Harmony Korine is one of the most significant artists of his generation. After emerging onto the world stage in the 1990's as a screenwriter (
Kids) and director (
Gummo;
Julien Donkey-Boy), his intuitive, open-ended approach to realism created a polarizing fervor amongst critics.
Lesser known but no less relevant are Korine's experiments outside the world of
cinema.
A Crack-up At The Race Riots, his first book, adapted the possibilities of his brand of montage to text. Numerous collaborations with other artists (such as
Christopher Wool, Brian DeGraw, Gus Van Sant and
Mark Gonzales) further stretched Korine's imagination into realms of formalized abstraction, vaudeville, black metal nihilism, and ambient soundscapes.