Do-it-yourself photo alphabet blocks

We’re going to take a short break from my Comic-Con wrap-up for a quick little instructional post on how to make your own alphabet blocks. They’re just like regular alphabet blocks except they don’t necessarily have the alphabet on the face—but we’re still going to call them ”alphabet blocks.” Basically, we’re going to be creating photo alphabet blocks, placing alphabet block-sized images on the face of each small wooden cube. Like a lot of my how-to posts I’m going to ramble for a bit about the motivation for creating custom alphabet blocks, so if you’re in a hurry, scroll down to the section titled “New and improved Mexican Loteria blocks.” Otherwise, read on and enjoy!

A little background

Arlene measures the value of her soul while listening to the insidious sounds of Musica de los Muertos — 2007

I’ve been using traditional children’s alphabet blocks in my photography for several years, dating back to around 2007, when I discovered that blocks would allow me to build more elaborate stages for my photos. Until that time, most of my work lived on a single horizontal plane atop the stacks of records that formed the physical base of each scene. Using blocks I could create tiers and steps, and better integrate the objects in the foreground with the vintage album covers in the back.

The blocks also allowed me to interject words and numbers into my compositions in a manner that stayed true to my vintage sensibilities. Like many of the toy figures that roam about my surreal constructions, alphabet blocks are objects that connect to past memories, and set the narrative in a familiar—yet unsettled—time period.

Money blocks!

The drawback of traditional alphabet blocks is that each set contains only 38 different characters (A-Z, 1-9, +, -, =). Sure, that’s plenty for creating words, numbers and equations, but I soon found the blocks somewhat limiting. My work relies quite heavily on symbolism and iconography to represent ideas in a much more interpretive way than the literal communication of letters and words. While working on my 2009 solo show Plastic Prophets of Vinyl Redemption I “invented” money blocks, which are nothing more than regular alphabet blocks wrapped with a piece of old-style U.S. currency like a little birthday present. A good example of money block use is seen below, with the blocks adding both compositional structure and narrative symbolism.

Mindy dreams of pearls and the envy of all the girls at Kappa Nu — 2008

My next foray into alphabet block customization came in 2010 as I was preparing new work for Seven Signs of the Kewpie Apocalypse. For this show I had it in my head that several pieces would benefit from alphabet blocks that looked like Mexican Loteria cards. Surely, such blocks must exist, or so I thought, for several reasons:

• Loteria images are everywhere! You can find them on greeting cards, matchbooks, cigarette cases, shopping bags, wallets, pendants, mouse pads, and beaded curtains.
• There’s no possible way that I’m the first person in all the world to have thought that Loteria images should be on alphabet blocks.
• They simply should exist because the idea of stackable Loteria blocks is just too cool!

Nope. I searched and searched, along the way finding alphabet blocks for languages across the globe from China to Egypt, but nothing that even remotely resembled what I was envisioning for my new photos. So I made my own.

A little history for those unfamiliar with Loteria cards
Loteria is a bingo-like game played by matching colorful images selected from a deck of cards with identical images on a player’s game board. It’s a simple but entertaining game, largely because of the wonderful pictures of people and things such as the sun, the moon, the devil, and the human heart. The images that most people associate with Loteria were created by Don Clemente Jacques in 1887, which continue to be produced to this day.

Mexican Loteria blocks — the early years

My first attempt at creating Loteria blocks was mildly successful, but not particularly satisfying. Having a nice deck of Loteria cards I simply scanned the card faces as high quality TIFF files, arranged the images into a document as one might envision the faces of a cube unfolded to lay flat, printed, then wrapped the paper around a normal alphabet block as I’d done previously to create money blocks.

Yeah, I guess they look okay, but the images are only so sharp, the colors are rather dull, and the folded end flaps were too thick and bulky, so you couldn’t really stack the blocks without first setting them beneath heavy books for a few hours to coax the paper flaps to lay flat. You also see only one image on each block, as I never could quite get the dimensions right to center images on every side of the block (and forget about the top or bottom flaps). Still, I used them for the photos in the exhibit with reasonable success.

Seven Signs of the Kewpie Apocalypse — 2010

Which brings us to the present day.

New and improved Mexican Loteria blocks!

Always looking to improve the look of my photos, I recently set out to create my own custom Loteria blocks that would improve upon the quick’n'dirty paper-fold blocks I’d previously produced. To this end, the blocks needed to be:

1. Colorful!
2. Sharp!
3. Printed on all 6 sides!
4. Easily stackable!

Rather than wrap traditional blocks with paper, I decided that a better solution would be to either apply or transfer existing Loteria images directly onto blank wooden blocks. I’d attempted photo transfers onto wood in the past, but had been less than happy with the results. DIY photo transfers are great if you’re willing to sacrifice a little bit of clarity and accept some distress to the image as you peel away layers of the transfer material. I’m not one to generally sacrifice or accept  quality—unless that’s exactly what I want, and in this case, it was not. So, for this project, I’d be applying existing Loteria images directly onto the face of blank wooden blocks using decoupage.

Step one — Preparing the images

Finding Loteria images that would fit onto the face of an alphabet-size block was not as difficult as I’d imagined. Pasatiempos Gallo makes a set of mini Loteria games that are intended to be tucked as prizes inside a piñata. The whole game—cards and boards—is printed on a single sheet of perforated light cardboard that is folded up to fit inside a playing card-size plastic wrap. Perfect! Though the cards were too large to fit on the side of an alphabet block, the images on the game boards were juuuuust right! Using a pair of scissors, I cut out each image, trimming to just outside the black line that borders each colorful illustration, effectively creating a deck of super mini Loteria cards

Trimming images from the mini Loteria game boards

Note on the printing process!
The Loteria images used for this project were professionally printed, likely using an offset printing process. If you consider using this same process for your own photos or images you will want to make sure that the images are similarly printed using either a laser printer or professional printing equipment other than ink jet. The process of applying the image to another surface involves the use of goopy liquids that  may cause standard inks (even when dry) to blur or smear. Be forewarned!

Traditional Loteria sets include 54 different images. Unfortunately, the mini game includes only 36, choosing to leave out 18 “less essential” images such as La Botella, El Arpa, and La Maceta (the bottle, harp, and pot, respectively). At first, this caused me no special grief… until I realized that La Calavera (The Skull) and El Musico (The Musician) were not included in the set. Oh, sadness.

Step two  — Preparing the blocks

Alphabet blocks come in all sizes, depending on the manufacturer. The alphabet blocks you see in my photos are produced by Melissa & Doug. They are really great blocks measuring 1 and 3/16ths of an inch on each side. There are a number of manufacturers of plain, unpainted blocks around the country, but the precise dimensions used by Melissa & Doug eluded me. For this project I chose 1 and 1/4 inch blocks from Barclay Wood Toys and Blocks located in Hebron, Indiana. Their blocks are made of kiln dried hardwoods (maple, birch, ash, etc) and at a cost of 16 cents per block I bought 16 for about $12 (including postage). Since there were 36 different Loteria images and I wanted to place a different illustration on each side of my blocks, I’d need to make six blocks (leaving ten for mistakes, er, future custom blocks.

I wanted my new and improved blocks to somewhat resemble the blocks I’d made using the paper wrapping method, so I made the decision to place the Loteria images on clean, white backgrounds—kind of replicating the white backgrounds of traditional alphabet blocks (though without the colored edge borders). A different approach would have been to stain the blocks to give them an old world feel, and while I think that would have looked spectacular, the white backgrounds would provide greater image contrast when incorporated into my work.

First coat applied to the unfinished wooden blocks

I applied two coats of white enamel spray paint to the blocks, placing each atop a quarter to prevent the painted blocks from sticking to the newspaper drop cloths.

Step three — Organizing the images

Didn’t we already prepare the images? Yes! But now we are organizing the images. Remember, my intention was to use these custom blocks in my photos, and how calamitous would it be to be in the midst of composing a scene and discover that El Diablito (The Devil) was on the same block as El Alacran (The Scorpion)? Horrors!

