Jesus of Peeps
by Janet Galore
494 marshmallow Peeps with wood frame
4.5ft x 3.5ft
... "During the thirties, Man Ray made a large number of drawings while in Paris or travelling in the south of France. Man Ray had shown these drawings to Eluard, who had asked him to leave them with him. On Man Ray’s return, some weeks later, he found to his delight that his friend had 'illustrated' each drawing with a poem. This new and unexpected proof of Eluard's esteem resulted in the publication of Les Mains Libres, a book in which more than sixty pen-and-ink drawings are reproduced, fifty-four of them opposite Eluard's poem." ...
Marcel Duchamp's Secret Masterpiece
by Rachel Wolff
For two decades, Marcel Duchamp fooled the world into thinking he had retired, while quietly creating his last great work. Rachel Wolff on the multiple love affairs that inspired it.
... Working in secret for 20 years, Duchamp constructed much of Étant donnés in his diminutive studio on West 14th Street in New York, confiding only in three women (two lovers, one wife, to be exact) and, in the work’s later stages, artist/collector William Nelson Copley. By the 1940s, Duchamp had gone “underground” with his art, claiming to have given it up entirely for chess. “Nobody had any interest in what he was doing because nobody, including myself, knew he was doing anything,” Copley once said. “This gave him all the freedom in the world.”
Duchamp decided in the 1950s to will his pièce de résistance to the Philadelphia Museum of Art to join the largest collection of the artist’s work. Étant donnés was permanently installed at the museum in 1969, one year after Duchamp’s death. It has since beguiled artists, critics, and art historians alike with its uncharacteristic look and perceivably lewd message. Jasper Johns called it “the strangest work of art any museum has ever had in it”; visitors feigned shock, bemoaning the piece to the director and even, at times, to guards and staffers in the galleries; and in his New York Times review, John Canaday wrote: “For the first time, this cleverest of 20th-century masters looks a bit retardataire.” It became sort of an art world in-joke and there’s little existing scholarship on the piece. It seemed, for the longest time, that no one quite got it.
The Philadelphia Museum of Art hopes to change that with Marcel Duchamp: Étant donnés, a[n]...exhibition...The show gathers a fascinating array of photographs, documents, objects, and artworks related to Étant donnés and its conception....
by Rachel Wolff
For two decades, Marcel Duchamp fooled the world into thinking he had retired, while quietly creating his last great work. Rachel Wolff on the multiple love affairs that inspired it.
... Working in secret for 20 years, Duchamp constructed much of Étant donnés in his diminutive studio on West 14th Street in New York, confiding only in three women (two lovers, one wife, to be exact) and, in the work’s later stages, artist/collector William Nelson Copley. By the 1940s, Duchamp had gone “underground” with his art, claiming to have given it up entirely for chess. “Nobody had any interest in what he was doing because nobody, including myself, knew he was doing anything,” Copley once said. “This gave him all the freedom in the world.”
Duchamp decided in the 1950s to will his pièce de résistance to the Philadelphia Museum of Art to join the largest collection of the artist’s work. Étant donnés was permanently installed at the museum in 1969, one year after Duchamp’s death. It has since beguiled artists, critics, and art historians alike with its uncharacteristic look and perceivably lewd message. Jasper Johns called it “the strangest work of art any museum has ever had in it”; visitors feigned shock, bemoaning the piece to the director and even, at times, to guards and staffers in the galleries; and in his New York Times review, John Canaday wrote: “For the first time, this cleverest of 20th-century masters looks a bit retardataire.” It became sort of an art world in-joke and there’s little existing scholarship on the piece. It seemed, for the longest time, that no one quite got it.
The Philadelphia Museum of Art hopes to change that with Marcel Duchamp: Étant donnés, a[n]...exhibition...The show gathers a fascinating array of photographs, documents, objects, and artworks related to Étant donnés and its conception....
In 1913 I had the happy idea to fasten a bicycle wheel to a kitchen stool and watch it turn.
A few months later I bought a cheap reproduction of a winter evening landscape, which I called "Pharmacy" after adding two small dots, one red and one yellow, in the horizon.
In New York in 1915 I bought at a hardware store a snow shovel on which I wrote "In advance of the broken arm."
It was around that time that the word "Readymade" came to my mind to designate this form of manifestation.
A point that I want very much to establish is that the choice of these "Readymades" was never dictated by aesthetic delectation.
The choice was based on a reaction of visual indifference with at the same time a total absence of good or bad taste ... in fact a complete anaesthesia.
One important characteristic was the short sentence which I occasionally inscribed on the "Readymade."
That sentence instead of describing the object like a title was meant to carry the mind of the spectator towards other regions more verbal. ...
A few months later I bought a cheap reproduction of a winter evening landscape, which I called "Pharmacy" after adding two small dots, one red and one yellow, in the horizon.
