photography :: philadelphia :: trenton china pottery co

"trenton china pottery co. #8, philadelphia"

Founded in 1927 by Louis Eidelson, a Russian immigrant, the Trenton China Pottery Company sold restaurant equipment and supplies on the corner of 2nd and Arch in Old City Philadelphia for decades and has been family operated for generations.

The company has since moved to a new location on Memphis Street and now operates under their new name, Trenton China Restaurant Equipment & Food Service Supplies.

"trenton china pottery co # 6, philadelphia"

Last month we visited Philadelphia and stumbled across this building during one of our walks.  I fell in love with it at first sight.  Maybe it was the faded advertisement or the pink, orange and red paints or maybe the old style fire escape ladders.  I was so fascinated by the story of the building that when I got home, I researched its history.  I imagine that this now empty brick building must have once been a proud bustling hot spots for restaurant owners and homeowners shopping for the latest kitchen gadgets. 

 

art :: peacock

i've been experimenting with a new series of animal illustrations in the last couple of months ... here is the 1st in the series titled "peacock" ... it started off with me digging up a peacock design i had done years ago ... i started tinkering with the design, adding textures and redrawing most of it ... here is the end result ... 

"peacock"

art review: ai weiwei

summer has come and gone and my hiatus has come to an end ... i have collected lots of inspirations and wonderful memories this summer and i can't wait to begin the creative process again ... firstly before i post some new works, i want to share my experience a few weeks ago at ai weiwei's "according to what?" exhibition at the art gallery of ontario

ai weiwei is a chinese contemporary artist who is extremely outspoken especially after the sichuan earthquake of 2008 where thousands died ... he is currently not allowed to travel outside china due to his political activism

what i found interesting and discovered through a video interview they were playing is that most of the art aren't actually made by himself ... ai weiwei explains that he comes up with the ideas and then his team helps him make the ideas into reality ... seeing as most of his works are massive labour intensive undertakings, i can understand why ... also, his art seems to be more about the political message itself than the execution (unlike most other art genres) ... 

the "moon chest"(below left) features 7 wooden chests with circular openings ... they are positioned such a way that as you walk through the installation, you experience the many different phases of the moon ... this is one of the more visually pleasing pieces of the exhibition

snake ceiling, 2009

moon chest, 2008

the "snake ceiling" (above right) is a ceiling installation made with backpacks ... this is an inspiration from the approximately 5,000 children who perished from the sichuan earthquake 

dropping a han dynasty urn, 1995/2009

han dynasty vases from 2,000 years ago are featured in the photographs above and the piece below ... ai weiwei tries to portray the idea of challenging traditional beliefs for the development of new ideas ... yet the coloured vases show that a new modern layer cannot remove the original past that still exists below 

coloured vases, 2007-2010

rebar from collapsed sichua schools in the aftermath of the earthquake were used for the installation below

straight, 2008-2012

when most of us travel the world and visit tourist attractions, we take tons of photos sometimes just of the symbol and sometimes posing in front of it ... below are 3 examples of a series of photographs that ai weiwei takes in the same situation ... what do you think he is trying to say?

art: bubblegum

i was driving into work this week and all of a sudden an image flashed across my mind ... remember that big bubblegum you blew when you were a kid?  those big fat sweet juicy ones like bubblicious or hubba bubba ... inevitably one will be so big that it pops and sticks all over your face ...

i wanted to capture that moment ... here it is ... my latest piece is called "bubblegum"

bubblegum

these were the flavours i remember the most ... what about you?

art: captain ilias

i just finished this illustration for my son's room ... his room has a nautical theme with a blue and red colour scheme ... he had a big smile on his face when i showed him ... made my day!

Captain Ilias

coming up the gangplank are our 3 newest passengers with their luggage ... mr. crab ... mr. clownfish ... mr.starfish ... i'm really happy with how this one turned out ... feels sunny and warm ... can almost smell the fresh ocean air ... 

art: hung out to dry

my latest piece titled "hung out to dry" was inspired by my recent trip to greece ... it was april and the weather enabled us to hang our laundry outside ... it was so windy that within an hour everything was dried ... it brought back memories of when i was little growing up in a hot climate which allowed us to hang the laundry on a line outside the window of a condo 25 floors above ground all year round ... i still chuckle when i remember back to times when a sock or a shirt would slip from our hands and land on someone else's laundry line floors below ... you would have to count backwards and downwards and try to figure out which apartment it was that you should call on to retrieve your clothes ....

this illustration was overlaid onto a photograph i took in greece ...

"hung out to dry"

inspiration: mary cassatt | artist

happy mother's day to all the wonderful mothers out there!  whenever one thinks of paintings of mother and their children, the wonderful mary cassatt comes to mind ...

mary cassatt (1844-1926) was an american impressionist painter who later made france her home.  she was influenced by her good friend edgar degas and often painted her sister lydia, women and their children and life in society.

 above: little ann sucking her finger, embraced by her mother, 1897

above:  breakfast in bed, 1897

above: mother combing her child's hair, 1901

above:  mother and child, 1901

    

above:mother and child (the oval mirror), 1889

above:  la toilette, 1891

above:  mother and child, 1900

above: mother and child, 1900

 above:  young mother sewing, 1900

above:  young thomas and his mother, 1893

   above:  mother wearing a sunflower on her dress