Beyond the Fire: Twin Peaks and a girl without a secret

'There are so many clues and feelings in the world that it makes a mystery . . . and there are many avenues in life where we’re given little indications that the mystery can one day be solved. We get little proofs — not the big proof — but little proofs that keep us searching'. David Lynch

8 April 2015 marks the 25th anniversary of David Lynch and Mark Frost’s television series Twin Peaks 1990–91. This ground-breaking vision of small town America revelled in a beauty and horror that lay beneath the surface of the everyday. It was part melodrama and murder mystery, and its success and longevity is a salient marker of our collective fascination with mysteries. As Lynch puts it, “Human beings are like detectives. We sense a mystery and we want to know what’s going on.”

It is happening again!

‘Between Two Worlds’ also includes a gallery-based presentation of the Log Lady Introductions, written and directed by Lynch to accompany syndication of the series in 1993. One of the show’s more enigmatic figures, the Log Lady communicated with a place ‘beyond the fire’ through her log and is presented in the Gallery in a setting reminiscent of the interior of The Black Lodge, a location in Twin Peaks described as a ‘place between two worlds’, where characters meet their shadow-selves.

In the penultimate episode Laura Palmer tells Agent Cooper who is trapped in The Black Lodge, ‘I’ll see you again in 25 Years’ – a promise that has swelled with fans since the announcement that Lynch, Frost and the Showtime network would revisit the town with a 9-episode third series to be directed by Lynch. A new novel by Frost called ‘The Secret Lives of Twin Peaks’ (2015) was also announced with the promise that it would reveal what happened to the show’s characters in the intervening years.

But like the song goes: who knows where or when?

During Lynch’s visit to Brisbane for the opening of ‘Between Two Worlds’ he intimated that while he was still very much in love with the world of Twin Peaks, negotiations with the network were proving difficult and contracts were yet to be signed. Lynch’s reservation and clear frustration with the process drew speculation internationally that the new series might never eventuate. Those fears were fuelled by Lynch’s recent announcement that he was leaving the production, lamenting that he wished things could have worked out differently.

Fans and actors have since begun the campaign to save the production with Lynch and Frost at the helm. The message is simple: No Lynch, No Peaks. In Sheryl Lee’s video message she described the endgame as “Twin Peaks without David Lynch is like a girl without a secret”. It’s a reminder of the commitment of fans worldwide who previously campaigned for 20 years for the release of deleted scenes from Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me that surfaced with the 2014 release of The Missing Pieces.

‘David Lynch: Between Two Worlds’
Exclusive to Brisbane’s Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA)
14 March – 7 June 2015.

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    David Lynch Working Notes: A place both wonderful and strange