In New York in 1915 I bought at a hardware store a snow shovel on which I wrote "In advance of the broken arm."
It was around that time that the word "Readymade" came to my mind to designate this form of manifestation.
A point that I want very much to establish is that the choice of these "Readymades" was never dictated by aesthetic delectation.
The choice was based on a reaction of visual indifference with at the same time a total absence of good or bad taste ... in fact a complete anaesthesia.
One important characteristic was the short sentence which I occasionally inscribed on the "Readymade."
That sentence instead of describing the object like a title was meant to carry the mind of the spectator towards other regions more verbal. ...
I've tripped out on and adored these since childhood.
I have forced myself to contradict myself in order to avoid conforming to my own taste.
- Marcel Duchamp
- Marcel Duchamp
Everything important that I have done can be put into a little suitcase.
—Marcel Duchamp
New York, March 1952
—Marcel Duchamp
New York, March 1952
... Barledeanu describes himself as a "director" of his own films and considers each collage to be a movie in itself. While many are light-hearted, others are darker, infused with black humour and often focusing on the man he calls his "greatest fear". "I knew that if he knew about my work Ceausescu would not sleep in peace in his grave," he said. "If people had found out about my work they could have chopped my head off … But this is my revenge."
Many of the most explosive collages were made after 1989, but those that were made during the regime have already interested collectors. Antoine de Galbert of La Maison Rouge art foundation said he appreciated "the risk involved" in Barledeanu's work, while Jérôme Neutres of the Grand Palais said the artist's background lent the collages a unique appeal. "Of course there is a fairytale aspect to his work, but that is not important to me. What I like is that he has been spared the usual artistic circles and his work is refreshing as a result," he said.
Whatever the world thinks, Barladeanu says he will carry on working regardless. "It's like eating pie or sandwiches. It fulfils me," he said in his fast-paced Romanian slang. "If I were reincarnated in another life I would still be making collages, and if I could take them to the moon I would."
Many of the most explosive collages were made after 1989, but those that were made during the regime have already interested collectors. Antoine de Galbert of La Maison Rouge art foundation said he appreciated "the risk involved" in Barledeanu's work, while Jérôme Neutres of the Grand Palais said the artist's background lent the collages a unique appeal. "Of course there is a fairytale aspect to his work, but that is not important to me. What I like is that he has been spared the usual artistic circles and his work is refreshing as a result," he said.
Whatever the world thinks, Barladeanu says he will carry on working regardless. "It's like eating pie or sandwiches. It fulfils me," he said in his fast-paced Romanian slang. "If I were reincarnated in another life I would still be making collages, and if I could take them to the moon I would."
... When looking through some really neat groups on Flickr.com, I came across a unique profile of the name Adopt-a-bot. Brian Marshall, a middle school teacher by day, is kept busy at night as the wild and crazy orphans crawl up from the deep dark recesses of his basement. Brian has a very creative mind, using found objects or items he finds from garage sales, eBay, scrap yards etc. Some of his favorite items to use are old oil cans, aluminum measuring spoons, electrical meters, retro blenders, anodized cups, and pencil sharpeners.
If you are ever in Wilmington, Delaware, you must stop by to see the menagerie of robotic creatures at the Adopt-a-bot orphanage. For as long as he can remember, Brian has always had a passion for building things. Legos and Lincoln Logs occupied his time as a youngster, but as he grew older and his construction techniques progressed, he sought out new and unusual materials that would allow his imagination to run wild. Then, one lazy afternoon while watching movies Brian was inspired by an unusual lamp and his artistic career was born. Lamps led to clocks, small tables, chandeliers and his first attempt at robots with his Night Watchmen series. The Night Watchmen were robotic heads that lit up to scare away the evil monsters that hide under beds. Then came the day when the first robot emerged from his basement, and he knew he had found his true passion. His basement became a place where all the unwanted, used up parts from commercial enterprises and residential homes could now come to find hope. This was when Brian created the world’s first robot orphanage. Just because these parts were no longer desired for their original purpose, they refused to believe they should die an agonizing death in a big smelting pot or a landfill. So with a little help, these parts were coming together with new and unusual friends to fulfill their dreams of once again bringing joys to others. And bringing joy they are to families as far away as Hong Kong. ...
