‘”Hello freaks, film friends and perverts! I was one of the first in the world to make a gay rights film after World War II, and I can say in all modesty that I’m probably the most productive gay filmmaker on Earth,” Rosa von Praunheim confidently writes on his website.

‘He is definitely the most hard-working one. Von Praunheim has directed about 80 feature and documentary films to date, as well as countless short videos for television. He initially didn’t even want to become a filmmaker, as he preferred painting. But he quickly noticed that he could reach a larger audience with his movies.

‘Rosa von Praunheim was born Holger Radtke on November 25, 1942, in a prison in Riga, during the German occupation of Latvia. Shortly after his birth, he was adopted by the Mischwitzky family, who brought him to East Berlin. The family lived in East Germany until they escaped to Frankfurt in 1953.

‘The young Holger developed an early interest for the arts. The first play he directed in high school was in Latin. He then studied at an art school in Offenbach and later at the Berlin University of the Arts. It was around that period that he assumed his stage name, “Rosa von Praunheim.” Rosa — German for “pink” — was a reference to the pink triangle homosexual prisoners had to wear in concentration camps, while Praunheim was the name of the district in Frankfurt where he lived as a teenager.

‘He directed his first short film in 1967. A year later, he received an award for “Rosa Arbeiter auf Goldene Straße” (Pink Workers on Golden Street). He became “famous and notorious,” as he likes to say, with his 1971 film, “It Is Not the Homosexual Who Is Perverse, But the Society in Which He Lives.” The title alone was already an unheard-of message in West Germany at the time. Even though the law criminalizing homosexual acts had just been reformed in 1969, homosexuality was still taboo for most Germans and the word “schwul” (gay) was used as an insult.

The filmmaker’s parents discovered that their son was attracted to men through this movie as well. This coming-out was a personal liberation for the artist, which he transformed into a wake-up call for all homosexual men. “I didn’t like gays who were completely apolitical and remained in the closet, who would find escape in parties instead of supporting the movement,” said von Praunheim. “I was angry at all the coward gays who would run away when chased by homophobes, instead of resisting as a group.”

‘With the film, Rosa von Praunheim became an instant icon of the gay and lesbian movement in Germany. He called homosexuals to “Get out of the restrooms and onto the streets!” and that encouraged countless people to reveal their sexual preference publicly. Within a short period, 50 gay rights groups were formed in West Germany. Von Praunheim became a star — in the art world as well. In 1972, his film was shown at the Documenta in Kassel.

‘The filmmaker pursued an unparalleled career and has won numerous awards. His films are campy and controversial, but often surprisingly peaceful and poetic. Many of them have gained cult status. That was already the case with his first feature film from 1970, “Die Bettwurst” (The Bolsters), a parody of bourgeois marriage. He also explored realities beyond his home country, directing, for instance, the documentary “Survival in New York” (1989) and its sequel, “New York Memories” (2010).

‘In 1985, he directed “A Virus Knows No Morals.” Instead of dealing with the issue of AIDS with what he called “a pity film,” he chose to do so with a black comedy. With the work, he aimed to entertain while raising awareness. “Many people criticize safe sex, because they believe the virus was created by the CIA and Germany isn’t threatened by it — as long as you avoid unprotected sex with Americans,” the filmmaker reported at the time of the release of this movie.

Von Praunheim organized Germany’s first large AIDS charity event in Berlin’s Tempodrom, featuring a series of major German artists such as Herbert Grönemeyer, André Heller and Wolf Biermann. He continued addressing the issue afterwards, creating an AIDS trilogy in 1990. While denouncing discrimination against people with AIDS, he outed two popular TV public figures, comedian Hape Kerkeling and TV host Alfred Biolek, on a TV talk show watched by some four million viewers. It become one of the greatest scandals of German TV history. “It was a cry of despair at the peak of the AIDS crisis,” explained Rosa von Praunheim later. He wanted to incite closeted people to move and show more solidarity with the gay community, which was strongly affected by AIDS and HIV.

‘Along with films dealing with homosexuality, the director has also centered many of his works on older women. Cabaret artiste Lotti Huber starred in von Praunheim’s film “Unsere Leichen leben noch” (Our Corpses Still Live) in 1981. In “Two Mothers” (2007), von Praunheim documented his journey to Latvia’s capital, Riga, searching for clues on his biological mother. His adoptive mother had only before told him that he had been adopted. He was nearly 60 when he found out that he was born in a prison and that his biological mother had been murdered in a psychiatric hospital. The artist further explored his own past in “Praunheim Memories” (2014), revisiting the streets of his youth.’

‘Much has changed within the 40 years of Rosa von Praunheim’s activist career. Since October 1, 2017, gay and lesbian couples can also get married. Isn’t that a wonderful birthday present? “No, not at all,” reacts von Praunheim. “We wanted something else. It’s now moving towards conformance and ‘let’s do like the heteros,’ but that wasn’t the plan.” Another fact disturbs him even more: “Many countries on Earth still criminalize gays. The situation is horrible for homosexuals in eastern Europe, in Africa and Asia. Churches vehemently fight against gays and lesbians. There’s therefore so much to do for us and for me, in the short time I still have to live.”‘ — DW

 

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Stills

 

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Further

Rosa von Praunheim Site
RvP @ iMDb
“I made a lot of difference and I was controversial”
ROSA VON PRAUNHEIM Le provocateur
RvP @ MUBI
«il faut révéler l’homosexualité des prêtres»
IT’S A WOUND-ERFUL LIFE
“IN TERMS OF OPENNESS, A LOT HAS CHANGED”
RvP @ letterboxd
RvP @ instagram
The work of Rosa von Praunheim: tackling AIDS in Germany through film
Interview With Rosa Von Praunheim
Perversion of Society
Gender expression in Rosa von Praunheim’s City of Lost Souls
“Quise educar sexualmente a la gente”
Reconceiving Trans Womanhood And Sexual Pluralism In ‘City Of Lost Souls’

 

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Extras

SPECIAL TEDDY AWARD 2014 – ROSA von PRAUNHEIM

My scene in the Rosa Von Praunheim film “Uberleben in Neukölln”

A restaging of NICHT DER HOMOSEXUELLE IST PERVERS’s legendary final scene.

