Lex Anteinternet: What Are You Reading?

Over on our most active blog, Lex Anteinternet: What are you reading?:

What are you reading?

A new trailing thread, dedicated to what we're currently reading.

And. . . we hope. . . with participation from you.

What are you reading right  now? Add it down in the commentary section
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June 21, 2016

Give Me Eighty Men

I'm presently reading Give Me Eighty Men by Shannon Smith. It's a history of the Fetterman Fight, and a history of the history of the Fetterman Fight. I'll review it when I'm done, but I'll note that the favorable mention of the book by the authors of The Heart of All That Is caused me to pick it up, even though I'd been inclined to previously avoid it.

So far, I'm enjoying it, and its certainly raising a lot questions in my mind about the Fetterman battle, although I'm reserving my judgment on various things so far.

Stop over and let us know what you're reading!

That thread:  What Are You Reading?

Sidewalk Compass, Denver Colorado.

Sidewalk compass located near the Brown Palace in Denver. Teh odd angle of the bottom photograph is explained by a desire not to have my shadow in it.

Barth Hotel, Denver Colorado

I don't know anything about it, other than that the Barth Hotel is located in Lower Downtown Denver.

The ? Supply Company, Denver Colordo

A snapshot, this depicts a building that has a tile sign noting that its a supply  company, but I'm not sure what sort of supply company, as a tree obscures that part of thesign.

Icehouse, Denver Colorado

This old building in Lower Downtown Denver bears a name that is somewhat confusing.  With a name suggesting cold storage, the building was in fact built as the Littleton Creamery and Beatrice Foods Cold Storage Warehouse.  Now, however, its an apartment and condominium building and it also houses a bar named the Icehouse Tavern.

View House, Denver Colrado

The sign for the View House cites it was established in 1915.  I don't otherwise know anything about it, other than that it's right across from Coors Field.

Penn Garage, Denver Colorado

The former Penn Garage in Denver Colorado.

Bar, downtown Denver

Not sure of the name, but its next to Wax Tracks in Denver Colorado.  An example of a contemporary bar mural, advertising Pabst Blue Ribbon.  This place obviously also offers pizza.

The Clyfford Still Museum, Denver Colorado

Most of the signs up here are of older painted brick signs, of course. There are exceptions, and this is one, but this is particularly an exception as I'm going to comment. 

Commentary from me isn't unusual, but usually it's on our Lex Anteinternet blog and not here.  But I cannot resist.

This is a very large sign skillfully rendering a photo of Clyfford Still into a sign. The big streaks on the end of the sign is a late example of Still's allegedly artistic work, better regarded as junk.

Still was a 20th Century artist who, starting off in the 1920s, had a public art career. Early on he actually painted figures but, starting in the 1930s, his work began to somewhat resemble that of other period modern artists and following that it was reduced to colored blotches such as we see Still, smoking a cigarette, contemplating here.  It's ironic that, in order to represent Still to the public, the museum has to use a photograph, rather than one of his crappy pointless blotched up canvasses.

On the side of the photo the following is set out:

The canvas was his ally.
The paint and trowel were
his weapons. And the
art world was his enemy.

Apparently art itself, at least in an intelligible fashion capable of conveying some meaning to 99.9999% of humanity, was also his enemy as the result of the use of his weapons was the slaying of intelligibility.  It's complete junk.

But then, a lot of "modern" art is.

Well, in that war the guerilla of public indifference is probably the victor, as the big result of stuff like this is the separation of humanity from its artists.  So, if any meaning was intended to be conveyed, it's conveyed to a pretty self contained little crowd.

Jackson's Sports Bar, Denver Colorado

Mural on the side of Jackson's Sports Bar in Denver, which is right across the street from Coors Field.  This was taken from a distance as I was waiting to get into a Rockies game at the time.

Pepsi Cola sign and The Dutch Mill sign, Champa Street Denver Colorado.

Sometimes the photos are just bad.  The nature of snapshots, I guess.

Pepsi sign and The Dutch Mill sign, Champa Street, downtown Denver.

Storage Building, Lower Downtown Denver Colorado

A building in LoDo that at one time offered space for storage.

Unidentified, Denver Colorado

A sign that's been painted over so many times, it's now pretty much unreadable in any of its variants. Downtown Denver.