Book ten: Penguin Lost by Andrey Kurkov

I liked Andrey Kurkov's Death of a Penguin so much that I immediately purchased the sequel, Penguin Lost.  And I'm glad I did.  Because these two short books might just be better as a single volume.  Penguin Lost opens with the same melancholy feel that ended the first book.  Viktor Zolotaryov seems intent on remedying the melancholy so has decided to find his penguin (Misha) and bring him home.  The wisdom of this decision is suspect, since Viktor believes Misha has fallen into the hands of a criminal mob.  And that mob may be looking for Viktor.

Viktor works his way through a number of mob members, only to discover that Misha may actually be in the possession of a Chechen warlord.  Finally he embarks on a dangerous and precarious trip where he encounters many strange characters and engages in equally strange activities.  It's at this point in my review I should probably issue a spoiler alert.  Viktor succeeds at finding Misha.  I won't tell you much more than that.  But this end to the story is the reason why I think the two books work better as a single volume.  It completes the story arch.  The first book starts with quirky, interesting characters that are offbeat, downtrodden, and yet somehow lovable.  It sadly ends without letting you know what has happened to Misha, the best character in the books.  The second book starts with that same feeling of sadness.  But by the time the book ends, you've returned to the offbeat likability of the beginning of the entire tale.  

Art class for grown ups.

AIGA Salt Lake City and the Mandate Press hosted Jim Sherraden for a printmaking workshop.  Sherraden is the current caretaker of Hatch Show Print, one of America's oldest show poster and design shops located in Nashville. For the workshop, we used many of Hatch's linoleum cuts, woodblocks, and etched magnesium blocks. It was a surprisingly relaxing way to spend a morning.  And there's something extra fun about making a mess with a bunch of ink and paper.

This activity also reminded me that it's my job to be creative.  Lately it seems that I've become overwhelmed by the business of advertising.  My focus on creativity may have suffered.  Spending four hours making visuals with blocks and ink was a great way to re-invigorate creativity.

I have to give a big shout out to the Mandate Press.  It's a fantastic space with all kinds of cool, printy stuff everywhere.  I may have a letterpress project or two that the Mandate Press could help me with.

I leave you with a few photos from the day including images of many of the prints I made.  Although I can't take credit for the circus t-shirt, but I had to share it because it made me giggle.

The art of the Christmas stocking: part three

The stats for Art Lobster show that previous posts about my custom made Christmas stockings are getting plenty of traffic this time of year.  (You can read those posts here and here.)  The increased views served as a reminder that it's time to post images of the 2011 stocking which I call Hello Christmas.

2011 saw me vacationing in Japan so it seemed only appropriate to concoct a stocking that would pay tribute to one of Japan's greatest ambassadors, Hello Kitty. So here she is looking as "kawaii" as ever.  And yes, the black kanji characters at the top spell "Jeff."  

The 2012 stocking is already under production but as always it's top secret until Christmas.  Expect a post next year.

Taking it to the Brazilian streets.

First, I need to make it clear I have no tolerance for cheap graffiti; those meaningless tags that lack any concept, style, or design sensibility. That kind of stuff just messes up a lot of really great buildings and views. That said, I'm an enthusiastic devotee of street art, starting with the masters from the 80s like Keith Haring and Kenny Scharf.  In today's modern world, street has gained at least a little more respect.  And I think that's largely due to a pack of talented individuals who've made it clear that global corporate brands aren't the only entities that should be allowed to express themselves in public places.

With artists like Nunca and the global sensation, identical twins Os Gemeos, Brazil is a hot bed for the latest street art.  Rio has even gone so far as to make street art legal.  And if you're in São Paulo, you can visit an amazing neighborhood that has embraced street art in a way like no other place I've visited.  Beco do Batman is a series of side streets and alleys that are a mecca for fans of street art.  This constantly changing gallery is a tribute to the urban art movement. And it's a surprisingly inspiring place.  So enough with the talking, here are a few photographs.

Book nine: Death and the Penguin by Andrey Kurkov

Dear NPR Books Podcast; Thank you for some of your more obscure book recommendations. They regularly make my literary life more enjoyable. A perfect example is Death and the Penguin by Andrey Kurkov.  This strange little novel is delightful if you can use such a word to describe a Russian novel.  And it is a Russian novel with its bleak scenes and freezing cold winters.

The delight is largely provided by Misha the penguin.  Yes an actual penguin is a central character in the book.  During the fall of the Soviet Union, as zoos could no longer maintain operations, many just gave away their animals to anyone who would take them.  Such is the case with Misha who was adopted by Viktor, a struggling writer living in Kiev.

