Sunday, February 21, 2010

betart

Through a confluence of events (like being out of holiday debt), I've had some sweet art pieces enter the house recently. The first is this art print from the Animal Collective Crack Box set from last year, an eye-popping piece of work from illustrator Jon Vermilyea. The box set, lovingly rendered by the Catsup Plate imprint and quite astounding, still never quite did the art justice, so it's nice to have this one up in all of its glory. And unbelievably (considering the Animal Collective fan base), a few of these beauties remain.

Another piece that I recently acquired is an edition of a 1970 collage from Swedish pop artist Öyvind Fahlström. Ever since happening upon Fahlström's work at the Centre Pompidou in 2000 and at a massive MACBA retrospective later on in my European travles, I've been obsessed with the man's playful/ serious works, be they comic book cut-ups (from Marvel to R. Crumb) or a game board unpacking the CIA meddling in Southern Cone politics or head-swimming India ink paintings. A truly under-appreciated artist.

 
Perhaps the piece I'm most proud of is this painting by one of my oldest and dearest friends. It somehow combines a disco dancefloor stratosphere with DJ booth and religious icon imagery (the chalice) while executing the work with a color theory (about how CMYK reproduction reduces a truly billion color life experience to only three hues) that totally works. It's an honor to be able to have this piece in the home.