Rosas Welt: 70 Filme von Rosa von Praunheim – Trailer Presse

 

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Interview
from Goethe institute

 

Mr. von Praunheim, a certain pleasure in provocation and breaking taboos runs through your whole career. You triggered considerable controversy in the early 1990s by outing celebrities such as Hape Kerkeling and Alfred Biolek on a TV show. Would you do such things again?

Outing was then a big thing. You can’t do something like that alone, but only with others, and that’s very difficult because I’m a loner really. But I certainly enjoyed it. I’ve made a film about David Berger, a gay religion teacher who was kicked out of his job, and tell how many gay Catholic priests there are. It would make sense to out gays in the Church. But that’s not for me to do. It’s a job for others.

How do you see outings today?

I think it changed journalism in a very positive way. Back then the media reported about gays only in connection with AIDS deaths, crime and what not. Suddenly, gays were presented quite normally in the press, without making a problem of them. That was a big improvement.

In “It Is Not the Homosexual Who Is Perverse, But the Society in Which He Lives” from 1971, your criticism was also aimed at the gay scene, from which you called for more commitment and struggle. What has changed since then?

One of the demands was that you should out yourself, be open about your homosexuality and talk about it in your circle of friends, with your parents, at the job. In terms of openness, a lot has changed. I think that many people now grow up more naturally with their gayness – supported by the internet, by gay groups and so on. This of course doesn’t apply to everyone. But because the social climate has changed, a large percentage can now live in their relationships more freely and openly.

On the occasion of your 70th birthday, you’ve launched a mammoth project – “Rosa’s World”, with 70 new short films. Many revolve around queer themes, but you also devote some to strong woman. Why is it that in the course of your career you’re films have repeatedly concerned themselves with older women, ranging from Lotti Huber to Evelyn Künecke?

It began with my Aunt Lucie, who played in Die Bettwurst (i.e., The Bed Potato) and became famous because, with her wonderful naivety, directness and honesty, she embodied a very different type of woman from that which had been previously known in film. I’m interested in older woman particularly because with them you have an erotic, but not a sexual, relation, and because between them and gay men there is often a wonderful solidarity. Perhaps also because we mutually esteem each other and both belong to minorities that are discriminated against by hetero men.

You haven’t yet had a big commercial hit. What does success mean to you?

Success is everything. But success also means when someone takes up your work. Or when someone tells me that he likes one of the poems I write everyday. Or when a couple of viewers go to the movie theater to watch one of my films. Naturally, it would be great if a thousand or ten thousand people would go to see one of my films, or if hundreds of thousands saw one on TV. But you grow humbler with time, because you know how difficult it is to prevail in this media circus. You’ve been very lucky if you managed to do anything at all.

The cartoonist Ralf König, to whom you recently devoted a documentary portrait “König des Comics” (i.e., King of the Comics), is also very successful with a heterosexual public. How do you account for that?

I think it’s the humor that makes it easier for straights to love gay life. Moreover, his comics and my films aren’t moralistic, but rather about everyday observations that could just as well apply to heterosexuals.

In the past your films and your commitment have initiated a good deal. Is there anything about which you’re particularly proud?

I don’t really know what to think about being “proud”. I’m happy that in my old age it’s been given me to continue working. My consciousness is focused more on the present and the future. The past and what I’ve done doesn’t really belong to me.

If you compare the Rosa of the early years with the Rosa of today, how much has he changed and how much has stayed the same?

I can’t say. I feel more like a seven year old. I notice this in the drawings I do. In them there’s something that was in me very early on and which I didn’t develop. So in this sense I’ve stayed the same. Very infantile. And that’s a wonderful feeling.

 

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19 of Rosa von Praunheim’s 91 films

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Samuel Beckett, 1969
‘Someone who is obviously supposed to be Beckett is walking down a Berlin street with a briefcase under his arm. He is accompanied on the soundtrack by an Italian text taken from Dante’s Divine Comedy. While the big words are being spoken, the camera, in an accurate documentary manner, moves a door sign into the picture (“Lunch from Monday-Friday 12-3pm”), but above all the Schillertheater. Beckett sits in front of the lofty building and reads the BZ.’ — Dietrich Kuhlbrodt

the entirety

 

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It Is Not the Homosexual Who Is Perverse, But the Society in Which He Lives, 1971
‘Perhaps the best Praunheim film and if its visual side has acquired a value of a historical record of a time – almost archaeological -, its ideological side is a performance of a timeless ideology – since the past always crave to return. The film gained an unusual perspective for the present as a document of contemporary action – the political art seek a discourse that in 71 had already found its formulation.’ — josé neves

the entirety

 

