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Martin Sharp

This is Sydney artist and legend Martin Sharp circa 1970. I went to a terrific retrospective exhibition of his work at the Museum of Sydney last week.

Martin Sharp, born (1942) and raised in Sydney, is seen as Australia's number one pop artist. He is best known internationally as the album cover artist for Cream's Wheel's of Fire, the exploding Jimi Hendrix painting and the Mr Tambourine Man Bob Dylan portrait.

 

(Top two images from Art and Australia Vol.47 Spring 2009)

(Disraeli Gears LP Cover from here)

He also co-wrote songs with Eric Clapton, published scandalous (for the 60s) magazines, restored and renovated Sydney's Luna Park, was friend and collaborator of (Tip Toe Through the Tulips) Tiny Tim, designer and artist for beautiful Sydney event posters in the 70s and 80s and a whole heap of other things! Actually, the exhibition itself is a real 4D experience with all his posters and knick knacks displayed in the one huge room. I've decided to go back sometime soon and properly photograph it.

 

(Top: Babylon the great is fallen, fallen. Revelations 18 v2. 2000 - 2006 from the Spring Historic Houses magazine. Bottom three images are postcards from the exhibition: The Sydney Opera House is ten 1983, Tiny Tim, The Chameleon 1982 and Eternity, Haymarket! 1977)

  Martin Sharp was a hero of mine when I was a young cartoonist and illustrator in Sydney so this exhibition was a real treat for me to go to. His posters like the one above of Sydney's Haymarket particularly remind me of my youth and memories of Sydney at that time.

Hope everyone is having/ will have a fabulous weekend!

This is Max.

Max was the creation of master cartoonist and illustrator Pericle Luigi Giovannetti. Isn't that a wonderful name? Anyway, Giovannetti started drawing for the now defunct Punch magazine after World War One and launched little Max in April 1953.

Max was such a hit with his wordless pomposity and general shenanigans that Giovannetti even wrote several books starring the one and only Max himself.

(Image from: Non-Stick Plans)

Unfortunately, all the Max books are now out of print but I've been surfing Amazon and I think I might have found a second hand copy...

Here's another Max story:

Both cartoons are from the book: Punch, All Creatures Great and Small published by Prion.

Happy Thursday evening everyone - hope your weather is a little tamer than it is here in Sydney! I am currently listening to 100 - 120 kilometre icy gale force winds (blown directly off the glaciers of the Antarctic) rattle my windows! And to think last week was a sweltering 34 degrees!! Go figure!

Ah Chas - you know me so well...

I have a morbid fear of hairdressers and Chas Adams has more or less summed up why I've only ever been twice. Those two visits were to get an expensive drinking straw perm (basically an afro that took about eight hours to do) which I promptly turned into dreadlocks. That was when I was at Uni by the way - fear not gentle readers I am no longer a rastafarian feral drawing machine these days - I have a neat bob which I cut myself. Much easier to maintain!

So, take it away Chas...

...and Weber has summed up why I have a problem with boutiques. I much prefer the anonymity of a department store.

You can find these and many more cartoons here.

Happy Friday!

Happy weekend!

This is how I feel most Friday afternoons - how about you? The drawing above is by an amazingly imaginative Edwardian/ Art Nouveau American cartoonist and illustrator: Winsor McCay. This image is from his "Little Nemo in Slumberland" newspaper comic strip which ran from 1905 to 1914.

The strip was about the sleeping dreams of a young boy called Nemo. (Incidentally, did you know "Nemo" means "Nobody" in Latin?)

Each evening Nemo would have these fantastic and surreal dreams in which he would be trying to reach "slumberland" and King Morpheus. In the last frame it would always be a drawing of Nemo in his bed or out of his bed in a tangle of bedclothes woken up by his adventures.

McCay's drawings were elegant and full of action. The one below is a particularly famous scene where Nemo and his friend Flip go for a ride on Nemo's bed which has sprouted legs.

Although not terribly popular at the time, the Nemo strip gained more of a following in the late 20th Century. One of Winsor McCay's biggest fans is Mr wild thing Maurice Sendak. I think you can see McCay's influence on his style.

All images here are from google images and you can find out more about Windsor McCay and Little Nemo here!

Have a lovely weekend all!

P.S....and don't forget my giveaway at Pikaland!

Happy Friday + a cartoon...

THE MAN WHO LIKES TO TALK POLITICS
Arnold Roth/1977

I'm not entirely sure that I understand this cartoon 100% but perhaps I understand enough of it to find it funny. Then again I could be wrong! ...all I know is that anybody who talks politics for too long or too fast leaves me feeling a little like these penguins.