Booton & Watts
No. 12
CB Checker
Robofish
Robo Band
Marshall
Ta much, dear Edosan
If you are ever in Wilmington, Delaware, you must stop by to see the menagerie of robotic creatures at the Adopt-a-bot orphanage. For as long as he can remember, Brian has always had a passion for building things. Legos and Lincoln Logs occupied his time as a youngster, but as he grew older and his construction techniques progressed, he sought out new and unusual materials that would allow his imagination to run wild. Then, one lazy afternoon while watching movies Brian was inspired by an unusual lamp and his artistic career was born. Lamps led to clocks, small tables, chandeliers and his first attempt at robots with his Night Watchmen series. The Night Watchmen were robotic heads that lit up to scare away the evil monsters that hide under beds. Then came the day when the first robot emerged from his basement, and he knew he had found his true passion. His basement became a place where all the unwanted, used up parts from commercial enterprises and residential homes could now come to find hope. This was when Brian created the world’s first robot orphanage. Just because these parts were no longer desired for their original purpose, they refused to believe they should die an agonizing death in a big smelting pot or a landfill. So with a little help, these parts were coming together with new and unusual friends to fulfill their dreams of once again bringing joys to others. And bringing joy they are to families as far away as Hong Kong. ...
Booton & Watts
No. 12
CB Checker
Robofish
Robo Band
Marshall
Ta much, dear Edosan
Day of the Dead papercut made in San Salvador Huixcolotla, Mexico (1980s) on Flickr - Photo Sharing!
Day of the Dead papercut made in San Salvador Huixcolotla, Mexico (1980s)
... They hung out with Allen Ginsberg and Janis Joplin and Andy Warhol and Sam Shepard. This was in the days when Mapplethorpe didn't have the patience to take pictures, before he became "smitten" with photography; when Smith had no idea she would one day front a rock'n'roll band. They were, as she neatly puts it, "in a fresh state of transformation", about to become the artists they would go on to be. "Patti, you got famous before me," he said a decade later, when they walked down the street and heard her hit record "Because the Night" blaring from storefronts.
"He was teasing me," Smith tells me now, "because I always told him I didn't care if I was famous, I just wanted him to be famous. But Robert wanted people to see me as he saw me – it didn't matter so much to me whether the world saw me or not, but it was very important for Robert that the world acknowledge me. He believed in me."
It has taken Smith 10 years to write the book. Initially, after Mapplethorpe died, she wrote instead of weeping, and came up with a series of linked prose poems in his honour, entitled The Coral Sea. But his death was succeeded by the death of Smith's pianist, Richard Sohl, at the age of 37, the death of her husband, the guitarist Fred "Sonic" Smith, and the death of her brother, Todd, all in the space of a few years, and though she'd promised Mapplethorpe on his death bed that she would one day write their story, she couldn't return to the first loss in the midst of the others. "Robert was the first great death in a series of great deaths," she says, "and it almost taught me how to grieve. Although you grieve differently for each person, the important part of grieving is to live." ...
"He was teasing me," Smith tells me now, "because I always told him I didn't care if I was famous, I just wanted him to be famous. But Robert wanted people to see me as he saw me – it didn't matter so much to me whether the world saw me or not, but it was very important for Robert that the world acknowledge me. He believed in me."
It has taken Smith 10 years to write the book. Initially, after Mapplethorpe died, she wrote instead of weeping, and came up with a series of linked prose poems in his honour, entitled The Coral Sea. But his death was succeeded by the death of Smith's pianist, Richard Sohl, at the age of 37, the death of her husband, the guitarist Fred "Sonic" Smith, and the death of her brother, Todd, all in the space of a few years, and though she'd promised Mapplethorpe on his death bed that she would one day write their story, she couldn't return to the first loss in the midst of the others. "Robert was the first great death in a series of great deaths," she says, "and it almost taught me how to grieve. Although you grieve differently for each person, the important part of grieving is to live." ...
January 27, 2010
The gay cartoonists who had the last laugh
Humour was a vital weapon in the campaigning gay press, a new exhibition of cartoon strips reveals
Joseph Galliano
... [David] Shenton and his fellow cartoonist Kate Charlesworth, 59, are mounting an exhibition, Drawn Out and Painted Pink, at the Drill Hall in Central London, of about 240 of their four-panel, line-drawn cartoon strips from the 1970s to the present day, arranged like brickwork and with the floor space filled with wry installations that comment on gay culture and history.
It includes the “Out of the Closet rail” full of joke clothes. Thus they have what Shenton calls a Rubik’s cube harness. “Harnesses were so difficult to put on, so we’ve made a complicated one with a set of instructions that are impossible to follow.” They’ve also made a three-armed, two-man rainbow-flag shirt and the “Duvet of Love” mosaic made from badges. It is typical of such playful artists that even the objects they make are cartoonish.
The show is presented like a 1980s nightclub, all black-painted walls and glitter balls. A pink stripe guides the visitor through the exhibition and functions as a timeline of landmark events for gay people.
The meat of the show is the work that both artists published in papers such as Gay News in the 1970s, Capital Gay and The Pink Paper in the 1980s and 1990s, where they (along with a small handful of fellow cartoonists such as Cath Jackson and Alison Bechdel) put everyday gay experience on the page. By default they were documenting the history of gay liberation in Britain. They turned gay people from the butt of the joke to those delivering the punch lines. ...
