Les Gobes Mouches, A Post Funny Garbage Production 1988

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What you are looking at is a self-published magazine I created in 1988, enlisting a group of artists with whom I shared a very special energy during the late 80’s/early 90’s. I am not sure exactly how many actual copies of this pseudo-publication remain and I certainly cannot recall more than 20 being made at all, so for what it is worth, the printed matter is a rarity. I myself, who had a habit of giving all my creations away, have the good fortune of being provided with this copy by my good friend Jenni Mehm-Oakes.

The energy of the group of artists I was associating myself with back then (all of us connected through the School of Visual Arts, NYC) started to really gel with the publication of a comic/collage/collection called Funny Garbage. Perhaps the name sounds familiar? What was then a simple xerox magazine, has since metamorphosed into the web company http://www.funnygarbage.com by Peter Girardi and Chris Capuozzo. After the initial, successful production and distribution of the Summer 1986 version of Funny Garbage, a few more magazines were produced, most notably, Nirvana Now. Most of these productions were created with Pete and Chris at the helm; I wanted to create and steward my own publication and was busy creating large works on 18” x 24” bristol. The magazine would turn out to be Le Gobe Mouches...and this is it.

ABOVE: A sketchbook cover from a year or so after LGM’s creation, note the sticker and reference to FG by Fluffy in the upper panel. RIGHT: A piece of salvaged inkwork from something aborted. On the back Mark Beyer’s address from an old Jersey City residence.

Le Gobe Mouches Revisited: The Moving of Stones and Draining of Shadows

Le Gobe Mouches © Mark Sunshine 1988,2009 All artwork copyright the individual artists. Any references to Funny Garbage throughout the magazine are solely of the period and do not constitute any current professional association with Funny Garbage Inc. 2009

Layout/Design/Art - Sunshine 1988/2003 reprise/surprise GUEST ARTISTS: Paul Komoda, Peter Girardi, Chris Capuozzo, Ian Farrell, Eric _______ (see BioDog?) plus appearances by Gary Panter, “Traub” and Mark Van Der Wahl.

What is special, for me, about this collection is the electric, explosive nature of it. For the aesthetic we were playing around with then, using collage, stickers, mad references from pop culture and appropriating almost anything we could lay our hungry eyes on, this magazine presents it fairly well. The mania is locked in, corralled by the grid patterns of the General Trademark stat camera, along with the layout of boldly inked lines. What is not transferrable by any method of reproduction is how I feel when returning to this work. I can recall the method of assembly I was fascinated with, in regard to the construction of those large pieces: using calligraphy nibs for extra bold line and accenting with crowquill pens. White-out was king, but the ink was scratched, sprayed, burnt and peeled as well. The pieces were rich with maddening detail, akin to a thick brick of German bread. Over the years it angered me that for all the work I had placed into the creation of LGM (I drove all over meeting up with the various artists in order to either get their pieces or indeed engage in realtime creation: having each fill in portions of layout I had crafted with that purpose in mind -- see centerpiece) it never really was seen by a great amount of people. I simply wanted this project that became a labor of love lost, to be seen. That is all I ever wanted and now it shall finally occur.

LGM c/o Armored Baby Salvage and Reclamation [email protected]

Paul Komoda

The above insert is from a letter from Mark Beyer, I scanned it in and superimposed it here. I was delighted to rediscover it. I was in the basement of an old apartment complex removing items from cardboard boxes -wrapping them in garbage bags -- in case of a flood -- caused by the Blizzard of 2003 = mountains of melting snow then being soaked with torrents of rain. - SUN