keeping house

I had a great day, it was really necessary.

r.i.p. horst tappert

Such a comforting idea that the time wasting habit of watching bad TV can be such an inspiration.

jan kiewiet

This is the uplifting story I promised you the other day. You can tell it to your relatives under the Christmas tree if you want. It is about my neighbour Marilyn. And about my dear father-in-law. And a lady in The Hague. My neighbour Marilyn maintains a website for her father Jan Kiewiet, who is a painter, and who immigrated to North America in 1953. A little over a week ago, she received an email through this website, sent by a lady in The Hague. The lady in The Hague owned a painting (a pastel rather, to be precise) by a Jan Kiewiet, and she was wondering whether the Jan Kiewiet whose website she found was the same Jan Kiewiet. The style looked very different, but then again the painting was very old, 1942. Marilyn had the answer, the painting was not her father's, but her grandfather's, and she was of course delighted to hear from somebody who owned one of his works. It gets better. The lady in The Hague had owned the painting for fourty years, but was now ready to part with it, and wanted to return it to the family, how sweet is that? The next day however, there suddenly were doubts, because friends of the lady in The Hague had tried to convince her to have the painting evaluated. Some people have just seen a few too many episodes of the Antiques Roadshow. Fortunately the day after that, the lady in The Hague had made up her own mind, and decided that she was going to go through with it. Fourty years ago she had gotten the painting as a present, she never paid for it, and she didn't want make money off it now. And that's where the dear father-in-law comes in. Willem drove to The Hague, climbed two flights of stairs with all of his heart problems (oh my), had coffee and cookies, and took the painting home. And now he is going to find a way to have it shipped to Canada. Marilyn feels like her grandfather is sending her a Christmas present from the grave!

horst lemke

Look what I found, Walter Trier's successor! After Trier's death in 1951 Horst Lemke illustrated Erich Kästner's books. I've said it before, research is the best part of illustrating. I'm doing something literary again, you'll see. Oh and it was my little radio moment again tonight. You can download the podcast if you want. I explain the whole Steven Harper uproar, so it's maybe even worth it. And I tell an uplifting story. One I will also publish on my blog, but not before I have the imagery. Do I sound mysterious?

And a Las Vegas song!

scenes from a marriage

My own dear husband of twenty-five years is sending me stupid quizzes. On this one, apparently, one is required to reply "yes" to everything. Or else, no long term relationship. The two of us must be the exception to the rule.

____ Are you clear about how much appreciation your partner needs you to show, and do you keep working to show it even if you don’t understand why he or she needs it so much?
____ Do you defer to your partner’s “housework help” criteria by doing more even though you think you already do more than your fair share?
____ Do you “stifle” yourself by not saying what you feel like saying because you think it might hurt your partner’s feelings?
____ Do you acknowledge and try to live up to your partner’s ideas about personal hygiene practices even though they are not the same as yours and even seem silly?
____ Do you try to dress in ways that please your partner even though you would sooner wear something else?
____ Do you try to live up to your partner’s definition of punctuality?
____ Are you willing to talk on your partner’s terms by listening as long as he or she wants and talking about what he or she wants to talk about, even if it requires you to draw on your entire store of energy, attention, and ability to mask boredom?
____ Do you do things (such as shopping, watching sports, yard work) just because your partner loves doing them and enjoys them more when you do them with her or him?
____ Do you avoid correcting your partner even when you easily and rightly could?
____ Do you pay attention to being a good sleeping partner by sacrificing the sheets, not rolling over because you might wake your partner, turning off the light or television even when you would sooner leave them on, and trying to go to bed and get up in synch with your partner?
____ Do you know what makes your partner laugh, try to cheer him or her up when you can, and laugh at your partner’s jokes even when you’ve heard them many times before?
____ Are you cautious with your comments and jokes even though you think your partner is oversensitive on some issues? (The AT&T rule of marital humor: Is your joke Appropriate, Timely, and Tasteful—by your partner’s standards, not yours?)
____ Have you asked about your partner’s sexual preferences and turn-offs (not assumed them), and do you try to comply with them?
____ Do you “lie” well to your partner by complimenting cooking or projects that you really consider a disaster?
____ Do you think your partner would eagerly marry you again?

the seagull

Of course we don't go to something as vulgar as the Santa Claus parade. We watched it from the opera, during intermission. A sad affair in drooling rain, even a WalMart float. Brrr. Whole families in sleeping bags, waiting for the parade since God only knows what hour this morning. Who wouldn't prefer the opera. Or rather, it was the ballet. When I say opera, I mean the building, although the building is called the Four Seasons centre. It gets more complicated, the ballet really was a play. Chekhov turned into ballet. Quite wonderful, really, especially my friend Michele in the pit. But there is one thing that keeps bugging me time after time in that beautiful opera. Why oh why is the costume and set design never ever at the same level as the dancers and the musicians? Or the singers, in case of actual opera. Maybe I am weird, being a visual artist, but I experience those aspects as intense as the music and the acting/singing/dancing. And once again today, they weren't nearly up there together.

brushes

I grabbed this little work of art away from Piffin, to scan it before she could take it to class. If the teacher decides to put it on display, we won't have it back for a long time. What you see is utterly charming simplicity, very rare in art school students. Speaking of myself, of course. I always envied students who could do that, I always went about things in an incomprehensibly complicated way. Often my finished products had nothing to do with the assignment anymore. The assignment here was to find a recognizable everyday wooden object, and carve it.

dejeuner

I am doing something with this painting, and as you can see I am not the first to do so. And since otherwise some sweet but ignorant soul is going to ask, yes, the bottom one is Picasso. And ladies and gentlemen, it is official, I am a 5K runner, I finished all the podcasts, congratulate me! I am going to do the 5 to 10K ones too, but I promised Michiel I would wait until his injury is healed. Until then I'll just run 5K every other day. 5K feels easy peasy, I am sure I can do a lot more. Takes up much time though. But it's nice, especially all this supportive attention. My dog walking friends in the park see me sweating, and almost cheer me. And neighbours see me, and go, oh I should do that too! Even Michiel's physiotherapist is proud of me, and he doesn't even know me. Michiel's injury, you ask?

frank o'hara

Sometimes my husband reads me poetry. He can be like that. I had never heard of Frank o'Hara, maybe I am too European, but it is beautiful. Sounds like a nice guy too: "Known throughout his life for his extreme sociability, passion, and warmth, O'Hara had hundreds of friends and lovers []"

old favourite

I must have played this song a thousand times on my walkman, cycling to and from the remote and tiny old village school outside Enschede that harboured the artschool's painting department. Especially from could be hairy, on moonless nights without street lights. Without bike lights it was impossible to get home alone. I still remember where the tape sounded wobbly. Of course I prefer Nina Simone's version, but this one was on my tape. And sorry, no sketches worth showing today.

peter struycken

To anyone who tried to email me today, I am really sorry, there seems to be something wrong. I can send, but I can't receive. Please try again tomorrow, I have mailed a complaint to my provider, I hope they will solve the problem soon. It was nice to suddenly receive so many phone calls from the home country.

cityscapes

Michiel thought we had a picture of how Donald Duck on LSD saw Ducktown, in a book somewhere. But we couldn't find it. Any of you able to dig up that picture? Or a different fun cartoon cityscape? Just doing some thorough research here.

Update: Evert found them (see comments) thank you so much, Evert!

walter trier 3

This was day before yesterday, last Monday. In the meanwhile the NRC editorial desk has left the building, we had a great week together. Now the AGO is closed until its grand opening in November, but visiting journalists from overseas know how to go about these things. And I told them not to email me, but to call, because I wasn't going to be at my computer, so when Ms. de B. and Mr. S. went for their private viewing in the AGO, I was at Loblaws getting them food, damn. I came home, saw their email, thought about forgetting about it, because I was a full hour late, abandoned that thought, ran out of the house, waved down a taxi, and was in the AGO moments later. Almost. (The taxi was driven by a different cabby than the one showed on the picture, that's illegal isn't it?) I had a long pleasant chat with the concierge at the AGO, waiting for the assistant curator to come and fetch me. He remembered queen Juliana visiting the AGO. But then finally, all the way at the other end of the museum, some white gloves were waiting for me, and I got to rummage through boxes full of original Walter Trier drawings. Wow. Wow. Wow. I didn't know a single one, they were all new to me. Real gouache, real ink, real pencil, as if done yesterday. If the paper hadn't been so yellow. I have rarely seen drawings showing so much visible pleasure. And so up close. I should hang out with journalists more.

david levine

I know, I am not blogging too much, but I am enjoying my holidays, I do think I deserve them. I treated myself to a jog on the beach today, shocking huh. I got off the streetcar at Woodbine, jogged all the way down to the end of the boardwalk, and back to Coxwell. Marathons of the world, here I come. And besides all that I am entertaining guests. The famous Mr. S. and Ms. de B. of NRC Handelsblad are in town to visit me, I think that is pretty major. Of course I am not entertaining them the whole time, right now they are at Niagara Falls. I've been there a few times too often, and I really think there are better destinations, but who am I. No self respecting European can go home without having seen the Falls. So they say. Last night for example we had a much better destination. Mr. David Levine himself in person spoke at Piffin's art school. And what a sweet sweet nice man he is. With eyes like beads on fire. I had the nerve to ask him two questions. Of course I had many more, but I didn't want to give myself away. Before the show he had already asked Ellen how many of us three were cartoonists. One and a half, she said.

annette tison

I don't know why I still have these days. I am old, and my conceiving days are over. But then, as my neighbour Kristen, a wise woman, pointed out to me, why would these days start happening at thirteen years of age, for that matter. We cannot turn nature off and on as we please. And nature has been good to me, I am the last one to complain. I have a healthy son and a healthy daughter, they materialized in my womb, no test tubes involved, they were born on our own bed, and I nursed them with my own two breasts that are cancer free to this day. Things that one would wish normal on everybody. One would think. The Dutch government may well fall over this wish. Doctors are now able to determine whether an embryo of just a few cells carries an hereditary form of breast cancer. Or bowel cancer. They were already doing Huntington's and something else, it doesn't come to me now. It's just two terrible illnesses more. But there is a Christian splinter in government, it was needed to form a majority, complicated. And I am so sure that had it just been the bowel cancer, it would have been silently added to the available medical arsenal. But breasts make these Christian men rise and preach hell and damnation. They call it ethics, but that's their way of fooling us.

spijkersloffen

Now she is making her own footwear. The future must hold great things for my daughter, there is no doubt about it. Unfortunately there are doubts about Orbit's future. Since yesterday it is clear his hernia is back. A limp every now and again, refusal to climb stairs, difficulty getting up in his chair. And he squeaked when I tried to pick him up. And we are not going to do another three and a half thousand dollar operation. So I called the vet this morning, holding it fully possible we were going to have to put Orbit to sleep, but then he wasn't actually doing very bad today. Not a hundred percent, but let's say eighty. Auntie Clare, bless auntie Clare, drove us to the vet. He's on steroids now, and anti-inflammatory meds, and has to be kept on a resting regime. And then his body should be able to deal with any disc material floating in places where it shouldn't be. The vet thought we may have caught it in time.

kittiwat unarrom

Here's a nice Sunday brunch for you. Michiel found this through one of his 3D forums, and if you google Kittiwat you'll find he's all over the internet. No wonder. But that won't keep me from uploading him onto my blog, because I find this truly fascinating. I linked the picture to a blog that explains everything, and shows a youtube clip in which you see Kittiwat at work in his bakery. Do you think vegetarians would eat his bread?

nudie cohn

I really only knew Gram Parsons from his music, until today -I was researching a new illustration subject (yes, finally)- I had no idea what he looked like. And I had never heard of Nudie Cohn, I come across so many things I don't know on a daily basis, I feel dumber and dumber. Nudie and his wife Helen are responsible for the outrageous outfits of Hank Williams, Roy Rogers, Elvis, Bobbejaan Schoepen(!), Porter Wagoner, and yes, Gram Parsons. His suit is embroidered with pills and marijuana leaves, and it is incredibly beautiful. Nudie and Helen started their career in New York in the 1930s, with a shop called Nudie's for the Ladies, selling underwear and outfits to showgirls and burlesque dancers. In the 1940s, after hitchhiking across the country several times, they settled in Los Angeles and began creating what would become the famous Nudie suits.

Comments closed for now, spam attack. If you would want to comment, use studio@duvekot.ca and I'll upload them.

no show

And I even bought a bike light so I would be safe coming home from life drawing. But the model didn't show up, so I could bike back by daylight still. Michiel had invented lasagna burgers, I was in time for those, that was a good thing. Two weeks ago I bought a new sketch book for the drawing class, and then Tim canceled. Maybe I should just never buy anything before class. So instead of a life drawing sketch I show you how Piffin abuses her parents in art school projects. It is an ingeniously sewn book out of painting canvas, full of weird snapshots, very heavy. She had her last exam today, we are safe for the Summer. With bike lights and all.

funny things

Piffin's friend Buni drew this lovely birthday card. And gave me permission to blog it. I believe it is her self portrait. Wearing a funny costume. It was a beautiful birthday, on a beautiful day. Piffin made her own birthday cake, a lemon and lime cheese cake. Only in stead of some zest, she put in a whole rind :-x Funny things happened today, birthday or not. I was happy to have mailed all of the tax shit to our accountant, and a tax notice flies in through the mail slot. A Dutch one! We don't pay taxes in Holland! Water Board District Tax, Holland is a country below sea level. According to the letter we are the owners of my father-in-law's house, he was very surprised to hear that. How in the hell the Water Board got hold of our address in Canada is a mystery. Every single day enough shit happens to get all worked up. Michiel had a bad day at work, he said. It had gotten so bad that he just couldn't take it anymore, he said. And what did you do? I went outside... and I ate... an apple. Wonderful stress management. Almost as wonderful as the big black guy I saw sitting in his car singing along with this Abba song, the whole street vibrated. Is it racist to think it's funny that a big black guy would sing an Abba song?

weekend

A lady's car broke down in front of our house. We were sitting on the front porch having a beer with a couple of neighbours, so we cheerfully watched the scene. The car made alarming screech noises as the woman turned the ignition. Hopeless. She then sat down on neighbour Paul's garden bench and gave up. So we waved a bottle of beer and invited her over. Of course it was an SUV, and of course it was parked way wrong, so we poked fun at that. Fortunately it wasn't her car, and it turned out we had met before at some party. She hadn't far to go, just a few blocks up the street. We had our beers as cars started honking. Neighbour Rick waved them through, lots of space, lots of space! Come on, we had a tractor trailer come through, if a tractor trailer can do it, you can do it! People were annoyed with the SUV half blocking the road. But it was quite good actually, it beautifully slowed down traffic. The lady, I now think she was called Margaret, but she probably wasn't, waited for the CAA to show, but it took an awful long time. In the end neighbour Rick decided to get his Terminator tool that he got at Canadian Tire, it can boost the battery or something. And it worked, so on her way she was. And back twenty minutes later, with an enormous pitcher of Margarita's! I got the lawn chairs out and we had a totally shameless party on our front lawn. Long after Margaret had gone, the CAA guy showed up, but Rick took care of him. And then I made dinner for everybody that we ate in neighbour Rick's back yard. And there is a typical South Riverdale weekend for you, aren't we all glad it's spring and the sun is out!

parent council meeting

I do like the city, certainly on a day like today. But I had a problem. I couldn't decide whether to go to the Parent Council Meeting in Otger's school, or the drawing class. So I wanted to keep my options open and set out to buy a new sketch book, my old one is full. I got on the streetcar, exactly like the little red ones in the picture, nothing ever changes in Toronto. I got off and walked to the art supply store, the one right next door to Piffin's art school, and I bought my sketch book. "Are you a student, a teacher, or otherwise?" "Otherwise". Then I walked to Pages, the bookstore around the corner, while sucking in Spring impressions. Nothing like art school students on a sunny day. But before I reached the bookstore Piffin called on my cell. I had her TTC pass, and she needed it. Shit, I even payed my streetcar fare with a ticket! Anyway, she allowed me to buy my magazine, if I bought her a Juxtapoz. I had planned on browsing through all the magazines, for acquistion inspiration. Okay, none of that. Back in the little red streetcar. But I still hadn't decided on whether to go to the meeting or the drawing. And then Tim canceled the drawing. I always have that, problems just solve themselves. Parent council it was. Pool closures, water fountains, and a new online bulletin board. But to sit there and observe these goings on was much more interesting than the actual topics. The vice principal was wearing wild shoes. And the legendary Canadian kindness of these people, as if nothing ever happens, and the city is really like in the picture. No, we do not want to announce that the water fountains are working again, because that would draw attention to the fact that there has been a problem. The students will figure it out by themselves, and we want to focus on more positive things. I love this city.

calm down

Otger was the only one drawing today. I was fighting a war of my own, getting my numbers ready for the accountant to do my taxes. I earned way more than I thought last year, ouch. So I really have to get all my deductibles right, or I'll pay myself silly. And then of course I got myself so nervous that I messed up my spread sheet. I just copied last year's spread sheet, but I hadn't noticed a scroll bar at the bottom of the document, and then when I did, I noticed there were still five or so rows hidden, with expenses from last year. And then when I deleted those, a whole bunch of my new rows became illegible. So stupid me decides to just close the document and reopen it, to get it back the way it was. Minus a full hour of work. If only I had thought about a "save as", but I didn't, because paperwork makes me nervous. Especially paperwork on spread sheets. Do you think I should have his grandfather talk to Otger about this weaponry? Grandfather slit his wrists to get out of the army.

philippe starck

The resurrection of Michiel, he is going to be a new man. We have tried to understand these photo's. A handsome guy with the Starck frame. A beautiful woman wearing the same frame. And an odd looking older guy. Why the picture of the odd looking older guy? To assure us that if he can get away with it, we could too? Well, it certainly looks very good on Michiel. And as for his grade of handsomeness, the optometrist payed him the compliment of the century. He took a long and close look at Michiel's face, and asked: "Did you have an accident when you were young?"

good friday

So learn something.

jacques-louis david

Just two days ago I was telling you about the shootings all around us in our hood. And what the flying fuck. The ladies Merrison had had dinner (very good lasagna, thanks) at our house, we let them out, and what do we see. The street at the corner cordoned off with a police line. And an officer standing there. So the ladies Merrison went over and asked what was going on, and reported back to me. I was on my flip flops and it's freaking cold out, so I stayed in. And what do you know, a stabbing. At the house next to the garden centre. Garden centre is a very big word for the business that sells soil in Summer and ploughs snow in Winter. The house next to it is inhabited by somewhat shady figures, I've seen some shouting matches going on there before. So I'm not that surprised. But it sort of makes me wish for the gentrification to speed up. Or is it the gentrification of the neighbourhood that brings out this violence? Are the poor people that us rich people are chasing out of town getting edgy? It's like living a film script with an open end...

crazy love

We watched the documentary Crazy Love. It is everything the title promises. Even Michiel and Piffin were mesmerized. Both of them tend to walk out on love stories, but this one was just too weird, I can't recommend it enough. The artwork above was done by the girl, after she was almost completely blinded with acid by her husband to be. To be, but not until after he spent fourteen years in prison. And it is much crazier than that. And for our own boring crazy loving family, Otger is home, jet lagged. Or very tired, at least. Fell asleep straight after dinner, did some gaming with his friend for an hour, and fell asleep again. Science test tomorrow, on everything he had to study over March break. Oh, well...

award!

The strangest mother & daughter picture so far, I think. And then I come home, sit down at the kitchen table with the newspaper and read about a mother with a transsexual kid. I can't read these things anymore without crying, I am on my way to become a sentimental little old lady, it gets worse and worse. I am pretty sure Piffin isn't transsexual though. The assignment was to build something to transform your body. Piffin built a pair of stilts, and crocheted a big giant dildo. Makes sense. And yes, you can imagine the dildo, it's not in the picture. Today was the presentation of all these transformations. I saw a guy dressed up as an angel, but other than that, I think she did the only sex change. And she won the best of class award! Twenty-Five dollars! (We never got money in the our day, huh) Honesty requires me to add that there also were 100 dollar awards, but she didn't win those. Still, there were far more students who didn't get any award, so I think she did pretty well. I know she did, her teacher came up to us, introduced herself, and told us she loved her. (I never had art school teachers tell my parents they loved me, huh)

alice in wonderland

We went to see Dutch theatre this afternoon. Gajes from Deventer played their Alice in Wonderland show at Nathan Phillips Square, and they were really good. Really. But to be honest, we had a hidden agenda. Gajes play on stilts, and Piffin is planning to do one of her own art projects on stilts. So she did some espionage on the troupe's hardware, and discovered that they nailed their shoes straight to the stilts. And that they wore knee pads. I am so loving those art school projects. After the theatre show we went and bought six handguns.

poesie

My contribution to the Dutch national poetry day. Or should I say my brother's contribution? This is what he wrote for me, March 31, 1968:

For starters
I find it difficult
To find something
and that is detestable

You know that everything is difficult
Even bike riding sometimes went wrong
that is why you will understand
that you have to persevere to get something done
that isn't easy

that is why dear girl
don't ever get mad
and don't ever get angry
because something doesn't work

Willy

art school

So nice of Piffin to keep us posted on the current state of affairs in art schools. FYI, this is a gigantic projection in a lecture hall. Funny, I heard someone doomsday on Dutch radio just yesterday, about what might happen when art schools become universities. Well, here you go.

cup and saucer

We bought a whole bunch of lovely Welsh earthenware, and if we would throw it on E-bay we would make a nice profit. But we won't, they are going to be a Piffin art project. I'll show you in two weeks, that's when it's due. She still needs a nice old little table, with curly feet, to present her stuff on. Any of you wouldn't have one for her, would you? Something like this would do.

jeff powis

No, it isn't Jeff in the picture, but it's a picture that tells everything I was going to say. My neighbour Jeff held a captivating lecture at the local library tonight, his little nine-year-old in the front row taking pictures of him with a gigantic SLR, cute. Jeff was the original producer of Manufactured Landscapes, followed Ed Burtynsky around the globe. The film won Best Canadian Film at the Toronto film festival. Tonight Jeff showed footage that didn't make it into the film, I have to make him do a longer private viewing one of these days. The ship wreck recycling in BanglaDesh, and the Three Gorges Dam in China, if that doesn't make you realize how privileged we are, nothing will. Of course it's not Ed Burtynsky in the picture above, nor is it Jeff. But it is the kind of camera Burtynsky schlepped through BanglaDesh and China. Which is also why I am not blogging any of his pictures, they don't work at 400 pixels. And of course it is Nicole Kidman in the picture, who was in front of Jeff's camera one fine day. Our whole street is proud of Jeff because of that.

bestiality

Quick, quick, for the children need the computer! My fair Otger hath studied a Midsummer Night's dream, morrow exam. He much preferth this merry BBC version to the Michelle Pfeiffer film, the boy has taste!

susanna hamnett

And we close off the week in style, by going to the theatre with the whole family. Our neighbour Susanna plays King Lear, all by herself, a one single woman show. She plays Lear, Cordelia, Goneril, Regan, everybody. Whole armies. Susanna used to be a clown and a Vaudeville artist, so it's even extremely funny. And at the same time still very much Shakespeare. If you're in Toronto, go see her in the Winchester Street Theatre, take your kids (and some blankets, I'm afraid they simply can't afford to heat the place). I heard Otger laugh out loud the whole time, pity it wasn't a Midsummer Night's Dream, his English exam next week is about a Midsummer Night's Dream. And Susanna is so so amazing. She is so good, she could easily be a star. But she walks her kids to and from school every day and seems to appreciate real life, and I imagine that hard to combine with stardom. There must be a hidden art world out there, filled with super talented mothers, doing great things in the margins.

