Bookmarks are a great way to try on art. And I’m not just saying that because I’m one of the presenters at the first Bookmark Collectors Virtual Convention, either.

Bookmarks come in so many styles and are made of so many materials, you can enjoy and experiment with form & function ideas and concepts in your own mind without feeling the pain you would at some gallery reception. But even if such interior dialogs aren’t of any interest to you, bookmarks are a great way to inexpensively try types of art.

Simple bookmarks with reproductions of the masters and/or famous artists are cheaper (and take up less space) than posters — so it’s a grand way to make inexpensive mistakes. Maybe you find yourself drawn to the vivid oranges in a mod artwork, but after a week of seeing it, you find yourself feeling it reminds you more of a fast food restaurant. If so, you can just stick it in a drawer, doodle on it, or give the darn thing away. Or, you could start collecting them. *wink*

For those with modest or even tiny art budgets, collecting bookmarks may not only be the way to get your hands on copies of works by famous artists, but original artwork as well. And they aren’t only the little paper-slip or folded varieties either.

Made of metal, fabric, plastic, cord, wood, scrimshaw, and more, there are many craftsmen, indie and unknown artists making bookmarks.

Maybe you’ll even be inspired to make some.

If so, Jen Funk Weber, owner of needlework design company Funk & Weber Designs and founder of Needle and ThREAD: Stitching for Literacy program, is hosting the The Making of an Embroidered Bookmark and the Stitching for Literacy Program session at the conference.

The first annual Bookmark Collectors Virtual Convention, an online event celebrating all things “bookmark,” will be held on February 20th and 21st, 2010. Registration is just$10 for all the sessions, forums, and trade show & gallery goodies.

To entice you to consider attending the event, and collecting bookmarks, I’ve enlisted the help of our very own Laura Brown, founder of Doodle Week. We’re offering five Bookmark Collectors Virtual Conference Commemorative Collector Bookmarks for the first five folks (from the US or Canada) who mention “The Ungulate” in their registration for the event.

Only 12 of these commemorative bookmarks will be made (five to be given away here, five my antiques and vintage collectibles site, one for the artist, and, ever the collector, one for myself), so it’s truly a limited edition. A great addition to — or way to start — your bookmark collection.

I hope you’ll consider participating in the conference; if so, I’ll “see” you there! If not, at least consider the possibilities of art bookmarks.

Image Credits:

One of six The Wedding Of The Mouse bookmarks by Japanese illustrator Gustav Klim, via Mirage’s Bookmark Exhibition.

Metal bookmark by CL Designs.

Wooden bookmarks by TRwoodworks.

I’m Going To Need More Books doodle commemorating the bookmark convention by Laura Brown.

I have a thing for art nouveau and arts and crafts tiles, so I was drawn to this arts & crafts tile poster by Mindy Sommers.

From there, I discovered not only this beautiful Bell Epoch poster by the artist, but that her art nouveau stained glass art can be found on more than Zazzle products because the artist and her husband run Color Bakery.

The stained glass art works (along with many other works) can be ordered custom on all their products.

Of the stained glass works, the artist says:

People ask me if, when printed on glass, if they will light up. The answer is yes. They won’t allow extensive light as they are not transparent…however, they are luminescent and direct lighting behind them will give the artwork a beautiful ambient glow.

While Color Bakery offers hundreds of their own designs, they allow customers to upload their own images to be put on everything from scratch resistant porcelain floor tiles (that you really can walk on!) to artsy mirror compacts. And if you’re an artist, Color Bakery provides custom art printing for artists and photographers too.

I subscribe to Modern Painters, but just now got around to reading the September ’09 issue — despite the fabulous John Waters on the cover.

Mr. Waters need not take it personally; I just have a plethora of magazines to get through, and if they aren’t in the magazine rack in the bathroom, well, it just takes that much longer.

Such reading habits, and the fact that my family refer to the bathroom as “the library,” won’t upset Waters either. If you don’t know that, you don’t know Waters. And you certainly haven’t read the magazine feature, which discusses his contemporary art collection, including:

Over the toilet in the bathroom is a Mike Kelley piece that “really pisses people off,” but Waters asks me not to say why, since he writes about it in his book. Also in the bathroom are a funny “Queer Batman” watercolor by Mark Chamberlain and “a Brigid Berlin tit painting; she painted with her tits.”

