Category:
Art

RIP Pigcasso

The artist's Wikipedia page.

Posted By: Paul - Fri Mar 08, 2024 - Comments (2)
Category: Animals, Art, Obituaries, Africa, Natural Wonders

Cotton Balls and Cardboard Boxes

Swiss artist Zimoun makes noisy art by causing hundreds of cotton balls to rub against cardboard boxes.

At least, he consistently describes the white objects as "cotton balls." They don't look or sound like cotton to me. But then again, they're constantly in motion, so it's hard to see exactly what they are.





via Book of Joe

Posted By: Alex - Wed Feb 14, 2024 - Comments (3)
Category: Art, Cacophony, Dissonance, White Noise and Other Sonic Assaults

Tumor Paintings

In 1834, Dr. Peter Parker obtained a medical degree from Yale University and then traveled to China as a medical missionary. There he commissioned Chinese painter Lam Qua to make portraits of patients at the Canton Hospital who had large tumors. Yale now has 86 of these portraits in its collection.

Peter Parker seems to have been a fairly common name before it became permanently associated with Spider-Man.

More info: Yale University Library







via Design You Trust

Posted By: Alex - Wed Jan 31, 2024 - Comments (0)
Category: Art, Medicine, Nineteenth Century

The Vincent Price Art Collection at Sears



Read the whole story here.

Sears had commissioned famous actor and art collector, Vincent Price, to assemble a collection of art and gallery paintings that would be merchandised through its stores, making fine art more accessible to all Sears’ customers. They gave Price carte blanche to travel the world to put the collection together. After that first opening in Denver, the program was broadened with exhibits of art in ten additional Sears stores and after the first 1,500 pieces of art has been sold, it was expanded nationwide to all Sears stores. The program ended in 1971, but more than 50,000 original artworks had been sold during its time.




Posted By: Paul - Fri Dec 29, 2023 - Comments (2)
Category: Art, Celebrities, Hollywood, Retailing, 1960s

The Broom Paintings of Emily Mae Smith

Your opinions solicited.

The artist's Wikipedia page.















Posted By: Paul - Sun Nov 19, 2023 - Comments (3)
Category: Anthropomorphism, Art, Twenty-first Century

Home Fallout Shelter Snack Bar

In 1980, FEMA published plans that allowed anyone to build their own Home Fallout Shelter Snack Bar. The plans are available at archive.org.





In 1983, artist Michael Smith followed FEMA's plans and built a Fallout Shelter Snack Bar, which he then displayed as an art installation. To accompany the snack bar, he also created a video game housed in a custom, upright arcade cabinet:

In the game, air sirens blast, and a pixel version of Smith's recurring dopey, tv-dadish "Mike" is charged with moving three blocks from the 1st floor of a suburban house to its basement to create a fallout shelter before the bomb hits (spoiler: it's impossible to win).

More info: rhizome.org

source: Video Installation 1983




Posted By: Alex - Sat Nov 11, 2023 - Comments (0)
Category: Art, Atomic Power and Other Nuclear Matters, 1980s

Portable Fish Farm

Text from The Los Angeles Times (Oct 1, 1971):

LONDON — A major exhibition by 11 Los Angeles artists was postponed at Hayward Gallery here Thursday in a controversy involving titled officials, a show business star, the press, and a people who pride themselves on their love for animals.

An international flap over fish.

Artist Newton Harrison's "Portable Fish Farm" is an ecological work about growth and life cycles. Six large tanks contain lobster, crayfish, oysters, brine shrimp and catfish, dominating a large upper room of the government-owned gallery.

The catfish—200 of them—were shipped here live from El Centro, Calif. Harrison wanted to demonstrate man's ability to haul food great distances and harvest it in a new environment. Some catfish were to lay eggs; some were to mature during the showing. Others were to be cooked at an opening feast for 250 guests, to prove Harrison's idea that "all art is about survival."

Fish, to be cooked, must be killed. Harrison wanted people to see the process as part of his exhibition.

The killing part hooked the British press. Advance stories ignored almost everything except the "ritual execution" of catfish. That news triggered a reaction nearly incomprehensible outside animal-loving England.

Confused readers called papers to protest the "bludgeoning" of innocent cats. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was moved to "deplore" any public catfish killing.

British comedian Spike Milligan, famous for his work on "The Goon Show," carried his protest to the gallery itself. He threw a hammer through the front window Thursday morning.


More info: The Harrison Studio

Images from Google Arts & Culture:





Posted By: Alex - Sat Jul 29, 2023 - Comments (3)
Category: Art, Food, 1970s

Journal of the Identical Lunch

Journal of the Identical Lunch, published in 1971, records the experiences of artist Alison Knowles and her friends all eating an identical lunch — "a tunafish sandwich on wheat toast with lettuce and butter, no mayo and a large glass of buttermilk or a cup of soup" — though not all at the same time. Knowles herself reportedly ate this identical lunch every day at a New York diner.

Copies of the book are now quite rare, so if you want one (perhaps as an investment? The price will surely only go up) it'll cost you at least $200, and perhaps as much as $500.

More info: artnet.com, MoMA.org



Posted By: Alex - Mon Jul 10, 2023 - Comments (1)
Category: Art, Food, Books, 1970s

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Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes.

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