Scooter LaForge: A Life of Art (2023)

[bunniefuu]

(Projector clicking)

(Music)

- I use doctrines of automatism.

It's also referred to

as pure psychic drawing

or pure psychic painting.

("Do With Me")

I learned from this artist

called Andr Breton,

who started the Dadaists and Sur

("Do With Me")

Automatism is pure psychic

drawing and painting

where you don't think

about what you're doing,

you just do it.

You try to clear out

your mind and not think,

and you just let the

hands go where they may,

and people who followed

that, Jackson Pollock,

Andr Breton, and Max Ernst.

("Do With Me")

A lot of the surrealists.

It's almost like you're

painting in the dark

or painting blindfolded.

("Do With Me")

Usually when I get off the eleva

my mantra in my head is to

get stupid and get dumb,

not so overthought.

So I always tell myself, get dum

get stupid, get dumb, get

stupid on this elevator.

("Do With Me")

Once you clear out the

mind then it allows space

for the subconscious to come in

and then come out of your body p

It's just to allow for new

ideas and new things to learn.

("Do With Me")

I'm ready for you

(Staticky music)

(gentle guitar music)

My name is Scooter LaForge,

and I'm from a town in New

Mexico called Las Cruces,

and I was born and raised there.

My dad is Mexican and my mother'

They both are artists.

I grew up in a very jovial atmos

typical suburban neighborhood,

where I played outside

and played with all my

neighborhood friends.

(gentle guitar music)

My dad loved to paint.

He built his own house that he l

a straw bale adobe house.

And he's spent all of his

life in the school system

as an administrator.

He was a principal and

then a superintendent,

and they're both definite academ

My mother's very creative, too.

She's a performer and

an actress and a singer.

- Some of my friends come over,

and we do art projects like deco

We always had books.

And of course there was music al

- When I remember him doing his

he was always by himself,

in his back bedroom,

in his little casita.

And then I would always sneak in

and look through his art stuff.

We would dumpster dive at times,

and he would find things

and create jewelry.

- A lot of crayon work,

color books, mixing up stuff.

- [Scooter] Creativity was a big

of the way I was raised.

We had to sit down for an

hour and read every day,

set schedules of stuff we had to

We had our play time.

We had our reading time.

We had our study time.

We had our discover something ne

My mom put me in dance and

theater and art and singing.

They really promoted all that.

(lively guitar music)

I grew up watching TV and

a lot of cartoons, too,

but it was regimented.

We had to do our reading, too.

There was a balance of both of t

Sit up sit up sit up

- [Scooter] Well, I love cartoon

I always have.

And I'm an 80s kid.

And we grew up with cartoons.

I grew up with cartoons.

They were my babysitter.

They were my anti-depression pil

They were my anti-anxiety pill.

They were everything.

To make it home

- [Scooter] And every day after

I would come home and watch cart

It was just part of being

a kid when I grew up.

Do you wanna play

Wanna play

Wanna play

We gonna play

We gonna play

- [Scooter] I think that's why

I keep putting these in my paint

'cause they make me feel good.

Gonna play

Gonna play

More, more and more and more a

- [Scooter] I even still have

Charlie Brown sheets on my bed,

stuffed animals around

the house and stuff.

There was a severed hand

outside of my apartment

building that they found,

and I painted a severed hand.

That doesn't have anything

to do with cartoons,

but the cartoons are a comfort f

That's one to be

Notion of being a kid

inside is very important,

because it leads to the imaginat

and it leads to being free.

(gentle guitar music)

(intense music)

- I think Scooter is an

heir to the downtown legacy

that has been labeled neo-Expres

So artists like Keith Haring and

who also painted on clothes.

Scooter has a certain sort of ir

and satirical approach that beli

bigger, deeper, more fine art me

Drunk on a dare

Be my honey

- Scooter naturally just paints

He'll paint the plates.

He'll paint you if you get too c

I used to like to call him Littl

- My tools I already have.

I don't go out and buy specific

Anything I can get my hands on,

house paint, spray paint,

paint that I find on the street,

paint that I happen to have here

Wanna take you with me

Take you on a ride

- It's not so much how it makes

It's how it makes me think.

When I look at Scooter's work,

there's always something

about it which is surprising.

Is it art?

What makes that work as a painti

There's something about

it which is awkward,

uncomfortable, and deeply

personal and beautiful.

It's almost like he's picking up

and throwing it at the canvas.

I don't see the content.

I see the paint.

It liberates the action.

Take my hand

- Scooter is the hardest

working artist I know.

It's his life.

Run the lights in your new spo

- People recognize his work,

because he is original.

He's not a derivative of another

Go for a drive

- If I would describe Scooter,

Scooter is very positive, cooper

He is always bringing work in he

He respects us.

Take you with me

Take you on a ride

- And that's where the

true creativity comes in

in being an artist is how are

you gonna sustain yourself

as an artist?

How are you gonna look for oppor

to where you can make money

and still do something creative

and not have to work in the cafe

Show up for the people

that give you these jobs

so they'll hire you again

and again and again,

after the fact.

The universe provides.

Seeing those opportunities

and taking advantage of them.

These people know what you do.

Step into those shoes and do it

and deliver it and do

the best job you can.

Don't be afraid,

and if you fail, that's okay.

Failing, you can learn

the most about yourself

and the most about your craft ev

If it turns out to be a piece of

that's probably one of the best

that could ever happen to anyone

Still learning.

I'm still in the beginning

of how to go forward

because this is the road less tr

I mean, I don't take

critiques personally anymore.

I like when people are

quite honest with me.

We are never gonna go

- Scooter's work was everywhere.

I couldn't avoid it,

and I really liked it.

It was sort of a combination

of depressing and

optimistic at the same time.

I do think he has a bright visio

of the future of the world.

But he also is smart enough to p

on the detritus of society

that gets in the way,

not just literally the

trash on the streets,

but just the trash of our societ

- The way I like to think

is everything's already finished

Like when this was a blank

canvas it was already done,

and there's solutions for everyt

It's just where I'm

feeling at that moment.

I work very sporadically.

If I feel like copying

something, I'll do it.

But that's a small part of my wo

- The first thing that struck me

is that I saw a sense of

innocence, just from pure impuls

And he's surprised by

what's coming out of it.

When you have a painting by Scoo

it really has a presence to chan

these subtle emotions into the p

And they become these

objects that are charged,

and it's really like an act of m

("Bubblegum")

- If you go back to work that I

when I was very young,

it was very detailed.

I was using tiny brushes.

And now I don't care as

much about that stuff.

I just have a lot of

freedom and I have fun.

And I think one of the

artist's duty is to have fun,

because it shows in the works,

and people can tell if someone

has a lot of fun painting.

("Bubblegum")

We're in a studio in

Tribeca, it's expensive.

I try and come here and use it e

I would want to be a surgeon

if I didn't want to be a painter

because creativity in

that field is paramount.

The reference between

painting and surgery,

I've always been interested

in the human body

and what goes on inside the

human body and how it works.

Rembrandt has the anatomy lesson

("Bubblegum")

Done in 1632,

and I've redone that painting

probably three or four times.

I'm really inspired by that

and other medical paintings.

("Bubblegum")

- I kind of discouraged him.

I knew he was really smart,

so I said, "Oh, you got

to major in accounting,"

or "You got to major in engineer

"You're so good in math.

"What in the heck are you

going to do with fine arts?

"Even if you went into teaching,

"at least you're going to have a

- I'm going to be an artist.

Look at me.

I mean, I can't not do it.

- He made his own decisions

on taking an art degree out of t

Good for him.

("Bubblegum")

- He's managed to combine

the punk rock attitude

with the opposite, comical,

with a lighthearted and

sweet sense of humor.

(gentle music)

- Scooter's work is very decepti

because at first it

presents sort of a comedy.

And I mean that in the

use of cartoonish motifs

and imagery that he's

taken from pop culture.

Throughout it all,

there's sort of a underlying

sensitivity and maybe sadness.

I've described his sense of

humor and his sense of art

as being like Charlie Chaplin in

where it's kind of this comic tr

We're inundated by these pop ima

that have no meaning that are ju

And I think you might look at a

and instead of getting a direct

it's a sense that there's someth

much more sophisticated

and underlying his message.

- A lot of comments that

people make to me are like,

wow, that's a beautiful

painting, but it's sad, too.

And it takes you a while to

look in there and find that.

But yeah, it's there.

I feel it's connected to

dark parts of my life,

'cause I have been in very,

very dark places in my life

since I can remember.

- When he was going into his sen

my husband and I made a decision

to move to Douglas, Arizona,

and he was devastated with that.

He didn't want to go.

We said, oh no, you're coming wi

So we moved there in his senior

He had the challenge of

fitting into a new high school.

He had no friends.

He had his own way of dressing,

which was very unique.

- It started in junior high,

openly flamboyant and openly g*y

and dressed that way and

presented myself that way.

And wasn't accepted.

It was in a really small town.

If you grew up in a bigger city,

you can find some other

people that are like you

and maybe two or three other peo

but I didn't have anyone there.

So I was just this kid who was g

who was dressed crazy, dyed

my hair, expressed myself.

- The culture we were living in

wasn't easy on the g*y society.

I remember one time we were

walking out of a restaurant

and these cowboys called him a f

I just was not okay with that.

I would become angry and yell ri

Scooter and I were brought

up with good morals,

and we were taught not to be mea

and my brother just went

into the restaurant.

He didn't want any part of it.

- In high school,

the depression came from

coming out and being g*y

and being really bullied.

My last name is LaForge.

They would write the

word LaFag on my locker.

People would threaten to

beat me up after school.

I would get pushed in the halls.

I would get made fun of constant

Tripping.

Once I got sucker punched.

(hand punching)

(body banging)

(somber music)

I didn't know what happened to m

It made me depressed and

it made me shut down.

I wouldn't talk.

I was angry.

I was mad at my family.

I was mad at my parents.

It caused a lot of problems,

and I was very unhappy.

At home, their reaction to it,

they wanted me to butch

up, to get more masculine.

- I think it was a difficult env

to live in our home at that time

My mother was living with us,

and she had extreme dementia.

The household was dysfunctional,

because I was mostly preoccupied

with my mother and my work.

The kids coped in their own way,

using their inner resources.

- When you're that age,

it's life or death to you.

(somber music)

- When I was younger,

I lived in a little house

outside of my parents' house.

We had a little area that was my

(somber music)

I'd sleep with the gas on

without the flames going,

so it was just pure gas

emitting from this heater, and,

I was hoping that I would die.

(somber music)

And senior in high school,

so it would've been 17.

(somber music)

When I woke up in the morning,

I was happy to be alive,

but still depressed and confused

and a lot of emotions all

mixed together in a blender.

(gentle intense music)

Painting on clothes, I was creat

I was making sculptures.

And it was just getting

suppressed and suppressed.

I would explode and then I

would paint the whole damn room.

Gives you freedom,

and on a positive note,

it treats every day like it's

the last day of your life.

The mind can be altered.

Instead of going into negative t

goes into positive thoughts.

The mind will change and

start to believe them after

being programmed that way.

Today, those dark sides have lif

I've done a lot of work on mysel

through therapy, and it's helped

(somber music)

I wouldn't be here today

if I didn't have those

experiences in my life.

It actually makes one stronger,

because they have that experienc

and they know how to deal with i

Facet to the diamond of

who you are as a person.