In Baltimore, he says, “I have the Michael Jackson print by Gary Hume looking through a glory hole right in my hall, which is really scary. Plus, you can see it in the mirror, which is even worse.”

But more interesting, to me, than the art John Waters collects is the art John Waters makes.

Waters calls his art conceptual and says it’s about writing and editing. “Hardly am I Ansel Adams. Or sitting around with a pottery wheel, like in Ghost. The craft is not the issue here. The idea is. And the presentation.”

And I love the ideas and the presentation. Like this piece, part of his Rear Projection series which combines parts of four film-title stills to spell out: contemporary art hates you.

The work’s title amusing title is …And Your Family Too.

In the article, Lawrence Levi describes Waters’ work this way: “Much of his work pokes fun at the art and film worlds he inhabits, allowing him to be at once an insider and a heckler.”

And if you think Levi or I are reading into the art, here’s what the artist himself has to say about it:

The art world “is a secret club,” Waters says. “It is a language; you have to learn everything. You have to learn how to dress, you have to learn how to see it, you have to learn how to talk about it, you have to learn how to read about it. All of it is impenetrable to a newcomer, and it was to me too.”

So let the art of John Waters speak to you, your insecurity over the intimidating impenetrability of the art world — go ahead and laugh, even. But don’t forget to just open your eyes too:

In his 1998 film Pecker, when the laundromat worker played by Christina Ricci tells her photographer boyfriend, played by Edward Furlong, “I don’t understand any of that art crap,” he replies sincerely, “You could if you just open your eyes.” But as his feelings about impenetrability suggest, Waters has no problem with elitism.

PS The book mentioned — which will contain the story of a Mike Kelley artwork above the toilet that “really pisses people off” — is Role Models; it’s to be published in May, 2010.

PPS I’d just like to say, that when discussing anything John Waters, you’re bound to mention bathroom artwork that piss-es people off, as well as “glory holes,” penetration issues, and the word “pecker.”  And I loved it.

Antique Week, Vol. 41, Issue No. 2112 (January 11, 2010) has a report in the national section on art sales in 2009.

In the article, two things stood out for me.

First:

Auction houses started slashing pre-sale estimates by as much as 50 percent to stimulate sales. When Sloans & Kenyon of Chevy Chase, Md., gave a $6,000-8,000 estimate to an unsigned 18th century oil of the Grand Canal in Venice, bidders from around the world smelled a deal. Instead, the painting went for $687,125 at the Sept. 27 auction.

The math’s off (the pre-sale estimate was what, 10-15% of the final sale?), but one thing’s for sure: People buy classic art the same way they buy bags of socks at Wal*Mart.

Second:

Old Masters are getting a new look from investors wary of fluctuations in more modern art, Warhol excluded. In its art review of 2009, Bloomberg said, “Collectors responded to the financial crisis by selecting the best 20th century classics, Old Masters, wine and jewelry at international auctions. They shunned investment in some contemporary art as prices dropped by half.”

And, it was noted earlier in the piece that Bloomberg had reported “that the sale of high-value contemporary art took a big hit last year when major auction houses ceased providing consignors with price guarantees.”

What this says to me is something about fundamentalism at times of crisis and art pretension as a form of commerce; art as financial investment based on fear of depreciation, not art purchased for appreciation.

I found this large framed copper horse at a local thrift shop.

By chomas22 at Flickr.

Sebastian Faena‘s homage Italian director Fellini, part of a series titled Hell’s Bellas.

Does it make a difference knowing it was an editorial for V Magazine?

In order to discuss the meaning of kitsch, you first need to know it’s definition. So I grabbed my copy of Kitsch, The World of Bad Taste, by Gillo Dorfles (with contributions by John McHale, Karl Pawek, Ludwig Giesz, Lotte H. Eisner, Ugo Volli, Vittorio Gregotti, and Aleksa Celebonovic; and essays by Hermann Broch and Clement Greenberg). In the book kitsch is defined as follows:

The word kitsch could derive etymologically from the English ‘sketch’ or, according to the other opinions, from the German verb ‘verkitschen (‘to make cheap’). According to Giesz (Ludwig Giesz: ‘Phanomenologie des Kitsches’ …1960) which is without doubt the most complete work on the subject, the word kitsch could approximately be said to mean ‘artistic rubbish.’