I divided my mini images into six groups—one per block—making sure that there would be a good distribution of  illustration themes and colors from one block to the next. So, for example, a single block might have one side depicting a person, another with a celestial body, another with something that grows, etc. I also used this time to plan the orientation of each image on each block. There really aren’t any hard and fast rules here, but have you ever looked at a drawing or painting of a pair of dice and had the feeling that something is wrong? That usually happens when the artist mixes up the number of dots that should appear on each face—i.e. one is next to six, three is next to four, two is next to five—combinations that won’t be found on a real die.

‘A’ is for apple…

The same holds true with alphabet blocks where, generally, the painted letter on the front of a block will be right-side up, with the letter on the opposite face will be upside down. Likewise, the outlined letters, numbers and illustrations on the unpainted sides (those that wrap all the way around the block between the painted sides) are flipped 90° from the main letters on the painted faces. (Go ahead, if you have some blocks handy, check it out.)

In any case, decide on a strategy for how your images will be oriented on the faces of your blocks. In my case, I decided that images on opposite sides of a block would be vertically flipped (like on traditional alphabet blocks). Images on adjacent blocks would be flipped 90°, so no two touching faces would ever have the images oriented in the same direction. I did this, again, to provide greater contrast for the image that would be facing the camera.

Organizing the images might not sound important, but will save steps later on when you discover that an image 30 seconds from drying solid has been affixed to the block upside down.

Step four — Attaching images to the blocks

With the paint dry we’re finally ready to attach images to the sides of our custom alphabet blocks! If you’ve ever decoupaged, this part is super easy. Of course, prior to this project, I had never decoupaged… and it was still easy!

I used Mod Podge to affix the mini Loteria images to the sides of my painted blocks. Mod Podge is, basically, a bunch of goo that acts as a glue, finish and sealer, that comes in all kinds of “flavors” such as matte, gloss, and sparkle (and probably a lot more based on the dizzying array of bottles I found at my local craft store).  I chose Gloss Lustre. I also chose a container with a flip-top drip applicator, as I didn’t anticipate the need for a whole lot of Mod Podge. For larger projects you may want to get a big ol’ vat of Mod Podge and a paint brush to slop on your glue and sealant.

Attaching an image to a wood surface is a two step process:

The Glue Step

1. Place a few drops of Mod Podge on the surface of a block.
2. Spread the goo over the surface using a foam brush (or a paintbrush), thoroughly covering any area where you plan on attaching the image.
3. Place the image face down on your workspace, and place a couple of drops of Mod Podge on the back of the image.
4. Once again, spread that goo around, making sure that you brush the goo up to and over the edge of the image.
5. Take the now gooey image and place it—face up, of course—on the equally gooey surface of the block. The image is going to slip and slide a bit, which is actually to your advantage as you can slip and slide it right into place at the very center of the alphabet block. I actually used the backside of a fork for this task, as the width of the fork was a little narrower than the height of the mini Loteria images, so I could easily eyeball the horizontal and vertical center points of my blocks.
6. You want to make sure that every little piece of the image is well attached to the underlying block, and that evil air bubbles get squeezed out from beneath the commingling layers of goo. How? Oh, I suppose you could use a fancy rubber roller for this kind of job. I used the fork from step 5, rocking it back and forth to firmly seat the center of the image and squeeze out bubbles. I then ran the rounded edge of the tines along the perimeter of the image to squeeze out excess goo and make sure every edge and corner was firmly affixed to the block.
7. Wait 15 or 20 minutes for the Mod Podge to dry. You can pass the time by reading my blog or by cleaning your brush using ordinary tap water.

Note!
Remember that Mod Podge is a glue, and though it is water soluble (to a point), your brushes will be very unhappy if they are allowed to dry solid in a coat of Mod Podge goo!

The Sealing Step
Once the first application of Mod Podge has dried, you seal and finish the now glued-on image with a second application of Mod Podge. Yes, the same Mod Podge. Remember, it’s a glue and sealer all in one!

1. Place a few drops of Mod Podge on the surface of your image.
2. Spread the goo over the image surface, making sure of three very important things:
   • Cover the entire surface, spreading beyond the edges and corners.
   • Brush as smoothly as possible (which is why a foam brush is recommended).
   • Brush in one direction.
3. That’s it!

