Merry Christmas from a couple of legends

 

A Christmas card from Ray and Charles Eames

Last night for their season finale, the PBS series American Masters aired a new documentary about the work and lives of Charles and Ray Eames, called "America's most important and influential American designers" in the PBS description--a claim I'd be hard pressed to argue with. Watch the trailer for the film here:

Watch Charles & Ray Eames: The Architect and the Painter on PBS. See more from American Masters.

Bob Wirth

There's a brief shot of the two working around what looks for all the world like Ward Kimball's train room, though I'm pretty sure that's just a coincidence of layout and fun functional organization. Who knows. Most famous for their eponymous chair, the couple did much more than that, and if you don't already know them, you should. Everything about this pair seems stimulating.

Also displayed are two other holiday cards that were sent to the couple, from the collection of the Library of Congress:

Lee Krasner and Jackson Pollock

Bob Winquist, Design Student

[guest]Design instructor: Tom Pope. Assignment: "Basketball hoop with attitude". Student: Bob Winquist. click to enlarge


Tom Pope was a year or two behind my class at Calarts, and it was great to see him at the get together for Bob Winquist in January. He'd brought with him an amazing rarity with a great story attached that he shared with all of us in his remarks to the crowd. I asked him if he'd share the artwork and its backstory here, and he kindly agreed. With the help of fellow classmate Zac Moncrief the very large framed piece was scanned so it could appear here. Tom's story follows below:

"I was fortunate enough to be a design student of Bob Winquist's for two-and-a-half years. So many people have shared so much about the pleasures and recieved wisdom gained from Bob that there is little new which I can offer. That said, Bob did give me something that not all his students can claim.

One day in Bob's class, winter of '90, I was offering my usual sea of valuable insight. At the end of class, Bob asked me if I wanted to teach the next week. I said sure, but... if I gave an assignment, would he do it?

Of course he would. So I thought of something random, as he oftened appeared to do. "A basketball hoop with attitude." I couldn't wait until the next week!
A week later, projects were pinned on the wall of the class room. It being second semester, there were less people in class and less projects since most people were knee-deep in their films by then. But Bob's assignment was right there among the others as promised. It was beautiful, but I hope I talked about someone else's first. I did my best to talk about and critique each assignment constructively and focus on their distinct merits as Bob always, always, always did.

After class, I asked Bob if I could keep his assignment, and he said of course. He signed it "Bob Winquist, 2/27/90" with a flourish on the back. I had it framed, and it has hung on the wall no matter where I've lived ever since. (I also have a handful of the other assignments in my parents' attic in Georgia.)

When I heard that there was going to be a remembrance for Bob I knew that I had to bring the piece. When I heard that we would be allowed to speak, I knew I had to talk about it. The response it got made me realize how lucky I was to possess an example of Bob's generosity in concrete form. The best part of all was the interest that Bob's own family showed in it. If I hadn't been aware of just how special Bob's own handiwork was, I was then.
Jenny has been generous enough to share this forum and to allow me to share this "wonderful", wonderful piece with a wider audience."

My pleasure, Tom. Thank you.

Shane P. and Shannon T. and Coraline J.

Shane Prigmore and Shannon Tindle are swell guys: friendly, generous with thoughts and props, and fun. They also draw and design like a bat out of heck.
At top is an example of Shane's work; Shannon's is below; click to enlarge them(and there's much more where they came from-see the links below to their blogs).

Dreamworks has them right now, but several years ago they were working on a stop-motion feature based on an exceptional book by Neil Gaiman, my new favorite author(be sure to read his latest, "The Graveyard Book", which just won the Newbery medal as the outstanding children's book of the year-also keeping in mind that in my opinion Gaiman, like all great authors, doesn't write so much for children as for himself).



I went to see "Coraline" on Sunday. It's a film that both men gave a lot to, along with many other brilliant artists.
I should probably do a separate post just about the film, but for now here's a sampling of some beautiful work Shane is sharing on his own blog, and Shannon's equally inspiring paintings are here. Go see--there's a lot more and it's all simply wonderful.

Lastly, here's a link to what's far and away the best of the several Coraline trailers, on YouTube. Really worth watching, even if you've seen the others.

Under the heading of local madness: an art opening at the Little Bird Gallery

JJ Villard at work


In the book Scrambled Ink my penultimate story was slam-banged up next to the closer by JJ Villard. I'd had no clue about the order of our stories--that was up to our editor--but in the event, I couldn't have been happier than to be able to imagine my dad's face as he turned from my drawings of a sweet girl and her dog to JJ's "DIG! DIG! DIE! DIE!". Sublime.

JJ is a filmmaker of note, a former colleague from Dreamworks, and the only man I've met who can write an email that screams. With this gentleman anything can happen--and usually does.

He's also part of a three man show opening this Saturday at the Little Bird Gallery in Atwater, in the company of fellow artists (and animators) Morgan Kelly and Jeremy Bernstein, both talented fellows with similarly skewed views of Our Town. Will be well worth a visit.
There are images aplenty at the Little Bird Gallery website--embedded, so I couldn't swipe them for partial inclusion here. But go have a look. This should be a grand opening.

Y'AINT GONNA GET THERE FREE : Screams in Hollywoodland
Little Bird Gallery
3195 Glendale Blvd. LA, CA 90039
Opening reception Saturday, January 10 @7pm
Runs through January 31.
Phone 323-662-1092

Winquist '74

Here's a rarity: Bob Winquist shows off a little of his home and office design in 1974-and there's Bob himself, aged 49, in his then-living room. From Good Housekeeping's House Beautiful, Spring 1974.

Keep that date in mind: 1974. Bob's is the most appealing and well-designed space that's showcased in this high-end magazine by far. The other interiors featured would likely make you laugh, cry, or just cringe; the seventies were not generally an attractive time, to be charitable about it.
But Bob then as later had his own highly individual taste and loved mixing old and new in an eclectic fashion, which makes a lot of his choices timely even now. But who knows what he'd say looking at this spread in 2008? By the way, the article identifies the art hanging over the fireplace as done by his life partner Robert Hammer. When I originally got this of course I had no idea who he was. He must have been a very interesting man to be Bob's partner for 50 years.

As to that and all things Bob, this opening line of the accompanying text is so apt:

Designer Robert Winquist calls his private life his "most treasured possession".

Indeed!

Click the lower image to see it in a larger size.

Christmas in August--a Marc Davis greeting

This is one of my Comic Con purchases: one of many Christmas cards designed by the superlative Marc Davis (with a self-caricature).

I'm not sure when this was done--how young would he have been to have looked as slim as he's depicted here? It's a wonderful drawing and I was glad to find it at the Van Eaton Galleries booth.