Rousseau on Aquilino

John Aquilino has been one of my favorite DC area painters since he moved from New York to the Maryland suburbs a few years ago. His landscapes are elegant and intelligent, and under the pretext of being an urban landscape, are really all about the handling of light and form, not really the subject matter.

He currently has an exhibition in Bethesda's Neptune Gallery, and like any other Aquilino shows in galleries and art fairs, it is selling out very quickly.

Dr. Claudia Rousseau of the Gazette newspapers reviews that show here and once again I wonder why this very talented bilingual art critic is not writing for the Washington Post (which owns the Gazette chain).

Aquilino is also a master of light, as in a painting like "No Parking" in which the angled sunlight falls sharply on the garage walls. These harsh contrasts of light and shadow are reminiscent of Edward Hopper, or even more of Charles Sheeler in the 1920s and '30s; the two are important 20th century American precedents for Aquilino's style. Like Hopper and Sheeler, realism is tempered with an abstract sensibility to underlying form, and a tendency toward simplification and reduction to emphasize the juxtaposition of shape and color. Hopper often included the human figure, bringing a sense of narrative into his work. Although Sheeler's cityscapes and paintings of factories eliminated the figure, there was always a hidden discourse about progress in them. It is this narrative element Aquilino seems to reject.

Bettie Page is gone

"Page was mystified by her influence on modern popular culture. 'I have no idea why I'm the only model who has had so much fame so long after quitting work,' she said in an interview with The Times in 2006.

Read the LAT obit and story here on this icon.

The richer they are...

The cheaper they are:

"He is one of the world's richest artists, who defied the credit crunch in September by auctioning a whole collection for £111m. But even Damien Hirst may not be immune to the economic climate - many of the workers who produce his works found themselves out of a job this week, the Guardian has learned.

On Thursday, up to 17 of the 22 people who make the pills for Hirst's drug cabinet series were told their contracts were not being renewed, according to two sources close to Science Ltd, Hirst's main art-producing company. Another three who make his butterfly paintings were also told they were surplus to requirements.

It is thought that amounts to approximately half of the London-based artists who work for Hirst. They are paid about £19,000 a year, sources said. In June 2007, Lullaby Spring, a cabinet filled with hand-painted pills, sold for £9.65m."

Read the Guardian story here.

I'm opening in Richmond on Friday

You can read the background about the show here, but the bottom line is that if you are anywhere near Richmond, Virgina tomorrow (Friday, December 12) between 6-9PM, the place to be is Red Door Gallery where my solo show "The Colors of Wars to Come" is opening.

Suspension Ribbon for the Alaska Secession Pacification Campaign Medal. Oil on Canvas by F. Lennox Campello. 18x24 inches, c.2008

The Alaska Secession Pacification Campaign Medal was established by Executive Order 14178 signed by the President on 7 December 2014. It may be awarded to mainland and Hawaii American military and naval personnel for participating in prescribed operations, campaigns and task forces ranging in dates from 6 September 2013 to the present.

The area of operations for these various campaigns includes the total land area and air space of Alaska and surrounding islands, and the waters and air space of the Gulf of Alaska, Bering Strait, Pacific Ocean and the Arctic Ocean within 12 nautical miles of the Alaska coastline.

Personnel must be members of a unit participating in, or be engaged in direct support of the operation for 30 consecutive days in the area of operations or for 60 non-consecutive days provided this support involves entering the area of operations or meets one of the following criteria:

• Be engaged in actual combat, or duty that is equally as hazardous as combat duty, during the operation with armed opposition, regardless of time in the area of operations;
• While participating in the operation, regardless of time, is wounded or injured and requires medical evacuation from the area of operations;
• While participating as a regularly assigned aircrew member flying sorties into, out of, within, or over the area of operations in direct support of the military operations.

One bronze service star shall be worn on the ribbon for qualifying participation during an established campaigns. However, that if an individual's 30 or 60 days began in one campaign and carried over into another, that person would only qualify for the medal with one service star. The medal is not awarded without at least one service star.

Additionally, one black service star shall be worn on the ribbon for qualifying participation during oil fields recovery and pacification operations immediately following the defeat of the Alaskan Insurgent Army.

The suspension ribbon for the medal's white and black colors were suggested by the colors of the snow and ice bound views of the Alaskan coastlines and by the color of oil, its main economic force.

See ya there!

Open Studios: Matt Sesow

DC's Matt Sesow is having shows all over the place, but this this Saturday from 12-6PM he has an open studio.

Details here.

Lecturin' at the Museum



My world famous lecture on collecting contemporary art (a primer for art collectors), which includes a bonus lecture on fun art history.

Email kidnapping

And so I get this email:

Artworks Purchase.‏
From: Lennox Campello (lennox_campello@yahoo.com)
Sent: Thu 12/11/08 12:02 PM
To: lenny@lennycampello.com

Hi ,

I checked you website and i think your artworks sucks....

lennox campello.

And clearly, someone with too much time in their hands and too much evil in their heart has gone through the trouble of creating a fake email account in Yahoo in my name just so that he can send me (and probably others) hate emails in my name.

If you get an email from "lennox_campello@yahoo.com" - it is not me.

But clearly this idiot is not aware that the days when you could do this in total anonimity are gone and that it is illegal to do what they have done and quite punishable by law. And we have busted the following from the fake email:

X-Message-Delivery: Vj0xLjE7dXM9MDtsPTA7YT0wO0Q9MTtTQ0w9Mg==
X-Message-Status: n:0
X-SID-PRA: Lennox Campello
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Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 03:56:11 -0800 (PST)
From: Lennox Campello
Reply-To: lennox_campello@yahoo.com
Subject: Artworks Purchase.
To: lenny@lennycampello.com
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="0-2120375569-1228996571=:19021"
Message-ID: <969407.19021.qm@web111211.mail.gq1.yahoo.com>
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--0-2120375569-1228996571=:19021
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

Hi ,
=A0
I checked you website and i think your artworks sucks....
=A0
lennox campello.=0A=0A=0A
--0-2120375569-1228996571=:19021
Content-Type: text/html; charset=us-ascii

Hi ,   I checked you website and i think your artworks sucks....   lennox campello.

--0-2120375569-1228996571=:19021--

You have 24 hours to send me an apology note or you'll be hearing from my lawyer (and from law enforcement) soon.