This drawing by a local high school student was procured for the Famous Hairdos of Popular Music by my pal Tom, an art teacher and longtime friend of this project. Big, big thanks to the drawer and thanks as always to Tom.

This postcard was in the Famous Hairdos P.O. Box this morning. Thanks to the drawer for sending it in. I love these drawings where all the constituent parts are nameable, like, ok, that's a river, some hills, Morrissey's hair, a tongue, shining sun, maybe those are nostrils, stegosaurus spikes. Yeah, that's everything. But still, what am I looking at? Is this a prehistoric ancestor of Morrissey's hair, pausing to drink from a cool mountain spring? There has always been a Rorschach element built into this project, but it's interesting when a completed drawing comes back and the hair has been turned into yet another inkblot, and I wonder just who is in the psychiatrist's chair, so to speak.

This is fun. Let's keep doing it!

A little roughed-up by the postal service, but nonetheless a nice postcard drawing retrieved from the Famous Hairdos P.O. Box this afternoon. Thanks to the drawer for sending this in! Here Jimmy Page has a neck to make Parmigianino proud.

Famous Hairdos Postcard Installation

Last week (while showing off all the great drawings from the Madison Zine Fest) I promised exciting news, and here it is: For the next two weeks (October 11- 22, 2010) blank postcards for the Famous Hairdos of Popular Music project will be hanging in UW-Milwaukee's Mitchell Hall for passersby to take and fill out! For anyone new to the project, this short paragraph should catch you up and give all the necessary details:

The Famous Hairdos of Popular Music is a two and a half year old collaborative art project based in Milwaukee. Friends and strangers complete drawings inspired by images of famous musicians' iconic hairstyles. Between October 11 and 22, you can participate in the project. Check out the space in UWM's Mitchell Hall between rooms 349 and 353 on the third floor, take a postcard, complete a drawing, and mail it back to the address printed on the reverse. This project becomes more fun the more people participate. Please join in!

I have to thank Lisa Moline, who arranged this for me, and Marcelino Stuhmer, whose students' work usually hangs in this location, for allowing me to use his space. As I write this, my fingernails are still sore from sticking all those pushpins. As an added incentive, the first hundred postcards come pre-stamped, so you can give your drawings to the project without spending the twenty-eight cents to mail them in. I will be dropping by often to replenish the postcards as they are taken. So please take them.

In other news, some may recall that a small contest was held here a few weeks ago to celebrate the publication of the fifth volume of The Famous Hairdos of Popular Music. I doubt that anyone is waiting with bated breath for the results of this contest because, well, no one entered. But if there are any armchair quarterbacks who have been checking for updates, that's your answer. No winner, but also, I suppose, no losers (or infinity losers, pessimists), but I'm not too disappointed. It was fun to try, and a similar contest will likely be mounted when the sixth volume comes out.

Thanks as always to any drawers, past and future, who keep this project going.

Madison Zine Fest, Part 3

Here are the last of the drawings acquired at the Madison Zine Fest for The Famous Hairdos of Popular Music project. There are some all-time faves in this batch, too. If you want to see the rest of the drawings, the first batch is here and the second is here. So pour yourself a generous glass of red wine and admire some truly inspired drawings.

Thanks again to all the drawers, festival organizers, attendees, and other friendly folks. Best wishes.

Madison Zine Fest, Part 2

Here are some more (but not all) of the remaining drawings that we collected on Saturday at the Madison Zine Fest for the Famous Hairdos project. Only while scanning the stack of postcards that we went home with did I realize just what an awesome outpouring of great drawings we got that day. So here is the second of three batches. Click here to see the first.

Thanks again to everyone who drew.

Madison Zine Fest, Part 1

The Famous Hairdos of Popular Music have just returned from a long, fun weekend in Madison. The Madison Zine Fest held on October 2 was a blast. It was maybe the most fun we’ve had at one of these events, aside from trying to navigate the streets of the Borgesian labyrinth that is Madison, and even that wasn’t too horrible.

Big, big thanks to the organizers of the Fest, everyone who came down, and anyone who bought a book from us, gave us a drawing, or both. Thanks to all of you I am still very excited about this project. It wouldn’t exist without you.

Back home in Milwaukee, there was a postcard waiting in the Famous Hairdos P.O. Box from a stranger here in town, so we’ll start with that one, and then please keep scrolling down to see half of the wonderful submissions we gathered in Madison. The rest will be posted very soon. Last but not least is a wonderful, not-hairdo-related, illustrated review of a peanut butter and jam sandwich sent in the mail from a good friend in Texas because some things are too great not to share. If you feel compelled to share your own sandwich reviews or hairdo drawings or any other correspondence, send them to:

P.O. Box 11872, Milwaukee, WI 53211

There should be more exciting news here within a few days as well as the rest of the Madison drawings. Stay tuned. Thanks again and enjoy!





































And here is a review of peanut butter and jam sandwich: