Lady Gaga’s Bluffin’ With her Muffin

by Art Fag City on November 21, 2009 · 39 comments

POST BY PADDY JOHNSON
LEFT: Lady Gaga, Bad Romance in Gossip Girl, 2009 RIGHT: Dana Karwas and Karla Karwas, Party Dress, January 30, 2008

Vagina lying (aka muffin bluffin) is a probably a strong way to put the variety of uncredited art influences that appear in Lady Gaga videos, but artists aren’t always happy to see permutations of their work show up on TV without their permission. Dana and Karla Karwas, for example, contacted me earlier this week, complaining that Gaga’s recent performance for Gossip Girl clearly drew on their Beverly Semmes like party dress with three ladders. This fall, Party Dress piece was exhibited at the Dumbo Art Under the Bridge Festival, amongst other venues.

I spotted at least a couple of less obvious Matthew Barney influences in the Bad Romance video itself, which made me think that a post about art inspired pop culture imagery was in order. A few highlights below:


LEFT: Twelve Monkeys still, RIGHT: Photograph by Lebbeus Woods. Image via: Life Without Buildings

Dana Karwas pointed me to the two part image above. According to Life Without Buildings blogger Jimmy Stamp, Lebbeus Woods sued Universal Pictures for their unauthorized use of the image and won. He allowed the studio to use the image, but took the financial settlement, which Stamp suggests was significant.


RIGHT: Showgirls, LEFT: Tono Stano, The Sense, 1992

There’s no controversy to this story: MGM Studios bought Tono Stano’s image and then used it in their cult classic film Showgirls.


RIGHT: Robert Longo, Untitled, (White Riot), from Men in The Cities, 1982, LEFT: Britney Spears, Womanizer, 2008

So far as I can tell there’s no real copyright issue here, but obviously an influence. I would guess Spears’ producers aren’t the only creatives who have drawn from Longo’s Men in The Cities.


LEFT: Lady Gaga, Poker Face, 2009, RIGHT: Eve Sussman/The Rufus Corporation, Rape of the Sabine Woman, 2007, video

Speaking to the subject of the influence of waring figures in suits, given the number of images I’ve seen exploring this subject, I’m inclined to call the phenomenon a genre. I’m sure there are at least a few scenes readers could add to the list.

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  • neorush

    Dana & Karla knocked theirs off from someone else. I have been seeing that “big dress” thing for 8-10 years…

  • neorush

    Dana & Karla knocked theirs off from someone else. I have been seeing that “big dress” thing for 8-10 years…

  • neorush
  • neorush
  • neorush

    didnt grace jones do it way back when too?

  • neorush

    didnt grace jones do it way back when too?

  • http://mteww.com m.river
  • http://mteww.com m.river
  • onomatopoea

    Fashion appropriates from art without credit or care. Whatever you can get away with. The art world cares because artists generally don’t get paid by the hour or on commission – that’s why you need art police.

    Dress Costume a 1:20 – The whole video is derivative though…
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OY0536g_6Wc

    SOme other examples of similarity I like:

    Dance – Creepy. Picture a little MJ in front of the TV.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8mJsgPj1iU

    Elmgreen and Dragset’s ball and chain may be parallel development – though the effect and “contnet” is a bit different:Elmgreen and Dragset:
    http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_NTgb8LFSL08/Stn5HYi9ANI/AAAAAAAACGc/Kv_IemDCkJs/s1600-h/frie-395.jpg

    Jason Sprinkle:
    http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_NTgb8LFSL08/Stn5HCFujzI/AAAAAAAACGU/e3N5k0Rp7FE/s1600-h/hammeringmanchain.jpg

  • onomatopoea

    Fashion appropriates from art without credit or care. Whatever you can get away with. The art world cares because artists generally don’t get paid by the hour or on commission – that’s why you need art police.

