Ugh, As If! - contemporary art and culture podcast · Lisa Fevral

Hellsa and other alter egos(Lynn Hershman Leeson&Roberta Breitmore) - 3x14

·1 hr 1 min·4 clips

The hosts argue alter egos matter most when they comment on identity, power, and who gets to speak.

They open with a disclaimer. Then they trade a few jokes about alter egos, which seems to suit the room. The conversation quickly settles into the basic question of how common alter egos are in art. From there, they argue that music is where alter egos can land hardest, since a new name, a new look, and a new era can actually reshape a career. Childish Gambino comes up as one of the examples. The hosts use him to talk through how a persona can get hard to shake. The point is not just whether the name works. It is why the name keeps sticking around. The discussion then shifts to Leeson and Roberta. That is where the episode gets especially good. They keep pulling at how a fictional identity can be maintained, documented, and taken seriously. The fact that Roberta could end up with paperwork, a credit card, and a bank account gets a lot of attention. Leeson, as an actual person with a history, could not get the same treatment nearly as easily. The hosts treat that as funny. They also treat it as a strange little indictment of institutional logic. The character was effectively kept alive by other people playing her. That absurdity is part of the point. It starts out sounding ridiculous and then starts sounding sharp. They make clear that the power of the alter ego is in how fully it can be believed. The episode also gets into the practical side of the project. Leeson made diagrams and paintings showing how Roberta was supposed to look and how her makeup should be applied. That detail grounds the whole thing in process instead of mystique. By the end, they widen the frame to another artist with a pile of aliases. They do not treat those names as automatically profound. Instead, they ask what the point was, and whether the alter ego mattered or just looked like another art-world move.

As heard by us

A sharp look at alter egos in art and music, especially when a persona starts to outgrow the person who made it.

This episode treats alter egos as more than a gimmick in art and music, moving from Blackpink and Childish Gambino to Lynn Hershman Leeson and Roberta Breitmore. It asks where a made identity begins to do real cultural work, and where it is still just style.

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Why you'd press play

You want alter egos in art treated like a messy identity argument.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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