Put That Down! That's My Grandma.

Proof that even great design lives for the deceased.

We will all die someday, that's just reality.

But you do not have to be kept on a mantel in some imposing marble mausoleum or cloisonné ginger jar!

Here are some super stylish options to leave this world as tastefully as you lived in it.

Obscenely Decadent Valentine's Gifts

Most of us don't have $10,000. to spend on a Valentine's gift, let alone $2,000,000.
But for those lucky few who do, here are a few thoughts.

Below are some options from a 1.7 million dollar space ship ride to a diamond-encrusted Mercedes 600SL (That's right...if you have to ask, you can't afford it). A photo engraved on 6.8 grams of pure platinum. And a custom home theater.

Perhaps you'd prefer your own private island for the two of you?

Maybe a 1.5 million dollar underwater venture?

Okay, so this list is completely useless for the average joe, but we can dream, can't we?

If any of you want to know more about these items, simply click on the pic and through the magic of the internet, you'll be there!

The 54 million dollar "Oopsy"

What began as a 40 million dollar "Uh-oh" is now a 54 million dollar "Oopsy."

You may recall this little story from October of last year.
It was published on Kovel's Comments Newletter as follows:

He may have built a few Las Vegas casinos, but Steve Wynn, in spite of his money and amazing art collection, is just like the rest of us.

Accidents happen.

He had just sold his Picasso painting to another collector for $139 million when he raised his arm to point out a feature of the painting of Picasso's mistress, Marie-Therese Walter, to friends.



Somehow his elbow shoved back into Marie-Therese's arm, making a 2-inch hole with two 3-inch rips radiating from the center.

“Oh s---,” he said, according to a friend who was there. “Look what I’ve done. Thank God it was me.”Every collector has had that feeling. No way to undo an accident. He later offered to cancel the sale, and decided to repair the painting and keep it.


Now, here's the latest from the Kovel's:

How much is a hole in a painting worth?

Steve Wynn accidentally raised his elbow and made a hole in the $139 million Picasso he had just sold. He cancelled the sale and had the painting repaired for $90,000.

Now he is fighting with Lloyd’s of London over the lost value of the painting.He claims the painting is only worth $85 million now, a loss of $54 million.

Lloyd’s has offered to pay the $90,000 repair cost and the $21,000 consultant’s fee for the restoration and increased security needed while the painting was being repaired. Wynn filed a lawsuit against Lloyd’s on January 11, 2007 and a day later, they started negotiating.

Does a repaired hole seen only under black light reduce the value of the painting by about 40%?
Time will tell.

--from Kovel's Comments

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish

In an effort to showcase what is beautifully designed, conceptually relevant,
art to some and objects to others, I wanted to bring these aquatic worlds to your attention.

They say that fish have a 'calming' effect on people.
That's why you so often see aquariums in Doctors' offices and Veterinarian's waiting rooms.
Why they are in Chinese restaurants, I'm not sure.


Either way, these fish are living the dream baby...

Who knew betta fish had it so good?

See more of my Aquariums that rock. list at ThisNext.

The 2007 Wallpaper Design Awards

If you're not familiar with the beautifully produced and informative magazine about global art and culture, Wallpaper, you ought to be. Below are their picks for the best in design for the year 2007. It's a wonderful and useful compilation of everything from best hotels to speakers.

Read On:

The International Judges' Awards

It was a tough choice but here they are: the ultimate in global design, architecture and style, as selected by this year's elite panel of international judges, designer Naota Fukasawa, hotelier Ian Schrager, designer Ron Arad, fashion designers Viktor and Rolf, actress Jane Birkin, and MD of Charme Matteo do Montezemolo.