- If you look at this painting b

it's an autopsy, but there's Sha

I call it the Shakespeare painti

It depicts a certain

timeline historically,

but the clown is there.

They're classic symbols

all rolled into one.

(upbeat music)

- I moved to San Francisco

after I finished college

in Tucson, Arizona,

lived in San Francisco for nine

I had it all in San Francisco.

I knew everyone there,

never had to pay to get into any

People knew me in restaurants.

I was connected to every

little aspect of that city

and was known in that

town in the art world.

(somber music)

I didn't even pick up alcohol

until I was in my 20s,

and then I moved to San Francisc

and fell into this party crowd,

and I started to experiment with

(somber music)

I found my happy place, and

I sniffed a lot of cocaine.

(somber music)

Makes everything interesting.

The most bullshit topics,

if you're high on coke, you

can talk about it for hours.

If you're too drunk, if

you do a line of coke,

then you're automatically awake

and you can keep partying and

you can stay in the nightclub

and it's just very social.

It just makes you yap, yap,

yap, yap, yap, yap, yap.

(somber music)

Also what happens is it can

bring you to a very dark place

where your world gets smaller an

and smaller and smaller.

(gentle intense music)

Because you start to get paranoi

and then you find yourself

doing coke by yourself at home.

And that's what happened to me.

(somber music)

Did a lot of shady stuff.

I hurt a lot of people.

I've thrown opportunities away,

'cause I was thinking,

well look at Jackson Pollock, a

Well they can be drunk,

so I can do it, too.

(somber music)

I came like this far from

throwing myself off the balcony

on a fifth floor walkup.

(somber music)

The last night that I

did any drugs or alcohol,

I had come home from the club,

and a friend of mine was with me

and we did the last of the cocai

and we were smoking cigarettes

and I was in a tiny

apartment in San Francisco.

And then he left and the

sun started coming up.

Now I'm not going to be able to

I'm high.

I can't sleep, I'm depressed, I'

And there was this wine bottle,

and it had all our

cigarette butts in there,

and I poured the wine bottle out

and drank that to force

myself to fall asleep.

Last drink of that wine,

I knew the party was over.

And then after that day I stoppe

And that was 19 years ago.

(somber music)

Well, I moved to San Francisco i

and I think that was not

the pinnacle of A*DS,

but it was just coming down.

- A lot of his work is tied to t

g*y act up aesthetic of the 80s.

When we were all fighting

the early days of A*DS.

It was a horror show.

And we all took to the streets s

and he's maintained that element

and brought it up to date.

- During my time in San Francisc

a lot of people died of A*DS.

Beautiful Hawaiian guy.

He was dating my roommate at the

maybe 25 or 26, and he

became HIV positive.

And then maybe he got

scared and depressed,

and he started using crystal met

He was one of these people that

a big beautiful man,

within three months turned

into a human skeleton,

and exhibiting all these signs o

and having KS, Kaposi sarcoma.

KS is where you get these

sores all over your body,

which was really common

in the 90s and 80s.

You would see it all over.

(somber music)

He ended up moving back home and

This is over three years.

Yeah, I saw it from the

beginning to the end,

people in the hospital beds

that are just like these skeleto

I lost a lot of friends,

and we lost a lot of people

and a lot of creative people,

and it was a hard time.

It was really a just devastating

(gentle intense music)

At that age where that deep-seat

fear was instilled in me

and the safe sex was instilled i

so I never was real risky sex-wi

because it was pounded into your

condom, safe sex, condom safe se

So I am from that generation.

So I come from that practice of

If I was born five years

earlier or ten years earlier,

that was a free for all.

Everyone was doing

whatever they wanted to do

whenever they wanted to do it,

in the bathhouses and

was like sexual freedom

and liberation.

And I think it's human nature,

because we're all sexual beings,

and it's part of being an animal

- The topics he picks for his ar

I mean it could be about

A*DS or the g*y community,

sexuality, h*m*,

celebrating trans people

that he knows and loves,

subversive things that he believ

or sometimes he's casting a

kind of satirical eye on it.

(gentle intense music)

- One day I decided to sell all

and get on the airplane and just

before I died or before I got to

and start over again here.

(upbeat music)

My mom got me a subscription

to Interview Magazine.

She bought me "The Andy Warhol D

when I was in elementary school.

And I read that book and became

with New York City's painters

and the visual artwork here.

And I started to follow it and s

and wanted to be a part of it.

There was always something in me

that knew I had to come here,

just because of what

I read and what I saw.

And I always felt a magnet

pulling me towards here.

You wanna make it last

- [Scooter] It was always my

end goal to kind of come here,

and I did the steps to get here.

You wanna make it last

(somber music)

- [Scooter] I knew that I belong

I've built a really nice

life for myself here,

and I've surrounded myself

with a lot of creative people.

When I moved here in 2001

I worked for a company called Ea

It's in Soho.

And everything was closed due to

You could still smell the

burn of the buildings.

(intense music)

So the city was at a stillness,

and it had a blanket of anxiety

(gentle intense music)

- A beautiful job.

- It's beautiful.

- Thank you.

- I love it.

- [Gazelle] That's incredible.

I love that heavy line that you

(gentle music)

- Well, this is a portrait.

We did that in his studio.

It was having really rough time

(heart beating)

There is so much information.

If you can see, I have a coral s

That's my heart bleeding.

(gentle music)

His art is not for everybody.

Art is just very personal.

So we are in the city where

it's all about the money.

The Chelsea galleries

have picked up on him.

(gentle music)

Some of these galleries might th

maybe his clientele would

not like so much his work.

For your art to be more

accepted you have to do this.

And I don't think that

will play well with him.

You need to have ba*ls in a

city like New York to say,

"No, I won't do that."

But that's fine.

He'll get there somehow.

