On Sundays, I too go to church. The believers there ignore the pulpit to watch windows, stained with light.
Dick Cavett Interviews Jean-Luc Godard
I am very happy to share this with you. This is a rare tape of probably the two people that I’ve learned the most from in my creative life. When I started Letter to Jane Magazine my original concept was Dick Cavett meets the films of Jean-Luc Godard, which in theory boiled down to “a discussion of images.” It is because of Dick Cavett’s work, both with his show and his writing, that I decided to make the format a discussion with artists. The heart and soul of the magazine stems from the inspiration I get from watching and reading Jean-Luc Godard’s work. As a young photographer, I developed most of my thoughts on images from Roland Barthes, but like Barthes work my theories were a bit confused and too complex. Godard’s work helped me makes sense of it all. I would watch something like La Chinoise, La Gai Savoir, or Pierrot le fou and all of the sudden things would just click and make sense. I’ve mentioned before that with issue 01 I concentrated on how to bring these concepts to a magazine, and with issue 02 I stopped caring about the magazine format and just on the concepts. Issue 02 was about as close as I’ll probably get to directly showing my affection for these two men. I tried to make the text pure discussion ala Cavett and the background story pure images ala Godard.
As for the interview itself, it’s not exactly riveting, but it’s a great example of what is lost these days, a real discussion in the media. There are awkward pauses, some mistakes, and miscues, but that is exactly how a real discussion is. We are shown the real essence of that moment in time. This interview doesn’t feel manufactured or planned. In short, this is a rare glimpse at two masters of their craft getting together for our benefit, and I’m glad I was able to see this.
