Word Art anyone?

I've never expected to see so much Word Art in Paris+ Art Basel! 

The first time I came across using words as a form of art was in the painting of American pop artist Robert Indiana. In 1965 he used four letters L-O-V-E against a backdrop of blue and green color.

I actually googled and found out that Word Art has been used since the 1950s by artists classified as postmodern. 

The definition of Word Art  is "text-based imagery featuring words and phrases in a variety of media including painting, sculpture,  lithography, screen printing, applied art, and projection mapping. Jasper Johns started inserting text in his artworks as early as 1957, followed by Roy Lichenstein and Andy Warhol. 

Elena Martinque described it as, "Thoughtfully utilizing text as a primary vehicle of communication in their artistic expression, these artists created works that pushed boundaries, shocked and seduced.

Several expressions of Word Art were displayed at the art fair. I was intrigued by the work of Tony Coke's lightbox. It featured Kanye West's comments: "I am the number one human being in music.... I am Warhol. I am the No. 1 most impactful artist of our generation" on 9 x 7 solid blue and red tiles. Apologies that I wasn't able to note the name of the artist, title and gallery of the last three artworks below:

Tony Coke's Face Value (Kanye West), 2011, edition 3, lightbox with duratran print, Greene Naftali Gallery

Lawrence Weiner's In & Our of Place Carried by Its Own Weight, 2011 l, Mai 36 Galerie

Jean-Michel Basquiat, Untitled, 1983, Van de Weghe Fine Art

Joël Andrianomearisoa, J'embrasse l'air du soir, 2020

Maria Pask, My Vagina is not Ugly, 2020, Gouache and Pencil on Chinese paper, Ellen de Bruijne Projects

I asked one of the galleries representing a Word Art artist for a stand-alone text priced at 10,000 euros. He said that the artwork's owner could use it in a billboard, for instance, for as long as the integrity of the text's font and spacing are retained. Not bad. it's like purchasing a copyright. 

Gai, Ricky and I at the end of the Grand Palais Éphémère 

The Paris+ par Art Basel, the new Modern and contemporary art fair, opened its doors at the Grand Palais Éphémère from October 20 to 23 with 156 galleries participating from 30 countries 

Edvard Munch at the Museee d'Orsay

Since college, I’ve always been fascinated by Edvard Munch’s The Scream (1893). It’s a painting of someone desperate, screaming, and haunted by external forces. 

Artsper describes it as “a panic-stricken creature, simultaneously corpselike and reminiscent of a sperm or fetus, whose contours are echoed in the swirling lines of the blood-red sky.”

Nick Mafi wrote, “When he painted The Scream in 1893, Munch was inspired by “a gust of melancholy,” as he declared in his diary. It’s because of this, coupled with the artist’s personal life trauma, that the painting takes on a feeling of alienation, of the abnormal.”

I’m glad I went to see the exhibition in the Musee d’Orsay depicting the 60 years of his life from 1863 to1944. Over 150 pieces of his work are presented, including about sixty paintings, drawings, engravings, photographs, etchings, drypoints, lithographs, and woodcuts.

The exhibit is not organized chronologically. The curator focused more on the cycle of life, death and rebirth. 

Self Portrait with Burning Cigarette (1895) is the first painting on display

The Sick Child (1885-86), 15-year old bedridden sister Sophie who died from tuberculosis at 11

The Kiss (1897)

Vampire (1893), initially titled Love and Pain

The Girls on the Bridge (1899)

Evening on Karl Johan Street (1892(

Metabolism, Life and Death (1898)

Death of Marat (1907)

one of the paintings of his sister with his mother, who passed away earlier, standing

Self portrait

Study of Metabolism

Woodcut of Madonna (1894-95)

The Sun (1912), one of 11 paintings commissioned for Oslo University's ceremonial assembly hall

The show ended with Starry Night where he was alluded to Van Gogh in the birth of expressionism

Note, though, if you’re expecting to see The Scream, it’s not hanging. There are studies of it in this show:

If you’re in Paris and interested in modern expressionism, don’t miss this show, “Edvard Munch. A poem of life, love, and death,” which will run until January 22, 2023, at the Musee d’Orsay.

Elmer Borlongan's first solo exhibit in Paris

Bravo to Elmer Borlongan's first solo exhibit in Paris, "When Time Stood Still".

The exhibit presented 15 paintings and monotypes.

Béatrice de Rochebouet wrote, "Produced during the Covid years, his new series draws on his past experiences and observations but is more introspective. What is important to each of us after the pandemic we experienced? What is the meaning of life from now on," these are all questions that led Elmer Borlongan, 55 years old, with a voluntary face animated by a bright smile, to push his work further... The colors are dark like the power of the darkness of the tormented landscapes of Evrard Munch, the distorted figures like the tortured bodies of Egon Shiele that the triumphant suffering metamorphoses into pure beauty." 

his muse, Plet Bolipata-Borlongan

Elmer with Jonatthan Matti

Friends and art collectors joined the artist at the exhibit opening on October 20:

Ricky Yusay, moi, Bea Garcia, Edouard Garcia and Gai Olivares

Elmer with H.E. Juvener M. Mahilum-West, Philippine Ambassador to France

Moi with art patrons Hetty and Paulino Que, Lori Juvida and Bobby Gopiao.

Asia Now Parisi Art Fair exhibitor Vinyl on Vinyl with artists

The exhibit will run until November 20, 2022 at Galerie Géraldine Banier, located at Saint-Germain-des-Prés   at 54, rue Jacob Paris.