{ feuilleton }

Two thousand

Being post number 2,000 here at {feuilleton}. The page above is a sample from Monograms & Ciphers (1906) by AA Turbayne at the trusty Internet Archive.

I’ll take the opportunity here to apologise for the continuing flakiness of my web connection. The advantage of WordPress is independence from the shackles of Blogger and co. but this can leave you at the mercy of webhosts with inadequate or shoddy resources. I intend changing host at some point but have been far too busy of late to deal with the matter. As always, your patience is appreciated. Thanks.

Vintage swordplay #4

The Crusader by George Quaintance (1943).

Continuing an occasional series, I was hoping to find the original photo which George Quaintance used as a model for this painting but failed dismally. I did find the photo below, however, a piece of Roman camp by beefcake photographer Alonzo Hanagan, aka ‘Lon of New York’ on this Boy Culture post where Hanagan is interviewed about his work.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The men with swords archive
• The gay artists archive

The art of Michael Hutter

Stadtlandschaft I (City I) (1999).

Michael Hutter‘s work is pitched at that enjoyably nebulous zone which lies on the borderlands of fantasy, science fiction and Surrealism, from which hybrid visions emerge that are never too defined in one direction or another. It’s a zone that French and Belgian artists often visit but whose inhabitants from other nations often seem all too few. Hutter’s art encompasses oil paintings and also ink drawings which include some erotic scenes like the example below. His site is well worth a browse, especially the vast and detailed Triptych which recalls similar works by Wayne Barlowe and Hieronymus Bosch. For more inhabitants of the nebulous zone, see the archive link below.

Pterdactyl II.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The fantastic art archive

Bob Peak revisited

left: Mame (1974); right: Excalibur (1981).

Matthew Peak, son of film poster artist Bob Peak, left on a comment this week on an earlier post I made about his father’s art with news of the relaunch of the Peak site. I’m looking forward to seeing what gets posted there especially since the additions to date are such good quality. Peak was a tremendously powerful and dramatic artist whose posters are often a lot more engaging than the films they were intended to promote. He was also exceptionally versatile, as the two examples above demonstrate (via IMP Awards), being equally adept at hard-edged graphics as he was with nebulous airbrush paintings. As with the similarly versatile Richard Amsel, the more time passes, the more these posters seem evidence of an artistry and individuality which has vanished from the world of film design.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• The art of Aquirax Uno
• Alice in Acidland
• Salomé posters
• Polish posters: Freedom on the Fence
• Kaleidoscope: the switched-on thriller
• The Robing of The Birds
• Franciszek Starowieyski, 1930–2009
• Dallamano’s Dorian Gray
• Czech film posters
• The poster art of Richard Amsel
• Bollywood posters
• Lussuria, Invidia, Superbia
• The poster art of Bob Peak
• A premonition of Premonition
• Metropolis posters
• Film noir posters

Three Heads Six Arms by Zhang Huan

A new sculpture by Chinese artist Zhang Huan which was officially dedicated in San Francisco’s City Hall Plaza last week. The photo is by Flickr user David Dasinger and similar views can be found in this Flickr pool. Huan’s copper figures may be intended to evoke Buddhist serenity but I can never see that plaza without remembering the horrible ending of Philip Kaufman’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Three Heads Six Arms is part of a series of monumental works depicting the fragmented extremities of Buddhist statues. The series was inspired by Zhang’s discovery of religious sculptures that had been destroyed during the Cultural Revolution for sale in a Tibetan market. (More.)

Via Erik Davis.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• The art of Arnaldo Pomodoro
• Sculptural collage: Eduardo Paolozzi
• Dead monuments
• The art of Igor Mitoraj