Category: Vernacular Art
Book Review: Sublime Spaces And Visionary Worlds
Sublime Spaces And Visionary Worlds: Built Environments Of Vernacular Artists, By Leslie Umberger, Erika Doss, Lisa Stone, Jane Bianco and Ruth Kohler. Princeton Architectural Press, 424 pages, 650 color plates and 100 black and white illustrations, 2007. ISBN 1-56898-728-5
Continue readingKankakee and Waukegan: Swell Places
Some first-rate signage from the funky Chicago suburbs of Waukegan and Kankakee.
Continue readingMotel matches
Great lodging images from motel matchbooks.
Continue reading100 Best Signs From Roadside Art Online
Here’s a selection of my 100 favorite signs from the pages of Interestingideas.com’s Roadside Art Online section.
Continue readingThe Interesting Ideas Store
Three great gift ideas from the pages of interestingideas.com 2008 Diner Art Calendar Gyros Project Calendar 2008 Edition Bizarre Bazaars the book: Weird, Wacky and Just Plain Embarrassing Business Names From the Grog N Groc Hall of Fame
Continue readingLittle Grills: Diner art from matchbook covers
Matchbook covers can be tiny masterpieces of vernacular commercial art. This set covers a favorite subject from the mid-20th Century, the roadside diner.
Continue readingCounty Fairs
Although the glory days of fairground art passed with the last of the true sideshows, county fairs and carnivals still offer bits of visual interest even if most of the imagery is blandly commercial. These are from the Lake and Kane County Fairs in Illinois, the Wisconsin State Fair in Milwaukee and the Rosholt Fair in Wisconsin. Plus, a bonus image from the gloriously named Temple of Food in Amstersdam.
Continue readingNick Engelbert’s Grandview art environment, Hollandale, Wisconsin
Some views from the very pleasant art environment.
Continue readingSpontaneous Creation
Home-Made: Contemporary Russian Folk Artifacts, by Vladimir Arkhipov, Fuel Publishing, 304 pages, 180 color pictures, 2006. ISBN 0-9550061-3-9 Folk Archive: Contemporary Popular Art from the UK, by Jeremy Deller and Alan Kane, Book Works, 158 pages, 2005. ISBN 1 870699-81-5 Two recent books from abroad attempt to document the spontaneous art making of ordinary people, one broadly and one eccentrically. Folk Archives, from Britain, covers a wide range of vernacular expression, from protest posters to shop signs. Home Made, also published in Britain, takes a certain kind of ingenuity as its subject, specifically creative responses to the acute scarcity of
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