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Die Bettwurst, 1971
‘It’s love at first sight: elderly secretary Luzi and young, unemployed Dietmar find each other by accident in Rosa von Praunheim’s outrageous genre, social satire.’ — IMDb

Excerpt

 

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Berliner Bettwurst, 1973
‘The story of the lovers Luzi and Dietmar from Praunheim’s earlier cult favourite film “The Bettwurst” finds its continuation: A marriage and device loan attracts two to Berlin, there will be married in the Memorial Church.’ — IMDb

Excerpt

Excerpts

 

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Porträt Marianne Rosenberg, 1976
‘The equipment of the 12-minute film, which was shot by a television team for the “Treffpunkt” series, has been brazenly increased to the kitschy. Marianne Rosenberg found nothing in it. Says Rosa von Praunheim. “She trimmed .” In the draperies of the interview apartment (it is Ulrike Ottinger’s) and in the dance movements of a third party (Tabea Blumenschein) a sub-image level develops that contains all kinds of lesbian signals. However, these are primarily not suitable for decryption. Marianne Rosenberg’s mother, who was there while the film was being shot, only intervened when asked about racial persecution. “That affects the image .” Interruption of the recording. And then came the simple “no”.’ — Dietrich Kuhlbrodt

Excerpt

 

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Army of Lovers or Revolt of the Perverts, 1979
‘This is a really fascinating snapshot of the gay community in America at a crucial point in time — right in the middle of the Anita Bryant firestorm and just before the failure of the Briggs Initiative, the death of Harvey Milk, and the AIDS crisis. This was made right around the same time as Word is Out and Gay USA, but its tone couldn’t be any more different than those mostly self-affirming documentaries. Here, von Praunheim both dredges up and seems to revel in the contradictions of the gay rights movement — both celebrating the open sexuality (and having unsimulated sex on camera) while chastising urban, ghettoized gays for their complacency with the small gains that they had made; showing a Grace Jones performance at New York Pride and interviewing a lesbian activist who found that performance to be sexist and degrading; and interviewing not just figures like John Rechy, Harry Hay, Del Martin, Phyllis Lyon and Fred Halsted, but also the founder of the American gay nazi party and one of the founders of NAMBLA. The result is a document that feels as messy, sprawling, angry — and occasionally sexually charged — as its subject matter. Can Criterion, Strand, or some other distributor finally pick up distribution rights for these Rosa von Praunheim films?? Crazy that they’re all so hard to find.’ — Evan

Watch the film VOD here

 

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Tally Brown, New York, 1979
‘Tally Brown tells tales, sings songs, and commands the screen for documentary filmmaker von Praunheim (whose Survival in New York is also showing in this series). The classically trained Brown’s musical repertoire encompassed opera, rock, and much more. Her film collaborations with Andy Warhol and Taylor Mead are discussed, and friends Holly Woodlawn and Divine weigh in on a thrilling performer equally at home on Broadway and at gay bathhouses.’ — Quad Cinemas

Excerpt

 

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City of Lost Souls, 1983
‘A group of American rock singers, dancers and acrobats live in Berlin. They are blacks, gays, transsexuals and Jews. What New York was for the 1960s, Berlin was for the ’80s. Ein groteskes Musical. Pollyfilla is a performer who defies traditional categorisation. As ScotsGay put it “they will engage in any act and transcend shame.” Adam Castle’s feral queer creature alter-ego stomps indelicately, the line between cabaret, drag and performance art. Behind the lurid façade of Praunheim’s film, lies a powerful dialogue about the queer and trans struggle for representation, which remains highly pertinent over 30 years later.’ — Another Gaze: A Feminist Film Journal

Excerpt

 

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Positive, 1990
‘This film documents New York City’s gay community’s response to the AIDS crisis during the 1980s as they were forced to organize themselves after the government’s slow response to stem the epidemic. Activist who are interviewed include New York filmmaker and journalist Phil Zwickler, playwright and gay activist Larry Kramer and musician Michael Callen who co-founded people with AIDS Coalition. Framing the individual stories of these three men is a chronicle of the creation of the Gay Men’s Health Crisis, ACT- UP and Queer Nation as the gay community confronted the AIDS epidemic.’ — collaged

Excerpt

 

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The Einstein of Sex, 1999
‘Magnus Hirschfeld (1868-1935) was a sexologist whose scientific investigation had an enormous impact on twentieth- century attitudes to homosexuality. Confronted with the conservatism of his era and driven by a determined humanism, in 1897 he founded the first political gay movement. Then in 1920 he founded an institute for sexology in Berlin. As a socialist homosexual of Jewish extraction, he was forced to flee his country in the thirties. During his stay in Los Angeles, Hirschfeld was called ‘The Einstein of sex’ by American journalists. He died in exile in Nice in 1935. Three years later, his colleague and friend Karl Giese comitted suicide, after a fruitless attempt to prevent the destruction of the Institute by the Nazis. Rosa von Praunheim wanted to found a monument to an important pioneer in the battle against homophobia in Der Einstein des Sex, which he considers to be his most conventional film. The film concentrates on the sensitive, tormented personality of Hirschfeld, on his emotional life and his political struggle. It also looks at the course of his love affair with Baron von Teschenberg, the happy years with Giese, his debates with the conservative anti-Semitic writer Adolf Brand and his relationship with his friend and guardian angel, the transvestite Dorchen.’ — IFFR

the entirety

 

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Cows Knocked Up by Fog, 2002
‘Catchy mix of farce and documentary. Portrait of a Berlin theatre company made up entirely of the homeless, alcoholics and junkies. They call themselves ‘rats’ and take the film over to have a party.’ — ogado

the entirety

 