- When I first moved to New York

I was trying to send my images

out to various galleries,

and I probably sent my images to

to hundreds of galleries,

and I never got responses or alw

So my experience with

these more established

and blue chip galleries

is they have to come and seek yo

(gentle music)

- Downtown New York,

it's where the people

more courageous and brave,

and the artists are free.

They're doing the art because th

They're not really thinking

about the fame and the success.

(gentle music)

Probably all those Chelsea galle

at some point will just

regret it for not having

given him the space.

It's not that he needs

this person deserves

on those galleries, too.

That's how I feel.

- Coming from San Francisco,

where I was a well-known artist,

here you have to start

over again and get humble.

Nobody knew me here.

You can't come to this town

and think you're going to take

it over in the first year.

You don't.

It's very 80s not to be humble

and to be like me, me,

me, me, me, I'm a star.

Don't you know who I am?

I mean, I'm a f*cking star, come

It's not like that today.

And there's no discovering of pe

That's bullshit.

People don't get discovered.

People work on their

craft for all these years,

who they've been studying it

probably since they were six.

I have not met one person who

got instant fame like that.

It's people that have been

working their whole life

and showing up and

being easy to work with.

Very, very, very

- 2015 was a big year for Scoote

because it was around that time

where he and Patricia Field

really established their relatio

It was like an incredible valida

because Patricia Field is very w

in the fashion world.

She was the stylist of "Sex and

Before that, she was a

champion for Keith Haring,

which was one of Scooter's

main inspirations.

She gave Jean-Michele Basquiat

his first show at her bazaar.

So for him to be associated with

was a very defining moment for h

- I'm very grateful to her,

and I just love how much freedom

she gives all these

artists who work with her.

She never tells people

what direction to go in

or how to paint something

or what to paint.

She just allows people to be who

And I think that's the key to he

- If I have an idea I always

tell Scooter about it,

because he works with you.

He's so collaborative.

It makes the work so much more i

when you have that positive atti

You can see the stars

- Collaboration, I always

want to meet the people

that I collaborate with and

see if I vibe with them.

There's something in the music

- My friend Helixx Armageddon is

She's a musician.

She's a performance artist.

She's a singer.

She's a dancer.

She memorizes everything.

The rumors in your head

- The thing that I absolutely

love about Scooter's work,

there's the drama, the

hope, the strangeness.

His paintings are a world unto t

Will always take you through

The only one you need

- Scooter and I,

following the q*eer March,

we were having a conversation

just around the state of the wor

and everything that has been hap

You walk down the Bowery,

you can see used needles on the

There's a lot of suffering happe

and a lot of people really strug

led to this idea of we should co

Is God waitin' for me on

the other side of pain

Does God know my name now

The funnel of energy that led to

two different things happening,

me writing two poems,

one focused on what it feels

like to have depression

and what it feels like to suffer

And the second, coming

of age in this time,

what's happening right now in th

I sent those two poems over to S

Created the artwork that you saw

which was the centerpiece

for the performance.

Got weary eyes, mind

and body disconnected.

I actually like to try to

embody the poem itself,

and the piece has so many elemen

And as I was looking at it,

I was imagining if I had

to act the story out,

what would it look like?

What would it feel like?

I had a few rehearsals with Scoo

I'm secure,

even with depression, clamped on

- I learned new things.

For instance, with Helixx,

I started writing poetry

after I collaborated with her.

(crowd cheering)

- Thank you, thank you.

Scooter, please, please.

(audience cheering)

Everything here is found.

This is a tape measure

I found on the street,

and the handle from a broomstick

Fake flowers, a carnation.

This I found in the dumpster.

- Everything that I have

from Scooter is custom made.

There was always a process,

that we go together and we get t

and we do fittings.

So by the time I get to

wear it, it is comfortable.

- Gazelle's collaborations

usually start with an

idea that Gazelle has.

'Cause Gazelle, to me,

is a performance artist,

and Gazelle's ideas are very

specific and very planned.

- It was made by someone

who really understands

who I am as a visual artist.

If it's too tight, if it's too w

if it's just part of what it is

four hours or five hours

wearing a Scooter LaForge piece,

just because it is his.

I have to wash it by hand very c

Some pieces are never washed,

but the thing is I only wear

something maybe once or twice.

Love love

When he does a dress or a look f

after that I do the styling,

and then he no longer has contro

because it comes my style into h

One of the things that really

makes me alive as an artist

is the reaction that I get from

Scooter also tries to experiment

because he knows I'm

not afraid to go places

where people won't go.

It's a very masculine work, what

When I say masculine, it's very

So the styling that I do is just

a little more glamorous

as Gazelle and more soft,

because my visual language

is a little more feminine,

so I need to smooth it down.

I have to choose the perfect pai

and the perfect pair of

earrings so it won't clash.

He trusts my judgment on what to

- We go back and forth

about five or six times,

and then all of a sudden it's fi

Legs and arms still feeling fi

If nothing's left

- Gazelle always has these

wild, surrealistic ideas,

and she inspires me to

think out of the box.

Love

(gentle guitar music)

How about that?

A drop of this wood

glue, just for security.

Okay, there we go.

Ethan Minsker has become sort

of a little brother to me

that I like to brutalize,

but at the same time, I'll do

anything in the world for him.

He's a brilliant draftsman.

He is a filmmaker, a painter,

animator, a sculptor.

And when it's closed

- What I find amazing about Scoo

is his ability to adapt to

the change in environment.

The galleries are closed?

Move your artwork out onto the s

Canvases may not be selling so q

Put it on the clothes.

And that is what's going

to make him successful

no matter what happens around hi

It's something that we can all l

And they threw you in the camp

- I've been walking around the c

and I'm trying not to

just keep my head down.

I want to look up.

Say hello to

- And that's where you

find the water towers.

The water towers come

in all shapes and sizes.

It's just like a reflection of t

who live in the city.

