Motley Crue's Nikki Sixx to lecture on photography

Nikki Sixx, who rose to fame as bass player and main songwriter of the ribald L.A. headbangers Motley Crue, has branched from heavy metal rock to silver emulsion photography.

Last seen in Los Angeles with the Crue earlier this month at the Hollywood Bowl, Sixx will be back on Aug. 25 -– to deliver a lecture on his alternate art form at the Annenberg Space for Photography in Century City.

The songwriter of "Shout at the Devil" and co-writer of "Girls, Girls, Girls" will deliver a talk entitled "Life Through the Distorted Lens of Nikki Sixx," which will probably have more than a little to do with his new book, "This is Gonna Hurt: Photography and Life Through the Distorted Lens of Nikki Sixx." The book is a follow-up to his 2007 memoir, “The Heroin Diaries: A Year in the Life of a Shattered Rock Star.

Promo material for Sixx's new book -- which has a companion-piece album, "This is Gonna Hurt," by his  other musical crew, the band Sixx:A.M. -- says it combines photography with journal entries and bits of memoir as its author "explores what true beauty is."

That theme (along with his presumed drawing power) helps explain Sixx's impending gig as a guest lecturer at an arts venue. The Annenberg Space's current exhibition is "Beauty Culture," in which about 500 photographs by more than 100 fashion and documentary photographers explore the subject in sections that include "The Hollywood Glamour Machine," "The Marilyn Syndrome" and "What Size is Beauty?"

Sixx's lecture is part of the Annenberg Space's Iris Nights series, in which the other upcoming celebrity attraction is actor-photographer Leonard Nimoy (Sept. 15), whose subject will be "Goddess: An Exploration of the Divine and the Secular Forms of Beauty." Other lecturers include photographers Matthew Rolston (June 30), Paul Lange (July 25), Fadil Berisha (July 21), Brian Bowen Smith (Aug. 4), Nino Munoz (Aug. 11) and Jodi Cobb (Sept. 8) as well as journalist Alex Kuczynski (Nov. 17).

Hold your horses, headbangers. Reservations for the free event can't be made until noon, Aug. 17, via the Annenberg website.

RELATED:

The beholding eye

Motley Crue, Public Enemy to headline Sunset Strip Music Festival

A new just-say-no Motley Crue

-- Mike Boehm

Photo: Motley Crue, with Nikki Sixx, Vince Neil (right) and Tommy Lee (rear), performing in 2009. Credit: Jake Danna Stevens / Los Angeles Times