Get Out And Vote

OK, all you art lovers need to go out and vote for the best sculpture in the Sarasota Season Of Sculpture 4! Of course, my vote goes to Christine Desiree's Pulse, because it's the best. Well, that, and I had a small hand in building it, so perhaps I'm not the most impartial of voters. But do you think that's going to stop Bill from voting for Hillary? I think not. So whatever your reason for voting, even if it's just to get me off you back, go visit the online edition of Arts & Culture Magazine and peruse the January/February 2008 issue. There's an article in there that covers the whole show, and you can vote for you favorite piece. If you don't vote for Pulse, you might want to vote for American Dreams, which we helped repair after some vandals knocked it to the ground. Or you could vote for Dance, which I took a great picture of. Or perhaps La Divine Proportion, which I also took a great picture of, but didn't share with you until now. Or maybe Celebraciones or Autumn Rhythm #20. The list goes on...

Bringing Art Back To Life

Here's a story I've been meaning to share for a couple of weeks, I just keep forgetting about it. Back when we first installed the giant cube called Pulse (which has been well-shared here on the blog), there was another piece of art nearby that caught my eye. I took a picture of that one the day after our install (above). It's called American Dreams, and it's by Gillian Christy, an artist up in Rhode Island. You may not know who she is, but you've perhaps seen her work on NFL Today on CBS and The Apprentice on NBC.

So, fast forward a week or two into the exhibition. I'm down there shooting the cube again, and I see a news crew gathered around that other piece of sculpture. As soon as they clear, I wander over and discover what you see in the picture above. Some vandals had climbed up on the piece and pushed it over. Note that the part hasn't rolled over, it's actually been bent where the rolled part changes into the soaring section. It's hard to soar when you're lying on the ground like this. So after I saw what had happened, I got on the phone and contacted the artist we had worked with on Pulse. She put us in touch with the director of Sarasota Season of Sculpture 4. She in turn put us in contact with Gillian up in Rhode Island. We offered our services to try and repair her sculpture without returning it to her studio. She agreed to let us try, and we spent a few nights putting the piece back together. Our first attempt revealed that there was more damage than just what was visible. Many sections were flexed in the crash, and the sculpture was no longer able to support itself. But a second series of repairs finally did the trick.

It took a few weeks of work to arrange the equipment necessary for the re-install, but we finally got all of our ducks in a row. This last picture shows American Dreams after we repaired and re-installed it. To my eye, it looks pretty close to the same as it did originally. Now if the vandals will just stay away from it, we'll be all right.

Oodles Of Doodles CCCXXX

Ahhh, teenagers. Gotta love 'em. At least RCA loved 'em when they came out with the great record Chet Atkins' Teensville (RCA Victor LSP-2161, 1960). This was after Elvis but before the Beatles, so they were doing everything in their power to separate the teenagers from their dollars. I don't know how excited teenagers were about listening to Chet Atkins take on such rockers as White Silver Sands, One Mint Julep and Night Train. But at least we get a nice dancing doodle. There's also a tag line on the front, "Guitar With A Beat", which I shared with you many moons ago. I don't know how I missed this at the time, but I'm making up for it tonight.

Score!

I got lucky at the Goodwill store this evening. I don't usually visit during the week, but I felt like I needed to visit this evening, so I did. What did I find but copies of just about every Roger Ebert book out there! This is the stack of all his movie review books, dating way back to I think 1985 (That first volume covers several years, but you have to open it up to see what years those are and I'm not going to try and pull it out from the bottom of the pile just now), then it goes from 1987 all the way to 2006 year by year! I think there's one older one I didn't get, and one from 1986, but I don't know for sure. I already had three of these, and I love to read them whether I've seen the movies or not. (I'm sure you're thinking that I should have bought just the most recent copy, but they do change from year to year, adding new movies and dropping old ones out, plus there's all sorts of supplemental essays and articles in each one.) I also picked up four hard-cover books, including his two Great Movies books. They also had one of the Answer Man books, but I already had that one. I think the total was 24 books at $2 a piece. Not a bad haul and I'll be reading these forever! Notice how the title changed a couple of times over the years in the picture above. Starts out as Roger Ebert's Home Movie Companion, then it changes to Roger Ebert's Video Companion and winds up as Roger Ebert's Movie Yearbook. I guess you have to change with the times. This collections spans VHS tapes to laser discs to DVDs and I suppose it's now transitioning over to Blu-Ray and HD-DVD. I'm so excited!