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Men, Heroes and Gay Nazis, 2005
‘Given the often personal, sometimes lurid and typically gay-related nature of his films (and his ubiquity as a German public personality), it’s perhaps easy to overlook the fact von Praunheim has, over the course of more than 35 years, created one of the most fascinating sociopolitical-docu oeuvres in the world. “Men” is well up to par, making something coherent (if not conclusive) out of several overlapping themes, archival footage and interviews with current or former radical nationalists. Anti-immigrant sentiments, uber-masculinity fixations and obliviousness toward the movement’s general homophobia are noted. Pic also finds room to consider “new Fuhrer” Michael Kuhnen, a closeted neo-Nazi leader who died of AIDS, and the tolerated (to a point) homosexuality of Hitler’s SA commander Ernst Rohm.’ — Variety

Excerpt

 

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New York Memories, 2010
’20 years after his successful documentary “Survival in New York”, Rosa von Praunheim returns to the city, in which he had the most exciting time of his life. Remembering his own experiences in the wild seventies, when New York City was characterized by sexual liberation and eccentric individuals, and recollecting the big changes in the eighties when AIDS started to take its toll, Rosa meets his former protagonists and goes on a personal journey to discover what has become of “his” New York.’ — MappealTv

Trailer

 

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Rent Boys, 2011
‘Despised, stigmatised and suppressed to the fringe of society — this is the reality young, male prostitutes face in Berlin. Most of the hustlers are immigrants, a lot of them act out of necessity. Rosa von Praunheim accompanies the young adults at their work in bars, porn movie theatres and on the street. He shows their reasons, their stories and above all, their strong will to survive.’ — mAppeal

Trailer

 

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Praunheim Memoires, 2014
‘The filmmaker Rosa von Praunheim remembers his humble origins from the unglamorous district of Frankfurt Praunheim.’ — letterboxd

Trailer

 

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Hitler und Jesus – eine Liebesgeschichte, 2014
‘Two actors improvise biographical scenes about Hitler and Jesus. They discover more and more similarities and set out in search of the reasons for their enormous success. Jesus wants to give love. Many conflicts have to be resolved until Hitler can finally come to accept this.’ — film portal

Watch the film VOD here

 

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Härte, 2015
‘A staple of the Berlin festival, Rosa von Praunheim’s stylised brand of filmmaking has never held him back when it comes to difficult subjects. His latest feature, Tough Love, is no different, capturing the challenging and often distressing life of Andreas Marquardt in a campy dramatisation intercut with interviews from Marquardt himself. Prostitution, molestation and karate are the defining acts of Marquardt’s life, although the harrowing experiences of his formative years and his natural talent for martial arts soon take a back seat to his career as a pimp. Informed by his awful experiences with his mentally ill mother, a career in the sex trade suits the lowly opinion of the fairer sex to a T. It’s tempting to not view Tough Love with a critical eye. It’s very nature as a retelling of true events compounded by low budget production values makes it more reconstruction than cinema. But Prauheim’s stylistic approach is distinctly melodramatic and as a result the film ultimately fails to unite form and function.’ — The Up Coming

Trailer

 

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Survival in Berlin-Neukölln, 2017
‘About Stefan Stricker, who calls himself Juwelia and has been running a gallery on Sanderstraße in Berlin Neukölln for many years. Every weekend he invites guests to shamelessly recount from his life and to sing poetic songs written with his friend from Hollywood Jose Promis. Juwelia has been poor and sexy all her life, has always struggled for recognition, but only partially.’ — letterboxd

Trailer

 

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Darkroom, 2019
‘In Darkroom, cult director Rosa von Praunheim focuses on a true crime story that occurred in Germany recently, and the result is one of his most thrilling films. Lars, a male nurse from Saarbrücken, moves to Berlin with his lover, Roland. They begin to renovate an apartment and their happiness seems.’ — MUBI

Trailer

 

