Category: Fall

#130 Cool & Breezy

Chaz DeSimone Leave a comment
#130 Cool & Breezy
 #130 Cool & Breezy
Click image to view full size or download poster for gallery-​quality printing & framing.
This is a high-​resolution pdf & may take a few minutes to download.
Find printing tips & framing ideas here.

National Scarf Day is September 27

Last week I came across the announce­ment that the first annu­al Nation­al Scarf Day is Sep­tem­ber 27, 2018, & one thing fell in place after anoth­er. I had been think­ing about wrap­ping a scarf into an amper­sand for some time, then that announce­ment was the clinch­er — for sev­er­al reasons.

First, Nation­al Scarf Day was “offi­cial­ized” by the same orga­ni­za­tion — Nation​al​Day​Cal​en​dar​.com — that I reg­is­tered Nation­al Amper­sand Day with. (That’s Sep­tem­ber 8, & here’s why I chose that date.) Since I did­n’t yet have a theme for Sep­tem­ber’s Amper­Art piece (push­ing it till the last minute again), this was def­i­nite­ly a pos­si­bil­i­ty. I was curi­ous who came up with Nation­al Scarf Day, so I read the arti­cle at Nation­al Day Calendar. 

Echo logo and Dot the spotted zebra

Lo & behold, Nation­al Scarf Day was found­ed by none oth­er than Echo Design, a high­ly respect­ed mak­er of lux­u­ri­ous, styl­ish scarfs (their orig­i­nal prod­uct, but now they offer gloves, home décor, swim­suits & more). They’ve been in busi­ness 95 years, & here’s the best part: Sep­tem­ber 27 is the anniver­sary of their first day in busi­ness. I love it when there is pro­found mean­ing for some­thing, & the name Echo was­n’t arbi­trary: it’s the acronym of Edgar C. Hyman’s name (just add cO.) To make the day they start­ed their scarf busi­ness even more spe­cial—now this is real­ly pro­found—Sep­tem­ber 27, 1923 is also day they got mar­ried! Read the fas­ci­nat­ing Echo sto­ry here.

Upon vis­it­ing echode​sign​.com, I was cap­ti­vat­ed with all the styl­ish designs & vibrant col­ors in their prod­ucts, as well as the fun & sophis­ti­ca­tion of their web­site. This imme­di­ate­ly inspired my Amper­Art design!

What per­fect tim­ing — the begin­ning of fall, when it will soon be Cool & Breezy; the date of Echo’s anniver­sary; & just about the time I was start­ing to won­der what this mon­th’s theme should be.

Before I con­tin­ue, treat your sens­es to these incred­i­ble designs by Echo. I nev­er knew scarfs could be so flam­boy­ant & artis­tic. I was on their web­site for at least an hour, like a kid in a can­dy store!

Echo Design

 

Hun­dreds more at echode​sign​.com/​s​h​o​p​/​s​c​a​rfs

Scarfs or scarves?

I was intrigued that Echo spells the plur­al “scarfs” rather than the com­mon “scarves.” I did a lit­tle research & dis­cov­ered “scarfs” is an old­er spelling, where­as “scarves” became more pop­u­lar around 1930. My orig­i­nal idea for nam­ing this Amper­Art piece was “Scarfs & Scarves” but then “Cool & Breezy” is much bet­ter, don’t you think?

Here’s a chart from writing​ex​plained​.org show­ing the usage of the two words in the last two cen­turies. “Scarfs” was just bare­ly still the pop­u­lar ver­sion when Echo Scarfs was found­ed in 1923. 
Blue: “scarfs”  Red: “scarves”

“Scarfs” sounds classier to me — each scarf is indi­vid­ual, where­as “scarves” sounds like a big pile of close­outs on the dis­count table. I’m glad Echo still spells it “scarfs.” (By the way, do you know which is more pop­u­lar: “gray” or “grey”? You’ll find the answer if you keep reading.)

Scarf Queen to the rescue!

