Last night I finally got around to reading American Born Chinese, a 240-page color graphic novel by Gene Luen Yang. This 2006 National Book Award Finalist is about a kid, born of Chinese parents, who must learn how to deal with being one of the few Asian students in a school attended mostly by caucasians who are either bullies or blithely rude and ignorant towards him.
What takes this interesting loss-of-innocence story and kicks it to a higher level is the way Yang intertwines two other stories into it. One is a mythical story of the Monkey King who aspires to be a god, and the other is a nightmarish sitcom about a extreme stereotype of a Chinese kid who torments his caucasian cousin with yearly disruptive visits. In the end, all three stories merge satisfyingly.
I'm a sucker for a clean line, and Yang's drawing style fits my predilection to a T. It's bold, economical, yet warm and very expressive. Link
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Spotted this pickup driving down the 101 near Van Nuys, California. There's an entire house packed on it.
This is the fifth of Tim Biskup's books of his tiny paintings. Jackson 500 Volume Three has 100 business-card sized paintings in it, reproduced at full size.
It's my favorite so far, because he is moving in new and interesting directions. Away from flatness and towards form. Away from simple emotions towards more complex ones. In his introduction, Biskup writes that "things fell apart" in his life recently and that he's "let a lot of anger and sadness into my work in the last year, but there is aslso a certain kind of joy to it that is new as well."
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Whenever a new issue of Hi-Fructose shows up in my mailbox, I climb on my roof and genuflect in the direction of Arcturus to pay homage to master Zogg for allowing such beauty to exist in this lowly mortal plane.
Volume 5 of the best art magazine in the Universe has articles about Travis Louie, Parskid, Lori Early, Amy Sol, Mark Jenkins, Aaron Noble, Mars-1, Friends With You's Rainbow Valley, Brendan Danielson, Josh Keyes, and other artists. There's a lifetime of material to study in these pages. Now that I have this, I may stop buying books and magazines altogether. Link
(Click on thumbnails for enlargement) I went with my wife and kids to Topanga State Park a couple of weeks ago. It offers wonderful hiking, rock climbing, and pond swimming. The best part of the day was watching the brave souls jump from the 40 or 50 foot cliffs into a swimming hole. I shot a video of the divers, which you can see here: Link
Graphic designer and cartoon historian Leslie Cabarga, went to great pains to clean up the excellent artwork in this 480-page homage to Casper the Friendly Ghost.
I've always been a fan of a clean line in cartooning, and the Harvey artists who drew Casper were masters of this appealing style. I loved Casper comics as a child, and seeing them again with adult eyes, I can understand why. The presentation draws you in immediately. I prefer to the scratchy hyper-dynamic, border-busting work that's so prevalent in contemporary comics. Today's cartoonists could learn much from the Harvey style.
Casper the Friendly Ghost has a knowledgeable introduction by Cartoon Brew's terrific animation historian Jerry Beck.
Dark Horse, the publisher, also has been publishing a terrific multi-volume anthology of Little Lulu comic books, which I highly recommend.
(Click on thumbnail for enlargement) Yesterday I was harvesting figs from my tree before the fig thieves who regularly drive through the neighborhood to poach fruit could get to them, and I spotted these three large shiny green beetles gorging on a fig. The topmost beetle had his entire head buried in the obscenely red meat of these delicious figs. Unlike the human fig thieves who eat my fruit, these iridescent scarabs are always welcome guests at my home.
Appropriately enough, they are called figeater beetles. Link to Flickr set
Ira Mitchell of Eagan has nothing against eye doctors. It's the markups on frames and lenses that make him rant about the high cost of eyeglasses on his blog, which he began last November. "Eyeglass stores are for suckers," he wrote.Indeed, the markup on glasses can easily exceed 500 percent, according to EyeglassDirect.com. In his photo at Glassyeyes.com, Mitchell has the look of someone who is not going to pay a 500 percent markup anymore. So when he broke his frames and found that a pair of frames and lenses at LensCrafters would run $400, he did what few people had done before -- he shopped for eyeglasses on the Internet. Judging from the 250,000 sets of eyeballs that have viewed his site, he's not alone.
Since discovering Glassyeyes, I've ordered prescription eyeglasses from two different online retailers, and I couldn't be more pleased with the results. You need to have a current prescription handy, which means you need to get an eye exam. The optometrist probably won't want to give you the prescription, because he/she will want you to buy glasses from him/her instead of going to a cheaper place. Insist on getting a copy -- say your insurer or employer requires it.