*

p.s. Hey. ** ae, Hi. Oh, okay, gotcha about the zine. How can I order a copy? What is a cheesemonger? I guess I can look it up. I like that term, cheese + monger is kind of clashy or something. And I love cheese. Even though I’m mostly vegan at the moment. What is your ideal artistic pursuit? I decided when I was pretty young to center being an artist in my life whatever it took, and it’s been hard, money-wise, but I feel the opposite of regret about that decision. Sorry for all the questions. No, I haven’t read that book. And I should, right? Assuming so, I’ll hunt it. Have a superb day by whatever means. ** David Ehrenstein, Thanks, but I’ll de-cue James Taylor if you don’t mind, ha ha. ** Misanthrope, You’re so earthbound. It’s interesting. Does it freak you out whenever you start to think about the earth being just a ball rotating in the midst of infinite space? Glad to hear Kayla’s doing okay. Oh, eek, about the possible exposure, and yeah, better safe than sorry is the byword of our times, so angle for protectiveness, I think. This is an absolutely gigantic and absolutely tiresome thing indeed. ** Dominik, Hi! Exactly about the editing. I think one of the reasons I keep doing the escort and slave posts is because I love editing their profile texts into poems as best I can. Except when they’re already poems, which happens surprisingly often and is exciting too. Maybe I should create a profile on those sites offering my services as a profile text perfecter. Except, as we’ve already discussed, I’m not so good at helping them sell themselves as sex objects. My guess is that I wouldn’t have continued to fiddle with this idea of turning the ARTE thing into fiction if I wasn’t sure it would work if I found the right approach. Maybe I have finally. Hope so. We didn’t get confinement. Now they say they’ll decide next week. The thing is that our infection rates are pretty high, but they’re plateaued, not rising, so that’s the possible saviour. Your situation sounds like ours except the schools are open here. Ha ha. Scary love there. Love so cute and ambidextrous that it can rim itself on cam and make a fortune doing so which it then donates to us out of love, G. ** _Black_Acrylic, I wonder if your storm is heading over here. No sign of it as of 9:41 am. The clouds in our sky are pretty fucking dark though, I’ll say that. ** Bill, Hi. I saw Zac yesterday, and he seems completely recovered apart from some recurring headaches, he says. I was expecting ‘The Lure’ to be a film based on that old Felice Picano novel. For some reason, I’m just simultaneously bored and repelled by the whole idea of mermaids, I don’t know why. Like even if Bresson has made a mermaid movie, making myself watch it would be like pulling teeth. ** Steve Erickson, Some things I’ve read about the Stones posit Brian Jones as the experimental one, others posit him as a hardcore blues guy who didn’t like it when they went experimental. Strange. But, yeah, I don’t know who else in the Stones would have been the one to take them in that direction. Bill Wyman? Nah. No, no lockdown announcement yet. Like I told Dominick, they delayed the decision until next week. Hard to tell. Granted, I virtually never remember my dreams, but when flashes of them linger upon waking, I haven’t once had a dream to my knowledge wherein anyone was wearing masks. ** G, Hi, G. Cool. I thought it might be nice to be serene for a day, so I’m glad it had that output. I can’t remember the last time I went swimming. I think it was at an onsen in Japan, but that wasn’t even swimming, just water immersion. I doubt that anyone is doing any better than OK these days, although I suppose all the slaves happily chained up in dungeons are probably thrilled. Here’s hoping you can get to Canada soonish. I’m an optimist, but I think that by late spring traveling will be a viable option again. No, too early for ‘I Wished’ events, I think. I’m going to do the final edit with my editor, such as that is — I don’t really get very edited — soon. That’s about it. Big kiss right back at/to you. ** Corey Heiferman, Hi, Corey. Oh, wow, that’s interesting: your weekend is Friday-Saturday? And then Sunday is back to work and so on? Huh.I know almost nothing about religion, which I assume is why your weekend is what it is (?), so that’s curious. Enfield is a good one. I wish I’d found it when I was putting the post together. Cool, thanks. I’ve never been properly scuba diving with a tank and all of that, just lightweight diving with a snorkel like you. But I liked it I would love to scuba dive. Hm. I unsurprisingly encourage you to ‘throw’ together a weird film for that festival. Truly, WTFN. ** Okay. Rosa von Praunheim. Sound familiar? Know his stuff? News to you? Today’s post gives you chance to begin to get his work under your belt, as it were. Which is not a bad idea, trust me. See you tomorrow.

 

‘Once a thriving city that lasted for more than 1300 years, Lion City, so named because it stood in the shadow of Five Lion Mountain, is now submerged beneath the waters of Qingdao Lake. When the government commenced on the Xin’an River Dam project in 1959, Lion City was the casualty, as the area was in need of an artificial lake. For more 40 years the city remained mostly forgotten. Recently, however, the Chinese government has taken steps to preserve the remains for future generations via sonar mapping, videos and photography.

‘Lion City was once a large habitation, covering approximately 1.5 square miles of land. All the architectural wonders that were in the city before its inundation still remain, sitting around 90 feet below the surface of the lake. There are imperial tombs, palaces, temples, government and civil buildings and residences.

‘Many decorative elements still exist as well, including at least 18 memorial arches and dozens of statues. There is also an intact city wall with five gates in it. One of the things that makes Lion City so unique (aside from it being located underwater) is that almost all cities during China’s past used a system of four gates to represent the four cardinal directions. Lion City has one more than this commonly accepted number.

‘Though the government is not planning on draining the lake to get the city back into the open air, it has for the last 10 years been dedicated to preserving its memory. Unfortunately, only archaeological diving is allowed, so no tourists can explore the city on their own as of yet. Likely this will change in the future as China realizes the cultural value of the city and the interest that diving enthusiasts from all over the world will show in it.’ — chinesejourney.com

 

 

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‘The trading town of Kalyazin was settled on the high bank of the Volga. The small river of Zhabnya, flowing into the Volga, separated the town into two parts. The Monastery of St. Nicholas was located on the one bank of Zhabnya, the Trinity Kalyazin Monastery on the other one. In the 18th century, the population of that area grew thanks to blacksmithing, shoemaking, and pottery. Kalyazin also was famous for its lace which was sold in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Trade traffic was growing, and Catherine the Great gave Kalyazin city status in 1775.

‘The Monastery of St. Nicholas quickly became one of the biggest and richest in the region of Tver. Around 1800, a beautiful five-tier bell tower almost 75 meters high (it’s like 25-floor building today) was erected near its main church. Light and elegant, it overlooked the city, and the sound of its bells was heard for kilometers.

‘In 1917, the epoch of the Soviet Union started in Russia under the slogan “We will build a new world.” Of course, the “old world” was supposed to be destroyed. Communists rejected religion, and for starters, banned church bell ringing.

‘In the 1920s, an ambitious project was developed: a few hydropower plants on the river Volga. Accordingly, several cities and hundreds of villages located on its banks were to be flooded. Mologa, Korcheva, Vesjegonsk are just some of the flooded cities. Kalyazin also went under the water of the Uglich Reservoir together with its cathedral, churches, houses, and streets.

