"Jack" at Campe

"Nobody can pass this up"

Chicago: a city built on legendary mob rule, abattoirs and a perpetually green river.  A city whose inhabitants are notoriously big shouldered and hardened by schizophrenic weather and constant sports-related failures.  Some might call Chicago a jaded city.  You could’ve fooled us, when we set ourselves up at C2E2 at McCormick Place over the past weekend.  While the volume of attendance may’ve been modest, the enthusiasm over the material was innumerable.

While Reed Productions billed the event as “San Diego Comic-Con comes to Chicago!” you might want to see another opinion here.  Not ones to dwell on the negative though (don’t let our grotesque posters fool you, there’s always a silver lining, even if it’s a woman getting the smack down from Der Fuhrer in Hitler! – she got to meet an extremely important historical figure!), we were definitely pleased with the level of excitement and surprise the Midwest had for what we had to offer.  “Jack” was interviewed by two separate camera crews (footage from both can be found in the Haute Campe blog as soon as it’s made available) and it didn’t hurt that we got a few posters into the homes and onto the walls of more than a few locals.

Five dollar slices of pizza – rather, five dollar pizza slices the first day and $5.58 the next two – and a lack of carpet in the booth (in more ways than one) couldn’t extinguish our eagerness to bring the sleaze.  A few of the highlights:

The guy who loved "the Girl who Loved Swastikas"

- One lucky convention patron was thoroughly yet expediently corrupted by us. After picking up the Ordered to Love reprint, he went on a Naziploitation binge, returning later with a copy of Hansi: the Girl who Loved the Swastika and requiring only a nudge (a nudge that literally sounded like, “Can you live with this in your house?”) before splurging on the poster The Life of Hitler.

"Jack" and Little Tom

- Company mascot “Tom” (not to be confused with Father Negovan) was also quite a draw.  This hand-sculpted and painted piece of wooden zombie fascism was a mystery to us here Haute Campe, but definitely fit the scheme of things.  Thanks to the many – and we mean many – knowledgeable fans who informed us of our mascot’s origin: SHOCKWAVE!

In closing, we wish to thank the attendees who came out from not only Chicago, but all over the Midwest – and further still!  Thank you for making what could’ve been a difficult and dismal show an entertaining one.

The original title of this entry should’ve been “How We Introduced Live Sadomasochism To Fanboys” but this is a family site after all…

Wares at the fair

Haute Campe’s presence at the WonderCon 2010, hosted by San Francisco’s Moscone Center, coincided with the online gallery’s activation (on April Fool’s Day no less) and was also the world’s introduction to the foremost poster gallery of iniquity! My, was it a sick and filthy weekend; while our presence may have been small, the stain it left on minds (and undergarments) of attendees was monumental – we shudder to think what kind of marks will be left on the fanboys, girls and in-betweens at San Diego Comic-Con International! With titles on display like “The Black Klansman”, “Wetbacks”, “Ordered to Love”, and “Female Fiends”, we were clearly out to offend everyone.

The show started off with rock n roll decadence: within the first hour of exhibiting, rock goddess and self-professed vintage poster fanwoman Jane Wiedlin (of The Go-Go’s) snagged herself the finest Cocaine Hand Mirror that the con had to offer.

As far as shows like Wondercon go, the bar for spectacle is pretty high, so Haute Campe had to rise to the occasion. Day 1 found a respectable esoteric following for a Sally Bowles-inspired ensemble, but by Day 2 it was a full-frontal fascist riot when she donned her Ilsa, She-Wolf of the SS uniform – complete with officer’s cap, riding crop and lust for sexperimentation! This, along with Jack’s impromptu “SPANKS YOU! – $1!!!” sales pitch, caused unimaginable chaos at the Campe-site. The offer proved too enticing for some, and Haute Campe’s resident She-Wolf walked away with a couple extra bucks and a sullied riding crop. Don’t believe us? Check out the Flickr accounts of the Asian businessmen who partook in the crowd surrounding us during said spanking sessions.

While all of the latter decadence was good fun, it was back to business on Day 3. Picking up the booth babe slack, we encountered cosplay superstar Linda Le (aka Vampy Bit Me) hustling for video game icons Capcom. Jack made the mistake of labeling British chat show phenom Jonathan Ross (The Jonathan Ross Show) as “The Molester” with a button baring the title from one of the Haute Campe 7-Button Packs, but Ross being of more discriminating taste, decided to go with a genuine “Freak” button from the Gail Potocki: Freaks Button Set. 