    In the lead up to the opening of ‘David Lynch: Between Two Worlds’ QAGOMA Senior Curator José Da Silva explores the process of developing the exhibition and its expanded program of events, screenings and performances. I learned that just beneath the surface there’s another world, and still different worlds as you dig deeper. – David Lynch I was 11 when Twin Peaks 1990–91 first aired on Australian television and I instantly fell in love with the idea of a world hidden with deeper truths. I was gripped particularly by the mythology of The Black Lodge and the location of Glastonberry Grove, where a circle of Sycamore trees and a pool of scorched engine oil marked a gateway between this world and its darker counterpart. When I arrived in Los Angeles last summer to visit Lynch’s studio, I made an impromptu detour out to the shooting location for Glastonberry Grove. With screen captures from the series and Google map in hand, I lined up the surrounding trees and stood at the ingress 25 years later. Now this might look like a strange bit of field research – which of course it is – but it also represents an enthusiasm that underscores my entire approach to curating this project. ‘Between Two Worlds’ wasn’t born of intellectual curiosity, but from a deep love of mysteries. It’s an exhibition about the transcendent power of the imagination and about an artist who loves a mystery, particularly one that leaves room to dream. Not surprisingly, the title comes from the poem Lynch wrote during the production of the Twin Peaks pilot that sums up the idea of crossing the limits of the ordinary world: ‘Through the darkness of future past / The magician longs to see / One chants out between two worlds / Fire walk with me’. When I imagined this exhibition, it began with a sense that it might indeed be possible to traverse the limits of the natural world – to chant out between worlds to a place both familiar and strange. Upon entering the finished exhibition, audiences will get such a chance, encountering a small drawing from the mid-1970s that illustrates the threshold of a living room. The gallery space then opens up to reveal Untitled 2007, an extraordinary installation that recreates the drawing as a théatre décor, enabling viewers to literally walk in and through its limits. Growing up in the Pacific Northwest during the 1950s, Lynch’s world seemed idyllic. It was what lay beneath the surface of that perfection that would consume him and form the basis of his artistic preoccupations. As Lynch describes: My childhood was elegant homes, tree-lined streets, the milkman, building backyard forts, droning airplanes, blue skies, picket fences, green grass, cherry trees. Middle America as it’s supposed to be. But on the cherry tree there’s this pitch oozing out – some black, some yellow, and millions of red ants crawling all over it. I discovered that if one looks a little closer at this beautiful world, there are always red ants underneath. Because I grew up in a perfect world, other things were a contrast. It was in the city of Philadelphia that Lynch would confront those red ants. The city’s atmosphere of violence, corruption and sadness left an indelible impression and gave him a certain way of seeing the world differently. Lynch recalls, ‘The feeling was so close to extreme danger, and the fear was intense… I saw things that were frightening, but more than that, thrilling.’ Lynch’s practice took form at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts where he experimented with an expanded field of painting and sculpture. His desire to see a ‘moving painting’ encouraged him to experiment with proto-forms of animation and make Six Men Getting Sick 1967.This defining work saw Lynch make the leap from still to moving images, using a resin screen with sculptural reliefs as a surface, he projected hand-drawn sequences of vomiting, creating – an endless cycle of sickness accompanied by the sound of siren. Lynch’s approach to painting reflects this prescient example of action and reaction, fast and slow, as well as the organic and visceral possibilities of the painterly surface that he found inspiring in the work Francis Bacon. For Lynch, everything begins with his love of painting, and it is this activity that best represents the creative continuum: ‘You could paint forever and never paint the perfect painting and fall in love with a new thing every week and there’s no end to it, your painting is never going to die.’ At the centre of ‘Between Two Worlds’ is the idea that wisdom is gained through knowledge and experience of combined opposites. For Lynch, ‘the world we live in is a world of opposites. And to reconcile those two opposing things is the trick.’ The exhibition in turn explores the expression of these dualities throughout his practice and the search for the balancing points between them. Shifting between the macroscopic and microscopic, the physical and the psychic, the exhibition reveals many of Lynch’s enduring subjects: industry and organic phenomena, inner conflict and bodily trauma, the interplay of light and darkness, violence and grotesque humour, life’s absurdities, and the possibility of finding a deeper reality in our everyday experience. Ultimately, it reflects Lynch’s instinctive impulses to look beneath the surface of things, to not only find moments of beauty or horror, but to also uncover deeper truths — the mysteries and possibilities that ensure the ordinary is always something more. Which brings me back to Twin Peaks and Agent Dale Cooper who perhaps knew best what we might just discover: ‘I have no idea where this will lead us. But I have a definite feeling it will be a place both wonderful and strange. ‘David Lynch: Between Two Worlds’ Exclusive to Brisbane’s Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) 14 March – 7 June 2015.
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    ‘David Lynch: Between Two Worlds’, the first exhibition in Australia to explore the 50 year career of the acclaimed American artist and filmmaker, opens exclusively at Brisbane’s Gallery of Modern Art on Saturday 14 March. ‘Between Two Worlds’ is the largest survey to date of works by the Los Angeles-based artist who will visit Australia for the first time in conjunction with the opening weekend. 'Between Two Worlds’ explores David Lynch’s entire practice as an artist and filmmaker, spanning painting, photography, printmaking, industrial design, music and the moving image. Featuring over 200 works across all media, the exhibition is sure to surprise Australian audiences not yet familiar with Lynch’s broader artist practice and is an exciting opportunity to see works never before shown in Australia. This is an exhibition about the transcendent power of the imagination and about an artist who loves a mystery, particularly one that leaves room to dream. Three ideas underpin the arrangement of works across seven galleries – ‘Man and machine’; ‘The extra-ordinary’; and ‘Psychic aches’ – and demonstrate the possibility of finding a deeper reality in our everyday existence. The exhibition also includes film screenings held onsite at the Gallery’s Australian Cinémathèque, including Lynch’s 10 feature films and nine programs of shorts and experimental works, alongside selected documentaries and works for television. The opening weekend includes two sold out events – a performance by David Lynch’s collaborator, US songstress Chrysta Bell, on Friday night, and an In Conversation with beloved Australian film critic David Stratton held in association with the Queensland Performing Arts Centre (QPAC) on Saturday afternoon. As part of his first ever visit to Australia, Lynch will host a Master Class for local students which will be broadcast to 11 regional and remote venues. Two special musical projects have been commissioned for the exhibition and will premiere at GOMA. Reflecting the enduring influence of Lynch’s work, the performances include concerts by USA experimental band Xiu Xiu, who will reimagine the music of Twin Peaks, and a collaborative project called HEXA, who will create a new soundscape responding to Lynch’s extensive archive of factory photographs shown in the exhibition. ‘David Lynch: Between Two Worlds’ Exclusive to Brisbane’s Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) 14 March – 7 June 2015.
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