SKIN magazine, Vol 2 No 6 1981
PETER BERLIN Today!
A Legend in His Own Time
Artists have always been their own best creation. Photographer/model/personality, Peter Berlin, is living proof. He has created his Public Image out of his Private Self. His famous face and his lithe body are his livelihood. Peter Berlin is a legend in his own time. And what becomes a legend most?
A salute! A salute to the art-business balls it takes to turn yourself, without narcissism, into an erotic phenomenon! The passion that fans have for Peter Berlin is rather much like the passion the British have for their Monarch. Peter, rumored to be a distant German relative of the British royal family, is liked for the same reasons the royal family members are admired: he's splendid, larger-than-life, and aloof.
BLOND ARYAN MYSTIQUE
The Berlin wall of cool presence, when Peter parades down Polkstrasse, or when he turns heads on Castro, is a self-protective Germanic attitude that appeals romantically to eager Americans the way that Garbo's aloofness also turned on a fanatic following. Swathed in as much rumor as 1eather, Peter, legend has it, burst upon the American scene in the early '70s. Star-gossip on the streets of San Francisco claims that Peter is the Prodigal Son of a titled European family who sent their heir well-heeled to America, where, at a distance, he could practice his art.
IMMER STREBE
Peter paid his dues in those early days learning the ways toward superstardom under the legendary J. Brian, whose modeling service and film interests appealed to Peter. Brian went on to make classic erotic films, featuring an astounding number of young numbers, like “Seven in a Barn.” Peter watched from behind the scenes.
Never one to fade into ensemble balling, Peter launched his own career. Immer strebe, Goethe wrote: Always dare to try! Sort of his own Svengali, Peter-the-private-man dared to become to Peter-the-public-star what von Stroheim had been to Dietrich. Peter recognized a media-biz fact: Streisand's control-of Streisand, start-to-finish, was the best and, therefore, the only way to maintain artistic and business control Uber alles.
Peter's principle has proved a stunning success with his adoring public. He is his own best creator and product. He dared to offer a version of his Self to the world; and the world can't get enough of that Peter Berlin.
PORTRAITS OF THE ARTIST
New York photographer Robert Mapplethorpe first introduced me to Peter Berlin. Mapplethorpe specializes in faces, flowers, and homoerotic fetishes. He has shot everyone who is anyone from Princess Margaret in full royal drag to Mr. Mineshaft in full raunch leather. Robert is currently the hottest, most controversial and, therefore, interesting photographer on the '80s international art scene.
Consequently, Mapplethorpe's “shoot” of Peter Berlin is a revealing “take.” A “name” performer on both sides of the camera! In Mapplethorpe's photograph, Peter stands relaxed in a woodsy Fire Island setting. To study Peter shot by another photographer than himself is a rarity. Mapplethorpe's magic behind his Hasselblad reveals an aura of Peter valuable to reading the aura that Peter, when shooting on his own part, chooses to dramatize in his own self-portraits. (Robert works his camera-magic on other people even though he himself has been superbly photographed as the quintessential Pratt-Brat art-punk by Scavullo.) Berlin works his Nikon voodoo best on himself; and doing so, he proves primitives wrong: the camera does not steal one's soul; it reveals one's soul; and if the camera-man is also the subject, the self portraiture revelation becomes so intensely personal, that viewers reading the photos immediately heat up to the intimacy, wherein a version of the Self, revealed, gives rise to a beatoff hardon.
BERLIN IS REAL STUFF
Peter Berlin is a real erotic fantasy. His blond, lean goodlooks, and his big-basketed leather clothing (which he makes himself) distinguish him from blond and handsome American men in leather, in a way that suggests a kind of Aryan Androgyny that makes the hearts beat faster. He is the epitome of the Appeal of the Northern European Blond Man. No wonder Tom of Finland has used Peter as a model for several of his drawings! Unspoiled by John Wayne American macho, Peter's clean, lean, aristocratic masculinity suggests the best of European film stars Helmut Berger, Oscar Werner, and Hardy Kruger.