savage gorilla

And all this because I want to tell you about my chapped feet. Apparently kids used to earn prizes by going door to door selling cream for chapped feet, guns no less. Since 1890, Cloverine® Salve has been the answer to skin care problems. A jack-of-all-trades, it soothes chapped, chafed and cracked lips - it is particularly useful for wind and sunburn. It's also great for chapped hands and faces, dry skin, minor cuts and burns, rashes and other skin irritations. I need it. Especially since I can't stop plucking all those funny hard chaps. It's starting to resemble nail biting. And then I pluck too much, and then, yes of course, I've got my left heel inflamed. It kills me when I put weight on it, so I walk real funny. Does this count as self mutilation?

d j weir

Great photo. This morning I listened to a radio interview with Douglas Coupland, in which he spoke about the viral marketing for his new book on YouTube. The book is set in a Staples store, and some of the YouTube clips are stop motion animations done in all staples. Totally random. (I have to keep my language up to date, sorry.) Linking too much work right now, just type "gum thief" in YouTube. And while you're at it, also type "Virginia Woolf Taylor". Coupland spoke about having seen the film as a child, and using it for his book, without first seeing it again, never mind, not important. But the film is awesome. The sound is way off in the YouTube clips, but that doesn't even matter much. Maybe even adds to it. Go look. Femke Halsema is becoming Elizabeth Taylor, don't you think? And then tonight I had another radio appearance myself. Went quite well, I had fun at least, doing it. Radio is such fun. You know what I think? It's like the actor friends we have. They're as if they live professionally. Where we ordinary mortals just walk and talk and eat and drink as we please, they are actually good and educated in doing those things, which makes them so nice to have around. They are good at being around. Same with those radio show hosts, they can really hold up a conversation. Maybe it's like dancing, and being led. But I don't dance, so I can't really say.

friend in snow

Piffin inside Starbucks, doing some paparazzi on her friend. And now they want the computer to upload some CD's they bought on their shopping spree.

rené magritte

It must have happened as I got off the streetcar. The cold against my head, or just a too sudden move of my brain, but I turned around numbers again. At first Otger was mad at me for getting off the streetcar at least three stops too soon. I really had made sure we had the right stop, still I didn't think anything of it. But as we approached 971, there were no shops at all, and I knew full well the Australian Boot Company is stuck between all kinds of other stores. So I checked my arm, I had written the number on my arm when Otger promised me he would not be able to remember it. 791. Shit. Back through all that slush and ankle deep water. Otger, sick from school, on his sneakers, in desperate need of winter boots. Wet to his knees almost. Fortunately we walk past Chippy's, so I can make it up to him. After that, dry socks and nice boots. He is not the only emergency in the store today, the customer before us arrived on All Stars. Everybody sent on their way with wet shoes in a plastic bag and a sturdy pair of Blundstones on their feet.

i am going to get expert advice

The Dutch christmas borrel at Toronto's Betty Ford clinic. Hi Guido! Are you really checking out my blog? How are my keywords? Look at my stats, bottom left. When do you figure I can stop working?

sean delonas

I was talking with a friend about how hard it is to draw really big women. And then I found this cartoon, and I thought that it was really cleverly done. And I wanted to blog it, so I would have it archived. But then I read that this cartoonist is really controversial, and right wing, and homo-phobic, and mean, it goes on and on. So I thought oh no, I can't blog that, I will have to find something else to blog. I'll just put the image into the folder where I keep all interesting images I find. But then I thought why so sneaky, I do admire the image, it is very well drawn. And so here it is.

a cultural test

Blackbird never tags anyone, but I know that if she did, she would tag me. So I consider myself tagged. And I consider all my blogging readers tagged by me.

What kind of soap is in your bathtub right now?
Pears.

Do you have any watermelon in your refrigerator?
No. It's clementine weather. (This is Blackbird's answer, but it goes for me too.)

What would you change about your living room?
I'd break away a few walls, finish sanding the floor, paint the walls, and install a tin ceiling.

Are the dishes in your dishwasher clean or dirty?
We don't have a dishwasher.

What is in your fridge?
Half an onion, cranberries, cumin Gouda, soup vegetables, dog food, mozarella, goat cheese, rose hip jam, eggs, margarine, butter, marmalade, ketchup, Dijon mustard, yellow mustard, maple syrup, left over gravy, turkey breast, smoked ham, hot sauce, milk, BBQ sauce, soy sauce, Tabasco, piccalilli, hamburger relish, capers, tartar sauce, pickles, sambal.

White or wheat bread?
Both.

What is on top of your refrigerator?
Dog food, dog biscuits, a bottle of sake, and a pile of printed recipes.

What color or design is on your shower curtain?
Stripes. Lots of colours.

How many plants are in your home?
None at all, I hate plants. They take up room.

Is your bed made right now?
Yes. And my electrical blanket is warming it up. For when I have finished typing this blog entry.

Comet or Soft Scrub?
Pardon me?

Is your closet organized?
Yes. But not very neatly piled.

Can you describe your flashlight?
Yes, we have mag-lites. I keep them in a kitchen cabinet together with the candles and the matches. For when there is a power outage.

Do you drink out of glass or plastic most of the time at home?
Glass! Plastic, what a disgusting idea.

Do you have iced tea made in a pitcher right now?
No.

If you have a garage, is it cluttered?
We don't have a garage.

Curtains or blinds?
Curtains.

How many pillows do you sleep with?
Two.

Do you sleep with any lights on at night?
No.

How often do you vacuum?
Once or twice a week.

Standard toothbrush or electric?
Standard. Hmm. I never thought of the opposite of electric as being 'standard.'
(I am leaving a lot of BB's answers unchanged)

What color is your toothbrush?
Magenta. But I urgently need a new one.

Do you have a welcome mat on your front porch?
I have a 4 x 6 sisal rug on the front porch.

What is in your oven right now?
The racks.

Is there anything under your bed?
Yes, a big folder with a series of lithographs Michiel did back in the eighties. We have no other place for it. And a baby's mattress.

Chore you hate doing the most?
Changing the beds.

What retro items are in your home?
I don't think we have anything retro. Retro is fake old. In our home everything that looks old is old.

Do you have a separate room that you use as an office?
No.

How many mirrors are in your home?
Many, probably more than thirty.

What color are your walls?
White, except the bathroom. Which I painted blue.

Do you keep any kind of protection weapons in your home?
No! This is an American tag, scary people, Americans.

What does your home smell like right now?
Of dog needing shower.

Favorite candle scent?
No!!

What kind of pickles (if any) are in your refrigerator right now?
Garlic and sweet.

What color is your favorite Bible?
This question is the reason I wanted this tag. Picture above. I don't leave the house without it.

Ever been on your roof?
No.

Do you own a stereo?
Yes, in the kitchen.

How many TVs do you have?
None.

How many house phones?
None.

Do you have a housekeeper?
Aside from me? No.

What style do you decorate in?
Eclectic minimalism.

Do you like solid colors in furniture or prints?
Solid.

Is there a smoke detector in your home?
There are a few. There are a couple of carbon monoxide detectors too.

In case of fire, what are the items in your house which you’d grab if you only could make one quick trip?
A coat. It's freaking cold out.

al capp

Strange, I was just researching negligees and marabou mules, for an illustration. I only found out today that they are called marabou mules, not that you're going to think too highly of me. My mother owned a pair, in baby blue with wedge heels. I remember how soft the pompoms were.

The Wikipedia about the cartoonist with the gangster name (why am I suddenly reminded of parent teacher night at Otger's school yesterday, mmm):
Born Alfred Gerald Caplin of Jewish heritage, Capp was the eldest child of Otto and Tillie Caplin, and a native of New Haven, Connecticut. He lost his right leg in a trolley accident at the age of nine.
Capp spent five years at Bridgeport High School in Bridgeport, Connecticut without receiving a diploma. The cartoonist liked to tell how he failed geometry for nine straight terms.

Oh, and by the way, it's not fair. Otger still has both his legs and his math teacher adores him. Oh, I know, it's because this site says that encouraged by an artistic father, young Alfred developed his own cartooning skills. And Otger's art teacher loves him too. And us too, the encouraging parents. Otger says he was still talking about me today. Unlike the incredibly good looking gym teacher :-( Rows of mothers lining up at his table!

florence kate upton

She began to sketch out ideas for a children’s book, using ‘penny wooden’ dolls as her models. However, without a central character on which to hang the tale, progress came to a standstill. Her aunt, Kate Hudson, found an old toy in her attic that had belonged to the Upton children, left behind from an earlier visit. This toy, which she named Golliwogg, provided inspiration, with the first story was produced in 1894. The publishing house of Longmans, Green & Co. offered Florence a contract, and The Adventures of Two Dutch Dolls and a Golliwogg was published for Christmas 1895.
During her stay in London Florence provided illustrations for the Strand, The Idler and Punch magazine. The American Society in London also commissioned a series of drawings and cartoons to decorate the souvenir programme of their November 1896 Thanksgiving Banquet. After three years of work, she returned to New York to attend the Art Students League, then continued studies in Paris and Holland. Returning to London in 1906 to take up permanent residence, she moved to 21 Great College Street in 1910.
Through the years Florence and Bertha collaborated on a total of thirteen Golliwogg adventures, the series ending as, over the years, cultural drift caused interest in the series to wane and Florence sought a career as a professional artist. The last of the Golliwogg books was published in 1909.
Florence continued to study and paint, concentrating mainly on portraits. She exhibited at the Royal Academy and other prominent venues and rapidly established a reputation as an accomplished society portraitist. Additionally, she received hundreds of commissions from the families of young soldiers.
Due to health issues, Florence was found unfit to serve in any physical capacity during the First World War. She instead aided the war effort by donating her original dolls and drawings to a fund-raising auction for the Red Cross, conducted by Christies in 1917. The dolls, sold as a lot, funded purchase of an ambulance, christened ‘Golliwogg’, which went to the front and served in France.
At the age of only 49, Florence Upton died in her studio on 16 October 1922, from complications following surgery. She is buried in West Hampstead Cemetery. For many years her vandalised grave was unidentifiable, with the headstone toppled face-down in the grass. The stone has now been set upright, courtesy of a Heritage Lottery grant, and awaits restoration.

postcards!

I am sorry if I had you check back a few times too often without even finding a website. We slept through the expiry date of our domain... But never mind, I will just give you two exiting posts tonight. My new post cards arrived! This is the first time I haven't physically gone to a real print shop. Instead I used one of those mega cheap internet ones. I feared for the print quality, but I figured it was worth a try. And what do you know, impeccable! I am really really happy with them, I am going to do more! And more! And more! And I will send post cards to all of you. (No I won't)

mural

Some good has come from this blog. Our dear neighbour and friend auntie Clare saw this drawing and fell in love with it, I can't blame her. For the longest time she has wanted to paint it on their mantelpiece, but you know how it goes. Busy lives. But tomorrow they are throwing their party of parties (hey, I bought a dress!) the mantelpiece has to look perfect, and it does. Doesn't it just?

bread pudding

Make sure to click the image. Sun-Maid raisins were about the only things that went right today, I made my lovely bread pudding. Very delicious, as soon as you collect 300 grams of left over old bread, you should try it. Today I made it because all of the old bits and pieces in the bread bin started out as outrageously expensive organic loaves, and who feels good throwing those out? Recipe: soak 300 grams of bread in lukewarm sweetened (175 grams sugar) milk. Squeeze it to mash. Then add some cinnamon, a generous hand full of raisins, vanilla essence, and 5 beaten eggs. Into a form and into the oven at 390 Fahrenheit, or 200 Celsius. 45 minutes. Very very good. And what went not good today, I hear you ask. The radio. My stories (story one, story two) were interesting enough, but the host was in love with my counterpart in Beijing. I have gotten used to the style of the radio program. I tell my story, and then I get some questions so I can fill in whatever I didn't make clear enough in my first go. Not so tonight, the questions went to Beijing, I was merely an intermezzo it felt like, bleah.

Anyway, the daily Louisiana tune, until the husband is back. Sit tight boys and girls, you can learn something.

otto soglow

We are slowly turning into a lost and found here. Otger keeps loosing stuff, first his metro pass. Then I notice his math marks drop into the seventies, he's lost his calculator, and didn't tell anyone. And his math book, he even lost his math book. He couldn't do his homework, but fortunately the next day a classmate gets him his book back. Then he looses his wallet, with some money, his TTC tickets, and his school and TTC ID's. He gets a form at the school office and takes it to Sherbourne station to get a new ID, but he forgets to take enough money. Which was a good thing, because at home, he immediately finds his wallet. Piffin lost her cell phone, which I find out when I get a call from the lady in Chinatown who found it. Michiel thought he lost his wallet, calls home, and Piffin finds it beside the bread bin. Then he looses the power cable to his laptop. And Michiel found a cell phone in Riverdale Park, which we returned to a very relieved owner. And don't forget the sweet chocolate lab we found roaming our street a while ago, which we got back to its worried sick owner. And then today I found a key chain while walking Orbit. I had already noticed a lost keys sign for days, lost keys on a Swiss Army knife. And there they were. I emailed to the email address on the sign. And the happy happy owner came to collect his keys tonight. And rewarded me with a very nice bottle of red wine. Cheers Charles!

terry gilliam

Tonight we watched Tideland. Piffin said she always thought nobody knew what goes on in little girls heads. That this film is exactly like what went on in her head as a child. Only she played with headless bodies, rather than with bodiless heads, but that is a minor detail. Or maybe rather significant, on second thought, mmm. Anyway, she said that because she didn't have one, she had to imagine an unhappy youth. Otger was wise, he stubbornly stayed out of this conversation. I think he was the only one genuinely shocked.

jean-honoré fragonard

The sketching phase is slow when the subject is more interesting. I get distracted. Check this (sorry, it's Dutch). There's also loads of great golden calves, it's amazing. Nicolas Poussin, Raphael, Willem Doudijns, Claude Lorraine, Jan Steen, Lucas van Leijden, Filippo Lippi. And no, I am not going to link all of that. Goodnight, I'll see you in my dreams.

earplug

Piffin made a giant iPod earplug, isn't it cute? Her iPod fits inside, so it actually makes music. I drove it to OCAD in the Beetle. It was a perfect fit with the rear seats down. Piffin has been in the basement for days on end, sculpting away in Styrofoam. And covering the thing in duct tape. Duct tape is always good. I am a bit wary though, about four years of art school. The house will get clogged with sculptures.

just like tom thumb's blues

When I research a subject, I always like to Google in different languages, I get so much more results that way. But sometimes my translating skills are too limited, and that's where my friends in the dog park come in. Dinah knew that Kleinduimpje in English is Little Tom Thumb. After that it was easy, he's called le petit Poucet in French, and in Germany the story is known as Däumerlings Wanderschaft. Anyway, I ended up playing all the versions of Tom Thumb's blues I could find. Neil Young is good too, and Nina Simone is just magic, but there's only sound. And Bryan Ferry believe it or not. Hell, it's just a great song, even that girl in her kitchen is fantastic.

piero della francesca

Piffin has to study this painting for her midterm exam. Now I always thought his nose was this shape because of syphilis, but apparently I always thought wrong, it was a tournament. My nose feels like it is exactly this shape, which in my case must be due to syphilis, because I wasn't in any tournament.

al hirschfeld

I snore. The other night Michiel couldn't take it anymore and he shook my shoulder, trying to get me to turn around, he always does that. I remember almost waking up, but not entirely. I remember thinking, no, no no no no, I am not going to turn, and I am going to pretend I don't notice him shaking my shoulder, and I am going to continue to snore. I remember feeling quite proud of myself for being so subordinate. A while later he shook again, harder. Then I did turn. Mind you, Michiel snores too. And so does Orbit. Sometimes the kids complain about the concerts coming from the master bedroom.

hank ketcham

Otger won. He saw the first snow of the year. His beautiful school is a film set constantly, and today they were shooting a winter day in the classroom right under Otger's. With fake snow falling outside the windows. I have to ask him to find out what film they're shooting, so we can go see it. And I had my neighbour Dennis explain poverty in Canada to me. He writes books about it. And tomorrow I'll be on the radio again. I think it will make an excellent subject, not one single party addresses it in their election campaign, it was in the papers. Dennis explained why. I'll tell you tomorrow. It is also a good subject because the radio people always put me up against someone in some poor war ridden third world country, as a contrast. As if Canada is the land of milk and honey, where in fact Canada is a welfare state in decline, where many people live in poverty.

etta james & dr.john

Piffin needs the computer tonight, so I just give you a little youtube. As if you can't youtube yourself. But make sure to watch it through all the way to the end, you won't regret it.

willem velthoven

Having read yesterday's comments, it seems I do have to state the obvious. Of course I am a feminist, and I think women of today (the privileged ones in developed countries) have an awful lot to thank feminism for. I see no reason to sit back and relax and be unconcerned. We made a list during dinner. En famille. Piffin can be openly gay. We can vote. We can work, even after marriage. We can study. We have birth control, without it, I would have surely become a nun, just like my three aunts, yay for them. We can have an abortion. We can have a bank account. We have full legal capacity. But women still don't get the same pay for the same work. We can say no when we don't feel like having sex. We can get drunk. We can divorce without scandal. We can have premarital sex without scandal. We can choose our last name when we get married. OCAD's president Sara Diamond only hires women. And Facebook closed a breast feeding group because of nudity. It's a crying shame, I am proud to say that I breast fed my kids anytime and anywhere. Which brings me back to yesterday. I can't see what is feminist about not taking care of your own children. Say we have a $100.000 family income. We could try to each generate half. But I'm afraid we would both have to find a different job to achieve that. Would 60/40 still be okay? 70/30? Silly right? Or should we, for appreciation's sake, both make 100 and hire cleaners, gardeners, chauffeurs, nannies and stylists to live our lives for us?

sweet sensation

Old enough for this song to be part of my personal luggage, and still suffering from monthly indisposition. Bwaaaak.

alvar aalto

We bought two of these this morning at a yard sale (2$ each). No Ineke, not in Cabbagetown, but gewoonweg around the corner. And really beautiful seventies spot lights for Otger's room, for 0$. We did go to Cabbagetown, and even before you suggested it. Only I have to admit it was by accident, on our morning walk with Orbit. We didn't even have money on us. It was quite shocking to find that we fit right in there. I felt a slight Zutphen syndrome creeping up on me, but according to Michiel World Peace would break out instantly if everybody was like the people in Cabbagetown. I was sceptical though, I said to him that the vast majority of the world outside Cabbagetown couldn't even afford to dress in a way that wouldn't stand out in the streets of Cabbagetown. Whereupon Michiel looked at himself and thought it wasn't all that bad. Whereupon I pointed out his Blundstone boots, his BlackBerry, his new MEC T-shirt, and his Lindberg glasses to him. Whereupon we wondered when this had happened.

which one would you choose?

Piffin's school:
The school has often found itself at the centre of Toronto's cultural and artistic nexus. In 1969-70, during his brief period of tenure, the President, Roy Ascott, radically challenged the pedagogy and curriculum structure of the College. The Ontario College of Art, OCA's open door culture of the mid-seventies' era, influenced science fiction/cyberpunk novelist William Gibson's years as he was dreaming up Cyberspace.[citation needed] At the turn of the 1980s, OCAD was a major participant in the Queen Street West scene. A new generation of artists such as General Idea, Jeremiah Chechik and Isobel Harry helped transform the run-down neighbourhood into a "Toronto's Soho". The scene evolved its own version of punk/new wave, featuring acts such as Parachute Club, Molly Johnson, and alumni Martha and the Muffins and Mary Margaret O'Hara. Sound and video artist David Rokeby's Very Nervouse System, relized Unincumbered Reality.

Otger's school:
The building has been added to many times since it was founded, and there are sections of the school built in almost every decade. Danforth has a reputation for its maze-like basement and general complexity. At least one basement level is permanently sealed to students creating a number of rumours about what might be down there (including a connection to the subway that runs under the school, a rifle range, and a bomb shelter). The sub basement does in fact coe school's active Cadet Corps and National Defence course, according to the current principal the range is still mostly intact. The school has three gyms, which is remarkable in a Toronto public school, and a large 1920s auditorium which is occasionally used in films (such as the final scenes of Billy Madison). Additional facilities include a high quality weight room, and a small swimming pool.
Danforth is known for having sent more of its students and staff to the Second World War than any other school in Canada, and has a large stained-glass window in the library to act as its war memorial.

woody allen

My dear friend in Tuvalu blogged this yesterday. I have told you my Annie Hall memories before, but one can never see this scene -what I wouldn't give for a large sock with horse manure in it- enough times.

moi non plus

Let me make some free promotion for the little jewelry shop on Queen and Broadview, where we stopped and lingered to wait for a streetcar. Might come in handy for someone who happens to need an engagement ring.

niagara

I downloaded the photo's from the camera today, and found this picture. Isn't it just magnificent? Piffin took it in Niagara, she and Daphne went to the falls by Greyhound, day before yesterday. I immediately stole the photo for my desktop, Piffin smiled as she came in and saw it. The photo is so amazing, full of detail and still so simple. The beautiful girl, focusing on that piece of paper. Those crazy bags, the garbage, dirty hands on the windows. The light is just right, the colours look as if they were chosen. You go to see the falls, and come back with a photo of the bus terminal. Such is the winding road of life.

guillermo mordillo

Very nice studio, I wish I had one half as nice. We were talking about Mordillo the other day, I don't remember why. We talk about lots of things. We couldn't remember in which Dutch magazines his cartoons used to appear. So I throw that question on the blog, you guys know everything. Mordillo was immensely popular in the seventies, my sister-in-law put his cartoons up in her bathroom, and that is a status not easily achieved. Was he in the Panorama? Nieuwe Revu? I can't imagine my sister-in-law reading those. Unfortunately I can't ask her, she renounced me. The Libelle then? Help us out. I was never a big fan of Mordillo's humour, his cartoons always gave me a kind of physical sensation around my stomach, I don't know. But then I experienced lots of strange physical sensations in the seventies.

If you want to follow up on my Wacom pen misery, then read yesterday's comments. And of course Carbon Computing did not have my new pen ready for me today, as they promised. I knew it. Vistek said it would take two weeks, so I was skeptical when Carbon promised two days.

frederick varley

This where I took them, or at least, it looks very much like this. Wasn't easy to get back in the car and drive back to the smog. A back country only camp ground. A trailer with a student, a parking lot, and a dock. You reserve your site, get your canoe, throw your stuff in, and good luck. Heaven. Piffin and Daphne put their canoe in the water, Daphne jumped in without paddles, drifted off, tried to paddle back with her hands, then drifted to the next dock, got hold of that, Piffin carried their luggage there, and went about things a little less impulsive. I hope they have enough food, they won't be able to buy anything, there is nothing there. But they do have their own private sandy beach. I'll pick them up again Friday.

savages

We found The Golden Book Encyclopedia in the garbage when we were walking Orbit. Unfortunately not all volumes, otherwise I would have scanned something about camping, or about rattlesnakes. Piffin and Daphne are planning their camping trip. I agreed to drive them to Massassauga Park tomorrow, if they have camp sites available, that is. This is what the encyclopedia -copyright 1959- has to say about savages:

"You are acting like savages" children are sometimes told when they are cruel or when they have bad manners. Such a saying is not fair to savages. Most savages follow carefully their own ideas of good manners. And not all savages are cruel. Savages are merely people who are not yet civilized. They live much as our ancestors lived thousands of years ago.

antonín dvořák

One of the spooky dinner guests from the previous post invited me to the rehearsal of her string quartet tonight, just as I was cleaning my kitchen floor. So I threw on a clean T-shirt and headed over to Kevan's grand piano. They had planned on rehearsing in an old people's home, but that somehow got canceled, hence Kevan's piano, and Kevan immediately offered the quartet to come over daily. The music was magic, and after a while I was their only audience, I felt so privileged. They were practicing Dvorak's string quartet in four movements, which they will perform this Thursday in Parry Sound. Now the second movement has a very well known theme. I asked them about it, I asked why does that sound so familiar. But none of them knew, they didn't think it was ever used in a movie or a song or anything. But I'm sure, and neighbour Marilyn was too. Those classical buffs just don't know about popular music. I am thinking David Bowie or Nina Simone or Billie Holliday even. I can't stand it that it doesn't come to me, I can almost hear the song, damn. Dvorak also used bits of negro spirituals, maybe it's that, maybe it's Billie Holiday singing a spiritual with the same theme. I guess you can't help out, can you? I could sing it to you, but then again...