There's something that's

hidden in the skylines

that symbolizes the

uniqueness of New York City

and its strength to persist.

I make the water towers

out of papier-mch

and recycled material.

- Ethan came over with his water

They were white and they

were pristine and brand new.

He just let me go free on those,

and his work is sculptural,

so it inspired me to make sculpt

Justice

- I think when you're collaborat

you always want to pick a

stronger artist than yourself,

somebody who you admire.

Then your message is

spreading through his message.

You're learning from his process

Say hello to Kennedy

Say hello to Saran Saran

Say hello to David Koresh for

- I see different ways to work,

adds another dimension to my wor

helps me to work with

different personalities.

And say goodbye

- Look at that.

This, I felt like the

orange was too strong.

And if it doesn't work,

I'll paint it white again

and start all over again,

or just go outside and throw

this in the garbage can.

It's a little guy giving you flo

Look.

He's handing you a carnation.

Another thing I like to do

is hold these in the mirror

from really far back to

see what they look like,

because you get a really,

a perspective against the wall

that from far away in the mirror

You get to see how it

looks really far away.

(Faire L'amour N'est Pas Loin")

Here's my collection of clothes.

It's pretty low right now.

(Faire L'amour N'est Pas Loin")

This is a jacket I'm working on

(Faire L'amour N'est Pas Loin")

- When he delivered a

T-shirt is when we met

for the first time.

Looks like Allen Ginsberg,

but it also looks like me.

He treats the clothing

with the same approach as the pa

They're moving canvases.

In some cases they're sculptures

Regardless of the surface,

he'll make it work.

I mean, for example, if you

see this vest I'm wearing,

it's practically a combine.

And it has elements that

you can interact with,

like this face.

- [Scooter] These are found obje

I have this-

- Is that a rubber head?

- This is rubber head, yeah.

It's like a puppet.

Make love to me, Ethan.

Some leather.

See, this could be his hair.

(Faire L'amour N'est Pas Loin")

- I first met Scooter LaForge

when I had my shop on the Bowery

and in the beginning I said to S

"Scooter, you can't use the Chan

"They are always watching me,

"and I've gotten threatened of l

"So just cut out the trademarked

"because we are not exactly anon

- This tote bag is a milestone

in Scooter's clothing combine

because it references Chanel,

as you can see in the logos.

I mean, it has all these wonderf

with little skeletons

and these delicate strips

of fabric and beads.

Chanel copied this and made

it into their collections.

The fake Chanel became the

real Chanel in their iteration.

(Faire L'amour N'est Pas Loin")

- This is kind of funny,

but I think it's a little distra

Here we go

Dressed to thrill

- His details are so

cared for.

Here's a little sleeve sewn on.

He sews things on his garments

as well as paints them.

And that just increases

the originality of him.

Get that fill

Gold, velvet, skinny men

- So I sort of mimic the shape h

Do you see this?

Follow it with the scissors real

See, that actually is perfect th

There, and there's his hair.

Every girl (voice muffling)

Every boy's in a band

- The back has a little ruffle o

but the front is a t-shirt.

And today with cross genders,

it all works.

Girls in velvet

- So this dress

is a Frankenstein dress,

made from thermal underwear.

And I love the veil.

Scooter had found this

sign on the street.

(laughing) I just loved it,

'cause I thought it was

so wonderful, raise plow.

So I said, well,

I think it would be really

cool to wear it as a necklace.

Scooter signed it, see.

So this is like a Scooter ready

The clothes were really

a place where Scooter

would try out new things.

Experiment, contributed to that

where he can then adding to

your painting vocabulary.

("Workaholic")

- His art and his fashion

are interconnected.

I mean, put this in a frame

and it's like, oh, that's art.

I could stick one of his art pai

over my head and that's fashion.

And that's how it should be.

- I see Scooter's fashion as

more like shamanistic robes.

Identities.

You become melded with the art.

("Workaholic")

- Company called JCRT,

they were interested

in using some of my paintings

in their plaid shirts,

'cause they focus on plaid.

And I've been fans of theirs for

and I hadn't really met them in

but I went to go meet these

guys, and we instantly vibed.

If there's not a connection ther

if it's something that I don't l

it's not going to work for me.

("Workaholic")

- I'm the quiet one.

- Pen and Teller.

He would give us a piece.

We would then play with it,

send it back to him,

and it became a sort of

back and forth sharing,

taking his work out of

the context of a painting

and putting it into a plaid,

not just a print all over me swe

but a new expression of his work

Feels as though they've been

painted onto the fabric.

It feels as though

they're three dimensional.

It feels as though you can

kinda touch and feel the work.

That just comes from that sort o

back and forth layering

that we've done together.

- It almost made them less provo

and maybe a little more playful.

So I think more people were will

embrace the collaboration.

- There's hidden sh*t everywhere

but that's what's so f*cking

amazing about Scooter's work.

There's just always some

bunny doing something.

Yeah, so this is literally a

picture of a Smurf jerking off,

and I think he is ejaculating

the Medusa's head.

What's amazing is seeing the

people who are wearing it

and not really realizing the ful

of what they're wearing.

That's what makes good fashion,

is when there is something a lit

and not everybody has to

know everything that you're-

- Hidden gems.

- Yeah they're hidden little

things in your clothing.

("Workaholic")

- These are just kind of added b

just to see people

wearing them on the street

is a really big payoff.

(Walter speaking in foreign lang

- [Translator] For me, fashion

is all about communication.

All the painting was

done by Scooter LaForge.

He has done a really amazing job

and he worked very hard on it.

We started by doing all the pain

and afterwards they were

all either woven or printed.

So it was a lengthy process.

- Walter and I have been

working on this show together

for about three months.

We've never met before,

only through emails.

So this is the first time

I'm really ever meeting him.

