I saw the footage later of course; but there was a famous recording of a radio announcer who was broadcasting it live so you get the panic in his voice. I have used that in my airship trilogy. Basically the Zeppelins were silver but I added the red and blue, and also the colour of the explosion. I did the hand colouring, the orange and yellow of the flames were coloured in by me. That\u2019s my artistic licence.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/KAN_Lucifer_Leslie_Huggins_30x40.jpg\")
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<\/strong>She does extraordinary work. I haven\u2019t seen \u201cZero Dark Thirty\u201d yet. I did see \u201cThe Hurt Locker\u201d and liked it. Very unusual for a woman. The subject matter \u2013 war and everything \u2013 seems like a masculine thing,\u00a0 but it\u2019s interesting to see a woman\u2019s perspective, or this particular woman\u2019s attitude towards the subject. You need the woman\u2019s voice to see through the haze and smoke.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/strong>The scarlet woman was the high priestess according to Crowley, and he had a number of these women, and he always had them dye their hair red [laughs]. There was continuity there. Some of them were natural red heads. For me the ideal scarlet woman would be Clara Bow, she had natural red hair. She was the sex bomb full of life and excitement of the silent film days; a star of American late silent. Have you ever seen any Clara Bow? No? Well you\u2019ve missed something! The films still exist. These are all the mythological spiritual side of women. I never made a film about a housewife. The scarlet woman is maybe a little bit like the Whore of Babylon, the mystic whore, not the one who takes money. \u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/strong>I did a film study in black and white. And if I can find the money I would redo it in colour, but I won\u2019t release the black and white. Thirty five millimeter film is very expensive, you see. It\u2019s the professional size and it\u2019s also the best colour, like Agfa or Eastman, whichever, but I can\u2019t afford it myself.\u00a0 It\u2019s a speaking film, too. Most of mine are silent with music but the Gnostic Mass is written by Aleister Crowley, and it has a role for the Priestess, the Priest and the Deacon. There are about five speaking parts. It\u2019s based on Crowley\u2019s text, I didn\u2019t rewrite it but its scripted in a narrative. It\u2019s the equivalent of if you\u2019d film a Catholic mass, there\u2019s nothing obscure about it, there\u2019s a few magical words that you\u2019d have to know what they mean, but most of it is in English.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/strong>I do now, my more recent films that are being shown in D\u00fcsseldorf [at Venus & Apollo, the Project space of the Julia Stoschek Foundation] are digital. One is on a friend of mine who committed suicide, [the musician] Elliott Smith. He was 34 when he shot himself. A stupid quarrel over a girlfriend, not a reason to shoot yourself, but he was obsessed with death I\u2019m afraid, because the first record he made of his singing was called Suicide Records. So he had this obsession that led to an early death at 34, but I filmed him singing. It\u2019s the only movie I ever made with live singing, it\u2019s called \u201cElliot Suicide\u201d. But digital to me is just another means of capturing image.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/strong>It can be picked up and superficially played with, anyone can do it, it isn\u2019t a secret the books are there, there\u2019s no violation of copyright, and if there is, believe me no one is going to get sued for using texts by Crowley.\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/Anger_03_Final-682x1024.jpg\")
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<\/strong>If someone is going to do something serious, they have to have the serious inside them. And so I don\u2019t try to influence anybody, they can just do what they want. Which is a Crowley maxim: \u201cdo what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law\u201d, which means do what you want \u2013 but be careful too.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/strong>This is public domain, if anyone wants to treat such a disgusting subject\u2026 to me Manson is best forgotten. I have a friend who fell under his spell, Bobby Beausoleil, [who starred in \u201cLucifer Rising\u201d] and he is in prison for life because of his association with Manson. I visited him once in prison, and once was enough. I have nothing to say. What are you going to say? \u201cCheer up\u201d?\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/strong>Some of the girls have been let out. I\u2019ll find out when I get back to LA. I\u2019ve met Franco, he\u2019s very ambitious, we did something together, worked on his film for 7 For All Mankind.<\/p>\n