Vic HaboushJanuary 16, 2006 5:15 pm
Vic Haboush week continues at Cartoon Modern with these paintings of sophisticated nightclub scenes. I wasn’t able to positively identify what project, or even studio, they were created for, otherwise they would have most certainly been in the book. The paintings may have been for some unproduced industrial at Sutherland’s. They sort of remind me of Shag’s work, except Vic understands how to use color and create dynamic compositions.
(click on images for larger versions)
I wish I had something more insightful or original to say other than “Wow, these are fantastic!”
But I don’t, so that’ll have to do.
Comment by Will Kane — January 17, 2006 @ 1:17 am
These are great, I like them more than his recent work…
Comment by Thorsten Hasenkamm — January 17, 2006 @ 2:14 pm
Gawd almighty!!!!
Tasty stuff. I hope for the record you do find out what they were for. A pity they couldn’t go in the book.
Comment by Jenny — January 17, 2006 @ 3:44 pm
Ummm, too good to be true! These are fantastic, Amid! Many thanks.
Comment by Ward — January 20, 2006 @ 10:42 pm
Interesting that you mention Shag or anyone else whose work so directly apes this style. There seems to be an energy and drive for experimentation during this phase of art, which in its subtlety and innocence, can only be mimicked but not fully realized by most of today’s celebrated hipsters. It’s like I could always do a work of art influenced by Picasso, but in the end it will always point to him and wind up being a tribute (or an embarrassing failure pointing back to me). It makes me wonder if there’s a crises of our time where so many pivotal art and music movements are so diffused or diluted in our culture that all we can do is romanticize on their original purity and wish we could ride a similar wave. As we distance ourselves further from the tools of pencil, paintbrush and paper, I’m sure that looking back and seeing how certain people who truly mastered those skills without a crutch of any sort, will only reveal their genius more and more.
Comment by Gerit — January 31, 2006 @ 4:43 pm
Gerit - Thanks for your eloquent thoughts. Very nicely put. There are very few things in art that are completely original. Fifties animation design wasn’t created in a vacuum. It was influenced by everything that the artists saw around them—the modern art movements, the jazz music that they listened to, the illustrations in all the magazines of the period. Today, people who blatantly copy work from that era always fall flat because it’s dishonest, none of those other elements surround us today that surrounded the designers of that period. Having said that, there’s also a lot of great designers who take the work from that era and build on it, add something of their own to it. Sometimes the lines blur, and it’s hard to tell who is simply copying the work and who is being original. Certainly, with digital technology, there are things that we can do today that are as innovative and groundbreaking as the work of 50s animation designers. It won’t look exactly like 50s design, but it shouldn’t. We have to use the great art of the past and build upon it to create a new expression of our time.
Comment by Amid — February 2, 2006 @ 10:41 am