Thanks to Pom, we at least have Dvorak. Now who comes up with the song?

IJsbrand knew the song, hurray!! It was Nat King Cole.

But I was partly right, Bowie sang the song too.

And Jamie Cullum.

And here I read this:
"Nature Boy" by Nat King Cole with the same theme as the first several notes of the opening of the second movement of Dvorak’s Piano Quintet in A, Op. 81. [Court Case: Eden Ahbez, who wrote “Nature Boy” didn’t have Dvorak in mind, but he was sued over it anyway. He was quoting a Yiddish song that has the same theme].

And the Wikipedia has this: The Yiddish songwriter Herman Yablakoff alleged that the melody to "Nature Boy" came from his song "Sveig Mein Hartz" ("Be Still My Heart"); his legal action was settled out of court.

les poppys

I think Lotte will like this video. I am totally into old French songs at the moment, please forgive me. The Dutch radio can't stop playing Julien Clerc and the likes in Summer. I can't imagine what would happen if the Tour de France would really cease to exist. It won't happen, dope or no dope. We, the public, need our French songs fix. I once saw Julien Clerc in real life! As he came out of his car at the Dutch TV studio's in Hilversum. We we were on a guided tour there with my art school. And I also saw the Tour the France once, in real life. We were on a camping holiday in France, and the Tour hit our village. Just a pass through though, on a straight and flat road, it went very fast. The sponsors were dangerous! They threw all kinds of treats at the public alongside the road, but they went full speed. And some of them were throwing video cassettes.

hans warren

I came across this self portrait of Hans Warren while searching for something else, isn't it always that way. I decided to post it especially for my father-in-law Willem, who often writes about Warren on his weblog. Hans Warren used to be best friends with his older brother, back in the remote and tiny village of Borssele. So remote and tiny that nobody thought anything of it, when Hans walked around wearing make-up. People just had no idea about homosexuality. Our family turns up repeatedly in Warren's famous published diaries, and not always in a positive way. I believe some family members were less than pleased with the success of Warren's diaries. Come to think of it, isn't it odd that this would be a self portrait? When it is, he obviously didn't use a mirror. But I could even imagine that Willem's brother did the painting, Willem's brother was a painter. I'll ask Willem when he's back from his chess tournament.

william forsythe

I sort of promised to post a picture of the Forsythe installation that Piffin worked on last weekend. Note the guy's socks, they're H&M, Piffin has a pair as well, they're neat. I guess that's the downside of buying at H&M, you end up very ununique. But we were talking about William Forsythe. We saw one of his ballets when we lived in Frankfurt. A friend of a friend had been a dancer in his company, and an intendant after she was too old. She got us tickets. Very nice of her. I had never seen anything like it in my life, it was super incredible fantastic. If you ever get the chance to see those guys perform, go for it. The audience went berserk, yelling and screaming. It was a very hot night as well, I remember. And I remember a male dancer in a little yellow skirt, breath taking.

edgar degas

It was two o'clock in the morning by the time Michiel was home from Guelph. Orbit has Intervertebral Disc Disease. A sort of hernia. In an advanced stage. No wonder, after two misdiagnoses. Remember his strained muscle a couple of months ago? And his so called ulcer. Let us learn from this to always think for ourselves in future, and not just swallow some doctor's words. This thing is making me rather cynical. Anyway. Operating was very urgent, but he had to have an MRI done first. And due to lots of other emergencies, they couldn't do the MRI until late afternoon. The plan was to take him straight to the OR after the MRI, while still under anesthetic. But that would have meant operating after hours, and that is 1000 $ per hour extra. We decided enough is enough, we are not the Trumps. And thus Orbit is going to have his operation tomorrow. If all goes well it will take him four to six weeks to recover, in a crate. No walking. We don't know if he will make a full recovery, because the disease is so advanced. We will have lots of veterinarian blogging here.

women in art

I'm just putting this here so I can look at it myself 25 times or more.

picasso comic

This image was in the folder where I keep nice internet finds, I don't remember where I got this one. I've got the nasty habit of seeing all the art I encounter in relation to my own petty life, gets me into trouble sometimes, but I mean well. Let's exaggerate. Uncle Pablo drew this comic about Eliane's day, May 30, 2007.

1. (top left) Orbit is feeling sick today, he lies on the floor like a wet door mat. I know it's a horse in the image, but Picasso may have meant to draw a dog, who knows.
2. It was a hot and humid day. As I was walking Orbit this morning, I felt like lying down.
3. Piffin is still helping Ron to build all those creatures for the new ROM opening parade.
4. I got hate mail today, because of a totally misinterpreted blog entry. Am I really that hard to understand? How does one avoid unintentionally offending people?
5. I know a very short black guy with two big white dogs. He came to my door today because he had run out of plastic bags, and one of his dogs had pooped in the church yard.
6. Michiel pulled two very ugly big conifers out of the front yard.
7. The cashier in the supermarket was desperate and exhausted after having to recalculate a customer's receipt over and over and over again. The old man was convinced he was being cheated out of his money.
8. Otger is getting ready for bed. I will go upstairs to bring him a good night hug as soon as I am done with this.
9. At lunch time neighbour Michele walked by with her two kids. One was bleeding from all of her joints, after her first rock & roll accident as her mother called it. Missed the corner at the bottom of the slope in Withrow Park on her scooter. And the other one said his first word ever to me! He shouted "Bye!"

ambrogio bondone giotto

Whenever there is a holiday in Canada, there is no holiday in Holland. Same thing other way around. Everybody at home because of Victoria day, I work. Today I was all set to go, but it's Pentecost in Holland. Of course it is also Pentecost here, but it's not an official holiday in Canada. I did reach one editor, but he wasn't quite sure which author I am going to have to draw. So I did some sketching, but not too much. I trust I'll have her in the mail tomorrow morning. Funny thing, those different holidays everywhere. The best one was German, Buß- und Bettag. Nobody ever really understood what Buß- und Bettag was about, but it was always vehemently defended as a holiday. We left Germany in 1995. The year -I just discovered, I learn so much from blogging- Buß- und Bettag was abolished. To finance a national health insurance. I hope Holland will never do away with the holy spirit, or Canada with Queen Victoria's birthday. One can never have enough holidays.

andrei tarkovsky

Look what I found, the movie that Tarkovski graduated with from film school, in 1960! It is apparently a very obscure film, but now available on DVD, and very much worth viewing. On Andrei's report card I found an interesting, yet trivial detail. Tarkovsky was excused from physical education. I'll have to show Otger this in the morning. I just got Otger the same privilege. The bullying in gym class had reached such a hopeless level, that the teacher and the principal and I decided not to bother with it anymore. Our little nerdy nerd can get his exercise dog walking and bike riding. I wonder why Tarkovsky was excused. There's a lot of Tarkovsky on youtube, if you feel like it. Not The Steamroller and the Violin though.

harm kamerlingh onnes

Not blogging my current project doesn't keep me from showing images I come across researching my project. This drawing is called Karel Appel show. No agreeably calm museum visits here today. We went to a very loud gathering. Fucking Walmart is moving into our neighbourhood. Apparently they cover all the suburbs in North America, and are now starting to explore their next frontier, the downtown cores. Hundreds of very committed people at the meeting tonight, but whether we will be able to stop this Moloch?

work in progress

I'll be working on a project for Zwijsen in the next couple of weeks. And I don't think they allow me to blog the images. Don't worry, there is plenty of other stuff, a nice change even from always blogging my own things. Piffin showed me her last painting this morning, and I promised her I would have an opinion about it by the time she's home tonight. So I thought I'd call in your help. What do you think? Does it need something more, this painting? What would you add? I think it maybe needs a second painting next to it, to emphasize the horizontal composition. I like the way in which Piffin handles her paint. This painting is 60 cm (almost 24 inches) wide. Any thoughts?

richard case (I assume)

This is not about the comic, I just thought they were nice rain drawings. Read about this strange comic strip here, the woman has 64 personalities, should be an interesting enough read. But Toronto today is all about weather. The first steaming hot humid day, starting with a fantastic thunderstorm early in the morning, and ending with one tonight. I love it, all-or-nothing-weather. But I didn't paint in it, I just watched it sitting on the porch. And in bed, this morning. Because of the cold I am having I was snoring horribly, according to my dear husband. So when the thunderstorm woke me up, at a quarter to six this morning, he was already gone. To work, mind you. Soaking wet at the office. The things I do to men...

burn baby burn

Now I missed Thursday because we had a fire! I was having my morning coffee on the porch when I heard a crackling sound, and I thought to myself, that sounds like fire. But I didn't smell anything, and I decided to ignore it. But the sound grew louder rather quickly, so I got up from my chair to look into the laneway where the sound was coming from. At the same time a gentleman across the street started shouting "fire!". So I hurried around the house and saw these incredible flames in the alley behind our house. I ran into the house and called 911. Fortunately the firehouse is really close, so it took them only a few minutes to get here, and put out the fire. A couch and four car tires. And a garden fence. But my, did those things ever burn. Scary! And then, when I finally got back at my computer, I realized that our internet cable runs exactly over the spot where that damn fire was. And yes indeed, meltdown. To make myself feel better, I bought a peony for my front yard. For... 9.11 $ no kidding. And now, through a brand new Canadian-style primitive laundry line:

Thursday, only one song, I'm a lousy songfinder:
David Bowie

Fridays seem to be especially popular with rappers:
The Cure - R.Kelly - Eminem - Ice Cube - megadeth - The Easybeats (thanks IJsbrand)

And the winner is: Friday's child by Nancy Sinatra.

gloomy sunday

Maroon 5 - U2 - Billie Holiday - Sia - Johnny Cash - Oasis - Morrisey - Earth Wind & Fire - Lionel Richie

More?

albert termote

They didn't ask about plays, they asked about sculptures. Is there a sculpture or statue in your neighborhood? And yes, there is good old Dr. Sun Yat-Sen where I walk Orbit every day. But Dr. Sun Yat-Sen must have sounded boring to my radio show host. He asked me whether I liked the statue, and why. Why indeed. Well, I think a park should have a statue. Just because. I remember when I was little, in our park in Eindhoven. I have never forgotten the radio monument there, a lady hanging over a pond, calling out to Indonesia, a Dutch colony at the time. Of course to my radio show host the idea of a radio monument had more appeal than Dr. Sun Yat-Sen could ever. And then I also did the good deed of explaining the commotion about the Canadian forces in Afghanistan handing over prisoners to the Afghans to torture. I hope I came across halfway coherent. And I sure hope O'Connor will resign. And I amused Holland with the Toronto FC and the Kansas City Wizards...

I quite liked the question actually. Let's repeat it. Is there a sculpture where you live?

she-she-sheep

Piffin's second ever art show! (Her first one was years ago, back in Belgium, I can't believe I never blogged that, I thought I had. With this kind of work, but then a life size baby elephant) The show today is one with the best student work from different Toronto high schools. We traveled all the way across town to Etobicoke for it, train, train, train, bus, bus, bus. To a mall in the middle of nowhere, with parking lots for millions of cars. A small miracle that they have public transport going there at all. We enjoyed a lovely Canadian dinner. And this one is for IJsbrand.

rafal olbinski

If I had known there would be no author for me to draw this week, I would have taken the weekend off and done the Dutch Woman piece after the weekend. But as usual, things turn out for the best. I am sort of having an unexpected weekend now, it is suddenly raining tickets. Okay, it already started raining while I was still doing the piece on Sunday, and Eva took us to see a Dutch film. And then Wilmar had Marlies tickets for my boys. And then last night Piffin and I went for some great jazz. And tonight the Elektra dress rehearsal. What have I done to deserve this?

brant parker and johnny hart

I think you can guess what we've been up to today. And about the Wizard of Id, in Holland he is called de Tovenaar van Fop. Many years ago I shared a house with some students. One of them was christian, but otherwise very nice. We decided to share a newspaper subscription, and Pernelle insisted on a christian newspaper. After she moved to a different address, I canceled the christian newspaper. They wanted to know why I cancelled, and I replied that I preferred the Wizard of Id, which ran in the Volkskrant.

gerrit rietveld

We found a very elegant solution for Piffin's problem. Michiel makes her really small furniture, and now she looks a lot taller.

radio

I was on the radio tonight, you could listen to it if you really wanted to, as soon as they upload tonight's episode. Theme tonight was organ donation, they had listeners call in to offer their shocking thoughts. No, I won't have anybody transplant my brain! Lucky potential receiver. And then a gentleman from Mexico and myself had to deliver some local news. Now in today's Canadian newspapers it was budget, budget, budget, budget. The federal government presented the budget, big thing. No way was I going to explain the Canadian federal budget to a Dutch radio audience. So I took what little there was of other news; poisoned pet food. Heart breaking story. But the gentleman from Mexico had such a load of hard boiled Armageddon size real world tragedies, that my pet food sounded awful meager. I thought about throwing in Toronto's mayor David Miller, who is officially Canada's smartest mayor after taking the lead in the mayors team at Test the Nation. But that would have made a ridiculous contrast.

richard ansdell

The lady through whom we adopted him told us Orbit had a seventeen page medical history. She would fax it to our vet as soon as we would find one. Well, we still haven't. The seventeen pages will remain a mystery. Orbit was on a diet, he only ate special dog food with fish in it, because he was allergic to meat. And he was on prednisone. Yes, go ahead, read that again, prednisone. Steroids. Because of nervous bowel syndrome, would you believe it. And he had all sorts of anxieties too, I won't bore you with those. The diet was easy, Orbit couldn't wait to get off it. He loves meat, allergic, get out of here. We're feeding him tripe now, his bowl empty in seconds! But a friend of mine who is a pediatrician warned me about the prednisone. Don't do that too fast, he'll die. Okay, we can't have dying. So only on days where I was absolutely super sure Orbit was strong and healthy, I brought his dose down a quarter tablet. It took ages, I was terrified the dog would die on me. But I was determined to do it without a vet, this dog had seen too many vets in his life, making money off him. Scaring his owners into coming back. They take courses in that you know, vets. And I am such an easy target, so I stay away as far as I can. Remember that periodontist guy? I bet he had taken keep-them-coming-back courses, god he was scary. Using the word disease three times in every sentence. Having me pay for appointments where he would only talk to me. Fortunately I have a phone with a display, I just stopped picking up when he called. I find all doctors not covered by OHIP act that way. And Orbit's previous owners must have been the total vet victims. Vets like that should be prosecuted. Orbit is a different dog without the prednisone. He doesn't fart anymore, thank the lord. He used to fart constantly, who knows his previous owners put him up for adoption because of it. And he suddenly enjoys petting and hugging very very much. Poor dog, he was almost indifferent to that before. And when he sleeps he gives off these happy sighs... To other dogs he is nicer than before. He lost some weight, but not too much. And sure, he has a sensitive bowel. Whenever he eats something yuckie off the street, he throws up after, or has some diarrhea the next day. But that's no syndrome!

josé saramago

Another guessing game. The other way around this time, who on earth did this illustration? I'd love to credit the artist, but the image is orphaned, I found it here. I finished Saramago's novel Blindness tonight. It took me a week longer than Otger. I gave it to Otger myself, it seemed like a book he would like: "In an unnamed city in an unnamed country, a man sitting in his car waiting for a traffic light to change is suddenly struck blind. But instead of being plunged into darkness, this man sees everything white, as if he "were caught in a mist or had fallen into a milky sea." Otger read it in three days, Otger reads anything in three days. Otger is a reader like my father was, it almost doesn't matter what you give them, a good book or a bad book, an easy one or a hard one, he likes everything. I did ask Otger how the book was, during those three days. He told me the story was quite horrible, and that he could handle it, but only just, and he suggested that maybe I wouldn't give him any even more horrible stories. Now I really had to read the book myself. Shit! Not only is this a really hard book to read, but it is also really disturbing. I mean, it's a great novel, I loved it, I can totally see why they gave this guy the Nobel prize, and I think great novels should be disturbing, but giving it to my teenage son was maybe a tad irresponsible. And he just read this? I am shocked and proud. I mean, he isn't the first thirteen-year-old to read grown up novels, and he won't be the last. And at his rate you can't expect me to read all of his books before him. So maybe we'll just have to live dangerously. Or better still, throw some suggestions in the comments!

n d wilson

I found this through The Paper Man, and I like it so much, I just have to have it on my blog too, thank you, Paper Man! The Napkin Fiction Project, you can use this Saturday to read all the stories on the Esquire website:

We put 250 napkins in the mail to writers from all over the country--some with a half dozen books to their name, others just finishing their first. In return, we got nearly a hundred stories.

For obvious reasons, I like N.D. Wilson's contribution best. But I must confess I haven't read it yet. Dammit, I don't even have time to write this blog entry.

Update: I read the story, read it, it's hilarious. Only I don't understand how he could tell it was breast milk in the bottle. Do you?

federico fellini

A Sunday dinner like it's meant to be. And ours wasn't half bad either, we felt like fries, and Michiel went to Zellers at half past five and bought himself a deep fryer! And made pepper/mustard steaks with the fries, mmm. And we didn't fight like in the scene above. Or otherwise. And don't worry, we don't understand Italian either, use your imagination. And there's more Amarcord on Youtube, just do a search, it's so beautiful.

edvard munch

I have to draw a sick child for the parental advice column. And researching how sick children get depicted, I realized sick children are a classic theme in painting. Of course I sort of knew that all along, but I just hadn't thought of it. Children used to be sick a lot, thank god those times have changed. I collaged together what I found. I like it when I get to do a real standard situation. Like the psychiatrist cartoon, I did one of those. Well, I never really do cartoons, but still. And the Odalisque. Madonna and child. Venus. I haven't done a desert island yet. I'd love to do a desert island cartoon. Well, I never really do cartoons, but still. Who can come up more standard situations? Or classic themes, if you'd rather do painting. I don't care about those differences.

my true inner self

Fallon & Rosof went to see a Robert Crumb exhibit - original drawings from the early ’60s to 2004 - in Philadelphia and took lots of pictures, I thank them for that. I already mouthwater seeing the images on Flickr, and can only imagine the experience of seeing a tangible Crumb sketchbook, and flipping through the pages: "The ’60s-era sketchbook is especially rich background material. It conveys the fertile imagination and manic exuberance of the artist once considered “just” a comic book artist but now embraced by the art world as our century’s Daumier, Goya or Brueghel."

The links on my previous Crumb post are still working, and still interesting.

constantin brancusi

My dog walking friend Pamela invited me over to her house this morning, she wanted me to show her some computer stuff. And I desperately wanted to see her place, because not only is she a painter, but her husband is a special effects guy, and their house is packed with latex monsters and animals, and chopped off limbs and such. But then her husband called from a studio, where they were shooting a commercial for a radio station. He had forgotten something, could she bring it, by all means. So there I am, in the middle of a studio set, swarming with people. Camera people, sound people, advertising people, radio people, what have you. I expected to be thrown out for trespassing any second. But I guess this is Canada, everybody is just so unbelievably nice all the time. The director came up to us to shake hands. I expressed my amazement to Pamela. She said that for all he knew, I could be the owner of the radio station. Well yeaheah, one day I look like a psychiatrist, and now I look like the owner of a radio station? Makes me wonder what I really *do* look like. Anyway, best part of course was seeing the Canadian version of Giel, naked and slimy, making his way out of the giant egg Pamela and her husband made...

circle

Thanks to Björn for finding this video. In our first year of art school we also had to practice drawing circles. Circles and ellipses. Sheet after sheet after sheet after sheet, I don't remember the requirements exactly. The teacher was called Brein, in English that translates to Brain. Of course practicing circles was boring, we didn't know about any World Championships. I doubt if that would have made us more ambitious. But when the day arrived that our circles were going to be reviewed, nobody had done enough work. Fortunately mister Brain called us into his room one by one, which gave us the chance to provide every student with more than the required amount of work, in the hallway the drawings mysteriously traveled from one portfolio into the next. So we all went into mister Brain's room with the same drawings. He never noticed. Or maybe he did, but he never said anything. Strangely enough, all the students got different marks.

maurizio cattelan

I was in the process of writing yesterday's-today's-whatever blog entry. I post-date this, it secretly is Friday morning. And then I kept hearing this noise in the chimney beside my desk. I knew it had to be a squirrel, but it freaked me out. I my imagination it was already running around my studio. In the silence of the night sounds can be so frightening! I turned off the lights and went to bed, I didn't even turn off the computer. So first thing in my pajamas, the unfinished business.

chili sin carne

I told my doctor a Picasso story today, but not about the painting above. About one he had hanging over his treatment table. Anyway, he appreciated the story, but that was not what I was going to say. Last night I promised Michele I would blog the recipes of the food I fed her. And I am such a people pleaser, so I do. Warning, this is not food of the christmassy kind, I had had enough of that. Michele too, she is playing the Nutcracker... This is just honest straightforward and wholesome food. Fits the weather. Now Michele is a vegetarian, so I had to turn my chili con carne into something vegetarian, and it didn't even turn out too bad. Which is not to say I don't prefer the meaty version myself. It's a Jamie Oliver recipe, I have to admit. I got it off the BBC food website years ago, and I must have made it a hundred times. I tried other recipes, but always returned to this one:

2 medium onions
1 garlic clove
olive oil
2 tsp chili powder
1 fresh chili, deseeded and finely chopped
1 tsp ground cumin (or crushed cumin seeds)
sea salt and freshly ground pepper
450g /1lb chuck steak, or ground beef, which I replaced by a handful of soaked gray lentils, a handful of chopped mushrooms and a block of extra firm tofu
a jar of sun-dried tomatoes
a big can of diced tomatoes
1 cinnamon stick
2 cans of red kidney beans, drained

Preheat the oven to 150C/300F. Chop the onions and the garlic, then fry in a little olive oil until softened. Add the chili powder, fresh chili, cumin and a little seasoning. Then add the meat or the veggie mix and continue to cook until it has sort of browned. Blitz the sun-dried tomatoes in the food processor with enough oil from the jar to loosen in a paste. Throw in the pan with the chopped tomatoes, cinnamon stick and a wine glass of water. Season some more. Bring to a boil, put a lid on and transfer to oven. After an hour, add the beans. Leave in the oven another half hour. Eat with crusty bread, salad and a blob of yoghurt or guacamole. Lovely!

