Curio: My Fair Lady at 50

Alexa here to celebrate the 50th anniversary of My Fair Lady. Although not my favorite movie musical, unlike the Smackdowners this summer,  I always have a blast returning to it.  Despite the many charms of Audrey Hepburn's performance, I love re-writing history and imagining how different a film it would be had Julie Andrews returned to the role.  Even more intriguing is imagining if Elizabeth Taylor (who wanted the role) had played Eliza.  For better or for worse, its Pygmalion story continues to be reinvented, with the latest incarnation being the ABC comedy Selfie (worth a watch for John Cho).

Some curios, vintage and handmade, to celebrate 1964's Best Picture after the jump...

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Curio: Andrew DeGraff's Movie Maps

Alexa here with your fix of movie art. Philadelphia illustrator Andrew DeGraff has a way with cartography. He harnesses this skill to create unbelievably detailed movie maps.  He draws each location of a film in relation to all the others, and then traces the path of the protagonists, effectively capturing the action of each film from a bird's-eye view. Every map, like one below based on North by Northwest, is done my hand in pencil and guache, and takes hundreds of hours to complete. 

More favorites after the jump including Lord of the Rings and The Shining...

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Curio: The Irreversible Image of Monica

Alexa here with some ephemera to celebrate Monica Bellucci's 50th birthday.  I will never forget seeing Irreversible; I was aware of Monica Bellucci before that but nothing prepared me for the impact, terrible as it was, that the film would have. Soon I was consuming every performance of hers (in an attempt to wipe away the imagery of Irreversible), and when I came upon this issue of RES magazine on a newsstand in the city I couldn't resist.

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Curio: Danielle Buerli's Three-dimensional Tributes

Alexa here with your weekly art appreciation.  In my frequent perusals of the pop culture artwork shown at Gallery1988, Danielle Buerli's work has always stood out.  Danielle is an illustrator working out of Zurich, Swizerland.  While in art school, Danielle's illustrations began to emerge from the page, and now she primarily creates diorama environments with found materials, often with inspiration from popular culture. 

Here are some examples of her wonderful movie tributes (more after the jump... )

"Milk Plus"

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Curio: Actorly Outerwear

Alexa here.  Sweater and jacket weather is upon us, that brief time of year where I can pretend to be strolling through the Upper West Side autumns of Woody Allen, or imagine myself on the golden Central Park stroll of Harry and Sally. (My actual fall look is a bit more Julianne in Still Alice, but we can't all be slaves to fashion.) As I drag my wool and leather out of mothballs today, I thought I'd share some outerwear creations for men, inspired by some signature roles of the actors who wore them.  

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