Upon dis­cov­er­ing Nation­al Scarf Day, I could­n’t wait to tell my friend Mor­gan Won­der­ly, who is an image expert. She says, “I have had a scarf obses­sion for many years now. I find that they are the per­fect com­ple­ment to any out­fit to add addi­tion­al col­or & style. As an image expert, when I work with my female clients, I always help them acces­sorize with at least a cou­ple of beau­ti­ful scarves in their sig­na­ture col­ors.” She told me her favorite red scarf is an Echo! Mor­gan was indeed excit­ed, & wrote about Nation­al Scarf Day on her blog. 

Simply Feminine, Morgan WonderlyBesides image expert & fab­u­lous makeovers, Mor­gan Won­der­ly is the author of Sim­ply Fem­i­nine — Sur­pris­ing Insights from Men. Ten years’ worth of inter­views with hun­dreds of men pro­vides a fas­ci­nat­ing (and sur­pris­ing) in-​depth study of women’s fem­i­nin­i­ty from a man’s perspective.

How did the Scarf Queen res­cue me?

After com­plet­ing, pol­ish­ing, for­mat­ting, & upload­ing my Amper­Art piece for this issue, Mor­gan admon­ished me for draw­ing “a piece of string” to rep­re­sent a scarf! (See the orig­i­nal ver­sion below.) So I fired up Pho­to­shop again & added some more threads to the scarf. It does look warmer & cozi­er. Prob­a­bly still not as wide as Mor­gan (or Echo) would like to see, but I had to keep the amper­sand rec­og­niz­able. (Look close­ly — the scarf is made up of “knit­ted” amper­sands as well. I don’t see why this could­n’t be made into a real scarf.) As for the gray vs grey answer, both spellings are more pop­u­lar: gray in Amer­i­ca & grey in the UK. You’re still reading!

original skinny design

“That skin­ny thing is not a scarf!” says the Scarf Queen

How do you celebrate National Scarf Day?

Wear your favorite scarf, of course! Bet­ter yet, splurge on an irre­sistible new one. Vis­it your local store, or shop right here at Echo and enjoy their enter­tain­ing web­site. Sign up for the Echo newslet­ter & you’ll save 10%. (As my sub­scribers know, I do not get any com­mis­sions nor par­take in affil­i­ate mar­ket­ing. If I like some­thing, I just want to tell the world.)

I’ll leave you with this stun­ning image. It’s the lim­it­ed edi­tion Echo 95th Anniver­sary Scarf, 50 inch­es by 50 inch­es of 100% silk & fin­ished with a machine-​rolled hem. Pur­chase here.

This is good: A per­cent­age of pro­ceeds from the sale of this item go to the Car­ing Kind Ini­tia­tive, help­ing peo­ple with Alzheimer’s Dis­ease get the care & sup­port they need.

 

Enjoy National Scarf Day &
Happy Anniversary, Echo Design Group!

 

Production notes for #130 Cool & Breezy:
Original size: 20x30 inches
Program: Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop
Fonts: Clicker Script (modified), Helvetica (modified)
Ampersand: Helvetica (modified to the point of unrecognizability — that’s what happens when you knit an ampersand)
Credits:
All scarves shown are from the echode​sign​.com website.
Chart: writing​ex​plained​.org
Book: sim​plyfem​i​nine​book​.com (book cover by Desimone Design)
You may repost the image & article. Please credit Amper​Art​.com.
To download a full-​size high-​resolution 11x17-​inch poster, click on the image.

For pro­fes­sion­al graph­ic design, please vis­it Des­i­mone Design.

Desimone? Damn good!

#74 Creak & Quake

Chaz DeSimone 3 Comments

AmperArt 74 Creak & Quake

Click to view full size  without watermark & download hi-​rez image for gallery-​quality printing & framing.
This is a high-​resolution pdf & may take a few minutes to download.
Find printing tips & framing ideas here.

Greet­ings, mortals.