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When I ordered a pair of glasses from Optical4less.com on July 23rd, I didn't know the company was based in Hong Kong. It wouldn't have made any difference. I paid a total of $70, including shipping for two pairs of prescription glasses (regular and sunglasses) in my favorite Clark Kent style. The box arrived, loving wrapped in brown paper with beautiful bird stamps on it.
The return address is A. Poon, Shop 137, Chung Fu Shopping Center, Tin Shui Wai, N.T., Hong Kong. Thank you, Mr. Poon!
I like these sunglasses even more than the $200+ pairs I have been buying for years. Note the nifty day-glo cases they are stored in.
A perfect fit! I couldn't be more delighted with my purchase.
Optical4Less's plastic frames page is a good place to start looking. They charge $29 for single vision eyeglasses using these cool, chunky framed glasses. Link
My 9-year-old daughter is at summer camp for a week. She sent this letter to us:
Dear Mom and Dad,Last night was so awful. Lilli had a migrain all night. A girl needed medication at 10:00. Are bedtime is 9:30. When the conslers were getting the medication a girl started to puke! A different girl was moaning. A huge spider was on the floor. The consler came in to help. We got to sleep at 12:00! Everything is fine. I'm having a great time.
Love,
Sarina
Automata maker extraordinaire Dug North says:
I went into an antique shop that was going out of business and picked up a large-format magazine/book entitled How to Make It. The book is made up of selected excerpts from Science and Invention Magazine published in 1926. You would not believe the stuff in there -- some of it really cool and really dangerous.
- An motor-powered ice sled that uses a sawmill-sized circular blade as the front wheel.
- A brazing torch powered by gasoline
- An airplane using a motorcycle engine
- A xylophone/thumb-piano made of razor blades
- A motor driven mono-wheel that you ride inside of
- And so on...
It made me think of you and your magazine.
G.J. Echterncamp is a young video director and documentary filmmaker. His latest subject is an utterly absorbing movie about his parents, Frank and Cindy.
In the 80s, Frank was a rising new wave pop star in a band called OXO. He was in his early 20s when he married Cindy, a vivacious blond woman almost 20 years his senior. Shortly after they married, OXO broke up. Cindy supported Frank for many years as he worked the club circuit in Florida, to no avail. They both began drinking and drugging. They also had a child, G.J., who grew up under their non-care for most of his life.
G.J. stays behind the camera most of the time as he films his extremely loquacious, alcohol- and drug-addled parents. I'm surprised he survived, as they are both revealed here to be incompetent, narcissistic, and childish. In spite of their odiousness, there is also something endearing about them, which is why this documentary is so good. You want them to do well, to get cleaned up, to get jobs, to stop hating each other. It's hard not to be disappointed when you discover that they'll never change.
I laughed out loud as many times as I shook my head while watching this. Link
(Click on thumbnail for enlargement) *Please*, do your fucking dishes! Thanks!
Previously on Mad Professor:
• Passive aggressive taxi cab sign
I love looking at (ie. studying, meditating on, losing myself in) this collection of old architectural renderings of supermarket prototypes, found by their owner in a photo album purchased at a garage sale. They appear to be from the early 1960s.
Store names are delightfully awkward word-play experiments and made-up sounding. I assume these renderings were used to simply show prospective clients what is possible in the way of modern "Food Mart" architectural stylings.
Granted, they are images of hideous chain stores, harbingers of terrible things to come. But in retrospect and as portrayed here these places seem so quaint and enchanted, wet, moonlit, not overly big-boxed yet, visited by a small handful of sophisticated men in trench coats and their nicely-groomed wives.
Link
Update:
Here's a musical slideshow with the renderings.
I am enjoying Glyph Jockey's cell phone photos of interesting sites in Tijuana. Link
This no-nonsense cabbie wants his fares to know what's what without having to speak to them. Xeni Jardin snapped the photo with her iPhone and added incisive comments in her Flickr stream. Link
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Mister Jalopy gave me this cake of Tio Nacho. It's a medicinal soap made by Bustillos in Mexico.
Take a look at Tio Nacho ("Uncle Tio"). He's undeniably related to J.R. "Bob" Dobbs, the holy figurehead of the Church of the SubGenius, of which I am a devout member. Here they are, side-by-side. Can you deny the resemblance?
It's safe to say that Uncle Nacho was J.R. "Bob" Dobbs' uncle. This fact alone was enough to guarantee my lifelong brand-loyalty to the soap, no matter what was in the box.