    Dress Costume a 1:20 – The whole video is derivative though…
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OY0536g_6Wc

    SOme other examples of similarity I like:

    Dance – Creepy. Picture a little MJ in front of the TV.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8mJsgPj1iU

    Elmgreen and Dragset’s ball and chain may be parallel development – though the effect and “contnet” is a bit different:Elmgreen and Dragset:
    http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_NTgb8LFSL08/Stn5HYi9ANI/AAAAAAAACGc/Kv_IemDCkJs/s1600-h/frie-395.jpg

    Jason Sprinkle:
    http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_NTgb8LFSL08/Stn5HCFujzI/AAAAAAAACGU/e3N5k0Rp7FE/s1600-h/hammeringmanchain.jpg

  • Chuckjones

    A few points. I read that Gaga was surprised by the 35 foot long dress when she came on the set. The ladder was her idea as a symbol of bad luck (which fit with the show’s script). The image above “left: Lady Gaga, Bad Romance” is actually a screen shot from the video Poker Face, not Bad Romance. It was part of a strip poker scene. If you look at the video, it does not look much like the “Rape of the Sabine Woman” and had nothing to do with rape. Finding a quick shot that looks like something else is a lot different than comparing the scenes of the two videos. That said, art progresses when artists influence others who take thing to different places.

  • Chuckjones

    A few points. I read that Gaga was surprised by the 35 foot long dress when she came on the set. The ladder was her idea as a symbol of bad luck (which fit with the show’s script). The image above “left: Lady Gaga, Bad Romance” is actually a screen shot from the video Poker Face, not Bad Romance. It was part of a strip poker scene. If you look at the video, it does not look much like the “Rape of the Sabine Woman” and had nothing to do with rape. Finding a quick shot that looks like something else is a lot different than comparing the scenes of the two videos. That said, art progresses when artists influence others who take thing to different places.

  • http://www.artfagcity.com Art Fag City

    I don’t think the Karwas dress is particularly original either — I mention the Beverly Semmes influence for that reason — but the three ladders on set is an obvious similarity regardless.

    Thanks for the caption correction – it was a labeling mistake.

    Obviously The Rape of the Sabine Woman has nothing to do with Poker Face. This post does not compare them in any other way than to note the aesthetic similarity between the two, and the frequency with which this imagery shows up in the broader culture often in completely different contexts.

  • http://www.artfagcity.com Art Fag City

    I don’t think the Karwas dress is particularly original either — I mention the Beverly Semmes influence for that reason — but the three ladders on set is an obvious similarity regardless.

    Thanks for the caption correction – it was a labeling mistake.

    Obviously The Rape of the Sabine Woman has nothing to do with Poker Face. This post does not compare them in any other way than to note the aesthetic similarity between the two, and the frequency with which this imagery shows up in the broader culture often in completely different contexts.

  • gf

    Toshiba recently copied a video by artist simon faithfull.noriginal: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hSDbAo2WMkncopy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6PSbUl_68k

  • gf

    Toshiba recently copied a video by artist simon faithfull.\noriginal: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hSDbAo2WMk\ncopy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6PSbUl_68k

  • Marina Galperina

    The Big Dress Saga continues. Back in 2004: Bjork, Olympics opening ceremony. Watch as the dress rises to cover the coliseum field: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FdjF-FCQhk (no audio)

  • Marina Galperina

    The Big Dress Saga continues. Back in 2004: Bjork, Olympics opening ceremony. Watch as the dress rises to cover the coliseum field: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FdjF-FCQhk (no audio)

  • Ginger

    I am not sure that the “Bad Romance” labeling was simply a labeling mistake . . . the still from the “Poker Face” video should be dated 2008 as opposed to 2009.

    Sorry, I don’t mean to nit-pick. These simple dating accuracies cannot just be held to high art or trendy art, and then carelessly applied to a pop music video — particularly when you are comparing the two.

    I’m afraid that your flippant labeling reveals a certain ‘rush to judgment’ on your part, and I’m not convinced that these art references that you suggest “influence” current pop imagery can be said to represent an origin either. However, I appreciate your writing on the matter, if for no other reason than that it highlights “similarities” as opposed to naive riffings of high art. I too thought of Matthew Barney when I watched the “Bad Romance” video for the first time…

  • Ginger

    I am not sure that the “Bad Romance” labeling was simply a labeling mistake . . . the still from the “Poker Face” video should be dated 2008 as opposed to 2009.

    Sorry, I don’t mean to nit-pick. These simple dating accuracies cannot just be held to high art or trendy art, and then carelessly applied to a pop music video — particularly when you are comparing the two.