‘Some citizens thought it was just rumor and refused to leave their houses. They were flooded together with their property. According to a declassified certificate of NKVD (Ministry of the Interior), 294 lives were lost, but how many people actually preferred to die at home, we don’t know.’ — victorblog

 

 

 

‘The Yonaguni Monument is a massive underwater rock formation off the coast of Yonaguni, the southernmost of the Ryukyu Islands, in Japan. There is a debate about whether the site is completely natural, is a natural site that has been modified, or is a manmade artifact. The sea off Yonaguni is a popular diving location during the winter months owing to its large population of hammerhead sharks. In 1987, while looking for a good place to observe the sharks, Kihachiro Aratake, a director of the Yonaguni-Cho Tourism Association, noticed some singular seabed formations resembling architectonic structures. Shortly thereafter, a group of scientists directed by Masaaki Kimura of the University of the Ryūkyūs visited the formations.

‘The flat parallel faces, sharp edges, and mostly right angles of the formation have led many people, including many of the underwater photographers and divers who have visited the site and some scholars, to the opinion that those features are man-made. These features include a trench that has two internal 90° angles as well as the twin megaliths that appear to have been placed there. These megaliths have straight edges and square corners.

‘Other evidence presented by those who favor an artificial origin include the two round holes (about 2 feet wide, according to photographs) on the edge of the Triangle Pool feature and a straight row of smaller holes that have been interpreted as an abandoned attempt to split off a section of the rock by means of wedges, as in ancient quarries. Kimura believes that he has identified traces of drawings of animals and people engraved on the rocks, including a horselike sign that he believes resembles a character from the Kaida script. Some have also interpreted a formation on the side of one of the monuments as a crude moai-like “face”.

‘If any part of the monument was deliberately constructed or modified, that must have happened during the last ice age, when the sea level was much lower than it is today (e.g. 39 m (130 ft) lower around 10,000 years BCE). During the ice age, the East China Sea was a narrow bay opening to the ocean at today’s Tokara Gap. The Sea of Japan was an inland sea and there was no Yellow Sea; people and animals could walk into the Ryukyu peninsula from the continent. Therefore, Yonaguni was the southern end of a land bridge that connected it to Taiwan, Ryūkyū, Japan, and Asia. This fact is underscored by a rock pillar in a now-submerged cave that has been interpreted as a fused stalactite-stalagmite pair, which could only form above water.’ — collaged

 

 

 

‘Port Royal was a city located at the end of the Palisadoes at the mouth of the Kingston Harbour, in southeastern Jamaica. Founded in 1518, Port Royal was notorious for its gaudy displays of wealth and loose morals and was a popular homeport for the English and Dutch sponsored privateers to spend their treasure during the 17th century. When those governments abandoned the practice of issuing letters of marque against the Spanish treasure fleets and possessions in the later 16th century, many privateers turned pirate and used the city as their main base during the heyday of the Caribbean pirates in the 17th century. Pirates from around the world congregated at Port Royal coming from waters as far away as Madagascar.

‘By the 1660s, the city had gained a reputation as the Sodom of the New World where most residents were pirates, cutthroats, or prostitutes. When Charles Leslie wrote his history of Jamaica, he included a description of the pirates of Port Royal: “Wine and women drained their wealth to such a degree that… some of them became reduced to beggary. They have been known to spend 2 or 3,000 pieces of eight in one night; and one gave a strumpet 500 to see her naked. They used to buy a pipe of wine, place it in the street, and oblige everyone that passed to drink.” The taverns of Port Royal were known for their excessive consumption of alcohol such that records even exist of the wild animals of the area partaking in the debauchery.

‘On June 7, 1692, a devastating earthquake hit the city causing most of its northern section to fall into the sea (and with it many of the town’s houses and other buildings). In addition, the island lost many of its forts. Fort Charles survived, but Forts James and Carlisle sank into the sea. Fort Rupert became a large region of water, and great damage was done to an area known as Morgan’s Line.

‘Although the earthquake hit the entire island of Jamaica, the citizens of Port Royal were at a greater risk of death due to the perilous sand, falling buildings, and the tsunami that followed. Though the local authorities tried to remove or sink all of the corpses from the water, they were not successful. Some simply got away from them, while others were trapped in places that were inaccessible. The decomposing bodies combined with improper housing, a lack of medicine or clean water, and the fact that most of the survivors were homeless, led to many people dying of malignant fevers. The earthquake and tsunami killed between 1,000 and 3,000 people combined, nearly half the city’s population. Disease ran rampant in the next several months, claiming an estimated 2,000 additional lives.

‘Some attempts were made to rebuild the city, starting with the one third of the city that was not submerged, but these met with mixed success and numerous disasters. An initial attempt at rebuilding was again destroyed in 1703 by fire. Subsequent rebuilding was hampered by several hurricanes in the first half of the 18th century, including flooding from the sea in 1722, a further fire in 1750 and a major hurricane in 1774, and soon Kingston eclipsed Port Royal in importance. In 1815 what repairs were being undertaken were destroyed in another major fire, while the whole island was severely affected by an epidemic of cholera in 1850. A final devastating earthquake on January 14, 1907, again liquefied the sand spit, destroying nearly all of the rebuilt city and submerging additional portions.’ — skyscraper city.com

 

 

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‘Villa Epecuén was a tourist village that was located in the Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. Now abandoned, its ruins are found on the eastern shore of the Laguna Epecuén, about 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) north of the city of Carhué.

