1. Belle de Jour (1967) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061395/

Directed by Luis Bunuel this film had so many vivid scenes I thought about them for days afterward. It was only on my third watch that I realised it was completely without music. The story is that Severine (Catherine Deneuve) is very cool physically, chaste with her husband, but with a secret sexual fantasy world, which leads her to becoming an afternoon prostitute. The film opens with the haunting sound of bells attached to a horse and trap and the image of Deneuve sitting there in her bright red coat and the flicker of a pleasure in her face as pain is inflicted on her are such startling images.

Her wardrobe was designed by Yves Saint Laurent, all military hard edges and straight lines hinting at her own restrictive personal exterior. After seeing the film I spent ages hunting down a black PVC mac as an homage only to have it stolen from a party weeks later. Stylish thieving bastards.

Oh when looking for images I found this great blog http://clothesonfilm.com/belle-de-jour-sex-and-alienation/4470/

2. Barbarella (1968) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062711/

Roger Vadim who directed this film was a philanderer of epically beautiful women of Gainsbourg proportions managing to have a children with Deneuve, Jane Fonda and having an affair with Bardot. Legend. Here they are backstage with their child.

The story goes that the role of Barbarella was originally intended for Bardot. Don’t get me wrong I adore Bardot but the knowing campness of Fonda’s performance really makes this film for me. Well that along with fantastical sets, brilliant soundtrack by Bob Crewe and Charles Fox and Paco Rabanne costumes- which apparently were very uncomfortable to wear.

This film inspired one of my favourite performances, I owe so much of my styling inspiration to this film. On multiple watches I am still drawn in by the wonderful atmosphere, the out and out 60s of it all. Anita Pallenburg even makes an appearance as The Great Tyrant, although hilariously dubbed. Also the opening credits  have to be one of the best of all time! http://www.artofthetitle.com/2009/01/23/barbarella/ / This film makes me nostalgic for the creativeness of film sets pre-computer graphics, I t must have been so thrilling for the actors with not a green screen in sight.

In Fonda’s autobiography she explained how terrified she was filming on a piece of glass 20ft above the studio. Her gleeful leg kicks are testament to her fear defying acting skills. A zero gravity striptease remains one of my lifetime ambitions.

3. The Tenth Victim (1965) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0059095/mediaindex

Definitely one of my top 5 Icons of the 60s, Ursula Andres is the star of this campy classic. As mentioned previously her ‘killer bra’ scene inspired my Studio 54 show. Co-starring Marcello Mastroianni of ’La Dolce Vita’ fame it’s a futuristic romp around Rome where the world’s population are divided into ‘Hunters and Victims’, in a survival of the fittest population control exercise. Andres being ,of course, one of the fittest and best Hunters, Ursula I salute you in your hotness!

I loved the 60s vision of the future in this film, un-constricting clothing, flat white Courreges style boots, cut out clothes. During the 60s there was real optimism about the future, as the Cold War drew to an end and leaps were made in technology and manufacturing. If only the actual future looked more like the 60s vision! Sigh. Where have the catsuits, helmets and beehives gone?

I would recommend this excellent book http://www.amazon.co.uk/Fear-Fashion-Cold-Jane-Pavitt/dp/1851775447 that was bought for me at the brilliant V&A exhibition a last year which explains how political and social issues influenced 60s fashion.

4.The Graduate (1967) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061722/

I remember vividly watching this film one rainy Saturday afternoon with my Dad. Probably not the most suitable film for a 10 year old, but I can’t remember being embarrassed by the sexy bits. In fact isn’t there a burlesque dancer in the nightclub scene? Dad you planted the seed early!

This shot of Anne Bancroft’s leg has surely got to be one of the most iconic sexy images of all time?  You may not notice it now but the montage scene of Ben whiling away his days at his parents’ house was groundbreaking in the way they had one shot leading to the other. There is a great article on the techniques that Mike Nichols used here http://www.filmsite.org/grad.html

The music too is amazing, ‘Sound of Silence’ is one of my favourite songs perfect listlessness and then crescendo. The Graduate has to be one of the best coming-of-age films, and the look on their faces as the bus at the end pulls away is cinematic gold.

Odd Fact: Anne Bancroft (Mrs Robinson) was only 6 years older than Dustin Hoffman when the Graduate was filmed.

2001: Space Odyssey (1968) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062622/

It’s hard to believe that this film was made in 1968 it still doesn’t look dated and quite frankly out classes pretty much every other science fiction film ever made. I first saw this film aged 19 when I ran away to New York  for the summer between my First and Second Year at Bristol. Me and my flatmate Andrew went to see it an open air screening in Bryant Park. It was electric and I remember everyone cheering a clapping as the monkeys (spoiler alert!) learnt how to make fire.

