Prozac Champagne

Richard Kern (born 1954 in North Caro­lina) is a New York under­ground film­ma­ker, wri­ter and pho­to­grapher. He first came to under­ground pro­mi­nence as part of the under­ground cul­tu­ral explo­sion in the East Village of New York City in the 1980s, with ero­tic and expe­ri­men­tal films fea­tu­ring under­ground per­so­na­li­ties of the time such as Lydia Lunch, David Woj­na­ro­wicz, Sonic Youth, Kem­bra Pfah­ler, and Henry Rollins in movies like “The Right Side of My Brain” and “Fin­ge­red.” Like many of the musi­cians around him, Kern had a deep inte­rest in the aesthe­tics of extreme sex, vio­lence, and per­ver­sion and was one of the lea­ding lights of Nick Zedd’s coi­ned Cinema of Transgression.

His new exhi­bi­tion (June 4 — July 6) @ Ren­tal Gallery will inc­lude vin­tage pho­tos from 1980 — 2009.