The child stares out from the publicity photos, skin white with dust and eyes expressionless. In a society fluent in the language of news media it's almost impossible not to interpret the blank face of Gottfried Helnwein's photo Child1:
it becomes a symbol of lost innocence and silent accusation.
The show this image promotes, Close Your Little Eyes, is a music theatre-installation devised by composer and director Max Lyandvert. Taking as its starting point a lullaby from the Vilnius Ghetto, it juxtaposes visual and sound images with music scored for 16-voice children's choir, string quartet and soprano soloist. ...

The Rules of Attraction promotional campaign skirted with controversy on more than one occasion, but there's a story that remains largely untold.
Helnwein:
Two images I could not forget - the rape scene and the suicide of that girl in the bath tub - very startling and so different than anything you have ever seen about these subjects on film.
There was a strange and sad beauty in the tardy, dreamlike movements of this girl with the expressionless face, slashing her wrists and slowly turning the water red. Theresa's acting, camera and music in that instant were one of the magic moments in cinema-history. ...

(Auszug)
SZ: Deutlicher: Ist die Beschäftigung mit dem Horror Edgar Allan Poes und die Beschäftigung mit dem Raben „Nimmermehr“ eine Therapie für Sie?
Lou Reed: Glaube ich nicht. Vielleicht ist es ja eine Therapie für Sie.
SZ: Grundsätzlich kann es ja trostreich sein, sich mit dem Dunklen . . .
Lou Reed: . . . das ist keine Therapie für mich. Kennen Sie Gottfried Helnwein?
SZ: Den österreichischen Künstler?
Lou Reed: Ja, Gottfried Helnwein.
SZ: Nicht persönlich. Einige seiner Sachen kenne ich, ja.
Lou Reed: Mögen Sie seine Sachen?
SZ: Nein.
Lou Reed: Aha.
SZ: Wieso?
Lou Reed: Er ist ein Freund von mir.
SZ: Ist er das?
Lou Reed: Ja. Er hat ein wunderbares Bild von Poe gemalt... ...

famed for his confronting paintings, Helnwein is as incisive with the camera as with the brush, as this portraits from the 80s attest. ...

Marilyn Manson's new Interscope album, "The Golden Age of Grotesque," arrives this week. The set, produced by Manson and Tim Skold, is led by the single "mOBSCENE." Says Manson, "This album is about expression. The imagination and personality of the individual cannot be trapped by small minds or defined by any one person. The genius of art finds sanctuary among children and madmen to survive. That, is who we are." ...

Marilyn Manson:
About a year ago, I hooked up with Gottfried Helnwein, and he and I have been working together on various projects that, again, cross the boundaries between photography, painting, film, and installation. It's part of what I'm going to unleash and put into effect as the next couple of months unfold. It's stuff that people dont get to see anymore; it's stuff that happened in the '30s, '40s, '50s and even the '60s with the Panic Movement and Action. Gottfried really pushes the envelope, not just for shock value but for the betterment of art, to make people want to have style because they like it, not because they want to impress other people, to want to be creative because it feeds them and it makes them exist. ...