Pumping Iron '74

I got hold of this 1974 copy of Pumping Iron magazine for a friend's birthday and it totally pained me to post it to him. It had signs of wear, but was generally in great condition and full of amazing shots of people like Mr Schwarzenegger in his Mr. Olympia heyday.

For the design geeks among us, it's designed by Martin Stephen Moskof and it's 205mm x 275mm, 221 pages and a softback publication.

Thanks to Celine at Counter-Print.co.uk for great service, careful packaging and general loveliness - if you have the two key ingredients of good sense and a little spare money, you'll head over there right now and buy something amazing.

McBess

There's a great body of jolly lovely work over at Matthieu Bessudo's site - aka McBess. Above is an illustration for his collective, Salle Polyvalente, from ages ago, but I always like something with a stuffed animal on the wall, so you'll have to head over to Matt's site to see newer stuff.
He's got a black and white, 24 page, paperback book for sale, Malevolent Melody, which looks awesome. It's an edition of 3,000 and has a 7" vinyl in the back featuring music from his band The Dead Pirates. All for just over a tenner.

Toilet Paper

Personally, I don't get it. It's a toilet, which isn't a particularly nice place to be at the best of times, more so if you're sitting on it. So why does anyone choose to read there? In and out in 3 minutes max. Shit, wipe, read in the living room.
I've researched this in the name of good journalism and, frankly, good dinner table conversation and ice-breakers at parties and there seems to be a lot more people than I would ever have believed that read in the khazi. This bin from Snowtone is for you guys. You freaks.

Blek Le Rat

It's been over three decades since Blek Le Rat started stenciling around Paris. Without a shadow of a doubt, he's the pioneer and, looking at his back history it's interesting to see where the medium developed from. It's a shame so few people even know of him, in comparison to the other B word anyway.

He's got an exhibition on at White Walls Gallery in San Francisco which is on now and finishes on 5th June 2010.

I'd also recommend getting his book, "Blek Le Rat - Getting Through The Walls" which is out through Thames & Hudson. I got my copy signed by Blek Le Rat when he was promoting the book at London Graphic Centre and, amazingly, there was virtually nobody there.

The Work of Christoph Niemann

Christoph Niemann is well worth a mention, his work has a nice sense of wit. He's got a new book out which is "A playful homage to New York" and shows aspects of New York depicted through the medium of photographed Lego bricks. The above image is taken from a n Abstract City series which are well worth a look.

Parisian Booksellers

All along the sides of the streets around the Louvre, there are little green boxes which are occasionally opened up by people selling second hand books. There are some real gems in there.