Category: Absurdist Texts & Documents

There’s no government, but at least there’s still Art…

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Pamper them with oils, swaddle them in the spoils of war. Watercolors, pastels, collage, découpage, gouache and the glory of riches. Feed their pointy little heads with the visions of well-heeled contemporary masters. Shower them with glitter from the gods. Smother them in dark museums and galleries. Clobber the slobbering blobs with sculpted urns, lash them with brushes dripping illusions. Give them the gift of fab, fame and fortune! Bestow upon them this Fun and Profitable Activity Book by one of Italy’s greatest living  artists—Peppo Bianchessi.

RICH KIDS

CONTEMPORARY ART FOR RICH KIDS is a full color, illustrated guide to modern rat and the wonders of creation’s maze. Let the kiddies ogle, spit, guffaw and squirm as they learn and play. Remember: rich kids represent the future of the planet. These little amorphodytes are our future landlords & banksters; they are budding mobsters, jihadis, politicians, investors, meth-heads and speculators. They were born to remake the world spin in their own greedy image.

Spoil them now while there’s still time. Give them something to do. Or read it yourself. It’s the breakfast of Duchampions.

CLICK HERE TO ORDER this luxurious little book of dreams.
A Black $cat Scholastic Classic.

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ABOUT THE ARTIST:

PEPPO2Peppo Bianchessi is a multimedia artist from Italy. He is a “mittel-European”, a  funny intellectual strongly influenced by Japanese culture. In Italy, Multimedia Artists have been around since the Renaissance and, before Apple Computers and multi-tasking, they were simply called Renaissance Men. When he was 20, Peppo went to the Venice Art Biennale for the first time. He was surprised to see that some of the so-called “young artists” were over 50. Recently he returned to Venice and discovered some teenagers were considered “young artists.” Peppo is now 45 years old and has never been a young artist. And it’s probably too early to consider him an Old Master, but he’s working on it. That is, to become old, not a Master. On many occasions he has tried to be a contemporary artist, but his timing was always wrong. Thus, he has accepted his real vocation: undermining the education of children (and adults) through funny and provocative books.

Contemporary Art For Rich Kids is his first book to be published in the United States.

And the praise just keeps on coming . . .

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“The little book Hotel Ortolan is beautiful, both photos and text, and the photos are a special pleasure because they’re so different from the mass of digital images out there.”  —Cordula Güdemann

“A new book by Tom Whalen is an event. A new limited-edition book by Tom Whalen, limited to 125 copies of which over 50 have sold in the first two days, is an event you want to get to before you turn into a bookless pumpkin.” 
—Peter Cherches

“I LOVE Tom Whalen’s and Michel Varisco’s Hotel Ortolan, with photographs perfectly suited to the text.  I savored it on second reading as much as I devoured it quickly on the first.  I think Tom Whalen is a national (technically international) treasure!“
—Suzanne Burns

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UPDATE (12/29/2013)  – THIS TITLE IS OUT OF PRINT

Bon Voyage, Captain Cap

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For those who may have missed our editions of Alphonse Allais‘s CAPTAIN CAP, here’s a treat: Doug Skinner‘s introduction to Vol. IV, THE SANATORIUM OF THE FUTURE:

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Dorothy Parker once remarked that most humorists “milk a formula until it moos in pain.” After so many years of turning in several columns a week, Allais may have been feeling the strain. He admitted in one piece that the punning names he used for his characters were not really that funny. In a series of rather glum installments in 1901 (July 25, July 31, August 9), he simply listed recent patent applications. Contemplating such genuine inventions as the luminous hat, the pedal-operated fan, the combination fishing pole and bicycle pump, the hail parasol, the gloves made from intestinal membranes, the multicolored cane, the sea soap, the summer fez, the metal legs for wooden horses, the powdered cheese, “etc., etc., etc.,” he could only remark, “The fantasists who think they’re so clever when they imagine a dust-catcher for submarines, or a rubber muzzle to prevent snails from dribbling on the salad, are small beer beside certain serious and licensed inventors.” Fact, all too often, trumps fiction, to the eternal despair of humorists.

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Black Scat Does Balzac

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Samuel Beckett’s classic absurdist play Waiting for Godot  was first presented in Paris on January 5, 1953.

Flashback: Paris, 102 years earlier, where Honoré de Balzac ‘s comedy Mercadet  had its inaugural  performance at the Theatre du Gymnase-Dramatique on August 24, 1851.

Mercadet features a character named “Godeau” who never appears.

Hmm.

Beckett claimed he never read Balzac’s play.

We think not. Thus, next month, Black Scat Books is publishing Balzac’s three-act comedy—translated from the French by Mark Axelrod. This unique limited edition includes an unpublished letter from Samuel Beckett to the translator.

On October 15, 2013, you be the judge.

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