The face of Marks and Spencer and voice of Roxy Music outrages Germany in newspaper interview
'My God, the Nazis knew how to put themselves in the limelight... Leni Riefenstahl's movies, Albert Speer's buildings, the mass parades and the flags - just amazing. Really beautiful.'
Bryan Ferry in 'Welt Am Sonntag'
When Marks and Spencer recruited singer Bryan Ferry to be the face of its menswear collection, it believed his reputation as rock's "king of cool" would help them to boost sales.
But customers and management of the retailer, founded by Russian-Jewish refugees, will be alarmed to learn that the elegant singer has admitted he draws inspiration from the aesthetics of Nazi Germany.
Ferry, the lead singer of Roxy Music, has caused outrage at home and abroad for remarks he made to a German newspaper about his admiration for the work of Leni Riefenstahl, notorious for her Nazi propaganda films, and the architecture of Albert Speer.
In an interview withWelt am Sonntag, the 61-year-old also acknowledged that he calls his studio in west London his "Führerbunker". "My God, the Nazis knew how to put themselves in the limelight and present themselves," he said. "Leni Riefenstahl's movies and Albert Speer's buildings and the mass parades and the flags - just amazing. Really beautiful."
One German correspondent on the website of Freundin, a German women's magazine, writes: "This can't be called intellectual humour and it tests even my tolerance when you hear such stupid, crazy and dangerous waffling."
The Labour peer and former war crimes investigator Greville Janner said: "It is deeply offensive when people think they can joke about the Nazis. Riefenstahl was part of the Nazi movement and the Nazis were murderers. And the mass parades he refers to make me vomit. Marks & Spencer should have a serious rethink about employing him."
Nick Viner, chief executive of the Jewish Community Centre for London, said that Ferry's remarks were "ill-conceived" and "left a bad taste in the mouth".
"Riefenstahl was responsible for sending people to their deaths. There is a fine line between people going about their business and people colluding in truly terrible behaviour."
Ferry's manager dismissed the protests as "absurd". "To take offence here is to confuse the aesthetic with the ideological," Steven Howard said. "To suggest that a certain appreciation of art and architecture that happens to be associated with the Nazi regime means condoning the actions of that regime is illogical."
The singer is a supporter of the pro-hunting Countryside Alliance. Anti-bloodsport campaigners called for the alliance to disown him. "Mr Ferry appears to be a man with very little sense of conscience," said Douglas Batchelor of the League Against Cruel Sports. "We would be interested to see if the alliance does the decent thing and disowns him."
Independent
April 15, 2007
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
He's doing a David Bowie or an Eric Clapton. Expects the cult of celebrity to rehabilitate his public persona, so his record sales will continue.
This is too much fuss for nothing. We must not let political correctness get in the way of artistic judgement.
I adore Byzantine and Gothic architecture - does this mean I feel nostalgic about the horrible theocratic regimes of the middle ages? I find Egyptian temples fascinating - does this mean I condone the use of thousand of slaves as builders?
Like it or not, some interestung art did come out of the third Reich, Riefenstahl and Speer included.
It's true that Bowie's remarks were over the top when he made them (31, not 22 years ago) in 1976. Obviously his cocaine problem at the time made him confuse art with politics. By the way, the fact that he managed to get over it so quickly and to help others, too (like Iggy Pop) is remarkable.
Neither Bowie (in his post-1976, sober years) nor Ferry condone fascism. But they have, in these politically correct times, the courage to express what many other people feel: that even in the most unlikely places you can find interesting art.
Post a Comment