Best new hotel
Home, Buenos Aires
Located in Buenos Aires’s hip Palermo Viejo neighbourhood, Home was designed by architects Rodrigo Cunill and Juana Grichener. The exterior may be austere, but the rest of the hotel is warm, light and airy thanks to a 300 sq m garden and heated swimming pool. All 17 rooms have their own distinct style with a retro theme, mixing vintage European wallpapers, Chilean wool rugs and custom-made native watambu wood beds with CD and book libraries, MP3 players and Wi-Fi. Room rate: from $115
www.homebuenosaires.com

View best new hotel nominees

Best new public building
Morgan Library & Museum extension, by Renzo Piano
Working in collaboration with New York architect firm Beyer Blinder Belle, the Renzo Piano Building Workshop masterfully inserted contemporary structures into a historic context. The expansion, which includes a new underground space and three glass-and-steel pavilions set around a central court, also adds an auditorium, a striking new entrance and an exquisite reading room, doubling the library’s floor space.

View best new public building nominees

Best new fashion collection
Prada
While Miuccia Prada might seem an obvious choice, being a fashionista favourite and having a keen interest in art and architecture, her autumn/winter collections were especially strong. Shown against a Rem Koolhaas backdrop, the theme was urban guerrilla. These were tough, sensible yet flattering clothes, ideal for the boardroom dweller, streetwise reveller and permanent traveller. A tempting mix of glamorous sophistication and urban grit.
www.prada.com

View best new fashion collection nominees

Best new grooming product
Serge Lutens cosmetics
Serge Lutens is a master when it comes to giving make-up a timeless elegance. He defined Shiseido’s image in the 1980s and 1990s, and he has now launched his own line of cosmetics, combining old-fashioned glamour with contemporary design and hi-tech formulas. The weighty black lacquer cases are a nod to old Hollywood movie star chic, but, for a modern twist, Lutens has replaced traditional curves with clean, linear contours.
www.salons-shiseido.com

View best new grooming product nominees

Best new private house
Baron House by John Pawson
John Pawson’s design for creative guru Fabien Baron’s house draws on the local Swedish vernacular, but uses cement blocks and timber detailing to create a contemporary sense of abstraction. This country home is in total harmony with its surroundings, its visible lines synchronised with the landscape. The house is divided into two lofty, light-bathed volumes, separated by a courtyard with views in every direction.
www.johnpawson.com

View best new private house nominees

Best domestic appliance
Ceramic speakers, by Broberg Ridderstråle
Mats Broberg and Johan Ridderstråle, graduates of Stockholm’s Konstfack University, moved away from the traditional black, box-shaped speaker and created a set of white ceramic speakers, using the symbol of sound as their inspiration. ‘It’s the universal icon of noise,’ says Ridderstråle of the truncated cone shape, which sits at the perfect angle to produce optimum sound.
www.brda.se

View best domestic appliance nominees

Best furniture designer of the year
Hella Jongerius
Dutch designer Hella Jongerius and Swiss furniture manufacturer Vitra may seem like an odd pairing; one is known for a naive, idiosyncratic approach, the other for slick, hi-tech furniture. But the collaboration speaks volumes about Jongerius’s talent and Vitra’s commercial nous because everyone wants design with a quirky, homespun feel, and Jongerius provides it in spades with pieces such as this ‘Worker’ chair. From vases for Ikea to a solo exhibition at Galerie Kreo in Paris, her design covers a wide spectrum.
www.jongeriuslab.com

View best furniture designer of the year nominees

Best city
Istanbul
Having carved out a niche as an art city, with its new modern art gallery and Sakip Sabanci Museum, Istanbul’s latest incarnation is as a shopping paradise and chic nightspot. A host of new stores and bars have opened in Nisantasi, not to mention design specialist Addresistanbul. But perhaps most impressive has been the emergence of a daring design scene. Derin Design and Gaia & Gino are already stars, while Autoban points to Istanbul’s exciting design future. The city is rapidly turning into an elegant party capital.

