Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Expressionist dogs and Secessionist tigers




Maurizio A. C. Quarello (possibly relative of W. A. Tercolor) is a very talented, imaginative and prolific Italian book illustrator. In the past five years, this young artist has illustrated 25 remarkable titles for children, winning many prizes in Italy and abroad. Taccuino di un animalista was first published in 2008 by the Spanish OQO Editora. In a similar vein to Svjetlan Junaković 's Great book of animal portraits, Quarello has fun with some very iconic works of art of the past three centuries, substituting their human subjects with a zoological assortment that includes, among others, Matisse's Dancing Parrots, Hopper's Nightfish, and Magritte's Ceci n'est pas un escargot. Beautifully executed, witty, educational, and definitely recommended to all lovers of animals and art.


On Quarello's website I have seen some previews of his latest creations, and they look fantastic...
His past work includes gems like the amazingly refined, sweet and humorous Toni Mannaro Jazz Band. Another amazing thing: you can freely download a low-res pdf of the whole book directly from orecchio acerbo's website... in fact, all of their remarkable editorial production is available for download. It's so easy to love such a self-confident publisher!

Beastly Bjork - Nature is Ancient

Monday, September 28, 2009

Monday Matticchio - Cat on Mac



Due to overwork and other unforeseeables, the weekly safari was postponed.
The cat, of course, is partly to blame.

Friday, September 25, 2009

Beastly Bjork – Triumph Of The Heart

one lovely human who knows how to party!

Mad Men and Crazy Critters, 1st episode - Italian wildlife



Manuel Orazi, L'Hippodrome, 1905

I am dedicating a series of posts to vintage poster artists, since I enjoy their work and 
am also very fascinated by the various use and abuse of animal testimonials in advertising. 
This first installment features the crème de la crème of Italian commercial artists from 1990
to the early 1930s, from the opulent Art Nouveau elegance of Manuel Orazi to the dynamic
 marketing genius of Leonetto Cappiello (both of whom actually mostly lived and worked in Paris).
 I can't help but notice how, with time, our apparently well domesticated creatures quickly picked up
 human habits. After a civilized start, where they experimented with dressing up and oral hygiene,
 quite predictably they moved on to copying our favorite misbehaviours and addictions, and ended up
 as a pretty deranged assortment of boozing, smoking and womanizing beasts.
I wonder what hard lessons they learned from this experience!

Luigi Caldanzano, Cuisinières, 1907

Luigi Caldanzano, Acquavite Mastino

Anon., Motori Clerici, 1910

Aldo Mazza, Vov Pezziol, 1910

Aldo Mazza, Calzature Nobilitas, 1912

Aleardo Terzi, Dentol, 1914

Aleardo Terzi, Colorificio Italiano, 1921

Franz Laskoff, Birra Milano, 1912

Franz Laskoff, Cordial Campari, 1921

Marcello Dudovich, Rimini, 1922

Carlo Biscaretti, Anisetta Evangelista, 1925

Leonetto Cappiello, Porto Pitters, 1928

Leonetto Cappiello, Florio e Cinzano, 1930

Leonetto Cappiello, Bouillon Kub, 1931

Leonetto Cappiello, Le Nil, 1912

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Beastly Bjork – Wanderlust



I've decided to start posting some favorite videos from one of my favorite artists.
A Bjork a day keeps the boredom away!

Sunday Safari - A walk in the woods


So I placed the apple pie in a basket, put on my red riding hood
and went to visit grandma's little cottage in the forest...

Illustration by Mohieddine el-Labbad from The Wise Tortoise,
thanks to my hair has turned grey's flickr stream

Animal Matreshkas by Irina Troitskaya, thanks to Kickcan and Conkers

Two Bird limited edition prints by Josh Brill, thanks to Grain Edit

4 hand printed Owl Gocco Coasters from Kerry Beary's etsy shop

La reine des bois by De Beaux souvenirs, thanks to The Art Room Plant

Tile from the moonlit forest series by Xenia Taler, thanks to The Art Room Plant

Jake by Jacob Escobedo, thanks to 22:blog

Suzuky Tiaki, thanks to Milk Tooth

Yevgeny Charushin, bookends for Mochnatye rebjata (The hairy kids), 1929

Red fox, illustration by Sebastiano from our book In the Forest


Bahman Dadkhah, illus. for Poems for Children (Iran 1972), thanks to A journey round my skull

...and I had the most wonderful time,
with a little help from my friends

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