For desert, Dutch apple pie. A recipe from a Canadian website, mind you. You have to be in Canada for the real traditional Dutch stuff. Never goes wrong, this pie, and it's not a lot of work.

leonardo davinci

I never knew Leonardo wrote fabels:

The Flea & the Sheep
A flea, who lived in the smooth hair of a dog, one day noticed the pleasant smell of wool.
"What is going on?"
He gave a little jump and saw that his dog had gone to sleep leaning against the fleece of a sheep.
"That fleece is exactly what I need," said the flea. "It is thicker and softer, and above all safer. There is no risk of meeting the dog's claws and teeth which go in search of me every now and then. And the sheep's wool will certainly feel more pleasant."
So without thinking too much about it, the flea moved house, leaping from the dog's coat to the sheep's fleece. But the wool was thick, so thick and dense that it was not easy to penetrate to the skin.
He tried and tried, patiently separating one strand from another, and laboriously making a way through. At last he reached the roots of the hair. But they were so close together that they practically touched. The flea had not even a tiny hole through which to attack the skin.
Tired, bathed in sweat and bitterly disappointed, the flea resigned himself to going back to the dog. But the dog had gone away.
Poor flea! He wept for days and days with regret for his mistake.

toronto

This drawing is 150 centimeters high. Otger made it in our first few months in Canada, when he was eight, or just nine. The day after we saw Toronto from up on the CN Tower. He made two of them, maybe I'll scan the other one tomorrow, it's a lot of work, I have to do it in parts. Michiel had them hanging in his office for the longest time, but he brought them home today. He is working on some sort of cubicle island now, no walls to hang drawings. I thought these two masterpieces were worth digitizing.

briton riviere

Orbit often puts his head on our knee like that, his master fortunately isn't as dramatic. Orbit sent us a christmas card today. Or rather, all the 2006 adoptees of the Dog Rescue sent it. All of their names are on the card, Orbit's too. And once again, we are grateful for his civilized name. Imagine having to call out "Einstein" in the park. Or Sweetie, Bonita, Herbert, Zeus, Pudding, Finnegan, Beckett, or Shakespeare. How embarrassing would that be. Michiel told me that a dog owner calling out "Sherman" already got laughed at in the park today. We can't have that, now can we. But I do hope all the other adoptees are doing as well as Orbit. Orbit is much much fitter than he was. I remember we even wondered about his legs, they didn't move evenly when he ran. They certainly do now. And he is much better with other dogs, he is confident and happy. Almost off his meds, and completely off his diet. He allegedly was allergic to meat, for crying out loud, and had to eat special fish dog food. But he doesn't even like that junk. He is chewing bones now, I buy them in bulk from the butcher. Fish, what nonsense. And all the anxieties and syndromes he had. All cured, the dog is perfectly fine. If there is one thing that I have learned so far from owning a dog, it is that a dog is even more of an emotional mirror than children are. Dogs are hypersensitive beings, and they so badly want to submit to you, to obey, to be good dogs. They will do anything. And if you are afraid, the dog will be afraid. And if you tell the dog he is sick, he will be sick. This is true for kids, and even more so for dogs.

kristal (1935)

I found these author portraits on this weblog. From left to right: Jef Last, Jan Engelman, Maurits Dekker, Hendrik de Vries, Albert Helman, A. Roland Holst. The only legible signature reads "Rafa", but I have no idea who he is. Still, ancient Dutch author portraits, such a lovely find. Do any of you in my dear readership know more?

jacob de gheyn

Parent teacher interviews. 3 out of 6 teachers consider her nothing less than a princess. I guess that's a good score. How to get her to do the same to the other three is what we're going to have to figure out.

cornelis jetses

I can't resist giving Lee Valley some free promotion, also because Piffin attended a wonderful lathing course there, last Saturday. (Wilmar, bummer we still haven't started our Dutch blog):

Making a Dutch Wooden Shoe
3.5 hours
Saturday, March 3, 1:00 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.
In this exciting seminar, "klompenmaker" Jack van Winssen will demonstrate the traditional art of making Dutch wooden shoes. Transforming a green log into a wearable piece of footwear, Jack will show the tricks and techniques to make a wooden shoe by hand using only the specialized tools of this old craft. Participants will be given an opportunity to try out the different tools at various stages. One lucky winner will get to take home the completed wooden shoe in an end of class raffle.
Fee: $25.00
Born and raised in the Netherlands, Jack van Winssen immigrated to Canada in the 1950s, and worked for several years as an aeronautical engineer. Soon after visiting many wooden shoemakers throughout Holland and acquiring a vast array of specialized hand tools, Jack decided to pursue his passion of making traditional wooden clogs. He currently is one of the few existing "klompenmakers" in Canada and the most experienced at this age-old craft.

walter trier 2

No dog story today, my head was blown off. But I do want to blog the wonderful collection of always-a-couple-and-a-dog Lilliput covers I found. More about Walter Trier here.

guillermo divito

For a moment there I thought I found Takkie, with a grown up Janneke. But Takkie looks a bit different. Typical internet fun, we -the Dutch- all know our national hero Fiep Westendorp, and in Argentina they probably know Guillermo Divito. Working in the same era, in the same style as so many illustrators in those days. I have a nice Takkie story too, today. Our Takkie had a bath. Now Orbit's previous owners insisted he was afraid of water, and they always sent him to a groomer. A perfectly short haired dog! Nonsense. But Orbit was starting to smell a little too doggy to my liking. We filled five buckets with lukewarm water (our shower head is attached to the wall, no good) and Michiel took Orbit and sat down in the bath tub. I poored the water. Michiel rubbed in the shampoo. He liked it! He loved it, swear to god. Ergo, never believe people who have their pet adopted. Oh, and byyy the waaay, finally updated my portfolio.

how I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb

Joris, in yesterday's comments: Gee Eliane. Model kids and a model dog. Now you really start to scare me ;-) I cannot leave that unanswered. I commented back that I don't like complaining on the blog, but that's not completely right. Truth is, I don't think it's that hard having model kids and model dogs. This morning, for instance. I was trying to teach Orbit some better listening skills. I called him back to me every time he was a little bit away, made him sit, and praised him. Simple. He thought it was good fun, so he complied. The little bits less little each time. Suddenly a German shepherd runs towards him, its owner screaming and shouting even before his dog reached Orbit. It sounded as if he was cheering him on, the stupid owner. Of course the dog attacked. Orbit squeaking like a pig, and the shepherd growling. Fortunately Orbit was still in our training mode, I called him, and he came over just like that. Observing other dog owners is very instructive, I find. I watched a professional dog walker as Orbit approached his pack. The dog walker sat down on his heels, making himself small, talked to Orbit in an inviting tone of voice, and patted him. Simply showing his dogs that Orbit was nice. I stole that trick immediately, because Orbit is a very dominant little character, and he often tries to intimidate other dogs. Except when I show my liking for the other dog. Simple. I have to admit I am nervous around pitbulls, and showing nervousness is bad. The same goes for kids. Don't show nervousness. Never share your fears and worries, show them how much fun everything is! Never ever shout at them. And don't even get me started on punishing. Everybody makes mistakes, and so do dogs and kids. Love the bomb.

drew friedman

Intermezzo, there was a retake on the root canal. Today without freezing, to make sure he hit the hot spot. And he did, five or six times. I much rather give birth. So enjoy Drew Friedman, I found him through Cartoon Brew. Drew Brew.

marc chagall

Root canal after all. I survived the weekend on Advils and red wine, but I had sense enough to call the dentist this morning. I don't know what he was expecting, but he put me under a sheet that even covered my feet. Then he opened up the tooth, after trying once, but having had to put more lidocaine into me first. There he saw what had been bothering me. The pulp in my tooth was swollen or something. Fluids, pressure that was in the process of building up. If I had waited longer, it would have found its way out through the root and infected god knows what. We caught it before that happened. My whole head up to my eyes had already been hurting though. That was because I have long roots, roots up into my sinusses, the dentist said. He is such a flirt. Four roots to be canalled, that was nooooo fun. Then he put cotton in the tooth, and a thin soft filling. So that if my pulp is going to do it again, and I wake up in pain in the middle of the night, I can take a needle and drill a hole in my tooth myself, to release the pressure. I am so looking forward to having to do that. The dentist offered me another shot of lidocaine before going home, but I declined, I prefer my lovely Advils. Not before waiting for the streetcar in the freezing wind though, and having to stand up all the way home. I went straight to bed. I got up to tell you about this. And going back in straight away.

dominic wilcox

Michiel is building Otger a new bed. And because Otger, who is now twelve, will soon grow up to be as tall as his uncles and cousins, we decided to build him an extra long bed. With an extra long mattress. So we go mattress shopping. We already tried matress shopping once here in Canada, just before we moved here, and that was just in time to decide to buy our mattresses in Belgium and ship them, wise decision. Canadians still sleep the old English way, on half a kilometer of boxsprings. And expensive!! Sleep Country broadcasts radio commercials every fifteen minutes on every single Canadian radio station to brainwash us into believing that it is an act of irresponsibility to buy a matress anywhere else. But the only affordable (after visits to Sears and the Bay I was already brainwashed into thinking 400 dollars is affordable for a mattress for a twelve-year-old) mattress there felt terribly cheap. And I do think that if one spends 400 dollars on a single mattress, one may expect it to feel nice, not cheap. I gave up. Also because time flies, and it had almost become dinnertime. Supermarket time, in other words. On my way there I pass a mattress store in Chinatown, and I think why not. The people at Sleep Country will think this irresponsible of me, and a Chinese mattress store will never have an extra long mattress, but what the hell. Only a very old Chinese man is in the store. I tell him what I want, expecting a no, or an I don't speak English. But he sais Yes, I have. And he gestures me to follow him to the back of the store. Down a flight of stairs. Down a second flight of stairs, into a dark empty basement. Empty but for one very long mattress. Perfect! 180 dollars! I'll get my husband, how long are you open tonight? Till sickoloclock. Turns out the long mattress was a special order from somebody who had two of them made, but then only bought one. When I came back with the husband, a younger shop attendant had arrived, fluent in English. He told us. We'll buy the mattress tomorrow, we didn't have enough cash. Don't go there before us!

early snow

It's just flurries, but I drove and walked through three of them, so it counts. Last year it was November 18, and the year before that it was November 24. Safe to say it's early this year. Early enough for Willem to see it while on our way to the airport. Good thing he's left, it suddenly is way to cold to sit in a wheelchair with just a pair of jeans on. Electrical blankets time it is, goodnight.

Update: Wow, I just read in TheStar that southwestern Ontario received 30 centimeters! "significant snowfalls of historic proportions."

andy warhol

There, we started doing the touristy things with Willem after all. Thanksgiving we had a wonderful day in London, yesterday we had the ladies Merison over for dinner, and today we went to see Andy. I also had to squeeze in a parental advise column drawing, as heart warming as ever, I might add. About the impossibility of talking with teenagers. I don't know, I have two of them, we talk all the time. Maybe I am just not your everyday mother. Anyway, to spice things up, I tried doing it in a sort of interesting way. With a little bit of meaning, for me at least. I liked the Troy diptych in the Warhol exhibit. And since Donahue was this teen-idol, I decided to use him to go with the parental advise column. The Warhol exhibition in the AGO was a bit weird by the way, I found. Visitors get a sort of telephone device, in which you have to type in the number of the work of art you're looking at, and you hear the explanation. I quite dislike that. Information, information, information, so much information keeps you from getting into the visual experience, I think. Although seeing all of these autistic beings standing around listening was quite the visual experience. And coming out of the gallery a group of three or four attendants awaited us, there was no escape from them: "Were you at all familiar with Andy Warhol?" Why do I never have a quick-witted knock-'m-dead wisecrack response to bullshit questions like that? What would you have said?

lucky number slevin

Otger did the drawings, June last year. Marilyn gave him the job, his first paid job. Marilyn is a set designer, she is Dutch, and she lives on our street. She promised to give him back the drawings, but she never did. I finally bought the DVD, and now I can see why she never brought them back. Henry's mother gets shot in front of them and they end up covered in blood, nice. You don't actually see her get shot, there's nothing between my before and after screendumps. Still, the film is very violent, but if you're into these kinds of things, by all means, go see it. Bruce Willis and everything.

jesus loves you

Listening to the oldies show with Otger. Son, you don't have to know everything about pop history, but there are a few things you just have to know. Who is this now? Don't know. It's a very old song, but mommy remembers playing air guitar to it in the street. Singing I love you yeah yeah yeah. Strange really, I don't think I had a clue what it meant, but I'm quite sure we sang I love you yeah, not she loves you yeah. How can you make such a mistake if you don't know any English? Anyway, Arnon Grunberg got cancelled. They're moving him to a different page, and they want me to stay on the page and do a different author. God fucking damn it. The positive thing about that being that they won't deny me any more important authors, because there aren't any. After I didn't do Reve, I now won't do Jesus.

cesar willich

I find this Cesar Willich on numerous poster selling websites, but that's all the information I find about him. That he sells a lot of posters. Some of them even offer limited editions, LOL. I guess this painting is on every cookie jar in Germany, but I hadn't seen it before. He's got good hair, that's for sure. I really only wanted a nice portrait of Richard Wagner, so I can brag about the fact that I got invited to the dress rehearsal of the Götterdämmerung! That's about a three hundred dollar ticket, boys and girls. Musician friends, they're a concept I can only recommend.

leonardo da vinci

Here's a clearer picture, but it's not as pretty. My neurologist did a mean nerve conduction test on me today, with needles and electricity. A nerve in my little finger was not at home, nothing. According to the doctor I have neurogenic thoracic outlet syndrome, he wrote it down for me. Doesn't that sound just great? He also explained what it is, but it didn't make much sense to me. Long live the internet: "True neurogenic thoracic outlet syndrome is caused by a compression of the nerves in the brachial plexus." So I look up brachial plexus, and find the images above. And the moment I want to take a closer look at the pictures I understand why I have this problem in my left arm, while being right handed: I move my head towards the screen and lean on my left ellbow, squeezing my brachial plexus! I must do this dozens of times a day, and I will stop doing this immediately, as of now, heute nog verdomme.

leopold rabus

Wem ist der Mensch Untertan, wen betet er an? Gott, Sex, sich selbst, das undurchdringliche Chaos der Welt? Was will ich? Was glaube ich zu wollen? Diese Fragen, die Rabus einem Betrachter mit seinen Werken an den Kopf wirft, lösen Emotionen aus. Schmerzliche aber auch heitere.

My optometrist thinks I may be developing glaucoma. I don't know why, but suddenly all these doctors seem to be so worried about me. Last June they wanted me to get my head checked, remember? Sent me for a cat scan. Of course my head was perfectly all right. And so are my eyes. But my eye pressure is a little high, so I'll be going on another hospital venture. Visual field testing. Like this, or like this.

lutz mommartz

A fluxus artist even Michiel had never heard about, na sowas. You can watch as many of his movies as you can handle, both on the internet archive website and Mommartz' own website. Besides from the one above (one reviewer writes: This is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. I doubt that I will ever see a person with such lovely expression, and it's great that this is on film.) I very much liked this one, about a beggar on the Ramblas in Barcelona. I couldn't help but wonder whether Mommartz has payed her for her performance. No actress would have done the job this convincing.

rafael rodriguez cruz

A nice pass time. Just type "portait" in Google images, and see what it comes up with. I liked the picture above best, it is painted in oil on canvas on wooden board and measures 300 x 400 mm, by Rafael Rodriguez Cruz, 28 years of age. Or 29, depends on the website. He won second prize in the 2006 National Portrait Gallery’s BP Portrait Award. Maybe you can put the URL of your favourite in the comments. If you want to try the same pass time.

The word of the day is my son's. In the subway station today he decided to take a "short cutje".

battle of quebec

We're off. Almost. The car is almost packed. Shopping, shopping, shopping is done. Martin will come house sitting tomorrow, I could ask him to keep my blog going, but that is too much to ask I'm afraid. So I closed the comments. Too many spammers, sorry. Sleepy sleepy now, and we'll see where we'll end up tomorrow. Au revoir!

reading causes constipation, strokes and heart attacks

Nothing by me in the literature section this week, they did a holiday special. With seven great drawings by the unsurpassed Joost Swarte throughout. Images he did for a calendar* that will be in the bookstores in August. If Joost Swarte is right, we are in for disaster. Otger and I went to the library today, for his holiday supply. He asked how many books he can borrow maximum. Fifty. FIFTY! You can borrow FIFTY books from the Toronto Public Library, and you can keep them up to SIX weeks. Membership is free. And it gets better. We decided fifty books would be a bit much. So Otger took ten books and went to the check out. One of the books had no stickers, no stamps, no library identification of any sort. Unread and brand new. Where did we find it, the librarian asked. On the shelf, between the other books. She asked the other librarians what to do. And they decided "finders keepers", so Otger got the book and doesn't have to take it back. This is one fantastic library. And we have a fantastic bakery too, it turns out. I was late, only one bread left, and a tiny one. I took both and wanted to pay. The girl at the counter asked the baker how much is the tiny bread. The baker said he made it from some left over dough, and just put it between all the other bread in the shop, figuring some customer would ask how much is the tiny bread, and that he would then say it was free. So now, almost five o'clock, he could finally give away his tiny bread. Sweet! Anyway, where were we, Otger had his ten books to take to Quebec. And I had promised him one from the bookstore, where he also bought another two with his own money. So now he is taking thirteen books. I hope he will come out of his tent to eat and shower, and go to the bathroom... or he really will have his constipation.

* It is a strange Dutch tradition to put up "birthday calendars" in bathrooms. So while sitting on the toilet in your friends houses, you check their social status. The more birthdays on their calendar, the more popular they are.

statler & waldorf

We are seriously thinking about putting up a webcam on neigbour Paul's house, filming the porch life across the street. In other words, us. Statler & Waldorf. We have to start watching our step though, we are far to Dutch to ever really adapt to Canadian social values. We are Statler & Waldorf. Commenting on everything passing on our sidewalk. Question is, who is the entertainment, us on our porch, or them on the sidewalk. Before long, people will make detours to avoid us. That would be another good thing about the porch cam, before people would go out jogging or walking their dog, they could check if the coast was clear. And for people in the homeland we would easily provide better entertainment than a tunnel in Norway. Best thing today was when a Chinese guy in a truck wanted to park, and a Chinese guy in a car was somehow upset about that. He swore and cursed at the guy in the truck, at least it sounded like that. And then the guy in the truck shouted back:"...(Chinese word), fuck, ...(Chinese word)!!" He got out of his truck and saw us laughing. And explained the whole incident to us in broken English. But we assured him we had already understood the Chinese version.

boxing

This handsome guy is my children's great grandfather. Or Michiel's grandfather. I was using his book for reference, I did another column drawing today. About kicking and fighting children again, as if there never is anything nice to say about children. And so funny, (Merel, proof!) Willem was telling me just this afternoon that he was going to watch tv after he'd be back from his chess club tonight, because there was something on about Max Schmeling. He had no idea I was drawing from the family boxing book. Willem used to box in his then-father-in-law-to-be Karel de Jager's boxing school, back in prehistoric times.

wembley

Dit is fragment nummer 26 van het boek "Wembley" van Richard Osinga. Ik heb het pallet bijna leeg wannneer er een toeter gaat. Uit de andere deur van de hal komt Greuter samen met drie jongens, een Afrikaan en twee Arabisch uitziende mannen met kleine krulletjes en een snor. Ze groeten me en ik loop achter hen aan naar de ruimte waar de overalls hangen en de witte laarzen staan. Ze gaan zitten aan de lange tafel en pakken eten uit plastic tassen. De vrouwen van de inpakafdeling komen binnen en gaan samen aan een hoek van de tafel zitten. De twee magere vrouwen pakken brood uit hun tas. De dikke vrouw met het korte rode haar drinkt alleen een witte dikke drank. Ik ben de enige die niets heeft meegenomen. Leolo had niets gezegd over eten en ik heb er verder niet over nagedacht. Greuter, de Afrikaan en een van de Arabische mannen geven me een dubbelgevouwen stukje brood. Er zitten kleffe plakken kaas tussen. Het smaakt zoals het eruitziet, plat en geel. Ik eet de broodjes die ik gekregen heb op. Ze smaken niet alleen nergens naar, ze vullen ook niet. Alleen het brood dat ik van de Afrikaan heb gekregen heeft een volle, hete smaak. Waarom eten deze mensen deze smakeloze broodjes? Hebben ze geen geld voor warm eten? Ze werken toch? Ze hebben geld, dat kan niet anders, meer geld dan je ooit met het verkopen van sigaretten zou kunnen verdienen. Naar het begin - Doe mee - Lees verder >>

Dutch author Richard Osinga's third book is coming out June 1st. And he is putting the whole thing online, in chunks, on everybody's weblog. Fun! He needs 300 of us, so participate!

nrc.next

With apologies to Geleynse and van Tol for changing a character in their cartoon. But tomorrow I'm making my debut in Holland's hippest newspaper! (Which is, dear non Dutch reader, the tabloid morning edition of the earnest old NRC Handelsblad.) They gave me three hours to turn my this week's black & white author into full colour. The other way around I knew, this exercise was new for me. Next week I'm doing a young and hip author again, should I anticipate a coloured version?

aurel schmidt

Very recent interview with her -day before yesterday- on fecal face dot com:
Lets start with the basics; what's your full name, where do you live, and how old are you?
Aurel Schmidt, New York, 23
Have you lived there a long time?
I have been in New York for a year, but I live out of a suitcase, so I wouldn't say that I really live anywhere, I more live where-ever.

The image above kept haunting me since I found it. I thought I had seen it before, or something extremely similar. Was it the lion of Oz? The elephant man? Michael Jackson? No. And then it dawned on me. The beast! I never even knew I remembered that stupid series. My brain is a thrift store.

laurie lipton

Felt like posting something other than my own work today. I found Laurie Lipton through my del.icio.us illustration tag feed, a wonderful way to find things of beauty. If you take the time to click through tons of garbage too, that is. But I like finding things there, it's like finding things on a flea market. I prefer finding things at flea markets to finding them pre-found in antique shops. In the same way I prefer del.icio.us to sites like Drawn! or Art Dorks, which doesn't mean I don't like those. It's just that in general I don't like it much when others decide for me what is interesting. Oh yeah, I did the death subject too today. For the column.

Two more very nice sites from my feed: click click

miss van

Oh bliss, a whole day without working and the chance of blogging some inspiring work by somebody else. Found through the lovely artdorks. No working is exaggerated of course, so much illustrating creates a backlog of al sorts of very profane things. Like taxes. I'm running late on those. But I did discover why it is that everybody else with our kind of money drives around in big cars and goes on holidays a zillion times a year. Turns out I kept paying gas bills for our old house, more than half a year. Almost a thousand dollars. I am such a fool, I just pay any bill I find in my mailbox. And Michiel found a three year old cheque of four hundred that he never cashed. We could just as well be throwing our money out of the window. Never mind, we did have some laughs too, today. Nice anecdote. We went to the paint shop for a new shade of blue porch paint. We talked about house colours with the paint shop guy. One day, he told us, a man came into his shop and asked for the cheapest paint possible to paint his house. So he sold him a mix of all kinds of left overs, a hideous colour. The next day, the man's across the street neighbours came in, and bought a colour of their choice, they paid over two hundred dollars. The paint shop guy was asked to make the tins look real old and used. They then gave the paint to their neighbour, stating "Look what we found in our basement! Why don't you use this colour?"

And so my question to you is: "Did you ever spend or loose money in a really peculiar, odd, strange or plain stupid way?"

john held jr

Held could do no wrong. People would send him blank checks begging for an original drawing. In the latter half of the decade he appeared regularly in a half-dozen magazines, designed sets and costumes for Broadway plays, had two newspaper strips [Margie and Rah Rah Rosalie] and ran for Congress. In 1930 he wrote Grim Youth and had his famous woodcuts for The Saga of Frankie and Johnnie published in a limited edition. They turned up a generation later in the first issue of a new magazine called Playboy.

