This is so cool for anyone who’s driven down Sunset Blvd. in LA from the 1960’s on. It’s already documented in a book by artist and photographer Ed Ruscha, and now in an exhibit at the Getty Museum, but I think it’s really best experienced online, in an interactive timeline that lets you move down the street in a leisurely way that you can’t do when driving, and flip to the other side of the street or to another year with a click, and even choose the car you cruise in. It’s brilliant!
Historic Kansas City Foundation
816-931-8448
Facebook page (the best place to keep up): https://www.facebook.com/HistoricKC/
I’ve always been interested in history, and everywhere I travel I make an effort to learn about the local history, and take tours with local experts. I realized about a year ago that I could do that in my own hometown, but I hadn’t. I’m lucky to live in a city that values history and historic buildings, and cares enough to share both with the people who live here.
This weekend provides a rare opportunity to peek into an artist’s lair and walk away with a piece of it at a relatively-reasonable price. This estate sale is at the home studio of Kansas City artist Allan Winkler, who will be in and out during the sale and is happy to sign his art for you.
Mike and Roger Estate Sales, July 26-28, 2019, (816) 309-2728
Each week I look diligently through the online posts for estate sales — a chance to walk into a stranger’s house and look at all their stupid stuff (it’s the stupid stuff that sticks around for the sales), and snoop around their homes. It’s fascinating to see what people spend their money on. And then, on my way home with a car full of someone else’s old junk, a brief moment of self-awareness sometimes kicks in when I realize how I’m spending MY money.
But this week something unique caught my eye — a chance to walk into a strange artist’s home and look at all his piled-up art. I think most artists don’t appreciate their talent, so their basements collect piles of cast-aside art, in the same way my basement collects old clothes and impetuous garage sale finds. That certainly seems the case with local Kansas City artist Allan Winkler, the talented sculptor, painter, cut-paper artist, cut metal artist, potter, poured glass, collage artist. He’s well-known in art circles for his outsider art.
West Bottoms Antique District
Kansas City, Missouri
I came away junk-drunk from my first First Friday in the West Bottoms, and Day Two was equally intoxicating. The vendors there are creative, clever, and passionate. It’s a big party where you get to buy really cool old stuff. If you like architecture, history, antiques, or food trucks…you’ll like the West Bottoms — it’s just plain fun! My Day Two finds…
Super-cool street art in the West Bottoms, in super-cool Kansas City.
It seemed wonderfully appropriate to arrive in Butte, Montana on Halloween, since I sought out this historic mining town for its architecture and, especially, for its many ghost signs. Ghost signs are painted billboards on the sides of decades-old buildings and, like decades-old people, some have survived better than others. There’s a conscious effort in Butte (and in Port Townsend, Washington and Eureka Springs, Arkansas) to preserve these artistic beauties as time capsules from the past. Nearly 100 of them survive in Butte, in varying conditions. A few of my favorites —
I love finding small pieces of art and vignettes inside a larger canvas. I call them graffiti bits. This is a mural on a wall that spans a block-long alley in San Francisco. Thousands of graffiti bits!!!
…in downtown LA. Yes, it’s actually in a parking lot.
…I found on my morning walk today…in the middle of nowhere!
obsessive hobbyist 