Loren Munk Paintings at Lesley Heller Workspace NYC until Oct.16th, 2011

"Village of the Damned" 2004-2005 60"x72" oil on linen by Loren Munk

Photo of Loren Munks's paintings in progress in his studio from Anaba blog

Some paintings take time to complete. Sometimes they take 3 years. Ask Balthus. Such is the case for Loren Munk's colorful and complicated paintings that document and map the history of the New York art scene. Roberta Smith's great review in the NY Times described one large piece as "a telephone switchboard run amok". I like these paintings and I like Loren. Loren Munk is also known as James Kalm (the guy on the bike) who makes little films of art shows in NYC. He may not remember me, but he was kind enough to interview and film me outside of my Brooklyn show at Ad Hoc Gallery in the summer of 2008. Here's a link to that video.

You can see Loren Munk's paintings through 

Oct. 16th at Lesley Heller Workspace, 54 Orchard St., NYC. 

Loren Munk's Website

The Art of Amy Crehore

Early Illustrations by Dorothy P. Lathrop (1891-1980)

50 Watts blog posted some nice images of monkeys that caught my eye by illustrator Dorothy P. Lathrop for the book "Three Mulla-Muggers" by Walter de la Mare (a.k.a. "Three Royal Monkeys"). LINK: 50 Watts. Also, archive.org has the full book online (published in 1919). It looks like Dorothy P. Lathrop was prolific. More about her and a list of books at wikipedia. "Three Mulla-Muggers" was her first illustrated book. I like her combination of techniques which reflect design trends of the period. The monkeys have human qualities and you know I like that, too. 

The Art of Amy Crehore

Anna Ternheim Performing "Shoreline"(cover)

Edward Lear's Amazing Art

It's been a while since I blogged about Edward Lear, one of my favorite artists. BibliOdyssey recently blogged about Edward Lear's sketches for his Parrot Book, a project he worked on in his teens while he was employed by the Zoological Society in London. It was published around 1832 when he was only 20 years old. He's the same Edward Lear who illustrated "A Book of Nonsense" (1846, book of  limericks) and "The Owl and the Pussycat" (1867). And he's the very same Lear who painted the serious landscape above (Masada on the Dead Sea 1958). Read a summary of Edward Lear's life (1812-1888) HERE. 

The fact that he "did it all" (fine art, illustration, cartooning) does not surprise me. Many of the great artists in art history did exactly that. 

The Houghton Library at Harvard University has started digitizing some of the Edward Lear manuscripts in their collection such as the Mrs. C. Beadon Edward Lear Scrapbook (top photo). LINKS HERE: Blog of Bosh

Landscapes of sculpted food

I saw this on boingboing and it's pretty fascinating. Advertising photographer Carl Warner makes fantasy landscapes (like the one above) from real food. Full story and pictures on For My Hour .

Gweek 017 Podcast: David Hahn & another Hokum Scorchers' song

Gweek is Boing Boing's podcast about comic books, science fiction and fantasy, video games, board games, tools, gadgets, apps and other neat stuff.

This week, Mark Frauenfelder interviews David Hahn, creator of of the comic book, All Nighter, published by Image Comics. David has also drawn for Marvel, DC, and Dark Horse.

The episode closes with another song by The Hokum Scorchers, a duo consisting of artist Amy Crehore and guitar maker Lou Reimuller. The song is called “I Got Your Ice Cold NuGrape" from 1926. (P.S. Here's the history of the NuGrape Song from a previous blog post!)
Link to Gweek:
GWEEK 017

The Art of Amy Crehore

High Fashion Ukulele Gals

Photo of the Day- Gals with banjoleles.

Thanks again, Vintage Ukulele Bangkok

The Art of Amy Crehore

Pies-in-the-Face Finale from Bugsy Malone

Russian Sport

Chikanobu's Woodblock Prints (1838-1912)

CLICK TO ENLARGE IMAGES

I've been meaning to blog about the artist Yoshu Chikanobu (a.k.a.Toyohara Chikanobu or Hashimoto Naoyoshi or Yoshu Naoyoshi) for some time. I currently have a calendar with his work on my wall from the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston (Pomegranate). During the Meiji Era (1868-1912), Chikanobu depicted the changing fashions of the day with his colorful woodblock prints. He drew beautiful, complex scenes  featuring patterned clothing (plaids!) and exquisite color combinations. His work documented changing seasons, times of day, events, family life and fashions (showing western influence) with a clean, elegant, simple line.

CHIKANOBU

The Art of Amy Crehore

Photo of the Day - Ukulele Girl 1918

 (click to enlarge)

This photo reminds me of the imaginary girls that I have painted, but it's the first time that I have ever seen it. The image is of a beautiful nude girl in an arm chair with her ukulele - taken by Albert Arthur Allen taken in 1918. 

(Thanks,Vintage Ukulele Bangkok facebook)

Read about this California photographer on Retrorambling 

and here's a link to more photos.

The Art of Amy Crehore

Bob Dylan's "Opium" Painting

Top photograph (an autochrome) was taken by Leon Busy around 1915 in French Indochina. Bottom image is a painting called "Opium" by Bob Dylan (2010) from the Gagosian Gallery website. 

Looks like Bob Dylan used the Leon Busy photo as a reference for his painting.

 From Sept. 20, 2011 - Oct. 22, 2011, Bob Dylan will be showing his paintings, "The Asia Series", at Gagosian Gallery's Madison Ave. location. 

Bob Dylan had a show of 40 paintings just last year at the National Gallery of Denmark called "The Brazil Series".

You can see more photos like the one above on Steven Martin's Opium Museum website. Steven has a book out called the Art of Opium Antiques. He is also working on a memoir about collecting opium-smoking paraphernalia, to be published in 2012 by Villard, an imprint of Random House. Thanks go to Steven for finding the Leon Busy photo posted above.

The Art of Amy Crehore

Gweek 015 features Craig Yoe + another Hokum Scorchers' song

Check out the interview with Craig Yoe, designer and comic historian, on a brand new episode of Boingboing's Gweek podcast (015). Also, my band, The Hokum Scorchers, plays a version of Luke Jordan's 1927 song "Pick Poor Robin Clean" at the end of the podcast. Luke Jordan was a blues guitarist and singer from Lynchburg, VA. We recorded this song in 1990.

Lou Reimuller - National guitar/kazoo/vocals, Amy Crehore- on the washboard/kazoo/vocals.

GWEEK 015

The Art of Amy Crehore

Our recording of "Pick Poor Robin Clean" is also found here.

Ode to Marihuana 1934

The song, "Sweet Marihuana", was performed in the movie "Murder at the Vanities" by Gertrude Michaels. This was made in Pre-Code Hollywood right before the Hays Code was strictly enforced in 1934. What is pre-code Hollywood? READ HERE . The Hays Code was a set of film industry moral censorship guidelines.

Thanks, Internet Weekly