NATURAL E FORMOSAMENTE HUMANA

Bryan Ferry nem sonhava no sarilho em que se ia meter (embora, talvez, devesse) quando, em Abril de 2007, numa entrevista à edição de domingo do jornal alemão “Die Welt”, elogiou o sentido da encenação e a espectacularidade do regime nacional-socialista de Adolf Hitler: “Falo dos filmes de Leni Riefenstahl, dos edifícios de Albert Speer, das grandes movimentações de massas, das bandeiras. Absolutamente fantástico. Verdadadeiramente belo". Instantaneamente, o mundo – dirigentes de comunidades judaicas, responsáveis políticos e clientes da Marks & Spencer, com quem Ferry celebrara um contrato de publicidade – caiu-lhe em cima. Razoavelmente embaraçado, o ex-estudante de Belas-Artes, logo no dia seguinte, apresentava "desculpas incondicionais por qualquer ofensa causada pelos meus comentários sobre a iconografia nazi, que foram feitos exclusivamente de um ponto de vista da história de arte” e fazia questão de sublinhar que “como qualquer pessoa sã de espírito, considero o regime nazi e tudo o que ele representou, maligno e abominável”. Verdadeiramente interessante é que, se, em vez de se ter referido à estética do nacional-socialismo, Ferry tivesse preferido falar do assombroso cinema de Eisenstein ou do glorioso "kitsch" das óperas da Revolução Cultural Chinesa (ambos armas de propaganda ao serviço de regimes responsáveis por um número de vítimas não inferior ao da barbárie nazi), é bem possível que a entrevista não tivesse provocado nenhum sobressalto. 

Mas poderia também ter recordado o Côro do Exército Vermelho, essa venerável instituição fundada, em 1929, nos primórdios da União Soviética, e ainda hoje em actividade que, na condição de embaixadora de charme, está para a imperial Mãe-Rússia como o Mormon Tabernacle Choir está para a agremiação da divindade que habita o planeta Kolob. Dividido em dois colectivos, o veterano Alexandrov Ensemble (criação de Alexander Vasilyevich Alexandrov, Artista do Povo da URSS, Prémio Estaline, autor do Hino da União Soviética e do Exército Soviético) e o MVD Ensemble, dez anos mais jovem e actual organismo oficial do Ministério do Interior da Federação Russa, tanto um como o outro demonstrarão, certamente, muito pouco apreço pela estética-punk das Pussy Riot, até porque continuam a seguir fielmente a doutrina que, em 1946, Andrei Zhdanov, comissário para a política cultural soviética, estabeleceu: combatendo “a música falsa, vulgar e com frequência, simplesmente patológica” de Shostakovich ou Prokofiev, contra o excesso “do som dos pratos e tambores”, exigia “uma música natural e formosamente humana” (opinião, aliás, próxima da de Joseph Ratzinger, que, em 2001 – na qualidade de prefeito da Congregação para a Doutrina da Fé, sucessora da Sacra Congregação do Santo Ofício –, acusava o rock, essa “expressão de paixões elementares”, de “perturbar os espíritos pelo ritmo, o barulho e os efeitos luminosos”). Formosamente viril e naturalissimamente harmónica, entre "Kalinkas", "Barqueiros do Volga" e (diria Zhdanov, não Putin) o indesculpável desvio de direita do "Ave Maria", de Bach, podem comprová-lo escutando o MVD no recente duplo The Soul of Russia:The Ultimate Collection.

O PERIGO DE SER MODERNO

Bryan Ferry - Olympia

Ninguém como Bryan Ferry (nos Roxy Music ou a solo) levou tão a sério o célebre aforismo de Oscar Wilde “só mesmo as pessoas superficiais não julgam pelas aparências”. O que, das capas de álbuns com deslumbrantes ensaios fotográficos "kitsh" de supermodelos ao sarilho em que, há três anos, se embrulhou devido a, muito candidamente, ter declarado quanto o fascinava a estética nacional-socialista de Albert Speer e Leni Riefenstahl – posteriormente, justificou-se alegando que é um absurdo confundir ideologia com estética –, nunca deixou de levar à letra e praticar. Oriundo do que, supostamente, deveriam ter sido as sessões de estúdio de um álbum de reunião dos Roxy, Olympia não se afasta desse rumo: se a imagem de Kate Moss, no rosto do CD, constitui uma homenagem à Olympia, de Manet (e não será também, sabe-se lá, genuflexão perante o Olympia, de Riefenstahl?), lá dentro o chuveirinho de citações prossegue, de "Tender Is The Night" (cortesia de Scott Fitzgerald) a "Alphaville" (de umas bobines de Jean-Luc Godard). A questão é que, onde tudo é – ainda que só aparentemente – apenas superfície, essa superfície tem a obrigação inegociável de ser absolutamente imaculada. E a de Olympia é tudo menos isso: a pose de requintado "lounge lizard", escorrega excessivamente no "faux"-funk de casino, o elenco de "guest-stars" (de Jonny Greenwood a David Gilmour, Flea, Nile Rodgers, Scissor Sisters e todos os ex-Roxy) empastela originais e versões (o massacre de "Song To The Siren" é atroz) e, tudo somado, fica somente uma vaga memória difusa do que foi o inventor da tribo “New Romantic”. Conviria recordar-lhe que Oscar Wilde também gostava de dizer que “o perigo de ser moderno é que podemos tornar-nos antiquados em qualquer momento”.

