Download - PrivatAir

William Klein has been living in Paris
since he left the army in 1948. He had been a
painter (he studied with Fernand Léger) before
switching to photography, then was taken up
by American Vogue’s legendary art director
Alexander Liberman, and given a contract. Th e
magazine also footed the bill when he said he
wanted to make a book about New York, since
he had been living an ocean away from his
hometown for six years. Th e result, Life is Good
and Good for You in New York, was not what
they expected; not only did the magazine refuse
to run the pictures (although they continued to
employ Klein) but the book wasn’t published in
America until half a century later. Th e
photographs are fantastic, but they cede
nothing to expectation: they are blurry, or
gritty, or cheeky. Th ey are smart and sassy and
pull no punches.
‘I grew up with everybody saying: “Th is is
the centre of the universe,’’’ says Klein, in mild
disgust, of New York. ‘My father, you know, he
was like Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman,
he used to say: “Th is is the land of opportunity!”’
Klein preferred Paris, and the aff ection was
mutual: his book was published there, in 1955,
and within a year its author had got himself an
assistant director gig with Federico Fellini on
Nights of Cabiria. ‘I was a groupie. When I
wanted to meet him, I called up his hotel and
said: “Can I speak to Mr Fellini?” And they
said: “One second,” and put me through.
Which doesn’t happen nowadays.’ He wasn’t
after a job, he says, he just wanted to give
Fellini his book. But the training proved useful
when Klein found a young boxer as smart and
sassy as he was. Actually, it was the politics –
rich white men funding a young black talent –
that piqued him into making a documentary.
Th e boxer in question was Muhammad Ali,
about to become heavyweight champion of the
world. Th e two men were hardly buddies – Ali
called Klein ‘England’, because that was the
only part of Europe he knew – but they shared
a willingness to poke American certainties in
their soft belly. Or punch them in the head.
Klein has made other fi lms, since: Mr
Freedom, a satire on American imperialism, and
Who Are You, Polly Maggoo?, a satire on the
fashion industry. He’s not one for the niceties,
which is what makes his photographs and fi lms
so fantastic, but one does require a certain
lightness on one’s feet when talking to him. We
meet during the Olympics, some of which he’s
enjoying and some less so. Th e Opening
PRIVATPERSON
Ceremony won his approval (‘What’s his name
– Danny Boyle? He’s no dope’) as did the
badminton and the Swedish women’s football
team – the latter for reasons which may or may
not have anything to do with their sporting
prowess. But the synchronised swimming was,
he said trenchantly, the worst kind of sport, and
the wrestling he found boring (and not just
‘boring’: I’ve left out a couple of adjectives).
I get the impression he was no less
combative with the Tate, when organising this
autumn’s exhibition. It’s a joint show with
Daido Moriyama, who has also photographed
If ever there was
an advertisement
for doing your own
thing, rather than
anything expect ed
of you, William
Klein is it
New York and Tokyo, and the shared limelight
was certainly their idea, not his. But it is about
time he got proper consideration in the UK.
He used to visit London with his wife, and
waxes lyrical about the afternoon tea with thin
sandwiches at Brown’s Hotel, but although he
did books on Rome and Moscow as well as
Tokyo and New York, he never honoured
London with his gimlet attentions. Now, the
city has forgiven him: there’s currently a show
of his early paintings at HackelBury Fine Art
as well as the Tate’s superb selection of
photographs, fi lm stills and even drawings – he
sketched out the costumes for Mr Freedom, he
tells me, and his wife made them.
Th e 1969 fi lm, which he also wrote, follows
a right-wing American superhero on his
odyssey to save France from communism, and
Forty-Six
features Delphine Seyrig, Philippe Noiret,
Donald Pleasance and even, briefl y, the singer
Serge Gainsbourg. Th e Americans appreciated
it about as much as the French, in the fi lm,
appreciate Mr Freedom’s attempts to rescue
them, which include blowing up Paris.
‘I remember a couple of guys who were
distributors in America came to a screening,’
laughs Klein, ‘and after about 20 minutes they
got up and said: “Lots of luck,” and left.’ He
doesn’t seem perturbed. Unlike Muhammad
Ali, whose mouthiness seemed always to be
about proving something, Klein appears
entirely comfortable being at odds with pretty
much everyone. He’s not grumpy: he clearly
enjoys life. When he went to shoot the Royal
Wedding street parties, he made up for lost
mobility (he recently had a knee operation) by
hiring a rickshaw. And when I ask him why
he’d chosen to take that assignment – which
must have been busy and dusty – he replies,
simply, that it amused him. He takes jobs as
and when he pleases; he has that incredible fl at,
an assistant and a secretary, a son (also an
artist) and he mentions a girlfriend, a
Portuguese fi lm star. It’s not a bad life: if ever
there was an advertisement for doing your own
thing, rather than anything expected of you,
William Klein is it.
I am sure he has a temper, when he wants
to unleash it, but I only see one fl ash. We are
discussing Slovakia, and he mentions that he
was invited there once, but didn’t go. ‘Well,’ I
say without thinking, ‘it probably wasn’t that
much fun to visit, back then.’ He snaps at me:
‘Back then? What, you think I’m older than
Coca-Cola?’ I backtrack hastily, but still, he’s
hardly a spring chicken. He’s done everything,
worked with everyone and even a major
exhibition at a prestigious institution like the
Tate is nothing new: he had a retrospective at
the Pompidou Centre in 2005. So, what, if
anything, is he hoping to get out of this show?
Th at doesn’t require much refl ection. ‘Listen,’
he tells me, ‘you have exhibitions to meet girls.’
So it seems that William Klein is likely to
continue a lifetime habit of getting just what
he wants, when he wants it. Tate Modern is the
world’s most visited modern-art gallery; he is
going to meet a lot of girls.
William Klein/Daido Moriyama, 10 October – 20
January, Tate Modern, Bankside, London SE1,
tate.org.uk; William Klein: Paintings, Etc, until
20 December, HackelBury Fine Art, 4 Launceston
Place, London W8, hackelbury.co.uk