I don't have people sending me blank cheques yet. And I promise you I won't ever run for congress. But I am doing my first magazine pages in a long time. And believe it or not, for the first time in a genuine women's magazine. I turned down a few of them in the past, because they offered less money than Piffin gets babysitting. I guess Piffin's babysit money is my rock-bottom illustration fee. Mind you, we live in a good neighbourhood. And so I am diving into the world of women's magazines. Starting with John Held Jr. who is well worth a Google search or two. He drew "flappers". Now I had never heard of flappers, I learn something each day: "A young woman, especially one in the 1920s who showed disdain for conventional dress and behavior." I found the image above researching my topic. Intuition!

this weblog is getting Dutcher by the day

Dear boys, 1973

isaac babel

The horse is for Willem.

Today, I made Michiel very happy with a birthday present. We made him guess last night, with a line of praise from the back cover, but he didn't guess right: "Here is a book that will last, that you will reread all your life and then pass on to your grandchildren. Or ask to be buried with."

Tom Teicholz in the Jewish Journal also puts it nicely:

Reading "The Collected Stories of Isaac Babel" (W. Norton & Co., 2002) in paperback, edited by Babel’s daughter, Nathalie, got me thinking about Jewish gangsters and tough guys.
Babel was born in Odessa in 1894. He wrote of Odessa’s Jewish underworld and its gangsters in sparkling prose. Fifty years before Mario Puzo gave us "The Godfather," Babel offered up Benya Krik. Benya, Babel tells us, had "gangster chic" — a century before Tupac took the stage. Babel’s Odessa was home to a universe of Jewish murderers, pimps and crooks. Before there was 50 Cent, Babel wrote of a millionaire named "Yid and a half."

But the real credit goes to the unsurpassed Arnon Grunberg, who pointed out this book to me in the first place:

In a quote from the short short "At Grandmother’s," the grandmother says to the narrator, who might or might not be Babel, “You must know everything. Everyone will fall on their knees before you and bow to you. Let them envy you. Don’t believe in people. Don’t have friends. Don’t give them your money. Don’t give them your heart.”
Over money and a heart, I prefer Babel’s stories.

The last push towards the bookstore was the title of one of Babel's stories: "The story of my Dovecote".

And Now for Something Completely Different. Just so you understand exactly how Canadian our son is becoming. He accidently saw a brief moment of (field) hockey on Dutch (online) TV. He pointed at the screen and bursted out in laughter. Is *that* supposed to be hockey?!!!! How are they going to hit *anything* with those sticks?!!!

have a daisy of a day!

Found this card between the litter in my front yard. "Have a daisy of a day!" And now of course, you are supposed to comment: "Oh, I sooo needed to hear this, thank you, you are such an inspiration!" Why don't I get comments like that? I was contemplating something along those lines with a fellow Canadian blogster today. Could well be I am reading the wrong blogs, I am something of a masochist. But I never read them like that in Dutch. Maybe I am better at finding Dutch blogs, who knows. But it could be cultural as well. Maybe North American commenters are sycophants, and European ones criticasters. Criticism is tricky in North America, people are spoiled by positivism. Everything is great. Which is nice, in a way. As long as you don't believe a word people say.

Sometimes though, admiration is more than justified, here's an interview with somebody I really admire. I wish newspapers had this much time: "It takes me a couple of days to finish the piece, and I'll sit on it for a few more days before taking another look with fresh eyes."

steven shearer

Time for a Canadian artist. My book says: Steven Shearer in many of his drawings focuses upon this figure of the young, white, burned-out male adolescent. Yet the artist does so in a manner that exudes a poignancy and empathy absent in the mass media's mostly disparaging or dismissive reflections on these subjects.

anthon beeke

This type is part of the canon of Dutch design. And since I own an ancient 1971 magazine with the whole alphabet in it, I thought I'd blog it, set it free on the internet. And although of horrible print quality, lots of enormous moiré and cut out with a kitchen knife, the letters in this magazine are gigantic, just a couple on each page, so I neatly edited everything together in one image. Not in the 1971 magazine but on the 2006 internet, I found an interview with Anthon Beeke. I like his answer to the question "why do you make these statements?" He says: "If, like me you live in a community of reasonably humane, culturally well-grounded freethinkers, in a city which has manifested its mercantile spirit from the sixteenth century by systematically plundering the world and accumulating an enormous wealth, a city which offers a tremendous amount of energy, so I try to give Amsterdam some of my energy back." I think I am homesick. Oh yes, I also found a website on erotypes.

Huh! The NRC is electing the best Dutch design. Beeke's type is not on the shortlist!

jorge rodriguez gerada

Found through the wonderful Trendbeheer. It doesn't rain much in Spain. It's charcoal.

david hockney

I bought a book. Or rather, I bought it last week. But I had to take it back, because the binding was messed up. Pages were missing, pages were double. A rare thing for such an expensive book, the bookstore lady said. But I am so happy to have it back, I hope I will learn a lot from this book. I am nowhere with my own petty portraits, nowhere. These portaits speak en feel and express. But I won't give up. I will study my book.

cindy sherman

I was almost desperate trying to find a picture that would capture this day. And then I found Cindy Sherman, so I am happy. The four of us went for our medicals. I think the doctor was desperate for some company. We sat in his oxygen deprived office for hours on end, chatting away about Canadian soldiers liberating Holland -he was that old-, the Iraq war, Quebec, Verdonk (thank you Hiram for yesterday's explanation), Bush, real estate, anti semitism, gay marriage, high school education, SARS, avian flu, and what not. And after that we had to go down into the basement for our HIV tests and chest X-rays. It was five o'clock when we left the building. Our appointment had started at 1 o'clock. And we hardly saw a waiting room. But I trust we are going to be allowed into the country.

fan mail

Laura recognized my drawing in the newspaper. The lady from the computer, she said. I am so flattered. Laura is the daughter of Holland's most notorious blog commenter Joost Brummelkamp. He started his own blog recently, but his true passion lies in commenting. This one is a gem, but I'm afraid you have to really be into Dutch blogging to appreciate it. See, now I am writing about Joost, where I should be writing about Laura. She wishes me happy holidays. Same to you, Laura! I like your drawing very much, thank you!

fiodor sumkin

I thought I found the amazing Fiodor Sumkin through the amazing pdf magazine The New Porker, but I can't find him back there, strange. Russian, weird, very hip. Does anybody out there know anything about this magazine? I found it through my del.icio.us feed. Fiodor in the meanwhile seems to have censored his blog, the more erotic drawings are gone. Fortunately I found them back on Flickr, but they're down for maintenance as I am writing this, so I can't link. I cought this image just in time.

david levine

My friend Ineke got me the 2006 New York Review of Books calendar!! This is so great, thank you Ineke! This is so great, only now we have to look at Condy Rice all month.

middleton's disease

I am drawing Gerrit Krol for this week's literary supplement. We somehow own a whole pile of Krol's books, Michiel must really like them. I have read some, but not all. I have never been able to read this one, the cover is just too horrible. It is so completely off-putting, I don't know, it just crosses a line. Willem told me about a different book (we skype constantly), I just have to tell you. Not much time though, I won't rewrite and rewrite until every sentence resembles the English language. My parents-in-law had a friend with Parkinson's disease. Hey, Gerrit Krol has Parkinson's too, I could have made an intelligent bridge here. A very alternative friend, he always refused big pharma medication, he's in a very poor state now. He communicates by means of buttons on his wheel chair. This way he dictated his life story to his sister, who self published the book. She gave Willem a copy, and he read it. And what do you know, the guy used to be a drug dealer! My mother-in-law got to know him doing some kind of soul searching course, she had no idea. They always wondered how he could afford to go to Turkey, Afghanistan or Iran for whole summers while living on social security. And owning a second house in France, for that matter. Turns out he had welded a double floor in his deux chevaux citroen. After his drug dealing life, he worked as an iriscopist (what's that in English, I don't think I even want to know). I tell ye, these old hippies...

koizumi naoko

Been having a housewife day today. Stripped half a door of its paint and vacuumed the living room, hurray. And an amazing meal in the oven, that goes without saying. Surfing some illustration in between everything, picture above is my best find. I do like simplicity every once in a while. I also chose this picture because I also have been doing what the woman in the picture is doing. I have been making an effort to blow back some life in a squandered mailing list. I love mailing lists. I love to babble away with girl friends while working. It's background noise, company for a lonely illustrator. It started years ago, when I joined a list for parents of gifted kids. But I got fed up with giftedness, it's a terribly limited way of looking at children. For a lot of those parents, anyway. So I always joined fractions of dissidents, schismatists. Rebels against the gifted doctrine. But agitators amongst ourselves, it couldn't turn out well. So in the end, we were left with just four of us. But I did blow back some life today, and now we're six again. And from all walks of life, even illustration. Wanna join? We do write in Dutch though. And we do have to like you.

sixma & vijselaar

It is send-your-artwork-to-Eliane week. I realise Epiphany is twelve days ago, but I guess the mail wasn't fast enough. Tjarda & Michiel have a tradition of designing the wildest christmas cards, I should dig in my archives one of these days and make a series. I should have quite a lot of them, Tjarda & Michiel are two of my oldest friends. We are heading for thirty years...

jean-marc van tol

It is not every day that I get a personal greeting from Holland's most famous duck and canary! Jean-Marc sent me his first ever comic album in English, I guess you Torontonians can buy it at The Beguiling. Everybody in Holland loves Fokke and Sukke (yes, the f and s words) but I must warn all too Canadian Canadians that nothing is quite as Dutch - or as funny - as Fokke & Sukke, and they might not have the stomachs for these nice little birds. Although mind you, they are a daily strip in what the "about text" in the album calls "the Netherlands' number one quality broadsheet, NRC Handelsblad". Yes, same one yours truly draws for. And oh yes, almost forgot, Jean-Marc has a blog too.

And hey, most important! Website in English!

rupert?

Now in English this little golden book is called "Rupert The Rhinoceros", but since it's election time in Canada, I think Cornelis is more appropriate. I'll explain. Cornelius the First was a Canadian rhinoceros, from Granby, Quebec, who was the nominal leader of the Rhinoceros Party of Canada from 1965 to 1993. The party attracted a considerable number of votes in Canadian elections, sometimes even coming in second place in some ridings, but never elected a candidate to the Canadian House of Commons. Some of their best viewpoints:

#reducing the speed of light because it's much too fast,
#instituting English, French and illiteracy as Canada's three official languages,
#building sloping roads and bicycle paths across the country so that Canadians could "coast from coast to coast",
#abolishing pumping oil out of the ground as that oil is there to keep the earth moving smoothly on its axis and if you withdraw the oil, the whole thing will grind to a halt,
#making bubble gum the national currency, so that it could be inflated or deflated at will,
#as an energy-saving idea, putting larger wheels on the back of all cars so that they will always be going downhill,
# declaring war on Belgium because a Belgian cartoon character, Tintin, killed a rhinoceros in one of the cartoons,
# offering to call off the proposed Belgium-Canada war if Belgium delivered a case of mussels and a case of Belgian beer to Rhinoceros "Hindquarters" in Montréal (the Belgian Embassy in Ottawa did, in fact, do this),

Much more on the Wikipedia page where I stole all this from.

ferdinand bac

Remember my Voltaire drawing? Then you'll probably understand how pleasantly surprised I was when I found the Voltaire portrait above, in the book I bought this afternoon. This is not a real letter by Voltaire, Ferdinand Bac wrote and illustrated it in 1912. And I also bought some Vitamin D, essential for my keeping up with what goes on in the world of drawing. Almost as normal as Viagra, one could say.

david levine

Of course I have been studying David Levine ever since I know I am going to do this literature thing. Not that even in my wildest dreams I imagine ever becoming half as good as him. But I trust my skills will benefit some from so much exercise.
Only one single Dutch author is featured on this Levine website. Harry Mulisch. Why him? Is he the most famous Dutch author outside of Holland? Maybe. Is he the best Dutch author? I doubt it. I do have a personal theory about his popularity, but I am of course just your average fun shopper in World Literature. I think Mulisch' best seller The Discovery Of Heaven works better in translation. In Dutch Mulisch' tone of voice is so archaic, an old man speaking, and at the same time he is so coercively trying to write a contemporary almost hip novel, I found that very irritating. I hate it when I read a book that doesn't stop irritating me. Mulisch is widely criticized for his arrogance, but his tone annoys me more than his arrogance. And I think his tone is lost in translation.

the kid

Postblogging again. I was too stressed out yesterday. I have to do changes to an illustration, but nobody seems to know how. Hard to explain. A whole day of aimless sketching. Today, waiting for the editor to make up his mind, I'll do another piece of parental advice. Very relaxing straight forward little drawings.

otger's style

I promised Otger I'd blog his drawing if he would manage to get the page filled. And he did. So I do. Otger has always drawn like this. Cities, factories, campgrounds, mazes, treasure maps, wiring, roads, games, machines... Anything complicated enough, it seems. Sinterklaas brought him a nice new big sketch pad today. And Otger brought home his best report card ever!

happy families

-read yesterday first-
Willem did indeed still have the card game, and he did send me some scans. We thank him. The dictionary tells me this particular type of card game is called "happy families" in English, life is full of irony. Traditionally Happy Families is a 44-card deck that features characters from different families: each family is made by a worker (the Baker, the Painter, etc.), his wife, his daughter and his son. Peter Vos used strange creatures instead of families, and devided those in four body parts. The game is played by asking the opponents for cards belonging to specific creatures, so to complete as many sets as possible. Picture above is the schijtlijster, or shit-trush. Also very interesting is the scrotum-bumblebee.

peter vos

Peter Vos created an overfamous card game. Overfamous in Holland that is. 1970. Very hard to explain this in English. About the shit-trush, the weird-frog, the room-elephant, the listen-finch, and the keyboard-lion*. Very ponderous translations of very poetic names, sorry. I can't find a picture of a reasonable size, I'll ask Willem tomorrow, he must have a copy. Picture above is a lithography that has nothing to do with the card game. My brother bought me the card game for my birthday. But my stepmother didn't like it, and took it away from me. She didn't hide it very well though, and whenever she wasn't at home, I went to the big china cabinet in the living room and stared at the pictures. Those days of controversy are not gone. Two weeks ago indignation went through Holland because of the domino-sparrow**. Again, a ponderous translation of a poetic name. A sparrow was shot, because flapping about, it threatened to ruin an attempt on the domino world record. Questions in parliament. This week's indignation is about bouncing-chicks***. Again, a ponderous etc. An award winning artschool graduate made a video of dead chicks. She bought them dead and frozen in a petshop, where they were being sold as feed. She put bouncing balls inside them and had them bounce on video. I think they look extremely funny, like cartoon characters. But the poor artist. Her website was found by some overpopular vulgar weblog, and she has been swamped with hate mail. I found out about this through an illustrators mailinglist I subscribe to. Even there, indignation. The big condemnation of all art tout court. All of these people would have taken away Peter Vos his "beestenkwartet" from their little girls, no doubt about it.

*Schijtlijster, mafkikker, kamerolifant, luistervink, klavierleeuw.
**Dominomus.
***Stuiterkuiken.

igor picasso

The classical chatbox I told you about has been postponed. Which is not a bad thing at all, it gives me more time to simmer.

comparison

Left Art Seiden (1953), right Mary Blair (1949).

geertgen tot sint jans

I am starting a big NRC editorial for next week. About a classical music chatbox. The Geertgen tot Sint Jans painting popped into my head, it's a virtual space surrounded by musicians, maybe I can do something with that idea. I am quite sure I have a book with this painting in it somewhere. How many books with fifteenth century painting in them can a person have? I could not find the blasted painting. And all that time, it had been one click away.

The drawing by Franciszka Themerson is extra. I added it because of the similar composition. Franciszka could draw music like nobody else.

nans van leeuwen

My friend Max launched a new website today. I promised him some promotion. For what it's worth. Max is a winter specialist, he writes books about snow and ice. On his new website he showcases his collection of children's books on skating. Don't let this fool you. Not all Dutch children can skate, not me anyway. No romantic scenes like the one above. Which turned into something of a leitmotiv in all of my romantic relationships. Every single boyfriend I ever had -except maybe one or two that occurred in the wrong season- swore he could teach me to skate. But they all failed. Michiel has given up on it a long time ago. I have weird motor skills. My gross motor skills are catastrophic, my kids made me promise never to run in public. My fine motor skills are the opposite, anything from knitting or crocheting, from sewing to embroidering, from drawing to painting, from moulding to sculpting, from cooking to vacuuming, come to me, come to me.

diary

Way way back, when people still knew how to hold a pen, they had different weblogs. Browse through the letters below, I hope you have Firefox, so you can throw them all in tabs. Some of them you may know, even from other weblogs. Some are really famous, and all are really beautiful.

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z ? & $

fiep westendorp

She is the mother of Dutch illustration, so I am not going to be so silly as to introduce her. On the website where I found this lovely picture (I think I have a much more comfortable chair) you can see some different versions she did of the same illustrations. Years apart, interesting to see how her style developed. You don't have to read Dutch, just look at the pictures. Wim Bijmoer is featured on the same page, which makes it even more interesting. Bijmoer illustrated "the sheep Veronica", bij Annie MG Schmidt. Which Fiep did later. And Wim did not appreciate the likeness her sheep bore with his. I wrote about this before.
I did work today, in case you're wondering. The weekly column about kid's stuff.

la pucelle

Stop, cruel, stop, secular troop; O violeurs, fear God, fear Jeanne (?)

The research is as interesting as doing the illustration. Getting sidetracked constantly. I found a website with a Voltaire poem in 21 engravings from -it says, but don't ask me for details- the Jean-Michel Moreau school 1819.

It was not easy to find an explanation in a few sentences of what the poem is about, but here is one:

Voltaire takes the appellation 'the Maid' literally, and turns the historical contest between the French and the English into a battle for Joan of Arc's virginity, upon which the fate of the war depends. In a work which focuses on the sexual exploits and desires of the characters (ascribed without regard to historical fact) the Maid is the subject of a series of attempted rapes and seductions, and in fact becomes the lover of the Count Dunois.

saul steinberg

Too boring to always only post my own things. I am researching a quicker, more sketchy way of working, I have been asked to do a weekly newspaper cartoon on raising kids. I thought I'd just approach it the Steinberg way :-) The little masterpieces will make me rich and famous, so the poor newspaper pay is no problem at all. --> And I *am* doing the next merry-go-round pages!

marcel marlier

This extremely cute bear is one of my oldest and deepest visual memories. It popped back in my head yesterday, as I was thinking about the illustration I am doing for next Saturday's newspaper. This bear used to be the logo of a series by the Belgian publishing house Casterman. It was probably drawn by Marcel Marlier, but I'm not sure. He illustrated the books though. I owned "het ondeugende geitje" and read it a million times. I own it again fortunately, I found it in a second hand bookshop. Piffin was addicted to his Tiny series when we lived in Belgium.

gary taxali

By the look of it, this cover is by Gary Taxali, but I can't find a single website crediting him for it. Does anybody know for sure? It's the Canadian edition of a book by William Leith, and I am illustrating a Dutch newspaper review of this book. At least I know who I'm up against :-)

holland michigan

I found this mysterious postcard while looking for a nice image of a housekeeping scene, because that is all I did today, housekeeping. Has to be done, no way around it. Apparently this street scrubbing takes place in Michigan. I knew the Dutch are (were) known for scrubbing their sidewalks, but this is overdoing it. This is not the Dutch diaspora, these are Dutch in frigging orbit.

kasimir malevich

The nephew got on a much more realistic aeroplane this afternoon. As I am writing this, he is still up in the air somewhere. And his father -my brother- is in his car on his way to Schiphol airport to pick him up. The nephew could choose (how old are you, honey?) whether he wanted to be chaperoned onto the plane or not. He chose yes, and so we all had to wait two hours for the chaperone stewardess with her golf cart. She called the nephew "pumpkin", and "baby". That must have been his final culture shock before leaving the country. With three other teenagers and two old ladies on a golf cart.

biotex

I have no idea who did these lovely illo's, and I don't have the energy to research it. If you're in Toronto, you'll know why. I am slowly starting to prepare the camping trip. I made reservations for a Dodge caravan, which, my dear Dutch readers, is not a caravan. Unfortunately in Canada there is no such thing as Biotex. Which, my dear Canadian readers, is a detergent essential to camping trips. "Vakantiewasje? Pak Biotex mee!" But then again, Canadian camp sites are so uneuropean in many ways. Washing machines everywhere.

