Tonedeff – Masochist [Photography By: FUBZ] | (Click To Enlarge)

December always does it to me. Maybe it’s the level of lifeless gray that New York does so well, or maybe it’s the propsect of another year of uncertainty – but as the year comes to a close, I get to thinking about all the things I’ve done in the past as an artist. Today, I thought about this photo.

Now, I know most of y’all downloaded your copy of Archetype way back in the century of 2005, which has been evidenced to me repeatedly at live shows by “fans” who know all the words but don’t know what the album looks like. Carrying on from Friday’s Sacrifice post, I wanted to share one of my favorite images from the Archetype booklet.

This particular photo was shot by the incomparable FUBZ, (whom I’ll be working with again shortly). We’ve worked together for a few years now, and he’s my go-to-guy for conceptual work. He’s one of the few photographers that can take an idea and execute it in a way that’s exactly how I see it in my own head. You can’t pay for that kind of creative synergy. It just happens or it doesn’t.

We had a bunch of brainstorming sessions to figure out what image would best represent the feel of the song. The idea of killing yourself repeatedly for the sake of something (in this case ‘writing the truth’), was something that really struck home with me. After a slew of different approaches, we decided this particular chalk-concept was the move.

‘Art Is Suffering’

Download This Wallpaper: [1024×768] | [800×600]

We ended up shooting all of the shots for the booklet in a freezing warehouse which was formerly a war-era movie theater. This particular shot was done in bathroom, which hadn’t been used in eons. I remember there being rat traps everywhere that needed to be cleaned up. Funny enough, you can see the one rat trap that snuck it’s way into the photo, behind me on the right.

There was no heat in this place in the dead of winter, so it was ULTRA-brick. See-your-breath-brick. You know, when it’s so cold that you can’t seem to get your feet warm even an hour after you’re indoors? Mind you, my arms were still bleeding from having yards of industrial-stength duct-tape ripped off after the “Politics” 12” cover shoot earlier that morning. I kept thinking of the ‘art is suffering’ mantra to stay focused.

I was encouraged to go to town with the chalk on the walls and floors. As you can imagine, it took a couple hours to get it all jotted down. If you look closely enough at the words within the chalk body outlines, those are the lyrics for “Masochist”, started at different points in the verses per body. The floor was grizzly as hell, causing the chalk to snap every few letters. It was tedious as hell, but as an animator-on-the-low, I’m accustomed to tedium. Once all the chalkery was complete, we set up the lights, and Fubzilla did his thing. Needless to say, the pain was worth it, as this turned out to be one of my favorite shots in the book.

I hope y’all can re-dig it.

Hollerate.
Tone.