Beautiful Losers | |
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Starring |
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Cinematography | Tobin Yelland |
Edited by | Lenny Mesina |
Music by | Money Mark |
Release date |
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Running time | 89 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Beautiful Losers is a 2008 documentary filmed by director Aaron Rose and co-directed by Joshua Leonard. It was produced by Sidetrack Films in association with BlackLake Productions, and stars several artists including Harmony Korine (writer of independent cult films Kids (1995) and Gummo (1997), the latter directed by Korine himself) [1] and former graffiti artist Steve "ESPO" Powers.
It premiered at South by Southwest on March 9, 2008 [2] [3] and later in general release on August 8, 2008 at the IFC Center in New York City.
The film focuses on the careers and work of a collective group of artists who since the 1990s began a movement in the art world using D.I.Y. aesthetics from skateboarding, graffiti and underground music such as punk rock and hip-hop. [4] The artists discussed and interviewed in the film include Thomas Campbell, Cheryl Dunn, Shepard Fairey, Harmony Korine, Geoff McFetridge, Clare Rojas, Barry McGee, Margaret Kilgallen, Mike Mills, Steve "Espo" Powers, Ed Templeton, Deanna Templeton, and Mark Gonzales.
A series of interviews with these artists explains their reasoning behind their "do-it-yourself" style of street art. As some of these artists discuss their growth in popular artistic culture they explain how becoming renowned and admired in the art world was something that never occurred to them from their various roots in street culture, or simply creating art for themselves. As many of the artists began to be recognizable and sought after they discuss their series of commercial success: creating advertisements for popular products, designing products themselves, working in film and being hired to paint and create artwork in well known locations. The personal feelings and convictions of some of the artists and how creating work for corporations compares to their beginnings in street culture is also discussed. The film portrays the artists as outside the realm of contemporary art.
The film was preceded by a published art collection titled Beautiful Losers.( ISBN 1933045302) The book was co-published by Iconoclast Editions and Distributed Art Publishers, and edited by co-curators Christian Strike and Aaron Rose, who directed the film. [5]
The publication of the book was to complement and commemorate the traveling museum exhibition, which itself was one of the settings and subjects for the film. The exhibit is a large scale group exhibition featuring the artists from the film as well as others, and which continues to tour around the world. [6] Opening in Cincinnati, Ohio at the Contemporary Arts Center in March 2004, the exhibition was in Europe through 2009. The exhibition was conceived and produced by Iconoclast, where founders Christian Strike and Aaron Rose also acted as co-curators of the exhibition, and as the editors and publishers of the book.
Ed Templeton is an American professional skateboarder, contemporary artist, and photographer. He is the founder of the skateboard company, Toy Machine, a company that he continues to own and manage. He is based in Huntington Beach, California.
Harmony Korine is an American filmmaker, actor, photographer, artist, and author. His methods feature an erratic, loose and transgressive aesthetic, exploring taboo themes and incorporating experimental techniques, and works with art, music, fashion and advertising.
Gummo is a 1997 American experimental drama film written and directed by Harmony Korine, and stars Linda Manz, Max Perlich, Jacob Reynolds, Chloë Sevigny, Jacob Sewell, and Nick Sutton. The film is set in Xenia, Ohio, a Midwestern American town that had been previously struck by a devastating tornado. The loose narrative follows several main characters who find odd and destructive ways to pass time, interrupted by vignettes depicting other inhabitants of the town.
Lowbrow, or lowbrow art, is an underground visual art movement that arose in the Los Angeles, California area in the late 1960s. It is a populist art movement with its cultural roots in underground comix, punk music, tiki culture, graffiti, and hot-rod cultures of the street. It is also often known by the name pop surrealism. Lowbrow art often has a sense of humor – sometimes the humor is gleeful, impish, or a sarcastic comment.
Barry McGee is an American artist. He is known for graffiti art, and a pioneer of the Mission School art movement. McGee is known by his monikers: Twist, Ray Fong, Bernon Vernon, and P.Kin.
Margaret Leisha Kilgallen was a San Francisco Bay Area artist who combined graffiti art, painting, and installation art. Though a contemporary artist, her work showed a strong influence from folk art. She was considered a central figure in the Bay Area Mission School art movement.
Aaron Rose is an American film director, artist, exhibition curator and writer. Rose is known as the co-director of Beautiful Losers, a film that focuses on an art movement which includes artists such as Barry McGee, Margaret Kilgallen, Steven "Espo" Powers, Chris Johanson, Harmony Korine and Shepard Fairey.
Chris Johanson is an American painter and street artist. He is a member of San Francisco's Mission School art movement.
Stephen J. Powers is an American contemporary artist and muralist. He is also known by the name ESPO, and Steve Powers. He lives in New York City.
WKE is an independently owned American production company and arts and culture delivery channel, a subsidiary of the advertising agency Wieden+Kennedy. The site contains material from a number of contributors, as well as original materials created by W+K under the creative direction of filmmaker Aaron Rose.
D.I.Y. America is a 2009 web video documentary series by director Aaron Rose which premiered on December 1, 2009, on Wieden+Kennedy Entertainment's website.
Cheryl Dunn is an American documentary filmmaker and photographer. She has made two feature films, Everybody Street (2013) and Moments Like This Never Last (2020). She has had three books of photographs published: Bicycle Gangs of New York (2005), Some Kinda Vocation (2007) and Festivals are Good (2015).
Dan Witz is a Brooklyn, NY based street artist and realist painter. He grew up in Chicago, IL, and graduated in 1981 from Cooper Union, on New York City's Lower East Side. Witz, consistently active since the late 1970s, is one of the pioneers of the street art movement.
Graffiti in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, is a cause of much disagreement among its residents. Graffiti is seen by some as an art form adding to the Toronto culture; however, others see graffiti as form of vandalism, viewing it as ugly, or as a form of property damage.
Jared Moshe is an American director, screenwriter and producer of independent films. He wrote and directed the films Dead Man's Burden (2012), The Ballad of Lefty Brown (2017) and Aporia (2023). He has also produced the features Destricted (2006), Kurt Cobain: About a Son (2006), Low and Behold (2007), Beautiful Losers (2008), Corman's World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel (2011), and Silver Tongues (2011).
Jesse Edwards is an American artist. Known primarily for his figurative and still life oil paintings, using techniques from the European Old Masters, that often provide satirical cultural commentary. His practice also includes painted ceramic sculptures. Edwards studied oil painting at the Gage Academy of Art (2002), and has been exhibiting publicly since. He has been into graffiti twice as long as oil painting or ceramics. After moving from Seattle to New York Edwards acquired representation by Vito Schnabel Edwards work was later chosen by the curators Theo Niarchos and David Rimanelli to be included in group exhibitions alongside works by Harmony Korine, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Andy Warhol, Julian Schnabel, Dan Colen, Dash Snow, and Pablo Picasso.
Roger Gastman is an American art dealer, curator, filmmaker, and publisher who focuses on graffiti and street art.
Drago is an independent international publishing house of contemporary art based in Rome, Italy. The company specialises in street and urban art and has published the works of street photographers, street artists and graffiti writers from around the world. It is frequently involved in exhibitions of contemporary art and acts as the official publisher for various galleries, museums and institutions.
Deanna Templeton is an American artist working primarily in photography. She lives and works in Huntington Beach.
David T. Schubert was an American graffiti artist and professional photographer recognized for his photographs of skateboarding and graffiti.