Short 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 reading

Review: Martin Ramírez: Framing His Life and Art

Martin Ramírez: Framing His Life and Art, by Victor M. Espinosa. University of Texas Press, Austin, 388 pages, 24 color photos and 54 b/w, 2015. ISBN 978-1-4773-0775-5. Hard cover, $40 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. It is the definitive treatment of a universally acknowledged self-taught master and is likely to remain definitive given the rigor of Victor Espinosa’s research. It

Continue reading

Book Review: Envisioning Howard Finster

Envisioning Howard Finster: The Religion and Art of a Stranger from Another World, by Norman J. Girardot, University of California Press, 304 pages, 16 color plates and 20 b/w illustrations, 2015. ISBN 978-0520261105. Paperback, $29.95 The prolific southern visionary Howard Finster was something of an enigma. How much of his colorful output was a matter of vision vs. showmanship? How important are his paintings vs. his Paradise Garden environment? Crazy, or crazy like a fox? The flood of work (some 46,000 numbered pieces, nearly all with spiritual messages) and his loquacious sermonizing raise another key question: Are we obligated to

Continue reading

Tour the Lakefront Stone Carvings: Oct. 11

Chicago is home to the greatest collection of outdoor stone carvings in urban America. Generations of beach-going carvers whiling away the hours left their marks on huge limestone blocks installed during the Depression to improve and protect the city’s park-lined lakefront. Many of these anonymous carvings have been destroyed as part of more recent anti-erosion projects. But the stretch of shoreline between Bryn Mawr and Montrose Avenues still boasts dozens of these small wonders — animals, bathing beauties, presidents, deities, buildings and, of course, initials, names and eternal professions of love. It’s the best public art that no one sees. They’re

Continue reading

Short Review: Walker Evans the Magazine Work

If Walker Evans’ famous Depression-era pictures for the Farm Security Administration long overshadowed his other work, his magazine career has been the most obscured of all. Employment at Henry Luce’s Fortune can easily seem at odds with his very individual vision and his social consciousness. But David Campany makes an effective case for elevating the magazine spreads to the first rank, and the book includes numerous facsimiles as evidence. Evans had a great deal of creative control, and the magazine format allowed him to present photos and text in ways that make his ideas more explicit than you can garner

Continue reading

Food Truck Visions: A Street Food Environment

The vibrant visual environment created by food trucks on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., is a longtime favorite at Interesting Ideas. These photos of this vernacular art experience are from our third session there, in August 2015. You can also see some glorious details at Food Truck Visions: Art of Street Food, D.C. . See our existing National Mall food truck gallery.

Continue reading