VISIONS OF HOPE

From the covers of the American television-listings magazine, TV GUIDE, across four decades, here are seven portraits of comedy legend, BOB HOPE – as depicted by the pens and paintbrushes of six masters of cartoon and illustration.

 

Hope's familiar features – the chin, nose, forehead and eyebrows – are brilliantly captured in caricatures by Hirschfeld, Searle. Scarfe and Davis, portraiture by Bernard Fuchs and the photo-realistic artwork by Richard Amsel.

 

 

TV GUIDE, January 26, 1957 by Al HIRSCHFELD (1903-2003)

 

 TV GUIDE, January 16, 1965 by Ronald SEARLE (1920-2011)

TV GUIDE, January 11, 1969 – Gerald SCARFE (b. 1936)

 

TV GUIDE, January 11, 1969 by Gerald SCARFE (b. 1936)

 

  TV GUIDE, April 10, 1971by Jack DAVIS (1924-2016)

 

TV GUIDE, February 28, 1976 by Bernard FUCHS [Again!] (1932-2009)

TV GUIDE, May 21, 1983 by Richard AMSEL (1947-1985)

 

THE PORTRAITS OF A LADY

The Royal Academy of Arts is currently celebrating the work of Angelica Kauffman RA (1741-1807), a Swiss Neoclassical painter who had a highly successful career in London and Rome. Remembered primarily as a history painter, Kauffman was also skilled portraitist, landscape painter. She was, along with Mary Moser, one of only two female painters who were among the 34 founding members of the Royal Academy of Art at its inception in 1768. 

 

In this 'Self-portrait in al'antica Dress' Angelica Kauffman chooses to show herself not just as an 'artist' (she holds a tablet and stylus and has her painters impedimenta within reach) but also as an idealised image of femininity. The rustic costume and the classical setting – columns, swagged curtaining and an idyllic country vista in the background – complete the romantic mood and, in doing so, effectively, effortlessly – and, perhaps, ironically – conceal the labour of the painter's craft.

There is a major focus Kauffman's portraiture in this exhibition and, in addition to the self-portrait above, I'm sharing just three works which show her very considerable talent.

 

DAVID GARRICK (1717-1779); English actor, playwright, theatre manager and producer who influenced nearly all aspects of European theatrical practice throughout the 18th century. Painted in 1764, Kauffman boldly portrays Garrick with unexpected – indeed, uncommon – informality. Garrick turns on his chair to look back at the observer, eschewing the frequently-adopted 'dramatic' pose used in the depiction of thespians! This air of being 'at ease with life', combined with the intensity of his look and the hint of a wry smile, makes for a compelling portrait.

 

 
Sir JOSHUA REYNOLDS, PRA, FRS, FRSA, (1723-1792); English painter who, himself, specialised in portraits. He promoted the 'Grand Style' in painting, which depended on idealisation of the imperfect. He was a founder and first president of the Royal Academy of Arts and was knighted by George III in 1769. This portrait of a portraitist (dating from 1767) combines the sense of a man of considerable public importance – the associated trappings provided by the studio setting with its easel, books, papers and an antique bust of Michelangelo, whom Reynolds so much admired – with a contemplative pose that reflects, perhaps, his friendship with Kauffman and, even, his acknowledgement of her worth as a fellow artist.

 

JOHANN JOACHIM WINCKELMANN (1717-1768); German art historian, one of the founders of scientific archaeology and considered by many as the father of the discipline of 'art history'. He was one of the first scholars to arrange Greek Art into specific periods, and time classifications. Kauffman depicts Winckelmann, pen in hand but looking away from what he is writing (and the observer), as if he were caught in a moment of reverie. The simple, uncluttered staging and the sitter's reflective expression suggests a man with an ordered mind who primarily seeks to bring order to the chaos of history.


The exhibition, 'Angelica Kauffman', remains on display at The Royal Academy, Piccadilly, London, until 30 June 2024.

[Photos: David Weeks]

"GIVE A LITTLE WHISTLE"

The newcomer to the bookshelves asserts his position...

 

 

"YOU ARE – NOT – MY CONSCIENCE!"

