THE OTHER BEATRIX POTTER

Whenever I show this picture to artist friends they invariably respond with something like "I know who did that...it was Beatrix Potter, right?" Wrong. The artist was Jill Barklem, who deserves to be better known.

Barklem did most of her work (above) in the 1990s, I think. She's not as well known in America as in the UK. I'm guessing that her publisher didn't promote her enough, but that's just a guess.

For comparison, here's (above) a picture by Beatrix Potter. Potter emphasized line quality and a gritty watercolor texture. Barklem was more architectural.

Big, natural wood cabinets like the kind Barklem liked to draw were common in the 1990s but are scarce now. Seeing this reminds me that for a decade or so romantic English country-style was in and sentimental cottage artists like Thomas Kinkade were popular. All that disappeared, seemingly overnight. Maybe if Barklem had continued to paint, that movement would have lasted longer.

The artist's real-life desk was full of thorns and brambles. She worked in pencil from photocopies of her rough layouts then inked leafy details derived from the samples that were in front of her.

Above, an example.

She liked drawing fine detail (above) and that was her undoing. She had an eye problem that was mostly resolved by surgery but which made rendering difficult. She abandoned children's books and did doll houses and miniature sculptures instead.

Interesting, eh?

GEPPETO'S WORKSHOP

Sometimes I wonder if Gustaf Tenggren was indirectly responsible for Disneyland. His paintings of Geppeto's workshop were so appealing and so real that they must have created a desire in the viewer to walk into the shop and examine the toys close up.

This is Tenggren at the peak of his powers, when he was at his most inventive and charismatic. I wish you could buy reproductions of these toys at Disneyland.

For comparison here's (above and below) backgrounds from the same film by (I think) Claude Coats, who's no slouch himself. They're great but I wouldn't say they fill the viewer with a desire to walk into the painting and look around.

A painter as good as Coates (above) would normally dominate a project like this but Tenggren wipes the floor with him.

Who painted this one? The clock designs are specific and real like Tenggren's but are a tad generic like Coates'. Maybe the two artists collaborated. Notice the Horvath-type detail on the clock at the lower left. I'll return to this in a moment.

Here's the Geppeto's workshop from the ride at Disneyland. Some of the toys have a Tenggren influence and some seem disconcertingly generic.

The dolls seem oddly spaced at first glance, but the passenger car goes through this pretty quickly and you could argue that they wouldn't read if they were more densely packed. Even so....

I don't see many of the unique clocks that are in the film.

Apparently some earlier attempts were made at reproducing some of the clocks and toys in the film.  Seeing this photo (above) makes me appreciate how difficult that job must have been. The sculptures contain some nice elements but don't capture the flamboyance of the original artwork.

There's that clock again (above). Why did the artist delete the Horvath-style bottom?

HOW WILLIAM STEIG ENDED THE LITERARY NOVEL

For those who don't recognize the name, William Steig was a wildly popular New Yorker cartoonist in its heyday in the 1930s. He eventually left the magazine because they were lukewarm about a new style he developed which was influenced by Picasso. After leaving he went on to develop two or three additional new styles, all good. Think about that the next time you find yourself agonizing over the perfection of just one new approach. 

Anyway, Steig had to pioneer new techniques because what he had to say was constantly evolving. The cartoons here are from his middle period when he was obsessed with the  problems brought on by middle age. 

 Youth is great, Steig seemed to say. You look good (above) and everything you do is imbued with romance and dash.

Then comes middle age, and everything you do seems like a grotesque caricature of what you used to do. Observations like this used to be reserved for long, wordy literary novels, but Steig put them into one panel cartoons. That's what I call economy! It's tempting to conclude that Steig almost single-handedly made a certain kind of long-winded novel obsolete.

People don't engage in swordfights or horse races in Steig cartoons. His work is all about the little things of life.  What he seems to be getting at is that we're all misled into believing that our lives are defined by the highlights. We think the important events are things like the big fight we had with a schoolyard bully or the day we met our lover, the day we had our first child, etc.  Actually, for Steig, those aren't the most important events at all. 

What's really important...I'm positing on his behalf...are the daily low profile events that nobody ever talks about. What's important are facts like, the fact that pizza tastes good, that your wife and neighbors can at least tolerate you, that the world is interesting, that family arguments about little things are inevitable, that your car doesn't break down too often, and that your family concedes the fact that the ratty old easy chair is yours and not the dog's.

In other words, the millions of events between the highlights are what life is really about. The handful of big super events are just punctuation.

I don't know about you, but that strikes me as profound. If life is about the little things, shouldn't we cultivate a strategy to maximize our enjoyment of them? That means being good at our job, being charming, being capable of having fun, cultivating self-discipline, being analytical....geez, it would be a long list. 

That's really all I have to say, but I can't help but throw another couple of cartoons in, even though they (below) don't fit my commentary.

Haw! A husband and wife quietly argue while walking down the street. Yikes!

Here (above) they're not arguing at all, but a third party causes grief. Boy, life can be tough!

AROUND THE WORLD WITH ORSON WELLES

Shortly after WWII Orson Welles did a show for American TV called "Around the World with Orson Welles." It was never shown here because half way into the filming Welles got a feature film okayed and he instantly abandoned his other projects. That's too bad. I saw some of it on European formatted discs at Steve Worth's house and can testify that the show was first rate.

His first subject was Basque country which straddles the border between France and Spain. Actually the Basques are neither Spanish nor French and have to put up with a pesky border check right in the middle of their land. It's okay, though...at the time Welles was there the Basques seemed to have a sense of humor about it all.    

