Mike Kuchar: Saints and Sinners

François Ghebaly is pleased to host a New Year's banquet of beefcake celebrating Satyrs, Stone Age He-Men, Sugar Daddies, and Bawdy Buccaneers, drawn, painted, digitized, and hosted by underground cartoonist and movie maker, Mike Kuchar.

The menu spans 50 years of a prolific career, and begins with a projection of a new 16mm transfer of Sins of the Fleshapoids, Mike Kuchar’s seminal 1965 sci-fi movie that marks his solo debut as a filmmaker.

Only 23 at the time, Mike Kuchar had been co-signing films with his twin brother George for a decade, already gathering the attention of the experimental film and art community of New York City. Sins of the Fleshapoids enjoyed a warm reception when it was first released, and the film came to exemplify the quintessence of the campy aesthetic, as defined by Susan Sontag the year before in 1964.

The next course introduces Mike Kuchar’s lusty drawings in an exotic garden. Mike Kuchar was introduced to a writer from the underground gay comic Gay Heart Throbs in the late 70s , and started a parallel career quickly gathering a cult following for his exquisite depictions of fantastic men.

For dessert, we have Tinkled Pink, a recent short film released in 2012, as an example of his recent films, which are more introspective in both nature, and form.

Mike Kuchar was born in the Bronx in New York in 1942, a few minutes before his twin, George. At age 12, the twins started to make films using an 8mm camera their mother gave them. Mike took over George’s teaching position at the San Francisco Art Institute, and continues to make several new films every year with his students and collaborators.