Curio: Black Friday at Gallery 1988

Alexa here with your weekly art appreciation. In addition to pie and turkey gorging, many this week will be loading up their carts at Black Friday sales. I prefer to load up my virtual cart, so the only Black Friday sales I'll be checking out are the online variety.  Gallery 1988, the pop-culture art gallery known for their annual Crazy 4 Cult shows, is holding their own holiday sale starting this Friday, with 30% most of the gallery inventory.

After the jump a selection of movie prints that are still available...

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Curio: Coin Characters

Alexa here with your weekly art break. Brazilian-born, Frankfurt-based graphic designer Andre Levy uses his free time from his job in advertising to create more personal work.  One of these projects has gotten a lot of attention on the internet: entitled "Tales You Lose," the project has Levy transforming coins into portraits of pop culture icons. 

Amelie, Bride of Frankenstein and more after the jump

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Curio: Paris Texas, 30 Years Later

Alexa here with your curio of the week. Wim Wenders' seminal film Paris, Texas was released 30 years ago, and over time it has become one of my all-time favorite films. So this week I thought I'd dig into my old magazine stash and share this 1984 issue of Film Quarterly that I scored at an estate sale awhile back. It includes a fascinating interview with Wenders, who discusses his "American period" and how its past failures (including Hammett) in may ways resulted in his success with Paris, Texas. Here are some selected quotes from the great philosophical meanderer. 

On casting Harry Dean Stanton:

We chose Harry Dean because he...is one of the few adults I know who...has kept the child that's dead in most adults, and certainly a lot of actors, with him. He has an innocence about him, despite a long career and being 58 years old. In Paris, Texas he and Hunter change roles: sometimes you find Travis in the position of the child and his son as he adult.

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Curio: 10 Years of The Incredibles

Alexa here with your weekly art appreciation.  Hard to believe that it's been 10 years since the release of The Incredibles.  The (hopefully) happy news that Brad Bird is working on a sequel was followed by the sad news of Elizabeth Peña's passing; she was so recognizable as the voice of Mirage.  Here's hoping that everyone else returns (Sara Vowell!), especially my personal favorite, Edna Mode (voiced by Brad Bird himself).  Here are some curios to celebrate a decade of this superhero family.

Tom Whalen's poster for Mondo, available here.

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Curio: Jason D'Aquino's Matchbook Miniatures

Alexa here with your weekly film craftiness. Jason D'Aquino is an artist with a gothic sensibility who works in miniature.  With the help of magnification goggles and architectural drafting tools, Jason draws pop-culture-inspired pieces on found ephemera, usually no larger than an inch square.

His matchbook series is perfect for this time of year: creepy graphite portraits tucked inside front-strike matchbooks, with many taken from classic horror movies.  (I particularly enjoy his use of vintage bone screw packaging for Frankenstein.) Here is a selection...  

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