Artwork by Ken Opin By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, cautions the keeper not to get carried away with grandiosity in the wake of Ken Opin’s excellent sketch portrait as Ken does a series of old friends in his remarkable sparse style that captures the essence of his subjects with a few deft lines. …
Read
Category:Art
Kickass and Phyllis Photo Art
Photo by Bill Stokes By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports the keeper was in the Vista West audience when Phyllis presented her debut “Phillis Phixes Photos” photo-artist show in which she used some of her prize-winning photos to demonstrate how the use of a wide variety of computer programs can not only improve …
Read
Kickass and Phyllis in the Coneflowers
Photo by Bill Stokes By Bill Stokes ickass, the doorstop dog, is impressed with the keeper’s forethought in avoiding a Leonardo Di Vinci “why-is-she-smiling?” type question with a photo he took of Phyllis standing next to a spectacular display of purple cone flowers. History tells that Leonardo combined art and science to become the most …
Read
Scratching the Surface: Day Tripping at Meow Wolf
Weldon Kennedy from London, UK, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Geoff Carter Alternate realities existing on an invisible plane is a commonly recurring theme in modern science (and literary) fiction. Everything from Harry Potter to The Matrix to The Butterfly Effect to Pan’s Labyrinth to Everything Everywhere All at Once features parallel universes just beyond the reach of human senses—or sensibilities. This idea, cojoined …
Read
Kickass and Mayhem Poets
Photo by jules a. on Unsplash https://unsplash.com/photos/NvFkYV2ngOk By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, stayed home as the keeper and Phyllis went to a performance of The Mayhem Poets, three guys taking poetry out of the box and throwing it to the wind. As one who spent his lifetime working with words within the discipline of newspaper column …
Read
Kickass and the David Statue
Jörg Bittner Unna, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports that the keeper has it on good authority that Trump and Desantis are both claiming that the giant Michelangelo statue of the Biblical giant-killer David, currently in the news, is an accurate image of themselves, with minor exceptions. In …
Read
Kickass and Van Gogh
heptc, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports that Phyllis took two of her grandchildren–Geordan and Luka to see the Van Gogh immersive show, and all pronounced it a pleasurable outing. There may be no connection, but at a lunch gathering following the show, Phyllis peered into one of …
Read
Kickass Chooses Phyllis Rant
Photo by Bill Stokes By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, joins the keeper in the cold sunshine of Mar. 12, 2022 to shuffle through possible subjects for his—the keeper’s daily rant—Putin’s incomprehensible war, the price of gasoline, Wisconsin’s gerrymandered legislature spitting in the face of the citizenry, incredibly arrogant Prehn forcing the continuation of …
Read
Kickass and Phyllis’ Art
Photo by Bill Stokes By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, will join the keeper today in assisting Phyllis as she turns Apt 523 into an art gallery to display some of the outstanding examples of her photo-art for fellow Vista West residents. It promises to be a gala event, and the keeper is wondering …
Read
The Bright Side
Artwork by Michael DiMilo Over the two years that I’ve been writing my weekly blog posts, it seems that there has very rarely been anything positive to write about. Between the January 6th insurrection, the continuing pandemic, the rising gun violence and reckless driving fatalities in our city, and various other sundry crises—including the rise of …
Read
Highlights from The Pen in Hand Graphics: The Michael DiMilo Gallery
Dick Tater by Michael DiMilo Volume 6 Over the course of the last two and one-half years, The Pen in Hand Blog has been lucky enough to have obtained the services of free-lance artist Michael DiMilo as a contributor. While his unique style has provided a provocative and edgy feel to the blog, DiMilo’s pieces–obviously–stand alone as …
Read
Highlights from the Pen in Hand Blog Graphics: The Michael DiMilo Gallery
The Money Badger by Michael DiMilo Volume V Artwork by Michael DiMilo By Geoff Carter Over the course of the last two and one-half years, The Pen in Hand Blog has been lucky enough to have obtained the services of free-lance artist Michael DiMilo as a contributor. While his unique style has provided a provocative and edgy feel …
Read