Taschen is the superb German publisher of beautiful glossy books on art, design, illustration, photography, fashion, sexuality, history, and film. At one end of the scale it produces books like the limited edition G.O.A.T. (Greatest of All Time), A Tribute to Mohammad Ali, designed by Jeff Koons, and currently selling on Amazon for £7,500. At the other end is the budget Icons series of books, selling at about a fiver each and available usually from your local remainders bookshop. They are about anything and everything, and once in times gone by I would buy one whenever I saw one. I’d still be doing that now, but they never seem to appear in The Works anymore (and even if they did, I wouldn’t know cos I never go in there).
Bizarro Postcards: I don’t even know what this book is. It has no text whatever, just wall to wall garish 1950-style American photos of models in stretch knit lace shirts, psychedelic hats, see-thru umbrellas, and dashikis. Meet Tickle Tim the Talking Pickle, and Willie Wiredhand; housewives, talk show hosts, astronauts, Santa Clauses, and car salesmen. I don’t get it and it’s not even that good. There seems to be nothing good or bad here to get a grip on; it’s just some pictures of some uninteresting things from a meaningless fictional recent past. But it’s little and was very cheap. Plus I need it.
Devils; that’s more like it. Still very few words, but now at least there is an introduction and captions so you know you are looking at Lechery by Pieter Bruegal the Elder, and the Witches Sabbath by Francisco Goya. We’ve got devils writing in hell, devils being worshipped by witches, devils fucking goats, devils exposing their arseholes, devils chasing nymphs, devils torturing nudes, devils with no arms, devils spitting anal fire, and devils playing the banjo.
Devils; that’s more like it. Still very few words, but now at least there is an introduction and captions so you know you are looking at Lechery by Pieter Bruegal the Elder, and the Witches Sabbath by Francisco Goya. We’ve got devils writing in hell, devils being worshipped by witches, devils fucking goats, devils exposing their arseholes, devils chasing nymphs, devils torturing nudes, devils with no arms, devils spitting anal fire, and devils playing the banjo.
Extra/Ordinary Objects 1: moose droppings, slimming mask, blood type condoms, penis gourd, a handcrafted “top grain” California cowhide Shoe/Boot gag, Turkish cherry stems, the Oncology Buddy cancer doll, vulva puppet, genital mutilation tool, fetus doll, a portable mass kit for priests on the run, homosexual doll, paper clocks, canned cheddar cheese, and the eco brick-shaped bottle.
Pussycats. It turns out that ‘pussy’ has long been a euphemism for the female external reproductive organ, the vulva, or, to use the technical term the cunt. Pussycats is a collection of artistic and satirical images of Victorian priests peering into holes, posh ladies with kittens on their laps, Egon Schiele’s Observed in a Dream, scratches, scrawls, paintings, prints, etchings, etcetera, etc, &c. Taschen Icons are strange and unusual things.
I had a scanning session, rendering piles of Taschen books into .jpegs, and when the mood takes me I'll stick 'em on here. I apologise that the written accompaniment to the images has been tedious, but the telly is on causing untoward distraction, disabling my brain and leaving me unable to string together all but the most perfunctory sentence. I'll do better next time, I promise (i.e. in a few minutes when I write the next post).
Pussycats. It turns out that ‘pussy’ has long been a euphemism for the female external reproductive organ, the vulva, or, to use the technical term the cunt. Pussycats is a collection of artistic and satirical images of Victorian priests peering into holes, posh ladies with kittens on their laps, Egon Schiele’s Observed in a Dream, scratches, scrawls, paintings, prints, etchings, etcetera, etc, &c. Taschen Icons are strange and unusual things.
I had a scanning session, rendering piles of Taschen books into .jpegs, and when the mood takes me I'll stick 'em on here. I apologise that the written accompaniment to the images has been tedious, but the telly is on causing untoward distraction, disabling my brain and leaving me unable to string together all but the most perfunctory sentence. I'll do better next time, I promise (i.e. in a few minutes when I write the next post).
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