Artist profile: Documentary on Ray Johnson 'How to Draw a Bunny'

How To Draw a Bunny

A pointed film about a most peculiar artist -- an artist too peculiar even for the New York art crowd. Ray Johnson had as much talent as Andy Warhol (a friend and colleague) but he really didn't want money or fame. He just wanted to make mail art and to amuse himself at home with whimsical and sly collages. (A goofy kilroy-is-here scribble bunny became his signature.) Soon, like Picasso, or a naive folk artist, everything in his grasp became art. Real artists grokked his stuff --if they ever got to see it, which few did. So he came by reputation to be the most famous unknown artist in America and then as a recluse he mysteriously disappeared, probably a suicide drowning. He left behind a huge master collage -- one clue pointing to the next in a complex recursive joke -- which turned out to be his life. In a delicious way I really enjoy, this documentary itself became an integral part of his grand collage to keep us guessing.

-- KK

How To Draw a Bunny
By John W. Walter
2002, 90 min
$37

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