Gargoyle Mechanique was originally the name of a group of collaborating art inventors {Steve Jones, Doug "Bert' Kennedy, Matt Crowe, David Landazuri and brother Roberto Landazuri were the principals} in San Francisco in the late 1970s, and later to be the name of an inter-media

Intermedia

Intermedia was a concept employed in the mid-sixties by Fluxus artist Dick Higgins to describe the ineffable, often confusing, inter-disciplinary activities that occur between genres that became prevalent in the 1960s. Thus, the areas such as those between drawing and poetry, or between painting...

 art space and theater, music, radio, sculpture, art and film collective serially located at various basements and storefronts in New York City's East Village through the 80's into the 1990s.

1980-1988. The Gargoyle Mechanique Laboratory was located initially at Second Ave and 4th st. where musician Steve Jones had moved after leaving San Francisco, but by 1982 had established itself at 69 First Ave in the East Village and was known locally as "The Basement". Principal artistic collaborators: Jones, Jeanne Liotta, Nick Markovich, Carmen Waldorf. Among the creative activities produced during this early fertile period was the Studio Verite Recording studio (6.66 /hr),the kabuki rock n roll band Door of Wigs (Jones, cassette tapes/Chevy guitar, Markovich, vocals, Liotta,percussion/vocals, Carlo Altomare, keyboards, rotating bass players) playing venues of the period such as [The Mudd Club] Mudd Club

Mudd Club

The Mudd Club was a TriBeCa nightclub that was opened in October 1978 by Steve Mass, art curator Diego Cortez and Anya Phillips, a figure in the downtown punk scene...

, CBGB's, and The Gas Station. Production of Super 8 films/performances, such as [Camptown Races]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33GEGUE8tE8 and radio plays such as HOUSE OF DOGS written by Markovich after Stendhal, Shelley, and Artaud, recorded by Jones and featuring Waldorf and Liotta. HOUSE OF DOGS was excerpted on the [TELLUS]http://www.ubu.com/sound/tellus.html audio cassette magazine #11 "The Sound of Radio" and was performed live with food music projections and actors at East Village club [8 BC] 8BC

8BC

8BC was a non-profit performance space and art gallery located in the East Village neighborhood of New York, New York, United States. Founded in 1983, the space was closed by 1985.-History:...

 in 1984. This same year Liotta and Jones gave birth to daughter Chloe Liotta-Jones. Her 3rd birthday party at Gargoyle Mechanique's backyard alley was captured in Super8 sound by Markovich and is preserved for posterity on The Center for Home Movies [LIVING ROOM CINEMA.]http://www.homemovieday.com/livingroomcinema/ Markovich also wrote the play CAKE, a cosmic comedy starring Waldorf, Liotta, and Ed Snyder with slide projections by Liotta and original tape score by Jones, and was performed at the New York Theatre Asylum on E. 9th st run by Raquel Shapira and Tri Garrity. Gargoyle Mechanique had a retrospective of this period of music,film, performance, and projected photoglyphs "from the beautiful to the backwards" at the Collective for Living Cinema

Collective for Living Cinema

The Collective for Living Cinema was an outpost of avant-garde cinema located on White Street in Lower Manhattan in the United States of America. It regularly presented work by filmmakers such as Ken Jacobs, Johan van der Keuken, Yvonne Rainer, Christine Vachon, Dziga Vertov and many others who...

 Collective for Living Cinema

Collective for Living Cinema

The Collective for Living Cinema was an outpost of avant-garde cinema located on White Street in Lower Manhattan in the United States of America. It regularly presented work by filmmakers such as Ken Jacobs, Johan van der Keuken, Yvonne Rainer, Christine Vachon, Dziga Vertov and many others who...

 on White St in NYC in 1987.

From 1989-1993, in NYC, the Gargoyle Mechanique Laboratory was located at 28 Ave B. The thriving art space brought together, and was run by a group of artists, filmmakers and musicians, including Tim Sweet, Loyan Beausoleil, Beth Grim, Kit Krash, Sheila Smyth, Fly, Zero Boy, and Bulkfoodveyer, though led by Steve Jones {now Jones Daughs}.

The September 16, 1992, New York Press 'Best of' issue, named The Gargoyle Mechanique as the "Best 70's Performance Gallery," calling it, "not quite communist, it's not quite socialist, and it might be but it might not be exactly communal, and the only thing that stops it from being anarchist is that they have to pay rent." Harold Goldberg described the Gargoyle in his 1990 Village Voice article, "We shudder at the fiery blood-red walls, the Addams Family furniture, the phantom performers in the smoky half-light, the hooks, webs, and weeds hanging from the ceiling of this 400 square feet (37.2 m²) cabaret space. The Gargoyle is pure horror out of control." But in the same article it quotes Gargoyle co-directors describing the purpose of the space, "We like to stimulate brains," grins Steve[Jones]. "The entire body!" corrects Loyann[Beausoleil].

A Gargoyle Mechanique Laboratory brochure from 1992 lists various artists and events that took place in the 28 Ave B space, including the Sunday Night Open Stage, which began after the Sunday night open mic at ABC No Rio stopped taking place. Produced by this group of diverse artist collaborators, the weekly event set an unusually high bar for live entertainment production values of an Open Mic event, with ever-changing stage designs, lighting, projections, sound-scape and audio effects, always with the goal of supporting and expanding performers' intentions. Many well known East Village performers, including Roger Manning, Fly (artist)

Fly (artist)

Fly is a comic book artist and illustrator, whose art has been published in several magazines and fanzines, including Slug and Lettuce, Maximum Rock 'N' Roll, World War 3 Illustrated, Village Voice...