Welles could have handled the project as a standard Lowell Thomas-type travelogue but instead he decided to focus on a couple of the people who live there. If I had Orson's job I would have picked interview subjects for their diversity: some good, some bad. Orson, on the other hand, picked only one type: people who had kind, civilized faces...people who he knew he'd enjoy talking to. What do you know? That turned out to be just the right thing to do.

He started with an American writer who lives there with her 10 year-old son. Actually she lives in the States and every two or three years takes a Summer in Basque country. She had a theory that everyone needs to escape to an alternative reality on a regular basis.

I'll add that this woman was interesting for another reason. Orson apparently charmed her into attempting to charm him. He brought out the best in her, and when she countered with a seduction of her own...which was meant for Orson...she seduced the film audience as well. Welles was smart to go after that.

But I don't want to give the impression that Welles only interviewed women.

He interviewed this guy (above), who had actually worked in Montana for a while. He was an extremely nice guy who had an admirable wife. It makes you feel good to imagine that the world contains people like that. He was a quiet man of few words but, amazingly, such a person is still capable of holding an audience's interest. How did Welles know that?

In another episode Welles set up in the kitchen of a Viennese restaurant that was famous for its pastries. Here he interviewed only one person, one of the owners. She was a rather nervous woman who had a sunny smile which frequently lapsed into something tragic. For that reason I wouldn't have chosen her for an interview subject, and once again I would have been wrong. The camera loved her!

She had one of those rare faces that seemed to reveal everything she was feeling, no matter how hard she tried to cover it up. She was a bundle of contradictions. She was alternately attracted to Welles and worried that he might do something that would hurt the business. She was vulnerable and strong, romantic yet practical. She definitely wasn't a natural-born restauranteur, yet the business she presided over continued to operate at a high level. She made it work, as G. A. Henty would say, by sheer pluck.

A fascinating subject for an interview!

BTW: a commenter speculates that the writer in the Basque village was New Yorker writer, Lillian Ross. Could that be? I wish I knew.

WORKING FOR THE RECLINER INDUSTRY

In a few months I'll be moving to a small town in the farm belt. I'll have to see what kind of work I can rustle up there. Small towns don't have much need for art. I hate to think about it, but there's half a chance that I'll end up as a salesman in a La-Z-Boy store. 

Yeah...La-Z-Boy. You probably didn't know it but La-Z-Boy's a big employer in rural America. If you don't live in a small town you probably don't realize how widespread it is. It's not just a few pushpins on an empty map....

....it's a whole doggone map full of pushpins!!!!! In case you haven't heard...La-Z-Boy is an empire! It's huge! That company owns this country!

Sure, if you live in a big city you don't need La-Z-Boy. You can buy designer furniture, and it'll be sophisticated and artistic and perfectly satisfying.

 But that's because you live in a big city. 

You can't get that stuff in the rest of America.

Yesssir....step just one inch beyond the city limit sign and you're in La-Z-boy Land!!!!!  The whole swathe of real estate between the megacities is united in the opinion that furniture design peaked in the 1960s. Fuzzy recliners still rule and any attempt to improve on them is regarded as an attack on Western Civilization.

If I get the job this (above) is what I'll be selling. These are the Coca Cola of chairs, the Mount Everests, the Plus Ultras, the Sultans of Seats. They come mainly in three fuzzy colors: Murky Rose, Ash and Dirty Powder Blue. I'm not sure but the company might also make the rounded Thrift Store-type end tables and coffee tables that always accompany the recliners.

I know what you're thinking...that Lazy Boys are prol furniture and upscale people wouldn't be caught dead with them. I don't blame you for thinking that, but you're wrong. The rural rich like La-Z-Boys every bit as much as the poor. They're just better at hiding them.

Trust me, tucked away behind the glitzy curb appeal of the country mansion is a living room packed to the gills with the workhorses of the La-Z-Boy fleet, including the magisterial train-length La-Z-Boy Sofas.

La-Z-Boys are the sentimental glue that binds Americans together and makes us an essentially classless country. All rural Americans, rich and poor, educated and uneducated, love the stuff.

Okay, I'm not being fair to the recliner people. Actually, the different recliner companies have research labs and are constantly investigating ways to update. Here's (above) a gaming recliner.

And here's (above)...what is that thing?....I'm guessing a physical fitness recliner, so you can doze off while exercising.

I'm not sure what this (above) is, either. Maybe it's a drum set for cutting edge garage bands who want to rebel and sock it to The Man while playing in sybaritic comfort. I'd better find out since I might be selling this stuff soon.

Drop by the store and identify yourself as an Uncle Eddies Theory Corner reader. Maybe I can get you a discount.

HOCKNEY LANDSCAPES

I'm not a fan of Hockney's minimalist paintings of naked guys in swimming pools, but I like the landscapes he did later in life.

I think this (above) is from Yorkshire in England. It's an example of intellect and style successfully imposed on nature. It's the way an artist organizes what he sees, and makes it pleasing.

Of course real life (above) is more chaotic and gritty. Plants fight for sunlight, grey overcast skies attempt to snuff out everything underneath...well, not really, but it can feel that way.
 

Here (above) Hockney imposes less order on what he sees. It's beautiful but kind of scary, too.

Above, one more variant. I get the feeling that Hockney has tired of this view and is looking forward to trying something else.

Here (above) we're confronted with the mystery of ordinary life. Massive predatory clouds wonder over fields of dense, complex living things. It's extraordinary and commonplace at the same time.

For comparison, here's (above) a Kandinsky showing riders galloping down a hill. I'm not surprised that so many great abstract artists had a background in landscape painting. It's the ideal subject for abstraction. Nature is full of shapes and colors that contradict and reinforce each other at the same time. It always confronts the viewer with a problem and a challenge.