View best city nominees

Best new restaurant
Müzede Changa, Istanbul
Six years after opening the ever-popular Changa, restaurateurs Tarik Bayazit and Savas Ertunc have opened an equally slick sequel, Müzede Changa. Architect Aysen Savas dreamt up the ‘glass cube’ that houses the restaurant; the 1960s- and 1970s-inspired interiors were designed by the award-winning Autoban design team; and chef Peter Gordon has given traditional Turkish fare a modern twist.
www.changa-istanbul.com

View best new restaurant nominees

Most life-enhancing item
Google earth
The earth is getting smaller. And so there is something so perfectly right about Google Earth, the rapid zoom from space to your own back yard and off again, sweeping across oceans and continents to land wherever you wish (security concerns allowing), to see streets and beaches and the places where other people live, work and play. Thrilling and disquieting in equal measure, there is an idealistic charge to the Google Earth project.
earth.google.com

View most life-enhancing item nominees

Shop or I'll shoot! Gun-shaped Items

Is it because we're in the midst of a nonsensical war?
Or because of all the horrible things happening in Darfur?
Or because we have a republican as president?

Whatever the reason, gun-shaped objects seem to be all the rage these days. So, if you've got a thing for guns (handguns, pistols, revolvers or other things that shoot), here's a list of items to admire. Or to loathe.

Your choice.

Clicking on the image will take you directly to the place of purchase.

Ready. Aim. Buy.

64th Golden Globes or Toga Party?

First of all, congratulations to all the winners and the nominees. It was a year of excellent movies.

But now, let's get catty.

I was really surprised to wake up this morning and despite the numerous articles on the 64th Golden Globe Awards which aired last night, no one mentioned the fashion trend that was glaringly obvious! I didn't know if I was viewing the Hollywood Press's nominees or a glamorous Toga Party!

White, strapless or one shoulder pleated gowns were everywhere! Even Angelina's and Eva Longoria's gowns, despite being colors other than white, were pleated and had Grecian style. What is the deal? Has ROME on HBO been that popular??

OK, so one Australian blog site mentioned the "grecian" overtones, but I almost expected Los Angeles headlines to read Golden Globes or Toga Party? Can't believe not one newspaper or evening magazine has pointed this out.

Here's the evidence: (click on the pic to enlarge)


So, As you can see, these beautiful women should be toasting with Ouzo, not champagne!

This Next Loves Me.

One of the reasons I began this blog was the overwhelmingly positive response I was getting on the hot new shopcasting site, Thisnext.com.

If you haven't visited it yet, you ought to. It's a compilation of people's recommendations for available products on the market.

I have personally created over 7 different lists on there.

Begun by Gordon Gould and Craig Ogg, it's received wonderful press from reputable sources like The New York Times and Wall Street Journal and continues to grow.

Once you compile a list of products, they keep stats as to how many people actually 'clicked through' on the product or put it on their own personal wish lists. It's here, that I discovered I have a knack for finding items that people like or want.

Today I learned that I am the first person to have posted 349 "first" recommendations.

I believe that literally means I'm a Trend-setter. What fun!



No wonder I'm still single.

Not Your Grandfather's Grandfather Clock

Quick little post so you could see how fun this is. It's a printed image of an antique grandfather clock on canvas with actual working clock parts behind the face! Just hang it up and it's both art and a clock in one! I love this! It's only $75 bucks. That's less than most decent clocks and certainly most art.

You can buy it right here at Dutch By Design.

Is LowBrow Art Just A Fad?

Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia, defines lowbrow art as follows:

Lowbrow, or lowbrow art, describes an underground visual art movement that arose in the Los Angeles, California, area in the late 1970s. Lowbrow is a widespread populist art movement with origins in the underground comix world, punk music, hot-rod street culture, and other California subcultures. It is also often known by the name pop surrealism.

The majority of lowbrow artworks are paintings; there are also toys (vinyl and plush), and sculptures.

The definition goes on to discuss the first artists to create what came to be known as 'lowbrow' art, magazines in the genre (the most famous being Juxtapoz, whose editor, Robert Williams, claims to have coined the name "lowbrow"), and 'alternative' galleries that carry these types of works.