However, “artistic rubbish” is as “I know it when I see it” as porn is. To simply define something as “bad” without considering the pure subjectivity involved is nearly nonsensical.

While Dorfles et all go on at great length about how they arrive at the wrinkling of their noses, the definitions are less than satisfactory — especially as they point to a real case of monetary snobbery.

For example, posters of the great art classics are considered to be kitsch. Translation: Unless you can afford an actual Rembrandt or other Master, your taste, however classy, will be defined as bad and kitsch by virtue of simply having a thin wallet.

In fact, Dorfles really, really, not only dislikes copies or reproductions of any sort, but is not exactly happy with any sort of consumerism (he would hate today’s art museum gift shops). Nor does he limit himself only to the visual arts; along with film literature and music are judged, their medium and means of consumer acts equally under attack.

Dorfles is not an complete idiot, however; he senses the reader’s potential ire:

If anyone is not satisfied with our choice and finds some of the images artistic which we will present as pseudo-artistic, un-artistic, too bad! To us at least it will mean that our reader is really a ‘kitsch-man’ of the first water; and that the psychological test has worked properly.

What Dorfles (and anyone else who uses insulting as a judgmental intimidation tactic) fails to recognize here in such a confirmed stance of absolutes, is that a kitsch-woman of the first water (me!) will find his awareness of discord and dispute wins him no favor intellectually. The gloves are now off. Any potential shield of ignorance leaves him standing naked before me, facing a battle to the inevitable intellectual death.

If all this seems to imply that Kitsch, The World of Bad Taste is a book to avoid, please do not misunderstand. I love a good book I can sink my teeth into — even if that means I’m growling when I do it. (And I’ll likely visit this book often for argumental posts.)

But if Dorfles brings us closer to a true understanding of what kitsch really is, it is purely by accident.

This book was published in 1969 — and contains essays written up to three decades earlier. Viewed with the benefit of time, or hindsight, I find a great contextual definition of kitsch. Or maybe I should say, a definition of kitsch as a defensive reaction to the preservation of Art.

Some love this book for opening “your eyes to the avalanche of junk that makes up popular culture” and others loath it for failing to recognize the “the signifigance of the narrowing gap between high and low art,” but both sides miss the real point. Defining art as high-brow or low-brow, dismissing popular culture and ourselves as collectively low-brow, isn’t just an over-simplification; it’s a poor assessment.

Art as a form of human expression is not a static thing. It changes. Like everything else. Even removing the individual voices and processes of the creators, artworks are offered to a public which changes. Not only did we once love Rubenesque women, but Ruben himself; now, meh, not-so-much for either of them. What we value, and how we value it, changes. The conversations we have, the issues we explore, change. And, perhaps most dramatically, the ability to produce, show, and critique art has changed.

If low-barrier equals low-entry equals low-brow is the math being used, people need to reconsider. The converse certainly does not hold true. And those who, like Dorfles does with machines, blame technology for the copious amounts of kitsch ought to remember the battles for freedom of access for all. And the remarkable artworks we’ve had, strides taken, as a result.

I don’t want to be equally guilty of passing judgment on those who are quick to condemn popular culture, kitsch, etc., but the very people who “feel overwhelmed by the tasteless tides of popular culture” are not only, as they whine, so afflicted by it, but they are employing it. It’s obvious they are digging such pop culture adventures as publishing sans gatekeeper with a big spoon. Self-publishing their high-brow opinions is a low-brow, kitsch activity.

But back to the book.

Contextually, this book of essays stands as a defense against Modernism and those art movements after it which reject tradition. It’s the defensive posturing of an establishment wishing to retain authority, to rally the museums, galleys, and wealthy who must guard the integrity of Art. It’s not that these people have better taste with which to form the definitions and standards of Art, or even the right to do so; but they do have a reason to try. For you see, what they truly hope to guard so zealously are their investments in it.

