A "cult figure" is a person whose image has become a symbol which transcends the meaning of the original image. The best way to describe them is as an "in joke" taken way too far. Every year the cult figure selection committee would choose a person to become the Cult Figure of the Year. Then, we would make a bunch of stuff with this person's face on it. Usually the person is selected because of the comical expression on his or her face, not because we have anything against them. Readers are asked to send in their own interpretation of the cult figure as well. Cult figures are usually just ordinary people who are not famous in any way (until we make them temporarily famous).
Occasionally I select an Arbitrary Cult Figure, a picture of a person chosen for no apparent reason that I use for collages and mail art purposes. I become temporarily obsessed with these images, and they become themes in my artwork for a period of time.
To understand Bill Simon you must first understand Johnny Mann, who actually is famous. He had a TV show in the 1960's, and he put out dozens of records. These days he has a troupe of singers and dancers who tour around America singing patriotic songs and dancing around in red, white and blue spandex jumpsuits (actually, they don't really sing, they lip-sync the songs). My friend Jay worked technical crew for one of these shows in 1986 at his high school, and he took a whole stack of programs that had big pictures of Johnny on them. We used these in a series of collages we were making for the cover of a catalog of "underground books" he was selling through the mail. I became obsessed with his picture. Maybe it was that stupid grin, or maybe it was his tie, or his name... I don't know. I had tiny color stickers made up, a giant poster, and hundreds of copies of his picture, and I cut out his head and put it over the heads of people in posters. He just seems so damn... well, enthusiastic! I had twelve different names under his picture, from "Salmon P. Chase" to "Ernest Borgnine" to "Sylvester Stallone," mostly because nobody knew who he was anyway... well, except for my dad who asked me what I was doing with all the pictures of Johnny Mann.
So what about Bill Simon? He was the roommate of a close friend of mine in college. I didn't like Bill too much when I met him because he seemed pretty arrogant and cocky. One day Bill left his high school yearbook picture out on his desk, and I borrowed it and made up a sheet of pictures of him. I started putting them up in the dorm building with the slogan "Get to Know Me!" written on them. Bill's friends were amused, but Bill was kind of mad about it and tore them all down. This made me more determined. Bill's picture soon appeared on bulletin boards all around campus.
October was heralded as International Bill Simon Month. To celebrate Bill's month, we took a whole stack of pictures of him to New York City and handed them out to passers-by, which was photographically documented in the "Book of Bill." (That's my friend Mark in the picture, by the way, who also gave me the recipe for "Pasta Sauce to End All Time.") I asked Bill's permission before I made up the T-shirts because for a while he was talking about bringing me up on harassment charges after people started calling him up to find out why his picture was everywhere. He laughs about it now, but I think it really pissed him off for a while. Actually, he doesn't look much like the picture any more. He lives in Illinois now, I think. If you see him, say "hi."
Tie-dye artist and Deadhead-in-denial Emmett Hollander came from an article in a car magazine about Volkswagen vans and the people that drive them. I picked out the picture because it was pretty weird to begin with, and even though he followed the Grateful Dead around, he denied being a deadhead. After the treatment I gave it, Emmett became a kind of Jesus-looking guy (He dyed for your sins?).
Some people seem to have trouble separating a symbol from what it represents, that is to see is as just a representation. Money is nothing but paper, the crucifix is just a piece of wood or plastic or metal, but it is the meaning assigned to these arbitrary things that is important to us, and I think this whole cult figure thing is a reflection on this. If someone is portrayed as an important figure, people seem to think of them as one, even if they are unknown. Disposable icons are perfect for our throwaway culture. Just pick a picture of someone, and make up stories about them. Invent your own folklore. Does anybody really think that Jesus was a pasty-looking northern European type? He was from the Middle East, for cryin' out loud! Somebody somewhere picked that image for him and millions of people believe it now.
Pick a picture of someone from a magazine, blow it up and declare him or her the messiah, and chances are good that someone will believe it. Organize your friends into a cult group based on this image. Write a book, like the Church of the Subgenius people did. The Book of the Subgenius is just a bunch of mail-art type collages and bizarre psychotic essays. They have a whole "religion" based on J.R. "Bob" Dobbs, a guy smoking a pipe whose picture looks like something they cut out of a magazine from the 1950's. To see the reach of the Subgenius, one only need to watch The Late Show with David Letterman. If you look carefully in the backdrop, right behind where Dave does the monologue, there's a picture of half of Bob Dobbs' face, under a big "E."