‘Developed in the early 1920s, Epecuén was accessible from Buenos Aires by train. The Ferrocarril Sarmiento line served the Villa Epecuén station, while the Midland Railway and the Southern Railway carried passengers to nearby Carhué station.

‘Tourism was well developed in Epecuén, as vacationers from Buenos Aires would seek the therapeutic salty waters of Lago Epecuén. At its height, Villa Epecuén had the capacity to accommodate 5,000 visitors, while unofficial accommodations allowed for 2000 more.

‘On 6 November 1985, a seiche caused by a rare weather pattern broke a nearby dam first, then the dike protecting the town. Rapidly made uninhabitable, the town saw the waters rise progressively, reaching up to 10 metres (33 ft) at its maximum. The village was never rebuilt.

‘At the time of the catastrophe, there were up to 280 businesses in Epecuén, including lodges, guesthouses, hotels, and businesses that 25,000 tourists visited between November and March, from the 1950s to the 1970s.’ — mentalitch

 

 

 

‘The port city of Baiae was commissioned by Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa during the civil war between Octavian and Sextus Pompey (37 BC). The magnificent port was intended for the impressive arsenal of the Classis Misenensis, the most important Roman fleet. It’s construction was entrusted to the architect Lucius Cocceius Auctus, whose ingenuity ensured the port’s connection to Lake Lucrine and Lake Avernus via a navigable canal and to Cumae by a 1 km (0.6 mile) long underground tunnel through which chariets could pass. Ultimately, the naming of the port itself was in honour of Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus.

‘Once complete, Baiae offered a comprehensive array of administrative naval services: warehouses for the storage of food and supplies, cisterns for potable water, dry docks for hull maintenance and workshops for the repairing of sails. Other, more personal needs were equally provided for: recreational facilities, the Temple of Poseidon, and discreet brothels.

‘With the passing of millennia, the original complex has been fated by bradyseism (caused by volume changes in an underlying magma chamber and/or hydrothermal activity). In the late fifth centuary Flavius Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator noted that the outer breakwater of the port had fallen into disrepair; in the following centuaries it disappeared completely, reuniting Lucrino with the sea. This lateral movement of the coast continued until 29 Septmber 1538 when an eruption occurred generating the so-called New Mountain, distroying the village Tripergola and reducing Lake Lucrino to little more than a pond.

‘Baiae again came to light via aerial photography taken during World War II. Pictures taken illustrate the topography of the extensive portal complex which covers an area of approximately 10 hectares. Buildings used as warehouses could be identified along with various column arrangements denoting courtyards of residential houses. Indeed, most of the mapping of the area has been compiled from studying such photographs.

‘The details pertaining to the port city’s construction have, however, been obtained via underwater surveys and observations. The walls and pillars rise from a few inches to more than a meter above the sea-bed and their stonework bears witness to the various building methods used, particularly reticulated work. Pathways, floor mosaics, ceramic wares and even the indication of frescoes can still be found in-situ.’ — The Underwater Archaeology Park of Baiae

 

 

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‘Revered for its emerald waters and abundant recreation, South Carolina’s Lake Jocassee area was filled with rich history before the dam was built in 1973. South of where the dam and the hydroelectric station are currently located was once Keowee Village or Keowee Town, the capital of the Lower Cherokee Indians. The lake’s name “Jocassee” is derived from the Cherokee language and means “Place of the Lost One.”

‘The Cherokee lost their land to settlers, and then the settlers lost the land to the waters of the new lake. Both Lake Jocassee and the neighboring Lake Keowee were formed as a result of the construction by Duke Power for their Keowee Toxaway Project. With the building of the dam in 1973, the waters of Whitewater River began to flow upstream for the first time as Lake Jocassee covered the town.

‘Jocassee Lake Dive Shop owner and technical instructor Bill Routh was the first to discover the Whitewater Bridge, Camp Jocassee for Girls, and the Attakulla Lodge which rests below 300 feet of water. A friend of Routh’s was the first to discover the Mount Carmel Cemetery, made famous by the 1972 film Deliverance, which was produced the year before the dam was constructed and the valley was lost.’ — blueridgeoutdoors

 

 

 

‘Evidence of an ancient “lost river civilisation” has been uncovered off the west coast of India, the country’s minister for science and technology has announced. Local archaeologists claim the find could push back currently accepted dates of the emergence of the world’s first cities. Underwater archaeologists at the National Institute of Ocean Technology first detected signs of an ancient submerged settlement in the Gulf of Cambay, off Gujarat, in May 2001. They have now conducted further acoustic imaging surveys and have carbon dated one of the finds.

‘The acoustic imaging has identified a nine-kilometre-long stretch of what was once a river but is now 40 metres beneath the sea. The site is surrounded by evidence of extensive human settlement. Carved wood, pottery, beads, broken pieces of sculpture and human teeth have been retrieved from along the river banks, according to a report in the Indian Express newspaper. The vast city — which is five miles long and two miles wide — is believed to predate the oldest known remains in the subcontinent by more than 5,000 years. Theorists are postulating that the area where this city exists was submerged when the ice caps melted at the end of the last Ice Age.

