Lead vocalist with The Kills and The Dead Weather, Alison Mosshart has spent the last 26 years on the road performing and living a predominantly transitory life. The daughter of a used car salesman, Mosshart grew up with a vivid appreciation for classic cars; for being behind the wheel and in the passenger seat. In the early days of The Kills they kept the band to a duo in order that they could tour America by car and throughout her life she has recorded her existence on the road with photography and journals.
CAR MA is Alison Mosshart’s first printed collection of paintings, photographs, short stories, and poetry. It is a book about cars, rock n’ roll, and love. It’s a book about America, performance, and life on the road. It’s a book about fender bender portraiture, story tellin’ tire tracks, and the never-ending search for the spirit under the hood.
CAR MA, is a 112 page love letter to the motorcar, and – more specifically – the perceptivity gained from a life spent relishing them. Already renowned as a lyricist, Mosshart’s reputation in the art world has been growing over the past few years as galleries in New York, London and Los Angeles have staged exhibitions of her paintings. CAR MA includes some of these along with hundreds of photographs she’s taken along the way. Her prose is electric, inspired by the images she was collating for the book, it provides a narrative to the anthology; a first person walk through Alison’s journals as she details memories, places, conversations, relationships, journeys and – of course – cars.
Mosshart imagines the auto body shop like some other Coney Island. And America’s highways the last great roller coasters. She shows us that the engine on fire is connected to the guitar feeding back since birth. And the sensation of walking on stage and facing an audience is like the laugh before the scream in a car without brakes. She ruminates that automobiles- with their doors and mirrors and windows, engines and wheels and radios- portray us. Mirror our need to be in or to exit, our inward reflections and outward visions, our lifetimes of tinkering with the mysterious heart. That which runs until it doesn’t. Throughout history the car has been a symbol of freedom and hopeful adventure. It stands to reason it is also a symbol of our subsequent spinning out… over things we never thought could happen during a song that f’king good with the volume up that f’king loud.
If you’ve ever found yourself feeling holy, pulling out of the gas station with a full tank, like the last beautiful free soul on this planet, this book is for you. In fact it’s probably about you.
CAR MA will be available from Dover Street Market. First edition is a limited edition run of 500 copies. Retail $50.00
ABOUT ALISON MOSSHART
Born in Vero Beach, FL, Mosshart pursued art from an early age. The daughter of a high school art teacher and a used car dealer, she had an early passion for painting, cars, and music. As a teenager she joined a punk band and began touring at the age of 14. Mosshart continuously made art, took photographs and kept extensive journals on tour, inspired by the constant change of scene and bewildering pace from one city and country to the next. The disjointed yo-yo of life on the road, adrenaline spikes and comedowns, the many bizarre or bad, boring or blissful moments, are manifest in her impulsive painting style and subject matter. Mosshart studied fine art at the University of Florida, Gainesville, between tours, concentrating on printmaking, photography, video, collage and drawing. Dropping out in 2000 to move to London to start The Kills, she continued her studies for a semester at various London art schools. As well as fronting both The Kills and The Dead Weather, she has appeared as a special guest on recordings by the Foo Fighters, Arctic Monkeys, Cage The Elephant, Primal Scream, Placebo, The Last Shadow Puppets and Gang Of Four.
ABOUT FF-1051
GALLERY FF-1051 is a contemporary art gallery in Los Angeles, CA. With local shows in Los Angeles to exhibitions at SCOPE Miami 2017, Art Wynwood 2018, and SCOPE New York 2018, FF-1051 Gallery brings its artists and curation forward on a diverse and nationwide scale. Focusing across mediums, FF-1051 works with artists living in Los Angeles and NYC but belonging to the global community. With an eye for emerging greats in the art world, FF-1051 Gallery curates high intensity talent from the contemporary art scene.