The gay cartoonists who had the last laugh
Humour was a vital weapon in the campaigning gay press, a new exhibition of cartoon strips reveals
Joseph Galliano
... [David] Shenton and his fellow cartoonist Kate Charlesworth, 59, are mounting an exhibition, Drawn Out and Painted Pink, at the Drill Hall in Central London, of about 240 of their four-panel, line-drawn cartoon strips from the 1970s to the present day, arranged like brickwork and with the floor space filled with wry installations that comment on gay culture and history.
It includes the “Out of the Closet rail” full of joke clothes. Thus they have what Shenton calls a Rubik’s cube harness. “Harnesses were so difficult to put on, so we’ve made a complicated one with a set of instructions that are impossible to follow.” They’ve also made a three-armed, two-man rainbow-flag shirt and the “Duvet of Love” mosaic made from badges. It is typical of such playful artists that even the objects they make are cartoonish.
The show is presented like a 1980s nightclub, all black-painted walls and glitter balls. A pink stripe guides the visitor through the exhibition and functions as a timeline of landmark events for gay people.
The meat of the show is the work that both artists published in papers such as Gay News in the 1970s, Capital Gay and The Pink Paper in the 1980s and 1990s, where they (along with a small handful of fellow cartoonists such as Cath Jackson and Alison Bechdel) put everyday gay experience on the page. By default they were documenting the history of gay liberation in Britain. They turned gay people from the butt of the joke to those delivering the punch lines. ...
Banksy film set for Sundance premiere
Banksy describes his first film Exit Through the Gift Shop as 'the story of how one man set out to film the unfilmable - and failed'
Esther Addley
Thursday 21 January 2010
He is better known for his work on brick, plasterwork, portable toilets and even, on one memorable occasion, an elephant. But until now the artist known as Banksy, in creating his satirical artworks, has largely stuck to the old-fashioned mediums of painting and sculpture.
Today, however, it emerged that the graffiti artist and cultural bête noire has branched into filmmaking, with the release of what is described as "the worlds first street art disaster movie".
Exit Through the Gift Shop, which will have its international premiere on Sunday at the Sundance film festival, is described by its creator as "the story of how one man set out to film the unfilmable - and failed", and by the festival's organisers as "an amazing ride, a cautionary modern fairy tale ... with bolt cutters".
Banksy's spokeswoman, Jo Brooks, declined to elaborate much further on the plot of the 89-minute feature film, though the festival's website helpfully provides some details, describing it as the account of what happened when a French filmmaker, Terry Guetta, set out to record the "secretive world" of street art, only to meet Banksy, at which point "things took a bizarre turn".
Pressed for more detail, the artist himself offered the following, hardly illuminating, elaboration through his publicist: "It's a film about a man who tried to make a film about me. Everything in it is true, especially the bits where we all lie." ...
Banksy describes his first film Exit Through the Gift Shop as 'the story of how one man set out to film the unfilmable - and failed'
Esther Addley
Thursday 21 January 2010
He is better known for his work on brick, plasterwork, portable toilets and even, on one memorable occasion, an elephant. But until now the artist known as Banksy, in creating his satirical artworks, has largely stuck to the old-fashioned mediums of painting and sculpture.
Today, however, it emerged that the graffiti artist and cultural bête noire has branched into filmmaking, with the release of what is described as "the worlds first street art disaster movie".
Exit Through the Gift Shop, which will have its international premiere on Sunday at the Sundance film festival, is described by its creator as "the story of how one man set out to film the unfilmable - and failed", and by the festival's organisers as "an amazing ride, a cautionary modern fairy tale ... with bolt cutters".
Banksy's spokeswoman, Jo Brooks, declined to elaborate much further on the plot of the 89-minute feature film, though the festival's website helpfully provides some details, describing it as the account of what happened when a French filmmaker, Terry Guetta, set out to record the "secretive world" of street art, only to meet Banksy, at which point "things took a bizarre turn".
Pressed for more detail, the artist himself offered the following, hardly illuminating, elaboration through his publicist: "It's a film about a man who tried to make a film about me. Everything in it is true, especially the bits where we all lie." ...
I found this thanks to dear Edosan; it's part of the below post.
All the lush Steampunkery in th' above posts were found thanks to this very flickr page.
Back of Marcel Duchamp's head - tonsured by Georges de Zayas
1920
Jul 22, 2008
canned chance; an escape from taste
David Need is in New York and visited MOMA yesterday. He sent a note to a listserv we're on that he came upon Marcel Duchamp's Three Standard Stoppages. There are two artifacts by that title in MOMA -- a boxed set of three wooden templates and glass panels, and then a painting that uses the template shapes.
