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Don van Vliet
"Riding Some Kind of Unusual Skull Sleigh"
1986/1987
Oil on canvas, 59" x 48", framed, Inv-No VLI 49/00
"Riding Some Kind of Unsual Skull Sleigh" - On the Arts
of Don van Vliet, W. C. Bamberger, Alap Editions, Whitemore Lake,
Michigan 1999,
Page 8:
… My look at Van Vliet's art, too, will suggest alternative
ways of looking at the art and the career. The title Rinding some
Kind of Unusual Skull Sleigh taken from a 1987-87 painting by
Van Vliet, one which marks a crucial point in the process of his
art, ans perhaps of his life. It is one of Van Vliet's larger
paintings, four foot by just under five, but it is not his largest;
it is painted in his most favored colors- dark red, ocher, black,
tanm paerly white. But there is something singular about the painting:
among those which have been repoduced it is the last which includes
a humane figure. …
Page 185:
... Riding Some Kind of Unusual Skull Sleigh has two dominate
forms, both figurative, both very different from one another.
Down the full length of the left side crawls or falls a deep crimson
man. His arm is outstretched and dirty white flares from his hand.
His face is made up of a few black rectangles, but it is clear
that he staring out at us, watching him- (Even when painted in
blacky shapes as here, Van Vliet's faces all convey strong individual
character, are almost always fascinating- often beautiful, and
it seems a shame that he stopped painted them after only three
years of his works finally reaching the art world stage.) What
may be a displaced limb or a tail in a brighter red, sweeps off
the right; small shapes like familiars or attendant demons cluster
around him. From beneath the brighter red limb a skull emerges.
It appears to be riding on a cushion of egg-yolk yellow. The skull
has one black eye and one red, and it, too, is watching us watch
it. Van Vliet has givven these figures an undeniable momentum;
the skull in particular forces itself nearer as we contemplate
it. …
Exhibition: "Don van Vliet - Neue Bilder" Galerie Michael
Werner, Köln 1988
Catalogues:
"Don van Vliet - Stand up to be discontinued"
Bielefelder Kunstverein, 1993/1994,
Kunsthallen Brandts Klaederfabrik, Odense. 1994 und
Brighton Museum & Art Gallery, Brighton 1994, 89
"Riding Some Kind of Unusual Skull Sleigh"
Artist Ink Editions, Los Angeles 2003, page 18
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