Update. We tortured our brains, and now we think to remember these images are stills from animated tv commercials. Must have been Geesink then. Does anybody know that? I did find larger images. And here you can listen to them!!!

william shakespeare

We went to see Much Ado About Nothing in High Park. We were not allowed to take photographs, so this is a scene from a different rendering. Apart from our sore backs from lying on an awry slope, it was a delightful evening. Even the nephew enjoyed it. This week seems to be haunted by art reflecting life. Much ado about nothing indeed. Her wit values itself so highly, that to her all matter else seems weak.

jack kirby

In the heat of the day, the kids were wise. They went to see a movie in a cool theatre. And even the nephew was wise. He arrived in Toronto wearing black jeans, boots and a down jacket. But after the movie, he went to the store with Piffin and bought a pair of swimming trunks. Clare wants to take us tubing in Elora. I wonder whether I count as a legal guardian for the nephew...

uncle pablo

Rush job for the newspaper. I can do it sketchy. If only I could sketch like uncle Pablo. It's about sex on the beach, don't google that at home. It's getting out of hand in Holland, strange little country. Orgies in Bussloo of all places. My parents-in-law live near there, I used to often swim there myself. Never saw any orgies. Local authorities are now calling for a national debate about open air sex. Illustrating is a fun job.

co westerik

IJsbrand suggested a different swimming pool. Very convenient, now I don't have to come up with something myself, although I must say I get a stomache ache looking at that deformed hand. Anybody out there with more suggestions on pools in art? We were so lucky today. We arrived at the pool just when they reopened after a half hour closure due to too much sunscreen in the water. And we stayed for an hour or so until again the lifeguards were unable to see the bottom of the pool. How dangerous indeed. And how sweet, all that sunscreen. Our pool is a panorama of gorgeous looking lounging young men, I just never know where to put my towel. It's a small pool, I can't help overhearing their gabble. About working out, about dieting, tanning, clothes, decorating ideas, I can't think of a cliché I did not hear. No doubt all that sunscreen was theirs.

david hockney

The mercury exploded last month – the hottest June on record. July’s poised to do the same. I can't work, maybe if I adapt a little. We turned on the airconditioning, we had no choice. I hate it to sit in the house with the doors and windows closed. The street is silent except for the buzzing of the air conditioners, empty and boring, everybody indoors. Fortunately there's a pool just around the corner. There are lots of pools throughout Toronto, and they are all free. This is a great city. No bags, shoes, food, or drinks allowed around the pool, and none for sale. Keeps everything clean. And lifeguards on all sides, grabbing their megaphones for the tiniest offences. Paradise. And they didn't even say anything about Otger swimming in the deep end! Otger was nervous, last year they called him out and made him graduate for a bracelet. He has graduated in every country he lived in (or didn't, namely Holland). This is the first Summer in which he remembers how to swim, our little athlete.

manhua

I was helping out my friend Levi today, he is doing a school project on Mickey Mouse. Maybe he can stick in this picture I found in a book I got from the library tonight. The book is full of extremely weird pictures, making me itchy with ideas. My favourite mood.

queen victoria

Most of my Dutch readers probably don't know that today we celebrate Queen Victoria's birthday. We honour her (and the neighbours) with power tools.

play-doh

This is Otger in his last school, where he was pelted with play-doh on a daily basis. Real stones they threw only once, in the classroom mind you. Such darlings. The kids in his new school are nicer. But not without impressive autobiographies, that's the assignment Otger's self portrait is for too. His classmates write about rats in frying oil, and exiting stuff like that. You either live in Chinatown or you don't...

tea set

My own actual original old Melitta doll's tea set! It is being remade, I don't believe it! I am going to immediately order it and restore fond fond memories. It will be so happy to finally replace the old one that didn't at all come to a happy end. The text on the website says "schlagfest", but that is not the case when smashed to pieces on purpose.

al hirschfield

I wanted to post this hypnotizing picture of Mia Farrow as Allison (my aim is true - it was in my head somehow all day) Mackenzie and then I stumbled upon this site full of Al Hirschfields, because I was thinking our orthodontist -Piffin had her retainers adjusted- looks like Woody Allen. Our accountant does too, but that's beside the point. If I were Jewish, I would also look like Woody Allen. Under any circumstances would I sooner look like Woody Allen than like Mia Farrow. I wasn't often allowed to watch Peyton Place, no doubt because of all te non happening sex. I guess maybe Allison Mackenzie and Rodney Harrington were my first fascination in that field. Absolutely spellbound I was.

eva & adele

Our neighbours dropped by for coffee. No, not Eva & Adele, they're just art zweckentfremded as illustration, I do that. Michelle knows German, she can tell Clare what zweckentfremden is. There probably isn't even an English word for that. Anyways, they're the closest to Eva & Adele that we have on our street. Clare is a very impressive career woman, I just discovered that. Nevertheless still rides her scooter on the stoop. And has coffee with us.

steven hayward

For weeks now I have been hunting for books set in Toronto, determined to learn some more about the city I live in. Patricia helped me, Robert from PopMatters wanted to help out, but he has chronic email troubles, and I did read some books, but not exactly what I had been hoping for. And then Patricia found this article in The Globe and Mail. And today I bought the Secret Mitzvah of Lucio Burke. About the Italians and Jews in the Ward, between College, Queen and Bay Street. The Christie Pits riots, days before the police intervened. But I'm not there yet, only at page 63, but breathtaking already. A Philip Rothian epic about an Italian teenager in 1933, at page 63 he is working as his neighbour's shabbes goy.

bernard villemot

Bought myself a pair of shoes today. Ralph Lauren, not Bally. I used to always wear Bally's when I was a little girl. Always the same ones, I remember I didn't like that much. Navy blue with a white instep. Of course my stepmother put a stop to that as soon as she took over the household budget. She bought me shoes that I tried to wear out as soon a possible, by letting them slur on the street while biking. Not that the next pair would be any better, I remember a pair of hideous white and red shoes, left and right were different sizes, I am not kidding you. They must have been a real bargain. So I consider it my own personal defenition of freedom, to be able to just go out on a Wednesday afternoon and buy a pair of Ralph Laurens, or Bally's, or Prada's, or Gucci's, or cake with whipped cream when it's nobodies birthday.

henriette van eyk

I found yet another marvel of Dutch literature. "Intieme revue" by Henriette van Eyk, 1936. She is mostly remembered for a children's classic she wrote and that has been republished, "Michiel, de geschiedenis van een mug". Other than that she sadly has become a relic. She's a great read though, ironic, humourous, she was co-founder of the famous illegal "Bezige Bij", inspired later writers like Annie MG, Belcampo, Bomans, and Carmiggelt, was called a literary clown, and was Simon Vestdijk's lover. I have read piles and piles of Vestdijks. And now the thrift store has given me Henriette van Eyk. And the sun shines. And the bedroom is paint ready at last. It will be a top to bottom completely white Scandinavian Ingmar Bergman bedroom.

norman rockwell

A couple of weeks ago we saw a wonderful Norman Rockwell book in the St. Lawrence antique market. Since it was 200 dollars, we just had a real good look through it, and I discovered that I like Rockwell a lot more than I thought. Good thing we didn't buy, cause today at the Saturday auction at Goodwill we managed to buy two almost as wonderful Rockwell books for 27 dollars! The auction alone was already great and exciting fun. People from all walks of life bidding, commenting and connecting in strange ways. A much more social event than just plain shopping. I'm really happy with the Rockwell books, I like Norm best when he is completely over the top. And it's interesting to discover the regularities or patterns in his compositions, or maybe even tricks. Very shrewd things these Rockwell paintings.

hermanus berserik

Bought today in a Toronto thrift store. An anthology of young poets, 1960. About half the names are unremembered. I'll read you "A foggy day in Rotterdam", at least the title is in English. I saw Cor Vaandrager -or what was left of him- sometimes in Rotterdam, late eighties, when I lived there.

Je kent het wel: een middag wachten
tot het gaat misten. Wachten
tot het donker wordt. Of avond wordt. Hij
(ik heb het over hem) kijkt,
ziet lege bussen
die koppig starten, de stad in - op zoek naar meer mist?

Stemmen van mensen. Oproer? Bijval?
Hij herkent ze, de stemmen. De mensen
kent hij niet - nooit gekend.

Je kent het wel: pijnlijk nauwkeurig
kan hij je zeggen (maar hij doet het niet):
"Nu gaat de telefoon"
En dan gaat de telefoon. De angst
dit aan te voelen. En de angst (nog groter)
zich na tien, elf juiste voorspellingen te vergissen.

De mist is binnen.
Reeds zijn de radiatoren verkild.
Hij trekt zijn benen op. Wacht.
Het wordt donker. Of avond.
Hij trekt huiverend een haar uit zijn pols.

bob blechman

Back to some significant culture. This is the only known cartoon about my dear husband. And Bob Blechman made the only known website full of animated gifs that doesn't get on my nerves. Very cool.

childbirth

I am researching my mildly ironic spiritual drawing, find nice things. Tomorrow it will be sixteen years ago that I gave birth for the first time myself. Around about the time I am writing this the midwife ripped my membranes and I went for a bicycle tour through Rotterdam. I was 43 weeks pregnant, so it was about time. Early next morning Piffin was born. Big, strong and healthy. She still is.

hubert airy

Dr. Hubert Airy, migraneur, 1838–1903. I should have listened closer to the weather report, stupid me. Yesterday 27 degrees and today stormy and 7. Guaranteed migraine attack. I see exactly what Airy drew, only more flickery and shiny like glass or silver. With vision loss around the aura's. And I had extreme enhancement of smell, Michiel had to put away everything with the slightest smell. Here's a funny bit by Marvin Minsky, Raising children as atheists:

***One day, at age 17, I was walking alone at night during a snowstorm in a singularly quiet place. I noticed that the ground looked further away than usual, and then it seems that I was looking down from a height of perhaps 10 meters, watching myself crossing the field. Well, having some education, I recalled some descriptions of this fairly common type of hallucination, and exclaimed to myself, "how interesting; I seem to be having a mystical experience. I'd better put a stop to this right away, or I might experience a conversion or something," recalling some observations of William James. So I quickly ran over to a nearby dorm and started a social conversation with some students. Another time, I forget the circumstances, I was looking at a tree and noticed that it was flickering strangely, sorta like a burning bush. In particular, I observed that it had acquired a sort of colorful, jagged, pulsating outline. "My goodness," I exclaimed to myself, "it would seem that I'm experiencing a scintillating scotoma, and it looks just like the picture I remember from Duke-Elder's Textbook of Ophthalmology. I'd better get ready for a migraine headache." (I had had what aseemed to be migraines before, but never with this phenomenon -- which was actually rather gratifying, because it confirmed an otherwise inconclusive diagnosis.) I always wondered if Moses (presuming that there ever was such a person) had migraines, too. Only a few such patients hear sounds as well. So let's add to the rest of this useful discussion a new point: make sure that your children learn about the 7 most common forms of mystical experience and whatever is known about their neurological mechanisms. ... Of course this is good advice only for those who like their minds the way they are.***

Appropriate this, because I am just starting an illustration about spirituality and such. And I can be mildly ironic too, hip hip hurray.

pope picasso

Cat again, been up to no good at all today. Let's make it a theme, a sort of blog break. It's not as if nothing happened, half of the Toronto police force came screeming into our street this afternoon. Some domestic violence of the bloody kind, but I don't want to write about that, that's too sad. I'll give you a nice quote from my book: "One must exaggerate or feel oneself a pygmy." Quite. And a nice triviality from the same book: it seems penis-bones of raccoons were very popular as tooth picks in an earlier day.

dr. seuss

When one doesn't know what to blog, one is supposed to blog a cat. So here ya go, two fab cats.

"Before Theodore Seuss Geisel found fame as a children's book author, the primary outlet for his creative efforts was magazines. His first steady job after he left Oxford was as a cartoonist for Judge, a New York City publication. In 1927 one of these cartoons opened the way to a more profitable career, as well as greater public exposure, as an advertising illustrator."

One funny thing did happen though, today. Otger told me he has a new nickname at school. Albert Newton. Because another boy was already Albert Einstein.

ward sutton

Not only do we live in Chinatown east, our neighbourhood is also sort of the Toronto gay district east. The real gay district is around Church Street, how ironic. In our hood live the happily married ones, with pets and children. Yesterday our neighbours invited us to a rally in their church to support Bill C-38 which is going to be voted on in parliament tomorrow. I still feel weird in protestant churches, as if I'm on enemy ground. More out of place as a catholic among protestants, than as a heterosexual among queers. And more so even, because it was a completely cross religional thing, with rabbi's and imams and everything. But no catholic priests, shame on them. Although I do believe one lost sheep signed the petition of religious leaders supporting the Bill. The imam was particularly great, wow. Was he ever infuriated. I am sooo sorry I forgot to take my camera.

heinrich zille

Michiel's parents sent him a very appropriate book for his birthday.

Zille zeigt die existenziellen Abgründe aber auch den liebenswerten Alltagshumor des Berliner proletarischen »Milljöhs« auf. Sein Werk ist eine Mischung aus Mitgefühl, Sarkasmus,Witz und solidarisch empfundener Verbitterung. Aus seinem Werk klingt das Lachen der Elenden, das Befreiung aus der Not für Sekunden bedeutet.

***Domestic Anouncement***
The last couple of days it has been virtually impossible to post comments, I am sorry for that. Somehow too may words ended up blacklisted. Should be all right again now.

boy's club

Today I invited a guest writer, my one and only husband. I figured he would put things into words way better than I ever could. And no misunderstandings: I show the Martha Rich image because we thought hers were by far the strongest pieces in the show, although she is very visibly a Clayton Brothers student. Here's the review:

We went to see the Boy's Club Show at Xpace. The work of 12 women illustrators, "looking for an opportunity to exhibit [their] work outside the confines of the magazine page and to express [their] ideas beyond the latest advertising assignment".

These works make every effort to be as unabjectionable as possible. That must be a habit their creators picked up from working for the magazines. Unobtrusiveness is their one virtue. Their goal is to disturb the page as little as possible. They are carefully, sometimes even skillfully, crafted to reflect the page without causing any ripples. Freed from the confines of the page, they become empty reflections, and it is now painfully obvious that there is nothing to see. These are very simple works posing as art, as if to say "Look at me! I'm a real painting!" They have no *need* to exist as paintings, other than to satisfy a market that is unwilling to deal with the complexities of real art. I began to suspect they were done in Adobe Illustrator, and then transferred to canvas. Their inability to excite, arouse and disturb makes them about as sexy as a woman who spreads her legs and sighs "Oh well, all right then."

diane arbus

Maybe it's not fair of me to post Diane Arbus because I had been hoping to see something of the kind, visiting the my-so-called-life exhibition in the Monte Clark Gallery. "My So-Called Life features six artists whose works explore the struggle of ordinary adolescents to live up to society’s expectations as they come into their own." No it's not fair, a little surfing left and right can conjure up the world's greatest art too easily, no wonder going out and taking the streetcar to Toronto's craftistic artificial distillery district disappoints. I don't know, I don't have it with that place. I get into this middle-aged-creative-women frenzy. Itching all over. Defiant too. I told the hat shop woman her hats were too Audrey Hepburn.

henry darger

A very puzzling story. Henry Darger was born in 1892 and died in 1973. He led a reclusive life after having fled institutions for the feeble-minded. After he died his landlord discovered an enormous artistic oeuvre in Henry's raunchy Chicago room. Amid the debris he found hundreds of gigantic watercolour paintings, illustrating a twelve volume fantasy novel Henry had written in his lifetime. Read all (?) about it on this website and don't forget to click on the paintings, to be seen and enjoyed in resolutions of thousands of pixels. And if that's not enough for you, you might want to read this 3 page Salon article: "The late Henry Darger is a darling of the outsider art world, a dishwasher who created a vast epic tale of naked little girls. But was he also something more sinister?" Questions, questions, after reading that one. Whether Darger was a murderer, no one will ever know. But did Nathan Lerner really not know about Darger's art before he died? Living in his house? Or did he just sit it out, waiting for the loot?

todd schorr

I kept thinking about these Milton Glaser things, and there is one thing that I find kind of unsatisfactory. Number 6, about style: "But the point is that anybody who is in this for the long haul has to decide how to respond to change in the zeitgeist." Now I for me personally, I find Glaser's more recent work not that appealing. But that might just as well just be me. I don't think he is very influential on the young and hot anymore. But take his sixties counterpart Alan Aldridge, I don't think he ever gave a single thought to any zeitgeist, he just kept doing what he did until fashion came back to him. And just look at the influence Aldridge still has on the young and hot. It wasn't easy but I managed to find three websites with a little more than a little bit of information about Aldridge. 1 2 3

milton glaser

When there is nothing to blog about one can always go to our hyperactive blogger Hanan and steal an inspiring idea. Today I found the 10 things Milton Glaser has learned in his carreer. I hate patronizing didactical advisory moralistic shit, but Milton Glaser has gone through quite a carreer, so it can't be all feint. And it isn't. I'll give you the first thing he learned, so you can decide for yourself as to whether you want the rest:

YOU CAN ONLY WORK FOR PEOPLE THAT YOU LIKE (I agree!!)
It took me a long time to learn this rule because at the beginning of my practice I felt the opposite. Professionalism inferred that you didn’t necessarily have to like the people that you worked for, and should maintain an arms length relationship to them. As a result, I never had lunch with a client or saw them socially. Some years ago I realised that I was deluded. In looking back, I discovered that all the work I had done that was meaningful and significant came out of an affectionate relationship with a client. Affection, trust and sharing some common ground is the only way good work can be achieved. Otherwise it is a bitter and hopeless struggle.

Oh, and am listening to this all day. Especially "creep", I think about 25 times now, even Michiel loves it. Via IJsbrand, everything today is second hand. I can't wait to hear what Martin thinks about it, but he is very hard to get in touch with these days.

jeroen de leijer

This is the comic strip that used to accompany my favourite radio show. I don't know why, but they seem to have stopped publishing them early last year. The radio show is still being broadcasted. Jeroen de Leijer studied at the same artschool I did, so I read. But much later in time, because he is much younger than me. Everybody is younger than me, but that is of little importance. I had my children before my carreer, so at least I didn't need any in vitro fertilisation. Jeroen also draws a comic strip in the same paper I did my first illustration in this week, so it can't really be a bad paper, I totally need to see a copy some time. Radio Bergeijk (the show) is very very typical Northern Brabant humour (Northern Brabant is in the southern half of the Netherlands - I know it must sound strange to Canadians to devide a petite country like Holland into regions of regions, but hell, doesn't Neil Young sing about Northern Ontario?). For me, every episode is a trip down memory lane. Half my family is exactly like the characters in both the show and the comic strip. Especially the half that doesn't want to know me anymore. Unfortunately they don't read BN/DeStem because they are from the eastern part of Northern Brabant. They read Eindhovens Dagblad, god I hope the local papers in Holland keep on merging like they do. I always imagine my sister-in-law reacting to my illustrating for NRC Handelsblad (very upscale) in a very radio Bergeijk tone of voice "Eindhovens Dagblad evidently wasn't good enough!".

right ceasar

This is much better. Now all we need is a frame. I didn't like the frame that could have come with it, too fake-old. I'd much rather have a genuine old one. Anybody have an idea where to get one?

wrong ceasar

Finally my Ray Ceasar was delivered, but it's the wrong one!!

- to be continued -

couch

I got out of the house to get the groceries, and look what I saw! The couch is ready! I'll let Peter hold on to it for a week or so, I think the couch is really proud to be on display like this. A very artistic window-dresser, Peter is.

bartolomeo passerotti

For just over twelve dollars I bought an enormous steak at the St. Lawrence Market, we could not even finish it with the four of us.

gilbert shelton

Done -for a while at least- with sex toys. And don't get me wrong, I swear I have never even touched a single such object. Whenever I pass a sex shop window it is with an averted head. You can imagine the fun I had researching on Google images. I was absolutely intrigued with nose dildo's, I would never even have imagened them, had I not been given this last illustration job. Goes to show what a mind broadening profession illustrating is. So there I am, job finished, but the nose dildo does not want to leave my thoughts. I could now show you the Chapman Brothers, but whyy? No, let's make 'em real jealous over at Drawn! and go for some old fashioned underground comics!

While typing this entry I hear the stupidest artist on earth being interviewed on the radio, how irritating. She is talking about D3 software, and it's not a slip of the tongue, she said it twice. A question from the interviewer: "What do artists do?" Answer: "They make an image to express themselves". You can order a CD with this historic interview for 8.50 euro. One mind blowing experience after another, my life.

peter pontiac

I subscribe to a mailinglist with Dutch illustrators. One of my colleagues there unsuspectingly posted the image above, click on it to see the whole thing. He took it from "the Pontiac Review #6" the sixth album in a seven-volume autobiographical series by Peter Pontiac, a widely respected comic artist in Holland. In the text above, Peter tells us about a glass recycling company that fiercely art directed his drawings, and that later a staff member of that same company complained to him about the boring image of their campaign. No wonder, according to Peter. Nothing really spectacular so far. Now about the mailinglist. A couple of subscribers started questioning Pontiac's professionalism, exposing his client like he did. And about him not "coming across" as a professional. My god!! My worst nightmare is coming true. In future artists will have to go to business school before they can start a carreer. Without gooey marketing jargon we will not be allowed to talk to -let alone about- clients anymore! Portfolio's filled with decades of beautiful drawings will be worth nothing. Lobotomized managers will only want to work with business school brainwashed illustrators who cannot draw. Professionalism, my ass. I am so completely not interested in whether anyone thinks I am a professional or not. I do what I do and I am what I am. Anybody trying to "come across" as a professional is an imposter in my book. I don't need to come across, I am not an actress. I am a visual artist and my work can very well speak for itself. And me myself can speak too, in four different languages if I have to, but not in gooey jargon, in servitude of the holy client.

marcel van eeden 2

Otger did a portait of Marcel at the opening. Marcel complained about the chin, and rightly so. But other than that, it's quite good I think. For a palm pilot drawing.

marcel van eeden

No blog entry yesterday, overseas visitors. Had a lot of fun contemplating the good old times. Opening at Clint Roenisch tonight. If you're in Toronto, get your ass over there. Great work, nice guy, what more do you want on a cold thirstday night.

dog?

William Wilson sent me one of his animals! Is it a dog? I think he likes it on my mantelpiece. For those of you who missed that blog episode: William is a stuffed animals artist and an NRC reader with initiative. He contacted the editorial office to purchase a print of one of my illustrations. I had a very chique giclée print done.

the new new yorker

A form of pirating the world hasn't seen yet. People in Moscou wanted to read something like The New Yorker, so now they have The New Eyewitness. It might just be an excellent opportunity for illustrators, I could of course send them a little promotion package, what do you think?
Via.

Update: the Wikipedia tells me The New Eyewitness is history already, damn.

alphabet

Al Hirschfeld * Brian Cronin * Clayton brothers * Dave Cooper * Eric White * Franciszka Themerson * Gary Baseman * Heinz Schubel * Isabel Samaras * James Jean * Kathy Staico Schorr * Lisa Petrucci * Mark Ryden * Nils Karsten * Otto Siebold * Peter Pontiac * Quincy Renon * Ray Ceasar * Saul Steinberg * Tim Biskup * Ub Iwerks * Vanessa Dell * Walter Trier * Xavier Marquis * Yoshitomo Nara * Zohar Lazar

kozyndan

After reading the Ray Ceasar interview on Pixelsurgeon I browsed through the rest of their interviews, quite an interesting time pass. I show you Kozyndan because I love complicated perspectives. And because I am jealous of their cooperation. Sigh, what if Michiel could just quit at Alias...

excerpt:

How do you work together? What's the process?

DAN: Depends. Mostly we beat each other up and whatever the blood stains look like - that's what Kozy starts drawing. She does the really detailed intricate drawings. While she is working on the backgrounds I am supposed to be figuring out what the characters are doing (although I am usually just watching TV or something though). Then she takes my character sketches and redraws them in her style, adds more of her own and I composite all the characters into her original background.

KOZY: Then we put the image on two computers and just start painting. We sit back to back and just pick areas to color until everything is just about done, then we join them in one file and finish it out.

ray ceasar

I have bought a work of art! We went to Ray Ceasar's opening in the Lonsdale gallery yesterday. I knew his work very well, but only from his website. Really great to see his pictures together, framed and much bigger. I adored them, I'm really glad we bought one. He knew my website too, he said. A very modern introduction, "I know your website!", "Yes, I know yours too!". This is the picture we bought. And so nice of him to pose for Piffin's camera phone. Here's an interview with Ray.

gerry putman

I still haven't shown you the book Martin gave us for christmas. Printed by hand, copyright 1967 - Mika Silk Screening Limited, Belleville, Ontario. It's called "Toronto Magnificent City - An Illustrated Look at a Great Metropolis", and it contains over a hundred Toronto scenes. The one above is closest to where we live, though we could never afford to live in the slums and skid row mentioned in the text. What fourty years can do. Fortunately the skyscrapers Nick and Helma Mika predict on Queen Street were never built. I still shop in these exact same shops. And we own a peeling paint and sagging verandah ourselves. And the second hand shops are very elegant. Today we frown upon the buildings idealised back then.

johan kleinjan

I am still sick. To fight the boredom, my friend Joris sent me a long list of URL's he took from the illustration issue of Credits. I missed this issue because of our move, it didn't get forwarded. So now I am up to snuff on Dutch Illustration. And I am in total Flash shock. Websites that catapult themselves full screen, producing horrible sounds and crashing my computer twice. Overly enthusiastic freshly graduated artschool students mainly I'm afraid, all very hip, and some of them truly interesting. A couple of agents representing older illustrators, showing what was hip when they graduated. What is it that sentences so many artists to life in the Zeitgeist of their graduation year? I bet you 80% of the young dogs I surfed this morning will keep doing what they do until long after everybody is sick of it. Maybe not Johan Kleinjan, I like him. I think he has something to do with this incomprehencible website. This is his Flash agent.

william wilson

I sent the giclée print off to William Wilson today. I hope it will arrive before William is off to Stockholm. William turns thousands of animals inside out. I am so happy they are fake ones. Don't know if I would have sold my artwork to him otherwise. I am thrilled though that he made me do what I have been wanting to do for the longest time, some serious art printing of my work. And I am serious about doing more. I can give you an idea of the costs involved. This print was a 20 x 26 inch one. Which translates to 50.8 x 66 centimeters. Printing costs were 157.39 CAN $. I would double that for you, hence 314.78 CAN $. Mailing it to Holland costs 55.42 CAN $. Makes 370.20 CAN $. And today that would mean 232.33 €. A rather complicated figure, so let's just say a 50 x 65 cm. print costs 250 €. And approximately 300 US $, considering cheaper shipping.

jason d'aquino

Otger is feeling miserable. Feverish, throat ache, stomach ache. He's asking for cups of tea, that's a sure sign of seriousness. He's watching Ice Age now, maybe that'll reduce the fever. The image above is a graphite miniature by Jason d'Aquino. On his website he states: "Reproduction without express permission of the Artist is prohibited by law. Pirates will be blown from the water." I'm holding on tight. I'm a pirate with good intentions though, so I hope I will be forgiven. And I love Jason's drawings.

helmut newton

This Helmut Newton photo used to hang over Piffin's changing table. It helped me come to terms with motherhood, and it gave Piffin something colourful to grab at. That's how it got the distressed look. I thought of it because of yesterday's Coney Island picture. I did a Google search on Coney Island and found this great picture of Robert Mapplethorpe and Patti Smith. (Helmut Newton and Robert Mapplethorpe somehow sit close together in my brain, this blog entry is a mess.) And guess what, lately Piffin is constantly playing my Patti Smith CD, it vanished from the kitchen I just noticed, she must have taken it to her room. Children!! They make all the good stuff disappear, I bought FIVE erasers yesterday because of that, grrrrrr.

