Auction details
7:15 AM PT - Nov 4th, 2007
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"Children instinctively know when they see glitter that they want to use it on their book report cover until people start telling them that that's tawdry, that they should start using stencils with beige ink, or something." Tom Lanigan-Schmidt is explaining his choice of materials in his art, the florist's foil, colored plastic, Saran Wrap and yes, glitter that he says reflects the light of "the strip joint and Coney Island and the disco." To Schmidt its all at a piece, just as his obsession with the religious art and artifacts at the Catholic Church is braided into his art like so much gold thread an a priest's chasuble. But the very utilitarian nature and low cast at the materials he uses pays homage to the neighborhood he refuses to leave behind. That's the one in Linden, New Jersey, where he grew up and learned "to survive by drawing pictures for these tough kids whose idea of being a man was being able to fight and get a girl pregnant when you were 16. 'Gavons', they, used to call those kids in the old neighborhood. "That's what the Italian peasants called other peasants they thought were too crude to talk about," he explains. In this piece, Schmidt has combined the elements at his childhood, rites of passage, art, sex, Holy Mother Church and pop culture in ways that can perhaps be explained through art. PLEASE NOTE: * THIS AUCTION STARTS ON SUNDAY NOVEMBER 4, 2007 AT 11:30 A.M. EST. ImagesClick on thumbnails to see larger images: 
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