Perich gave us three different films to curb our elegiac appetites throughout the evening. Kristina and the Agonies (featuring Miss Korsholm) is one of his most recent works (2008). Dear Kristina repeats the words, “I thought I was traveling, but I was standing still,” as she discusses her vicious boyfriends, slight lovers, and eerie dreams that agonize her day and night.
Perich gave us historical debate, as he presented one of his most scandalous features with Neke Carson in 1972. I Love You, while completely jaw dropping with debate, is absolutely stunning, as the “Rectal Realism Artist” Neke Carson paints on film, with his sphincter, in perfect calligraphy, the words “I Love You” on a clear glass panel. Perich’s film even reveals a glimpse of the shadow of the lyrical words on the back wall of the studio.
The final film (which closed the evening) featured performance artist Victor Hugo in 1978. While Hugo and Warhol had collaborated in 1977 for Andy Warhol Does Sex Parts (Hugo was a recruiter for models from the “baths” in NYC), I was not alone in attempting to conceal giggles as Perich films Hugo performing a sexual ritual of sorts and destroys one of Warhol’s paintings.
Although slightly less promiscuous as Perich’s 1970s work, Night Italia has 128 bound pages of underground European art and culture in its most recent issue. Marco Fioramanti and Anton Perich have been friends for 20 plus years and Fioramanti (a Roman Artist) decided to present Night Italia as homage to Night NYC.
This non-profit communication project is a voluntary collaboration of numerous artists to bring underground art back to the forefront of culture. Fioramanti surprised our intimate audience greatly with a bewitching performance and story, of a man, who upon growing old, disappears to sea to find his true love Lighea, the mermaid (played by Kristina Korsholm). Neke Carson plays the piano as we watch Fioramanti transform Kristina into a mermaid all the while feeding her a glass of red wine. He then takes a swig from her glass and carries her out of the room, orange mermaid tail flapping.
