The US actor-slash-performance artist Shia LaBeouf, whose latest feature film Man Down is setting UK box office records of the wrong sort, can take comfort in his ongoing artistic collaboration with Luke Turner and Nastja Säde Rönkkö. While the trio first met in Los Angeles, their story begins in London, they told the independent curator Ellen Mara De Wachter for her new book, Co-Art: Artists on Creative Collaboration, published this month by Phaidon. LaBeouf was in Britain filming another war movie, Fury, when he contacted Turner via email. “Hey, I’m a big fan of what you’re into and like to learn more... my name is Shia, I’m an actor, blah, blah, blah,” LaBeouf wrote. When Turner suggested they meet in in his flat, LaBeouf “got out of the tank on set” and turned up in full military garb. They soon discovered a shared passion for Joseph Beuys. The trio’s eventual meeting in Los Angeles was like going out on a “Tinder date”, according to LaBeouf. The more than 20 other artistic duos, trios and collectives that De Wachter interviewed for the illuminating book tell their own stories of how their stars aligned but none got off to such a Hollywood start.