Duchamp took three meter-long strings and dropped them from a meter's height above treated canvas. Then he fixed them just how they landed, producing three wavering curves that he called stoppages and mounted on glass panels. Then he cut a wooden template along each of these three stoppages.
The whole lot fits in a repurposed croquet box, which gives it a sanctioned feel. Keep in mind that at this time (around the onset of WWI) the definition of the meter was the distance between two lines on a standard bar of 90% platinum and 10% iridium at 0° Celsius. Of course that distance was based on an erroneous geographical measurement...
canned chance; an escape from taste
David Need is in New York and visited MOMA yesterday. He sent a note to a listserv we're on that he came upon Marcel Duchamp's Three Standard Stoppages. There are two artifacts by that title in MOMA -- a boxed set of three wooden templates and glass panels, and then a painting that uses the template shapes.
Duchamp took three meter-long strings and dropped them from a meter's height above treated canvas. Then he fixed them just how they landed, producing three wavering curves that he called stoppages and mounted on glass panels. Then he cut a wooden template along each of these three stoppages.
The whole lot fits in a repurposed croquet box, which gives it a sanctioned feel. Keep in mind that at this time (around the onset of WWI) the definition of the meter was the distance between two lines on a standard bar of 90% platinum and 10% iridium at 0° Celsius. Of course that distance was based on an erroneous geographical measurement...
Fingers
1930
Picasso, other art works stolen from French villa
Sat Jan 2, 2010
MARSEILLE, France (Reuters) - Thieves have stolen about 30 paintings, including a work by Spanish master Pablo Picasso, from a private villa in the south of France, police said on Saturday.
The haul, which also included a painting by post-impressionist Henri Rousseau, was worth about 1 million euros ($1.43 million), a judicial source said.
The theft was discovered on Thursday by a caretaker at the house in the Provençal village of La Cadiere d'Azur....
Sat Jan 2, 2010
MARSEILLE, France (Reuters) - Thieves have stolen about 30 paintings, including a work by Spanish master Pablo Picasso, from a private villa in the south of France, police said on Saturday.
The haul, which also included a painting by post-impressionist Henri Rousseau, was worth about 1 million euros ($1.43 million), a judicial source said.
The theft was discovered on Thursday by a caretaker at the house in the Provençal village of La Cadiere d'Azur....
Ta much, dear Edosan
Makers from all over the nation will make their way to The Henry Ford, in Dearborn, Michigan for Maker Faire, July 31-August 1, 2010. This two-day, family-friendly event celebrates creative and resourceful people in the areas of science and technology, engineering, food, and arts and crafts. Additional information will be released as it becomes available. ...
Ta much, dear MSiegel!
WOO - HOO!!!
Ta much, dear MSiegel!
WOO - HOO!!!
Each pic's a link to a different site so click away, Gentle Categorian.
Paintings by dog sell for more than £1,000
Paintings done by a dog called Sam are selling for up to £1,045 in Maryland, USA.
19 Oct 2009
Selling for up to $1700 (£1,045) for an individual work, Sam has put his brush to 22 different canvases Photo: BARCROFT MEDIA
Using the lush surroundings of his home town of Eastern Shore, Maryland as his muse, Sam's paintings are attracting a loyal art world following.
Some of his 22 paintings - done using a tailor-made paintbrush held in his mouth - have sold for up to $1700 (£1,045).
"Sam is a regular renaissance dog and his abstract paintings are all the rage with the hip New York galleries," says Mary Stadelbacher, Sam's owner.
"He loves his painting and would happily carry on for hours if I left him to it.
"He loves to work in a variety of colours and layers his paintings with darker shades first and then moves on to lighter ones later."
Mary, who runs Shore Service Dogs, in the United States took in six-year-old Sam four years ago as a rescue dog.
"He had been bounced around a couple of dog pounds, so I couldn't have that," says Mary about Sam, who is a bloodhound, sheep-dog cross. ...
Paintings done by a dog called Sam are selling for up to £1,045 in Maryland, USA.
19 Oct 2009
Selling for up to $1700 (£1,045) for an individual work, Sam has put his brush to 22 different canvases Photo: BARCROFT MEDIA
Using the lush surroundings of his home town of Eastern Shore, Maryland as his muse, Sam's paintings are attracting a loyal art world following.
Some of his 22 paintings - done using a tailor-made paintbrush held in his mouth - have sold for up to $1700 (£1,045).
"Sam is a regular renaissance dog and his abstract paintings are all the rage with the hip New York galleries," says Mary Stadelbacher, Sam's owner.
"He loves his painting and would happily carry on for hours if I left him to it.
"He loves to work in a variety of colours and layers his paintings with darker shades first and then moves on to lighter ones later."
Mary, who runs Shore Service Dogs, in the United States took in six-year-old Sam four years ago as a rescue dog.