Allow 15 to 20 minutes for the sealant coat to dry—perfectly clear!—and one face of the alphabet block is finished.

For the Loteria blocks I worked on all six at the same time, basically doing the primary (i.e. the coolest) image for each block first, then rotating to an adjacent side to affix that image, and so forth until all six sides were complete.

The results?

My set of six finished Loteria blocks!

I’m incredibly happy with the way my blocks came out and I can’t wait to begin using them in upcoming photos! Next—and since I still have 10 unused blank blocks—I think I’ll begin brainstorming future custom alphabet blocks. Famous authors? Notable scientists? Tarot cards? What do you think, Patient Reader; any suggestions?

Read Full Post »

Behind the plastic gates at Wind-up Dreams Studios!

People, have been after me for ages to post a few photos of my studio, and it seems as though it’s always that “next thing” on my long list of tasks. Well, guess what? Today, finally, is “next thing” day!

Behold! We step behind the Lego gates that border the grounds at Wind-up Dreams Studios!

Okay, so I don’t really have a gate made of multicolored Lego bricks, but the studio is tucked away behind a stucco and red-roofed wall in the converted guest house in my back yard. Here’s a nice view from the back courtyard.

Wind-up Dreams Studio — exterior view

The studio holds all my vintage vinyl LPs, along with a stockpile of essential equipment for creating my art: toy figures, alphabet blocks, old books, and kewpie dolls. Oh yeah, I also have a bunch of photography equipment such as tripods, flood lights, and a light tent where all of my creations are constructed, staged, and shot. The studio is the place for shooting my photos, with all post production work taking place on an iMac inside my office in the main house.

Entrance to the studio. No, really, I’m quite friendly.

Let’s go inside!

View from just inside the door. Messy!

And there you go. Nothing too fancy. Just a single small desk, a chair, and a whole lotta “stuff.” My main work area is inside the light tent you see on the right. That’s where I build the three dimensional scenes that are the basis for my photographs and videos. Beyond the light tent is “toy land” where my crazy array of toys and trinkets are stored. Actually, that’s not completely true… Many of my extra special figures are on permanent display inside the main house, with small collections of interesting figures occupying almost ever room. When called upon, those figures magically come to life and wander out to the studio while I am a sleep. One day, I’ll be stuck on a particular composition, and the next morning I’ll awake to find that a clay devil pounding on a drum has somehow made his way from the main house out to the studio to stand in exactly the perfect place to complete the photo. Amazing!!

Note!
Please shield your vision away from the lacy white curtains and the horrid floral print on the window valances. Those are left over from the previous owners who had papered the entire room in a similar pattern. And covered the bed with the same floral print. And shaded the lamp with, yes, flowers. And upholstered the white wicker furniture in the same wicked print. And laid white carpet. It was a 1970′s Holly Hobbie nightmare. I’ll change out the window treatments, I swear.

The back corner of the room is for lighting and tripods, records are on the left, and alphabet blocks are just inside the door and out of sight.

A, B, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K…

The storage for my alphabet blocks doubles as a TV stand, which actually doesn’t do me a whole lot of good since cable doesn’t run out to the studio, and I’m only able to pickup a handful of digital broadcasts using rabbit ears—which is just as well, as I’d MUCH rather listen to music as I work. The little bookshelf speakers on top of the cabinet are hooked up to a wireless receiver so I can stream music from iTunes inside the main house out to the studio. Random shuffle is my best friend!

Interesting coincidence
The purple cabinet was originally brown, and it was a fixture behind the counter at my parents’ drug store. There, the cabinet was used to display rolls of 35mm film.

Here’s a better look at the vinyl records I frequently use as background source material for my photos.

Stacks of vintage vinyl. Probably 500 LPs to choose from.

Record storage was becoming a huge problem in the main house until I discovered these LP-size milk crates at The Container Store. Each crate holds 50 or 60 record albums. They’re easy to move and flipping through the crates is a breeze while looking for a background to catch my eye. To the right are stacks of 45 RPM singles. Being an engineering bordering on OCD, I recently organized all of my 45′s by label color so I don’t have to go searching for a particular color to top a stack of records in a given composition. I’d formerly find myself taking apart whole constructions looking for a 45 of a particular color because I’d buried my one 7″ single on Sun Records somewhere deep within an elaborate stage set.

