artiste d'mon >>> del moran

Del Moran:
Reality Burns
Interview by: silverio pantalla

Who is Del Moran and what makes you burn?
I'm a man with the testosterone levels of a 15-year-old boy. I'm an advertising director's dream. I have 10-second attention span and a mind that retains every twisted image and useless fact it comes across.

I'm a classically trained artist who hates classically trained artists. What a waste of money and a load of crap.

I'm a work in progress. I imagine myself living in a groove.

I've got A-D-D. I've got nasty habits. I'm white boy with a ghetto pass.

If I weren't an artist, I'd be locked up somewhere institutional green and padded. I've be pimping around in a Caddy on Hollywood and Vine.

What makes me really burn? Two things:
Art for art's sake and masturbation without lubrication. Hmmmm!!*
* maybe those two are really the same thing. Think about it.

Describe your typical day?
Up around 10, wake and bake, email and phone call until 11 then its "The Price Is Right". I find that Barker's Beauties inspire me, especially since they started using Playmates. Then it's off to the studio where I can hole up for hours. My man cave has it all. Macintoshes, large screen TV, Internet... the works.

I can just as easily work for 6-7 hours straight or stare at the wall for the same length of time. When I get creative, I can bang out 3 pieces in a day. But I also may go weeks between projects until I get inspired.

Do you choose your subjects or do they choose you?
Some of both…

An image just catches my eye and I go with it. I like to think I can find beauty in the dirtiest places.

Of course, when you have the kind of international recognition that I have, people will follow you everywhere trying to work with you. I cannot get Shannon Doherty to stop calling me. Its just part of the downside to fame, you can't escape it.

What is Reality Burns and why?
Reality Burns is an attempt to bridge the gap between high art and smut.

It is not just my studio, television show, website, t-shirts, magnets, and stickers - it's my bent view of what is beautiful. It's skinned knees and skinned hearts. It's Mona Lisa with a new tattoo. It's the flies in the back of your mouth.

In the past few years we've acquired quite a following, especially in Europe. In fact, my partner JDog and I are currently in negotiations to franchise the whole thing like the EST movement in the seventies or Chuck E. Cheese. Nothing makes me happier than seeing a kid with my stickers on his skateboard or a girl wearing my shirt designs.

How was the "This is NOT Porn Show"?
Definitely a defining moment… not only for my career… but also my life. It was my first shot at bringing my twisted view of the world to Southern California and it was a smashing success. Sold all my pieces. Lots of the ladies from the "entertainment industry" showed up and brought their friends. Beautiful women were so knocked out by my pieces, they tore off their clothes and demanded to be my next creation. No kidding. Check out the pics. There up on the website.

What is your most important goal in life as a person and as an artist?
Two things: Women and money.
Everything else is just fluff.

If you could meet anyone, living or dead, who would you meet and why?
Clarence Williams III. I couldn't care less what people say about Richard Roundtree as Shaft, Linc was a bad mutherf*cker on a weekly basis.

Oh yeah, and Pam Grier. All that creamy goodness rolled up in a chocolate wrapper. She embodies everything I live for.

What is the biggest misunderstanding about you?
People think I'm a dick, when really I'm just hyper.

Who have been some of your main influences as an artist and as a person?
I'm a mix of all the bad and ugly from the last 30 years of pop culture.

The top 10 include Issac Hayes, Elvis, Evel Knievel, David Lee Roth, Hugh Hefner, Snoop Dogg, my cat Ratface, Tommy Lee, Redd Foxx, and one very special lady, Traci Lords.

What are your immediate plans for the future?
Halloween Night kicked off my return to the East Coast art scene. "Getting' Busy in Chocolate City" opened as part of the Artomatic Annual Show in DC. The new stuff will knock you out. Another project in DC and a trip to LA to lay the groundwork for a show early 2003. Check out my website for schedules and times.

I just offered a new line of t-shirts on Christmas Day. Pick one up for someone special. They'll love you for it.

After the New Year it's my usual vacation routine. A quick trip to the Grotto at Hef's place and then a South American tour quickly followed by a six-week stay at Betty Ford and a shot of penicillin. Rinse. Repeat.

And as always, I'll continue to do my charity work with young unwed mothers...