Dan Graham
Rock My Religion, 1982-84
Video, color, sound, 55 min 27 sec
“Rock My Religion” is a provocative thesis on the relation between religion
and rock music in contemporary culture. Graham formulates a history
that begins with the Shakers, an early religious community who practiced
self-denial and ecstatic trance dances. With the ”“reeling and
rocking” of religious revivals as his point of departure, Graham analyses
the emergence of rock music as religion with the teenage consumer in
the isolated suburban milieu of the 1950’s, locating rock’s sexual and
ideological context in post-World War II America. The music and philosophies
of Patti Smith, who made explicit the trope that ”“rock is religion,”
are his focus. This complex collage of text, film footage and performance
forms a compelling theoretical essay on the ideological codes and
historical contexts that inform the cultural phenomenon of rock ‘n’ roll
music. (SR-KA)
GF0001912.00.0-1999
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