Come Up and See Me Sometime

Collage, decals
Ongoing series

Hubby’s photo collage series Come Up and See Me Sometime debuted at Paris Photo LA solo booth, a presentation by Klowden Mann n the Paramount Picture Studios soundstage and New York City Street backlot. The work uses images from the golden age of Hollywood as their starting point, reconfigures them, and titles the new figures with quotes by the famous female stars of old Hollywood they resemble.

The heyday of Paramount Studios radiated glamour and effortless style through seemingly blemish-less beings. The siren song of that era still exerts its charm through time, echoed in these reassembled stills. The collages create an alternate nostalgia and serve as an homage to the actresses who secured their place in a male-dominated industry through force of character, intelligence, and talent.

Select works were enlarged as wall decals within the exhibition space at Paramount Studios (2015) to emphasize the beauty and bigness of personality that defined that world, and how we are starstruck (or dazzled) by it. The pieces expand upon the language of her applauded exhibition at Klowden Mann in 2013, building upon her consistent ability to simultaneously support, engage with, and challenge the conventions of the exhibition setting.

Hubby on the series:

“I used Mae West as the central muse for the series because of her consummate wit, refreshing candor, and unapologetic glamour. By intermingling hairstyles, suits, heels, derbies, and gowns, I created unions of opposites, combining masculine and feminine codes, and the fairy dust of Hollywood’s golden aura with its constructed artifice.”.

More from the series, including installation views: Paris Photo LA.