Tag: art

Quick Reads: Barbara Nessim Interview on Huffington Post

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Just this past fall, my friend Angie introduced me to the artist Barbara Nessim. Angie and Barbara became friends through their years of working together, and Angie thought that I would enjoy meeting Barbara and having the chance to speak with her in person about her art, which was recently shown in a retrospective exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum. She was right!

Huffington Post has just interviewed Barbara about her career as an illustrator, the “feminine” qualities of her art, and her friendship with Gloria Steinem, among other topics. You can read the interview (and see a few examples of her work) here.

Image: Barbara Nessim, Portrait of a Young Maid Ready To Go (1968), via Huffington Post.

Just Because: Cupids and Psyche Making Perfume

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I’ve never been to the Getty in Los Angeles, but if ever do make the trip, I’ll be keeping an eye out for this antique fresco depicting three cupids and Psyche preparing perfume. Look at the cabinet at left, with its shelves of scent bottles!

Image: Fresco fragment with Cupids and Psyche making perfume, third quarter of 1st century, fresco, The J. Paul Getty Museum, 72.AG.81. You can view the full object record here.

On the Street: Vince Boutique, Madison Avenue

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I may be reading too much into the holiday-season windows of this Vince boutique on Madison Avenue when I say that they immediately remind me of Minimalist artist Dan Flavin’s series Monument for V. Tatlin (1969-70).

Flavin’s sculptures in this series were made entirely from prefabricated fluorescent lighting tubes.

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The series was a (semi-humorous) homage to Vladimir Tatlin’s design for an impossibly high and complex tower that would serve as a monument to the Communist International organization (1919-20). Some of Flavin’s neon arrangements referred to the shapes of that never-built monument, and others were simply abstract shapes.

Were Vince’s visual merchandising experts aware of Flavin’s work and its implications about art and history? Were they trying to suggest an abstract menorah? Or did they just want to come up with a window display that was illuminated and modern (and not too expensive to execute)? Your guess is as good as mine. I’ve never even been inside a Vince shop.

Images: Vince photo by Tinsel Creation; Dan Flavin photos/works courtesy of The Museum of Contemporary Art and Phillips.

On the Street: Hermes on Madison Avenue

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I passed the Hermès flagship boutique on Madison Avenue one day last week and paused to take this photograph. I wasn’t impressed by the overall window display—I don’t really understand the connection between the stacks of books, the geological print on the seated mannequin’s dress, and the arrow—but I recognized the small sculpture perched on one of the teetering book piles.

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