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The Painted Boy /Night Bloom Trailer Directed by: Bernard Schwartz for The Cogozzo Group
Shot on VHS by: Ellen Wong, Bernard Schwartz

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The Painted Boy is a song about the illusions we project towards the world and the lies we tell ourselves in order to avoid facing trauma. I borrowed the title The Painted Boy from a 1995 documentary film of the same name based on the writer Jerzy Kosinski. It is a clever play on the title of his controversial holocaust survival novel “The Painted Bird.”

Kosinski’s life, and oftentimes his writing, appeared to be a loosely embroidered narrative of falsehoods and other people’s traumas that he wove together to perpetuate a mythical public image of himself. As Kosinski’s life continued, his work became more dissected by scholars who began to expose his literature and crafted persona as fraudulent. As his reputation began to erode, Kosinski’s mental health deteriorated. I don’t judge Kosinski for the deceptions he told to bolster his appearance in the public eye, he was clearly a deeply insecure and troubled man, but I find his story to be a cautionary tale of what can happen if we go on living a life unable to face our own personal truth, our own personal traumas.

My great aunt, the painter and poet Elise Asher personally knew Kosinski, as he was part of the same mid-century New York art and literati circles. She told me, towards the end of her life, “he always seemed like he was hiding something.”

For this video, I merged The Painted Boy with my song Night Bloom, a song that came to me through a joyous moment of improvisation. A moment that would have never opened up for me had I not decided to face my own trauma. It is dedicated to all my brüders und schwesterns who have had the courage to face their own, and with compassion for all of those who may never get there. It may sound cliché and mawkish but I truly believe that love can heal all wounds.

#AdamMiller #Gateway #Chromatics

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