Viktor takes a job preparing advance obituaries for a local paper.  But as time goes by, Viktor realizes that something isn’t right.  Most of the people for whom he’s written obituaries end up getting murdered. If that’s not strange enough, Viktor is left taking care of Sonya, a friend’s young daughter who instantly befriends Misha.

As the plot progresses, it becomes clear that Viktor’s life might be in danger.  His best hope may be the fact that a shady character has taken to requesting Misha’s presence at events and funerals.  As the depressed penguin’s health declines, the book twists to a melancholy end filled with events that get stranger and stranger.

With a dark sense of humor, Death and the Penguin is one of the strangest, most rewarding books I’ve read in a long time. And the images of Misha enjoying a cold bath or sadly plip-plopping through the kitchen are delightful.  This book easily qualifies for four Jeffies. And if it weren’t for a few outlandish moments at the end, it probably would have gotten five.

Book eight: Caravaggio: A Life Sacred and Profane by Andrew Graham-Dixon.

Maybe I’m stuck in a rut reading books about troubled historical figures who struggled with (or at least may have struggled with) homosexuality.  Because immediately after reading about Alan Turing’s troubled gay life, I moved on to Caravaggio: A Life Sacred and Profane by Andrew Graham-Dixon.

Let me start by saying this is an epic biography of an artist that has always intrigued me.  Graham-Dixon’s attention to historical detail and careful annotation is mind blowing.  It’s obvious this is an author who is intent on getting it right. And while my knowledge of art is far superior to my knowledge of mathematics (which made reading the book about Turing a challenge), it's still easy to feel uninformed up against Graham-Dixon's brilliance.

Even with the immense effort taken to document the details of Caravaggio’s life, this book just wasn’t all that interesting. But it may not be Graham-Dixon’s fault.  It might be that no one knows that much about Caravaggio.  Sure we know he got into a lot of trouble brawling with other cantankerous artists.  Yes we know he probably killed a man.  Of course we know he wasn’t the best at managing his business affairs.  We even know that his relationship with the Catholic Church was something akin to bipolar.  But generally, I pretty much knew most of what is covered in this book, certainly not to the detail provided here, but nonetheless I didn’t feel like the book really introduced me to anything new.  And that’s OK, except Graham-Dixon seems to make up for this fact by adding lots of filler.

Most of the book features the lives of people who lived at the same time and in the same places as Caravaggio.  And a lot of their lives aren’t as interesting as I’d like them to be.  Graham-Dixon suggests that many of these relationships are the reason Caravaggio may have acted the way he did later in life.  I frequently found those assertions to be a stretch.

Which brings me to the one assertion that other art historians have suggested, but that Graham-Dixon suggests is a stretch; Caravaggio was gay (or at least had meaningful homosexual relationships).   Graham-Dixon strikes me as an old white guy who probably is a little uncomfortable with the whole gay thing.  He goes out of his way to confirm that while we have historical documents that confirm Caravaggio had sex with women, there are no historical documents confirming Caravaggio had sex with men.  But in a book that jumps to several historical conclusions (or at least theories), Caravaggio: A Life Sacred and Profane chooses to gloss over a fair amount of circumstantial evidence that the artist and his assistant may have been one of art history’s great gay couples.  And wouldn’t that make a great book.

Book seven: A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines by Janna Levin.

I first learned about troubled mathematician Alan Turing from a RadioLab Shorts podcast.  I knew nothing about the man who basically invented binary code and was instrumental in helping defeat Germany in WWII by developing a machine that broke the German code.  Turing was also gay.  In fact, he was convicted of homosexuality in 1952 and rather than go to prison, he chose treatment with female hormones (chemical castration).  That situation left him less than happy and in 1954 he committed suicide just before his 42nd birthday.

The RadioLab Shorts program was a fantastic look at the genius of Turing and it recommended A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines as a fictionalized look at the mathematician's life.  The novel written by Janna Levin (a mathematician herself) brings together the theories and ideas of Turing and Kurt Godel, a mathematician/logician/philosopher and contemporary of Turing.  While the two never physically met, their ideas seem to play well against each other.  I say seem because I’m definitely not smart enough to read this book with any real understanding of the mathematical principles discussed.  From incompleteness theorems to mechanical decision theories to whatever the hell Wittgenstein was philosophically worried about, this book was sometimes a complicated read. While Levin doesn’t overindulge in the mathematics, it was still enough to confound a novice like me.

The narrator of the book delivers the story in a dreamy, almost surreal style that sometimes feels overwritten.  In fact the language often gets in the way of the story leaving the reader unsure of what he or she just consumed.  And even the story, while somewhat dark, has a fanciful attitude that was confusing.  While the book is far from awful, it had lengthy passages that were tedious.  For my money, if you’re looking to find out more about a very interesting historical figure, I’d download the Radio Lab Shorts episode, The Turing Problem.