 

 

 

['Real-Life Information'. Newcomer: 'Donald Duck 70 Years' figurine by Royal Doulton (1998); Long-time Resident: Jiminy Cricket Disney Christmas Ornament (c. 1983; inspired by JC's performance as The Ghost of Christmas Past in Mickey's Christmas Carol; the original hanging eyelet and ribbon have been surgically removed!]

"WHAT DAY OF THE MONTH IS IT?"

 

Today, May 4th, has been intergalactically hijacked by STAR WARS fans with the popular meme 'May the Fourth Be With You', but for fans of Lewis Carroll, the date has an entirely different significance.

 

Carrollians have long designated today as 'Wonderland Day', marking, as it does, the birthday of Alice Pleasance Liddell, born on May 4, 1852. 

 

 

 

Alice was the fourth of the ten children of Dr Henry Liddell, at the time of her birth, Headmaster of Westminster School and then (from 1855) Dean of Christ Church, Oxford. It was there that Alice, her family (and, in particular, her brother Harry and two of her sisters, Lorina and Edith), met a young mathematics don, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson who was an enthusiastic – and pioneering – champion of the new 'art' of photography and who wrote entertaining poems, puzzles and stories under the pseudonym, 'Lewis Carroll'. 

 

 

 

Alice Liddell – "Child of the pure unclouded brow. And dreaming eyes of wonder!" – would become Lewis Carroll's child-muse and provide the inspiration for a curious fantasy originally entitled, in manuscript, Alice's Adventures under Ground and, later and much amplified, published in 1865 as the book we now know as Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. 

 

'Hidden in plain sight' in the book are two date-specific allusions to Alice Liddell's birthday....

 

In the book's sixth chapter, 'Pig and Pepper', Alice encounters the Cheshire Cat...

 

 

 

******

 

[Alice asked] "What sort of people live about here?"

 

"In that direction," the Cat said, waving its right paw round, "lives a Hatter: and in that direction," waving the other paw, "lives a March Hare. Visit either you like: they're both mad."

 

"But I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked.

 

"Oh, you can't help that," said the Cat: "we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."

 

"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.

 

"You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here."

 

******

 

Shortly after, the author tells us...

 

******

 

After a minute or two [Alice] walked on in the direction in which the March Hare was said to live. "I've seen hatters before," she said to herself; "the March Hare will be much the most interesting, and perhaps as this is May it won't be raving mad--at least not so mad as it was in March."

 

******

 

So, the month of the year is now established as being May.

 

Then, in the following chapter, 'A Mad Tea-Party', we find this exchange...

 

******

 

The Hatter was the first to break the silence. "What day of the month is it?" he said, turning to Alice: he had taken his watch out of his pocket, and was looking at it uneasily, shaking it every now and then, and holding it to his ear.

 

Alice considered a little, and then said "The fourth."

 

"Two days wrong!" sighed the Hatter. "I told you butter wouldn't suit the works!" he added looking angrily at the March Hare.

 

"It was the best butter," the March Hare meekly replied.

 

"Yes, but some crumbs must have got in as well," the Hatter grumbled: "you shouldn't have put it in with the bread-knife."

 

******

 

Thus it is established (if you put any credence in such nonsense!) that the 'day of the month' of May is, indeed, 'The Fourth'!

 

Whether it's YOUR birthday (or your UN-Birthday) I hope you have a WONDER-filled Wonderland Day!

 

 

[Photographs: Lewis Carroll; Illustration: John Tenniel (enlarged and coloured) from The Nursery "Alice" (1890)]

FULL OF BEANZ!

Ah, time for lunch! 

Beans on toast? 

NO!

Heinz Beanz Cheesy on toast...

It looked and sounded interesting – even a little tantalizing – so we gave it a go...

VERDICT:  

OK... We like both named ingredients, so, yes, OK. But seriously over-priced (£1.50-£1.80, depending on the store) and, yes, you could certainly make it more cheaply yourself.

WARNING!: 

Be aware there are some extremely negative reviews of this product online. For example, one Tesco customer wrote: "Tastes and smells like burnt cheese on toast mixed in with a teenager's gym sock."

THERE'S MORE!: 

What I didn't know (I lead such a sheltered life) is that 'Beanz Cheesy' (or should that be 'Cheezy'?) is just the tip of the iceberg – sorry, that's a ludicrous simile – the tip of 'a hill of beans', because Heinz have, apparently, been messing about with their legendary product for some while now... 

