Carlos Batts is a Los Angeles-based photographer originally from Reisterstown who has shot nudes and fetish stuff for himself and others, plus a couple of covers for this very paper. He has weathered examinations of his work and whether or not it’s crap or porn or both (“Skin Graft,” Arts & Entertainment, Dec. 3, 2003; “Why is This Man Smiling?”, Oct. 24, 2001). He is now the really, really proud creator of his third book, American Gothic, the debut original offering of Scapegoat Publishing, Reptilian Records store/label owner Chris X’s recent spin-off enterprise. We talked to the pair about their latest creation at Mr. X’s home earlier this year, where there are lots of skulls and alluring devil-things lying around.

 

City Paper: (To Chris X) Do you get this a lot, that you look like the guy in the George Romero movies?

Chris X: Yeah, but I’m better looking than him. Tom Savini. I wish I had one of those gun codpieces.

CP: OK, so what do you do?

X: After 10 years of watching the music industry change and formats change, I decided I wanted to do something different. So I moved into publishing because there are artists who I want books by and those books don’t exist, and there are books I want to read that don’t exist. So who better to do that than me? I’m doing this book of Carlos’ art because I’ve been into his art since the day I met him. I’ve watched him grow and become famous for his fetish photography, but this [collage and multimedia art] of his has gone unnoticed because publishers were afraid of it or whatever.

Carlos Batts: I’ve got a film coming out on DVD with Cult Epics called American Gothic based on the painting. It’s just not like, for goth kids. This is the 75th anniversary of the painting, “American Gothic.” In the 1930s when that painting was created it was a satire of rural America. The hidden message in the book is there’s more things going on besides skulls. There’s like, racial tension and sexual tension, and my work is far beyond just eroticism. I decided to make that to challenge the art community as well as take this idea of America and put my identity to it. So I have a film that’s based on the painting that the old man had killed his wife and did it for the painting and is trapped inside of the painting.

CP: So what are you saying about this country?

Batts: I didn’t grow up going to Hot Topic at the mall. I’ve been around this scene for a while and there’s more to me than—

CP: Are you sad that there’s Hot Topic now and you can get your little goth kit?

Batts: I would love to have 15-year-old goth kids grow up listening to Chris X’s music and Carlos Batts’ photography because his ears are better than—Chris has put out records by bands that are far more provocative than anything on Headbangers Ball.

CP: How does that make you feel? I mean, you know what I’m talking about? I go to Arundel Mills mall and see a 15-year-old girl wearing skin-tight PVC and white makeup and looking like Marilyn Manson.

X: I have mixed feelings about it—

CP: Because kids can’t help where they live—

X: Exactly. I’m glad that it’s a little bit more accessible than it used to be and that people who otherwise wouldn’t dig deep enough to find it have access to it, but from a business point of view, of course I don’t like the overcommercialization of something that used to be more artistic and underground and special. I also don’t like the competition.

CP: You try to make money on your business and put aside money to do other things?

X: I try to make money with the record store and also put these things out there where people can see them by having a store. I’m building my empire—record label and book publishing—so that I don’t have to stand behind a counter the rest of my life.

CP: How do you guys feel about the fact that I’m the one who had to fuckin’ come here to do this interview? You know? I went to a couple different editors, and they all just kinda went, “ehh,” and I thought it was important because (points to Chris X) you’ve been around for a long time and (points to Batts) you do what you do and nobody else does it.

X: Who else is doing stuff like this in Baltimore? Who else has got a label like this in Baltimore? Who else has got a store like this in Baltimore?

CP: What does that say about my paper, though?

X: People like us are taken for granted. I’ve been putting on shows and putting out records and doing what I do for 15 years. I think your paper does a fairly good job of covering a lot of things that people would otherwise not know about. But even though it’s in the paper it doesn’t mean anyone’s paying attention to it.

Batts: I’m here visiting. I don’t need to say anything bad, I’m living my life. And Chris doesn’t know this, but doing his record covers over the past six years while I’m shooting the girl stuff, Chris was one of the few people that understood my work, and I honestly think he came up with projects for me to do so I could keep doing my work fresh. This book is far more different than anything I’ve ever done. It’s the real me.

CP: You told me you shot a couple of little films. You want to be a director?

Batts: My life has been planned since I was 15. This new film is amazing, because it looks like the book. I directed two videos, I did a couple feature-length fetish films, but that was years ago, and the whole goal was to be a director. The film is a companion piece to the book. It’s in the vein of Matthew Barney or David Lynch, the same kind of visceral idea of what cinema should be. I have that now. I don’t wanna make weird art films for only weird art people. We’re not gonna have a problem selling books. Our peer group is there.

CP: Your subculture?

Batts: Our subculture, but I’m far bigger than that. I have a universal vision. The fact that me and Chris are friends, that we’re different races and cultures, our families are different, but we have a general interest, that’s more provocative to me. Baltimore sometimes isolates people. They think they don’t have the same interests, both racially and culturally. The book isn’t just about skulls and scaring people. I watch MSNBC every morning. I walk down the street and pay taxes like everybody else. I don’t wake up and there’s a porno set in my house. There’s other things happening, man.

The only problem that I have with the City Paper is that we shouldn’t even have a debate right now, I’m from fuckin’ Reisterstown, this is my third book. You find me any—I’ll say it—go to MICA, go to any fuckin’ art school in Maryland, period, and find me a photographer that graduated from there and has three books, that’s been around the world, that’s exhibited around the world, that’s curated around the world, that’s worked with bands. I shot Snoop Dogg, my fuckin’ rap hero, and Glenn Danzig from the Misfits. I’ve done everything I wanted to do. Everything. To the T. There shouldn’t be a debate. I should be celebrated, like, “Damn, this is cool!” when I come back. I shot my brother’s rap group. I come back to Baltimore to my friends, I show love.

X: Both he and I might go ignored or taken for granted in Baltimore, but there are people from all over the East Coast and all over the country who come to my record store to shop, but people here, because of whatever petty bullshit they have—problems with me or my politics or whatever—they don’t come to my store. The same with my label. People might think of it as a Baltimore label, but I’ve got bands from all over the United States on my label.

CP: Whenever I see a business like yours, I always worry about it, and I always wonder how it says afloat.

X: It’s a struggle and a fight. I’ve lived in the back room and slept on the floor.

CP: Tell me again about the Scapegoat thing, I shoulda asked you that, but I’m not a reporter.

X: The name of the publishing company, Scapegoat, is also a reflection of myself and the artists that I’m working with and the authors that I’m working with and how we’re perceived—or ignored.

CP: Why is that? What did you boys ever do to anybody?

X: A lot of people are very comfortable with their Martha Stewart television view of life, and they don’t want to think about the grease on the bottom of the stove of humanity. People don’t want to recognize that we are carnal beings and we are animals with desires and feelings like hatred and anger that are just as much a part of us as love and beauty, and I prefer to expose both sides of that.

CP: Martha Stewart did time. Either of you guys done time?

Both: No.

CP: Neither of you boys has done time?

X: We haven’t been caught.

Batts: I wear rubber gloves.

Baltimore City Paper

812 Park Ave.

Baltimore, MD 21201

(410) 523-2300

Contact CP | Advertise | National Advertising | About Us | Work Here | Staff Directory

All parts of this site Copyright ©2013 Baltimore City Paper.