Legs McNeil, Gillian McCain: Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk (1996)

“This first oral history of the most nihilistic of all pop movements brings the sound of the punk generation chillingly to life. Lou Reed, Iggy Pop, David Johansen, Dee Dee Ramone, Nico, Patti Smith, Malcolm McLaren, and scores of other famous and infamous punk figures lend their voices to tell the outrageous that bring the punk era to life. From its origins in the twilight years of Andy Warhol’s New York reign to its last gasps as eighties mainstream metalmania, the phenomenon that was known as punk is analyzed, criticized, eulogized, and idealized by the people who were there, and who made it happen. Please Kill Me reads like a fast-paced novel, but the energy it celebrates and the tragedies it contains are all too achingly human, and all too real.”

Publisher Grove Press, New York, 1996
ISBN 0802115888
452 pages

Authors
Publisher

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Hold stenhårdt fast på greia di: Norwegian Art and Feminism 1968-89 (2013) [Norwegian/English]

Hold stenhårdt fast på greia di (“Hold on to your thing”, but the original title holds more references) is the first major exhibition to consider the connections between artistic practice and the feminist movement in Norway.

“The exhibition presents an overview of the many ways in which second-wave feminist ideas contributed to a transformation of the accepted subjects and methods of contemporary art in Norway, as well as the creative contribution that artists made to the public representation of the women’s movement. From the formal liberations of the 60s avant-garde, through the developing political awareness and organised struggles of the 70s, to the disenchantment of the 80s, the exhibition also aims to show some of the ways in which formal art production was influenced by a radical core of activist practice.” (from the catalogue)

The exhibition was first held at Kunsthall Oslo (March-April 2013); another show is scheduled at Kunsthall Stavanger (January-April 2014). It is curated by Eline Mugaas, Elise Storsveen and Kunsthall Oslo.

Publisher Kunsthall, Oslo, 2013
32 pages

PDF (from the publisher)

Alice Růžičková: Český dokumentární film v 80. letech: “Originální Videojournal” (2000) [Czech]

The diploma work of Alice Růžičková entitled The Czech Documentary Film in the 1980s: “Original Videojournal” analyses the origin and history of the Czech underground audiovisual periodical, produced between 1987 and 1989 by a group of Czech dissidents including Olga Havlová, Michal Hýbek, Pavel Kačírek, Jan Kašpar, Andrej Krob, Jan Ruml, Joska Skalník, Andrej Stankovič, and many others.

In the late 1987, an idea was born to not only send the video shots documenting the Czechoslovak dissident activities abroad, but also to produce a programme for the domestic audience. With the financial aid from the Czech exile centers abroad (Foundation of Charter 77, ČSDS – Czechoslovak Documentary Centre), the “Original Videojournal” editorial group acquired a video tape recorder Sony Video-8. This led to the production of video news from the dissident and alternative culture, covering political and ecological issues from the “unofficial” perspective.

The thesis first locates the origin of the journal among diverse groups in Prague, Brno and other places. Further, it contains an analysis of seven regular and two thematic programmes produced before November 1989, followed by nine special volumes made during and shortly after the 1989 revolution.

Attachments include a correspondence between Václav Havel and František Janouch, reflections about the Journal in printed underground zines, related historical texts, bibliography from the Libri Prohibiti database, script of the documentary film Zblízka Originální videojournal (dir. Alice Růžičková, 1998), and photographic documentation.

Master thesis
FAMU (Film and TV School of Academy of Performing Arts), Prague
Supervisor: Marie Šandová
78 pages

Czech TV programme series about Original Videojournal, 20 episodes, 26 min. each, 2011–2012
Original Videojournal at Monoskop wiki

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