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Bannard on NBC Miami
Post #1441 • January 8, 2010, 2:52 PM • 35 Comments
Miami's NBC affilate has put together a slide show with interesting annotations about Walter Darby Bannard on its website.
2.
January 8, 2010, 6:08 PM
it is amazing how he captured so much of darby in so few words. that krazy kat picture is a good one.
3.
January 8, 2010, 6:36 PM
The guy who put this together apparently specializes in this sort of piece for NBC and other outlets, and he's obviously good at his job. I assume he's some sort of freelancer, evidently somebody sharp and with a feel for humor. It's a terrific montage, both light and telling.
4.
January 8, 2010, 7:09 PM
I don't personally know WDB. I know his writing very well since I proofread all of his archive. And of course I know him through this site and we've swapped a bit of e-mail.
Therefore I really appreciate this glimpse of him. I want to be like WDB when I grow up.
5.
January 8, 2010, 8:02 PM
He reminds me a bit of the Walter on Fringe. Those paintings could be portals to another dimension - and I'd go there if they're representative of it.
6.
January 8, 2010, 8:23 PM
JGS -- as the Brits say (or at least once did, public school slang from the 50s). Stands for "Jolly good show!"
7.
January 10, 2010, 5:36 AM
Cool slides, cool looking artist, cool looking art but those thin legs with no calves look arrgh...
8.
January 10, 2010, 9:42 AM
Note to Darby: Time to get those calf implants. And maybe throw in some blond highlights.
9.
January 10, 2010, 1:26 PM
Hey, dis my paintings but not my beautiful legs.
that's below the belt!
(So to speak).
Actually, they only look skinny in relation to my somewhat more voluminous upper torso.
I think the guy (Jacob Katel) did a great job on this thing. The pictures are imaginative and the he got the quotes right, and, above all, it is fun and interesting. It was refreshing to deal with dsomeone who is simply interestied in entertainment, pure and simple, with no art world BS.
10.
January 10, 2010, 1:31 PM
I am more impressed by and taken with this guy's work on this piece than I have been by any number of excruciatingly pretentious and tiresome pieces of video or computer "art."
11.
January 10, 2010, 2:54 PM
You don't need implants, WDB. Just get some calf raises into your daily workout routine. Hold a pail of acrylic medium in each hand and go up on tiptoe for a count of ten...hold it...then release slowly. Five times a day. A couple of months and you'll look like the governor of California!
Or you could just spend your time painting.
12.
January 10, 2010, 3:18 PM
"There's more bullsh-- in the art world than anywhere. When people try to tell you why you should like something because it's 'important' that's the worst thing ..."
Right. "It's important" has always been a lousy way to get people to read the classics. It's a lousy way to get people to look at art, too.
"Art is simple. You just look at it and either you like it or you don't" ... "You can tell horrible work just by using visual common sense. If something is horrible looking, then it's horrible."
Right. But independent judgment and visual common sense are not encouraged by the importance pushers. They want your brain to be hooked on the substance they manufacture: texts.
"Art is entertainment. It just depends on who's being entertained."
Right. For most people, there will always be more entertaining forms of entertainment than art. But there will also always be a percentage of the population who are turned on by the purely visual. (Is that percentage steady? Are their brains wired a little differently?)
"Art goes in fads. It's completely a fashion biz. Nobody understands it ..."
Right. But as with any fashion biz, there are classic looks that stand the test of time, and trendy looks that make us squirm when we see them again, just a decade later. (Those with a taste for the classical squirmed at the time, too.)
13.
January 10, 2010, 4:35 PM
Speaking of bullshit, read comment #8 on the previous thread and follow the link/s.
14.
January 10, 2010, 4:40 PM
And Chris, I strongly doubt that the governor of California's calves (or much anything else about his physique, including his face) is due to solely natural means.
15.
January 10, 2010, 5:16 PM
A little sake cup for OP:
Bizen 1
Bizen 2
Bizen 3
Bizen 4
Bizen 5
Bizen 6
It's about 3 inches in diameter by 1.5 inches tall. Anything that can pack that much visual interest into such a small size has definitely got my attention, and then some. Serra? Feh.
16.
January 10, 2010, 5:23 PM
Again, Bizen ware does not use applied glaze or any sort of hand-painted decoration. The surface effects are due to what happens during firing due to the designs of the "kiln gods."
(Clicking on an image once it comes up enlarges it)
17.
January 10, 2010, 7:42 PM
Looks like the kiln gods were pretty pissed off that day.
18.
