11/20 Menke: Steak Mtn.

The Artist

Christopher Norris, better known by his artist pseudonym Steak Mtn., has been creating his often unnerving and deceptively complicated art pieces for a while now. He is currently based in Brooklyn, NY, though he grew up in Salem, MA. Not only is Norris an artist in the traditional sense, but he is also an "illustrator, graphic designer, set builder, and porno director" (Gazin, "I Probably Hate You: An interview with Steak Mtn.").

He initially used the name the Amputees for his artwork before changing it to Steak Mtn. around 2001, under the mindset that "[he] was vegetarian, and somehow the irony of calling this art a mound of meat seemed funny" (Gazin, "I Probably Hate You: An interview with Steak Mtn.").

He has done artwork for many bands, including Against Me!, Fake Problems, Jeff Rosenstock, amongst others. His work is pretty instantly recognizable and always thought-provoking. You can find many examples of his art here.


The Art 

Steak Mtn.'s art is beautiful and usually very dark. His unique style has a way of invading a viewer's mind upon their first seeing him work. The second I found out he was behind some of my favorite album artwork, I quickly realized I had seen his work everywhere in the music scene. While he is a fantastic graphic designer aesthetically, Steak Mtn.'s pieces also make great statements on topics such as sexuality, gender, and the body.

His cover for Against Me!'s 2014 album Transgender Dysphoria Blues features a black and white image of a severed breast on top of a mound of meat. The cover perfectly encapsulates the album's content, which predominantly deals with Laura Jane Grace's feelings as a transgender woman. The cover fits right alongside other "controversial" album covers from the past for its challenging use of the human body. Sure enough, it was inevitably given the censorship treatment with the ridiculous edited cover, featuring only the mound meat from the first image with a nice, smooth square on top. It's completely absurd that  the breast is what was censored, rather than the meat underneath, which is infinitely more explicit (not that I think either should be left out in any way). This is one reason why Steak Mtn.'s work is so important: it doesn't pull any punches. Norris doesn't really think of his audience, it seems; instead, he makes the art fit the theme of whatever he is working on, regardless of if that means his art will be censored in a store at some point or not.

Chris Martins, in his article "Against Me! Use Grisly Pound of Flesh for NSFW ‘Transgender Dysphoria Blues’ Cover," was very clearly affected by the album artwork. He calls the artwork "kinda icky" and at the ends talks about a caption underneath that reads "Steak Mtn." Clearly he just hadn't done his research before setting out to write the piece, but the way that he seems to dismiss the artwork in the piece and call it "kinda icky" is a huge bummer, especially coming from someone writing about music.

A lot of Steak Mtn.'s art seems to be influenced by his working in the porn industry. As a set-maker for a website and a director (though I haven't seen his films, from what I've read they're really weird, but not in a distasteful way; it sounds like they come off more as just experimental/artsy films), he has worked very closely with the human body and with people in a very controversial industry. He even said of it that, "It was the only job I have ever I truly loved, including all of this Steak work" (Gazin, "I Probably Hate You: An interview with Steak Mtn.").

Steak Mtn.'s 2012 solo exhibition, "Get Ready, Jungle Heat," consists almost entirely of very minimalist, but also explicit pieces. I searched the Internet for some sort of review any of his work, only to find articles talking about his "I probably hate you" scarves and watches, but they didn't really say anything other than that they exist and where to buy them.

While his persona seems to focus on hate and darkness, clearly Norris' heart and art are in the right place. His art is challenging in the best way, urging viewers to think about things like gender, the body, and sexuality. There's a reason people return to him to work on their projects: Norris is one of the best and most important artists of his time, as well as a personal favorite of mine.

Gazin, Nick. "I Probably Hate You: An Interview with Steak Mtn. | VICE | United States." VICE. VICE Media, LLC, 11 July 2014. Web. 17 Nov. 2015.

Martins, Chris. "Against Me! Use Grisly Pound of Flesh for NSFW ‘Transgender Dysphoria Blues’ Cover | SPIN." Spin. SpinMusic, 24 Oct. 2013. Web. 19 Nov. 2015.