Extreme Guest Appearances 2: Charles Fox

My good friend Charles Fox, linked to often throughout this blog, has become one of the internet's most thorough archivists of classic, often wonky American signage. He also might be the only person I know doing something ambitious with Instagram (username Charles_fox). Here are a few of his favorite signs he photographed in 2013.

Some Sources Sighted

Putting all my cards on the table here, offering up some of the elements that informed my collages, all found hidden in public in Bloomington, IN.


Chairhouse


Star Search


House Broken


Acoustic Views


Frosted Friends


Stylin'


Profilin'

Collages in Progress

A quartet of recent works on paper, inspired by vernacular signage, grafitti, and personal symbolism from Bloomington, Indiana.

Maybe if I'm feeling forthcoming, I'll share my source images this week.

Fake Printmaker

3-color silkscreen cobbled together at AIR, PGH for my reading at the Cyber Punk Apocalypse.
Bloomington, IN residents may recognize the signage appropriated from City Style hair salon in the Kroghetto Complex.
***

Also: The internet's a lonely planet.
Blogspot seems woefully doomed to irrelevance, and is definitely difficult to search for random writing blogs of interest. Should I get with the already fleeting times and do a Tumblr? Or head everyone off at the nostalgia pass and revive my Livejournal?

This is like the time I got really depressed after watching the Negativland documentary cuz I realized I turned to analog cut and paste methods out of poverty, not critical relevance.

More Fake Danger

Greg and I are in a maze. Running seems right. He's sweating whiskey and looks crazy, hay hooked into the fur of his sweater. I'm crashing into cornstalks, trying not to twist an ankle in my party shoes. We're running cuz there's no imminent danger; we have to invent it. My lungs sting. I'm puffing and want to give up. We've managed to weave ourselves into an unfamiliar place, twisted till we're dizzy.

I wanna lay in the mud laughing till the crows come pick the skin from my bones-- a dumb city kid. Leave me here.

This is why he was handed the map, I guess. I've got passivity written all over me. When my friends dunk me in the pool I just go limp. I imagine my last wet guffaws bubbling to the surface: You guys really got me this time! The corn maze just illuminates my greater flaws and our first wold woes. We make conflict where there is none, navigate insane mazes of social bureaucracy, flashing polite hand gestures to other bicyclists, alerting them to our next moves. In the vortex of my brain chemistry, manic depression is the only minotaur.

Meanwhile, back in the maze, my companion is illuminated from within. We work well together--until he gives me a shove that sends me flying far afield. Whatever, we all die alone. On my knees in the mud I make a call to my workplace, lucky to get service out here. I've got a feeling I'm going to be late.

#FSDC

This is where I go to cry/my online gang tattoo

Summer Smilers

It's fall now.

Frost is on the pumpkin and it's thyme for typin.

But I'm still harvesting a couple summer smells.

***
Sig transit gloria.
Blog reveille.

Scenes from a Plaster Shak

A search for a lawn goose to treat with chrome paint for the upcoming sculpture park opening at MICO led me to this funky little shak (or shaq-ed.)
Where DO lawn ornaments come from?
Bill, the shak's proprietor makes them from molds.


Peaceable Kingdom


Choose your own Adventure


Paint your own RV

I returned home 80 lbs. richer in concrete and satisfied that shak business continues to thrive.

'Mericana

bathroom wallpaper at Arthur's Music in Fountain Square, Indianapolis.
sometimes known as the Wild Boar Tavern, or Horn Dogs' Brasserie.
For reference...

fussy footwear/fruity boots

racist charicature clusterfudge available at the gift shoppe


next post may feature selections from a Statistical Index of Kitchen Witches and/or the hidden poetry of latrinations.

Scenes From a Fish Fry

Last Friday, my associate Mark and I attended a Lenten fish fry at a local Catholic church and elementary school-- incidentally the gradeschool attended by this blog's autuer.
our goal was to film an ethnographic documentary using my semi-insider status to win the confidence necessary to access some of the more mysterious corners of this phenomenon.
However, since the only boom mic we could acquire was a hairbrush tied to a broom handle we scaled back our project's scope (that's a fish joke) and just ate Cod with my parents.
Submitted for the readership's approval are our hastily collected relics.



food revue


& a pink cloud for you

Fear of a Soft Planet

stuffed animal insulation



pool noodle flying buttresses