The cybernetic penis on the cover of Brain Salad Surgery
For anyone who attended an Art High School or an Academy of Fine Arts, knowing Emerson, Lake & Palmer was essential, both for the band's choice of pieces often inspired by classical or pictorial compositions, and for the covers, commissioned from artists of the caliber of Dalí or Giger. The project with Salvador Dalí did not go well due to the high cost demanded by the Spanish artist; after all, it was well-known that Dalí liked to be paid very well, indeed, with a pun to mock him, the surrealist poet André Breton had nicknamed him Avida Dollars.
Brain Salad Surgery, or 'Insalata di cervello chirurgico,' was undoubtedly a successful LP for Emerson, Lake & Palmer. It was during a brief tour in Switzerland that the trio of British artists met H.R. Giger in Zurich. The artist invited them to his home, which he had transformed into a sort of cyberpunk cathedral avant la lettre. The band was fascinated by the place and asked Giger to design the artwork for the album they were working on. The artist created a cover consisting of two panels to be overlaid; in the first, there was an industrial mechanism integrated with a skull, and just below, a circular empty space from which part of a woman's face was visible. Lifting the first panel, the face appeared in its entirety, showing deep scars and hair that seem a precursor to what would become Giger's most famous creation: Alien. What many don’t know is that just below the woman's chin was drawn a gigantic penis that, despite the objections of EL&P during the final selection phase, was partially hidden due to the difficulties encountered in publishing the cover. What a shame. A few years ago, I found in a book – which I no longer have – the drawings of the original cover. Honestly, I don’t understand how a 'cybernetic penis' could have caused such a scandal. Probably the Anglo-Saxon market is very puritanical, and I know for sure that in some American states, images of Greek and Italian art are not published due to the presence of nude bodies.
For anyone who attended an Art High School or an Academy of Fine Arts, knowing Emerson, Lake & Palmer was essential, both for the band's choice of pieces often inspired by classical or pictorial compositions, and for the covers, commissioned from artists of the caliber of Dalí or Giger. The project with Salvador Dalí did not go well due to the high cost demanded by the Spanish artist; after all, it was well-known that Dalí liked to be paid very well, indeed, with a pun to mock him, the surrealist poet André Breton had nicknamed him Avida Dollars.
Brain Salad Surgery, or 'Insalata di cervello chirurgico,' was undoubtedly a successful LP for Emerson, Lake & Palmer. It was during a brief tour in Switzerland that the trio of British artists met H.R. Giger in Zurich. The artist invited them to his home, which he had transformed into a sort of cyberpunk cathedral avant la lettre. The band was fascinated by the place and asked Giger to design the artwork for the album they were working on. The artist created a cover consisting of two panels to be overlaid; in the first, there was an industrial mechanism integrated with a skull, and just below, a circular empty space from which part of a woman's face was visible. Lifting the first panel, the face appeared in its entirety, showing deep scars and hair that seem a precursor to what would become Giger's most famous creation: Alien. What many don’t know is that just below the woman's chin was drawn a gigantic penis that, despite the objections of EL&P during the final selection phase, was partially hidden due to the difficulties encountered in publishing the cover. What a shame. A few years ago, I found in a book – which I no longer have – the drawings of the original cover. Honestly, I don’t understand how a 'cybernetic penis' could have caused such a scandal. Probably the Anglo-Saxon market is very puritanical, and I know for sure that in some American states, images of Greek and Italian art are not published due to the presence of nude bodies.
serenella
21 dec 16
DeRank ™: 0,00 ScieMenZiaTi
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