Berlin is ageless, because he has developed the classic archetype of his Self. Men, whom he once modeled for years ago, now seem older than Peter. Without any Dorian-Gray vanity, Peter lives a quiet, disciplined, and highly sexy lifestyle, that maintains the Look of the Eternal Blond. As an artist, he cares for his subject. His responsible maintenance through gymnastics and grooming give his natural genetic gifts a commanding glow.
Like the Great Faces of the Silver Screen, Peter's Image will go on forever. Each stage of his appeal attracts audiences at different times. Some men prefer Peter as Ultimate “His famous face and his lithe body are his livelihood.” Blond Chicken; others, as Young Veal; still others watch and wait for him to age to the Commanding Aryan Authority of Beef. In all the Ages of Man, Peter is savvy how to essence out his appealing best.
STARFUCKING
“My image,” Peter says, “is very calculated. I want to touch people. I want to love and be loved. I want to enjoy life and not fight with accountants, both financial and 'moral.' There is a lot of idiocy in the World Society right now. If we live among idiots, we tend to become idiots. I include myself. Like most people, I feel I sometimes don't live up to my potential. But then, how can you be yourself and create your art if everything in society is against you? Society thinks that what I do is 'pornography.' That's why I've cut down on my filmmaking. If I didn't think that artists have a duty to lead society, I'd think maybe we should all go off somewhere until society is no longer so confused.”
He has made only two films : “Nights in Black Leather” (1972), and “That Boy” (1975). Both were as commercially successful as are the current 20 different sets of Self-Photos he has available. “I shoot with a motor-drive remote control,” Peter says. This technique allows him to double-expose the film frame to offer, for instance, two images of himself facing one another.
“Too bad narcissism has today so many negative connotations,” he says. “Without being stuck on yourself, the only way to love other people is to learn to know and love yourself. That's both the intensity and importance of self-love.” That truth and that quality is much of the appeal of Peter's art. “A healthy narcissism is what homosexuality is about in the first place. Men love their own bodies through loving other men who are similar to them. We all started jerking off looking in the mirror. Then once we've discovered what we love in ourselves, we move out to other men. As a result, we both have better sex with each other. That's what I want to express through my camera. That's what I want to-can I say it? teach.”
Then Peter says what every star says: “Unfortunately, people confuse their fantasy of me with the reality of me. They perceive this Ideal and they expect the Real Me to be 'on' all the time. No one can do that. So, you see, when I walk out in public I sort of have to stay to myself. It's a kind of animal protection.” He smiles. “My favorite kind of sexplay is to jerk off with another man who understands getting at Male Essence through what was it you called it?”
“Mirrorfucking,” I say.
“Yes. Mirrorfucking. First, your own self alone with a mirror. Then when you understand that, you with another man alone together with five mirrors. A man can live a whole sexlife based on that style! That's why I'm moving next into videotaping. The video screen is like the Ultimate Mirror. But the images I shoot will not be scripted. Video should be done with hidden cameras, so the men you are having sex with act naturally and not for the camera. Cameras tend to make people hide their true selves. That’s why I am so careful with my camera as an art-tool.”
Peter rubs his hands on his leather “Unfortunately, people confuse their fantasy of me with the reality of me.” thighs. “I can’t go to bars anymore. Many men I talk to can’t go either. Bars are boring. You know why? Too many guys standing around in the shadows are so far away from being in touch with themselves.”
Peter speaks a basic truth. “It’s not sucking and fucking; that’s something left over from heterosexual procreativity. Jerkoff is where it’s at. Every man has a thousand loads. I don’t want a thousand children. If this is decadence, so be it. This is pleasure.” Peter’s pleasure in his art is apparent in his photographs. At press time, his first public exhibit of his photos, including two shots by Robert Mapplethorpe, as well as the drawings of Peter by Tom of Finland, is scheduled for San Francisco, and then for a New York, Los Angeles, and European tour.
