Remembering Charlotte Moorman, The Topless Cellist

One of the forgotten stars of the avant garde music movement of the 60s and 70s is topless cellist Charlotte Moorman, but a new biography about this unique woman is seeking to change all that. Joan Rothfuss, former curator of the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, is set to release her profile of Moorman, Topless Cellist: The Improbably Life of Charlotte Moorman, with a book signing at the WAC this Sunday.

According to the Minneapolis Star Tribune (link below), while Moorman is largely forgotten today, she once appeared on some of the biggest talk shows and stages in the world.

(Moorman) grabbed the avant garde by the scruff of its self-absorbed neck and -- in the 1960s and '70 -- dragged it onto the public glare of television variety and talk shows (Mike Douglas, Johnny Carson, Merv Griffin), shopping malls and prisons, and to New York City's Central Park, Shea Stadium and Grand Central Terminal.

Moorman played the cello while suspended from balloons floating over Australia's Sydney Opera House, performed on a cello made of ice, and often did her shows topless, in the buff, wrapped in cellophane, or wearing the "TV Bra," a contraption that sported two mini-televisions, one for each breast, in plexiglass boxes attached to transparent straps.

In February 1967 she was arrested (during a topless performance), tried and, in a sensationalized trial that generated huge publicity, convicted for violating "community standards of decency." Though humiliated by the incident, she embraced the "Topless Cellist" nickname that it spawned.

For more information, visit the Walker Art Center's website at www.walkerart.org

Via Minneapolis Star Tribune