But you can’t insulate your investments in art. Art is part of a living, breathing, culture which, as stated, changes. As the cultural values change, so do the monetary values of art. Not always in the art investor’s favor.

And no desperate debates designed to keep the established art status quo can thwart it.

So, the definition of kitsch…

On one hand, kitsch is purely subjective in the sense that each of us knows it when we see it and we ascribe different attributes to it. “Bad,” “atrocious,” “so bad it’s grand,” “funny,” “too funny,” “cheap,” etc. Which is why kitsch rather defies a classification. (What pleases or amuses one, insults another).

But kitsch, as it is often used in the art world, often has quite a different distinction. I see it as more than a slur, but an actual means to limit and control the art market, if not the art world.

Image credits: As all images are scanned from Kitsch, The World of Bad Taste, by Gillo Dorfles. Presented in order placed in the post, with author comments, if any.

Vintage ad, found on page 177: “An example of facile and grotesque copyfitting in this attempt to identify the inimitable blue of a painting by Cezanne with the blue of a man’s sportshirt.”

Film still, found on page 195: “The depiction of a famous painter on the screen is painful even in the hands of a director with taste. Vincente Minnelli’s film about van Gogh, Lust For Life (1956).”

Mona Lisa “kitsch,” found on page 21: “10. The Mona Lisa myth appears once more against the tiles of a shower. 11. A spectacles-case”

I believe this work by Marc Brunier aka Mister M is a print made from a woodcut; I love how the lines define the musculature, defining the anatomy as well as sense of direction, if not action.

The artist recently had a showing of his works in Poland — and I’m utterly intrigued with the wall of small works, which invite you too look in, like a voyeur, through little windowpanes.

Of course, I can’t resist showing you that at that exhibition, that the French (at least speaking) artist was joined by someone looking like a comic book Frenchman in his striped shirt. (The artist himself is in the middle of the photo; the man wearing the hat and glasses.)

Marisa Haedike of Creative Thursday makes whimsical works, often selling not only the originals, but prints, dishes and even night lights. If you see a character you adore, you can also commission the artist to make a clay sculpture piece, like darling Frannie here.

I found this cartoon by Mike Twohy inside the January 2010 issue of Good Housekeeping, and it reminded me that now is as good a time as any to address the issue of aesthetics and “artistic response.”

Art experts and educators such as Sally Hagaman have rather specific definitions of aesthetics:

There still is confusion between understanding aesthetics as an adjective (as in “aesthetic scanning”) and aesthetics as a noun (as in the philosophy of art), a distinction made clear years ago by Sharer (1983) and others. Aesthetic scanning clearly is a method of art criticism, of responding to a specific work or body of work. Aesthetics historically is a branch of philosophy with its own substantive content. This content deals with general questions about art such as “What is art?”, “What’s the difference between a work of art and a copy?”, “Are there criteria that can be used in evaluating all works of art?”, and “Is the concept of originality in art a meaningful one?”

I refer, more simply, to aesthetics as the process of recognizing and articulating the emotional and/or psychological response(s) to works of art.

You have to first recognize or identify the responses that you as an individual have to artworks before you can talk about them and use them to exemplify, define, defend, or otherwise discuss art (works) and Art (in general) in terms of “good,” “bad,” or the bigger questions Hagaman stated.

Most of us, sadly, have not been taught how to do this.

Schools, with their ever-threatened budgets for the arts, may teach us how to mold clay, encourage us to express ourselves creatively by drawing, give us plenty of time to master the techniques of plastering tempera well enough for cheerleaders to make those banners on brown craft paper, but they typically fail to give us insight into how we react to art.

This is why I like to take my kids to art museums, one at a time, giving them my undivided attention and helping teach them to how to think about and talk about what they like and don’t like. (Always illuminating!)

It’s not good enough to say, “It sucks,” or even, “It doesn’t speak to me.” Or to even feel that way. I want them to know why they feel it sucks, why it doesn’t speak to them.

Knowing why you feel the way you do about art is the only way you really know your own opinion — and feel comfortable discussing, buying, viewing art.

I can’t get enough of artist Tamar Stone — her corset and bed books inspire me so much!

