The pages for my Haunter of the Dark book now have a news section where relevant announcements and updates will be posted. Any important news will also be mirrored here.
Category: {art}
Art
The art of Ernst Fuchs
Ernst Fuchs, one of the founders of the Vienna School of Fantastic Realism in 1946, and a big influence on a later generation of artists such as HR Giger and Robert Venosa.
Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The fantastic art archive
The Essex Street Water Gate, London WC2
He crossed the road and went into the darkness towards the little steps under the archway leading into Essex Street, and I let him go. And that was the last I ever saw of him.
The Diamond Maker (1894) by HG Wells
Old and New London – Its History, Its People and Its Places (1878).
London’s water gates date from the time before the building of the embankment and the road on the north side of the river, when the tidal wash reached a lot closer to the buildings (and former palaces) that follow The Strand and Fleet Street. The gate in Essex Street dates back to t0 1676, and was used for a time as an emblem by Methuen publishers when they had their premises here.
A plate from The Romance of London by Alan Ivimey (1931).
Methuen imprint (1931).
An etching by Edgar Holloway (1934).
Methuen imprint (1948).
The Water Gate as it was on the afternoon of 18th May, 2006.
Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The etching and engraving archive
Pestival
Mark Pilkington is organising this insect arts festival. Looks great, I’ll have to try and get down to see it. Nice that Phase IV, Saul Bass‘s strange and rather fascinating feature film, is one of the highlights.
27 May – 4 June 2006
London Wetland Centre
“If all mankind were to disappear, the world would regenerate back to the rich state of equilibrium that existed ten thousand years ago. If insects were to vanish, the environment would collapse into chaos.” E.O Wilson
The First International Arts Pestival is dedicated to raising awareness of the integral role insects play in the global ecosystem and in all animal societies. Many of those insects are increasingly endangered through human action.
Through appreciation of “insects in art and the art of being an insect”, the Pestival aims to create positive PR for this 400-million-year-old, highly evolved taxon that has had thousands of years of bad press.
We are building up a fantastic programme of talks, demonstrations, workshops, art installations, films, music and performance, fusing art and science to reach out to a broad, interested audience of homo sapien adults and children.
Bridget Nicholls & Mark Pilkington
On behalf of the International Arts Pestival
Patron: Zac Goldsmith
Austin Osman Spare
Today is the 50th anniversary of the death of one of my favourite artists, Austin Osman Spare.
Like many people in the 1970s, I was introduced to the work of Austin Spare by Man, Myth and Magic, a seven volume “illustrated encyclopedia of the supernatural” published weekly in 120 112 parts by Purnell. My mother was a Dennis Wheatley reader so we had a couple of occult paperbacks in the house, among them one of William Seabrook‘s accounts of voodoo in Haiti and a copy of Richard Cavendish’s wonderful magical primer, The Black Arts, (later retitled The Magical Arts). Cavendish had been chosen as editor of Man, Myth and Magic and included occultist and writer Kenneth Grant on his editorial staff, a decision that gave the book’s producers access to Grant’s collection of Spare pictures. In a rather bold move, they launched Man, Myth and Magic in 1970 with a detail of a Spare drawing on the cover, a work often referred to as The Elemental although the authoritative Spare collection, Zos Speaks has it titled as The Vampires are Coming. It’s a shame that AOS didn’t live for a few more years to see this; after labouring in poverty and obscurity for most of his life he would have found his work flooding Britain, with this first issue on sale all over the country and the cover picture being pasted on billboards and sold as posters. It’s possible there were even television adverts for the book (although I don’t recall any), since there usually were for expensive part works like this.