Formats
Anthologies
103
Audio
301
Catalogues
348
Clothing
23
Editions
27
Ephemera
58
Literary
42
Monographs
165
Posters
256
Video
40
Zines
143

Shop > Artists' Books

Out of Stock
#13280

Emperors of Ice Cream

Artist
Arvo Leo
Date
2017
Publisher
Blank Cheque Press
Format
Artists' Books
ISBN
978-0-9952644-3-4
Size
14 × 20 cm
Length
216 pp
Genre
Drawing
Description

“The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream” –Wallace Stevens

Blank Cheque Press is pleased to present a new collection of drawings by Canadian artist Arvo Leo. Taking its title from the enigmatic Wallace Stevens poem of the same name, the book collects together over 100 full-colour drawings by the artist—sometimes comic, other times uncanny or grotesque—to explore themes of mortality and persistence in the creative process.

“The drawings in this book were originally made in 2010, over a period of two days, in the south of Rotterdam. They appeared in the publication Charming the Snake of Reason, edited by my friend Marnie Slater. Marnie told me about a photograph that she had taped to the wall of her studio of the writer Robert Walser lying dead in a field of snow, below which a caption read: charming the snake of reason. Naturally this made me feel very cold, and made me think of the poem ‘The Emperor of Ice-Cream’ by Wallace Stevens. The poem describes a dead body at a funeral while a muscular man serves ice cream to the attendees, upending the usual gravity and atmosphere around death. The black ink drawings included here allude to such characters as manifested in a series of peculiar emperors, each grounded by the white of the page, the starkness of winter. Be they dead or alive, many of these emperors are busy trying to get somewhere, while others seem utterly content or confused where they stand. Colourful snakes, twisting and unruly, emanate from waffle cones, their frozen bodies handled with a playful confidence. If anything, this book becomes a medusa’s head, gently writhing in the grasp of your warm-blooded fingers.” –Arvo Leo.

  1. Emperors of Ice Cream
 

Related Items

  1. Laurie Simmons: Cup and Saucer
  2. David Bradford: Ecstatic Essays No. 01: Nell Zink Is Damn Free
  3. Steffanie Ling: Nascar
  4. Casey Wei: Ecstatic Essays No. 03: Ozu’s Seasons
  5. Jenine Marsh: Ecstatic Essays No. 04: The Mastication of Alina Szapocznikow
  6. Laura Demers: Ecstatic Essays No. 05: Tacita Dean’s Wanderlust
  7. Ashley Bedet and Fionn Duffy: A Three-Body Problem
  8. Dodie Bellamy, Nayland Blake, Cecilia Corrigan, Amy De’Ath, Lynne Tillman, and Jackie Wang: SAY BYE TO REASON AND HI TO EVERYTHING
  9. Jacquelyn Ross: Young Adult // Issue No. 02
  10. Jaclyn Bruneau, Robert Dayton, Jacquelyn Ross, and Daniella Sanader: Young Adult // Issue No. 03
  11. Robin Cameron: Fourteen Frottages
  12. John Kelsey: Drowning Devourers of the Deep Plane
  13. Richard Long: Selected Walks 1979-96
  14. Masanao Hirayama: PYRAMID QUIZ (5153) Special edition
  15. Peter Hauenschild : Montagne Sainte-Victoire
  16. Bernhard Cella and Michael Horsky: Familienalbum
  17. Maria Bussmann: Waldrolle
  18. Vincent Trasov: Mr. Peanut Drawings
  19. Ron Giii: Oxygen Theatre
  20. Tim Lahan: Some Ways
  21. Garry Neill Kennedy: Eighteen Drawings
  22. Zuni Halpern: Elephants
  23. Kyrill Constantinides Tank: Janus Neinus Vielleichtus
  24. Cabin Time: Wilderness
  25. Karen Zalamea: They are lost as soon as they are made
  26. Das Wunder des Lebens
  27. Robert Dayton: The Official Diaper Cake Journal #1
  28. Ingo Giezendanner: GRR66: I’m not a white sheet of paper
  29. Ingo Giezendanner: GRR65: prrrretty pattrns
  30. Jason McLean: Pryor Wanted
  31. A Bottle of Notes and Some Voyages
  32. Claire Christie and Douglas Stone: Douglas Stone
  33. Arjuna Routte-Prieur: Stapleton Studio
  34. Ed Ruscha: Couplings
  35. Erik Brunetti: Practice wishful thinking
  36. Yoko Ono: Franklin Summer
  37. Lars Ahlstrom and Hans Anders Molin: Airspace