With all these projects and interests, I knew she’d collect lots of stuff, but I wanted to know more about what the artist draws from…

I collect a lot of books, images etc. However, because of limited space and finances, I also go to the NY Public Library to do research with their really old books. Before you could find things on-line, I used to go to the library to do a lot of patent research (something I learned while being a para-legal) — and learning how to read a patent’s family history — to get you to other resources.

With the internet, so much stuff is online — but a lot of it is low-res, which I can’t really use, and also you have to make sure the images are in the public domain (due to copyright issues).

As with my latch-hook rug, works are inspired by my travels.

One of my hobbies is “Polaroiding dolls on the road,” which I’ve turned into paper books from Polaroids. I also have a series of bathrooms/outhouses along the road… And meals on the road… But I haven’t had the money to turn those into books (all the scanning of those is just so time consuming, and I rather just keep moving ahead with the sewing projects).

You can get copies of Tamar Stone’s books at PrintedMatter.org: Dolls on the Road: The Barbie and Ken Series. Vol. 1, Dolls on the Road: Baby Dolls and Others. Vol. 2. And you can visit Tamar Stone’s website to keep up-to-date on the artist and her projects.

I’m not a quilter — despite the ridiculous number of quilting books (old and new) and boxes of fabric (vintage and modern) I own. I made one honest attempt at making my daughter a crazy quilt… But, well, I’m saving it all for that magical One Day when I’ll have the time and patience to really learn what I’m doing. Still, I love to look at quilts, especially the less traditional textile art pieces.

In 2009 there were, in my mind, two notable quilting stories — and both center on Mark Lipinski.

First, as I reported in April over at Kitsch Slapped, the March/April issue of Lipinski’s Quilter’s Home magazine was “too hot” for Jo-Ann Fabric and Crafts to carry — despite Lipinski having paid $2,500 to wrap each copy of the issue in plastic like a porno mag.

Why so much fuss about a quilting magazine? Because the publication dared to include Shocking Quilts, an article by Jake Finc which featured quilts on such controversial (yet culturally aware/abundant) themes as lynching and erectile dysfunction. Part of my response (where you can see some of the quilts in question & under condemnation) was:

These quilts are the very definition of art — not just something made by hand, but unique works exploring issues of our society. You remember art, don’t you? It’s one of the ways people communicate & exchange ideas, start dialogs. Well, Jo-Ann will have none of that.

Please confine your creativity to the kits provided.

The second bit of news in 2009 quilting news is also another low point.

In September, Lipinksi announced that he was stepping down as editor of Quilter’s Home magazine and breaking all ties with the publication. This was a result of New Track Media‘s July ’09 purchase of CK Media. The ol’ “creative differences.”

However, since New Track Media had also purchased Quilters News Network TV in 2007, Lipinksi also announced this meant we was discontinuing any involvement with QNNtv.com, including co-hosting Quilt Out Loud!, the internet television program.

While these two low points or lowlights in quilting 2009 seem to indicate negativity, exposing the continued blanding of art by the very commercial outfits which should be encouraging creativity, I choose to be optimistic: Thank gawd quilters, artists, and art lovers everywhere have Mark Lipinski, a man dedicated to his craft, to creativity, who won’t knuckle-under to the knuckleheads of mediocrity.

To show support of Lipinski and his values, pony up some pennies and purchase from his shop. There you can even buy back issues — including copies with the Shocking Quilts feature as well as the last issue Lipinski had a hand in. And keep an eye on his blog for more news — rumor has it, there are fabulous projects in the works!

Several people must have been fauning fawning over R.A. Daniel Maclise’s Pan And The Dancing Fairies (The Faun And The Fairies) because the pretty painted piece sold for 301,250 GBP (roughly $498,509 in US dollars) at Sotheby’s Victorian & Edwardian Art auction held December 17th, 2009.

I show it to you merely because it would have been the piece I would have been wistfully admiring had I been at the auction.

I hate putting a value on art. I think you should pay what the artist asks, so long as the depth of your affection for the piece matches the depth of your pockets.