This mor­bid install­ment of my Amper­Art series could have been enti­tled “Crypt Doors & Tomb­stones” but I chose the just-​as-​eerie verbs over the nouns “Creak & Quake.” These words are all from the first stan­za of Grim Grin­ning Ghosts, the theme song per­me­at­ing Walt Dis­ney’s Haunt­ed Mansion. 

Truth be told, I’m still only 99% sure that the song starts with 

“When the crypt doors creak & the tomb­stones quake…” or
“When the crypt goes creak & the tomb­stones quake…”

Why? Because after vis­it­ing sev­er­al web­sites to make sure I got the lyrics right (even though I’ve heard the song hun­dreds of times, it’s not embed­ded into the skull like “It’s a Small World”) there were dis­crep­an­cies. The first site which sound­ed like an offi­cial lyrics site is what threw me off: It read “…goes creak” which was sur­pris­ing, as I’ve always heard, so I thought, “When the crypt doors creak…” The orig­i­nal song­writ­ers — Bud­dy Bak­er, melody, and lyrics by Xavier “X” Aten­cio, the Dis­ney leg­end — were list­ed, along with dates and oth­er infor­ma­tion.  So I fig­ured that was what they wrote, and every­one just adapt­ed what they thought they heard. 

Until I vis­it­ed a few more sites. Every­where else the song goes “…doors creak…” which sounds so much bet­ter; is part of the Dis­ney fans’ venac­u­lar; and what I chose to use in my piece of art­work. (It’s prob­a­bly the cor­rect choice.)

William Shake­speare & his poem, Venus & Ado­nis, influ­enced the title of the Haunt­ed Man­sion’s theme song:

Look, how the world’s poor peo­ple are amaz’d
At appari­tions, signs, and prodigies,
Where­on with fear­ful eyes they long have gaz’d,
Infus­ing them with dread­ful prophecies;
So she at these sad sighs draws up her breath,
And, sigh­ing it again, exclaims on Death.
‘Hard-​favour’d tyrant, ugly, mea­gre, lean,
Hate­ful divorce of love,’ — thus chides she Death,—
‘Grim-​grinning ghost, earth­’s worm, what dost thou mean
To sti­fle beau­ty and to steal his breath,
Who when he liv’d, his breath and beau­ty set
Gloss on the rose, smell to the violet?

The tomb­stone and grave­yard in this piece real­ly do exist: The Gra­nary Ceme­tery, Boston, Mass. Well, almost. The top and bor­ders of the tomb­stone are authen­tic (except for the icon­ic “D” under the skull); I elon­gat­ed the entire mon­u­ment and replaced the somber inscrip­tion with sil­ly lyrics. So much for rev­er­ence. I wish to give cred­it to an incred­i­ble pho­tog­ra­ph­er, whose image I came across on the Inter­net and used as ref­er­ence for this piece. Her name is Del­la Huff. Her pho­tog­ra­phy is spec­tac­u­lar. See it at http://​del​lahuff​pho​to​.zen​fo​lio​.com/ I had no idea such mor­bid tomb­stones actu­al­ly exist­ed. The grave­yard, though heav­i­ly dis­tort­ed by my twist­ed mind, is among many won­der­ful pho­tographs I found at https://​www​.flickr​.com/​p​h​o​t​o​s​/​m​b​d​e​z​i​n​e​s​/​s​e​t​s​/​7​2​1​5​7​6​0​7​8​5​7​0​0​8​0​82/

listen up!

As much as I detest innacu­ra­cy (why can’t oth­ers do a lit­tle research like I did, even though it took longer than the art­work?) it led me to sev­er­al inter­est­ing haunts:

I dis­cov­ered alter­nate, high­ly enter­tain­ing ver­sions of Grim Grin­ning Ghosts; a great video for the kids (and the grown-​up kids); and of course it was haunt­ing­ly won­der­ful to hear the orig­i­nal sound­track again (where I could swear they enun­ci­ate “doors”). Here are those sites:

Turn off the lights and turn up the sound:

Enter­tain­ing a capel­la from VoicePlay:
https://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​j​p​w​0​y​Q​p​v​b_c

Here’s the orig­i­nal sound­track fol­lowed by a cool alter­nate ver­sion (which seems to have been pro­duced by James Pres­ley) and some of the begin­ning and end­ing narrative:
https://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​X​S​a​q​SVi – Ms

The kids will enjoy this sin­ga­long video: https://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​e​a​v​o​0​8​I​X​duQ (I like it very much myself.)

