Nancy Arlen (January 29, 1942 – September 17, 2006) was a cast polyester resin sculptor and drummer for the no wave band

Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury (planet), Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Mars (mythology), Roman god of war. Mars is a terr ...

Art

In the 1970s, Arlen as a sculptor showed her cast-polyester abstractions at Robert Steffanotti Gallery. She also showed at the

New Museum The New Museum of Contemporary Art, founded in 1977 by Marcia Tucker, is a museum in New York City at 235 Bowery, on Manhattan's Lower East Side. History The museum originally opened in a space in the Graduate Center of the then-named New Sc ...

. Arlen found her working materials at the plastic shops of

Canal Street (Manhattan) Canal Street is a major east–west street of over in Lower Manhattan, New York City, running from East Broadway between Essex and Jefferson Streets in the east, to West Street between Watts and Spring Streets in the west. It runs through ...

. Arlen made a series of glass works in 1983.

Music

She was also the drummer for

, one of the No Wave bands. Mars played live about two dozen times, all in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

. Their first show was at

CBGB's CBGB was a New York City music club opened in 1973 by Hilly Kristal in Manhattan's East Village. The club was previously a biker bar and before that was a dive bar. The letters ''CBGB'' were for '' Country'', '' BlueGrass'', and '' Blues'', Kri ...

in January 1977; their last one was at

Max's Kansas City Max's Kansas City was a nightclub and restaurant at 213 Park Avenue South in New York City, which became a gathering spot for musicians, poets, artists and politicians in the 1960s and 1970s. It was opened by Mickey Ruskin (1933–1983) in Decembe ...

on December 10, 1978. Their recorded debut was the "3-E"/ "11,000 Volts" 7-inch single, released by Rebel Records/

ZE Records ZE Records was originally a New York-based record label, started in 1978 in music, 1978 by Michael Zilkha and Michel Esteban. It was reestablished by Esteban in 2003. History Michael Zilkha (b. 1954) is a British-born Oxford University, Oxford ...

. The group then released a single live EP in 1979 or 1980, though they had broken up in 1978. Both recordings were compiled by

Lydia Lunch Lydia Lunch (born Lydia Anne Koch; June 2, 1959)Martin Charles Strong. ''The Great Indie Discography''. 2003, page 85 is an American singer, poet, writer, actress and self-empowerment speaker. Her career began during the 1970s New York City no ...

's self-run label, Widowspeak Records, in 1986, as ''78''; the songs were slightly remixed and tweaked by

Jim Thirlwell James George Thirlwell (born 29 January 1960), also known as Clint Ruin, Frank Want, and Foetus, among other names, is an Australian musician, composer, and record producer. He is known for juxtaposing a variety of different musical styles. ...

(a.k.a. Foetus). It was reissued by

Atavistic Records Atavistic Records is an American record label based in Chicago, Illinois, known for its no wave and free jazz recordings. Atavistic has released albums by Glenn Branca, Nels Cline, Lydia Lunch, Peter Brötzmann, Ken Vandermark, Pinetop Seven, Sw ...

on CD in 1996 as ''78+''. In 1978, Mars appeared on the influential ''

No New York ''No New York'' is a compilation album released in 1978 by record label Antilles under the curation of producer Brian Eno. Although it only contained songs by four different artists, some consider it to be a definitive single album documenting Ne ...

'' compilation LP produced by

Brian Eno Brian Peter George St John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno (; born Brian Peter George Eno, 15 May 1948) is a British musician, composer, record producer and visual artist best known for his contributions to ambient music and work in rock, pop an ...

, along with DNA,

Teenage Jesus and the Jerks Teenage Jesus and the Jerks were an influential American no wave band, based in New York City, who formed part of the city's no wave movement. Background Lydia Lunch met saxophonist James Chance at CBGB and moved into his two-room apartment. ...

, and

James Chance and the Contortions James Chance and the Contortions (initially known simply as Contortions, a spin-off group is called James White and the Blacks) was a musical group led by saxophonist and vocalist James Chance, formed in 1977. They were a central act of New York ...

, which helped to bring the nascent No Wave genre into the foreground.

Footnotes

References

Richard Milazzo Richard Milazzo is a critic, curator, publisher, independent scholar and poet from New York City. In the 1970s, he was the editor and co-publisher of ''Out of London Press''. He is the co-founding publisher and editor of Edgewise Press. In the 198 ...

and

Tricia Collins Tricia Collins is an American art critic, art gallerist and curator of contemporary art. She was half of the curatorial team Collins & Milazzo, with Richard Milazzo, who together co-published and co-edited '' Effects : Magazine for New Art Theory ...

, ''Deprivileging Critique'', Editions Antoine Candau, 1990. *

Carlo McCormick Carlo McCormick is an American culture critic and curator living in New York City. He is the author of numerous books, monographs and catalogues on contemporary art and artists. Pedagogic and art writing activities McCormick was Senior Edito ...

, ''The Downtown Book: The New York Art Scene, 1974–1984'', Princeton University Press, 2006. {{DEFAULTSORT:Arlen, Nancy Postmodern artists Sculptors from New York (state) 1942 births American experimental musicians 2006 deaths 20th-century American sculptors 20th-century American musicians No wave musicians