 

OH, AND, YES, TALKING OF SOCKS (see above): 

It turns out that Heinz really DO sell socks...  

Sorry, SOCKZ!!

NO!

ENOUGH!

PULL YOUR FINGER OUT!

Hearing a description of someone on the radio the other day as having "A finger in every pie", made me think that this would make an excellent advertising slogan for that legendary pie-maker, Mrs. Nellie Lovett, so I made this little mock-up for her...

 

 I was thinking of adding:

"Since eating one of Mrs. Lovett's pies, I have eaten no other!" 

– His Hon. Judge Turpin (Decd.)

PRICE WARS

Images from the British Museum's exhibition LEGION: life in the Roman army (remaining on show until 23 June 2024), reminding us of two premiere forces that have fashioned every culture across the centuries of recorded time...

WAR...

 

 

...and

 

MONEY...

 

[Photos: Brian Sibley & David Weeks]

EARTH DAY AND POGO

Inaugurated on this day 54 years ago, in 1970, Earth Day is an annual event on April 22 to demonstrate support for environmental protection, Today it includes a wide range of events coordinated globally by Earthday.org including one billion people in more than 193 countries. The official theme for Earth Day 2024 is "Planet vs. Plastics."

 

For that first Earth Day, legendary American cartoonist Walt Kelly – creator of the beloved comic-strip about Pogo Possum that resident philosopher of Okefenokee Swamp – produced an Earth Day poster showing Pogo surveying the mess of garbage littering his swamp homeland and carried the slogan "We Have Met the Enemy and He is Us.”

 

 

 

Kelly was re-working a comment made by American Naval Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry, who – on September 10, 1813 – having trounced the British Navy at the Battle of Lake Erie, reported to Major General William Henry Harrison, “We have met the enemy and they are ours. Two ships, two brigs, one schooner and one sloop.”

 

Kelly’s variation on this famous battle report, had a different intent: to remind us that humankind has a way of being its own worst enemy – specifically that we have only ourselves to blame for the conditions that are polluting our environment and threatening the future of human life on earth.

 

A year after Kelly's poster appeared, he created a special comic strip for Earth Day 1971 featuring Pogo and his friend Porky Pine that restated his earlier warning against the self-destructive course which we were (and are still) blindly pursuing...

 

 

You can read more about Walt Kelly, Pogo & friends HERE

MORNING BLUES!

Sometimes this is just how you feel in the morning –––

even on a Friday!

 

 

 

[Illustration: Cover of vintage breakfast menu (c. 1940) from the Walt Disney Studio Restaurant, Burbank, California, USA]

"A SKULL FULL OF MUSH!"

 

A splendid piece of cover-art featuring the work of the illustrator and distinguished fine artist Daniel Bennett Schwartz (b. 1929), made for TV Guide, the US television listings-magazine. 

 

This issue (May 5-11, 1979) features an impressive double-portrait by Schwartz of James Stephens and John Houseman, stars of The Paper Chase, a law-school drama series that was a spin-off from the 1973 movie of the same name and which quickly became one of my favourite American TV shows of the late '70s and early '80s.

 

Always a fan of 'flamboyant' acting, I adored Houseman's towering reprise of his role in the original film: the domineering, curmudgeonly, sharp-tongued law tutor, Prof. Charles W. Kingsfield Jr.  "You teach yourselves the law, but I train your minds. You come in here with a skull full of MUSH; you leave thinking like a lawyer."

 

Also, to be perfectly frank, I had more than a bit of crush on Kingsfield's student, James T. Hart, played by the blonde and bespectacled James Stephens––– 

 

And there, I think, I had better stop lest I get tempted into making inappropriate jokes about legal briefs...

EASTER IN MOOMINLAND

Along with one of my Easter Eggs yesterday came this delightful little button badge featuring Moominpappa, ever-reliable paterfamilias of Tove Jansson's Moomins and their extended family. [Many thanks S&R!]. 

 

This provides me with an opportunity to display a quartet of original Easter illustrations by Tove. Made in 1950, these illustrations were created using a mixed technique of ink, watercolor, and gouache and were later featured on postcards and sold at the department store Stockmann in Helsinki, Finland, during the spring of 1956. 