- He sent me ten words,

and he's like, "Just go for it,

He sent me the ten words that

represented this collection,

and he's like, "Do whatever you

"I don't wanna have any rules.

"Paint however you want.

"Get your true feelings out on t

"Use big, bold brush strokes.

"Really go wild."

So I just let all my inhibitions

and I just let the paint come ou

And you saw the results.

("Workaholic")

- Here, this is a painted seashe

This could be a nose.

Here's an anchor.

This could be an earring.

But that I can use the machine.

("Workaholic")

- When I first got the

jacket, I was speechless.

It makes me feel bigger than I a

I'm not a large person.

Everybody wants to know where

it came from, who created it.

It does bring a lot of attention

("Workaholic")

I'm wearing something that only

(Ivy laughing)

("Workaholic")

- [Scooter] So I had

all those retail jobs,

and then I started painting on and I started selling

them in Patricia Field,

and said to myself, I'm

gonna go down to part-time.

My T-shirts started to get more

and the paintings started to bec

a little bit more well known.

And then I was like, f*ck it.

I'm gonna take the leap

of faith and quit this job

and do this full-time.

("Workaholic")

- Ever since I did that

I've been surviving,

and intuitively I've

felt like I was ready,

because I was clearheaded.

I wasn't a mess on drugs and alc

Being a successful artist,

you've got to be able to show up

and you've got to be able to del

and you have to be good at what

So if you don't have all

those three things down,

the other person's going to get

("Workaholic")

(gentle music)

I've gotten more confident in pa

and I'm not afraid to paint in p

and I'm not afraid to paint, per

I mean, that's the one thing

in life I'm not afraid of.

I deal with a lot of fear and an

and somebody asked me to

paint something for them

and they know my style of artwor

I have no problem doing it.

And I don't have a problem doing

if people are watching me.

I'm thankful for that.

'Cause I know a lot of

artists who can't do that

and paint with people around.

(gentle music)

I did the Beef Jerky Show.

It was a residency, and I

went there to go paint nature

and forest animals and flowers.

And then I had this idea to come

with painting the fairytale

Hansel and Gretel,

because that house reminded

me of the old witch's house.

(gentle intense music)

The reason I called it Beef Jerk

the true fable of Hansel and Gre

they actually took the children'

Hansel, and they dried

him and they made jerky

out of his organs and

his muscles and stuff,

and that's what they ate during

the great famine in Germany.

(gentle music)

("Harmony for Disarmament")

- Kind of withdrawn at times.

So you'll see him and it's like

he maybe doesn't even say hello.

- I get fearful in crowded rooms

Like there's kind of a

social weird anxiety thing

that happens to me in crowded ro

I'm not afraid to kind of speak

but I get afraid of weird things

Sometimes I get dizzy and then..

I'm still afraid that people

aren't going to like me

or accept me.

If somebody says something bad

or sometimes you get a lot of ha

it makes me afraid.

("Harmony for Disarmament")

It's weird when the fear kicks i

If I go to art openings by mysel

and I feel like I'm a fraud

or I don't belong there.

("Harmony for Disarmament")

I'm glad I wore that mask

and that bear costume,

'cause I wanted to have

another layer of art in there

with these characters,

'cause I love animals.

And yes, it was really nice for

to kind of have a barrier,

because sometimes when you're

talking to a lot of people

and you're listening to a

lot of people's stories,

a lot of people telling me about

their art and what they do,

and all this bombardment of info

in one night can be

daunting and overwhelming.

We're wired

- I had envisioned that in my he

and wanted that to happen.

Add another layer of interest to

and have these weird

stuffed animal plushy people

running around.

("Harmony for Disarmament")

So this last show at Howl!

I did five really large painting

They were seventeen feet,

which is bigger than this room,

by thirteen feet high.

And what I had done is

I went into the gallery

and kind of measured

them bespoke to the walls

all about Pompeii,

specifically the erotic murals i

which I've been obsessed

with my whole life

because I saw them in National G

They became my first introductio

to porn or eroticism.

I always have those in my head.

And the first time we look at st

that is titillating for us.

I'll never forget it.

So I've always been obsessed

with these erotic frescoes

in Pompeii because they

depict people having sex

and men with men, which

really turned me on,

and a lot of phalluses and women

and they had all these brothels

all over the city of Pompeii.

All Italian cities were like tha

That just got preserved.

I painted Mount Vesuvius,

and I put a big black cloud up t

And I started thinking about dea

like that cloud could represent

and then I started

associating sex with death.

And then I started thinking abou

me moving to San Francisco

in the late 80s and early 90s

and see all of these people die,

(gentle intense music)

It just seemed like there was

so much sex going on there,

and all of a sudden everyone

died 'cause of the volcano.

So I kind of saw this parallelis

and then this black cloud

could also represent global warm

It could also represent the turm

that the United States is under

So it had a lot of metaphors,

and every time people go into th

they see different things in the

'cause it opens a door

for other people's

viewpoints to see stuff.

And then they relay that stuff t

and I get inspired by that.

("Clockblock Remixed")

- The openings are the business

and then there's love affair wit

And that comes when you go on yo

Hey mama, let me buy you a bee

Hey baby, hey mama

- Literally calls to me,

come to me, come to me.

And I go right up to the canvas.

I wanna f*ck the canvas.

- So Scooter's work last night,

so seeing the paintings in real

life as compared to online,

it's a very different thing

to see the brush strokes,

an intimate relationship with th

And that you're not going to get

And you're not going to get

at an art opening either.

You have to have the intention

to have the intimacy with the ar

and go during gallery hours

when you're not called

upon to be socializing.

You're looking for attention

- Going out and going to museums

and going to galleries and

looking at other's paintings,

it's a huge practice for me

and a huge part of my routine.

And you wanna feel cool

- People have different reasons

why they show the paintings.