, Lach

Lach

Lach is a musician associated with the anti-folk movement. Born in Brooklyn, New York, he was trained as a classical pianist from an early age only to abandon it once he heard The Sex Pistols, The Jam and The Clash for the first time. Realizing he was a songwriter, Lach backtracked and explored...

, Paleface, John S. Hall

John S. Hall

John S. Hall is an American poet, author, singer and lawyer perhaps best known for his work with King Missile, an avant-garde band that he co-founded in 1986 and has since led in various disparate incarnations....

, and Brenda Kahn

Brenda Kahn

Brenda Kahn is a NYC-based singer-songwriter known for her poetic lyrics. Her career began in 1990, when her first album, Goldfish Don't Talk Back, was released to critical acclaim. Her punk-tinged folk music led to a major label deal with the Chaos label at Columbia Records, and in 1992, Kahn...

 were regulars at this Sunday night event. Internationally known artists, sculptors, poets, musicians and inspired thinkers have also shared their expressions in GMLab, from Allen Ginsberg

Allen Ginsberg

Irwin Allen Ginsberg was an American poet and one of the leading figures of the Beat Generation in the 1950s. He vigorously opposed militarism, materialism and sexual repression...

 to Jivamukti Yoga

Jivamukti Yoga

Jivamukti Yoga, co-founded by Sharon Gannon and David Life, is one of the nine recognized styles of hatha yoga. Jivamukti Yoga is a physical, ethical, and spiritual practice, combining a vigorous hatha yoga, vinyasa-based physical style with adherence to five central tenets: shastra , bhakti ,...

 founders David Life and Sharon Gannon to Timothy Leary

Timothy Leary

Timothy Francis Leary was an American psychologist and writer, known for his advocacy of psychedelic drugs. During a time when drugs like LSD and psilocybin were legal, Leary conducted experiments at Harvard University under the Harvard Psilocybin Project, resulting in the Concord Prison...

 to John Perry Barlow of the Grateful Dead

Grateful Dead

The Grateful Dead was an American rock band formed in 1965 in the San Francisco Bay Area. The band was known for its unique and eclectic style, which fused elements of rock, folk, bluegrass, blues, reggae, country, improvisational jazz, psychedelia, and space rock, and for live performances of long...

 and the Electronic Frontier Foundation

Electronic Frontier Foundation

The Electronic Frontier Foundation is an international non-profit digital rights advocacy and legal organization based in the United States...

. According to an article in the New York Post, John F. Kennedy, Jr and Daryl Hannah

Daryl Hannah

Daryl Christine Hannah is an American film actress. After making her screen debut in 1978, Hannah starred in a number of Hollywood films throughout the 1980s, notably Blade Runner, Splash, Wall Street and Roxanne and Kill Bill.-Early life:Hannah was born in Chicago, Illinois, the daughter of Susan...

 also visited the space. All in all, hundreds of artists from around the country and the world shared their expression at Gargoyle Mechanique Laboratory, though music, theater, installation art, exhibitions, group shows, intermedia, computer-based works, and early online media.

The name Gargoyle Mechanique was partly inspired by a museum of antique mechanical toy

Mechanical toy

Mechanical toys are powered by mechanical energy, for example using rubber bands, springs, and flywheels. Mechanical toys use four types of different movements, these are called Rotary , Linear , Reciprocating and...

s and contraptions on the pacific coast of San Francisco named Le Musee Mecanique

Musée Mécanique

The Musée Mécanique is a for-profit interactive museum consisting of 20th-century penny arcade games and artifacts located at Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco, California...

. The name Gargoyle Mechanique was devised in 1978 by the team in San Francisco, originally for the purpose of sending a set of gifts to another local San Franciscan arts group, Ralph Records

Ralph Records

Ralph Records was The Residents' original record label, the name coming from the somewhat colorful phrase "calling Ralph on the porcelain telephone."...

 and The Residents

The Residents

The Residents is an American art collective best known for avant-garde music and multimedia works. The first official release under the name of The Residents was in 1972, and the group has since released over sixty albums, numerous music videos and short films, three CD-ROM projects and ten DVDs....

, and the group felt they needed an identifying moniker to do so.

Original S.F. member, artist Douglas Bert Kennedy created the first logo of the shield emblazoned with the goats head. After Steve Jones Daughs had established the Gargoyle Mechanique project and identity in New York, Kennedy redesigned the logo into the bug-like-tribal-mask image. Eventually Jones altered that design, placing it inside a gear, to create what is most widely remembered as the Gargoyle Mechanique logo image.

The initial San Francisco collective, located in an old Victorian-era

Victorian era

The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...

 house at the intersection of 14th Street and Eureka, a few blocks from Castro and Market, included sculptor/poet/illustrator Douglas Bert Kennedy, electronic music

Electronic music

Electronic music is music that employs electronic musical instruments and electronic music technology in its production. In general a distinction can be made between sound produced using electromechanical means and that produced using electronic technology. Examples of electromechanical sound...

composer Matthew Myrle Crowe, experimental musician Steve Jones Daughs, poet musician David Davo Landazuri. In various collaboration with others and themselves, the group made music, sculpture and writings all at once.