And some­thing real­ly enter­tain­ing — spooky at first with organ and choir, then wild­ly zany with unique voic­es, and all sorts of oth­er sounds…produced by James Presley:
https://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​R​I​_​4​v​z​q​e​vLg

Production notes:
Original size: 10x15 inches
Program: Photoshop, Illustrator (for the dingbats)
Fonts: Willow, Eccentric, Harrington
Ampersand: Harrington (line shadow added)
Images:
Tombstone & graveyard  reference: Granary Cemetery, Boston, Massachussetts, USA
Della Huff is the photographer whose tombstone photo was used for reference and sampling by the artist. See her spectacular fine art photography at http://​del​lahuff​pho​to​.zen​fo​lio​.com/  Della’s original photo that made this AmperArt piece possible:
http://​www​.pbase​.com/​d​e​l​l​y​b​e​a​n​/​i​m​a​g​e​/​4​0​9​4​6​116
Graveyard background: mbdezines Image modified so extensively it does not resemble the original photograph…but the background would  not be “authentic” without this photographer’s contribution.
Artist discovered that crypts do have doors at:
http://​idiot​pho​tog​ra​ph​er​.word​press​.com/​2​0​1​4​/​0​5​/​2​8​/​t​h​e​-​c​r​y​p​t​-​d​o​o​r​s​-​o​f​-​r​i​c​o​l​e​ta/
Music and lyrics sites visited for reference:
https://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​j​p​w​0​y​Q​p​v​b_c
https://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​X​S​a​q​SVi – Ms
https://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​e​a​v​o​0​8​I​X​duQ
https://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​R​I​_​4​v​z​q​e​vLg

H u r r y  b a c k …

#32 Giving & Sharing

Chaz DeSimone Leave a comment

Click image to view full-​size or download hi-​rez file for gallery-​quality printing and framing. This is a high-​resolution pdf & may take a few minutes to download. Find printing tips & framing ideas here.

 

Amper­Art #32, Giv­ing & Shar­ing, reminds us what the very first Thanks­giv­ing was all about when the Native Amer­i­can Indi­ans and Pil­grims exchanged gifts and enjoyed a feast cele­brat­ing peace among them­selves. But did they go back for sec­onds & thirds? Prob­a­bly not…they did­n’t have a couch and remote con­trol to work off all those calo­ries between servings.
 
Last year’s Thanks­giv­ing Amper­Art prompt­ed a cou­ple respons­es by my sub­scribers (and amper­sand fans)telling me how much they liked the con­struc­tion paper cut out effect, remind­ing them of those grade school hol­i­day art projects. (I still recall the won­der­ful minty smell of the thick white paste. Tast­ed good, too.) So, I decid­ed to let those com­ments from my loy­al sub­scribers direct this year’s Thanks­giv­ing Amper­Art, once again cre­at­ing a cut-​out effect with a slight­ly dif­fer­ent treat­ment. And once again, it was a lot of fun. Thanks, Lisa and Pat.
 
New 2012 Thanks­giv­ing Din­ner Place­hold­ers 
Espe­cial­ly for you, Jo Ann, I’ve cre­at­ed anoth­er set of Thanks­giv­ing Din­ner place­hold­ers. All of myAmper­Art sub­scribers can get their 2012 Thanks­giv­ing Din­ner Table Place­hold­ers -here-.
 
Hap­py Thanks­giv­ing Every­body! 
PRODUCTION NOTES: Program: Illustrator Original dimensions: 20″ x 30″ Font: Souvenir Italic Images: Traced and modified from reference Layers: 1 for each element; several for horn Effects: Shadow