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The Inner Sleeve: Christian Marclay
Herb Alpert's Tijuana Brass - Whipped Cream & Other Delights (A&M 1965)
Art Direction by Christopher Whorf
When I started digging through record crates in the late 1970s – a regular activity that I kept up until the end of the 90s while looking for my raw material – I stumbled upon this amazing looking record, Whipped Cream And Other Delights by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. The cover features a voluptuous model covered only in whipped cream from head to toe. Released in April 1965 the album shot to number one and stayed on the charts for more than three years, selling over six million copies in the United States. The record made Alpert rich and famous and the cover became iconic.
In the 80s there seemed to be a copy in every crate I thumbed through. I got my first copy for 25 cents, and then another, and soon I was buying every copy I could find, never spending more than a dollar for it. Soon it became evident that this record had a special meaning for many people, because every time I went to the cash register to pay for my purchases the sales clerk (always male) would itemise the albums and pause on that particular cover and tell me a story about his first encounter with it: “ My father had this record…” or “I had my first erection looking at her…” or “my mother used to hide it…” A friend told me how she first realised she was a lesbian while looking at that cover. I wish I had recorded all these Baby Boomers reminiscing, it would tell the story of a generation that had discovered its sexuality through this image. The whipped cream was like Proust's Madeleine: it made people remember. The stories sustained my curiousity and I kept thinking the collection would become an artwork.
When in 2001 curator Carlo McCormick asked me to contribute a selection of records from my archive for his exhibition The LP Show at Exit Art in New York, I provided him with my entire collection of Whipped Cream And Other Delights, about 200 copies.
Exhibited en masse as a wall grid from floor to ceiling, small differences between mechanical reporoductions became perceptible. Sometimes the hit title is highlighted in yellow, the printing quality varies depending on pressings, with matt paper in the States and glossy paper in Europe, the wear and tear, the taped repairs, the old price tags, and so on. It is like looking at Warhol’s screenprints, infinite variations of a same face. Among them I inserted five parody covers made in homage to the Tijuana Brass. Later The LP Show traveled to the Experience Music Project centre in Seattle. Coincidentally, the cover model Dolores Erickson, who lives nearby showed up for the opening. Sadly, I could not attend the event and missed my chance to meet Dolores. As a consolation, I received a picture of her standing in front of my wall of covers. Unfortunately I couldn’t find this mise-en-abîme to reproduce here.
A year later however, I did meet Herb Alpert when I was awarded the Herb Alpert Award for Visual Arts. There was a ceremony in New York and I thought of bringing a record for him to sign, but then at the last minute I felt silly and didn’t bring it. But that year’s Music Award winner Laetitia Sonami brought her copy to get autographed. She is a composer who uses sexy prostheses embedded with sensors to control her electronic music. The connection between body and music made sense.
The Alpert Award in the Arts provides cash prizes to artists working the fields of dance, film/video, music, theatre and the visual arts. Herb Alpert sold a lot of records, made of lot of money, and now he gives it away to many good causes. It’s nice to know that all that cream was not wasted.
-The Louvre in collaboration with FIAC in Paris presents two of Christian Marclay's graphic scores this month: see Out There. Snap!, a new monograph dedicated to Marclay's photographic practice, is published by Les Presses Du Réel and Mamco.
lespressesdureel.com
Art Direction by Christopher Whorf
When I started digging through record crates in the late 1970s – a regular activity that I kept up until the end of the 90s while looking for my raw material – I stumbled upon this amazing looking record, Whipped Cream And Other Delights by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. The cover features a voluptuous model covered only in whipped cream from head to toe. Released in April 1965 the album shot to number one and stayed on the charts for more than three years, selling over six million copies in the United States. The record made Alpert rich and famous and the cover became iconic.
In the 80s there seemed to be a copy in every crate I thumbed through. I got my first copy for 25 cents, and then another, and soon I was buying every copy I could find, never spending more than a dollar for it. Soon it became evident that this record had a special meaning for many people, because every time I went to the cash register to pay for my purchases the sales clerk (always male) would itemise the albums and pause on that particular cover and tell me a story about his first encounter with it: “ My father had this record…” or “I had my first erection looking at her…” or “my mother used to hide it…” A friend told me how she first realised she was a lesbian while looking at that cover. I wish I had recorded all these Baby Boomers reminiscing, it would tell the story of a generation that had discovered its sexuality through this image. The whipped cream was like Proust's Madeleine: it made people remember. The stories sustained my curiousity and I kept thinking the collection would become an artwork.
When in 2001 curator Carlo McCormick asked me to contribute a selection of records from my archive for his exhibition The LP Show at Exit Art in New York, I provided him with my entire collection of Whipped Cream And Other Delights, about 200 copies.
Exhibited en masse as a wall grid from floor to ceiling, small differences between mechanical reporoductions became perceptible. Sometimes the hit title is highlighted in yellow, the printing quality varies depending on pressings, with matt paper in the States and glossy paper in Europe, the wear and tear, the taped repairs, the old price tags, and so on. It is like looking at Warhol’s screenprints, infinite variations of a same face. Among them I inserted five parody covers made in homage to the Tijuana Brass. Later The LP Show traveled to the Experience Music Project centre in Seattle. Coincidentally, the cover model Dolores Erickson, who lives nearby showed up for the opening. Sadly, I could not attend the event and missed my chance to meet Dolores. As a consolation, I received a picture of her standing in front of my wall of covers. Unfortunately I couldn’t find this mise-en-abîme to reproduce here.
A year later however, I did meet Herb Alpert when I was awarded the Herb Alpert Award for Visual Arts. There was a ceremony in New York and I thought of bringing a record for him to sign, but then at the last minute I felt silly and didn’t bring it. But that year’s Music Award winner Laetitia Sonami brought her copy to get autographed. She is a composer who uses sexy prostheses embedded with sensors to control her electronic music. The connection between body and music made sense.
The Alpert Award in the Arts provides cash prizes to artists working the fields of dance, film/video, music, theatre and the visual arts. Herb Alpert sold a lot of records, made of lot of money, and now he gives it away to many good causes. It’s nice to know that all that cream was not wasted.
-The Louvre in collaboration with FIAC in Paris presents two of Christian Marclay's graphic scores this month: see Out There. Snap!, a new monograph dedicated to Marclay's photographic practice, is published by Les Presses Du Réel and Mamco.
lespressesdureel.com
Posted 02/11/09
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