    I’m afraid that your flippant labeling reveals a certain ‘rush to judgment’ on your part, and I’m not convinced that these art references that you suggest “influence” current pop imagery can be said to represent an origin either. However, I appreciate your writing on the matter, if for no other reason than that it highlights “similarities” as opposed to naive riffings of high art. I too thought of Matthew Barney when I watched the “Bad Romance” video for the first time…

  • Ginger

    I am not sure that the “Bad Romance” labeling was simply a labeling mistake . . . the still from the “Poker Face” video should be dated 2008 as opposed to 2009.

    Sorry, I don’t mean to nit-pick. These simple dating accuracies cannot just be held to high art or trendy art, and then carelessly applied to a pop music video — particularly when you are comparing the two.

    I’m afraid that your flippant labeling reveals a certain ‘rush to judgment’ on your part, and I’m not convinced that these art references that you suggest “influence” current pop imagery can be said to represent an origin either. However, I appreciate your writing on the matter, if for no other reason than that it highlights “similarities” as opposed to naive riffings of high art. I too thought of Matthew Barney when I watched the “Bad Romance” video for the first time…

  • http://www.artfagcity.com Art Fag City

    You are nitpicking. In the lead sentence I identify artists – not myself – as the people who are unhappy about uncredited influences. This was not an accident.

    You can call a mistake in labeling careless, but it negates the act of finding and taking the screenshots, both of which took a bit of time. And if no earlier precedent than Longo’s Men in the Cities is offered up in a criticism about influences, than the comment is meaningless. Thus far, critics of this post have offered none.

    The point of these forums is not to prove that what’s been written is fallible, but to add to the knowledge base that’s already there. Comments that serve no other purpose that to demoralize the writers of this blog will no longer be published. There’s been far too much of that on this blog as of late, and it’s stopping as of now.

  • http://www.artfagcity.com Art Fag City

    You are nitpicking. In the lead sentence I identify artists – not myself – as the people who are unhappy about uncredited influences. This was not an accident.

    You can call a mistake in labeling careless, but it negates the act of finding and taking the screenshots, both of which took a bit of time. And if no earlier precedent than Longo’s Men in the Cities is offered up in a criticism about influences, than the comment is meaningless. Thus far, critics of this post have offered none.

    The point of these forums is not to prove that what’s been written is fallible, but to add to the knowledge base that’s already there. Comments that serve no other purpose that to demoralize the writers of this blog will no longer be published. There’s been far too much of that on this blog as of late, and it’s stopping as of now.

  • onomatopoea

    i bet if you talked to the designer in person they would be happy to admit their influences – and shut up the humbug here – artists are more careful to differentiate their brand – lady Gaga is a singer who performs at art world functions.

    The art world might like to make fashion as art but that doesn’t make it so. Making work about fashion is hard because people just see fashion. Mathew Barney has the look and feel of fashion (and is thus familiar in a sense) but is “edgier” – instead of oiled or painted bodies we get latex faces, rotting horse flesh, blood and anal seepage. Instead of Euro dance music we get hardcore bands from Connecticut.

    But there does seem to be a trend to make Barneyesque work – that is, fashion tries to have meaning – where Barney was picked up too young (and started relatively late) to have created a cosmology, created one on the fly under well funded fire. The fashion world co-opts cosmologies – throwaway paper dresses without ideological or deep idiosyncratic
    But the superficial similarities are what fashion is all about – and that’s kind of interesting.

    Lady Gaga, apparently, is a gay icon (like madonna) which hardly makes here original, but no one says that about vaudeville or football. It is what it is. You can do it well and add something along he way.

    I mean really, art is a kind of sport to most people who play in public.

    What I mean to say is, there is a lot of repetition in the art world as well as the fashion world – i see it more as a matter of timing and nuance (individual style) than a question of originality – something that seems to worry people here concerned with dates – the linear progress of art has been pretty well discredited except in the market place where Regina Hacket already wrote this article (this angle as they say) for money (before she was layed off).

    heres a list of tropes off the top:

    Decorated guns/guns made out of stuff
    Found objects used in multiple to create larger structures (pipe cleaners, cigarettes, coins, straws, cups, wood squares)
    People dancing in unison or performing some ritual (may pole, digging a hole, moshing, square dancing, running down the street)
    large heads as floor sculpture

    So become a tranny, learn to sing, if only badly, be a dj, and make soem art. Your fame awaits!

