Photos: Russ Meyer / courtesy of Feigen Contemporary, New York |
ABBAS KIORASTAMI does it. So do Peter Greenaway, Dennis Hopper and Wim Wenders. But now an independent filmmaker who predates them all is doing it too staging an exhibition of his film-related artwork in a swanky New York gallery.
Russ Meyer is best known for the "nudie-cuties," exploitation and proto-porno films he directed throughout the 50s, 60s and 70s. Now the director of such classics as Faster, Pussycat, Kill, Kill! and Up! exhibits his portraits of large-breasted women at the Feigen Contemporary Gallery in New York from December 1 to January 12. Taken all throughout his career, these photos (printed in editions of 20) track Meyers most single-minded of sensibilities through times in which it was viewed as alternately shocking, stunted, reactionary, timid and now, quaintly, nostalgic.