inspiration today: vintage magazine covers

wish they would do covers like this again. Magazines are so stale these days with rolling calendars of the same photoshopped celebrity faces - and not even well-photoshopped either. I would love to stroll passed a magazine stand sometime next month and instead of seeing Keira Hathaway Johansson or whoever on September's Vogue, I would die to see a vivid gouache painting of a model in a Dior Couture gown or a satirical cartoon of a department store salesman begging a customer to buy the new collections. But as that is never to be I guess I'll just have to enjoy the beautiful illustrations on some of these old covers instead and be thankful that we at least still have The New Yorker... I especially love A.H. Fish's whimsical social commentaries:

Issue: February 1921

Artist: A.H. Fish

Description: A woman grows visibly annoyed with her husband, who refuses to put down his newspaper at the dinner table.

Issue: January 1921

Artist: A.H. Fish

Description: A woman, at home leafing through a catalog of automobiles, calls up a man, maybe her husband, to discuss her potential purchase.

Issue: January 1923

Artist: A.H. Fish

Description: Curled in a chair, a woman comes to tears over a stack of bills while her well-dressed husband nonchalantly has a smoke.

Issue: January 1922

Artist: A.H. Fish

Description: Stranded under a full moon, a motorist is defeated by a flat tire while his date waits in the car.

Issue: April 1928

Artist: Marion Wildman

Issue: July 15, 1935

Artist: Cecil Beaton

Issue: June 15, 1935

Artist: Jean Pages

Issue: October 23, 1989

Artist: Lee Lorenz

Issue: March 18, 1939

Artist: Barbara Shermund

Covers available for purshase at Condenaststore.com and Thenewyorkerstore.com.

inspiration today: stitch drawing

Was searching for cool illustrations online recently. One blog lead me to another and what I stumbled upon is a very interesting art form. Rosie James is a textile artist who uses a sewing machine as her drawing tool. Now, being a former fashion design student myself, I've definitely dabbled on a Bernina or two and broken more needles than I care to admit. So, to me, Ms. James' work is definitely an impressive feat:

Stitchdraw.blogspot.com

inspiration tonight: fly me to the moon

40 years ago today we landed on the moon.

Found these pretty brush paintings that highlight our only natural satellite:

by Lin Li - Enjoychineseart.com - South Carolina

Purchase his artwork on eBay

inspiration today: newspaper canvases

one of the things I love about New York is, any place can be an art gallery: a restaurant, a coffee shop, my hair salon. I once visited a little gallery inside an apartment building and the entrances to two of the apartments were actually in the gallery. So, as I admired a beautiful oil painting of a country cabin in the Catskills, a young couple struggled to push a stroller through the doorway of the adjacent wall. A funny little city this is; but inspiration is around every corner.

An artist named Tom Matt shows his work in these kinds of places. I was in Bazzini several months ago sampling a salsa dip when I discovered a couple of his pastel drawings hanging across from the deli counter. He takes the paper-of-the-day and on it creates a beautiful representation of the Brooklyn Bridge or a street corner on 79th and Columbus. Anyway, just a huge fan of cityscapes in general, but I particularly love his drawing style. I've posted some of my favs below, but there is much more on his website including a Paris series.

Lower Manhattan from the Manhattan Bridge

80th & Amsterdam

Brooklyn Bridge

Bryant Park, the Grace Building & Chrysler

(or the scene when I'm on my way to fashion week coming from the Times Square 2 train, past the Conde Nast building, and about to cross the street and head over to the tents!)

Central Park & The Plaza Hotel

Ludlow & Houston

Mercer Street & Waverly Place

The Flatiron Building