Bikes On The Walls

Here in the USA, the news we hear about Argentina tends to fall into two categories:

           its football (soccer) team and players

           the bad news.

In the latter category was, during my youth, the Peron regime.  These days, it's about hyper-inflation:  People spend their money as soon as they get it because it loses value faster than a dot-com stock in 2000.

What's often forgotten, though, is the country's creativity:  Not for nothing has its capital, Buenos Aires, been called "the Paris of South America."

And the city's and country's artistry isn't limited to what ends up in museums or on pedestals in public squares.  From what I've heard, few cities have more murals.  And those displays that adorn the city's walls encompass all kinds of styles--and subjects, including bicycles and bicycling.

Mart Aire started to grace buildings and other structures with his artistry in the 1990s---when he was 12 years old.  I just love the way his colors and sheer whimsicality express the flights of fancy and sheer freedom I experience when I'm spinning along a seashore, pumping up--or coasting down--a hill or zigging and zagging through city streets.

Happy Easter/Passover/Ramadan!

 Today is Easter Sunday.  It's also the fourth full day of Passover and the eighteenth of Ramadan.

So, to be fair--and because I'm non-religious and love cats--I am posting this springtime image:

Image by Kilkennycat.

All praise be to Marlee. And thanks to  Max, Charlie, Candice, Charlie (Yes, there were two Charlie-cats in my life!) and Caterina for the memories.   

A Beautiful Ride, Indeed!

Perhaps I am more fortunate than most people.  After all, on two consecutive days, I took rides that--as familiar as they were--nourished my mind and spirit, if in completely different ways, as they exercised my body.

And I rode to work with the sun blazing over Hell Gate as a cool breeze floated over me.  "You look happy!" one of my students observed.

Happy, indeed.  After riding to work, I got to talk about poetry.  Between classes, I checked my e-mail.  Someone sent me this:

A beautiful ride, indeed!

Bicycle Paisley?

Although the paisley pattern is named for a town in Scotland, it is thought to have originated in India or Persia (present-day Iran).  Some have said the kidney-ish shapes found in paisleys were inspired by mangoes.  Others have attributed their origins to pears or other fruits.  Also, paisley's swirls and  botanical motifs are said to have been inspired by palm trees (The French often refer to paisley as "palme".) or by pine or cypress trees. 

Whatever you believe, a pattern that has printed on, or woven into, everything from Hermes silk scarves and ties to hippies' T-shirts and headbands originated many centuries ago, long before the first bicycle was built.  What might paisley look like if its creator(s) got around on pedaled two-wheeled vehicles?

All right...So you never asked yourself that question.  I confess: I never did, either.  Somehow, though, I think I found an answer to it here:

From Bike Art:  Bicycles In Art Around The World

It's one of my favorite pieces of bicycle art I've seen in a while.  Now I'll admit that I rarely see an image or representation of a bicycle that I dislike, even if it's of a bike I'd never ride or buy: bikes and cycling make me happy.  Still, I realize that not all drawings, paintings or other objets that include or represent bicycles are art.

So what makes something art? (You weren't expecting to see a question like that on this blog, were you?)  Well, as I understand it, art gets at the essence of something.  A painter or sculptor will make a work about some particular person or subjects and render it from whatever materials he or she chooses or has available. But those people, subjects and materials are really just vehicles for expression of the forms--whether of light, texture, shape, sound or energy--within those subjects.

That is why something like the bull's head Picasso made from a bicycle saddle and pair of handlebars is, if not "high" art, then at least something more than mere amusement.  To me, it represents the energy of moving forward on a bicycle and of the singular determination it sometimes takes to keep on riding, especially in adverse conditions.

So...Is the bike "paisley" a work of art?  Maybe.  Whatever it is, I think it went beyond--if only somewhat--typical stylized representations of bicycles.  That's more than enough to make me happy.

Kurt Mc Robert's New York Cyclists

Sometimes it seems that--here in NYC, anyway--there are two kinds of cyclists:  the ones everyone hates and the ones other cyclists hate.

In the first category are, of course, hipsters with fixies and delivery cyclists riding against the traffic on city streets--and, worse, in bike lanes.  The second group consists of tourists on rented bikes and hedge-fund managers on bikes that cost more than their secretaries make in a year, with lycra outfits to match.

Back in the '80's, the cyclists everybody loved to hate were the messengers.  (I know: I was one.) And the ones who ticked off other cyclists were the Chinese (and, later, Mexican) delivery guys, who invariably were riding the wrong way just when you were flying down the street and couldn't steer out of their path. 

And there was another category, of which I was a part:  The ones fishermen hated.  Now you might be wondering why a fisherman would hate a cyclist.  Well, it has nothing to do with, "A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle."  Instead, it had to do with the fact that very often, as we rode across the narrow pedestrian lanes like the ones on the Marine Park-Gil Hodges Memorial Bridge, men (almost always men) were casting their lines off, or had propped their fishing rods on, it. Sometimes they came close to snagging us, or we got a little too close to them (as if there were any choice!) and they claimed we were scaring fish away. 

Perhaps the hate stemmed from resentment:  Most of the anglers were poor or working-class, many of whom were immigrants.  They saw us, on our expensive bikes, much as those who participated in Occupy Wall Street see bankers and the like.

Anyway, there are categories of cyclist--and haters--that didn't exist back then.  Illustrator Kurt McRobert has catalogued them on his site.


(All images are from Kurt McRobert's site.)

If You Crossed Daniel Rebour With James Thurber...

Now I am going to pose a completely pointless question, as I am wont to do.

Here goes:  What would Daniel Rebour have drawn for the New Yorker?

I think I've found the answer:








The man responsible for this drawing, Jean-Jacques Sempe, in fact did a cover for the publication E.B. White made famous:

  

He was born in Bordeaux in 1932 and is, from what I understand, still active.  He is very well-known in France as well as other countries, mainly for the often-whimsical and often romantic, if sentimental (sounds really French, doesn't it?) work for Paris Match. Here in the US, more people have seen his work than know of the man who did it.















Can you imagine Sempe in a room with James Thurber--or Daniel Rebour?

The Cyclist's Empire

I'm not a collector.  But I would love to have chanced upon a painting by, say, Miquel Barceló, before anyone had heard of him.  Or Joan Miro. Of course, that would have meant my being born about 50 years earlier than I was!


I missed out on something else that, while not quite as exclusive, is a rarity.  A hundred prints were made.  They sold out almost immediately.


I'm referring to The Cyclist's Empire:





As you can see, it's an image of the Empire State Building made from tire tracks.  Seven different types of bicycle tire--or seven different tread patterns, at any rate--went into creating the image.


I wonder if there was any debate as to whether to use 700 C, 650 B or 26 inch tires!