Our experience ended with a visit from Chris Gore, of Filmthreat and G4TV fame, and his large can of beer dubiously concealed in his jean pocket. For him, it was the Anti-Alkohol Bottle Opener kept him intrigued. Sadly for him, he missed out on a complimentary spanking.

All shamelessly plugged products above – button sets, Cocaine Hand Mirrors and Anti-Alkohol Bottle Openers, can be found in the SWAG section for sale (get yours… NOW!)

A special thank you to the Comic-Con International crew for making the show a hit!

http://www.comic-con.org/wc/
www.comic-con.org

Jack and I are watching TV in our hotel.  We got in to San Francisco yesterday to have a little mini-vacation before the big weekend, and spent the day rummaging through thrift stores and bookstores.  (Hats off to Forest Books at 16th and Valencia for actually having a handful of books with silent cinema reference that I didn’t own!  Not many could claim this achievement, as my library’s tired floorboards will attest.  You MUST visit them.  Plus, Rocker Guitars is lucky to have the brilliant Marlon behind the counter- he showed me why I couldn’t live without entering the world of boutique guitar pedals by Subdecay Studios, Homebrew Electronics, and Love Pedal.  I am a believer.  They also have a stellar selection of boutique amps- Victoria, Top Hat, Bogner, Matchless- more of every model than I’ve seen in one place.  Man, I wish they were in Chicago…)

So, Jack is scanning channels, and what comes up???  Olga’s House Of Shame!!!!

Olga's House Of Shame!!!

One of the BEST posters ever, BUT… no one told me that lines like “she had low morals, and would even stoop to selling marijuana to teenagers” and “after hanging upside-down for forty-eight hours, even the strongest of characters become agreeable” were spoken in THAT 1950s documentary-style voice!!!  Chicks kept prisoner in a Chinatown basement?  ”A daily dose of heroin?”  ”I never thought I would enjoy beating anyone as much as I enjoyed beating this one…” Thank God for Something Weird Video, this is brilliant.

One more day off tomorrow will take us to Haight-Ashbury and then—–

I just got distracted as the voice on the TV says “the test shows… gonorrhea!”

I look up, to see a soldier respond, “She was so young… she looked so CLEAN…”

I can’t type fast enough, I’m laughing so hard at this exchange… then…

Another high point, when the soldier is told he might also have another dreaded STD:

Soldier: “But I heard that syphilis was just a bad case of diarrhea?  (Trust me, you really want to click on that syphilis link.)

Doctor: “Not by a long shot!”

Jack informs me what we are watching is a film called “Pick Up”.  MAN, oh man, is this a MUST-SEE…

Oh!!! Now he’s showing the soldiers slides of… “There’s the fella that put you in the hospital, that little bean-shaped fellow.”  Hahahaha!!!

Oh, man, this is one of the best things I’ve ever seen, I can’t even keep up with the one liners…

All right, I’m giving up on this blog, I’m laughing too hard at this movie.

SO:

Wondercon, this Friday, Saturday, and Sunday!

High point for fans of Haute Campe will undoubtedly be the presence in the autograph area of Jim Kelly, martial artist extraordinaire:

So after you go and get an autographed photo of Mr. Brown, please stop by the Century Guild booth, and say hello to Sioux Sinner as we celebrate the launch of Haute Campe!  Plus: follow us on Twitter for moment-by-moment updates!

Olga oversees her muscle: a pregnant woman who works for heroin-

Olga's latest crush, chained and ready.

Did you catch a whiff of that?  Is it the scent that brought you here?

If you haven’t already guessed, the odor in question is not from a used Arcade stall or stale popcorn cemented to the floor via smuggled-in whiskey and Coke.  Rather, it’s the magnificent funk of 60+ years of kitsch, camp, deviance, and depravity!

HAUTE CAMPE, quite certainly the world’s filthiest poster gallery alive!

SEE! rare, antique drive-in, grindhouse, B-movie, cult classic, exploitation posters, all available for purchase;

OGLE! Buxom HELLCATS — led by the Kommandant of Kitsch herself, SIOUX SINNER;

WITNESS! Swag and shenanigans to make She-Devils gag!

We have arrived.  The seats have not been sprayed down with deodorizer in an attempt to preserve the stench of vintage trash.   Enjoy your visit to Der Campe, and be sure to stay tuned to the CALENDAR for the latest stops this drive-by, drive-in caravan will be making.

Our first stop: WONDERCON 2010, Booth #1332!  We unleash filth and fury upon the unsuspecting attendees of San Francisco’s foremost comic book, fantasy and pop culture convention.  SIOUX SINNER to shock and seduce, IN PERSON!