 

 

 

 

I ought, perhaps, to offer an explanation for the little witches flying by in the background to Snuffkin's scene of merry music-making. This from the website 'THIS IS FINLAND': 

 

Finnish Easter traditions mix religious references with customs related to the long-awaited arrival of spring. If you answer the door on the Sunday before Easter, you may be confronted by endearing little witches offering to bless your home in return for treats.

 

In the most popular family tradition, young children (especially girls) dress up as Easter witches, donning colourful old clothes and painting freckles on their faces. 'The little witches then go from door to door, bringing willow twigs decorated with colourful feathers and crepe paper as blessings to drive away evil spirits, in return for treats,' says children’s culture expert Reeli Karimäki of the Pessi Children’s Art Centre in Vantaa, just north of Helsinki.

 

Like many Finnish householders, Karimäki keeps a basket of small chocolate Easter eggs ready by the door to pay off the marauding witches. Other families reward them with sweets or small change – or keep their front doors resolutely closed.

 

The witches recite a traditional rhyme at the door: Virvon, varvon, tuoreeks terveeks, tulevaks vuodeks; vitsa sulle, palkka mulle! (In translation: 'I wave a twig for a fresh and healthy year ahead; a twig for you, a treat for me!')

 

'This Finnish children’s custom interestingly mixes two older traditions – a Russian Orthodox ritual where birch twigs originally represented the palms laid down when Jesus entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday; and a Swedish and Western Finnish tradition in which children made fun of earlier fears that evil witches could be about on Easter Saturday,' explains Karimäki.

 

To this day, the little witches are more likely to roam on Easter Saturday in western Finland, but on Palm Sunday in other regions.

 

Karimäki adds that, as Easter approaches, Finnish children also plant grass seeds in shallow dishes of soil and place birch twigs in vases of water, and watch eagerly for green shoots and 'mouse-ear' buds to appear symbolising the springtime reawakening of life. Easter eggs and Easter bunnies – both pre-Christian symbols of fertility – also abound in Finland, though these are more recent cultural imports.

 

To read more about a Finnish Easter – Passion Plays, Church celebrations, bonfires and seasonal cuisine, CLICK HERE

CROSSED EGGS

 [Photo: Brian Sibley]

GOOD FRIDAY

“He was the boy I had given birth to and he was more defenceless now than he had been then.”

 

― Colm Tóibín, The Testament of Mary: A Novel (2012)

 

[Photo: Brian Sibley]

EASTER TIMES PAST

 

 

It's Eastertide and Radio Times magazine has just unveiled the cover-art for its Easter 2024 Issue. The work of Dawn Cooper, it comprises a bunny, a bird (a red-breasted swallow?), spring flowers and, obviously, a few eggs. What could be nicer? They are, of course, all part of the traditional tropes and trappings of the season, but it sent me off in search of how Radio Times marked Easter in days gone by.

 

For five decades, like a number of other weekly magazines, Radio Times employed artists noted for their skill at working with woodcuts and pen-and-ink illustration and allowed them the time and space to create lavish pieces of decorative art that – for what was nothing more than an ephemeral publication – are astonishing in their unrivaled detail, story-telling and arresting imagery.

 

Many Easter issues of Radio Times contained interior artwork presenting classic or newly-created depictions of the Passion, but the covers – unsurprisingly, perhaps – mostly comprised intensely rural, village-centric scenes from some of the finest illustrators of the age – in all of which the church was either a central feature or at very least an integral element of the design. It may be hard to believe, my children, but that is how it was in Britain during those early All-Things-Bright-and-Beautiful years of the Twentieth Century.

 

 

 

Easter 1934 - John Austen (1886-1948)

 

 

 Easter 1948 - J. S. Goodall (1908-1996)

 

 

Easter 1949 - [Unidentified artist] 

 

 

 

Easter 1950 - Robin Jacques (1920-1995)

 Easter 1951 - C. F. Tunnicliffe (1901-1979) 

 

Easter 1952 - S. R. Badmin (1906-1989)

 

 

Easter 1954 - S. R. Badmin (1906-1989)