But, because I mostly write about antiques and collectibles, people often ask me about how much they should pay for art at auctions, or at least want a rule of thumb to guide them at their local farm or estate auction…

I’m no art appraiser; most of my experience with antique paintings has been observed at (countless) smaller local auctions, Antiques Roadshow episodes, and those Roadshow style trash or treasure events. But I feel rather confident saying that any antique painting purchased for $150 or less is a bargain. Seems like no old painting is ever, unless the canvas is completely shredded, deemed worth less than $150. Even antique paintings by unknown artists with small tears and in need of professional cleaning seem to be valued at or over $150.

That said, expect to pay more. Not just for big name artists, but for paintings which charm. If the painting charms you, it likely will charm another bidder or two, increasing the price. That said, console yourself with the following rational reasons to spend as much as you’d like buying antique paintings at auctions:

• Consider how much something else covering that space would cost — be it a framed poster or generic starving artist art.
• Spend as much as you are comfortable with; you’re going to have to live with it.

A lovely fashion sketch by Sir Cecil Beaton, which wafts off my monitor and makes my heart lighter…

In non-art related news, I’ve been spending all weekend cleaning my home, laying down poison and traps, all to rid myself of an unwanted, non-pet, mouse. I can understand him wanting to move in here; it’s already friggin’ cold here in Fargo. But he cannot stay here.

I tell you all this so that you A) understand why I would be feeling the need to get away from the cleaning fumes and get some fresh spring air, and #2 have an actual real life lesson in how art can transport one.

This needlefelt ‘wool painting’ (No.499 Hillside Too by Deebs) reminded me that a few years ago — five, maybe — I saw some crafting show on TV showing how to do such a thing. They were making a purse, and all I could think of was how fragile and itchy such a purse seemed to me…

However, a nice 11″ x 14″ wall piece seems much more appealing.

For some reason I really like the trees; wool seems to match the texture of evergreens, even from a distance.

And, I lurves me the color purple.

Combined, there’s a reverse wistful sense for me — like the bleak itchiness of the past has been left for more colorful pastures.

But that’s just me; you tell me what you see and feel.

Etsy artist WHIMSYlove turns vintage and used books into wall art by folding the pages, origami style, for three-dimensional artworks dubbed Writing on the Wall Book Art — and it’s being featured for sale at the Bellevue Art Museum.

Each Writing on the Wall piece arrives with hanging hardware and a keepsake card printed on white cardstock with “stats,” including Book Title, Author, Copyright Date, # of Pages in book, & how many folds were made to create your piece of artwork!

I received a promotional mailing from Edward Tufte about the first major museum exhibition of his sculpture. I can’t say much about the actual exhibition (Seeing Around, on view at The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum) as I haven’t been there. (Yet?) But I do have a few thoughts on the promo pieces.

First of all, any art exhibition, museum, gallery, etc., which uses Charles Schulz’s Peanuts is awesome; but super bonus points for using the strip in which Charlie Brown is too intimidated to discuss what he sees in cloud formations with Lucy. What more of a non-threatening introduction do you need to proceed?

So, like anyone who receives multiple-paged stuff, I began to flip through the pages… Until I found Tufte pièce de résistance: four pages on animals and landscape sculpture.

If seeing the photo of sheep nestled into a contemporary art sculpture doesn’t get you, how about Zerlina the Golden Retriever peeping from Geometric Cutouts? And if that slice of adorableness still doesn’t entice you to read Tufte’s thoughts on the artistic relationships between land, animals, and landscape sculptural artworks, how about a photo of Zerlina’s “repertoire of concealment methodologies” — complete with cartoon bubble thoughts for both the dog and the cast iron lion?

I may not have been a real fan of such contemporary and large-scale sculptures before, but through such inviting images and narrative Tufte now has me intrigued…

So I stopped flipping through the brochure, and began reading. And viewing far more of the art (and viewing it far more thoughtfully too).

Inside, Tufte presents some food for thought. Like the images shown, his artist’s statements are welcoming. Tufte just ‘talks’ about his works, his intentions, and invites you to see not only his works, but other works, perhaps in new ways.

He doesn’t talk down to the reader — but he sure as heck doesn’t ramble on in such a lofty way that makes me think (as I far too often do) that either the Emperor has no clothes or I don’t know a damn thing about art.

