Howard Arkley
Best known for his visions of Australian suburbia, artist Howard Arkley created abstractions of typical houses and interiors, often toying with the two- and three-dimensional. The bold lines and bright colours he used created skewed views of the home, and constructed images question the line between usefulness and decoration, and the aspirations of the suburban dream.
Over his three decade long career, the Australian artist Howard Arkley (1951-1999) produced paintings, sculptures, and installations using a range of techniques from airbrushing to more conventional tools. Inspired by punk music, the club scene in the 70s and 80s, fashion, feminism and masculinity, and this vast range of potent influences are detectable in his striking body of work. His final major pieces were displayed at the Venice Biennale in 1999 and if his work is your thing, other artists you might like include: Roy Lichtenstein, Jeffrey Smart and Richard Larter.
If you like Howard Arkley, then you'll also dig this:
March 11, 2007 | New Art | by Zac |
Howard Arkley, the great Australian painter of suburbia, has a retrospective showing at the Art Gallery of New South Wales from 10 March 2007 to 6 May 2007. I love his use of colour and strong outline, and the way he fashions the ordinary into something quite amazing. Well worth checking out. [more about Howard Arkley]
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April 26, 2007 | New Illustration | by Casper Johansson |
Amy Bennett captures the image of middle-America that the rest of the world grew up dreaming about. It’s all manicured lawns, sturdy cars, and smiling neighbours hiding secrets in the shadows. [see also Howard Arkley]
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June 12, 2007 | New Art | by Judy Z |
The Australian landscape, the subject of endless tributes by artists of all media, is given an intriguing and mysteriously-sexual twist by Fiona Lowry. In her show at Sydney’s Gallery Barry Keldoulis, Lowry has painted dream-like images of the bush. Instead of flora and fauna, she shows shadowy human figures, some engaged in overtly sexual behaviour, others more ambiguous, all alluring. To create these delicate spidery effects Lowry uses airbrush, a material more often associated with the boldness of Howard Arkley, say, or graffiti art, combined with photography. Airbrushed in washed out pinks, greens and browns, the work makes me wonder if I’ve missed out on something in my overdressed forays into the Australian bush.
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Charlie Immer’s pastel-pallete sometimes obfuscates the gory violence in his surreal images. At other times, it heightens the gut-wrenching and visceral effect of his work. Read more
As part of the Robin Hood Foundation, a charity organization whose mission it is to fight poverty in New York City, Lost At E Minor contributor and in-demand illustrator in her own right, Yuko Shimizu — in collaboration with designer Stefan Sagmeister — recently completed an eleven panel mural at PS96 in The Bronx. Read more
The new Melbourne-based football themed t-shirt collection — GFUNK&BATZ — is a lot of fun. Driven by the designers’ passion for the game, the shirts will have you leaping around like Kewell or Beckham (if that’s what you want) in no time. Read more
Gonzales’ gentle piano reworking of the beautiful Feist soliloquy, One Evening, trickles through my headphones like the sweetest sprinkle of mid-winter sunshine.
TIME magazine’s annual Person of the Year issue is coming out this week. I illustrated one of the runner-ups, but of course, I have to keep my mouth completely shut. I don’t know who is the winner though. On TIME’s website, you can see all the past covers of this most talked about issue of each year. It’s a good time to look back history and learn from it anyway, don’t you think?
How many times can we play the same song in different settings? Hmmm, I don’t know. But it is a hell of a song, from a hell of a band, as that uniquely English oddity, Jules Holland would no doubt concur.
Music isn’t necessarily a serious venture. It’s almost funny when you find some you know will grate to dust the stiff upper lipped critics of the world. Every now and then I like the type of sound that hops around the edge of your ears without working its way into your brain and messing up the seratonin levels. And Californian 16-piece tropical-ska-pop group, Still Flyin’, do just that for me. It’s a good laugh, quite catchy, and an awesome live experience so I’m told: especially with the sun out, a can of cider in your hand and a bunch of grinning faces skanking around you.
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T-post: the world’s first wearable magazine
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With the recession still biting, it may be time to whip out the glue and the cardboard and make your next pair of cool kicks. Don’t know how they’d manage in the rain though? Read more
Amazing cake designs by Charm City Cakes
Baltimore company Charm City Cakes produces the most innovative wedding and party cakes on the market. Inspiration for these creative bakers comes from everywhere: art, fabric, furniture, architecture, landscapes, science, and music, and each cake is individually designed to match your personality, and the theme of the occasion you are celebrating. Don’t miss these cakey engineering masterpieces. Read more
Karen Caldicott’s clay head models
British born, New York-based model maker Karen Caldicott has been making clay heads for all major US publications over the last decade. Read more
Our celebrity-saturated culture makes many of us irrationally hateful of the faces we see on our TV screens and magazine pages. Good thing there’s Celebrity PunchOut to let off some of that steam.
Thanks to Sony Australia, four Lost At E Minor readers will win personal audio prizes, including the new 8GB Walkman S series video MP3 player and the MDRXB500 Extra Bass headphones. Read more
The Plus One t shirt by New York designer Ryan Sullivan is printed by hand, one at a time, using a dye-based print and printed on cotton/poly blend tees. Size is true to fit.
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