Urban Cowboy...in a Dress
Mama, cjon't let your babies grow up to be Larry Krone
arry Krone was bom in 1970 in
Chicago but spent most of his younger
years in St. Louis, a city he still recalls
fondly. He recounts his early artistic
development there: “In those days,
1 always thought that to be a real artist, you had to
be a painter. But after a while I came to realize that
painting wasn’t my medium. 1 was more into craft
books and funny drawings, and I was always using
country music imagery in my artwork.”
After moving to New York at age 19, he learned
to play the ukulele and began making vjdeo art.
“1 became convinced that your most real emotions
can be expressed through music,” he says.
Gallery owners in New York who saw his visual
work asked him to perform, introducing him to the
stage. “At first I could only sing and perform when
I was by myself, just me and the camera,” he says,
laughing about it now. “It wasn’t meant to sound
good at first; it was meant to sound kind of pathet
ic. It was more about ideas than musical quality.”
What started as conceptual art soon evolved
into sincere performance. Krone began writing his
own music and singing at clubs downtown, work
ing a variety of outfits into his set—“Roy Rogers
costumes with rhinestones and fringe.” His per
formances today maintain a conceptual element.
“My themes have to do with revealing layers of
a person, such as masculine and feminine, juvenile
and sad.”
Krone’s layer-revealing technique often
involves hiding glitzy costumes beneath rugged
L
daywear: the rhinestone cowboy lurking beneath
the drab ranch hand, waiting for the spotlight to
bring him out. He also performs in drag, “although
I’m never convincing as a woman.... Sometimes
I’ll strip off my cowboy outfit and have a tight
dress on underneath, or 1’11 strip down to my
underwear,” he says. “But when you’re on stage,
you’re putting on a show, so even when I’m in my
underwear, ids usually patched together with
embroidery and rhinestones.”
When he started exit, Krone performed ail covers.
Today he has evolved to the point of performing
mainly original material. For TBA he opens for local
favorite Holcombe Waller, of whom he speaks high
ly, as he does his fellow TBA alumni from New York:
Claude Wampler, Neil Medlyn and Taylor Mac.
It’s nice to see such solidarity in a community that
can sometimes be highly competitive. Krone is the
kind of guy you want in your comer: big-hearted,
wearing the veneer of the underdog, the guy you
want to win, against the <xkls.
In addition to his performance art and song
writing, Krone has long been a visual artist and
has produced some highly original works of
outsider art that have garnered him a gixxl lot of
critical attention. Among them: dolls made from
his own wisdom teeth dressed in miniature hand-
sewn costumes; an exhibition of country-music
lyrics spelled out in human hair; and a “crazy
quilt” using ever-smaller pieces of fabric to insin
uate that its maker is, literally, crazy. He’s had solo
shows or taken part in group exhibitions in
Krone'» layer-revealing technique often involves hiding glitzy costumes beneath rugged daywear.
Larry Krone performs mainly original material along with a few covers.
Toronto, Berlin, Mexico, Belgium and New York’s
prestigious Whitney Museum.
It makes sense, then, that TBA will also feature
Larry Krone’s Campfire Exhibition, for which he and
a team of skilled volunteers will construct an Old
West campsite to go with his elaborate backdrop of
tinselly rain curtains, 25 feet high by 7 feet tall,
constructed of hundreds of paper-thin sections of
Mylar. This showpiece will be built up during the
course of the festival and punctuated by perform
ances before a fake campfire in the gallery.
“Anyone is invited to come in and help build
the set,” Krone says, opening the door to a fully
interactive installation. “I want to have tumble
weeds, hay bales, alcohol and coffee to drink, and
sing-alongs so people can join in.”
But that’s still not all the Larry Krone action
Portland gets this month. Concurrent with his TBA
appearances will be an exhibition at Elizabeth Leach
Gallery of works on paper from his Love Is in the Air
series, all of which feature the title of one of Dolly
Parton’s most famous songs—“I Will Always
Love You”—handwritten repeatedly and obses
sively over various images. Krone first exhibited
at the gallery 10 years ago, making this some
thing of a triumphant homecoming.
Krone seems to have a genuine soft spot for
Portland (his brother lives here) and speaks
fondly of its kookiest tourist attraction, the now
defunct 24-Hour Church of Elvis, which
operated from 1985 to 2002 at three different
locations and garnered national attention. "I
loved the lady who gave the tour. I wanted to
bring her out to New York and curate her into
a show as a tour guide, but then she disap
peared." (Recent reports have church founder
and performance artist Stephanie G. Pierce
working at a call center, designing toilet seat
covers in her spare time and perpetually plotting the
return of the “church” in yet another location.)
Krone’s interest in country music is completely
genuine and runs through all his work, whether
beneath stage lights or on gallery walls. “Some
people expect me to do a sort of hokey sendup of
country music or something ironic, and that’s not
what I do at all,” he clarifies.
Somewhat ironically, though, he didn’t listen to
country in his childhood or teenage years, but only
discovered it after moving to the big city. “I felt
that I’d heard it before, like I’d been listening to it
my whole life. It brought memories of home.”
Krone fondly recalls many a night spent at a bar
called the Village Idiot. “It was this kind of typical
East Village bar; it wasn’t trying to be from the
South or anything, but they only had country on
the jukebox. 1 had some of rhe best times of my life
there. The beer was cheap, the place was filthy, and
everyone got insanely drunk. And I loved the
music.”
He recalls thinking: “What’s happening to me?
Why am I responding so much to this music that’s
not supposed to be very good or intelligent?” His
conclusion: “It’s easy to like. A lot of people prefer
to challenge themselves to like things that are more
difficult, but country music enshrines all the basic
things that are good and true and human.”
L arry K rone opens for Holcombe Waller
8:30 p m. Sept. 13 to 15 at Someday Lounge,
125 N.W. Fifth Ave. Admission is $7 for PICA
members or $10 for nonmembers.
L arry K rone ’ s C ampfire E xhibition is on display
through Sept. 16 at Museum of Contemporary
Craft, 724 N.W. Davis St.
L ove I s in the A ir is on display through Sept. 29 at
Elizabeth Leach Gallery, 417 N.W. Ninth Ave.
Find Your Diamond
in the Peart.
JUDITH
ARNELL
JEWELERS
Located In The Pearl District
320 NW 10th Avenue
Between Everett & Flanders
JudithArnellJewelers.com
503.227.3437