"He had been bounced around a couple of dog pounds, so I couldn't have that," says Mary about Sam, who is a bloodhound, sheep-dog cross. ...
Cuzco Newsboy, 1948. The picture of a Mexican boy was one of the earliest photographs by Irving Penn, who started out in the art department at US Vogue. It is one of the lots being auctioned at Christie's New York on October 8. (All photographs courtesy of Christie's)
Photographer’s death drives up prices at Christie's auction in New York
By Sophie Taylor
FIRST POSTED OCTOBER 9, 2009
As expected, the news of Irving Penn's death appeared to help drive up prices at an auction of photography at Christie's, New York yesterday. His photograph Cuzco Newsboy, which adorned the opening page of The First Post's picture essay to mark the photographer's death, went for nearly three times its upper pre-sale estimate.
The photograph, taken in Mexico in 1948, and presented as a gelatin silver print, went to an anonymous bidder for $72,100. The estimate was $15,000 - $25,000.
But the photo that beat all the others - there were 14 Penns for sale in total - was Chimney Sweep, London, one of a series of portraits Penn took of ordinary working people in New York, Paris and London in 1950. It fetched $74,500, way above the $10,000 - $15,000 estimate.
None of the pictures was among Penn's most iconic images, but they still fetched a total of $492,850, more than double the auction house's total lower estimate of $235,000. ...
By Sophie Taylor
FIRST POSTED OCTOBER 9, 2009
As expected, the news of Irving Penn's death appeared to help drive up prices at an auction of photography at Christie's, New York yesterday. His photograph Cuzco Newsboy, which adorned the opening page of The First Post's picture essay to mark the photographer's death, went for nearly three times its upper pre-sale estimate.
The photograph, taken in Mexico in 1948, and presented as a gelatin silver print, went to an anonymous bidder for $72,100. The estimate was $15,000 - $25,000.
But the photo that beat all the others - there were 14 Penns for sale in total - was Chimney Sweep, London, one of a series of portraits Penn took of ordinary working people in New York, Paris and London in 1950. It fetched $74,500, way above the $10,000 - $15,000 estimate.
None of the pictures was among Penn's most iconic images, but they still fetched a total of $492,850, more than double the auction house's total lower estimate of $235,000. ...
... So you have to hand it to the maharajas. We’ve underestimated them. Their talent for exploiting their populace and growing rich, disgracefully, was close to superhuman. That admitted, I see the V&A has set out to understand them in deeper and different ways.
Every now and then in this display, you encounter a map of India placing a particular nawab, nizam, rana, raja or sultan — the maharajas were a federation of royals, rather than a single species — in his shifting geographic kingdom. There are newsreels, too, and documentary-style black-and-white photographs of jewel-encrusted maharaos with curly moustaches meeting stiff British dignitaries with brooms up their jackets. On one of its strata, the show harbours an ambition to locate the maharajas in the full history of their times. But trying to hear this documentary message above the roar of the surrounding diamonds is like listening to a chirping robin while standing next to Niagara Falls. Yes, the maharajas may have played an interesting role in the jittery relationship between India and Britain. But what really matters here is the size of their rocks.
I have seen goose eggs smaller than the yellow diamond at the centre of the great necklace commissioned from Cartier in the 1920s by Maharaja Bhupinder Singh of Patiala. It was the largest single commission ever received by the finest French jeweller. And what of the string of huge emeralds worn by Ranjit Singh’s horse in the 1830s? Wouldn’t the weight of all that priceless stonewear around its neck have slowed the nag to a hobble? At one point in the glitterfest, I found myself staring at a slab of blue glass, roughly the size of a pear, set into the centre of a turban monument from Murshidabad. It turned out to be several hundred carats of uncut sapphire. ...
Every now and then in this display, you encounter a map of India placing a particular nawab, nizam, rana, raja or sultan — the maharajas were a federation of royals, rather than a single species — in his shifting geographic kingdom. There are newsreels, too, and documentary-style black-and-white photographs of jewel-encrusted maharaos with curly moustaches meeting stiff British dignitaries with brooms up their jackets. On one of its strata, the show harbours an ambition to locate the maharajas in the full history of their times. But trying to hear this documentary message above the roar of the surrounding diamonds is like listening to a chirping robin while standing next to Niagara Falls. Yes, the maharajas may have played an interesting role in the jittery relationship between India and Britain. But what really matters here is the size of their rocks.
I have seen goose eggs smaller than the yellow diamond at the centre of the great necklace commissioned from Cartier in the 1920s by Maharaja Bhupinder Singh of Patiala. It was the largest single commission ever received by the finest French jeweller. And what of the string of huge emeralds worn by Ranjit Singh’s horse in the 1830s? Wouldn’t the weight of all that priceless stonewear around its neck have slowed the nag to a hobble? At one point in the glitterfest, I found myself staring at a slab of blue glass, roughly the size of a pear, set into the centre of a turban monument from Murshidabad. It turned out to be several hundred carats of uncut sapphire. ...