Oodles Of Doodles CCCXXIX

I suppose there was a time when Guy Lombardo was considered a hip musician. How could anyone who is today considered such a boring anachronism have ever been popular? I don't know, but based on the number of Lombardo records I see in the junk stores, he must have been bigger than Elvis at one time. I mean, I never see Elvis records, and that must mean that he didn't sell very many, right? OK, perhaps there is a small flaw in my logic there, but you get the idea. This doodle shows Guy Lombardo And His Royal Canadians as they must have appeared in the early fifties at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York. At least that's what the liner notes tell me. I suspect there were more members of the band in real life, but what do I know. This doodle comes from the back of the LP The Band Played On (Decca DL 8208). I'm afraid I didn't muster up the courage to listen to it. Sorry.

Success!

Guess what I finally got a copy of this weekend? You'll have to wait until next Christmas to hear it, though. Just imagine the wonderful sounds of Chimeatron ringing in your ears. (In case you don't remember, this is one of the LPs I showed you back during the Christmas season that I had a sleeve for, but no vinyl. But now I've got the record, baby!)

Oodles Of Doodles CCCXXVIII

Another doodle for you tonight from another artist that you've seen plenty of times (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8) before here at the blog. This is from the flipside of Al Nevins And His Orchestra-Dancing With The Blues (RCA Victor LPM-1654, 1958). Yep, that's Al Nevins from The Three Suns. And the artist here is Mozelle Thompson, who I've shared out quite a bit around here. Very nice work, I wish I could find out more about him. They must have thought quite highly of him to allow that large signature to be featured so prominently with his work.

Oodles Of Doodles CCCXXVII

I've been excited about sharing this doodle ever since I found the LP several months ago. I think it was lost in the Christmas shuffle for a little while, but I found it again today and I'm sharing it with you tonight. I don't know exactly why I'm excited about it, I just like the somewhat gritty depiction of 'modern' life it seems to depict. (Modern in this case being somewhere in the early fifties, I believe.) I suppose it dovetails nicely with the LP I scanned it from, The Age Of Anxiety (Symphony No. 2 For Piano And Orchestra) (After W. H. Auden) by Leonard Bernstein Conducting The Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra Of New York, Lukas Foss, Piano (Columbia ML 4325). It's rare that I feature a doodle from a symphonic LP, but this one speaks to me for whatever reason. I thought you'd enjoy it, too. No idea who the artist is, but there is a credit on the LP itself that says Darrill Connelly. That may or may not cover the design of the entire LP and may or may not include the doodle. Google doesn't return much on that name, so if it means anything to anybody, please let me know.

Oodles Of Doodles CCCXXVI

Here's another little doodle for you tonight. This is an interesting one, but it's certainly not the most artistic one I've ever shared. I'm guessing that the dancing guy above is drunk as can be, that is the about the only thing I can think of that may explain the look on his face. His date doesn't seem to be too perturbed about it, though. I don't think this is meant to be the same couple as shown on the front of the LP (below), but maybe. They don't even look like they were drawn by the same artist to me, but anything is possible. The album in question is Kurt Edelhagen And His Orchestra-Jazz From Germany (Decca DL 8231). I guess the target audience here was GIs returning from their time in post-war Germany, trying to recapture a little bit of the music they experienced over there. Not the native oom-pah band stuff, but the American invention after it got filtered through the Germanic lens.

Oodles Of Doodles CCCXXV

Guess what I dug up yesterday? Yep, it's another doodle from someone I've shared many times before, yet I have no idea who he is. All I can tell you is the initials RR seem to show up quite a bit on the backs of these RCA Victor LPs, and occasionally on other labels. This locket appears on the back of George Beverly Shea-Through The Years (RCA Victor LPM-1642, 1958). I didn't have to look at this one twice to know it was something I needed. I'm almost to the point where I can recognize the work of this mysterious RR. Perhaps it's time I did some serious research to see who it really is. And I mean primary research, not a Google search. Perhaps I should contact the History Detectives. "RR" has shown up before here, here, here, here, here, here and here. Oh, and here too.

The Next Week In January

Another week, and yes, another picture. Great one this week that I can remember taking quite clearly. It was in some one's back yard on Anna Maria Island. I had heard these quaker parrots squawking for a while and I was trying to find them. Turned out they were gorging themselves on this bird feeder. I shot for probably twenty minutes as the flew in and out of view. There were maybe a dozen birds on a wire above this feeder, and as soon as a perch became available, a new bird would swoop down and take his turn. If someone didn't vacate a perch quickly enough for another birds liking, he was fairly likely to get pushed off of that perch. Some of the pictures in this series (but not this one unfortunately) showed a cockatoo that had flown some one's coop and taken up residence with the wild birds. I guess he thought he fit in somehow, but he stood out like a sore thumb.