If you love male models in the fashion and advertising world, now's your chance to help preserve the archives of the man who nearly all by himself invented the concept of male model in 1940's Los Angeles, California.
As you can read in this interview on the blog, Bob Mizer of the Athletic Model Guild was a prolific photographer and filmmaker. In his lifetime, he produced over 1,000,000 negatives, slides, prints and films.
Original slide during the sorting process.
Dennis Bell, the current owner of the Athletic Model Guild and founder of the Bob Mizer Foundation (a 501(c)3 non-profit), is cataloging and archiving every single image and will eventually make the entire collection available for viewing by the general public.
His current Kickstarter campaign is to help finance the proper storage of Mizer's 700,000 35mm transparencies. Yes, you read that right: 700,000.
This is a small portion of Bob Mizer's estate, prior to its rescue.
Money raised by the Foundation pays only for supplies, such as the archival sleeves for negatives and transparencies. Volunteers and interns provide the necessary labor.
Some of Mizer's estate now in protective storage.
If you're a fan of vintage physique photography and/or classic Americana, now's your chance to give what you can to help preserve this precious historical treasure. Because the Bob Mizer Foundation is a 501(c)3 non-profit, your donation is tax-deductible.
Each transparency is sorted, inserted into sleeves cataloged, photographed
and placed into protected storage.
For more information about Bob Mizer, please see the Foundation's website.
Production still from "Why the Wooden Indian Wouldn't." Eddie Scott & Phil Morrison. Los Angeles, 1969.
You can help support the Bob Mizer Foundation by donating directly at its Kickstarter campaign and website.
There you will find more information on Bob Mizer, the Athletic Model
Guild and the Foundation, including its mailing address for your
donations and updates on gallery shows, screenings and lectures.
My partner, Phil, and I recently attended a party in Vallejo, California on Sandy Beach Road, which is mostly a long dirt trail. All of the waterfront homes there are built over the Napa River.
The mailman won't hike Sandy Beach Road, so the mailboxes came to him.
We were amazed to see playing at the house party this short film uploaded to YouTube by the GLBT History Society. It was created in 1947 by an amateur filmmaker. The houses are better constructed today, but this is very much how Sandy Beach Road remains some seventy years later.
Today I was thrilled to find out the Netflix original series, Sense8, has been renewed for a second season.
When you jump to this post on the blog, you can read my review of Sense8. I love the series. My review is the most Twitter-engaged blog post I've made to date.
Be sure to follow the series on Twitter for updates from the cast and creators.
Volume 22 of 360 Magazine is now available at Magzter and Blurb!
Known
as the California Golden Bear issue, it features David Guetta, Hilary Duff, Bastille, Clean Bandit, Mr. Probz, Bebe Rexha, Kidnap Kid, Disclosure, the World of Speed motorsports museum, and much more.
In this issue, David Guetta discusses the effect house music has had on his career and life, his upcoming release on his label, Jack Back Records, and why he is working with Yoko Ono on the UNICEF campaign #IMAGINE.
The official video to his song, "Hey Mama," features Nicki Minaj, Bebe Rexha and Afrojack.
Now available here for $39.50 is Jeff Sheng's hardcover photo book, FEARLESS: Portraits of LGBT Student Athletes.
From 2003 to 2015, Sheng photographed 202 lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender high school and college athletes in the United States and Canada. He says he began this book as a self-exploration of his identity as a closeted high school athlete in the 1990's. Accompanying many of the images are intimate essays written by the out athletes.
The afterword is by retired professional NBA basketball player, Jason Collins.
The 316-page book offers eight covers to choose from. Be sure to visit fearlessbookstore.com to see them all, read excerpts by the athletes, and purchase this book.
If you're a fan of this blog, you know I love female leads in film and television. I can't get enough, especially after the departure of Buffy and Veronica Mars, so you know this trailer for CBS's new series, Supergirl, made my day.
I'm looking forward to watching Melissa Benoist bring alive Superman's cousin, Kara Zor-El–and Calista Flockhart play her tough-as-nails boss.
Sense8 is a paranormal, erotic thriller. As noted by critics, the story begins slowly, mysteriously and isn't quick to reveal itself. But when the 12th episode ended, I was absolutely stunned. Sense8 has a huge cast spanning the globe. It is beautifully shot. It is the most glorious television show I've ever seen.
4 of the 8 people who together become "a cluster" are male, the other 4 female. They are straight, gay, transsexual and, maybe even, bisexual. The women are equally strong and important as the men. There are even wonderful shout-outs to Diana Prince and Nancy Drew. (One thrilling episode is titled "W.W.N. Double D?" or "What Would Nancy Drew Do?") The 8 main characters are connected on a profoundly emotional level–Imagine if you and someone else suddenly knew and felt everything the other had experienced and was experiencing during your entire lives. Yes, I mean everything.
A Nancy Drew moment occurs at Atlas Cafe, near where I work.
There are stereotypes–a Mexican film action hero living a soap-operatic double life; a righteous South Korean martial-arts champion; a world-class computer hacker living in San Francisco–but these stereotypes are adroitly upended, as the emotional lives of the characters are explored in rich detail to reveal each individual as wholly unique.
When the sinister consequences of the cluster become clear, it is also evident that each of the 8 is important for being uniquely themselves, for it is the strengths and knowledge each has accumulated over their individual life journey that now protect and enhance the lives of the others in the cluster.
I won't reveal plot points–It's a thriller, after all, so the action sequences are enthralling!–but I will note a moment that beautifully sums up Sense8: One of the 8 becomes lost in the annual, massive festival celebrating a god. A child takes their hand and says, "Come. This way. Come," leading the way through the jubilant crowd to a statue of the god. The child then shows the way inside and up into the statue's papier-mâché head so that the main character can peer through its eyeholes to see the revelry as the god's statue sees: unfolding forever is the interconnected, unstoppable, glorious magnificence of life.
As I note in this post on the blog, Jean Cocteau's La Belle et La Bete is my all-time favorite film. So, it must be no surprise I was thrilled to find out several drawings by Cocteau are on exhibit at Wessel + O'Connor Fine Art from May 16 to July 26, 2015.
Some are pornographic in nature.
All are exquisite.
"Untitled" pencil on vellum, ca.1950's
"Essais pour l'affiche du Festival de Musique de Menton, 1956"
"Je me souviens de l'avenir." Venise 1956
"Venise 1956 II"1956
Lithograph includes Portrait of Jean Cocteau by Picasso dated 1916
Volume 21 of 360 Magazine is now available at Magzter and Blurb!
Known
as the Black Wolf issue, it features Fifth Harmony, Cody Simpson, The Janoskians, Neena Patel Williams, Lus Sahagun's "Escombros," Jason Dussault, and much more.
Fifth Harmony is Camila Cabello, Lauren Jauregui, Dinah Jane Hansen, Normani Hamilton and Ally Brooke Hernandez. Ally Brooke Hernandez discusses their hit debut album, Reflection, what it was like to meet First Lady Michelle Obama, the 5H girls' philanthropic work, life on tour, and what's next for the 5H girls.
