Well it’s finally happened! The 50’s Teddy boy look is back! All these photos were taken recently and the models are wearing clothes that you can buy from stores right now. Interesting because the Fred Perry polo shirt was really a Mod thing, but still it has a 50’s feel here. I love these photos set at a fairground. They’ve really captured the 50’s feel. I think the guy in the leopard skin top looks cool.
Well not quite! My brother is just about everything I’m not. How the hell I ever got him to dress up in Teddy Boy’s clothes I’ll never know! He even wore my white tie, belt buckle, tie pin and chain! That’s my Dad’s dinner jacket and my brother’s own shirt. My mother did his hair. Yeah I do remember these details. But I never realised my brother had a beard back then. What I do know now is that he’s a great brother to do this for me because he must of hated all that. This would have been so far out of his comfort zone, but you know what, I think I caught something of the real him, even with all that gear on. He was a tortured soul in many ways, and I can see that now. This was a photo for my degree course.
There is nothing more theraputic than carving something out of lino, apart from slicing a chunk of skin out of your hands, which I did quite often. Carving an image is a very different process to drawing one. I hope it worked.
I couldn’t resist playing around with the lino cut in photoshop. It was interesting taking an image created in a very old fashioned way and then modernising on the computer. Kind of proves why so many of these old skills are now not used anymore. What took me hours to create with carving tools can now be created in seconds with a good artwork programme.
You know this is probably my favourite painting I’ve ever done and yet no one really gets it. If nothing else, you should be able to tell my favourite artist is Magritte!
Did I mention that I’m a collector of 50’s memoribila? This is my jukebox. I couldn’t resist making the photo a bit more interesting though and putting it on a backdrop from an authentic diner.
To play tribute to the anniversary of Elvis’s death I thought it was time to revamp this blog.
As we travelled from Virginia Beach to Lewes in Delaware we came across this amazing authentic 50’s Diner. What was even more interesting to me was that I sat on the very stool that Elvis had, although the stool originally was in another diner when he sat on it!!I As it’s the 30th anniversary of his death it seemed appropriate to add these photos I took of the diner in this blog. As I walked through the doors it really felt like I travelled back in time to the 50’s. I had the best pancakes ever! It was a real highlight of my holiday.
For a while I spent my time taking photos of Teddy boys, 50’s Cars and singers.
Ok well this really shouldn’t be here because it’s a pastel drawing I did of Elvis during the early 70’s. I was never keen on the white jump suits really, but whatever he wore he will always be the King of Rock’n ‘Roll to me!
Better known has Buddy Holly of course! Died on the 3rd February 1959. Another one of my drawings for the exhibition.
My daughter saw this last night and asked who drew it. I said “I did”, and she looked and said “Oh I didn’t realise, you were a proper artist!!” I’m not sure what she meant by that, but she said it’s her favourite drawing of mine. So this is for her – Elvis from the film “Loving You”.
When I sent the drawings I did away for the competion I’ve just mentioned, one of them was never returned. This one. I’ve just found a tiny photograph of it that I must have taken at some time. I was really upset when they never returned this drawing because it was my favourite by a long way. I was beginning to find my style here. This is a mixture of drawing with white and black pencils, white paint and pastels. It’s a poor copy of it because all I had to scan was this polariod photo that’s about the size of a post it note!
I was a member of the Buddy Holly and The Crickets fan club and was friends with the guy who ran it. He told me about the “Buddy Holly Week” that Paul McCartney ran each year. One year he had an art competition and I sent in 3 of my pieces of work. The one shown here won and was hung up in a special gallery in London. One of the judges turned out to be someone I’d admired for years, David Oxtoby. I spoke to him and we discussed the picture. We both loved the original photo because it was taken in Nashville before Buddy became famous. You may not know this, well unless you are a fan too, but Buddy was advised to change his image. Infact it was the Everly Brothers that suggested he should smarten up, so soon after this Buddy had all his teeth capped, replaced his geeky glasses for the dark frames and started dressing in suits. Oh just incase you are interested here is the original photo I based my drawing on.
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