The film is visionary and when it was released at the height of the space race it must have felt like the technology in this film was literally just a few decades away (I wish).  The images that stay with me are the cylindrical running track, and the that  amazing under lit floor in the final scene complete with baroque furniture.  Even though I don’t fully understand the ending I love it, the cyclical nature of space, life, giant babies and all.

Performance (1970- let me have it will you?)http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0066214/

I only actually saw this film for the first time last year. I like 60s films set in London and I loved seeing the ramshackleness of all the giant houses in Nottinghill.  This film paved the way for so many British Gangster films, you can clearly see some borrowed camera techniques in the brilliant Gangster No. 1 with Paul Bettany. Charles Fox who plays the gangster on the run spent months in South London hanging out with real crime lords to get into character, he was previously known  for romantic leading man roles. I think he did a pretty good  job, saying that my only experience of South London gangsters has been seeing them in film, played by actors.

I love the bohemian world Anita Pallenburg and Mick Jaggers’ character live in, they were even rumoured to have had an affair.

This film to me captures a zeitgeist if the hippy 60s living alongside a still brutal underworld and I love the scene of Jagger rocking out with a fluorescent light and using a monolithic synthesizer .  There is also a total disregard for continuity when Charles Fox covers himself in red paint, its almost laughable. But the ending as the car drives away did make me go ‘Ohhhhhhhh!’.

Part II coming soon. I’m off to Bestival tomorrow whoo hoo.

I was 15 when I first gazed at Tina. I had seen her before in pictures but never in the flesh.  But there she was in my favourite vintage shop her eyelids heavy with lashes, pinky orange lips parted staring out at me- she was beautiful. At that moment I fell in love with her.

Tina

“Tina” the name of this an iconic picture is painted by my namesake and inspiration the painter J.H. Lynch during the early 1960s. I saw my first ever Lynch painting in a my favourite vintage shop growing up called Attica in Newcastle. It is still to this day jam packed with vintage clothes and furniture with beautiful 60s ashtrays gleaming like sweets, and velvet jackets hung next to Edwardian shirts. I used to go there and browse wearing my first vintage purchase a 70s Burberry Mac ( which I used to get called ‘Flasher!’ for wearing-rainwear being obviously controversial in sportswear ridden 1999 Newcastle.

“Tina” captured my imagination and right then became the quintessential 1960s fantasy woman to me, more ‘Bond’ than a Bond girl. She is so perfect I wonder if she was a real person? Sadly the probably the only person who can truly tell me, the reclusive J.H. lynch, died in 1989 aged 78.

And so my love affair with the Lynch girls began, even though I discovered them in my teens I only bought my first print 5 years ago ‘Autumn Leaves’ followed quickly by ‘Tina’.

With my interest renewed I wanted to find out more about the artist and I found this excellent (and the only) website http://www.jhlynch.org/ by Mario Klingemann. Lynch’s paintings were mass produced throughout the 60s, they were even sold through Boots the Chemist. He died in 1989 destroying much of his work, as he never received the critical acclaim he deserved. Subsequently very little information is known about him. Acording to Klingemann’s website the originals are in the possession of his nephew. (lucky him!)

a rare early Lynch landscape

J.H. Lynch’s early pictures were of country scenes and then he started painting these goddesses! I wonder what first inspired him to do so? Was it a woman he knew? Did he paint from life?

I get the feeling that some of the paintings might been inspired by photographs and then exaggerated into a gorgeous ‘Lynchian’ vision of woman that is almost cartoonish. I think “Autumn Leaves” might have been inspired by this picture of Jean Shrimpton.  What do you think?

I think it’s sad that Lynch never felt appreciated in his lifetime. Admittedly these paintings are not perhaps ‘technically’ brilliant, the bodies are sometimes a little off (See Tina’s shoulder) and some might argue that these paintings are simply not ‘art’ but wall decoration. They are to me missing the point and the magic of Lynch. While Lynch’s paintings have become almost a visual shorthand for 60s kitsch they mean more than that to me. 1000s of prints were produced because the are beautiful and fantastical and who doesn’t need some of that?

The only picture of the mysterious Lynch I could find. The picture is thought to have been destroyed by the artist before his death

I chose the stage name ‘Agent Lynch’ because I want to be on stage one part Bond Girl and one part mysterious Lynch like nymph. Having a stage name, and I think this is true for most performers especially burlesque, allows you to create a character that gives you a licence to be who ever you want to be when you perform. This fiction of character allows me to create and perform something I would simply lack the confidence to do if just plain old ‘Kate’. I would feel naked on stage as Kate, as Lynch it feels almost natural. (what a floozy)

And while I will never know if Tina or Lisa really existed, I know Lynch had a love affair with them if only in his mind. I can see these beautiful creatures now running barefoot through the moss with big hair, eyelashes and pouting lusciously next to trees swathed in silk (well ok ploy-mix satin) and I like to think of them all cooing over J.H. Lynch in heaven finally united with his creations. As I grow older Tina will always be perfect to me- and as I’m looking at her now she looks pretty darn good for 72. How does she do it?

