Art + Inspiration

Sculpted Crayons and All That Jazz

Hello friends — and a hearty welcome to the new subscribers. A flurry of you signed up this week and I’m delighted to have you. This is my weekly newsletter where I share bits of beauty and creative inspiration from around the net, and around the world. My aim is to provide a respite. Enjoy!

• In 1946, the folks at Harvard paid $27.50 for a what they believed was a copy of the Magna Carta. It turns out it’s an original document from 1300 A.D.

• This little dance compilation for Tanz Luzern gave me such joy this week.

tanzluzern

A post shared by @tanzluzern

• Frederick Church, one of the fathers of the Hudson Valley school of painting, traveled the world and painted what he saw. Sometime in 1859, he visited Eastern Canada and made a series of paintings of icebergs. They’re sublime.

  

• This is cool: architectural oddities of Los Angeles. Many of these are old haunts of mine.

• These shoes were made by Ignazio Pulchino, a Sicilian immigrant who had a shop in the Chelsea district of London in the 1920s. As hemlines rose, shoes became more fabulous. Case in point:

  

• Painted fingernails are definitely having a moment.

• During the pandemic, I relied on poetry, and read a poem a day online for more than a year. After every reading, I would say: “Thanks to the poets!” I’m feeling that same gratitude again now, as we weather a different kind of crisis. This poem, What the Living Do, by Marie Howe, came through my feed this week and knocked my socks off.

• How am I just now learning about the art of marquetry (wood inlay)? And it turns out, Alison Elizabeth Taylor is its virtuoso. Jerry Saltz posted about her this week on Instagram.

• Diem Chau is a sculptor working in many different forms, but the one I want to share with you today has to do with carving crayons.

  

• I really thought this was AI but no, it’s a real building, located in Shenzen, China, and designed by New Zealand architectural firm, Van Brandenburg. In the materials I’ve read, the designers talk about using techniques of Gaudi’s. You can really see that in the exterior pillars.

• The Thomas J Price sculpture currently installed in Times Square has sparked quite the conversation, some positive, some not.

  

• In honor of this cinematic masterpiece finally being available to watch online, here’s the first five minutes of All That Jazz. Stick around for the dancing, kicks in at 1:30.

Thanks for tuning in. I appreciate the eyeballs and attention. Leave word and tell me what touched you in today’s newsletter. I always love hearing from folks. And enjoy your weekend. — Chris