January 10, 2010, 7:55 PM
Chris, you are, of course, quite hopeless, but, on occasion, you manage to justify your existence (which is more than can be said for all too many people).
19.
January 10, 2010, 8:07 PM
"A couple of months and you'll look like the governor of California!"
That's what is known as a "failed state", right?
I'll stick to painting.
20.
January 10, 2010, 8:07 PM
And, just for that (17), you are going to look at this:
Tanba sake bottle 1
Tanba sake bottle 2
And people say I can't appreciate text-based work.
21.
January 10, 2010, 9:31 PM
Looks like a good bottle for Tanuki.
22.
January 10, 2010, 9:38 PM
Well, at least a tanuki wouldn't be so gauche, even if it is a raccoon.
24.
January 11, 2010, 8:22 AM
OK, so they're technically raccoon dogs. And let's not fixate on certain anatomical issues. This is supposed to be a high-toned blog.
26.
January 11, 2010, 9:17 AM
I doubt it, dude. Implant technology was not that advanced in the latter 19th century. But really, you shouldn't encourage Chris. He's sophomoric enough as it is.
27.
January 11, 2010, 9:21 AM
Ok, ok. I had to pop my hyperlink cherry sometime, and I thought what better than overgrown raccoon-dog nads, Yoshitoshi style.
The photo-essay is awesome. I love studio shots.Check the smiles on this guy. Darby, yer the shit. Keep on rockin' on.
"Andy Warhol was there. He always had these guys with him and they'd stand around looking lost."
Maybe they were justed vexed. Or maybe one too many ludes in their Cosmos, who knows.
28.
January 11, 2010, 9:59 AM
I expect looking lost was a requirement for joining Warhol's entourage. Anyone who didn't look (and preferably act) that way would have clashed with the head zombie.
29.
January 11, 2010, 10:54 AM
The whole Warhol attitude was one of complete passivity and vacancy - just sit around and make movies of nothing at great length.
Somehow this caught a wave of the spirit of the 60s and they rode it.
30.
January 11, 2010, 11:09 AM
Well, OP, given that there was so little, if anything, there, making a "virtue" out of that was really the only way to make it pay off--and since conditions were such that it was doable, it was pretty much a no-brainer. The thing is, why do people still go for Warhol's schtick?
31.
January 11, 2010, 11:26 AM
I think anyone who picks on Warhol himself should read Uncle Andy's by James Warhola. It made me feel warmly towards Andy. The picture I've built of him is of a painfully shy man, with a lot of deep hurts, who somehow accreted a large group of broken, insane people around him. I may not like his art very much these days, but my feeling is, when he started out he was sincere. The hangers-on and the expectations of the weird and wealthy got to him. I think his blank expression in public was an attempt to turn invisible. Anyone wearing that wig-and-glasses set is clearly doing his best not to be seen.
I find Andy a little tragic, actually, underneath it all. I don't think he wanted to wreck fine art.
32.
January 11, 2010, 11:35 AM
Sorry, Chris, but people worse than Warhol can still get some relative or other compromised party to write favorable versions of their lives. That sort of thing does not convince me.
33.
January 11, 2010, 11:52 AM
Chris, I don't think sincerity amounts to much with this sort of thing. I had a girlfriend years ago who was his agent before the Pop craze. He was very hot as an advertising illustrator and had the usual "I want to be an artist" craving those people have.
He was an approval addict, and he found a groove and went with it. He was passive and inert but he had a real tropism for the trends, went for them like a moth to the candle.
34.
January 11, 2010, 1:43 PM
Well, OP, it figures Warhol would be highly trend-conscious, because that's where the approval or attention was most likely to be had, and that's also the background from which he emerged. He was essentially a slick, flashy commercial artist who came along at a very opportune time, and a confluence of dubious but favorable circumstances allowed him to go "legit," so to speak. It's really very much like a glorified bait-and-switch; what's amazing is that so many still fall for it.
35.
January 11, 2010, 1:51 PM
Actually, it's not amazing; it's more like "but of course." The whole system is based on illegitimacy of one kind or another, so it must perforce continually "validate" Warhol and what he helped to spawn. There's way too much gain riding on it to upset that apple cart.
1.
Jack
January 8, 2010, 3:10 PM
Thanks, Franklin. I'd already seen this, but other people should. The problem with Bannard is that he's too real, too solid, too much the genuine article. The virtually complete absence of BS makes him, in current art world terms, a freak. But if nothing else, it's nice to see Warhol being good for something, even if it's just a hook to publicize a real artist.