Rammellzee
Entry updated 2 May 2022. Tagged: Artist, Comics, Music.
(1960-2010) US multi-disciplinary artist whose work covered performance art, rap, graffiti, painting, sculptor and comics. He drew on history, science, sf and popular culture to shape a mythology to inspire his artwork. An African-American/Italian who kept his real name secret, Rammellzee was part of New York's burgeoning rap and graffiti culture as it evolved in the late seventies, becoming a member of the city's underground art scene – which included the likes of Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring and Donald Joseph White (aka DONDI).
A key inspiration was the story of medieval monks whose Gothic calligraphy became so ornate that it became illegible to their superiors, who forbade its use; he saw parallels between this and the heavily stylized urban graffiti that had prompted draconian anti-vandalism laws from the New York authorities (see Crime and Punishment; Paranoia). This led to his credo of Gothic Futurism (not to be confused with Medieval Futurism) – the conflict between letters and the homogenization demanded by the rules of the alphabet (see Linguistics). Ikonoklast Panzerism was its military arm, "in a war against symbols which have been wrongly titled, only the letter can fight" (the war analogy strengthened by the term for covering a train or building with graffiti being "bombing"). As a literal version of this metaphor he created the Letter Racers, weaponized skateboards representing the alphabet: "In the 21st and 22nd century the letters of the alphabet through competition are now armamented [sic] for letter racing and galactic battles. This was made possible by a secret equation know as THE RAMMELLZEE". His philosophy is expressed in a surreal technobabble: "The infinity or Van Allen Belt ∞ 'a section-grafage symbol' is based with electromagnetic energies positive north, positive-south squared, negative north, negative south squared, chemically based dry-based, and so-called anti-based energies. This build/destroy symbol is for science, mathematics (universal) to our life forms knowledge and not religion." (From "Iconic Treatise on Gothic Futurism" [1979; rev 2003 web].) He also confessed to being 16 billion years old, through inhabiting different bodies (see Reincarnation).
Rammellzee built about twenty "Garbage Gods", some being heavy combat outfits (nodding to Powered Armour), created – like much of his art – from debris found in skips; they resembled futuristic samurai or Kaiju. One, the Gash/Olear, had built-in pyrotechnics (which did not always work as planned; he was injured on at least one occasion); others were Crux the Monk, "star gazer, puzzle master of time itself", and China, with one giant eye: "He's a bookie: he takes bets."
There is much Humour in Rammellzee's work, including his interviews: he admitted to being frequently surprised by what he says. Though not considering himself an Afrofuturist, he is often linked to the movement: certainly Sun Ra and George Clinton were influences, whilst he argued that humanity's future was in space (see Colonization of Other Worlds). But "We still do not know how to leave this planet the right way. We'll bring religion out into space and it'll be stopped." As well as working with rap acts such as K-Rob and the Death Comet Crew (the latter also using sf themes in their work), Rammellzee collaborated with the likes of William Burroughs, Bill Laswell and Big Audio Dynamite. [SP]
"Rammellzee"
born New York: 15 December 1960
died New York: 28 June 2010
links
- Interview (April 2004 The Wire)
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