...and I think it's a fine piece of cartooning.

A choice Arnold Roth cartoon from 1977. Born in Philadelphia in 1929 Arnold, amongst other things, did record covers for West Coast Jazz musicians such as Dave Brubeck.

This is another cartoon form my Man Bites Man book.

Happy Friday one and all!...and have a glorious weekend!!

Happy Friday!!

 

A bit of prime 1963 silliness by cartoonist and short story writer Lou Myers from one of my favoutite cartoon and illustration books "Man Bites Man : Two Decades of Satiric Art". You can find it here on Amazon.  

Happy Friday everyone!

This just in...

The zines have arrived! A brief re-cap: I collaborated on this zine project with five other amazing Australian artists  - my previous post about the cover and contributors is here and my previous post about the contents is here.

....and you can find it in my shop here!! 

Many thanks again Penny, Emma, Niina, Helena and Ali! It was a total honour to work with you guys and I can't wait for the next one!

Happy Friday!

Happy Friday everyone! As for Sydney, I take back all those nice things I said about it yesterday! It's cold (very cold!), wet AND windy! *sigh* I think for difficult to negotiate in, wet and windy takes the cake. Actually, there's a lot worse out there like blizzards and twisters, so really I mustn't grumble. Anyway, I hear the weekend is going to be glorious - so if it's going to be miserable, it may as well be during the working week I say.

To celebrate Sydney's arctic temperatures, here is a classic winter cartoon from the master of dark humour: Charles Adams.

Charles Adams was a cartoonist for The New Yorker from 1932 until his death in 1988. However, he is most famously remembered as the creator of "The Adams Family". Below is another Chas Adams cartoon which features his "family". This one was originally meant to be for the cover of the 1946 Christmas edition of The New Yorker but the editor thought it might be a bit too dark so it was put inside. However, you guessed it, it was an instant hit with the public. 

Many thanks to everyone who stops by this humble blog and leaves a comment! I really get a kick out of reading your comments and thoughts and I especially love visiting your gorgeous blogs and seeing what's been happening in your world!

Have a lovely weekend all!

Five things that make me happy!

I have been tagged by Mothersvea to list five things that make me happy! So, here they are in no particular order!

1. Cartoons  2. Cats

An elegantly drawn cartoon makes me happy. Even better when it's featuring a cat, of course, being the tragic cat fancier that I am! This drawing/ cartoon is by Eugene Mihaesco.

3. Art

Like a lot of people, art fills me with joy and wonder. Seeing as there are so many fine, fine pieces to choose from I decided to go with a painting I recently stumbled upon called "Jove Decadent" by Ramon Casa in 1910.

4. Gardens and flowers

I am very partial to ambling about gardens and parks with my boyfriend. Actually, I'm quite found of Chinese lanterns too come to think of it! This painting is by John Singer Sargent and is called "Carnations, Lily, Lily, Rose".

5. Sydney

Sydney makes my very happy. My boyfriend, my father and my father's cat live here. The weather is more often than not wonderfully lovely most seasons. It has a wide harbour, natural bushland and beautiful broad beaches that surround the city. I love learning about it's history and fossicking through old historic photos from it's past. The one above is from the 1930s and shows Sydney's wharves nearby Circular Quay.

I'd now like to tag Tracy and Emma and Christina and Miriam if they fancy it!

Astral Rabbit Rides Again!

Behold! A very bad scan of a page from The Adventures of Astral Rabbit. As you may or may not recall, yesterday I posted some photos of two beloved former animal companions: Charles Aznavour and Astral Rabbit. Astral Rabbit was named after a cartoon I was up to my eyebrows in at the time. I thought today I'd show you a small portion of that story.

Above you can see our hero, Astral Rabbit, valiantly escaping the evil duo Mike and Felix on an elephant. I can't quite remember what the story behind Mike and Felix is, I'm sure if I rummaged around I could find the chapters that fill me in on their evilness. Anyway, Mike and Felix being the resourceful chaps that they are, are consulting a gypsy crystal ball reader: Madame Pink Eye as to the whereabouts of hero Astral. It really doesn't get much more exciting! 

It's a big drawing! I didn't ever think about the logistics of mass producing any of this story i.e. in a book or something. I just drew it for myself. I was a mad keen cartoonist at that time and was drawing like my life depended on it for inner city newspapers and even for bigger publications like Australian Mad Magazine. Since then I have settled down and have discovered the wonderful smudgy world of pastels and charcoal and Art Deco dames and pretty birds!

Hump Day be gone folks! We're on a downward trajectory towards a bliss filled weekend!