Ren Master - Christopher Bollen

en masterThis summer, Artist Matthew Barney tookdeath for a test ride, and it got great mileage.Composer Jonathan Bepler supplied thewicked driving mix. By christopher bollen

“Some of the ideas of ‘Ren’—the ideal American West,ceremony, passage, devotion,ferocity, conformity, youth—made the band a perfectmatch for the project.”—Jonathan Bepler“We got a hold of AncientEvenings as a basis for alibretto, and we started kickingaround ideas. It soonbecame clear we had a fulllengthpiece on our hands.”—BeplerOn May 18, 2008, at approximately 6:30 p.m.PST, at a defunct RV dealership south of LosAngeles, artist Matthew Barney and composerJonathan Bepler took their audience on a psychicroad trip into the afterworld.A few hundred guests, many having flown fromNew York City for the occasion, stood on the dealershiprooftop overlooking a lot filled with Sebrings,Chargers, and Rams. No one had the slightest clueof what to expect. More than one person looked upto the sky. “Maybe something will drop down fromabove,” one guest speculated. Since this was aperformance by Matthew Barney, creator of thebody-and-mind-distorting Cremaster Cycle filmseries, that guess seemed as plausible as any.The performance was the first in a series thatBarney and Bepler plan to present over the nextfew years, exploring the seven stages of the afterlifeaccording to Egyptian mythology, as describedin Norman Mailer’s 1983 novel, Ancient Evenings.Stage one is the loss of one’s “ren” or “secretname,” and “Ren: Chrysler” was the title of thisparticular performance. It wasn’t the first timeBarney has used Mailer for source material.Cremaster 2 (1999) was centered around GaryGilmore, the killer antagonist in Mailer’s nonfictionbook The Executioner’s Song, with a cameoby the author himself as Harry Houdini.Bepler, Barney’s Berlin-based collaborator, createdmusic for four of the five Cremaster moviesand is plenty familiar with Mailer territory. “Matthewand I got together to work on something small forthe Manchester Opera House as part of a groupshow last July,” he says. “We got a hold ofAncient Evenings as a basis for a libretto, and westarted kicking around ideas. It soon becameclear that we had a full-length piece on ourhands. Then, after a bit more, we saw that eachact of this work could be its own piece. So ‘Ren’is the first stage of this longer work.”Bepler’s music set “Ren” in motion. From differentdirections under the freeway, ranks of aSouthern California marching band descended onthe lot playing a funereal symphony on snaredrums, bass drums, cymbals, tubas, and buglesthat echoed in somber surround sound across thecar lot. “When I first arrived at the site, I wasshocked at how loud it was,” Bepler remembers. “Imean it’s a few yards away from the I-5! It’s reallybeautiful, and I think having the musical groupsphysically approach from afar, their sound emergingfrom the din, worked nicely.” After playingBepler’s composition, the band raced up the drivewayto the upper deck and formed two neat rowsin front of the audience. Suddenly a badly wreckedlime-green 1967 Chrysler Imperial appeared—thevery one that had starred in Cremaster 3 (2002).Cremaster’s amputee star Aimee Mullins lay halfburiedon the car’s roof, while smashed into thetrunk was a demolished port-a-potty, with its giganticwhite septic ball sticking out of the back like theabdomen of a spider. The car was hauled withropes to the lower lot by 50 greased-up men lookinglike California day laborers; there it soon tradedplaces with a gleaming gold Pontiac Firebird insidethe glass showroom. Inside the group drummedon specially built Chrysler logo “pentadrums,” thenOaxacan singer Lila Downs sang a dirge from thebalcony with a mariachi band.Here the real death orgy began: An excavator,fitted with a special head called a “Slashbuster,”began to grind through the Imperial’s hood,chassis, and finally, the port-a-potty. Metal flewagainst the windows, flames spit from the engine,and the septic ball erupted with harsh-smellingport-a-potty contents. The Cremaster 3 icon wasreduced to wreckage. Afterward, in a garage, theFirebird was covered with a plastic sheet,Madagascar roaches were released, and thenaked sex-performer Mouse marched the entirecrew in a procession through a gate.Any questions?Plenty. But Barney’s experiments don’t come witheasy answers. Was it the 1967 Chrysler Imperial orthe entire Cremaster series that was passing intothe afterlife here? Or was it the symbolic death ofAmerican car culture? The only thing clear was thatwe were having a good time as Barney cementedhis return to live performance. And although manyof “Ren’s” symbols still belonged to his familiariconography, new themes and imagery emerged. “Ihave been wanting to work with a drum and buglecorps for some years now,” Bepler noted. “Matthewlikes them, too. Some of the ideas of ‘Ren’—theideal American West, ceremony, passage, devotion,ferocity, conformity, youth—made the band aperfect match for the project.”It was a strange ritual, sleaze meeting sublimity,as American myth and Egyptian lore hooked up ata car dealership amid the strip malls of SouthernCalifornia for a violent, otherworldly sound andimage–scape. For one evening, nearby Disneylandfound dark competition in Barneyworld. Most ofus preferred the “Ren” ride.Above: Matthew Barney and Jonathan Bepler’s REN, 2008, LosAngeles, Ca. Photos (opening spread and this page): ChrisWinget. Photos (opposite, from left): Kelly Thomas; IvanoGrasso. Special Thanks: Regen Projects, L.A.98August 2008 99August 2008