Some people want to make money.

'Cause some people, it's

really about money and sales,

and other people it's about

the love of the artwork.

Hey sexy, hey hot stuff,

why don't ya come over here

Hey sexy, hey hot stuff,

let me buy you a beer

Hey sexy, hey hot stuff,

why don't ya come over here

Hey sexy, hey hot stuff,

let me buy you a beer

Smile it can't

- [Scooter] And the way I

think about my audience is

what can I do on the painting

that's going to make it look spe

a*s is sweet

Give me a bite to eat

- I did look back on

historical other painters,

going back to caveman drawings.

Cave paintings and hieroglyphics

are the essence of painting and

and I go back and look at that,

and everything in front of that.

And you wanna feel cool

- To simplify,

some of my works can be very

complicated and maximalist.

As far as commercialism,

going into some of these art fai

feels like a shopping mall.

But I don't know if that's a

place for an artist to hang out

because it's really soul sucking

Don't come lookin' for me, boy

- But there's some art fairs

that are really, really super, s

like Spring Break.

(intense music)

Yes, Spring Break,

been collecting these old vessel

that were clay and bisque fire

that reminded me of pots that

you would find in Pompeii.

And I collected about 25 of them

Why don't you call it

Mount Vesuvius Fire Sale?

That's something that would be k

on a souvenir stand at Mount Ves

And then I painted these

little phallic symbols,

and I painted these little statu

that were sent.

A satyr from Greece, and

they were really popular.

So it kind of looked

like a souvenir stand,

or an excavation site

you would see in Pompeii.

Go for a drive

Hold your hand

Drunk on a dare

Be my honey

- I have a lot on my mind

and trying to figure it out exac

Thank you.

We're going to set up the table.

We're going to do this wall

and then finish this wall.

It's like,

like an organism.

Who knows when it's going to eve

It's like an amoeba,

when the cells split over and ov

It's art for life.

It's movie extra life.

So, we could leave this white,

and it could be a break to the

eye or it can go around it.

What if I put this

painting underneath here?

And there's this, do this longer

We all navigate or go for a dr

Wanna take you with me

Take you on a ride

(voice muffling)

- [Scooter] And I did want to ge

Either fake flowers or real flow

We all navigate or go for a dr

I'll take you with me

Take you for a ride

- [Scooter] And it says "people

are peculiar" in Hebrew.

(voices muffling)

So tapped out.

("Instafunk")

- Ted, how's this here?

And then we're going to be almos

("Instafunk")

Now it's all about fine tuning i

("Instafunk")

During the Spring Break Art Fair

our country started coming

down with coronavirus.

I feel very lucky and fortunate,

because thousands and thousands

came through my Spring Break art

and I didn't get sick,

but the country did get sick,

and in particular, this city got

and all been quarantined for thr

and over the past three months,

the death toll is getting

up to 20,000 people.

I think we're at close to

18,000, only in New York City.

(somber music)

During this quarantine time,

which started March 1st,

we were all stuck inside our apa

I live in a tiny one-bedroom apa

I started to get really bored

with myself and bored with TV,

and I noticed I had paintings

underneath my kitchen sink

and some old paint brushes.

I thought to myself, I'm

going to make this a cave.

Let's do a coronavirus cave pain

I don't need all of this outside

stimulation to create work.

I don't need a lot of product,

as far as paint and brushes.

I painted my whole apartment

with four colors of paint.

I used my hands.

I used paper towels to rub in.

I learned a lot of new

things, and it got me excited.

It got my adrenaline going,

so I kept going and going and go

and now I would say 98% of all t

in my apartment are covered in p

(crowd clapping and chanting)

- [Crowd] Black Lives Matter.

Black Lives Matter.

Black Lives Matter.

Black Lives Matter.

Black Lives Matter.

Black Lives Matter.

Black Lives Matter.

Black Lives Matter.

Black Lives Matter.

(crowd yelling and glass smashin

(people banging on glass)

(glass shattering)

(people murmuring)

(gentle music)

A man by the name of George Floy

m*rder*d by a police officer,

and this caused riots

throughout the whole country.

For every action there's a react

So the action of the

m*rder of George Floyd

caused this reaction.

It's a simple law of the univers

It's Newton's law.

All these windows on Bowery

Street are all smashed down.

Within the next few days

they get boarded up.

You walk down the street and it

we are in a ghost town.

Outside the windows

There's papers rollin'

- Over the last couple of weeks

a lot of the storefronts

here on the Bowery have been boa

There's all this canvas now for

to just go and do whatever they

I want to make a positive mural.

I support the Black Lives Matter

support the Pride movement,

and so I just want to make

something that's about love,

and it's something positive

to look at right now.

It's crashes

- I'm still continuing

to try and go out there

and do the next right thing

and spread a positive

loving message to everyone.

(lively guitar music)

g*y Pride is coming up.

So SpongeBob has recently

come out as a g*y.

James had this idea to a paint S

and then I started

painting pink triangles.

So there's probably about seven

underneath that mural.

I was really happy with

the way it came out.

(folky music)

- He's so humble and he is so co

and he's always down to

do this kind of stuff.

I have a lot of artist friends

that are less well known than Sc

that I told about this.

"Nobody's paying for the paint,

"and the boards are coming down.

"I'm not gonna bother."

I told Scooter, he was very

excited about it right away.

I was excited about it.

And then when Scooter was

excited, I was even more excited

(folky music)

- And I think anything's

better than these boards.

And a lot of reform that needs t

and systematic change.

There's a lot of horrible stuff.

I just hope we can fix this prob

(folky music)

- Being stuck at home,

not having a lot of outside

sources of entertainment,

it has affected me a lot.

And what it's done, on the posit

forced me to go internally.