... The house, where the artist lived for 24 years, features in several of his works but this is a fresh blow to the independent museum, which now faces competition from a new museum that opened in the city this summer.
Johan Berckman’s, a policeman at the scene, said: “At 10.10am this morning someone rang the bell of the museum asking if they could visit. He was let in and when he was inside he pulled out a pistol and ordered the woman to go back to the door to let a second person come inside.
“There were three museum workers inside at the time and two Japanese tourists. All five of them were ordered out the back and told to keep quiet by the man with the gun.
“In the museum the other person stole the painting and they both made good their escape. They seemed to know which painting they wanted to steal - they took the whole painting off the wall, including the frame.”
Johan Berckman’s, a policeman at the scene, said: “At 10.10am this morning someone rang the bell of the museum asking if they could visit. He was let in and when he was inside he pulled out a pistol and ordered the woman to go back to the door to let a second person come inside.
“There were three museum workers inside at the time and two Japanese tourists. All five of them were ordered out the back and told to keep quiet by the man with the gun.
“In the museum the other person stole the painting and they both made good their escape. They seemed to know which painting they wanted to steal - they took the whole painting off the wall, including the frame.”
el lay's not all bad...................
WTF, Hackney council?!
...“It’s awful that people react to art in this manner,” said Amy Boswin, director of the Novato Ignacio Art Gallery near Petaluma. “If they opened a biology textbook, they’d see a lot more risqué stuff than that.” ...
Let us ahem pray those fuckwits never do open a biology book: they'd want them banned too, also.
Let us ahem pray those fuckwits never do open a biology book: they'd want them banned too, also.
Ta much, dear Edosan!
WAH! SCHWA! WAH!
A love of beauty and the title you gave the strip are the reasons, Griffy. Education ain't required for recognizing true beauty and 'preciatin' it.......although it certainly can enlarge the boundaries of what one considers beautiful.
Dear Edosan somehow knew I was planning to post a buncha dragons, so this site which he sent me goes first.
"Polymorphous perversion."
May 24, 2009
How Philip Mould found a Gainsborough on eBay
Philip Mould has discovered, restored and found 'lost' paintings including a Gainsborough, he reveals in his book Sleuth
Ed Caesar
As a teenager, Philip Mould loved to perform magic tricks. He’s still at it now. Indeed, in his 22 years as a debonair dealer and “sleuth” of English portraiture, he has become one of the greatest conjurors in the business. Through discovery, restoration and historical research, he has — shazam! — found “lost” paintings, turned unloved tat into minor art gems and traded portraits that have unstitched the seams of art history.
One of his most treasured foundlings — a jolly portrait of a country squire — is sitting with us now, perched on an easel in the office of Mould’s Mayfair gallery. The story of its discovery is related in his new book, Sleuth, about his adventures in the high-art world. The dealer first saw the painting two years ago while idly browsing on eBay. It was described as “American school, 19th-century”. Although it was clearly overpainted, Mould became convinced, in one of the nervous, thrilling moments that have punctuated his career, that he was on to something. He bought the lot for less than $200. When the painting arrived in London, Mould decided, for the first (and last) time in his career, that he would start the restoration work himself (see extract below). What he found confirmed his suspicions that he was looking at an original, Ipswich-era Gainsborough.
He calls the painting “Mr eBay”. It’s clear the pair are still very much in love. “I know it’s an unsophisticated early work, but there is,” says Mould, in his public-school chirrup, “a chuckling humanity in the face.” And the recent private sale of Mr eBay must have had the dealer chuckling all the way to the bank? “I can’t give you an exact figure,” he says, suddenly coy. “This is not a great Gainsborough, but his portraits can sell for anything from £15,000 to £5m. Let’s just say he paid for a couple of months’ overheads at the gallery.”
Mould’s love for the Suffolk painter has led him to a more significant discovery, which will be formally recognised by Gainsborough’s House on June 1. The dealer has promised not to reveal the exact nature of the new work, but is happy to say that the painting comes from when the artist was “14 or 15, and will shed new light on our understanding of his precocity. It will show that Gainsborough was a Mozart, a juvenile genius”. ...
How Philip Mould found a Gainsborough on eBay
Philip Mould has discovered, restored and found 'lost' paintings including a Gainsborough, he reveals in his book Sleuth
Ed Caesar
As a teenager, Philip Mould loved to perform magic tricks. He’s still at it now. Indeed, in his 22 years as a debonair dealer and “sleuth” of English portraiture, he has become one of the greatest conjurors in the business. Through discovery, restoration and historical research, he has — shazam! — found “lost” paintings, turned unloved tat into minor art gems and traded portraits that have unstitched the seams of art history.