Wow, millions of Patti pictures.

psychedelium

Bought a lamp today. Thought it might cast some interesting shadows, but it turned my studio into something of an aquarium. Nice lamp though, clear glass with white glass drippings melted all over it, almost like it's tangled up in Ipod wire. Bob Dylan and I have a lot in common.

hugo kaagman

Some more interior design today. A nice example of the condition of things in our household, mint! Hugo Kaagman is a graffiti artist who spraypaints half of our country, even oven cloths, and comes away with it legally. He started out in the eighties with his own house, which he covered in zebra pattern. A friend of ours lived in the same house.

irene klinkenberg & nicole van schouwenburg

Zeppo tipped me about these shelves. They are absolutely it. I want them. Over my night table. I won't put Kristien Hemmerechts on there though, nor Simenon. But hey, I read in the papers that a new Houellebecq is coming out.

mary mapes dodge

No idea who did this illustration, Dodge is the writer so it seems. Is it an American book? You can read the whole thing online if you want to. But I very much doubt you do. Anyway, it is the best known Dutch hoax. And I am researching old boy book covers.

Our ID campaign "gelijk oversteken" is becoming a real succes. I didn't know Jan Marijnissen was backing us, good for him! So says NRC Handelsblad today, but without URL or image. Shame on them.

tejo remy

Martin and Michiel are building the wardrobe. It's going to be quite different from the one above, unfortunately. Though the one above is probably also more complicated than it looks. M & M have to redo half the electrickery in the bedroom, before they can start to rebuild some walls that one of the previous owners demolished. They want a sliding door on the outside of the wardrobe, much like a barn door. With an antique cast iron sliding system. All they have to do is find such a thing.

butter dish

Incredible! Cockie blogged our old butter dish! We used to have this exact poppy crockery a long long time ago. I think I took the last couple of plates when I left home, but they gradually died. I asked Cockie for more, I hope she still has some. On second thought, our crockery may have had smooth edges and a silver rim, not scalloped like in this picture, mmm.

For more challenging christmas entertainment go visit Michiel. Don't read the comments, I believe Willem's solution is wrong.

richard scarry

A christmas present from my publisher! And I haven't even sent out cards myself this year, I don't deserve it. It's an animated version of Richard Scarry's Gingerbread Man, and it's adorable. With the voice of Willem Nijholt, a very famous Dutch actor, and music by Henny Vrienten, a very famous Dutch musician. Whom I was introduced to by the way, in October in Amsterdam, ha! And I carried around Willem Nijholt's flowers all night, who was absent at the presentation. The next morning we tried everything to find out his address in order to bring him his flowers, but we couldn't find it. No flowers for Willem Nijholt. I am on the verge of starting a third project for my publisher, and an extremely exiting project I dare say...

henri pieck

What ever would I do with these finds if I did not have a blog? I never knew the (searching for the right adjective here) Anton Pieck had a drawing brother? I was searching for police officers because I'm doing something really political for Hiram, who is paying me for that with hundreds of hits, my stats are going crazy. Welcome, Hiram people!

franciszka themerson

Working against a strangling deadline here, but I just have to show you this. Last week Jasia from the Themerson Archive mailed me. She thought I had written nicely about Franciszka Themerson and she was going to send me a book because of that. Now how sweet is that?! Picture above is Jasia's card, I don't want to break the back of a gorgeous new book in my scanner. And now for Chinatown noodles.

franz ignaz pollinger

Ölgemälde von Franz Ignaz Pollinger aus dem Jahr 1848, das die Familie des Rieder Handelsherrn und Bürgemeisters Josef Anton Rapolter um den ersten Christbaum in Ried versammelt darstellt. Gleichzeitig scheint es sich, wie aus den Spruchbändern am Christbaum hervorgeht, um das Geburtstagsfest des Vaters zu handeln.

Don't ask. I'm looking for inspiration for this week's drawing. Have to show you this one.

mantelpiece

This beautiful junk emerged from under the mantelpiece. The mantelpiece was gigantic, and covered in hideous linoleum, like the floors. We brought the mantelpiece back to it's original -more than big enough- size, sanded it down and revealed the hardwood floors. And Michiel bought outdoor fairy lights for on the porch!! Now he just has to install an outdoor socket. Minor detail.

reupholstery

We bought our outrageously expensive B&B couch some ten years ago. You could say that's a fair timeframe for reupholstery. But the fabric wore out too long ago. So long ago that I grew to hate the damned couch, the thing looks like we bought it at the flea market, holes and everything. Flat cushions. It's not the one above, oh no, same colours though. As we bought the couch we were assured that we could order new sleeves, everything is velcro and zippers. But when I tried to do just that, I of course could not. Our model was obsolete. So now Peter with his upholstery shop around our corner is going to facelift our B&B. In January. He's too busy now, everybody wants their furniture done before christmas. I like the walls in the picture by the way.

Oh yes, birthday alarm. I blog one year today.

wallpaper

Now people start begging me for actual renovation progress photo's. But I can't find the cable to connect the camera to the computer. I did manage to get the scanner running however. So here's a piece of wallpaper from our bedroom. We really should do a decollage and just cover everything with varnish. Unfortunately we're not that romantic. And for those of you who missed this picture the last couple of times I showed it; this is the house.

ms kirk

Parent teacher interviews, I met Otger's new teacher. Which way will this one go, will she understand him or will she not. She seems nice enough, so we're hopeful once again. And the class is full of weirdo's like Otger, smart but at grade two level for the simplest of things. She was reading a book on the subject, so at least the teacher is willing to learn. Otger has to start work on a science project. I'll show him WunderKat, see what he thinks.

intelligence

It is not intelligent to look all over for the washing machine hoses, then do all the laundry by hand, and then find the hoses inside the washing machine. The pipe cleaning above would be interesting. Our warm water pipes are in danger of cardiac arrest, they're completely clogged. It takes hours to fill a bath, and after having taken the bath, the water finds it's way through the kitchen ceiling.

hello world

We're connected again. Yesterday ten minutes before midnight the last piece of junk was unloaded from the truck. We almost dropped dead in our beds. Today I gradually started unpacking, despite aches and pains everywhere, especially my back, my right knee, and both index fingers. And we're cold, we can't get the furnace to work. The furnace guy couldn't either. Now I'm waiting for the electrician. As long as I keep busy I'm not cold, but I'm too tired to keep busy. All went well by the way, only the basement stairs are too narrow for the washer and the dryer, darn. And Piffin will have to do without a lot of things, because the attic entrance is also ridiculously narrow. And I see some water stains here and there I don't completely trust, and smell an odour I don't completely trust, we'll see. The corner store woman is funny. "Again!" she shouted as I came in. "Yeah, I'll be here a lot." "So good, Canadian people come live here, area gets more clean." "I am not Canadian, I am from Holland." "Aaaah! Like me!! I am from Hong Kong. Hong Kong multicultural! Multicultural is gooooood!"

Multicultural update: A genius from Trinidad fixed our heating problem. The fancy programmable thermostat was fucked up. He took it down and hooked up a vintage one. We tipped him good.

huib maaskant

I found another model railroad website. Last month I found American model railroads, this time it is genuine Marklin. I say genuine, because Marklin used to be the one and only. In Europe. In our house. I was never allowed to even touch it and I imagine my brother is protecting his Marklin with his life to this day.

peyo

Yay, winter's here! Just what we need. Who would want to move without snow?

Piffin (at school) just emailed me this picture with her new camera phone.

queen mary

Category famous moves: this is queen Mary's doll house being packed up for transport in 1924. Meanwhile I am sitting between ever growing piles of cardboard boxes. But today I didn't do any packing, I went to the new house. To meet the furnace guy, but he didn't show up. And I am having my gynaecological thing, so I stood there cramping for nothing. Oh well, having some white wine now, and cooking dinner. Rice & bean sprouts, I'm getting ready for Chinatown.

sainte wilgeforte

My two previous posts led to this one. Sorry for the poor quality of the picture, I challenge you hereby to find me a better one. The pastor of the church in Wissant sure is getting his way. He is protecting this statue vehemently. When you enter the church there's a sign "l'eglise n'est pas une musee", and I don't think he allows camera's. Hence the unfindability of Wilgeforte on the net. Legend has it that Wilgeforte's father (11th century) wanted to marry her off against her will. To avoid the marriage, she grew a full beard overnight. Thereupon her father crucified her. And thus, I can draw your attention to the child abuse awareness week on Dutch television. Great initiative.

I just received this explanation (in Dutch, so don't bother if you don't read Dutch) from a reader. Same saint, but not Wissant.

gustave courbet

Gustave Courbet (Ornans, 1819 - La Tour de Peilz, 1877) : L'Origine du monde (1866). Ce tableau fut peint en 1866 pour Khalil-Bey, ancien ambassadeur Ottoman à Saint-Petersbourg. Sulfureux dans sa provocation, il resta pendant longtemps enfoui dans l'oubli des pudeurs choquées. Il est désormais visible dans l'équivoque splendide de son titre et la splendeur provocante de sa représentation au Musée d'Orsay.

In Belgium I had a neighbour with a postcard of this painting on his window sill. This morning the Jehovah's Witnesses bakery woman was asking me about a Renoir painting. I advised her to just type "Renoir" in Google images. Suddenly I hoped so much that she would stumble upon that postcard image I used to see daily. But when I looked it up, it turned out that "the origin of the world" is not by Renoir, as I had wrongly assumed. It is Courbet. Lucky bakery woman.

jezus & jebroer

The things I find packing our belongings! I didn't fabricate this lovely artefact, my brother did. By the time I was in kindergarten, stuff like this was already way too old fashioned. But I vividly remember being so jealous of my brothers because they did get to twist (weave? twine?) paper. Which, by the way, had nothing to do with the subject matter.

Real estate surrealism: We didn't understand why the replacement value of our house in the quotation for property insurance was so much lower than the purchase price. Turns out that if the house burns down, we still own the land, which is worth the difference. I think you need a very morbid imagination to understand these things without triple explanations.

OMG, this is the neighbourhood we're moving to.

andy warhol

Our boxes are not as pretty as Andy's, but I don't want our move to end up in an art gallery anyway.

Otger went to school this morning:
Me: "Get another A for math!" He: "I'll get A's for everything!" Me: "You don't have to get A's for everything, really you don't." He: "Okay, for everything except French then."

Piffin went to school this morning:
"School starts late today, but I'll take the 8 o'clock bus anyway, because after 8 o'clock my body wants to be at school."

brian warner

Piffin is going to a concert tonight.

Depending on which internet rumour you believe, Manson has either murdered a Mexican teenager and cut off his own genitals on stage or ritually sacrificed an elephant and had two ribs removed in order to fellate himself.

But then again:

These days, Manson is close to his parents and has moved them to California, so that they can be near and he can financially support them. Would he like to be a father himself? There's a long pause. 'Possibly,' he says eventually. 'But only at a time when I could dedicate the proper attention it would need. It would be the ultimate art form to raise a child. That would be your immortality right there.'

what's up doc?

Boxomania. We scored two carloads of boxes on curbs around the city, and they're filling up fast.

show and tell

I am so looking forward to living like this.

I found this record sleeve in the show and tell galleries. I was planning on linking to some more gems on that site, but there are just too many. Candy for the eyes, go visit. Parbleu, I would love to do an outrageous CD sleeve, but all the musicians I know prefer to wack some typography on a photo. If I have to believe Will at showandtellmusic freeking parakeet training records had more exiting covers some decades ago.

Update: I just noticed that Bezembinder blogged showandtellmusic on October 25. So I'll credit him, although I swear I found the site by myself :-)

joko

I decided to do a sequel on yesterday, the Eliane comix are too funny to not show them. I can sequel on Picasso too: through Eamelje I found this requiem by the one and only Kurt Vonnegut (my, some people are so damn good at getting old). Quote:

TROUT: You ever meet anybody who was really smart?

KV: Only one: Saul Steinberg, the graphic artist who’s dead now. Everybody I know is dead now, present company excepted. I could ask Saul anything, and six seconds would pass, and then he would give me a perfect answer. He growled a perfect answer. He was born in Rumania, and, according to him, he was born into a house where “the geese peeked in the windows.”

TROUT: Like what kind of questions?

KV: I said, “Saul, what should I think about Picasso?” Six seconds went by, and then he growled, “God put him on Earth to show us what it’s like to be really rich.” I said, “Saul, I’m a novelist, and many of my friends are novelists, but I can’t help feeling that some of them are in a very different business from mine, even though I like their books a lot. What would make me feel that way?” Six seconds went by, and then he growled, “It is very simple: There are two kinds of artists, and one is not superior to the other. But one kind responds to the history of his or her art so far, and the other responds to life itself.”

I said, “Saul, are you gifted?” Six seconds went by, and then he growled, “No. But what we respond to in any work of art is the artist’s struggle against his or her limitations.”

prince shervashidze

From PeoplePlay UK (1500 images on British theatre history, goldmine alarm!):

Serge Diaghilev asked the painter Pablo Picasso for permission to reproduce a small painting of two giantesses running along a beach. It was to appear on a drop curtain hanging in front of the stage during the overture. The scene painter Prince Shervashidze painstakingly copied the original, and with such precision that Picasso himself was delighted. He wrote on it 'Dedie a Diaghilew. Picasso' (dedicated to Diaghilev) in the corner. The curtain is 10.3 x 11.7m, with a painted area about 7 x 8m, which makes it the largest canvas ever signed by Picasso.

I found this incredible website through Ramage.

Funny funny funny: bel blog! molto belli i colori!

Even funnier: I discovered comic strips about me! (via)

jim henson

Some good news from our southern neighbours for a change, a new series of U.S. stamps will be issued in 2005 featuring images of Kermit the Frog and the rest of the Muppet gang. In all, there are 11 Muppet stamps. Miss Piggy, Kermit's sometime love, gets a stamp of her own, as does the nonsense-spouting Swedish Chef, who was a supporting character on The Muppet Show known for his offbeat cooking techniques. I found out about this through Bianca, who was so lovely as to snail mail me a sketch book! I received it today and immediately snail mailed her a sketch back.

Oh, and of course I finished the dinner drawing, I'll show it as soon as it's published. I am ready to pack now!

j h lynch

From the website I found through happy famous artists:
Does this painting look familiar? The chances that you have seen it before are pretty high. The chances you also know that its name is "Tina" are a bit lower. The chances that you know anything about the artist who created it are close to zero.

I never knew that these images were published in "de Lach", a very shabby shady shoddy Dutch magazine in the sixties. I don't think I ever even saw a copy, but I do remember that the parents of a girl in my class had a subscription. The things one remembers... This was the girl who knew all about sex before anybody else did.

New R.A.M episode, about the graphic novel. Interviews with Will Eisner, Art Spiegelman, Craig Thompson and Dominique Goblet. The narrated in between parts are in Dutch. The stream hasn't yet been uploaded to the website, but you can acces it here.

rogier klomp

Beautifully drawn animation film by Rogier Klomp. An artschool graduation project, an animated documentary. (Click the second film icon on this website for viewing, film is in English with Dutch subtitles, the first film icon shows a short statement by Rogier in Dutch.) Posting this today is appropriate, in more than one way. The film is about US politics, presidential campaigns and conspiracy theories. Klomp doesn't claim objectivity, but I don't think anybody is amazed by anything coming from the US anymore. Or Holland, for that matter. Where a film maker was murdered today.

lynd ward

Otger bought this book at a second hand book sale this weekend. He is now frantically reading it. Otger is a victim of the gender neutral times formal education is going through, he craves for real boy books. He reads everything from Treasure Island to Dik Trom, from Pietje Bel to Jules Vernes. This version of Robinson Crusoe is being sold online for 30 dollars US, haha, he paid 3 Canadian I think. Unfortunately his copy doesn't have the interesting footprints cover, but other than that it's the same book. Otger loves the illustrations and the archaic language, he had to look up how much a "league" is: A unit of distance equal to 3.0 statute miles (4.8 kilometers). Now that's learning, eat that, schoolboard people weeding the school libraries for "outdated" books!

anregungen

Kuechen: rustikal und modern, tausend Anregungen in Farbe. I wish I could show you the whole book, I've had it for the longest time, but it's starting to grow on me. Every time I look at it, Michiel threatens with divorce. But I think it beats the book he bought yesterday.

vijselaar & sixma

Can you imagine the fun of visiting Michiel Vijselaar and Tjarda Sixma in their home? Thousands of toys, thematically filed in dozens of shoe boxes. For ever young, they are. But they finally, finally finally grew up enough to make themselves their long overdue website. Go have fun visiting them. The image above is not even on the site yet, Michiel emailed it to me, it was in last Saturday's Volkskrant. It's about 15 years of commercial television in Holland.

zohar lazar

The Zohar (Hebrew זהר Zohar "Splendor, radiance") is widely considered the most important work of Kabbalah, Jewish mysticism. It is a mystical commentary on the Torah (five books of Moses), written in medieval Aramaic and medieval Hebrew. It contains a mystical discussion of the nature of God, the origin and structure of the universe, the nature of souls, sin, redemption, good and evil, and related topics. Lazar is a Romanian family name, as far as I can tell. This is all the information I can find regarding Zohar Lazar. I found him through Internet Weekly. He works for all the big magazines, I can find dozens and dozens of his illustrations online, but not a word about the man himself. A true mysticist.

dale hale

Peanuts comic books, not the newspaper version. I found the website through Neurastenia. Beautiful covers, but except for the very first one, Charles M. Schulz did not draw the insides of the books. It is even possible that the "signed" covers may not be Schulz either. These issues were produced by a crew of artists working for Schulz and who did advertising artwork for him. The main artist was Dale Hale. Snoopy of course is contemplating Kierkegaard.

Keep visiting Paul Giambarba, he is still posting those magnificent drawings Edward Penfield did in Holland.

bovenzeeertje

Time to promote a different gouden boekje. Sieb Posthuma's Bovenzeeertje came out together with Tim's Bed. Sieb's drawings are absolutely adorable. They remind me of Steinberg. And although Steinberg never did a little golden book, Het Bovenzeeertje very much breathes little golden book. Chapeau. Sieb and I had a little tete a tete (forgive me for not looking for French accents on this bleeding qwerty keyboard) at the bicycle rack, where we confessed to each other we wouldn't at all mind doing another one. Very nice guy too, Sieb.

king of dogs

Walter is asking for reviews of his new book. I haven't read it yet, but I can contribute with a visual review. I'll enjoy Walter's book, if it's only half as good as Donna's.

maurice vellekoop

Shit, shit, shit. I just received an invite for a lecture by Maurice Vellekoop, and I CAN'T GO. I'm in Amsterdam. I could cry. So all of you Torontonians will have to go see this uberfamous fellow Dutch guy in my place. Tuesday, October 5th, 2004, 6:30 pm. The Central Hall, Room 230, Level Two, Ontario College of Art & Design, 100 McCaul Street, Toronto. 10 bucks for non CAPIC members.

heinz schubel

We lived in Germany when Piffin was young. Piffin was perfectly bilingual, and often we used to read to her in German. Lurchi was her absolute favourite. And sublime for reading out loud, because it is written in rhyme, with an iron rhythm. You can try. The stories are a shoe brand's marketing product, they sure don't make 'em like that anymore! Frightingly German I'm afraid, I just learned that Schubel used to draw nazi propaganda during the war. And later communist propaganda, as a prisoner of war. Wise decision to turn to children's literature after that... :-~

brothers

Happy birthday to the brothers! (Michiel's brother and my brother are born on the same day, fifteen years apart however) The cards are from the Chinese art bookstore around the corner from our new house. I had never been to a Chinese art bookstore before. Wildly interesting, I'll go again. I saw a book with Chinese cave paintings. The existence of Chinese cave paintings had never even crossed my mind, cave painting for me is Lascaux, period. Maybe I should have bought the book, I didn't have much time yesterday, with the home inspection and all. But I certainly have to start working on my artistic multiculturality.

pierre perrault

At least we made it to the last night of the Film Festival. We saw "La Bête lumineuse", and laughed our asses of. A bunch of guys together in a cabin for ten days of moose hunting. And it's a documentary, it wasn't even acted. Ever seen anyone cook dinner so drunk that they fall flat on their onion? And bloody too. The liver above is from the first and only moose they shoot. And the guys that did not shoot the moose had to eat the raw liver. And then puked, of course. The film was raw too, not just the liver. But I still feel my cheeks from laughing.

iris kiewiet

Today I showed my NRC co-worker Iris a big chunk of Toronto. We are so tired. We saw tons of closed galeries (such a good idea to do this on a Monday), the MEC, Kensington, Honest Ed's and David Mirvish Bookstore. By now she is thinking about immigrating.

art spiegelman

I was too busy this week to go to a bookstore, so I haven't seen it in paper yet, but "In the Shadow of No Towers" is out. Spiegelman started drawing the comic straight after 9-11 and now it's a book. No American newspaper (other than "The Forward", a jewish magazine) had the nerve to run the comic strip, and oddly enough, Spiegelman sold it to Die Zeit. Read the customer reviews at Amazon, very controversial book indeed.

paul cezanne

I am so sick of the horrible weak and fluffy cheap bread the supermarkets and bakery's sell. And good quality bread is too expensive to buy daily, I think. With the quantities eaten in this household... So I started baking again. The kids love it, everybody loves it. My arms love it too, haha. And it's so easy, you only need time.

Dissolve some yeast in sugar and warm water, four cups of flour in a bowl with some salt and sugar, add the yeast, 65 ml oil and 225 ml warm water. Knead for ten minutes. One hour rising under a towel. Knead for a minute. Form the portions you want and let them rise again for 45 minutes under a plastic bag. Put on a greased baking tray and bake 10 minutes at 210 degrees. Then turn down to 180 degrees and bake for another 20 - 30 minutes. Enjoy the smell!

If you have a better recipe, please share.

ashkenaz

Ashkenaz is the festival of New Yiddish Culture in Toronto, we went to see Martin play. The pictures of the band did not turn out well enough for publication. Music is so difficult to capture in a photo! And the CIBC stage is not very photogenic anyhow. So I show you us. With the one and only Arie, practicing on a bottle (his parents won't let him have a clarinet, they hope he'll make more money playing the violin). His dad is the famous clarinet klezmer virtuoso Martin van de Ven. A lot of Dutch/Canadian cross culture at Ashkenaz. Monique, with Collected Stories, and Ot Azoj from Amsterdam. We were having drinks with them and I promised to send a request in to Grensverkeer to play their music. Weird things happened too. Creepy almost. What do you think of somebody walking around with a Munich 1972 Olympics handbag on a jewish festival? And the guy I bought a scarf from. I said something about his accent. No, he was from the US, he had needed a lot of speech therapy as a child, and he was NOT German. Later I looked at his business card; Hess & Becker.

charles le brun

Bezembinder has a beautiful picture blog, and yesterday he showed a Le Brun physionomy drawing. I am grateful he did, because I had almost forgotten I own a book with these drawings. But what good is a book if there is a website showing every single drawing from the book, and much larger too?

