no I saw you in that film the man who came to earth and that was a man who was
in his own void way yes very much do you feel that yourself somatically
I've always dealt with isolation and everything I've written I think so it's
something that triggers me off it it always makes me interested in a new
project if it has anything to do with alienation or isolation do you feel
isolated though not really but I can I can quietly imagine how it must feel to
be isolated so I have often put myself in circumstances and in positions where
I am isolated just so that I can write about you do in a way I've sort of been
thinking quite a lot about you and often often seen you anyway that's the smoke
bothering you no it's not at all because we're gonna make you who that mysterious
that you talked about I think that it's not at all mystifying why you change
your appearance as often as you do to my view by the way because I think you've
used yourself as as a canvas yes very much so
was that right yes very much so I never wanted to appear as myself on stage ever
at any time until recently I think so I as I did writing character form I wanted
to produce those characters on stage which is something I feel I did quite
successfully at the time that was simply an exercise of projecting something else
like you say for instance you would be presenting a picture well I was also I
wanted to use rock and roll in some way or Arthur and I got tired of the sort of
the lie of the rock performer is exactly the same on stage as he is off stage
which in most case isn't true at all but so I thought well take it a stage
further and completely separate the personalities the person behind it all
who's writing it and creating it and the one up front but does the interviews and
does the shows and and so I created the characters and put them on stage and
then I would take them further and put them into interviews and I would only do
interviews as the character well you're hiding yourself from us
partly but I was enjoying it very much I mean I like the idea of taking it to
that sort of surreal stage is that sort of again
carry on with it right because you work you went to art school before you did
anything else didn't you yes yes as we all did everybody I went to answer right
and you paint now yes but your paintings you're not willing to let us see yet no
I've been offered there two or three showings but I've turned I've accepted
two of them and then I broke my word and said I wouldn't show them like I haven't
yet backed up the courage why not what what what do you fear well I know
I'm a good writer I'm not sure about putting my paintings are they're very
personal to me as well they're all portraits and they're all portraits of
people in isolation most of the paintings are Germans or Turks who live
in Berlin and they're either from East Berlin and who are now living in West
Berlin and knowing their families are on the other side of the wall and so I
tried to capture a lot of that kind of isolation and I put a lot of myself into
the paintings as well they're very much part of me if you're interested in
isolation is it because you think that a person in an isolated state feels
greater emotions than they do when they're surrounded by people and things
I think if he is in isolation instead of receiving the the whole world as his
home he tends to create a micro world inside himself and it's that peculiar
part of the human mind that fascinates me about the small universes that can be
created inside the mind some of them fairly schizophrenic and quite off the
wall does that mean you have to separate yourself quite a lot from say falling in
love and getting very involved with a person oh no I think no I do I think
quite the reverse for me I do fall in love quite quickly
once upon a time used to falling off quite a lot but I know I think I think
love is very important for my writing but love falling in love is different
from then going on to love that person yes it is yes
and once you love somebody a lot it means that you've got to share
your life with them that's what I know I don't think so you can love somebody
from afar but if you then decided not to love them from the fires what I mean
you as an artist would have to give up quite a lot of your time to them yes and
I can't do that that's what I was wondering well you didn't know love
can't get quite in my way because it I feel I shelter myself from it incredibly
what do you shelter yourself again I mean sorry I'm losing that other you
lost your that's partially that hard yeah over a fight yes over a fight over
design no it was he wanted it and I wanted it but I kept it um well that was
over I think I can't remember it very well it was over a girl I can't remember
her name was it your first love when David Bowie no I wasn't even in love
with her I don't think and he thought I was and in a manner of speaking
but I wasn't in love with her and so he came out and belted me one day but he
and she's you've loved in your time haven't you so I've read I've only heard
- but it was - you've been asked the question whether you're bisexual or not
- many times yes and you you've never quite answered
it oh I have I said I was bisexual that's enough hmm hmm does that mean
though that you really are or does that mean that you you're you're keeping some
I've answered the question right okay right can I ask you another
question about yourself in isolation partly when you're you're now living in
Japan aren't you I just come back from Japan I don't know where I'm going to
next when you're living in a place is that because you again want to be
isolated yes no not yes now at the moment it wasn't a couple of years ago I
wanted to put myself in dangerous situations which I did put myself in any
situation which I feel I can't cope dangerous situations such as what can
you explain areas where I have to be in sort of social contact with people which
I'm not very good at doing I don't know what you mean now
well like I went to Los Angeles and I lived there for a couple of years which
is Sidhe I really detest yeah so I went to live there among people that I didn't
like very much to see what would happen to my writing and then did you find you
did to test the place Oh quite twice as much as when I went there well what did
you think you're going to detest about it before you got there everything it
represented such as then what I mean that do you dislike America no I like
the plains of America I like New Mexico very much in the Ryota ground and that
area but I don't like American cities too much I like the real cities like
Chicago and Detroit mm-hmm I can't quite see what the difference between Los
Angeles well it's sort of a callous it's a it's a it's sort of a blister on the
backside of humanity really yeah whereas Detroit has a real people
energetically trying to survive but in Los Angeles its fabrication yeah in in
real life where I'd deal with fabrication in public but my real life
is not at all fabricated hmm you know you said you do want to be in situations
which which you're frightened of right yes but how easy is it for you to mix
generally speaking with people because surely you're so famous that people
would recognize you straight away and therefore no they don't at all really no
I have no problem with that really hmm but then perhaps is that because you do
go deliberately to a new new place yeah yes that's why I went to Berlin when I
left America yeah I wanted to have another kind of friction and so I went
to Berlin and I found the friction I wanted what was that people living under
the impression that everything might collapse very quickly and people are
very serious there and don't care too much about flippancy
hmm that's it's a very tight life they're surrounded by a wall with
machine guns which is ever coming in on you more you
live there the longer you live there the more it comes in and the wall by the end
forces though it's right around the apartment or house that you're staying
when you lived in Germany did you get involved with people there I mean
writers and artists yes there are some of the new wave bands and some of the
serious writers there I quite enjoy them very much but most of
the time I spent on my own hmm when you went to Japan which is nice where you
are now right yeah what was the while there next well when
I first started trying to bring pantomime into rock and roll my other
influence of the time part from German Expressionism was Kabuki theater
so I I'm from kabuki I then got interested in the cultural religious
aspects of Japan what do you find on the balance between the the heritage of
Japan and the modern world that they have them how they balance it which is
very precarious to say the least this is a friction there as well when you go to
a place I'm not a very good travelling myself I resist it because I if I can't
speak the language I don't feel I'm gonna be able to communicate and so
forth you know sort of frightens me um when you go what's the kind of first
thing you get to know about a place in order to make you start to feel a little
as if you belong to it cafes and bars I think you know where to
buy food yeah right you've got you you paint and what painter do you think has
influenced you Eric heckle you've described yourself as a writer what
writers have influenced you William Burroughs might change my mind tomorrow
but yeah if you're asking me immediately those are the first things that come to
mind yes I mean as a child who do you think Donald Duck was he your favorite
character than was my loathed him you maybe learn how to hate that's very
hard I've always hated the Donald Duck he sends me quite crackers when I heard
him very unlikable did you dislike Mickey Mouse as much yes did you like
any of the traditional people that you were supposed to like like did you like
Winnie the Pooh no no Rupert bear no no I didn't teddy bear no I didn't I don't
think I can't remember having anything like that at all now I never liked and
children's things very much I always liked paintings from very early age
thank you very very much indeed for talking to me I really enjoyed it