A new satirical new film (Untitled), which premiered at the Palm Springs International Film Festival earlier this year and is slated for theatrical release in September. Loaded with in-jokes and references—to everyone from John Cage to Bruce Nauman to Robert Gober—(Untitled) follows the characters as they seek acceptance and success in the New York City art world.
There’s the Damien Hirst-like Ray Barko (Vinnie Jones)—a porkpie-hat-wearing Brit who outsources the vast majority of his work. Barko shares Hirst’s love of taxidermy and eclecticism. At Gray’s gallery he shows a stuffed baboon passionately kissing the nozzle of a pristine vacuum cleaner (conflating classic works by Hirst and fellow art star Jeff Koons); a deer head in a barber’s chair; a cow suspended from the ceiling, draped with strings of pearls; and a cat splayed spread-eagle and stapled to the wall.
The film’s director and cowriter Jonathan Parker asked Los Angeles artist Kyle Ng to fabricate Barko’s artworks in collaboration with his son Sam Parker, a fine arts undergrad at New York University. Before settling on taxidermy—which is relatively conventional by art-world standards—they considered going sillier and more extreme. “Jonathan initially wanted me to do this synthetic butt that pooped paint, a nose that shot out mucus—stuff like that,” Ng says with a laugh. “But in the end, the concept was to make something that is as ridiculous and redundant as possible. Plus, I happen to have a huge collection of taxidermy.”