45 RMP singles. Yes, organized by label color.

The box beneath the 45′s contains a veritable army of kewpie dolls, all acquired for the installation I had on display during my Seven Signs of the Kewpie Apocalypse show in 2010. I don’t let them out much. I’m afraid of what they may do.

View from the toy cabinet looking back towards the entrance

Super cool art hanging in the studio!

You won’t find a lot of art on the walls of my studio. Not because I don’t want art on the walls; I do. Unfortunately, the walls are not particularly conducive to driving nails. While the main house is generous in its use of the finest construction methods of the day (remember, this is 1927), the studio—nay, guest house—nay, “servants quarters” (which was, in fact, the original function of the room)—the walls of the studio seem to be constructed of concrete blocks covered with plaster, which makes hanging art an exercise in frustration. To the right is one of my favorite pieces—an enlarged page from the Space Happy coloring book that’s been decoupaged on the surface of a kitchen cabinet and embellished with glitter.

Dinos! Cowboys! Battleships!

Hanging opposite Space Happy is the awesome mixed media piece you see to the left. It’s a mosaic on a big ceramic tile created by one of the developmentally disabled adults at St. Madeleine Sophie’s Center in El Cajon, California. St. Madeleine’s is a wonderful organization that has done immeasurable good tapping into the creative talents of students throughout San Diego County. My sister gave me this piece for Christmas several years ago and thought it was a perfect addition to my fun filled studio!

Elsewhere in the studio I have posters of work by Keith Haring and Jackson Pollock, as well as an instructional cool poster outlining bad behavior in India. In a couple of the photos above you’ve probably noticed a large lobby poster from Forbidden Planet that had been on the wall in the big empty space above the record crates. Curse you, concrete walls, curse you!

Way over on the other side of the studio is where you’ll find most of the objects I cram into my photos. At the center is the Cabinet of Pop Culture Curiosities, which we’ll explore in all its candy-colored glory in a few moments. Above the cabinet is an assembly of shells, stones, and other interesting things first created by my artist friend, Anthia Linou. Over time the installation has changed a little, with new pieces added and older pieces moved or removed as occasions have arisen to use elements of the installation in my photos.

Far wall. Toys! Books! Stuff in boxes!

To the left and in front you see a jigsaw of boxes and containers, each containing a wide array of recently acquired figures or toys that overflow beyond the red wooden walls of the cabinet. I have a general idea of what is hidden where, but I’m frequently surprised by what I find as I open boxes and hunt through bags searching for a specific object to to be positioned within my latest three dimensional diorama.

Vintage books used to construct my scenes

Right of the cabinet is a bookshelf of oddly collected books, many of which have made appearances in past work, and almost all of which at one time or another has been used out of sight as supporting structure for my gravity defying stage constructions. Beyond what you see in my finished photos is a calamitous construction of records, blocks, Legos, and books, as I often need to build platforms and scaffolds as a base for objects and figures to be “level” with my chosen background imagery.

As we teased earlier, the real stars of my photos are the vintage toys and figures that perform as “actors” in the scenes I create. I’ve been collecting toy figures for years and years, and before committing my work to a studio these figures once-upon-a-time occupied playful space in my office from my days as a software engineer. There, they were scattered all across my desk, danced precariously atop my computer monitor, and mingled with manuals on the bookshelves. It was a fast paced, high tech life to be sure, but my toys are much happier living life together in my studio!

The Cabinet of Pop Culture Curiosities

With a little close inspection you’ll notice that the shelves are more or less organized into zones of common purpose—sort of like the sections in an encyclopedia. There’s the presidential section, the cowboys & Indians section. The kewpies all stand together, rubbing their cute little pink, green and yellow shoulders with Buddahs and nuns. There’s a musician section. An animal section. An army section and a skeleton section. Then, we have the geography section, the bumper car section, the rubber food section and the Egyptian section. Outer space is on the top shelf, and the realm of Monster Women is down below. It all sort of makes sense and provides me with the palette from which I add character to my images.