That has manifested as meditatio

a forced art residency,

got to really go inside

and figure a few things out in m

(folky music)

- We've gone through this whole

where we have the masters,

we have the best painters ever,

and now we're not,

it's not even about

the best painters ever.

I think now it's about

getting a message out.

(folky music)

- No, one's really buying

paintings right now.

Since the coronavirus happened,

all of my jobs have been put to

I haven't been able to do

any of my side painting jobs I w

So my income has been absolute z

(folky music)

What I did do was I made

a coronavirus T-shirt

and offered it for sale,

and the proceeds of the

sales for that T-shirt

went to the Coalition for the h*

and I sold about sixty shirts.

(folky music)

- [Scooter] Yeah, it's a small o

They're wipes.

They're body wipes.

Toothpaste and toothbrush, you w

- Yes.

- This is

a red velvet cookie and chocolat

Yeah, you're welcome.

And feminine products.

(folky music)

That's men's underwear, there's

light gray and dark gray.

That one in your hand.

I think that one is, look at it.

And this one.

And this one.

It's new.

It's brand new.

(voice muffling)

This is men's underwear

and women's underwear,

and that's toothpaste and toothb

I just thought that would

be a good place for me

to start to help out some other

(folky music)

Yeah I need it every day baby

("Sensualite'")

- With the recent United

States Supreme court ruling,

says that we can't discriminate

against LGBTQAI people,

and this was quite a

landmark for everyone,

especially for me and my family,

because my sister, who

was in the military,

and had already devoted twenty y

of her life to the Navy,

was kicked out of the Navy

because she was l*sbian.

Reached out to

- This devastated her life.

She served in the Gulf w*r.

She put her life at risk in the

She flew C21 helicopters.

Her roommate reported

her as being l*sbian,

and the Navy,

after this full career, kicked h

And in that day she was done.

The dreams from the days passi

- And it's something

that she's had to deal

with her whole life,

just because she was l*sbian.

That's it.

Through the smoke and fog

- I'm grateful that people

can't be fired anymore

just for being g*y or just

for acting effeminate.

I've seen people been fired for

Then behind the sunshine

- Now it's against the law for t

(gentle music)

You know, the paintings,

I don't even draw on this canvas

I do love to draw, and I draw a

And when I paint, I tend

to draw with the paint,

and I don't correct lines.

I just don't work that way.

I tend to just be really

free with the paint.

(lively guitar music)

- I imagine future

generations looking back,

if they really want to get to kn

what's happening right now,

all you have to do is look at hi

and register all those different

emotions that you feel.

And that will teleport you

back to this moment right now.

It's all captured in his work.

(folky music)

- This probably has like

seven layers in here.

That's where new discoveries are

There's definitely moments

where concepts materialize.

This painting and this

painting are all from Venice.

And they had a lot of

religious paintings here,

so I came back and I decided to

a whole series of paintings

on religious works.

So concepts do come from

my personal experiences.

(folky music)

- As an artist, you're bullied b

History said it must be this.

It must be like this.

It must be like that.

And what I see in Scooter's work

he goes back and forth,

back and forth into history.

He's redoing Picasso.

He's making you look at Cezanne

He's making you think about

classical Renaissance painting.

He's sending you way out

to the mysterious clothing that

Unexpected artistic experience

in today's painting.

That's really unusual.

- Sometimes I paint television s

and sometimes I paint shoes

and bags and cardboard.

These are gonna be masks.

- I mean, from the second I saw

I said this guy's going to be bi

And I think it's going to

keep exponentially growing

after he's gone.

If I outlive him,

that's gonna be my 401K.

- I try and explore and do

new things and keep it fresh.

That's the beautiful thing about

It's endless.

Always can find something

new to do with just

a tube and a canvas.

He said, this one

- It's not finite.

It's infinite.

(folky music)

- I believe that at this

point in the 21st century,

the notion of what art

is, is up for grabs.

What is relevant?

And I think the importance

of Scooter's work,

because he has such an

extensive vocabulary,

it's almost like he

knows various languages.

(folky music)

I think that his art is a remix,

a reinvention of the

traditions of the old masters.

(folky music)

Oh yeah

Oh why

Buried in black

(intense guitar music)

- [Scooter] In the history of ar

where is my work going to be pla

That's not for me to say,

because I'm not an art historian

Was out there on the porch of

Which said, shook my

hand and said Hey Joe

- [Scooter] All I know is

I have these paintings.

This is plastic, basically.

So this is going to last a long

time, 'cause I used acrylic.

Lit it simultaneously

I'm a gifted guy

You know what I mean

- [Scooter] I've seen artists wh

and who have created a big,

beautiful body of work,

and then they die,

and then all of their stuff

in a dumpster on the street.

Who knows what's gonna happen wi

It could be in a dumpster.

And it could be in a museum.

And the only reason that

van Gogh's is where he is

is because of his brother

Theo's wife, Johanna van Gogh.

And she kept all their letters,

and Johanna kept all

of Vincent's paintings,

and if she didn't keep all that

I don't think he would

be where he is today.

It takes that person who loves

art and who loves archiving

and the history of art

to place it in history.

And if I'm lucky enough to

have that person in my life,

that would be great, but I

don't know if that'll happen.

(camera popping)

(paper tearing)

"Alternative Dreamland"

- But anything else you want to

- [Ethan] No, you did wonderful.

"Alternative Dreamland"

Bayside vanished to sunset

We waited all day long to be t

- I've been really frustrated,

I've been really beat down,

but I never gave up on painting.

I do a lot of stuff for free.

And it's keeping me going.

It's keeping the ball rolling.

Every now and then I do

get a nice paying job

that pays my rents and it keeps

me going for another month.

That's my theory on

surviving in the art world.

("Alternative Dreamland")

- Tap tap tap tap tap (laughing)

- [Ethan] I'll be in the editing

being like ahh.

(Helixx laughing)