Visiting Canajuns, art shows, a trip to Chicago, and the discovery of some cool new zines.
Greetings! Here's the run down on the latest happenings in the Shopkeep's world - The last few weeks of my life been filled with visiting Canajuns, art shows, a trip to Chicago, and the discovery of some cool new zines and readables. It's been busy, but who am I fooling?? ...it's always busy! Scroll down and I'll fill you in...
Doctor Troy Lovegates Esq. stayed with us for a week before his show @ N+P. The dude never stops producing, it's kind of ridiculous. Here's some drawings on (yet to be cut) linoleum blocks he was working on in his spare time for a future book of prints.
The strange thing about his productivity is that it doesn't effect his conversing, or vice versa. He doesn't skip a beat, the entire time painting this board we carried on a conversation as if I'd had his undivided attention. It was weird.
(detail) ...He said that he's able to do this as result of learning to draw in the cafés of Quebec where everyone constantly chit-chats.
Found this step-by-step process of him doing some lino-cut printing on the internets.
As a good host, I showed him some of the better sights of our fair city, like the Pet Cemetery.
Where we encountered, at the grave of Skippy, lover of life, a bag of weed, a pipe, and some eye-drops.
...Dude, Skippy fuckin' loved it, man.
...And on to Casanova, where DJ Robbie projected images on my face.
Large, sinister, green-faced, screaming images...
...onto the faces of the unsuspecting patrons in the establishment.
And just like that, before we knew it, the week was up and his show was hung. (John took some nice pics of the show).
This piece was entitled "Moroccan Tranny" (see painted board at top of post).
The art enthusiasts came out for the opening and were merry.
Some displayed such jubilance and excitement that there was an impromptu wrapping of this mustachioed gentleman in cellophane.
(I heard everyone is doing this at Art Basel this year.)
Before Lovegates got on Amtrak bound for Vancouver, he gifted me this cool little zine his pals made called "Old Time Rubbings."
It's made by a group of Canajun renegade archeologists, and it's a great piece of work. (PS - Did you know Cajun folks [i.e. the group of folks in Louisiana] are actually Canadian??? ...I just learned this and it blew my mind. Turns out Cajun is just slang for Canadian, "...similar to "the American pejorative "Injun" for "Indian")
Nonetheless, the story is that these guys do urban archeological digs (usually without permission) in search of strange artifacts, such as old bottles, tools, etc... This zine is entirely comprised of graphite rubbings made from the raised type on old bottles they've found on these digs.
Pretty incredible stuff, and the logos are beautiful. Cure's All Diseases!
I'm going to assume that the Sperm Sewing Machine Oil was not from a human.
Super great stuff. It sort of reminds me of Mark Dion's Archeology that was at the Tate in London a few years ago. Hope to see more stuff from these guys in the future.
A couple of days later, I flew over the patch-work quilt of the American landscape to Chicago for Thanksgiving. As I flew, the thought kept occurring to me that the world must seem like an awfully small place to a commercial airline pilot.
Chicago's O'Hare Airport, or ORD as it's called on account of it's former land occupation, an apple ORcharD.
Chicago, you were quite dreary this time around.
I've always liked the tracked-out type on this CTA building.
I really wanted to walk around and snap half-frame shots of all the cool old deteriorating signage that the city has to offer...
The weather was not into my plan. I should've known better having spent the majority of my existence in this locale. (I'll have to come back in the summer)
I managed to get a few snaps here and there in between the rain drops.
I love it when you snap a photo and, by the looks of it, can't distinguish the date it was taken.
This is most of what I saw for the five days visiting Chicago (that, and the inside of various family member's homes).
The lights and the rain drops on that windshield of my sisters old car were kind of amazing.
One hand on the steering wheel, and one pressing the shutter.
Then on the day after Thanksgiving it dumped 4" of snow.
I didn't even mind. To tell you the truth, I was pretty content chilling indoors at my mom's place.
Amidst my staying indoors, I dug through some old stuff and discovered these old cameras: My mom's old Kodak Duaflex II and my Grandma's Agfa A-8 Cadet.
While searching the internet to see if I could still find film for these beauties (you can), I discovered this phenomena known as Through-The-Viewfinder photography (or TTV) that folks are re-purposing these cameras for. In fact, there's an entire Flickr group dedicated to TTV photography ...Who knew? ...I think I'm gonna build me one of those contraptions and try it out myself, the effect looks pretty rad.
Of course, no trip to Chicago is ever complete without the requisite visit to Quimby's - the raddest indy-press & zine shop in the country. (Between you and I, the absence of a Quimby's-like place in SF is the reason I opened N&P five and a half years ago. I need my damn zines!!!) Needless to say, I scored some goodies.
And back to the airport, homeward bound.
Westward, back over the mother-board of circuitry of fast-cheap-and easy thrown up suburban sprawl that stretches from the lake-side streets of Chicago northerly through Milwaukee and seeps into the Twin Cities. ...Oh America, what will these ugly homogenized suburbs look like in 30 years?
Back in SF, I spread out my Quimby's booty on the table and devoured them all up. Here's what I scored: Le Gun, a super sick London based art mag (and collective), the always fantastic Burn Collector#10 (great stories of office employment, and party going in Chapel Hill NC), and finally a beautiful photo book about one of my favorite windy city authors - Chicago's Nelson Algren by Art Shay.
Le Gun: Work by Hannah Bays (left) and Alan Kitching (right)
Le Gun: Letter pressed type of a De Selby quotation.
Le gun is such a sick mag. ...I love their aesthetic. (Le Gun people if you're reading this please get in touch, I want to carry your mag @ N+P!)
Chicago's Nelson Algren compiles Art Shay's stunning black & white photos of Algren's Chicago haunts with caption's written by Algren.
Algren eating at a Chicago soup kitchen.
It amazes me that these photos are from the 1950's, because they look so much older. Check out the books of Nelson Algren. - The Man with the Golden Arm, Never Come Morning, etc ...great stuff.
And that's about it good people, I'll end this post with a couple shots of the "bum out the neighbors" fireworks party that occurred post Jeremy Fish art show. Super fun.
Roman Candle laser-beams (sorry for the noise dear neighbors).
Okay,
bye bye,
Andrew ...eh?
PS - N&P is a good place to go shopping for all of your holly-jolly holiday needs.
Words and Photos: Andrew Scott. Andrew along with Breezy run Needles & Pens in San Francisco. {moscomment}
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