Of course I was eager to open it anyway. Could it be that Tio Nacho's active ingredient was the sacred herb habafropzipulops (or 'frop, as it is known in the street)?
J.R. "Bob" Dobbs' pipe bowl is stuffed with this beneficial plant, which, according to Everything2, is
The revered and despised grief-easer of the mountains, the warrior against pain, the healing herb. Whether taken as smoke, liquid, food, or as "Bob's" pills, it, above all other medicinal substances, "spells relief." From the hearty young stalks protruding from the Himalayan snow to the white 'frop-dust that settles on the rim of "Bob's" Pipe, it is the closest thing to the untainted essence of ODIN on Earth. Habafropzipulops is not merely safe, but beneficial -- nay, even necessary -- to bodily health. We encourage our children to partake of it copiously, to their little heart's abundant desires.
Amen to that! The side of the box has a list of ingredients:
Pine tar...................... 1.80 GAfter looking up Resorcinol on wikipedia, I'm certain it is the resin of habafropzipulops. (Please don't email me in an attempt to convince me otherwsie, as my mind is made up on this matter.)
Sulphur....................... 1.80 G
Resorcinol.................... 0.90 G
Neutral Soap
(Sufficient to complete) .... 90.00 G
As soon as I opened the box, I was struck by a powerful aroma, one that was both sweet and burned. I detected hint of cloves and granny perfume. The soap came wrapped in a piece of paper emblazoned with the emblems of various expos dating back to 1880 (Silver Medal winner at the Pan American exhibition in Puebla):
Also of interest was a fold-out instructional pamphlet enclosed in the box. The cover featured a 50s-style cartoon character reading the very same pamphlet, but unlike the famous infinite regression Borden's Dairy Cow logo, the little pamphlet the man was holding was blank. It really should have had the same drawing of the man reading the pamphlet. I was disappointed.
The other illustrations in the pamphlet were excellent, though. I don't understand Spanish, but it looks like Tio Nacho is good for six things:
1. Washing babies. It also makes fun bubbles!
2. Google translates "En la piel cabelluda" as "In the hairy skin." I'm taking this to mean it promotes hair growth. At $1.95 a cake, it's much cheaper than Minoxidol.
3. I don't need Google Translate to tell me what's going on here. This loving couple has contracted a serious skin condition. The fact that they are a couple makes it pretty clear that this particular disease is contagious. Judging by the expressions on their faces, I'd say the girl gave it to the guy, and not the other way around.
4. Itchy Scalp. Now we're talking. If I skip a day of washing my hair, I go out of my mind with itchiness. I often wake up in the middle of the night feeling like my hair is infested with crawling bugs, Charles Freck-style.
5. Dandruff. I use Neutrogena coal tar shampoo to control my dandruff. It works wonderfully, and never in my life have I smelled anything as delightful as coal tar. When I die, I want to be entombed in a tank of it.
6. Excessively greasy hair. That's me! My head is itchy, flaky, and greasy. Please help me, Uncle Nacho.
The soap is brownish red. The color reminds me a bit of Neutrogena shampoo. It's a good color, but wouldn't jet black be the best color for this soap?
Now it was time to put the soap to the test. As soon as it got wet, it released the smell of sulphur. The odor overpowered the other smells it had. It reminded me of the chemistry set I played with as a kid. It's not a bad smell, but after a while it gets to be a little obnoxious. I washed my hair with it once, twice, rinsing it with the coldest water I could stand (cold water rinses out soap better than hot water.)
When I was done. I could still smell the sulphur, but my scalp felt good. I scratched my scalp over a black sheet of paper, and some small flakes fell out. So the soap isn't perfect. Maybe it takes several applications to fully kick in. I'll let you know.
If want to try this product, be sure to heed the warning:
"AVOID GETTIN IN EYES AS IT MAY CAUSE TEMPORARY SMARTING."
Future versions promise to include buddy list management, privacy controls, and the ability to email your chats. LinkJiveTalk for iPhone (alpha) Features:
• Multiple IM networks, multiple accounts per network: AIM®/iChat, MSN®, Yahoo!®, GoogleTalk®, ICQ®, and Jabber
• Automatically reconnects in case of data service disruption, including phone calls, loss of cell coverage
• Real-time chats, quick switch between multiple simultaneous chats, intuitive chat interface: - click to browse, call, or send an email directly from the chat screen
• SSL encryption of all over-the-air data transmission
I've tried out a number of different iPhone protectors/cases/holsters and the Griffin Elan Holster is my favorite so far. Yes, the iPhone has a glass touch screen, and it's remarkably scratch resistant, but I am terrified that it'll get gouged, so I want a solution that offers screen protection when I'm carrying the iPhone around.