‘If confirmed, the find would also push back the date of India’s earliest known civilisation by 5000 years. The Harappan civilisation has been dated to about 2500 BC. The newly identified site “looks like a Harappan-type civilisation but dating way back to 7500 BC,” said minister Murli Manohar Joshi. It was generally believed that a well organized civilization could not have existed prior to 5500 BP.’ — collaged

 

 

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‘The Lost Villages are ten communities in the Canadian province of Ontario, in the former townships of Cornwall and Osnabruck (now South Stormont) near Cornwall, which were permanently submerged due to the creation of the Saint Lawrence Seaway in 1958.

‘The flooding was expected as the result of the Moses-Saunders Power Dam construction, which began in August 1954. In the weeks and months leading up to the inundation, families and businesses in the affected communities were moved to the new planned communities of Long Sault and Ingleside. At 8 a.m. on 1 July 1958, a large cofferdam was demolished, allowing the flooding to begin. In all, approximately 6,500 people were displaced by the project, 530 buildings moved, and countless homes, schools, and businesses demolished.

‘Some communities were relocated rather than abandoned altogether. Many materials including several historic buildings from the communities are now preserved in a museum in Ault Park near Long Sault. Some high points of land in the flooded area remained above water as islands and can be visited.

‘In some locations, a few remnants of sidewalks and building foundations can still be seen under the water, or even on the shoreline when water levels are sufficiently low. Elsewhere, divers can follow the old roads and sidewalks of the towns underwater.

‘The “Lost Villages” were: Aultsville, Dickinson’s Landing, Farran’s Point, Maple Grove, Mille Roches, Moulinette, Santa Cruz, Sheek’s Island, Wales, Woodlands.’ — ar-tour

 

 

*

p.s. Hey. ** Shane Christmass, Ha. Now ‘Short Night of Glass Dolls’, that I know, and, yeah, I too think it’s cool. Mm, I cannot remember where I was when Night Stalker was doing his thing. I think in LA, but … blur. Thanks about the books. Especially the Selffuck one because they/he still hasn’t sent me the books I ordered months ago. No, I don’t think I’ve ever been invited to a festival there, but I assume it would be pretty costly to bring me or anyone in from this far away, and I’m not the kind of crowd magnetising superstar that would make such a money outlay feasible, I assume (again). ** ae, Hi! Grocery jobs sound tiring and hard on the backs or something. I hope you two get to crossfade into something more … worthy? Ubuweb is doing an erotic zine? I thought that place was kind of dead to new adds. I’ll visit. Anyway, cool. Thanks a lot for the shopping link. That looks like a handy site to know about, and I didn’t. Some artists built an online or viral or digital or whatever Dream Machine. It’s in a post here coming up in a week or two. Thanks much for the info and for everything. Happy Thursday. ** David Ehrenstein, Really, ‘act like Brian’? That’s wild. Jagger must have hated that. ** Tosh Berman, Hi, Tosh. Jack is back! I was watching the inauguration off and on all day/evening yesterday, and it was so amazing not to see a single thing about or showing that piece of shit the entire day, at least on the channel I was watching. ** Dominik, Hi! Speaking as a fellow lover of editing, it’s often more fun to edit texts or scripts that aren’t that hot, you know? Where whatever your edit is, you know it’s all uphill. The fiction thing is something I’ve been working on off and on for quite a while. It’s an attempt to transform the material/script of the doomed ARTE TV series project into a work of script-like fiction. I’ve tried a bunch of approaches that haven’t worked, but I’m trying a new one now that seems promising. If it works it’ll be a novella co-authored by Zac and me. The Pinault thing will be in person, so it’ll happen when that’s possible, Who knows when that is because there seems to be a strong chance that the govt. is going to announcement confinement tonight, mega-ugh. I’m finally seeing Zac today and hopefully frequently now, although if the confinement happens, who knows. How’s stuff where you are? Ha ha, nice and weird love! Love where every hair on its head is roller coaster and its eyes are shrinking rays and its body is an escalator, G. ** Bill, Hey. Ultra best of luck with the work swamp this week. I’ll be saving you a blog seat until further notice. ** Misanthrope, I think so too. Yeah, don’t get me started on opioids. My usual pragmatic viewpoint and demeanor go out the window. Hope Kayla sails through her bout with the Co-monster. Most seem to. Sounds like she’s been smart about it. ** _Black_Acrylic, Hi, Ben. Have fun with the class today. Know you will. And big up on the general return of order. These days, that’s manna. ** G, Hi, G. I’m glad you liked Jack’s stories. Wow, thank you so kindly for those amazingly kind words about my poem. Hm, I think I wrote that poem when I was taking poetry classes in city college, so I would guess it dates from ’73 or ’74? Anyway, wow, thanks so much! You good? ** Kyler, Hi, K. I think I did know you’re a witch. I mean, what aren’t you, let’s face it. You got the vaccine? Whoa, lucky you. I’m not in the qualifying camp here yet. No pre-existing conditions and the age requirement is 80 or older thus far. ** Brian O’Connell, Hi, Brian. So happy you dug it. Jack’s writing is ace. Gotcha on the dead witch novel. Dude, my past is littered with half-finished things with concepts that seemed exciting but were lame-ass. High fiver or low five. Yeah, I had the inauguration on all day either in the background or being watched. It was comforting and relaxing just as it seemed like it was going to be. Twitter = upside down cross and clove of garlic (for me). There’ve been these worker guys in my apartment tearing everything up looking for holes mice could enter and exit from for three days, and that means I’ve been stuck here supervising, but today I’m going to kick them the fuck out by noon or so because I have shit to do. Dinner, out, nice. Boy, I miss that. Have a great, great one! ** Right. Underwater dead cites, what’s not to like, am I wrong? See you tomorrow.