My Museum #2

Don't you hate it when the Louvre gets it before you do?

Scissor Work

This is an example of scherenschnitte, or scissor-cut paper art. I like the stark white on black image. As far as I can tell, it's a fantasy plant, with the creepy fringed projections like carnivorous Venus flytraps, and the thistle-like crown. I assume this is a child's work, since it's a relatively simple. You can see that it was folded vertically before cutting to achieve the symmetry, and there are pinpricks at the base. One little spray on the left side has fallen off and has slipped into the base at lower left.

Scissor work is a really widespread practice, and folks have been at it for centuries. Portrait silhouettes were among the first affordable likenesses, and some of those artists, like August Edouart, are well-known to collectors. Their products were called shades, shadowgraphs and scissortypes.



There was a prolific scissor cut artist from South Carolina named Carew Rice, who depicted Southern scenes.




And the contemporary artist Kara Walker uses large-scale cutouts as her medium. I don't know that she uses scissors, but she cuts a lot more than paper.

Artful Enterprise

Photos While-U-Wait, Shooting Gallery, Budweiser On Tap and Sandwiches. It's like Homer Simpson's favorite business ever.

But I'm an art lover, so what I see is like Walker Evans took this picture and mailed it to Edward Hopper for the scene just past the swinging half-doors, and he mailed it to Jasper Johns for the neon target over the door, and he mailed it to Warhol for the photobooth snaps, and then Chris Burden shows up to get shot, literally. Plus beer and sandwiches.

Eh, I get carried away. But I think it's a crazy concept, The Barn.