(The latter might in fact be true, but such intimidation doesn’t welcome anyone to view the exhibition — other than those, like Hugh Grant, who will pretend they get it to appear hip — which really just reinforces the silence around naked Emperors too.)

From here I fell in love with several of his abstract sculpture series: The eight feet wrenches (above, left), and the Open Ended series (at bottom of the post).

What’s more, I want to stand before them outside. Even if Zerlina and/or the sheep aren’t there. I want to see how the light, the trees Tufte planted in the museum’s sculpture garden, the other people all play with the giant abstract sculptures.

Which is precisely what this catalog or promotional book is supposed to do.

So hat’s off to Tufte for exposing himself as a very fine Emperor of contemporary art sculpture indeed.

In the January 2010 issue of Elle magazine, there’s an interview of Hugh Grant by Holly Millea. Whatever you think of Grant, there’s an interesting bit on the actor as an art collector.

Elle: Tell me, is it true that you bought an Andy Warhol painting of Elizabeth Taylor for $4 million in 2002 and sold in it 2007 for $23 million?

HG: Those numbers are not quite correct. It all began with a drink… And I was thinking about some stuff in the Sotheby’s auction and I saw this Warhol, so I drunkenly rang up the girl who helped me with art, and said, “You’re going to bid for that.” And to my horror, she did, and even worse, got it. I slightly regret selling it now, even though it made me rich. My contemporary art collection began with just needing to put things on the wall. I was looking around my Victorian house thinking, “What would be the coolest is contemporary art — it will make me look young and interesting.” I’m more than 80 percent skeptical of the whole thing. Having said that, the stuff I own, I have come to love now.”

See, it doesn’t matter what the size of your wallet celebrity status is, lots of people seem to think owning art will make you seem “young and interesting.” And Grant seems to at least have been intimidated or “skeptical” about art.

I can’t (ethically) suggest you get drunk and buy art (let alone bid on anything at Sotheby’s or other big auction house); nor do I even hint at a promise of millions in return on your art investment. But if you relax and sort of view buying art as a means to cover your walls, you can do quite well. At least you’re likely to end up with stuff you’ve come to love.

Scans of the interview in its entirety here.

When I was about to turn 10, my mother took me out — just her and I — to go shopping for my own gifts. It may sound silly, but at the time it was the coolest thing ever. A few blissful hours in which I was the only kid and had the sole attention and direction of my mother. And her wallet. We even stopped for sundaes too.

The only thing that topped it was the actual gifts I chose.

There was the Louis Marx Comanche horse, the bay with black mane and tail with articulated head and legs; sure to make my sister pea-green with envy. And there was a boxed set of colored pencils — not just any colored pencils, but water color pencils.

Comanche was lovingly played with, surviving far better than most plastic horses, and was eventually given to a younger horse-loving cousin. But the pencils are another story.

I’d had colored pencils for years in school, of course; but these were different. They were water color pencils. They even had a permanent plastic case which stated their magnificence and superiority above the usual temporary cardboard box. These pencils were so prized, so grown-up, so filled with the colors and promise of real art, that they intimidated me. I rarely used them. In fact, 30-odd years later, they sit, looking nearly untouched.

I won’t lie and say that Comanche wasn’t loved; he really was. But I was willing to put him to use as the manufacturer intended. The water color pencils, however, were so loved I didn’t dare use them.

Without getting overly sentimental (and risking sounding like a cliche), it’s really sad to acknowledge that somehow I’ve thought the world needs more loved-into-being-tailless horses more than whatever art I might have made. The world, and I, can survive both.

Memo to self: One of the New Year’s Resolutions is to get out the water color pencils and make something. Maybe even some horses.

Art Credits: Horse Running in Gold Field and Prancing Horse by Hosslass Art.

Ukrainian billionaire Victor Pinchuk, via the Victor Pinchuk Foundation, has created a new international contemporary art prize to discover, recognize and give long-term support to a future generation of artists.

The Future Generation Art Prize will be held every two years and the winner will receive $100,000.

All artists up to 35 may apply with their work without any restrictions concerning gender, nationality, race or artistic medium.

The artists apply through an open call via the Internet. Application form shall be available to all on the Prize website.

