Wednesday, September 27, 2017

Yes, It's a Blog Post About Memorable Couches

"The Chesterfield" by Frank Holmes
Couches.  Sometimes they're called sofas. And often they evoke memories. I remember the old green couch which we had when I was growing up in Maple Heights. I remember, too, the brown couch in our living room in Bridgewater. In fact, I have memories associated with a number of couches over the course of a lifetime.

A couch is one of those things you probably don't think about very often, until someone draws attention to it. The occasion for this blog post was a convergence of sorts. This summer I re-connected with an art instructor I'd had at Ohio University circe 1972-73, Frank Holmes. He shared with me a binder with many of the paintings he's executed over the years, and I happened notice a series that featured couches. At roughly the same time I stumbled upon a Vanity Fair article titled TV's Most Memorable Couches. This seemed too serendipitous to not be shared.

So, as I prepared to share some of the couches Frank Holmes had painted he sent me an email indicating that he had at one time said he did a whole show at TLK Gallery in Costa Mesa on the West Coast featuring couches. He found transparencies and forwarded them so I could add them here.


"Andy's Sofa"
"Indigo"
"Prone"
Do you ever Google a word and then click on the Images tab? Here is what you see when you want to find images of couches. See anything you recognize?

Here are several additional Frank Holmes couches for your visual stimulation.

"Seaside Sofa" --31"x 44" / Oil Pastel, 1981
"Party, Party" --31"x 44" / Oil Pastel, 1981
"Faust's Sofa" --31"x 44" / Oil Pastel, 1981
"Heavenly Sofa" --31"x 44" / Oil Pastel, 1981
"Misty Sofa" --63"x 88" / Oil on Canvas, 1982
"Sofa in Blue" --63"x 88" / Oil on Canvas, 1981
"Big Red" -- 63"x 88" / oil on Canvas, 1982
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Learn more about Frank Holmes' "Big Date" 

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Suggested Related Readings:
The Sofas of Madison County by R.J.Waller
Of Mice and Couches, John Steinbeck
The Couch Also Rises, Hemingway 
The Old Man and the Couch, also by Hemingway
The Great Sofa Gatsby Owned by Fitzgerald
Black Couch Down by Mark Bowden
Portrait of the Couch by a Young Man, James Joyce
Finnegan's Couch, also by Joyce
Joyce's Couch, by Finnegan
Brave New Couch, Aldous Huxley
Sofas at Noon, by Arthur Koestler

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Meantime, sofas stretch out all around you. Dig it.

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