This is the list I should be on, given the paltry readership of this blog. (But I have every confidence that it will grow, and love all of you who check it out now!)
(Cartoon by Pablo Helguera, at the Art World Saloon)
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
The Art World's Least Powerful
This is the list I should be on, given the paltry readership of this blog. (But I have every confidence that it will grow, and love all of you who check it out now!)
(Cartoon by Pablo Helguera, at the Art World Saloon)
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
If I Were Young, Pretty, and Female, This Would Be My Halloween Costume
And I am not even that big a Lichtenstein fan. But this is amazing.
(Source: Charmed by TashaMarie. Hat-tip to Buzzfeed and Matthew Yglesias.)
Bill Davenport covers Don Ivan Punchatz
Bill Davenport, "Second Foundation", acrylic on canvas, 2000
Don Ivan Punchatz, 1936-2009
Robert Boyd
I noticed that illustrator Don Ivan Punchatz had died but didn't think much about it until yesterday when Matt Guest sent me a note on it. Guest had been a student of Punchatz at TCU, and, according to Guest, Gary Panter had been a student of Punchatz's at one point. That Punchatz had taught these two artists was enough to make me look further. It turns out that Punchatz was responsible for some iconic, trippy science fiction paperback covers that I had grown up with.
He did all the Foundation Trilogy covers that were current when I was a teen.
These were the covers of Dangerous Visions volumes 1-3. It seems like Punchatz went through a period of painting vaguely menacing monochromatic bald guys for science fiction paperbacks. It was the 60s I guess. I love 'em. (All of the above covers were taken from the blog Skiffy, where you can see lots more classic science-fiction illustration art.)
Of course, Punchatz wasn't all about naked bald guys. He did all kinds of illustration work, including great covers for National Lampoon and Time, and many, many other book covers. Matt Guest told me this one was his favorite (which says something about Matt, but I don't know what...)
I noticed that illustrator Don Ivan Punchatz had died but didn't think much about it until yesterday when Matt Guest sent me a note on it. Guest had been a student of Punchatz at TCU, and, according to Guest, Gary Panter had been a student of Punchatz's at one point. That Punchatz had taught these two artists was enough to make me look further. It turns out that Punchatz was responsible for some iconic, trippy science fiction paperback covers that I had grown up with.
He did all the Foundation Trilogy covers that were current when I was a teen.
These were the covers of Dangerous Visions volumes 1-3. It seems like Punchatz went through a period of painting vaguely menacing monochromatic bald guys for science fiction paperbacks. It was the 60s I guess. I love 'em. (All of the above covers were taken from the blog Skiffy, where you can see lots more classic science-fiction illustration art.)
Of course, Punchatz wasn't all about naked bald guys. He did all kinds of illustration work, including great covers for National Lampoon and Time, and many, many other book covers. Matt Guest told me this one was his favorite (which says something about Matt, but I don't know what...)
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Strange Sentries in the Heights
Mr. Kimberly stumbled across this wall and its strange sentries at 620 W. 9th Street.
Here's a close-up view of one.
Does anyone know what these are all about? It looks like a stockade around a post-apocalyptic retro-lithic scavager village, where they top the walls with scrap-metal totems to frighten the irradiated spirits and shambling zombie hordes that menace the degenerate remnants of the once-proud race known as homo sapiens.
(Hat tip, of course, to Neon Poisoning.)
Here's a close-up view of one.
Does anyone know what these are all about? It looks like a stockade around a post-apocalyptic retro-lithic scavager village, where they top the walls with scrap-metal totems to frighten the irradiated spirits and shambling zombie hordes that menace the degenerate remnants of the once-proud race known as homo sapiens.
(Hat tip, of course, to Neon Poisoning.)
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Richard Martinez' Shaped Canvases
Robert Boyd
If you are driving around Rice Military looking for the Darke Gallery, the only thing to visually distinguish it from the tall townhouses that populate that neighborhood's small blocks is this sculpture:
When I went in, I met the owner of the gallery, Linda Darke Swaynos. She told me about the show they had up (paintings by Richard Martinez) and in the process described her strategy for selecting artists. Her artists tend to be art professors at various universities around Texas. As she put it, many of them are in areas with few or no art galleries and little opportunity to show their work. And practically every university in the state (and the whole country, too) has some art teachers, and many have art departments and a brace of professors. So for her, this forms a nice pool of talent from which to pick artists to exhibit.
Richard Martinez teaches art at U.T. San Antonio. His canvases are not strikingly original. When one thinks of shaped canvases and stripes, one thinks of Frank Stella works from the early '60s. Martinez' canvases are mostly monochrome (the spaces between the stripes are subtly different shades of the same color as the stripes) but unlike those early Stella pieces, they are brightly colored. The shapes, too, are different--baroque and even rococo, in a way. (This, too, recalls Stella--but the later Stella of the wall sculptures.)
