MoCCA NY Gets a Miami Makeover

Adventurous collaborations deserve documentation and the collaboration between Aline Kominsky-Crumb and Dominique Sapel is being chronicled in a new exhibit at the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art called "Miami Makeover: Almost Anything for Beauty." The exhibit opens on June 14 and runs for the summer, but on Wednesday, June 13, from 6 to 8 PM there will be a panel discussion featuring the chroniclees.

"Being a cartoonist," said Kominsky-Crum, "I wanted to find a way to capture this atmosphere and these fabulous women – the creators and their creations! I am fascinated by their idea of beauty and by what women are willing to do to achieve it. As a 63-year-old woman raised in the Five Towns of Nassau County on Long Island, logically I should be 'one of them,' but I was touched at age 8 by some divine intervention and was propelled in a very different direction- I became an artist/observer. Still, there’s a part of me that is curious and can identify with this 'other type' of female."

Kominsky-Crumb and Sapel set out to entirely re-imagine their body image. Donning new outfits, wigs, jewelry, nails, makeup and padding in just the right places, the two artists remade themselves in the image of a modern Miami woman.

"With this seed of an idea in my head," continued Kominsky-Crum, "I asked my cousin Ilana Arazie, whose mother is also one of Cookie’s clients, if she wanted to do a film about the beauty parlor. She was game, and I came up with a premise. I asked my French friend and art partner, Dominique Sapel, to come with me to Miami and get a total makeover at Hair Magic. Nothing would be permanent, and all of it fake: just a week as a blonde bimbo! Not having a clue as to what she was in for, Dominique was a willing and enthusiastic partner."

Admission is $5 (and free for MoCCA members).

Full press release below.

MIAMI MAKEOVER
Almost Anything for Beauty
A collaboration with Aline Kominsky-Crumb and Dominique Sapel

Exhibit: June 14 through Summer 2012

WEDNESDAY JUNE 13: 6 - 8pm: Panel Discussion
Featuring Aline Kominsky-Crumb and Dominique Sapel,
moderated by Karen Green (Columbia University, Librarian for Graphic Novels)
Admission: $8 / FREE for MoCCA Members
The Museum of Comic & Cartoon Art – MoCCA – is pleased to announce “Miami Makeover: Almost Anything for Beauty”, an exhibit featuring the work of Aline Kominsky-Crumb and Dominique Sapel, and a documentary about their adventurous collaboration.

Aline: "My parents moved there twenty years ago and some of my best memories are of the many hours I spent with my mother visiting the beauty parlor, Hair Magic, and the beautician, Cookie, who performs miniature miracles there on a daily basis. The 'look' there is big blond hair, big lips, and big tits, and you can always count on there being some personal philosophy and practical tips thrown in.

"Being a cartoonist, I wanted to find a way to capture this atmosphere and these fabulous women – the creators and their creations! I am fascinated by their idea of beauty and by what women are willing to do to achieve it. As a 63-year-old woman raised in the Five Towns of Nassau County on Long Island, logically I should be 'one of them,' but I was touched at age 8 by some divine intervention and was propelled in a very different direction- I became an artist/observer. Still, there’s a part of me that is curious and can identify with this 'other type' of female."

Kominsky-Crumb and Sapel set out to entirely re-imagine their body image. Donning new outfits, wigs, jewelry, nails, makeup and padding in just the right places, the two artists remade themselves in the image of a modern Miami woman.

Aline continues: "With this seed of an idea in my head, I asked my cousin Ilana Arazie, whose mother is also one of Cookie’s clients, if she wanted to do a film about the beauty parlor. She was game, and I came up with a premise. I asked my French friend and art partner, Dominique Sapel, to come with me to Miami and get a total makeover at Hair Magic. Nothing would be permanent, and all of it fake: just a week as a blonde bimbo! Not having a clue as to what she was in for, Dominique was a willing and enthusiastic partner."

This show is the result of their adventure: Dominique & Aline transformed. Their journey is shown via their respective paintings and drawings as well as a video documentary that shows their metamorphosis first hand.

Aline Kominsky-Crumb is an American underground comics artist, and wife of cartoonist Robert Crumb. She has studied at The Cooper Union and the University of Arizona, graduating with a BFA in 1971. With Aline’s introduction to underground comics in the 1970s came her work with the Wimmen's Comix collective andTwisted Sisters, as well as a series of collaborative comics called Dirty Laundry, a comic about the Crumb family life. Her works have appeared in The New Yorker magazine, and been collected in Love That Bunch and Need More Love: A Graphic Memoir. Drawn Together, a collection of the Crumbs’ collaborative comics, will be published in October 2012. Aline Kominsky-Crumb currently lives and works in a small village in southern France.

Dominique Sapel is a multidisciplinary artist living and working in the South of France. Self-taught, with a 35-year history in the arts and exhibitions across Europe, her works are often a cacophony of iconography, collaged materials, and vivid subjects; dolls and toys cavort with goddesses, women clash with cars and cartoons. Sapel's previous collaborative exhibits with Aline Kominsky-Crumb include "Sacred Women" (2003) and "Resonance of the Dolls" (2007). Sapel's latest solo show was "Madame Butterfly" at the Chateau d'Assas in 2009-2010, Vigan, France.

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