Want a closer look? Let’s go!! (Click on any image to get a nice close-up view!)

Beatles!

Kewpies, and Buddhas, and Hulas — oh my!

Toys waiting to be plucked for use in a new photo

A portion of the animal shelf

The presidential suite

Telephone Teens and Astronauts sitting atop my little Tivoli radio

The presidents stand next to the brain section. Clever, no?

A portion of the religious section

Little girls and pirates

Doesn’t that make you want to run off to a toy store and buy a bunch of toys? I do feel bad, though, that accommodations are so crowded, and—worse!—so many great figures and toys are still locked away in the darkness of their shipping containers. One day I hope to devise a better way to store and display my cast of willing characters so all will have equal chance to catch my eye and find a spot in upcoming photographs.

We’ll wrap up this studio tour with a quick look at some of the equipment I use when capturing my photos.

The light tent where I construct all my photos

Above you see the setup for a typical photo session, with a 30″ EZCube light tent sitting on a table top, and floodlights surrounding the cube. The gauzy fabric allows light to bounce throughout the inside of the tent which cuts down on harsh shadows and other lighting troubles. The lights in the back are simple low wattage desktop lamps that are used to illuminate the inside of the tent while I’m working without sucking up huge amounts of electricity and otherwise acting like a personal tanning salon. The floodlights in the front are each 500 watts, which blaze with heat and illumination to pretty much simulate the sun inside the tent. In front of the tent and hidden just inside the fabric flap is my camera—a Canon XTi with a really nice L-series lens that allows me choose from a variety of apertures and zoom as necessary for a given stage construction.

The light tent with three floods. Get ready to sweat!

About a year ago I decided that simulating the light of the sun was not good enough—I wanted to simulate the light of many suns! So a third floodlight was added that could be positioned above the tent for even more control over light sources. The current setup is shown at the right with the staging for Despite her parents’ righteous determination, Baby Haley dreamed to follow her own path contained within.

And there you have it!

We hope you’ve enjoyed this short trip into Wind-up Dreams Studios, and if you come across any interesting and unusual figures that would like a home amongst the devils, nuns, kewpies, and presidents… Please! By all means send your recommendations my way!

Thanks for visiting!

Read Full Post »

Plastic Prophets of Vinyl Redemption — Deluxe Edition released!!

Plastic Prophets of Vinyl Redemption — Deluxe Edition

I’ve posted from time to time about the digital coffee table book of my photograph, Plastic Prophets of Vinyl Redemption, which was released this past summer, exclusively for Apple’s family of iOS devices. Creating the book was tons of fun, and I’ve been very pleased with the reception the book has received from the ebook community.

However…

Being a collector of books (and toys, and records, and art, and CDs, and devils, and, and, and…) I remain completely enamored of objects I can touch and relate to in ways that will never be matched by the bits and bytes trapped within a digital device. What can I say? I like the feel of a book in my hands, and there are great untold mysteries in slipping a sleeve from a big, beautiful album cover and reading the liner notes as black vinyl spins beneath the soft touch of a diamond stylus. Real books feel special. They smell like knowledge.

While I’m very proud of my digital book, and I’ve been quite excited to see how people have enjoyed flipping and zooming through the colorful pages on the iPad, I still wanted to produce a physical object that people could turn in their hands, explore, and connect with in ways that are difficult to mimic in a digital book.

And, so…

Over the past couple of months I’ve been hard at work creating a deluxe edition of Plastic Prophets, and I’m very excited to announce that the package is now available!!

Deluxe Edition box with cover photo printed on glass!

The Deluxe Edition comes packaged in the box you see on the right. Each wooden box is hand painted, signed and numbered, with a cover image that’s been printed on beveled glass and mounted to the lid. Inside are all kinds of collectable treasures you couldn’t possibly replicate in a purely digital release. The highlight is a 32 page full color “mini book” featuring many of the standout images from the digital book—here, reconfigured to be printed and bound in a limited softcover edition.