Richard Martinez, Young American, 2009
The pieces also all have a single painted element in silhouette. This is another little baroque touch.
Richard Martinez, Ultra 19, 2009
There is not that much to say about these. This isn't quite a situation of "What you see is what you see." But close.
Richard Martinez, Ultra 18, 2009
Richard Martinez, Ultra 18 detail, 2009
The thing is, I like these paintings. It was pleasant being in a room with them. And that's enough.
Darke showed me another piece from her most recent show that I really liked.
Marcelyn McNeil, Study 2, painted strips of wood, 2009
Again, this was a nice piece to share a room with. It was fun to walk around it taking pictures.
Marcelyn McNeil, Study 2, painted strips of wood, 2009
I like the fact that it is a sculpture, and a fairly large one at that, but that it remains so low to the ground. I like that you have to look down to really see it. It also reminds me of canoes I saw in Brazil.
If you are driving around Rice Military looking for the Darke Gallery, the only thing to visually distinguish it from the tall townhouses that populate that neighborhood's small blocks is this sculpture:
When I went in, I met the owner of the gallery, Linda Darke Swaynos. She told me about the show they had up (paintings by Richard Martinez) and in the process described her strategy for selecting artists. Her artists tend to be art professors at various universities around Texas. As she put it, many of them are in areas with few or no art galleries and little opportunity to show their work. And practically every university in the state (and the whole country, too) has some art teachers, and many have art departments and a brace of professors. So for her, this forms a nice pool of talent from which to pick artists to exhibit.
Richard Martinez teaches art at U.T. San Antonio. His canvases are not strikingly original. When one thinks of shaped canvases and stripes, one thinks of Frank Stella works from the early '60s. Martinez' canvases are mostly monochrome (the spaces between the stripes are subtly different shades of the same color as the stripes) but unlike those early Stella pieces, they are brightly colored. The shapes, too, are different--baroque and even rococo, in a way. (This, too, recalls Stella--but the later Stella of the wall sculptures.)
Richard Martinez, Young American, 2009
The pieces also all have a single painted element in silhouette. This is another little baroque touch.
Richard Martinez, Ultra 19, 2009
There is not that much to say about these. This isn't quite a situation of "What you see is what you see." But close.
Richard Martinez, Ultra 18, 2009
Richard Martinez, Ultra 18 detail, 2009
The thing is, I like these paintings. It was pleasant being in a room with them. And that's enough.
Darke showed me another piece from her most recent show that I really liked.
Marcelyn McNeil, Study 2, painted strips of wood, 2009
Again, this was a nice piece to share a room with. It was fun to walk around it taking pictures.
Marcelyn McNeil, Study 2, painted strips of wood, 2009
I like the fact that it is a sculpture, and a fairly large one at that, but that it remains so low to the ground. I like that you have to look down to really see it. It also reminds me of canoes I saw in Brazil.
Monday, October 19, 2009
Giant Heads by the Freeway
When you are driving east on I-10 or south on I-45 in that tiny segment just north of downtown where the two freeways become one, you might notice this sculpture as you whiz by.
They are actually located on a tiny little street called Elder Street in a tiny little neighborhood kind of trapped between Houston Ave. and the freeways.
The heads are, of course, by David Adickes, the guy who did the giant Sam Houston up in Huntsville, and more famously has done super-sized presidential busts. I like them--they are so out of scale that they become almost pop art. But this has been his schtick for a while (because, I assume, this is what folks commission from him.)
Look, if we're going to have giant heads visible from the freeway, lets honor some great Houstonians. I want to see a giant head group that includes Donald Barthelme, Lightnin' Hopkins, A.J. Foyt, and Jesse H. Jones. And maybe Beyonce. Who else deserves to be a giant head by the freeway? (Nominate your own choices in the comments.)
(Crossposted to my other blog, Wha'Happen?)
They are actually located on a tiny little street called Elder Street in a tiny little neighborhood kind of trapped between Houston Ave. and the freeways.
The heads are, of course, by David Adickes, the guy who did the giant Sam Houston up in Huntsville, and more famously has done super-sized presidential busts. I like them--they are so out of scale that they become almost pop art. But this has been his schtick for a while (because, I assume, this is what folks commission from him.)
Look, if we're going to have giant heads visible from the freeway, lets honor some great Houstonians. I want to see a giant head group that includes Donald Barthelme, Lightnin' Hopkins, A.J. Foyt, and Jesse H. Jones. And maybe Beyonce. Who else deserves to be a giant head by the freeway? (Nominate your own choices in the comments.)
(Crossposted to my other blog, Wha'Happen?)
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