One of his most treasured foundlings — a jolly portrait of a country squire — is sitting with us now, perched on an easel in the office of Mould’s Mayfair gallery. The story of its discovery is related in his new book, Sleuth, about his adventures in the high-art world. The dealer first saw the painting two years ago while idly browsing on eBay. It was described as “American school, 19th-century”. Although it was clearly overpainted, Mould became convinced, in one of the nervous, thrilling moments that have punctuated his career, that he was on to something. He bought the lot for less than $200. When the painting arrived in London, Mould decided, for the first (and last) time in his career, that he would start the restoration work himself (see extract below). What he found confirmed his suspicions that he was looking at an original, Ipswich-era Gainsborough.
He calls the painting “Mr eBay”. It’s clear the pair are still very much in love. “I know it’s an unsophisticated early work, but there is,” says Mould, in his public-school chirrup, “a chuckling humanity in the face.” And the recent private sale of Mr eBay must have had the dealer chuckling all the way to the bank? “I can’t give you an exact figure,” he says, suddenly coy. “This is not a great Gainsborough, but his portraits can sell for anything from £15,000 to £5m. Let’s just say he paid for a couple of months’ overheads at the gallery.”
Mould’s love for the Suffolk painter has led him to a more significant discovery, which will be formally recognised by Gainsborough’s House on June 1. The dealer has promised not to reveal the exact nature of the new work, but is happy to say that the painting comes from when the artist was “14 or 15, and will shed new light on our understanding of his precocity. It will show that Gainsborough was a Mozart, a juvenile genius”. ...
I can't think of a suitably foul epithet for these t'iefs.
These images are wonderful, but I couldn't find a home/entry/explanation page for this slideshow. Part of the URL is studypages/internal/...ArtofTibet/LECT1, so it has to do with a Tibetan art lecture.
Propeller Head
Robo Betty
Scotty Robo Dog
Robo GnomeTa much, dear Foxy!
... Long live Dadaism in word and image! Long live the Dada events of this world! To be against this manifesto is to be a Dadaist!
Berlin, April 1918
Tristan Tzara, Franz Jung, George Grosz, Marcel Janco, Richard Hülsenbeck, Gerhard Preisz, Raoul Hausmann
unpretentious proclamation
by tristan tzara
8th april 1919
Berlin, April 1918
Tristan Tzara, Franz Jung, George Grosz, Marcel Janco, Richard Hülsenbeck, Gerhard Preisz, Raoul Hausmann
unpretentious proclamation
by tristan tzara
8th april 1919
Deliciously subversive artworks.
Delroy Anderson - Painting his way to a better life
Published: Sunday | February 8, 2009
Robert Lalah, Assistant Editor-Features
He sits on a turned-over bucket on the narrow sidewalk that runs along Olivier Road in St Andrew. Cars, buses and even large trucks whiz closely by as he focuses on the task in front of him. He grasps his paintbrush with intensity in his eyes and strokes the easel like a surgeon making a life-impacting incision.
Delroy Anderson has made this unlikely spot his base for the past year, working on paintings that he hangs on the fence beside him, hoping to attract buyers. His latest creations include images of US President Barack Obama and family. These have been catching the eyes of many a passer-by, and have forced Anderson to work overtime.
Recent Obama project
"This man really get everybody excited. Everybody want to have a painting of him in their house. I have to be focusing more and more on that now," he said when Sunday Arts paid him a visit, last week.
But there's more to this story than a man selling paintings on the roadside. ...
Published: Sunday | February 8, 2009
Robert Lalah, Assistant Editor-Features
He sits on a turned-over bucket on the narrow sidewalk that runs along Olivier Road in St Andrew. Cars, buses and even large trucks whiz closely by as he focuses on the task in front of him. He grasps his paintbrush with intensity in his eyes and strokes the easel like a surgeon making a life-impacting incision.
Delroy Anderson has made this unlikely spot his base for the past year, working on paintings that he hangs on the fence beside him, hoping to attract buyers. His latest creations include images of US President Barack Obama and family. These have been catching the eyes of many a passer-by, and have forced Anderson to work overtime.
Recent Obama project
"This man really get everybody excited. Everybody want to have a painting of him in their house. I have to be focusing more and more on that now," he said when Sunday Arts paid him a visit, last week.
But there's more to this story than a man selling paintings on the roadside. ...
Yankistan's not all bad, you know.
"With the right company, it's possible to enjoy oneself even in Philadelphia."
"With the right company, it's possible to enjoy oneself even in Philadelphia."
I nicked the cute little wide-eyed ox from this site.
Nicked off dear Starwalker
Andrew Wyeth, one of the most popular and also most lambasted artists in the history of American art, died on Friday, Jan. 15, 2009. He was 91. ...
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