Real estate update: The selling agent has surfaced. It turns out they turned down our bid because they had a higher one. But what do you know, the others buyers couldn't get their mortgage financed. Yo, we're playing again.

chinatown

Since three o'clock this morning on the phone with various money sources, going through long overdue crash courses in mortgaging, learning that communication with the seller's agent goes through a Chinese interpreter, and discovering that we were supposed to have applied for our landed immigrant status.

philip roth

Somebody somewhere today claimed that Grapus was around in the late eighties. I thought it tragically funny that 1968 is so long ago already, that it is possible to move it forward two decades just like that. There is absolutely nothing wrong with fucking around with history if you know what you're doing. If you're called Philip Roth for example. I have just finished reading "the plot against America". (Not even for sale yet, haha! I happened to find an advanced copy in a second hand bookstore.) Now that is fucking around with history for advanced students. Wow. Compulsory reading. Charles Lindbergh is elected president of the US and teams up with Hitler. I'm glad though I can show you the Grapus image instead of the Roth cover, because although it is done by Milton Glaser, it is hidious.

For some private life news, go to Michiel.

takei takeo

Japanese children's book illustration from the 1920's. Very much worth checking out, beautiful silhouetty stuff too. Via Neurastenia.

Gossip of the day:
A new member subscribed to the illustrators mailinglist. He asked for comments on his (wonderful imo) website. One of the comments posted was very conceited and dismissive. Subsequently, another list member -who teaches at an artschool- responded in this way to that negative comment: "I just emailed X privately and asked him whether he would consider giving a guest lecture at our artschool. I did not look at the discussed website, and I don't have to see it to understand the kind of humorous, steeped in experience, and especially accurate insight that would, nowadays, stand every designer in good stead." In other words, you have such a wonderful way of telling people how much they suck, you should be an artschool teacher.

paul kane

We're going to lie on this Georgian Bay beach for a week or so.

From the ROM website: 1 2 3

"Hailed as a founding father of Canadian art, Paul Kane (1810-1871) made two journeys across Canada determined to paint, in his words, "a series of pictures illustrative of the North American Indians and scenery." As one of the first Canadian artists to portray the northwest, Kane chronicled Native cultures and historical events providing pre-photographic records of fur-trading posts, travel by canoe and dog team, Native customs, and one of the last great buffalo hunts."

walter trier

Most of what I find about Walter Trier is in German, so I am nice and write you a short summary:

Walter Trier illustrated many of Erich Kästner's children's books. (I have three of them, "das doppelte Lottchen", "Die Konferenz der Tiere", and "das fliegende Klassenzimmer".) But despite that, he is almost forgotten in Germany. Partly because the humoristic genre is widely being looked down upon in Germany but certainly also because as a jew, he had to end his carreer in Berlin, and flee to London in 1936. In London he worked for Lilliput, for twelve years he did the covers, always a couple with a dog. (And I have a copy!) Disney offered to hire him as an animator, but Trier declined, he wanted to work under his own name. In London he also did anti nazi cartoons, and they were dropped out of airplanes over Germany. In 1947 he emigrated to Canada, where his daughter lived, and worked as a designer for J.S. McLean's successful meat-packing business, Canada Packers Limited. He died in 1951. The AGO had a Trier show in 1999, I read they even have a collection. I'll look out for it, next time I'm there.

Some scans from "Die Konferenz der Tiere": 1 2 3 4

marshall mcluhan way

Marshall McLuhan is going to have a Toronto street named after him next week. Picture above is my own old personal copy of the medium is the massage. (Very bad quality, this medium. What does that say about this message?) We had an American photography teacher in art school that made us study this book. Over and over and through and through. Think he was a true fan. We, the students (I'm quite sure I don't just speak for myself) straight out of highschool, in the late seventies, were not exactly the right McLuhan audience yet. I don't even recall whether this teacher spoke Dutch. If he did, he certainly can't have been fluent. Interesting lessons, but somewhat of a disaster, my marks were terrible in any case. The longer we live, the more farlies we see. Much later I realised Klinkowstein wasn't my first McLuhan experience. Even straighter out of highschool, in 1977, I had seen Annie Hall in the cinema. I remember not knowing what was happening to me, I had never seen anything like it. I sensed it had to be a great film, but I didn't understand a thing. My friends thought it a horrible film and reacted almost aggressively. I remember vehemently defending the film. Of course I didn't know that I had seen Marshall McLuhan make an appearance in the film, not as himself anyway. A real life character. Which he isn't anymore. But at least he is getting his Way now.

philippe starck

Michiel is off to Los Angeles. Partying in The Mondrian, lucky bastard. I wonder if Mondriaan would have liked having a Hollywood hotel named after him. But I suppose he would have. Considering his Snow White fascination.

sin in the sun

Their sin in the sun was a prelude to lust in the dark! Now try saying that with an Amsterdam accent. I have no idea whether I should credit some blog for this paperback covers link, I just bookmarked it, don't remember how I found it. Looking forward to this French River more and more every day. Collecting pulp fiction is easy over here by the way. I saw whole shelves of them in a second hand book store last week, the nicest ones -I saw Dashiell Hammett- lovingly wrapped in plastic. But I am not a collector.

And again: snail mail!! Love it, love it. Bloggers sure know how to snail mail. This one is from Odette, she sent me two lovely flowers, but one got damaged a bit, the envelope was damp.

roy lichtenstein

Again we did not buy a house today. The agent showed us several, one house even got us nervous. We went back after an hour. And it had just sold. What a relief, haha. It was nice though, big kitchen, nice deck, porch, skylights, nice street, affordable... The other houses were either too small, or just plain sad.

richard serra

Hinke asks everyone to spread the word. So I do. Richard Serra did the painting, and set it free for the good cause. Go download.

ads

Always fun, browsing old ads. Sugar 'n Spicy had them. The picture totally reflects my mood. I do want to work, but it's soooo vacation as well. Otger went to his first day of i-camp today, so Piff and I went shopping. We found such a lovely and more than perfectly fitting original dirndl... And I didn't allow her to buy it, the neckline required drinking age I'm afraid, grmpf. But it suited her, oooo. She would have looked a lot like this girl, and she's an artist. Maybe I was too strict.

lonely champion

We were betting on the wrong horse, we went to Kensington, not the Danforth. A whole crowd was cheering for the Portugese at our favourite coffee corner. There's usually a very Dutch atmosphere in this café, they serve "kano's" and sell liquorice in all sorts, but today, there was nothing Dutch about them. Even in the cheese shop everybody was watching the game. The nice car outside did not have a Portugese flag unfortunately. And then the game was over, and sadness hit in. Not in this guy: "There is only one of us, but we're all very happy!"

my baby has gone to the schouwburg

I found this through Scrubbles, honour where it is due. The 365 days project is a part of Ubu web, interesting enough in itself, mp3's 'till you drop, from Alvin Lucier to Vito Acconci to Marcel Broodthaers, just to name a few. The 365 days project is in the "outsiders" section. Among 364 other hilarious things, you will find this gem by the Willem Breuker Kollektief. Make sure to read the explaining text by Joe Tepperman, scroll to July 8. I always love to blog topics that conjoin Dutch and North American culture, and I am super thrilled I found this one. Joe explains what a CJP is, what a schouwburg is, and even has a go at governmental art subsidies. Willem Breuker on his part is singing (!) in a comical over the top Dutch/American accent, which I would have thought to be completely lost on North American ears. The record sleeve is designed by the one and only Dick Bruna, another North American succes. It was a flexi disc that was distributed at highschools, somewhere in the seventies, to promote the arts to teenagers.

spike and suzy

Hahaha, I never knew they were called Spike and Suzy in English. I've always known them as "Suske en Wiske", or even as "Bob et Bobette". I could tell a thousand anecdotes about Spike and Suzy, they are such an important part of my cultural heritage. Piffin even learned to read by consuming a full meter of Spike and Suzy albums. This was in grade three, as her teachers were becoming quite desperate about her reading abilities. She took dozens of them to and from school in a cart, and had half the school population reading during breaks. I guess she needed an audience for learning to read. In 1964 my brothers assembled their own album, by cutting the daily episodes from the newspaper. I remember my father's rage when they did this before he had read the paper. Here's a page with my brother's birthday date on it. What would they have said if they had known their little sister would be able to just put their album in a scanner? I really should make a facsimile version, the original paper has decayed badly.

maurice sendak

Sendak created the first dummy for the book in 1956, but set this first version aside because he wasn’t satisfied. He returned to it in 1963, it was a story about horses at the time. Sendak got frustrated, he came to believe he could not draw horses well, and again he put the project away. Four days later he saw the light, and drew "Where the Wild Things Are", this time with the monsters we all know so well.

In het Nederlands.

Dr. Dylan

This topic is so two days ago already, but it was news to me. It is not even his first honorary degree, he got his first one at Princeton, in 1970. I read somewhere (I can't remember where, strange, I'm just too tired, went swimming with the kids and had myself tortured by a physiotherapist, who even made me pull weights in a gym, can you believe that? Now I know why I never take proper care of myself, it just eats up all your time, exercising and stuff, you can't get anything done anymore. No wonder those horrible sporty people are never creative or intelligent or whatever. Do you want to know what this physiotherapist had to say? I am too heavy breasted for my back. Yay! I'm going to buy a staggeringly expensive bra! I'm exhausted, I'm going to bed with a book as soon as I finish writing this post) that it looked like he was made professor at Hogwarts, rather than at St. Andrews. Which triggered my imagination, and I went looking for a creapy professor photo. But I'm afraid my imagination is better than the photo's I found. According to George Harrison, Dylan makes Shakespeare look like Billy Joel. And Leonard Cohen called him "the Picasso of song". Some peer recognition that is. Go visit bobdylan.com. Tons of songs, you can only listen to a minute or so of each, but it's very inspiring, browsing decades of Dylan.

fabric

A website with dozens of incredible examples of vintage fabric. Kitchen and food, cats and dogs, love and romance, pinup girls, western themes, florals, polka dots, etcetera, etcetera. I would almost feel like sewing again. I haven't sewn a thing in a long time. I prefer drawing, drawing is so much less crafty. Just a pencil between the brain and the paper.

Today was Otger's last school day. He brought back his things. A page fell out of his Dutch/English dictionary, the most used page.

autumn whitehurst

Time to blog an interesting illustrator. So where do I go? I surfed Theispot. What a pain! It looks horrible, it navigates abominably, it doesn't want to go back to the thumbnail grid after visiting a portfolio... Boy, am I glad I don't spend my money there. So I try Altpick. (Don't even mention Portfolios!) Very civilized look, straight forward browsing, and I find a great artist straight away. Autumn Whitehurst, she's in Brooklyn. If you're interested in illustration, read the interviews.

john körmeling

Grand opening night (music and drinks and all of hip Toronto) of the John Körmeling exhibition at the Power Plant. In Utrecht people could drive their own cars onto the ferris wheel, but they couldn't get that insured here. So now there are four brand new Saab's on the wheel, not bad at all. Otger went in twice, he loved it. Second difference: it is said that in Utrecht you had a view over the city from the top of the wheel. In Toronto however... maybe you get to a third of the hight of the harbourfront condo buildings around it. But you do get a lovely view over the lake and the islands. And it's not scary at all, you're in a Saab.

veluws landschap

When Piffin was young, I faithfully glued every single photo in photo albums. A first child is so special. Not that Otger was routine. But his photo's ended up in corners and holes. And buying a digital camera is lethal. So Piffin and I decided to take action (her school's over already). She went through half a meter of CD's and made me a folder with all photo's featuring Otger. I selected, put 31 X 4 photo's together and printed, and printed, and printed. Now all we have to do is dig up all the regular photo's in shoe boxes throughout the house. Otger hardly showed any interest by the way, but he will. Some day. Picture above is Otger in 2000.

john h. striebel

I haven't heard back yet on any promo card I sent. Not that I am impatient... I even sent one to the newspaper above, you would say they'd like my style there :-) But I guess they have changed art directors since they hired John H. Striebel in 1923. Those were the days.

italy?

I saw these chairs on allartlog a while ago, they're gone now, unfortunately. I knew I had them on an old photo, but I didn't find it until today. It's me there, drawing. I have no clue where this picture was taken, probably Italy, but where?

And I found more silhouettes (via k10k). Mark my words, I have spotted a trend. (see two previous posts)

Update: Jeroen mailed me, he put the photo back prominently, together with mine. I can have it pop up here too, of course.

lotte reininger

I am an ignorant little shit. I had to hear about Lotte Reiniger from my own husband in yesterday's comment box.

"Lotte Reiniger, when mentioned at all, is most often brushed off in a single sentence noting that she apparently made a feature-length silhouette film in 1926, The Adventures of Prince Achmed; but since that was in Germany, and silhouettes aren't cartoons, Disney still invented the feature-length animated film with Snow White. Anyone who has seen Prince Achmed wouldn't be convinced by this reasoning, but, alas, only a tiny fraction of the people who see Snow White ever get to see any Reiniger film at all."

Her carreer was hampered by the succes of the sound film and the rise of nazism. Lotte and her husband were identified with leftist politics -they were friends with Bertold Brecht and Kurt Weill- and had a hard time fleeing Germany. Despite all that, she left an impressive oeuvre, and if you surf around a bit, there's a quite lot to be found.

In case you're wondering what my sudden fascination with silhouettes is all about, I do have a little plan. I rarely start drawings with sketching, thinking is what I do. Preferably in a bath. I want to draw my daughter's portrait. Otger's portrait already has a fairly dramatic shadow, but I want to give Piffin a wild one. She is goth, so I think I will have her shadow strangle her or something. She'll adore it.

silhouettes

These three pictures look very similar, although their how, why, and what, are very different. Similar appearance. Appearing similarity. They are all tributary to Victorian silhouettes, which is an interesting enough theme. Picture on the left is by Koizumi Kishio, a Japanese artist from long ago (okay, so maybe he's not very Victorian). I found him in Scrubbles' newly archived categories. I can't find this particular picture anywhere else. Middle picture is of course Kara Walker, who takes the silhouettes to Tate level. I had to scan Stéphane Bouquet (on the right) from a comic story in a book, as I didn't find what I wanted on his website. Probably many more artists use Victorian silhouettes, but I think these three make an interesting visual rhyme. Marcel van Eeden sometimes draws silhouettes, and I remember a very nice animated tv series. Who can think of more?

fiona smyth

Fiona Smyth opening in the WARC gallery. Oh my. All of us -Otger, Michiel, Piffin, me- were talking to her, and she stayed extremely polite. I think this was the first time in my life I outed myself as a true fan. We concluded we are both famous for our tits, need I say more?

real estate agent

This is a drawing by Tara McPherson, a Los Angeles artist. Very much worth checking out. There is more to her work than hipness, if you look closely. Besides that, I think the girl in this particular drawing looks a bit like Maria. Likeness in portraits is a mysterious affair, it's hard to achieve likeness deliberately, it's something you "recognize" when it appears. That's what erasers are for. You just keep sketching and erasing until you recognize likeness. I read in an interview with Al Hirschfeld that he erased for hours, I was so glad reading that. In artschool they always tried to teach me that erasing was sinful. But it can't be, if the holy Hirschfeld did it.
News of the day: we had a real estate agent visit us! We are so chicken shit scared out of our minds fobic about buying houses, this is going to be a life changing experience. She has us going to two open houses this weekend. A stylishly renovated Victorian home, I guess I'll have to go learn all the eufemisms.

monsters

I'm going to make the worst remark possible, just coming from an art gallery opening night. "My little girl can do this too!" In this case it's true. Piffin was eight (which is seven years ago), here's proof: she made it into an interior design magazine. Notwithstanding that, there was absolutely nothing wrong with the gallery show we saw. We saw Rhya's inflatable monsters, but we missed Rhya. I want her to make more monsters and do a solo show with no distracting paintings on the wall. Another artist -I didn't ask her name, so stupid, but I gave her my card, so maybe she'll read this and introduce herself- showed sewn animals like the ones my daughter made. And hilarious puppets on chairs that can drive on remote control - in their underwear!

James Jean

Brace yourselves, lots of links today. I found James Jean in Clandestina, a very interesting online illustration zine. His own website is worth browsing too, especially if you like sketches and journals. And if you're interested in the carreer side of illustration, one - two interviews, he even talks about napkins in the first one. Very short summery: born 1979 in Taiwan, grew up in New York, lives in Los Angeles. Makes super yummie work.

homecoming

It's about time I show you something different than my own stuff for a change. This incredibly sensitive, complex and lovely work is by Nils Karsten, I found him through Fallon and Rosof, who upload so much art on their blog it's hard to keep up with reading. I'm having a home making day today, my whole house is clean, and Otger is coming back from a week in Holland later. Bringing along four friends for dinner. So it's dining and drinking tonight, mmm.

snow

First we went to the AGO, to see the Rodney Graham exhibit. And although Graham is probably really big in Canada, I didn't see "it". Maybe I am just too female for so much lonely male romanticism. Then we visited some galleries I won't even mention. Then the gallery building on Richmond Street. A lot of very sympathetic art, lacking just a little bit of "it". And then we suddenly stumbled on "IT" in capital letters. In a narrow hallway even, that's why the photo is at a weird angle. Michael Snow. They're street banners for an art project in 1994, they were sold from the AGO museum shop, and when they ran out of them there, they were stolen from the light posts. Snow already made these walking women in '69, they are sweeping and absolute images. I wonder where the guys at TBWA\Chiat\Day got their idea for the ipod adds.

For my Belgian readers: In 1967 Snow was the winner of the Fourth International Experimental Film Festival in Knokke-le-Zoute.

shameless

Since I have my first very own promo card, I am suddenly interested in other people's promo cards. I am a self centered person doing self centered things. Anyway, I've done it. I've sent my card to New York, San Francisco, Washington, Seattle, Philadelphia, Dallas, Boston, Baltimore, Atlanta, Chicago, Vancouver, Toronto... I'll keep you posted. Why am I telling you this? Because I decided that my blog ties everything concerning my vocation together into one big Gesamtkunstwerk. Hey, I'm going holistic (not). I want to get the "how" I do things closer to the "what" and "why". If self promotion is an act of art (or an act of fiction or amusement or pedantry or anxiety or fretfulness or quandary or vacillation or faltering or averseness or procrastination or qualm) I feel better about it. Grant me that.

And an addendum for confused visitors: this is George Reeves and this is Christopher Reeve.

radio

Every time I visit a flee market I see things I recognize from long ago. If I was that kind of artist, I would collect them and reconstruct my parental home. I bet you I could do it. We didn't own anything out of the ordinary, everything from our kitchen utilities to our furniture is there, at flee markets and garage sales. But the internet is a bit like a flee market. And I don't even have to carry what I find. So today I imitate Bie, with his category "devices I used to know". This is my old radio. It's a model of the very futuristic (1966!) Evoluon, the Philips museum for technology in Eindhoven. I remember secretly listening to this radio in bed under the blankets. I had to go to bed insanely early, so I read with my bed lamp under the blankets too. A bed lamp I see at flee markets and garage sales all the time.

miffy

An auction house in Haarlem is going to sell original Miffy drawings. I read it in the NRC. Illustrations for the very first two Miffy (or Nijntje, in Dutch) books, 1955 and 1957. The seller is anonymous, and Dick Bruna is trying to prevent the auction. High bids from Japan are expected. I wouldn't be at all surprised. Maybe Dick Bruna will bid himself, in secret. The Dutch magazine Quote that -like Forbes in the US- annually publishes a list of the richest people, estimates Bruna's wealth at € 42 million (almost CAN $ 69 million). Great carreer choice, illustration.

typewriter

Cockie has declared this week "week of the typewriter". So I -a two finger typist- can't stay behind. Though I never even owned one. Nowadays it is completely acceptable to learn how to type, a sensible idea even. My children learn to type. When I was young (...) learning to type was uncool. It was for girls who would end up in office jobs. After all, it is not chique to know how to serve food with two pieces of cutlery. If you can do that, you're a waiter.

queen street

As promised, I walked by the Courtyard again and posted a different picture. (The temporary picture was just a photo I found on the internet) I didn't take my camera with me yesterday, too stupid. We went to the printshop with the design for my promotional postcard on a CD. At last, I've been beating around the bush for ever with this bleeding card. And suddenly we saw some very VERY Dutch photos hanging on scruffy parking lot walls. So I went back, it looks more interesting now I think, with a little Toronto surrounding the Amsterdam hooker zone. Quote from the Amsterdam-Toronto-Fest flyer: "The Netherlands is (shouldn't that be *are*?) known for its liberal views. Experiments in social design have led to the establishment of a new type of red light district - the drive-in brothel. The photographs of Dutch photographer Gertjan Kocken show these unique locations which facilitate a concrete reality for the commercial sex trade to inhabit". What an inviting place, the Theemsweg...

diary

Last week Marcellus Hall kept a diary for Slate. An illustrator in the real world. About rush fees, revision fees, sketching in public, clients that don't pay, phonecalls with art directors, entering contests for money, and a lot of eating and drinking and bicycling through New York in between. If I would write in the same way about today, it would become a very dull blog entry. Loading and unloading the dishwasher (I have a mouse living in it!!), vacuuming, changing sheets, hanging laundry, cleaning the bathroom, and having a big pot of Bolognese simmer for three hours, so at least the house smelled like good food instead of detergents. And I went to the supermarket and the post office. My envelopes allways turn out to be over standard size. They are standard size in Europe, I don't throw away enough. So I allways end up paying too much for stamps. I will never get rich.

arty sunday

We went to the Harbour Front Centre to see Nick & Rhya's robot in motion. It moves funny, like an ape almost. I felt like tapping the glass to make it move more.
Then we went to see Cloaca in the Power Plant. Somehow I have allways managed to miss it in Belgium. Probably because we lived three streets away from the S.M.A.K. Unfortunately it was neither feeding nor shitting time. Maybe in it's fourth version, Wim Delvoye can make Cloaca mate as well.
Picture above is from Toronto's centipede Shary Boyle. Also in the Power Plant. As most interesting inhabitant of the Republic of Love.

sea cucumber

Anneke put some lovely new pictures in her heading.

charlie brown

For Harm:

Umberto Eco, the author and semiotician, called Peanuts the first comic strip to speak "in two different keys." "The world of Peanuts is a microcosm, a little human comedy for the innocent reader and for the sophisticated," he wrote.

From a Toronto Star article by Murray Whyte.

toronto illustrators

This is the first Google hit when you type in "Toronto illustrators". The official Toronto kids library listing of Toronto based writers and illustrators. On the site you can't distinguish between writers and illustrators, so I went through each and every link. I listed the illustrators below. If you click on the link, you are extremely lucky if you find more than an ID photo. Are these people illustrators? For Pete's sake, they need a camera to do a self portrait... I stumbled on drawings only twice! I wish these people would join torontoillustrators.com. At least that would generate some pictures. Oh well, if their computerisation is in any way up to snuff, then maybe they will find this post and take action.

Veronika Martenova Charles Heather Collins Barbara Feldman Laszlo Gal Phoebe Gilman James Houston Maryann Kovalski Vladyana Krykorka Loris Lesynski Michael Martchenko Sheila McGraw Robin Muller Ruth Ohi Karen Patkau Eric Parker Dušan Petricic