Here is my homage to the Lynch girls shot by the uber talented fashion photographer Wendy Bevan. www.wendybevan.com

Places of Lynchian interest: please do mail me if you have any more using contact link above.

www.mrlynch.co.uk Newcastle bar decorated with Lynch paintings and orginal 60s furniture. Groovy baby.

www.atticavintage.co.uk an Aladin’s cave of vintage(and the occasional Lynch)also  in my home town Newcastle

http://tinawesaluteyou.com/ My wonderful local coffee shop in Dalston London which is named after and features Lynch’s most popular painting.

On Monday I was invited to the launch of ‘Beatles- Bowie: The 60s Exposed’ photography exhibition at the National Portrait gallery.

I have not been there for ages so it was a treat. It’s a pretty large exhibition with some star pieces you will probably know and lots of other gems you probably haven’t seen before. It’s pretty amazing that a period of ten years produced some of the most iconic Rock and Roll imagery we have today.

It was great to see the progression from the more posed teddy boy’s of the early 60s to shots that literally look as if they could have been taken yesterday.Testament to how the work of these photographers changed the face of modern photography forever.

Private views are great- not only so you hopefully get to see great work but you also get free drinks. But not only was there a free bar at the gallery there were REALLY fancy canapes- like tuna summer rolls! I then cursed myself for putting a bloody £2.95 EAT Coronation chicken sandwich in my belly, when I was emergency tight buying in Topshop, leaving no room left for posh nosh. I was also so thirsty, but I could not find any water, so I just nailed a glass of wine before we headed into the exhibition. Much to my later hot flush regret…..

My favourites pictures were the David Bailey shot of Mick Jagger in the furry hood (I had this on my wall as a teenager) and the beautiful one of a topless Jane Birkin! Je t’aime Jane forever!

It was also GREAT for some vintage starspotting! I actually saw David Bailey. He is such a legend to me, I could not quite bare to look at him directly. But I did notice that in a sea of suits and dresses he was wearing about 3 un-ironed shirts looking a bit of a wonderful mess. He can totally get away with it though- he’s mine and about a gazillion others photography hero. Plus he was married to Catherine Denueve. Respect to that.

We got chatting to Dave Berry and his wife who came over to say they liked our dresses ( I was with Wendy and Rachel so we made a rather odd, if colourful, 20s/30s/60s style trio). He sang that wonderful haunting song ‘The Crying Game’. His picture was pretty cool too, cowboy hatted and on sitting in an orange bubble chair, he had that kind of has that Chistopher Walken thing going on. His biog on the photograph said he was well known for ‘erotically caressing the microphone’, I asked him if it was true and said ‘of course darling!’ and gave me a wink. Brilliant.

You can check out some geniune 60s microphone caressing here:

We also met this great photographer called Baron Walman- he worked for Rolling Stone as their Chief Photographer ( think ‘Almost Famous’) in the 60s and pretty much shot everyone: The Stones, Zappa, Morrison and Hendrix. He was very sharp and told me some good stories, although ‘I did think he was called ‘Barry’ for half the conversation! Baron a tad cooler methinks. Whoops. Oh and according to Baron the sixties were really as good as I think they were, and he should know. Yaaay.

Barry...I mean Baron in front of one of his iconic pictures (this one is not at the exhibition sadly)

Then I bumped into Jimmy Page(!). I first met Jimmy almost two years ago at a 100 Club gig, and all I kept on thinking I can’t believe you play the guitar on a ‘Whole Lotta Love’! (I really need to do a show to that soon). That night he very kindly gave me a lift to my show, and when you are carrying a huge suitcase and were planning to get 2 buses to Kensington a free taxi ride with a genuine rock legend is always much appreciated. So it was really great to see him again, but I was hugely dehydrated (no drinks in the gallery) and with excitement of meeting Mr Page again I broke out into a slight hot sweat on my face. Have you ever had that when you get a sweaty top lip and you try and nonchalantly dry it mid-conversation?? Sooo not a good look. Anyway Jimmy was nothing but charming and did not seen too scared by my shiny face. Musical genius and nice: what a combo.

The exhibition runs from tomorrow to the 24th Januray (and don’t forget to check out the Twiggy exhibition upstairs too) You can find out more info and buy your tickets here: http://www.npg.org.uk:8080/beatles/index3.htm

And thank you very much to Terence Pepper and Rachel Snider for inviting me.

Until next time..xxL