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If you've ever been curious about the kitschy paintings you've found at a thrift store, then check out
Just Above the Mantelpiece; it features the most famous of pop-culture mass-market pieces, from big-eyed children and pets to voluptuous half-naked women and horses. Author Wayne Hemingway makes a heartfelt case for the cultural importance of these paintings. Using the example of his own grandmother, a collector, Hemingway discusses the significance of mass-market art for the middle and working classes and compares it to the rest of the art market.
According to Hemingway, Vladimir Tretchikoff, famous for his paintings and posters of mysterious ethnic women, "achieved everything that Andy Warhol stated he wanted to do but could never achieve because of his coolness." A huge phenomenon for the past 40 years has been portraits of crying and big-eyed children. The most famous creator of these iconic images is San Francisco artist Margaret Keane. Her exaggerated style became known as "Keane-eyes." Hemingway traces the influence of Keane through movies, fashion, and famous collectors, noting that movie director Tim Burton commissioned Keane to paint a portrait of his girlfriend Lisa Marie. This book is a personal and focused look at the 1960s generation of mass-market art. It includes pullout posters of some of the famous paintings and features a fuzzy mock wallpaper cover. --J.P. Cohen
Book Description
Just above the mantelpiece is a big, beautiful book which celebrates the mass-produced art that began to decorate thousands of homes on both sides of the Atlantic from the late 1950s. Once derided by the art world, artists such as Vladimir Tretchikoff, creator of The Green Lady, and Margaret Keane, whose portraits launched the Big Eye movement, are today emerging from anonymity to be reassessed as pop art geniuses. Wayne Hemingway, one of Britain's leading street fashion designers, explains his long-held fascination with the genre in a concise, witty text that runs alongside over 300 gems from his own collection. He sketches the lives of the leading artists and reviews their new-found acclaim in the world of fashion, fine art and photography today.
"I think what Keane has done is just terrific. It has to be good. If it were bad, so many people wouldn't like it." -Andy Warhol
Wayne Hemingway, co-founder of Red or Dead, Britain's legendary street-fashion label, hosts his own weekly TV slot
Includes tipped-in images to peel off and frame
Mass-market art is now highly collectible