Hidden away in the box are other printed goodies, including a Plastic Prophets sticker, a Wind-up Dreams web card (randomly selected from a dozen different designs), and a signed, miniature, Certificate of Authentication.

Want a little more?

You’ve got it!

Your new best friend inside the luxurious Deluxe Edition box!

Lift the glass cover and inside the deluxe box you’ll find your very own kewpie doll, just like those you see in my photos! Your kewpie comes direct from Japan, and wears around its neck a miniature flash drive filled with a host of exclusive digital content.

The drive holds two digital versions of Plastic Prophets of Vinyl Redemption. The first is exactly the same as the digital ebook available on Apple’s iBookstore and compatible with the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch. And just in case you don’t have access to one of those devices, the flash drive includes the full 135 page book as a PDF that can be viewed on any personal computer.

iPad users will find another added bonus on the flash drive: 95 custom wallpaper images pulled from the pages of the book to give your iPad a custom Wind-up Dreams look that will be the envy of all your friends! Kewpies, bathing beauties, robots and presidents. They’re all on the flash drive to brighten your electronic day.

So what are you waiting for? Click on over to the Wind-up Dreams & Vinyl Nightmares Etsy shop for more information!

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Read Full Post »

Sweet Feast at the House of Pink Delights

Sweet Feast at the House of Pink Delights

Yes, it’s a brand new photo!  Sweet Feast at the House of Pink Delights was created for a food themed group show in Los Angeles opening in mid-October.  I had a lot of fun creating this piece, envisioning a delightful restaurant scene where diners are served a very special delicacy — kewpie heads stewed in a savory broth of ice cream, pie and cake.  Mmmmmmmm!!  And your wait staff for the evening?  Why — of course! — the presidents of the United States!  It’s Benihana meets the Oval Office.

On the right side of the photo you see the kewpie pantry.  Fresh, raw, kewpie heads, each the visage of cute, cuddly mischief.  John Adams oversees the pantry, handing off the choicest cuts to his fellow heads of state who march to the bubbling cauldron at the center of the House of Pink Delights, where smiling kewpie heads bob amidst the sweet treats.

On the left, Harry Truman marches a well done entree to a pair of enraptured diners.

How would you like your kewpie head prepared?  Pink?  Red?  Or candy coated Green?

More information about the exhibit and the special framing treatment given to this piece coming soon!

Read Full Post »

Seven Signs of the Kewpie Apocalypse begins TODAY!

Unbeknownst to her Creator, Eve longed to become a cheerleader

Seven Signs of the Kewpie Apocalypse has arrived!  Starting today, July 3rd, John’s solo exhibit show will run through July 30th at the Pannikin Coffee & Tea, La Jolla, CA. There are new photos, old favorites from the Plastic Prophets series, a room filled with our lower-priced line of framed Album Editions, and a video installation with stop motion animations, slide shows, and other delightful treats.  Installations of kewpies (some will probably be the largest you’ve ever seen. Seriously, these guys are BIG.), robots, vintage album covers, and alphabet blocks will greet you at every turn.  The Opening Reception is tonight, 5:00-7:00pm. John will be there to answer your questions and entertain you with how he manages to make the devils, babies, and saints toe the line, even in the midst of an earthquake.  Oh, and there will be free munchies! Hope to see you there!

Read Full Post »

The Prophecy of Self Improvement

Hear ye! Hear ye! Wind-up Dreams & Vinyl Nightmares hereby reveals the first of five prophecies from the Plastic Prophet. In your quest for Self Improvement, I predict you will desire new and glorious works of art for your humble abode and that these works will provide you with the zest for  life, vibrancy, and humor you have been searching for. You shall click your way over to Etsy and find such works of art and add them to your cart with the knowledge that you have fulfilled your destiny. You shall also return at the beginning of each month from now through August to discover what new Prophecy I will reveal. Thus sayeth the Plastic Prophet.