The Elan Holster, made of leather and lined with a "no-scratch-lining" covers the screen when not in use. To use the iPhone, you pull it out of the holster. This means while you are using it, it's unprotected. If you're afraid of dropping your iPhone when you are using it, this is not for you.
I like using my iPhone without a cover or rubber sleeve, because it feels good in my hand in its naked form. When I'm done using the iPhone, I slide it back into the holster, which has a clip that can be oriented vertically or horizontally.
My friend said it looked "too old man," for his taste, but I consider that a recommendation. There are plenty of smart old men out there, and they are smart enough to use one of these to keep their iPhone's display from getting scratched. $30 from Griffin
The lurid images and garish colors found on the covers of Mexican exploitation pulps are a source of inspiration to me. Mexican Pulp Art is a 140-page celebration of Mexican pulp novel and comic book covers from the 1960s and 1907s. Published by Feral House, the color reproduction of these images is superb.
The artists who painted these images -- space aliens, three headed reptilian beasts, sexy but dangerous spacegirls in tight catsuits, fire breathing disembodied ghoul heads, demonic children, drug addled hoodlums, animated corpses, and tentacled giant flying eyeballs, etc. -- were clearly having a grand time.
Don't be fooled by the seemingly primitive subject matter -- the backgrounds and overall composition of the paintings are masterful and worthy of careful study. $13.22 on Amazon
Link (Thanks, George!)The below images are ads for martial arts courses that appeared in comic books of the late 50s through the early 80s. The ads were usually over the top in their promises to teach you how to smash bricks with your head, turn invisible, fight 12 attackers at one time, and kill a man with your pinky finger. Even including bodybuilding courses, hypno coins, and fake vomit in the equation, there was something especially strange about selling martial arts training through comic book ads. Unlike all those other products, it was unlikely anyone could get hurt or killed by mucking about with a sea monkey. Yet, in truth, all you really got for your 99 cents was a small pamphlet providing ass-backwards instruction in a few techniques, or, more often, a "taster" for the larger course. It's safe to say no one became a martial arts master through a comic book ad.
I first learned about Vallance from Re/Search's Pranks book, where he recounted his now-famous 1978 art stunt of taking a thawed frozen supermarket chicken to a pet cemetery in Los Angeles and straight-facedly requesting it be given a proper burial. (The tombstone read, "Blinky, The Friendly Hen).
His current exhibit contains bits and pieces of his past, each of which carries some kind of personal significance. The items are house in beautiful displays.
LinkThe fragmentary Orange Crush bottle, for example, bears witness to a childhood trauma. “One night during the summer of 1966,” reads the accompanying text, “our family went to the Canoga Park Drive-in Theater to watch Fantastic Voyage. My stepfather brought along bottles of Orange Crush soda. He did not explain why, but instead of a bottle opener he had brought along a pair of pliers to open the bottles. At a certain point during the movie, he said that he would open everyone’s bottles with the pliers. But for some reason, I didn’t want my drink just yet.
“Later, when I got thirsty, my stepfather refused to open the Orange Crush for me. Instead he handed me the bottle and the pliers. I tried in vain to open the bottle — after about 15 minutes I managed only to shake it up, real good. At last, in one violent cataclysm, the bottleneck exploded, sending sharp shards of glass and sticky orange soda pop all over the seats, the ceiling, the windows and the rest of the family. Boy, was I in trouble now! And still thirsty.”
(Click on thumbnails for enlargement) This beautiful hardbound book from Fantagraphics (and what book by Fantagraphics isn't beautifully-produced, I ask you?) reprints the first 3 issues of Ivan Brunetti's misanthropic, black-humored, comic book, Schizo.
By all rights I should be depressed from reading Brunetti's comic strips, gag cartoons, parodies, and multi-page autobiographical stories, but his absurd sense of humor cuts through the bummer factor for me.
Not for kids! $16.47 on Amazon
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This delightful picture book traces the history of outrageous street fashions developed by girls in Japan. From the mean street "bad girls" of he 1960s up to the blackface-makeup wearing manba of today, this book provides a fascinating look at a rich and weird subculture.