Additionally, 100 correspondent art experts from all over the world will nominate a minimum of two and a maximum of five candidates. The experts are curators, artists, critics and tutors at art colleges and academies. All artists apart from former Prize winners are be eligible to apply multiple times, as long as they continue to fulfil the entry conditions.

Online applications for the prize will be taken between January 18, 2010 and April 18, 2010. In October of 2010, twenty shortlisted artists will be selected to show their work in an exhibition at Kiev’s PinchukArtCentre, one of the largest centers for contemporary art in the Eastern Europe, founded by Pinchuk in September 2006.

I dated a musician, once upon a time; a jazz musician. He was often put off by my love of certain music, deriding it as ‘pop music.’ I had to remind him that the ‘pop’ stood for popular, and that meant that a large body of folks had to like it to make it ‘popular’. I even reminded him that jazz was once ‘pop music.’

Of course, that didn’t always sit well. For either of us.

I can’t speak directly for him, but his disdain for ‘pop’ certainly smelled snobby to me, and I felt as if I had to prove that I still had ‘good taste’ (at least most of the time) despite occasional descent into liking what other people did…

Pop culture has become synonymous with kitsch, defined as ‘bad taste,’ and while the two may overlap, there are distinctions.

Pop Culture Defined: Dictionaries define Popular Culture, or pop culture, as “the vernacular (people’s) culture that prevails in a modern society,” and as “the currency or iconography of a contemporary culture.”

In any case, popular culture is both dynamic, as cultures are constantly changing, and it is static in the sense that it is specific to both place(s) and time(s) or period(s). What is pop culture in the USA, now, is not the same as China, nor is it the same as the USA in 1950.

Pop culture is built largely by industries & groups that disseminate cultural material & the relationships these groups have with the population or consumers. In the US, examples of these groups are the film, television, news media, & publishing industries, as well as political groups, religions, and social organizations. It isn’t just what they ‘push’ at us, it is how we, as consumers, interact with it. Do we buy it? Not just commercially, but do we buy into it…

As my jazz musician felt, popular culture is not always ‘high brow.’ It does however merit study. Why do people believe, act, buy…?

And don’t think it is merely of interest to corporations or marketing teams either. Heck, it’s part of the science of anthropology! Those scientists know that these same motivators and triggers allow us to believe in marriage, religion, food, clothing, education, language, rituals & traditions. They know that pop culture buy-ins affect those things!

So if you ever feel your love of Mickey Mouse, Pig Latin, G.I. Joe, Marilyn Monroe, Dr. Suess, anime, Andy Warhol, The Simpsons, Gone With the Wind, Michael Jordan, Mystery Science Theatre 3000, & yes, even jazz, isn’t worthy, think again! They are to Americans as patriotic as baseball, apple pie, and mom.

Yes, your mom is a pop culture phenomenon!

Image credits: Pop art poster for Ben Frost‘s exhibit at the Boutwell Draper Gallery; Pup Art quilt by Nancy Brown, via Susan Brubaker Knapp’s Blue Moon River blog.

We keep hearing how poor MJ was, but the dude spent a fortune commissioning art — of himself. And while he was one helluva a musical artist & entertainer, he didn’t have a clue about art.

Just unveiled, Kehinde Wiley’s monumental commissioned portrait of Michael Jackson:

And here’s a 1990 painting of Jackson by David Nordahl:

Now maybe you’re not surprised to see the size of MJ’s ego displayed in such works. I’m not; but I thought he had more of an artistic sense. All that money to promote yourself as a kitsch icon? Such high prices for such low kitsch? I mean he could have commissioned such portraits from any high school art class student. All he’d have to do is give the kid a copy of an art history book along with the deposit check. But what screams to me the most from all of this is that Jackson would have put these on display, likely in his home.

Where his kids could see them.

So I no longer can buy Prince, Paris and Blanket dressed in masks, scarves and blankets as some sort of shield protecting the kids so that they’d grow up normal. Not when he was willing to subject them to such portraits of daddy. These painting not only distort images of dad as a real person but distort images of real art too.

Well, at least I don’t think Jackson commissioned such artworks to include his kids’ faces as cherubs or whatnot. Or maybe I just don’t recognize his kids.

Or maybe there are frightening family portraits we have yet to see.

See also the edible MJ.