(2010)

MARINA ABRAMOVIĆ BY LAURIE ANDERSON (II)

Balkan Erotic Epic - Marina Abramović (2005)

LA - One of my favorite baffling quotes comes from Lenin: “Ethics is the aesthetics of the future”. I guess it means that sometime in the future we’ll all be good to each other and communicate so clearly that we won’t need those things that we put in the beauty category. They’ll just be fetishes, relics. In my paper I talked about how belief and beauty rub up against each other to make something, and how uneasily they rest together. I used the Parthenon as an example. When the Parthenon was a place of worship, everybody brought their beautiful statues to dedicate to the gods, their kouri, to celebrate their victories, their dedications and their prayers. They propped them up all around the Parthenon, which quickly came to look like a museum, there was so much stuff there. So they all went back to the caves and the woods and the rivers where they could find the gods, because they couldn’t find them in the Parthenon anymore.

Tesla Coil - Marina Abramović

 

MA - You know, there was a very interesting breakfast in the ‘70s, which a friend of mine, Lutz Becker, invited me to. This old man was sitting there, and I didn’t realize for half of the breakfast that he was Albert Speer, Hitler’s architect. He was just out of prison and he was helping with the maquettes for a movie about Hitler that Lutz was making, called Double Headed Eagle.

LA - Lots of symmetry in that, by the way.

MA - And I asked Speer a question: “Why did you use concrete for all those buildings?” I’ll never forget his answer. He said, “When they get destroyed, they still look good”. The concrete collapse looks better than bricks: there is more momentum; they fall into big pieces. That an architect, who builds his stuff for forever, was thinking of destruction as part of the process! The other funny thing about worshipping — I was in Thailand, in one of their fantastic old temples where you can go outside and buy a little piece of gold leaf to put on a sculpture. I was looking through this huge place, and in a dusty corner was a big fuse box with all the electrical wires, which somebody had covered in gold leaf. I loved the idea of worshipping electricity as a mystery. And why not?

(aqui)

(2010)

O CERCO POLITICAMENTE CORRECTO (continuação):

Bryan Ferry's Nazi gaffe


Olympia (real. Leni Riefenstahl, 1938)

"My God, the Nazis knew how to put themselves in the limelight... Leni Riefenstahl's movies, Albert Speer's buildings, the mass parades and the flags - just amazing. Really beautiful" (Bryan Ferry in "Welt Am Sonntag")

When Marks & Spencer recruited singer Bryan Ferry to be the face of its menswear collection, it believed his reputation as rock's "king of cool" would help them to boost sales.

But customers and management of the retailer, founded by Russian-Jewish refugees, will be alarmed to learn that the elegant singer has admitted he draws inspiration from the aesthetics of Nazi Germany.

Ferry, the lead singer of Roxy Music, has caused outrage at home and abroad for remarks he made to a German newspaper about his admiration for the work of Leni Riefenstahl, notorious for her Nazi propaganda films, and the architecture of Albert Speer.

Outubro (real. Sergei Eisenstein, 1927)

In an interview with "Welt am Sonntag", the 61-year-old also acknowledged that he calls his studio in west London his "Führerbunker". "My God, the Nazis knew how to put themselves in the limelight and present themselves," he said. "Leni Riefenstahl's movies and Albert Speer's buildings and the mass parades and the flags - just amazing. Really beautiful".

One German correspondent on the website of "Freundin", a German women's magazine, writes: "This can't be called intellectual humour and it tests even my tolerance when you hear such stupid, crazy and dangerous waffling."

The Labour peer and former war crimes investigator Greville Janner said: "It is deeply offensive when people think they can joke about the Nazis. Riefenstahl was part of the Nazi movement and the Nazis were murderers. And the mass parades he refers to make me vomit. Marks & Spencer should have a serious rethink about employing him".

O Destacamento Vermelho Feminino (Ópera de Pequim, 1964)

Nick Viner, chief executive of the Jewish Community Centre for London, said that Ferry's remarks were "ill-conceived" and "left a bad taste in the mouth".

"Riefenstahl was responsible for sending people to their deaths. There is a fine line between people going about their business and people colluding in truly terrible behaviour".

Ferry's manager dismissed the protests as "absurd". "To take offence here is to confuse the aesthetic with the ideological," Steven Howard said. "To suggest that a certain appreciation of art and architecture that happens to be associated with the Nazi regime means condoning the actions of that regime is illogical". ("The Independent Online" 15.04.07)

O Couraçado Potemkine (real. Sergei Eisenstein, 1925)

Ferry apologises for Nazi remarks

Singer Bryan Ferry has apologised for an interview in which he praised the iconography of the Nazi party. The UK star is reported to have told a German newspaper that the "mass marches and the flags" of Hitler's regime were "just fantastic - really beautiful". Jewish leaders in Britain condemned the comments, and called for Marks and Spencer to drop Ferry as a model. "I apologise unreservedly," the singer said in a statement, adding he found the Nazi regime "evil and abhorrent".

According to press reports, the 61-year-old told the "Welt Am Sonntag" newspaper last month: "The way that the Nazis staged themselves and presented themselves, my Lord! I'm talking about the films of Leni Riefenstahl and the buildings of Albert Speer and the mass marches and the flags. Just fantastic - really beautiful".

Olympia (real. Leni Riefenstahl, 1938)

(...) In a statement released on his behalf, Ferry said he was "deeply upset" by the publicity surrounding the interview. "I apologise unreservedly for any offence caused by my comments on Nazi iconography, which were solely made from an art history perspective," he said. "I, like every right-minded individual, find the Nazi regime, and all it stood for, evil and abhorrent".

"We do welcome the fact that he has issued a swift comment that there was no intention to condone the Nazi regime," said Jeremy Newmark, chief executive of the Jewish Leadership Council.

"Nevertheless, his choice of language was deeply insensitive", he added.

Lord Greville Janner, vice-president of the World Jewish Congress, told Reuters news agency: "His apology was total, appropriate and absolutely necessary. I hope that he will never make the same mistake again". (BBC News 16.04.07) (2007)