Just so you know to whose work I am referring, some of the most well-known of these artists are: SHAG (Josh Agle), Mark Ryden, Marion Peck, Todd Schorr, Elizabeth McGrath, Tim Biskup, Gary Baseman, Gary Taxali, Anthony Ausgang, Camille Rose Garcia, Joe Sorren, Tara McPherson and Raymond Pettibon.

The Wikipedia definition goes on to historically compare the Lowbrow artists to the Dadaists.

This is where they lose me.

Now, I really enjoy looking at their works, even own a few of their books. I am entertained by their not so subtle interpretation of pop culture and their 'jabs' at historic art. I even enjoy seeing how 'creepy and offensive' some of them can get.

But since when are illustrations, comic books, tattoos and graffiti considered an art movement?

Art, yes. Movement? Nah.

Comparing Shag to Marcel Duchamp makes me cringe.


Okay, so the first time Marcel Duchamp penned R. Mutt on a urinal and called it a "Fountain", the art world was aghast at what he considered art. But he was the first (the first) to take an everyday object and ascribe some ironic meaning to it.

Jeff Koons, a well respected contemporary artist, merely did the same years later and his work has recently been rapidly declining in value. You may recall the white porcelain puppy planters or blue balloon dogs on plates that appear in online auctions weekly.



Even Nara and Murakami (two asian artists whose work treads the fine line between 'fine art' and lowbrow' art and are referred to as Neo-Pop Japanese art) have also declined in value.



Just take a look at the chart below. It is January 2007 data from artprice on auction and sales values in the art world.



So, as I was saying before I got off on an art tangent there, Did Shag have the same impact on society that Marcel Duchamp did?

To compare some fun retro cocktail party scenes or cute tiki illustrations and altoid tins to Man Ray's Photographs or Duchamp's urinal is not only a stretch, it's a disservice to the fine art world.

Nowhere in the Wikipedia definition do the words goth, creepy, alien, retro or macabre appear, yet you can ascribe most of these adjectives to the work in this genre.

Yes, I'd pay a lot of money for an original Francis Bacon or Lucien Freud painting (similarly described as macabre, goth, creepy...even disturbing) but probably not for an original Mark Ryden. And that's not because Mr. Bacon is dead and Mr. Ryden is alive and kicking, but because, to me, Francis Bacon is an artist and Mark Ryden is an illustrator. Albeit an excellent illustrator. The difference between their work however is not merely because of the style or medium in which they work, but it's because of their originality, conceptuality and the emotion evoked by their works. Bacon's work is open to interpretation, multiple manifestations of theory and conjecture, whereas what you see is what you get with Ryden's work. One can look at Bacon's paintings and see something different every time, not so much with Ryden's.



Please understand me, I believe the aforementioned lowbrow artists are talented. I think their works are amusing at the very least and valid expressions of culture and society at the very most. I'd happily buy Shag's cocktail party invites to mail out or wear a Nara T-shirt. I hope these artists make money. I believe they work hard and have great talent. But is it art or a fad?

Over 15 years ago, I hired Gary Baseman to do some illustrations for a piece for Dayrunner (the organizational agenda company) and he did an excellent job. I picked him after looking through what was then the bible for art directors to find illustrators (the blackbook). But would I have considered going to a show of his works? Probably not.

I do believe that those people who plopped down 2500$ for a Shag lithograph 5 years ago, couldn't sell it on ebay for even half that today.

To whom exactly does low-brow art appeal? It's not like you can equate lowbrow with low cost anymore. Many of these artists sell pieces of their work for thousands of dollars. But will the value of these pieces increase?

According to market indeces and art world trends, the answer is no. I am not privy to Juxtapoz Magazines' circulation numbers or Shag's personal income, but I bet it's not climbing steadily.

So, before you 'invest' in a piece of lowbrow art, I have two words for you: Patrick Nagel.