Raymond Pettibon

Wheels Off with Rhett Miller

Rhett Miller

Music, Performing Arts, Arts

4.9 • 609 Ratings

🗓️ 31 May 2022

⏱️ 44 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Raymond Pettibon is recognized for his early work created in the midst of the Southern California punk rock scene in the late 1970s-early 80s, most notably his hand drawn concert flyers and logo design for his brother’s band, Black Flag. On this week’s episode of Wheels Off, he joins Rhett to talk about his creating his own place in the art world and the DIY approach that he continues to maintain. Raymond and Rhett discuss the unique way he combines art with words in his work, and why it’s important to stay grounded in the work itself. Raymond Pettibon emerged from Southern California DIY culture and its punk-rock sensibility, and his work still embraces a youthful edginess and sense of political engagement. Drawing from disparate cultural sources—which range from Marcel Proust and William Blake to the Bible—the artist makes cartoon-inspired ink drawings on paper which evoke the aesthetics of fanzines and concert flyers. Baseball players, trains, crashing waves, political figures, and comic book characters make frequent appearances, often accompanied by cryptic, ironic snippets of handwritten text. Pettibon has been the subject of solo shows at the New Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, and the Kunsthalle Wien. Alongside his fine-art practice, Pettibon has illustrated album art for Sonic Youth and Black Flag, among other musical acts. Wheels Off is brought to you by Osiris Media. Hosted and produced by Rhett Miller. Co-produced by Kirsten Cluthe in partnership with Nick Ruffini (Revoice Media). Editing by Matt Dwyer. Production Assistance by Matt Bavuso. Music by OLD 97’s. Episode artwork by Katherine Boils. Show logo by Tim Skirven. This podcast is available on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also ask Alexa to play it. Please leave us a rating or review on iTunes. Revisit previous episodes of Wheels Off with Rosanne Cash, Rob Thomas, Will Forte, Lydia Loveless, Allison Moorer, Ted Leo, Paul F. Tompkins, Jen Kirkman, and more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Osiris.
0:04.0	Welcome to Wheels Off, a show about the messy reality of the creative life.
0:09.3	I'm Rhett Miller.
0:10.0	That's when it got wheels off.
0:14.0	Started ugly, we ain't gonna stop.
0:16.0	Oh, she made me feel like a good car.
0:19.0	That's when it got wheels off. A lot of folks know Raymond Pettibone from his Black Flag album covers.
0:29.9	That was where I first saw his work.
0:33.0	But that was just a thing he did early in his career.
0:39.1	And since then, it has been an incredibly varied and successful career.
0:47.9	From the Moka to the Whitney to and on and on,, like he is a widely revered artist.
0:59.7	That isn't to say that he's a household name.
1:03.4	I would be surprised if most of you really knew who he was,
1:07.3	because that's, I guess, how contemporary art works, but also, in a way, by design.
1:15.2	Like, he kind of came up in the punk rock world by accident. His brother was in Black Flag.
1:23.0	But he is very much an outsider artist.
1:28.2	And honestly, I'm putting words in his mouth, but my perception of him is that he does what he does without worrying about its reception, if that makes sense.
1:42.2	It's fascinating getting to speak to him because he is incredibly reticent.
1:50.4	You'll hear in this interview he gives a lot of thought to everything he says.
1:58.2	He seems like he's very careful to be kind and not judgmental about
2:05.5	different artists' choices that they make. But boy, he is, he is something. I hope you guys
2:15.5	take a second, if you don't know his work, to go just maybe
	...

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