The photos and illustrations by Kazumi Nonaka are terrific. $11.53 on Amazon.com
This is an excellent, tragic tale of an impoverished documentary filmmaker who gets involved with a bad-news buddy in horse race fixing scheme, which turns out badly. Worse, the bookies he owes money to seem to love hurting deadbeats more than they love money.
The tile or Keith Dixon's tight, modern-noir tale is a good indicator of the protagonist's M.O. -- I think he is ready to check out, but he wants to end his life in a risky, thrilling way, and still have a chance of making it out alive on the other side.
Released last year, The Art of Losing deserves more attention than it received. $16.47 on Amazon
First published in 1963, this tall board book for little kids has some of the cutest illustrations I've ever seen. My 9-year-old and 4-year-old daughter both love looking at the book, and I enjoy reading it to them.
Gyo Fujikawa's drawings of babies and toddlers is full of sly humor, and is dead-on accurate in depicting moods, actions, and behaviors of youngsters. It's an excellent reference for artists, too. I keep it in my studio. $5.99 at Amazon.com
I enjoy novels that take place in circuses, carnivals, sideshows, etc. The characters are usually flawed and desperate, the jargon is colorful and evocative, the plots are urgent and compelling. The books are great escapes from my life as a desk jockey.
Sara Gruen's Water for Elephants is no exception. The story takes place during the Great Depression. The main character is a young veterinary student who is about to graduate from Cornell when disaster strikes, leaving him penniless and homeless. He jumps a train, which ends up belonging to a circus run by a sociopathic ringmaster. He gets a job in the circus, working under the supervision of the circus' sadistic and paranoid schizophrenic equestrian director. Naturally, our hero falls for his boss' wife, which leads to all kinds of trouble.
The chapters alternate between the protagonist's miserable and humdrum existence in a nursing home at the age of 90 (or 93; he can't remember), and his exciting life in the circus as a young man. To be honest, I could have done without the nonagenarian chapters, which I found really depressing. The rest of the book makes up for it, though. $8.37 on Amazon
Before I start a new painting, I usually draw what I want in Adobe Illustrator, and then transfer a printout of that drawing to canvas or board to paint. I've tried opaque projectors, but the image is faint (at least on the el-cheapo version I use) and I don't really have room to set it up. I've also tried using a piece of paper that I've rubbed pencil or charcoal on, but that produces a blurry line.
Like an idiot, it wasn't until a couple of days ago that I considered the possibility that there might be a transfer paper for artists. Of course, there is one. It's called Saral Wax-Free Transfer Paper, and it works like a dream. It comes in five different colors, but I can get away with blue and white. It leaves a clear, thin line that erases easily and doesn't mess up the color of the paint I use. I'm already hooked on it for life.
If you send a self-addressed, stamped envelope to Saral, they'll send you free samples in all five colors. Link
This 200 page book contains 200 stunts presented in the form of one page comics. Sam Bartlett's prankish sense of whimsy is reminiscent of the best kind of street theater and performance art -- it's thought provoking, funny, and at times mildly annoying.
There's much useful information to be gleaned here: how to make it look as if you have a "rubber knee," how to draw on both sides of a piece of paper at the same time with one pen, how to flip a three-fingered bird (when a two-fingered bird just won't do), how to pop your knuckles for maximum effect; how to slice a banana before peeling it, how to open a beer bottle with your eye socket, and how to make scary looking teeth out of an orange peel.
If you have kids, they'll love you even more when you try out these stunts on them. Kids like to be teased much more than grownups. $20 at Elderly Instruments
Also of interest:
• Pranks
• Penn & Teller's How to Play in Traffic
• Be the Coolest Dad on the Block
This is the best book on painting instruction I've come across. The author, John Howard Sanden, paints like one of my favorite painters, John Singer Sargent, and he produces portraits using the alla prima method -- in his words, "I attempt to execute a finished painting from the very first stroke, without traditional intermediate steps as toning, underpainting, glazing, or scumbling. And I try to complete the entire painting in one sitting, if possible."
His approach can be summarized as "observation and selection," and every chapter offers his information-rich advice on how to do that. I have way too many instructional art books that show complex diagrams for anatomical proportions, color theories, and weird compositional schemes. These mean nothing to me, and I suspect the artists who include these in their books don't use their own teaching methods. Not so with Sanden. He's a no-bullshit teacher. He admits that his "direct attack" style results in many failures, but that just means you rub off the paint and start over. Because when you eventually get it right, this method produces awe inspiring work.
It's a mystery to me why this book is out of print! Fortunately, used copies are available, and the price is reasonable. From $42.29 on Amazon
