Ray Yoshida’s Museum Of Extraordinary Values by Karen Patterson My rating: 5 of 5 stars I’ve had the privilege of seeing Ray Yoshida’s art collection only twice, the first time in 1994 when I was co-curating a show of bottle-cap art for Chicago’s Intuit. Ray was gracious and loaned some pieces. His collection was spectacular, but tellingly, it did not seem out of the ordinary. If it was finer than many I had seen (my own included), it was not fundamentally different in style and approach. The mix of Maxwell Street flea-market finds with masterpieces is a hallmark of the
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Review: The Family Circus: Daily and Sunday Comics, 1962-63
The Family Circus: Daily and Sunday Comics, 1962-63 by Bil Keane My rating: 5 of 5 stars I liked Peanuts as a kid but I loved Family Circus. Where Charles Schulz used his kids to make universal points, Bil Keane tried to be about real kids and real parents. It was a chronicle of post-war suburban life, and I could relate. It also was probably the greatest source of insight I had into the parental point of view (well, along with Dave Berg’s The Lighter Side comics in Mad Magazine, with had some similarities to Circus in style and point
Continue readingReview: Clothes, Clothes, Clothes. Music, Music, Music. Boys, Boys, Boys.
Clothes, Clothes, Clothes. Music, Music, Music. Boys, Boys, Boys. by Viv Albertine My rating: 5 of 5 stars I came of age around the same time as Viv Albertine and I was drawn to punk, so this memoir was bound to resonate for me. Much as I appreciated punk’s exasperation with the state of both society and popular music, though, I was far too inhibited, and more to the point way too square, to be part of the scene. Albertine was very much in the thick of it, however — friend and bandmate of Sid Vicious pre-Sex Pistols, close to
Continue readingReview: John Baeder’s Road Well Taken
“John Baeder’s Road Well Taken,” by Jay Williams, Vendome Press, 272 pages, 300 color and b&w illustrations, 2015. 978-0865653191. Hard cover $45 John Baeder is legendary among roadside architecture enthusiasts for Diners,” his book of photorealistic diner paintings that turned out to be one of the most culturally influential publications of the 1970s. Baeder, the subject of a new biography by art historian and curator Jay Williams, appreciated 20th century roadsides and the buildings that populated them before they became old, when they were just ugly rather than a source of popular nostalgia.Widespread fascination with highways like Route 66 and
Continue readingReview: Letters of Note: An Eclectic Collection of Correspondence Deserving of a Wider Audience
Letters of Note: An Eclectic Collection of Correspondence Deserving of a Wider Audience by Shaun Usher My rating: 5 of 5 stars Interesting letters, most by notable people, through the centuries, well presented. What’s not to like?
Continue readingShort Review: Sue Williams
An important book about an important artist. I confess I’m biased, since I collected Sue Williams’ art early in her career. But that art’s development, in its formal variety and conceptual complexity, has demonstrated a deepening of her talent and intelligence. This book is thoroughly illustrated, of course, and the essayists do a creditable job keeping up with the evolution it shows, especially the artist’s shift from explicit messages literally written into the work to an embrace of abstraction that is stylistically powerful and still intellectually challenging. You can find it here on Amazon.
Continue readingReview: Martín Ramírez: Framing His Life and Art
Martín Ramírez: Framing His Life and Art by Víctor M. Espinosa My rating: 5 of 5 stars Victor Espinosa’s long-awaited study of Martin Ramirez — for most of his life an unknown inmate of an obscure California asylum but now an art-world star — joins the 5 or 10 most important books yet published on the subject of self-taught and outsider art. (Read my full review). View all my reviews
Continue readingShort Review: Harlem: The Unmaking of a Ghetto
Camilo Jose Vergara brings a fine photographic eye, a sociologist’s curiosity and expertise, and tremendous commitment to his explorations of cities, their decay and their resilience. This study of Harlem is most enlightening.
Continue readingShort Review: Yokai Museum (Supernatural Beings of Japan)
Yokai Museum: The Art of Japanese Supernatural Beings from Yumoto Koichi Collection is a compendium of Japanese demons and ghosts as visualized over 300 or so years up through the mid-20th Century. That cut-off period is important to those of us who love Japanese science fiction, especially the crazy monsters spawned by shows like Ultraman and made into some of the weirdest toys ever. The resonance of these Yokai with Pokeman is also strong, if not stronger. Although this book doesn’t get into those topics, and it seems not written for a U.S. audience, just looking at the pictures will
Continue readingShort Review — Home-Made Europe: Contemporary Folk Artifacts
A good follow-up to Home-Made Russia, with more make-do creations that often demonstrate artistic talent if not intent. Plus, the interviews with the creators (or occasionally their relatives) are entertaining in themselves. I’d love to know how Vladimir Arkhipov finds these people and their vernacular things.
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