Art Chantry

For each entry in your blog, write one paragraph describing your selection:

* Describe what it is
This is a poster done by Art Chantry from the Art Chantry show in the Parkland Gallery.
* Describe its function
To advertise what appears to be a concert by the Mono Men and the Nomads. (I know..who?)
* Describe where you saw it
Parkland Art Gallery
* Discuss the style of the design & typography
The best way to describe his work would be to say that he does his own thing.
Many of his posters feature type that varies among the letters. It gives the overall poster a billboard poster from the Victorian era look. His designs can be loud to the eye with the colors used and size of objects. This piece differs from the majority of the posters on display in that it is not done on the normal poster medium but, rather on an actual vinyl record. It is also not loud and harsh on the eyes like many of his posters.

* Discuss the quality of the artwork


Well, obviously, the use of a vinyl album to look like a tire- in motion- to actually be a poster. GeNiUs.

* Discuss what attracted you to the piece
Initially I thought "this is art? and " this was created by an award winning artist?"

Then I got up close to it and got excited.
He used a vinyl album! So cool! The wording is done on the actual album

About Art Chantry

Arthur S.W. Chantry was born April 9, 1954 in Seattle, Washington. He is a graphic designer often associated with the posters and album covers he did for bands from the Pacific Northwest, such as Nirvana, Hole and The Sonics. He as also done work in logo design.

Chantry uses a 'low-tech approach' to design that is informed by the history of graphic design. His work has been exhibited at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Museum of Modern Art, Seattle Art Museum, the Smithsonian and the Louvre.

Chantry is basically self-taught. He returned to Seattle in the late 1970's, and in the early 80's became the art director of the Rocket, a monthly music magazine. He also emerged as a graphic designer known for quick turnarounds and innovative (and cheap) ideas about production.
Mr. Chantry is probably best known for expanding on the bristling low-tech aesthetic of punk music, in posters and album covers for bands like Nirvana, Hole and the Sonics, as well as lesser-known groups like the Cramps, the Lord High Fixers, Mono Men and Bert. These works reflect an omnivorous talent for the incisive recycling of vintage images, usually with a handmade look that Mr. Chantry calls roughed up.

Among his sources are 60's psychedelic posters, wholesome 50's advertising (including pages from tool catalogs and grocery store circulars) and Monty Python's gloss on Edwardian illustration -- usually presented with a sense of clashing social values. These are underscored by techniques like torn-edge collage, taped images, messy script, punch-printed lettering, startling juxtapositions and endless variations on the possibilities of photographic graininess achieved by repeated photocopying. His gift for language is especially prominent in a poster in his influential ''tool style'' that features a policeman extolling the benefits of condoms: ''250,000 times cheaper than the average child!!''

Basically, Mr. Chantry seems never to have met an image or a technique that he couldn't bend to his own or his client's advantage. If you don't happen to be steeped in the history of graphic design, punk rock or the Seattle underground -- or even if you are -- his gritty inventiveness gives this show the force of revelation.

ROBERTA SMITH New York Times