HOW WOMEN STAND / WOMEN STANDING

If you remember, a few months ago Theory Corner devoted a post to the fact that a lot of women lean forward without realizing it. Well, months have passed and I'm here to report that this is what I'm still seeing on the streets. I see it everywhere.

They stand askew a lot too, at least in photos. We're so used to it that we don't notice it,  If I hadn't called your attention to it, you probably wouldn't have noticed that the woman above is listing like The Leaning Tower of Pizza...er, did I spell that right? One more inch to the side and she'll fall over.

I'm not talking about bad posture (above). I'm talking about women who are not generally regarded as having posture problems.

This woman (above) was probably asked to stand up straight, and she probably believed she was...but she wasn't. She's leaning forward.

Maybe you thought high heels were what thrust women forward, or maybe a big chest. Nope, none of the above. Look at this woman (above). She's small chested, is wearing flat shoes, and is still leaning. I guess women were just born that way.

Maybe that's why they're always leaning on things.

I always assume that magazines are run by people who know more than I do. They say that flirty women always lean against walls, and who am I to disagree?

 I'll try to remember that when I draw cartoon women.

Rich women (above) sometimes prefer pottery or trees to walls.

Well, if it makes them happy.....

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BTW: Congrats to NASA for landing the Curiosity rover safely on Mars. I'm all for Mars exploration, but I haven't supported previous rover missions because they didn't seem likely to collect enough information to justify the cost. 

Maybe this falls into that category too, but I couldn't help but be impressed by the precision of the landing, and the hardware on this vehicle. It's got a laser that can read stratas on exposed cliff sides in high-def, and the cliffs probably probably date back billions of years.  

We learned a lot about the origin of the Earth from the manned missions to the Moon. Maybe we'll learn as much from this mission.    

UNKNOWN WOLVERTON

Well, maybe "unknown" is the wrong word, but these pictures are certainly little known. It's a tribute to Basil that sketches this funny seem second rate when compared to his other work. See what you think.

Is this (above) by Basil or his son Monty?

This one's (above) definitely by Basil. I like how the eyes are on top of the head.

The black and white version of this sketch (above) is fairly well known, but not this colored version. The color helps it, I think.

Mike Fontanelli sent me this caricature (above) of Basil Wolverton, drawn by Drew Friedman. It's certainly well done, but it's not the way I like to picture Basil. I see him as a sort of mischievous joke teller like Rodney Dangerfield.

Here's another Friedman caricature, this time of Mad artist Will Elder. Don't ask me why, but I buy into this 100%. Probably Friedman knew Elder.

Here's the link to Drew's site:

http://drewfriedman.blogspot.com/2012/07/legends-of-comics-portraits.html

JOAN CRAWFORD'S ACTING STYLE

Haw! I can't wait to see if the blog can handle a picture this big! I pity the people who are looking at this on a mobile phone. 

Anyway. that's Joan Crawford in a close-up from "Humoresque." Tonight I watched a TCM documentary on Crawford at John's place, and I saw a lot of pictures I'd never seen before. Seeing them provoked what I thought was a deeper understanding of Crawford's  acting style. I'll tell you what that understanding consists of, but first take a look at the pictures (below) that provoked it.  

Crawford (or her photographer) tried out a number of personas in her portraits. Any one of them represents a possible career path she might have taken. Here (above) she tries out  an innocent girl-next-door look, layered over with ambition, neurosis and intelligence.

Here (above) she's purely innocent and idealistic. I don't doubt that she could have pulled it off on screen, but I'm glad she didn't go this route. Innocent is a great look for young actors, but she wouldn't have have been able to sustain it as she got older.

Ditto the weird, hard-core sci-fi look. She's great at it, but you can only play that for so long.

She experimented with weirdness a lot. 

I think she wanted to convince the studio to make the kind of stories that favored her kind of nuanced weirdness.  Maybe she was inspired by Garbo.

All those experiments with innocence and weirdness weren't wasted, though. As her later persona evolved, she just folded these qualities into it. As time went by she developed an immensely layered screen personality. 

How would you describe this close-up expression (above) from "Humoresque?" She looks weird, innocent, mature, young, dignified, idealistic, hurt, worldly, shocked, vulnerable, steely, philosophical, kind, and potentially cruel...all at the same time! Sheeesh!

For me Crawford's best period was middle age. She'd had a lot of random nuances before that, but that's when she finally figured out how to focus them. During that period she discovered dignity. She kept the fascinating youthful nuances and allowed them to co-exist with a caricature of the kind of dignity the best people seem to acquire in mid-life. Not only that, but she bundled these qualities together in a stylized, over-the-top theatrical style. 

So that's it. That, I humbly submit, is part of the secret of Joan's midperiod acting style.

MORE JOHN K DRAWINGS

The poses above are from "Sven Hoek," one of the highlights of the second season of "The Ren and Stimpy Show." Nice, huh? I love John K's work when it's all cleaned up as it is here, but this post is about his roughs, which the public never sees. Here's a few, below. See if you agree that they're infused with charm and skill and a love of cartooning. 

Here's (above) a scene from Adult Party Cartoons' "Firedogs II" where the Fire Chief asks Ren and Stimpy to light him up. I love the simple but effective way John composes his shots. The Chief's giant head and thick, meaty hand are hilarious.

CHIEF: (To Stimpy) "Hey Eddie, gimme a smoke." (Then to Ren) Light me, Tommy."

REN: "Sure thing!"

[The Fire Chief never gets names right].

I like the way The Chief (above) studies Ren as our hero lights the cigarette.

A beautiful pose on The chief (above) as he artfully sucks in the smoke...

...then blows it out again...right into Ren's face. How do you like that baguette-like smoke? Being a fan of the Chief, Ren feels honored to be smoked at, but his eyes water like crazy.

