Lawrence Rothman - H

What this video is

Released January 14, 2016, 'H' emerged during a fertile period of mid-2010s LA underground art-pop defined by queer identity exploration and auteur music video craft. Lawrence Rothman — a gender-fluid artist whose work navigates addiction, body image, and societal alienation — channelled the surrealist absurdity of Los Angeles's culture of perpetual youth into a gothic visual poem. The track later appeared in the…

Why it matters

A defining artifact of 2010s queer experimental art-pop, 'H' demonstrates how independent artists leveraged auteur directors to produce visually ambitious short films at boutique scale. Sigismondi's gothic surrealism, already established through decades of major-label video work, here serves a…

The director

Italian-Canadian director and visual artist, founder of the independent label Mamaroma. Renowned for directing music videos for David Bowie, Marilyn Manson, Björk, The Cure, Christina Aguilera, and Katy Perry. Also directed the feature film The Runaways…