Garden Cleanup

It's never-ending, of course, but I finally did the first round ...
Still life with snail.

These Bleeding Hearts turned creepy in when the flash went off.

Assembled detritus, with pruner.

Crafty snail poses as a fern fiddlehead.

Drumroll For My Blogroll

As I am finally getting my blogroll together, a peek at a few of these visual bloggers who will now be just a click away.

A Journey Round My Skull
Strange, odd, illustration from obscure, far away places. What more could you want? Here's how Will describes his blog:

Unhealthy book fetishism from a reader, collector, and amateur historian of forgotten literature. Recent obsessions: illustration and graphic design.

llustration by Alexander Alexeieff, 1929
Fluxus postcard, ‘Men are cheeky but
MONSTERS ARE INOFFENSIVE,’ 1967


The Unknown Hipster
Not unknown to us. Who better to visually eavesdrop on Larry Gagosian and Mick Jagger at a Damien Hirst opening than Jean-Philippe Delhomme?




The Textile Blog
From the U.K. Just like the name says—plus links to every important textile resource out there.Ann Macbeth rug design, 1905
Textile by Scandinavian Modernist, Sven Markelius, 1958
Mbuti barkcloth



Bibliodyssey
You’ll only find it here, if it is old, printed, and truly remarkable.
Croatian genealogical book, 1740
Cutaway of a French nuclear power station, June 1978


Ace Jet 170
Belfast based graphic designer Richard Weston is impressively tuned into the nuances of print Here’s what he writes about Read Better, Read Faster.

No design credit, and some might claim to understand why, but I think there's an unsung hero at work on this sublimely balanced cover from 1976. Take that finger, for example (photo-credited to John Hybert by the way); positioned one third in. Now, you're telling me that's by accident?

...and wonderful found type.






Nothing is New
No one knows her way around the archives like Kelly Rakowski. She has been a huge inspiration for many of my far flung virtual adventures.
Members of the Western Massachusetts commune, Brotherhood of the Spirit, in the mid 1970s.



Grain edit
Frankly, I don’t know why the rest of us bother to post vintage graphics. Chances are anything cool from the 1950s-70s has been posted here already by Dave C + Elizabeth Surya’s crack team.




Little Augury
An aesthete of the highest order, Little Augury is a devotee of devastating beauty and high style, wherever it may be found, be it antique aristocratic elegance, black & white glamour, or uber-class decadence of a bygone era. Only the most rarified of today’s tastemakers make it onto the radar of this blogging interior designer.
Ivory Objects on an 18th century English lacquer desk.
Lady Ottoline Morrell
Incredible hair by Marisol Suarez
Lee Radziwill in one of the most famous of all the
Indian chintz tented rooms designed by Renzo Mongiardino



Manystuff
Contemporary graphic design blog by Paris-based Charlotte Cheetham. Offshoot projects, publications and exhibitions have been developed from this blog.




Words and Eggs
Lots of vintage goodness.






AisleOne
"An inspirational resource focused on graphic design, typography, grid systems, minimalism and modernism."
Album covers by Josef Albers.
2010 calendar poster by This Studio.
War Design packaging for adhesive manufacturer, Construction Technologies Australia.

Earth Day & Other Troxler Posters

As far as images go, Earth Day turns out to be quite a yawn. I was hoping to uncover and post all the fabulous posters of the last four decades, but alas, mediocrity is mostly what I found.

I did find one winner—this 1992 poster by Swiss designer Niklaus Troxler. Simple to the point of abstraction, it needs no type to to remind us of the violence we inflict upon our environment. Now, I might not get away with this anywhere else, but since this is my blog, I’ve decided that instead of boring you with Earth Day posters (which you are welcome to see here and here), I’ll show more of Troxler’s work.

Discovering jazz as a teenager, Troxler organized his first concert in 1966 at age 19. While passionate about music, he pursued his other passion, graphic design, as a career. In 1975, he united the two by producing the first annual ‘Jazz in Willisau’ festival and creating all the related visual material. Over the course of the ensuing 35 years, Troxler has designed an astonishing number of posters in a wide range of styles for the festival and for the performances of the participating artists. You can see them all on his website. Michael Beirut was quoted in a NY Times article about Troxler, "I love the poster series because it so neatly recapitulates the design history of the last few decades. You see the influence of Push Pin eclecticism, California new wave, Swiss post-modernism and post- punk grunge, all passed through the unique prism of a guy working in a really small town in Switzerland."

Below are posters on a variety of subjects, followed by jazz-related posters.

Happy Earth Day!


Stop Violence, 1993

International Wheel Chair Marathon, 2010

Art in the Newspaper, 1999

Swiss Posters of the 21st Century, 2010

50 Years Helvetica, 2007

Jazz Festival Willisau, 1997

Trio 3, 1996

Jazz Festival Willisau, 1978, 1979

Two Basses, 1997

Dave Holland Bass Solo, 1995

Modern Jazz Quartet, 1992

Music of Jimi Hendrix, 1993

Keith Jarrett, 1976

Dave Holland Quintet, 1983

McCoy Tyner, 1980

Marty Ehrlich Quartet, 2006

Jazz meets India, 1983

African Echoes, 1988

Dave Pike, 1970