  • onomatopoea

    i bet if you talked to the designer in person they would be happy to admit their influences – and shut up the humbug here – artists are more careful to differentiate their brand – lady Gaga is a singer who performs at art world functions.

    The art world might like to make fashion as art but that doesn’t make it so. Making work about fashion is hard because people just see fashion. Mathew Barney has the look and feel of fashion (and is thus familiar in a sense) but is “edgier” – instead of oiled or painted bodies we get latex faces, rotting horse flesh, blood and anal seepage. Instead of Euro dance music we get hardcore bands from Connecticut.

    But there does seem to be a trend to make Barneyesque work – that is, fashion tries to have meaning – where Barney was picked up too young (and started relatively late) to have created a cosmology, created one on the fly under well funded fire. The fashion world co-opts cosmologies – throwaway paper dresses without ideological or deep idiosyncratic
    But the superficial similarities are what fashion is all about – and that’s kind of interesting.

    Lady Gaga, apparently, is a gay icon (like madonna) which hardly makes here original, but no one says that about vaudeville or football. It is what it is. You can do it well and add something along he way.

    I mean really, art is a kind of sport to most people who play in public.

    What I mean to say is, there is a lot of repetition in the art world as well as the fashion world – i see it more as a matter of timing and nuance (individual style) than a question of originality – something that seems to worry people here concerned with dates – the linear progress of art has been pretty well discredited except in the market place where Regina Hacket already wrote this article (this angle as they say) for money (before she was layed off).

    heres a list of tropes off the top:

    Decorated guns/guns made out of stuff
    Found objects used in multiple to create larger structures (pipe cleaners, cigarettes, coins, straws, cups, wood squares)
    People dancing in unison or performing some ritual (may pole, digging a hole, moshing, square dancing, running down the street)
    large heads as floor sculpture

    So become a tranny, learn to sing, if only badly, be a dj, and make soem art. Your fame awaits!

  • onomatopoea

    american music awards man, so unoriginal and derivative.

  • onomatopoea

    american music awards man, so unoriginal and derivative.

  • onomatopoea

    american music awards man, so unoriginal and derivative.

  • http://kayodetoday.blogspot.com Kayode

    Speaking of Gaga, I’m getting a Ryan Trecartin vibe from Beyonce’s Video Phone video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFHdA_4y78Q
    Things get terrifying after 1:00 but I was unable to resist the urge to run it back and watch her triple writhing action 7 times. Same thing with the first few minutes of I-BE AREA.

  • http://kayodetoday.blogspot.com Kayode

    Speaking of Gaga, I’m getting a Ryan Trecartin vibe from Beyonce’s Video Phone video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFHdA_4y78Q
    Things get terrifying after 1:00 but I was unable to resist the urge to run it back and watch her triple writhing action 7 times. Same thing with the first few minutes of I-BE AREA.

  • Thomas
  • Thomas
  • Thomas
  • pim avondrood

    analysis of gaga’s occult symbolism, interresting for some of you..

    http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=2737
    http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=2614
    http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=1676

  • pim avondrood

    analysis of gaga’s occult symbolism, interresting for some of you..

    http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=2737
    http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=2614
    http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=1676

  • aeh

    it has all been done before, originality is dead, its just how you use and re-shape what has already been done and I don’t see a problem with that.
    lady gaga for example knows exactly what she is doing and gives credit to most if not all the designers and influences she has working with her and around her.

  • aeh

    it has all been done before, originality is dead, its just how you use and re-shape what has already been done and I don’t see a problem with that.
    lady gaga for example knows exactly what she is doing and gives credit to most if not all the designers and influences she has working with her and around her.

  • salocin

    http://madonnarevelations.blogspot.com/2008/05/guy-bourdin-shes-not-me-shes-copy.htmlnn“The lawsuit against Madonna contained copyright infringement of at least 11 Bourdin works. Madonna was forced to pay $638,000 after copying ideas from a well-known artist without permission.”

  • salocin

    http://madonnarevelations.blogspot.com/2008/05/guy-bourdin-shes-not-me-shes-copy.html\n\n”The lawsuit against Madonna contained copyright infringement of at least 11 Bourdin works. Madonna was forced to pay $638,000 after copying ideas from a well-known artist without permission.”

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