Tag: Artists

  • Artist Books

    Over Winter Break, our little family went to the Museum of Modern Art here in Manhattan. Part of the reason to go was to kill an afternoon, but also the kid really is loving her art class at school. They were studying Picasso before the break, and she remembered that MoMA has several of his very famous paintings, and was excited about seeing them. For the wife, she hadn’t been out in the City in a while, you know, to actually enjoy this place – so she was hip on going. Me; I love going to museums – any museum: historical, art, kid, whimsical, yarn, whatever…

    So, up on the top floor, MoMA is holding a retrospective on Edward Ruscha. I was vaguely aware of his work, especially the gas station stuff, but I didn’t know a whole lot about the guy. Let me say this, if you are available, you should go check it out. His work covers several different mediums, and is a very interesting digestion of Post War America, and the growing of Pax Americana.

    Out of all his works, the one I was most drawn to were his artist’s books, the first being “Twentysix Gasoline Stations.” There was something to the simplicity of the work in the book, and the efficacy of the design on the whole. Ruscha went on do many other artists books, all keeping with the same design theme. What these books reminded me of was two things; gallery books my uncle would make, and other artist’s sketchbooks.

    I am aware that Ruscha’s artist books were not sketchbooks, but a complete work unto itself, but I have been to other artist’s shows were they make a single sketchbook into a work. Some of the most interesting I have seen, sadly I have forgotten names, were books that had cut out pictures from magazines and newspapers, or were a combination of text ant drawings/paintings.

    And then there are the gallery books that my uncle used to make. He was a painter/artist who spent time in New York in the late 50’s and 60’s and then relocated to Houston. When he had a show in a gallery, books would be printed for the event, but my uncle took extra time making these limited-edition books individual and unique. Some of the books he would personally swipe paint across the cover, and I think one he would rip the corner off of the first page, to make each book feel “used.”

    And for the past week, in the back of my head, I have this “artist book” idea-thing kicking around in my head. Not sure what to do with it. About six months ago I started farting around with the idea of making a limited run “zine” that would feature crayon drawings and poems with my kid, but that never materialized. (I think my daughter was never on board with the idea.) But I like the idea that writers should adopt artists books as part of their medium to work with. This would be more than a chapbook, as it would incorporate more visuals and play with format and style. For a writer not only works with words, but also the form that books can take, right?

    I’m going to play around with this some more. Even though I might just be describing chapbooks…

  • The Late Night with David Letterman Opening

    If the kid is on Summer vacation, then I am on Summer vacation.

    This is a rule that I made up for this Summer. What this really means is that I am not going to the gym, and I am staying up late at night. In both respects, it has been very successful. My pants are getting tighter, and I have watched an enormous amount of odd and entertaining things off of the Roku when I should be sleeping.

    Last night, like a bolt of lightning striking a tall tree, I had a thought, “I wonder if the old opening from Late Night with David Letterman is on YouTube?” We all know the answer is yes, but what I was looking for was the specific one that I saw when I first saw in the late 80’s. I found this one, which feels correct.

    Watching it last night, a couple things came back to me. First, it was remembering my older brothers telling my Dad about this show. All of us in my family have a good, if slightly off kilter sense of humor. They were trying to explain to the old man about this talk show that did these weird bits like Top 10 Lists, a monkey with a camera on its back, a Velcro suit, and the host was this smart-alecky guy. It sounded like it was right up our alley, but it came on during the week, really late.

    Growing up in Texas, Carson was on from 10:30pm to 11:30pm, followed by Love Connection from 11:30pm to midnight.  Then Dave came on, when it was way too late for any normal person to be up. My brothers are nine and seven years older than me, so they were in college, and had the time and constitution be to loyal viewers. I was still in grade school, and our home only had one large tv in the livingroom. But, in my 6th grade year, which made me 11 or 12, my parents bought me a little 18” black and white TV, for the purpose of playing my Nintendo, thus avoiding confrontations of who was going to watch Cheers or play Legend of Zelda. And I did play video games on that little TV.

    And I also started watching Dave.

    I was probably the only 6th grader in my school district that could hum the Late Night theme song, and knew who Larry “Bud” Melman was. I was able to hide my clandestine viewing from my parents, but I think they caught on, yet didn’t care. (I kept making good grades, so where was the problem?) That show started influencing me on how I thought about humor, about being just a little strange and idiosyncratic, and also being a little normal while having a few things that are off. Like, how Dave dressed. He wore the talk show host’s uniform – shirt, tie, sport coat. Yet, as Dave wore that, he also had on sneakers, and khaki pants, and his hair was short but unkept. He had all the pieces of normalcy, but was still a little off.

    The second thing that came to me when I watched the opening of Late Night, was that this intro is still how I think about New York City. When I envision this place, I think about it at night – the buildings shutting off their lights, the cabs rolling down nearly deserted streets, and the bars during the week when it’s late and there are just a handful of people in there. And the bar in the opening, “Old Town Bar and Restaurant” I now realize that I have been in there a handful of times, and it still looks the same. In fact, I noticed that at the end of the L shaped bar, there is a guy in the corner sitting with a drink and talking to the bartender. That’s my favorite spot in any bar to sit, which now makes me wonder if this is where I came up with/stole the idea?

    After watching the intro, and getting a heaping helping of nostalgia, I started to wonder when I started my fascination with New York City? I feel like I always wanted to be here. Was it watching Ghostbusters? Night Court? Was it because this is where artist came to be artists, and I wanted to be an artist? I’m sure it was a compounding effect of all of these influences.

    Either way, I live in New York City now, and I don’t know if I can live anywhere else. It’s the only City where a subway ride entitles you to rub up on strangers.

    (And, hey, ummm… If this is blog is making a fancy tickled, then if you could take a moment and give a like, or a share, and comments are always welcomed.)

  • Good Old Kurt Vonnegut

    It was a slightly strange weekend. First of all, I was a horrible father, and showed my child a movie, which I thought she would find entertaining, but actually just gave her nightmares. I speak of 1999’s The Mummy, which I thought she’d find fun, and not scary. I mean, this is the same kid that had no issues with any of the Indiana Jones movies’ and their face melting, heart removing, and weird aging/dusting thing. Nope, total miscalculation – Mummies are very scary to seven-year olds.

    So, I’m a shitty dad, or at least that’s how I felt Friday/Saturday night.

    The kid couldn’t sleep in her room alone, so I stayed up with her on the pullout sofa. I was looking for something to watch that would put the kid asleep, but still keep me engaged, and I found a documentary about Kurt Vonnegut on HULU (This is not a movie review) that fit the bill. Though Vonnegut is one of my favorite writers, I really didn’t know anything about his life other that he sold cars at one point, and got divorced.

    After watching the documentary, I had two questions I wished were answered; first, why did Vonnegut choose to move to Barnstable, MA from Schenectady, NY? I get that living on Cape Cod is cool, but did he know someone there, did he vacation in the Cape first, did he read an article about the place? I mean, what was it? Second, how did Vonnegut, who by his own admission was just getting by selling short stories at this time, afford a home on Cape Cod? I am assuming that Cape Cod has always been Cape Cod, which means it has always been in demand, but back in the 50’s, were homes really that big AND inexpensive that an infrequently published, and modestly monetarily successful writer could afford a home? Was his wife supporting him?

    I really feel these questions need to be answered, as I think this is the failure of most biographies; they never explain how an artist paid their bills when they had no money, and still found a way to create.