Read Full Post »

A caffeine fueled opening for Vinyl Mysteries

Vinyl Mysteries of the Caffeine Alphabet opened at the Pannikin in La Jolla this past Saturday night on one of the absolute hottest nights of the summer. In spite of the sweltering heat, I had a great time chatting with the folks who came by to see my first solo show, and I spent most of the night psychoanalyzing my own work (which is oddly therapeutic). Thank you to everyone who dropped by — especially my friends Dawn and Mike who travelled all the way from Los Angeles to provide support. Dawn was extra prepared by bringing a video camera. Early in the afternoon, before the evening reception, I took them on a rambling, stumbling tour of the exhibit, which is captured for posterity on video tape. If I get some good footage I’ll see about posting it here so that more people can laugh at my bad socks.

Amanda and Renee, the owners of the Pannikin were really great, giving me free reign of the gallery space to sort of transform their coffee shop into a retro-inspired vinyl wonderland of LP covers, tin robots and wooden blocks. You can see pictures of the framed pieces and the installation here. But just in case you don’t want to bother with a link, how about a couple of quick snapshots?

Lorraine leaps upon the red carpet to get her first delicious taste of paparazzi fame at the 1959 Grammies

Okay, this gives you a nice, general idea of how the show was setup. Oh! But first, allow me to thank my fine assistants — Lin, Jo Anna, Vince and Gunnar — all of whom helped me get everything hung on Friday night (when the temperature threatened to melt the tin from around the sturdy bodies of my robot brigade). Kudos, gold stars and much appreciated thanks for their role in making my show look really great!

On to a little “Gallery Setup Analysis,” so I can point out a few things about how the show was hung. First, in the upper right corner of the above photo you get a peek at the installation that rimmed the main room of the Pannikin (and throughout). The inside of Pannikin is an old, converted bungalow, and the main room is the original living room of the house, featuring a book rail that hangs a foot or so from the low ceiling. Normally, the rail is packed with old books, games, and assorted coffee pots and antique collectables. All the books and games were taken down so that I could line the shelves with vintage, cheesecake-ish, record albums from the 50’s and 60’s, though I chose to leave the coffee pots on one side of the gallery because I thought they complemented the installation quite well. In front of the records I set up robots and wooden blocks, which were used to spell various phrases.

Above: P-H-O-T-O  A-T-O-M-I-C  S-H-A-K-E-D-O-W-N. All told, I think there are around 300 or so blocks in the exhibit.

First up… how about those frames? As always, every piece in the show was matched with a custom frame chosen to fit the mood and style of the photo. In this case, it’s a gleaming gold frame with an inward cast to emphasize the glitz of a Hollywood awards show. Framing costs for the show set me into bankruptcy, but what price art, ya know?  Above the frame you see a pair of wooden blocks “13” which match up to the titles and prices on the art works sheet for the exhibit. We went through a lot of putty Friday night… which I hope holds up under the hot month of September! Over the weekend I stopped into the gallery a couple of times and none of the blocks had fallen off the wall and into someone’s latte, but I still took the opportunity to press them all firmly into place.

To the right of each piece we mounted the show title cards, which were custom made for the exhibit. The tags are mounted onto recordable CDs that mimic retro vinyl records — grooves and everything! (Thanks to Kristy D. for the tip on finding these specialized boutique recordable CDs.)

I prepared a set of “coffee robots” for the exhibit that were placed in various places standing guard over the artful proceedings.  Here’s a close up of the coffee robot in the above picture, along with a tower of blocks.

I liked the image of tin robots emerging from a cup of coffee beans, an element featured in the title piece for the show, and repeated with these simple miniature sculptures.

I provided pretty simple “opening reception dining fare” for all my guests — wine, water, juice and chocolate — served from atop and within vintage record players.

Yum! There were also stickers on hand with images of the featured piece — The magnificent minds of medicine gather round to examine Nastasscia from the inside out — which (in a spectacular stacked frame) was definitely the hit of the evening!

Hmmm… actually, on second thought, the most popular hit of the evening were my business cards. So good that no one could take just one. With nine different designs and each a mini work of art, most people opted for a generous collection, and I was very happy to oblige.

I hope you have a chance to visit the Pannikin to take in the show in person, sit down, have a bite to eat and enjoy their fabulous coffee. The exhibit will be up through the month of September. Have fun!!

Read Full Post »