Category: Magenta

#56 Lose Weight & Feel Great

Chaz DeSimone 1 Comment

#56 Lose Weight & Feel Great

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My friend Crys­tal got me back into shape last year. I’ve giv­en her a lit­tle plug after my main sto­ry. She real­ly helped me lose weight & feel great!
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LOSE WEIGHT & FEEL GREAT—Back around 1978 I lost $400 in one day wear­ing that phrase! (or some­thing that sound­ed just like it)

That was back in the ’70s when a com­pa­ny that sold herbal sup­ple­ments via your typ­i­cal pyra­mid multi-​level mar­ket­ing scheme recruit­ed (by means of over-​the-​top “rah-​rah” meet­ings & con­ven­tions) any­one who want­ed to get rich quick & stay healthy at the same time. I bought into the dream­scheme, stocked my liv­ing room full of every type of sup­ple­ment, ton­ic & snake oil the com­pa­ny had to offer, & head­ed out on my first day, wear­ing my shiny new Lose Weight — Feel Great lapel but­ton near­ly the size of a hock­ey puck, to make an overnight killing. After all, I was in top shape, toned & tan, & fig­ured any­one would assume a few sup­ple­ments a day took me from a fat slob to an Atlas in just a few weeks. (In actu­al­i­ty, I had been work­ing out for years.)

I did­n’t get a sin­gle nib­ble. Instead, I lost over $400 in one day. I was so excit­ed about wear­ing that damn badge & mak­ing my easy for­tune that I for­got all about my reg­u­lar job, my loy­al clients & dead­lines for designs. (It was my fault, not the MLM’s. Just not for me.)

I tore that but­ton off that evening & nev­er did anoth­er MLM again. But at least the phrase, a slo­gan of the era, prompt­ed this edi­tion of Amper­Art. (This com­pletes the first Adver­tis­ing Slo­gan series, one slo­gan per month through­out 2013. You can see the entire list here.) Read More

#33 Raindrops & Whiskers

Chaz DeSimone 6 Comments

 

This is the first of four pieces in the My Favorite Things col­lec­tion, inspired by the song from the 1960 musi­cal and 1965 movie The Sound of Music. Only the lyric phras­es con­tain­ing “and” were turned into Amper­Art designs. I’m glad “whiskers on kit­tens” was one of them. I love cats & kit­tens. I don’t like ros­es as much as car­na­tions, but “rain­drops on car­na­tions” prob­a­bly would not have won an Emmy.

Each edi­tion in this series will be released a week apart. You must sub­scribe to receive high-​resolution pdf files so you can cre­ate beau­ti­ful prints (11x17 or 8.5x11 inch­es). Sub­scrip­tions are free & you will receive your print down­loads by email. You’ll find sug­ges­tions on print­ing and fram­ing here.

In research­ing the style to use for this art­work I found one of the orig­i­nal movie posters, sam­pled the col­ors from which I chose a lim­it­ed palette (I did not use blue as that would be your per­fect mat in a nice frame), select­ed the appro­pri­ate type­styles & hand-​drew the amper­sand, styl­iz­ing it to resem­ble the main title in the poster:

The amper­sand not only con­nects rain­drops and kit­tens and ket­tles and ponies and door­knobs, it also links the last two lines of the song, which appear on all four lay­outs at very top and very bottom.

To fur­ther research this piece, I real­ly enjoyed watch­ing the movie! If you ever need a joy­ful lift & a lit­tle humor, this is the movie to see. It’s won­der­ful & timeless.

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