Haw! Boy, this one (above) is really rough. John could easily have finished it. Maybe he wanted to see what his board artist could do with it.

Ever the fireman, the Chief responsibly stomps out the flame. I like the charm and restraint in this pose.

I value my collection of John rough Xeroxes and, until now, you had to work for John to get them. I was amazed when I found out that he was giving them away as prizes on his Kickstarter site.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1056985656/john-ks-cans-without-labels

Geez, these aren't even Xeroxes. They're originals. Frankly I think John ought to keep them. The day will come when things like this'll be auctioned off at Southby's.

He's giving away originals of his phone doodles, too. One of these days I'll put up some of my collection. You've seen a few of them....that's where he did some of his funniest caricatures of me.

CAVES IN THE CLOUDS / HILARY BRACE

I almost called this post "Hilary Brace: Aviation Artist," but I don't think she thinks of herself that way. Brace claims that she's just drawing imaginary landscapes. Maybe, but what I'm seeing here (below) are cloud caves of the sort that my Dad said pilots used to see. 

My Dad said that he'd seen them, and I see no reason to disbelieve him. Flying as a passenger in commercial airlines I've seen bits and pieces of cloud caves, though they weren't as clear and romantic as Hillary makes them. Commercial jets travel too fast for cave exploration.

Nowadays it's against the law to fly through clouds if they can be avoided. All the traffic makes it too dangerous. My Dad didn't have to worry about that when he was young. There were no cloud laws then. He even flew in open-cockpit biplanes (which were old-fashioned even in his time). Imagine what he must have seen!

My Dad's long gone now. I wish I'd thought to ask him what the caves were like.

I'm guessing that they didn't last long...no more than ten minutes maybe.  After that they'd close up (above), trapping the poor pilot inside. Of course he could fly through the walls to escape.

I wonder what it would have been like to fly through the caves in a thunderstorm. It must have been cold and windy and wet. Maybe there were hailstones. Maybe flashes of lightning illuminated the walls.

Here's (below) a link to a great video of a sputtering lightning flash. Imagine being inside a darkish cloud cave when a bolt like this one appeared.

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap120723.html

Caves like this (above) remind me of Jules Verne's story, "Robur the Conqueror." I wonder if he imagined his character's giant airship hiding in caverns like this one.

Remember those old film clips that showed barnstormers standing on the wings of planes? I assume they were braced somehow. Imagine what it must have been like to be one of those guys flying through the corridors of a cave in the sky!

  

THE SET DESIGN FOR "THE SCARLET EMPRESS"

To prepare for this post I did a Google search for "The Scarlet Empress/set designer" and came up with nothing. I tried a bunch of variations and still came up with nothing, then it finally dawned on me (because I read it): there was no set designer. The director designed the sets. He also did the costumes, the props, the lighting, and the cinematography. I wouldn't be surprised if he collaborated without credit on the writing. Geez. Josef Von Sternberg...what a mench!

[Many thanks to Joel and Romed who found the proper designer credits and listed them in the comments. I still believe, though, that Von Sternberg played a big role in those areas].

Of course the film is remembered as a Marlena Dietrich vehicle, and it is...she's great in it...but this post is about the art direction. I like it, partly because I believe elements of it could easily be incorporated into present day American design. Well, maybe not the two-headed eagle throne (above)...that's here because it looks so cool.

I love traditional Russian architecture. The turrets look Islamic, the flamboyant towers seem to be influenced by India, Oriental Asia, and The Balkans. I even see a little gypsy in them. Of course lots of details are influenced by Western Europe, especially Germany and Scandinavia. What a delightful hodge-podge!

Like Sternberg I'm a big believer in the idea that the perfect interior for a large public building is...another building, like this gazebo (above).  It's a sort of a building within a building. I'll put up more examples below. 

Here's (above) the gazebo from another angle. Nice, huh? How do you like the lighting here? I wish current architects would plan the light fixtures in their houses so they're lit for drama, just like they are in Hollywood movies. Multiple pre-planned lighting possibilities should be hardwired into every new house. Shapes should be added to new buildings just because they cast great shadows.

Here's (above) a Russian cottage exterior influencing the design of a palace interior. This is actually a room inside the palace. It's the building within a building idea again.

Here's (above) a representation of the Devil. Compare it to the dramatic one of a knight below. I love the way the top of the Devil picture fades into the darkness of the ceiling.

This good vs. evil theme (above) and its stylized execution points to the greatness of the Russian soul. Russia suffered immensely in the conflict with Ghengis Kahn and the Mongolians and they believe that suffering gave them a depth that the rest of the world could benefit from.

Nice lighting! That dense, black cross is a powerful symbol. Look at the expressionist sculptures that hold up the candles.

The Czar is strangled to death behind the cross.

How do you like vertical struts (above) holding up the banisters? You can't see them very well here, but they're carved gnomes holding candles.

Here (above) Von Sternberg treats the wooden staircase as an actor and gives it the star treatment. That's what I'd do. Stairs aren't just a conveyance to another floor, they're a powerful romantic symbol which convey aspiration, mystery, and adventure. On the right kind of staircase you do some of your thinking, you propose marriage, you assimilate culture.  Stairs impress by their sheer volume and by their musical rhythms.

For me beautiful, prominent staircases are also a version of the house within a house idea. Von Sternberg's staircase really dominates, in fact it's probably more interesting than the rooms it leads to.

I'll wrap up with this fascinating interview (below) with Von Sternberg from the 60s. It's in two parts; this link only covers the first. They're both worth seeing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DX7sll9Gug

Here's (below) the entire film! Be sure to watch it in full screen.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xh2n6k_the-scarlet-empress_tv