Calicornication: Postcards of Giant Produce (1909)

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Produced by the prolific San Francisco–based publisher Edward H. Mitchell, each card features a single rail car rolling through lush farmland. Aboard are gargantuan, luminous fruits and vegetables: dimpled navel oranges, a dusky bunch of grapes, and mottled walnuts. Placed end-to-end, the cards would make a colorful train crossing California’s fertile valleys. Unlike other, more action-packed “tall-tale” cards — filled with farmers, fisherman, and children for scale — Mitchell’s series is restrained. Sharply illuminated, the colossal cargo lean toward artwork rather than gag. “A Carload of Mammoth Apples”, green-yellow and gleaming, could have been plucked from Rene Magritte’s The Son of Man.

links_2026mar03

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RIP Éliane Radigue

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RIP to one of the most brilliant artists of the last hundred years. A few favorites:

michelangelo foot sketch sells for $27.2 million

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via Hypebeast:

The work itself is a rare red chalk study for the Libyan Sibyl, one of the monumental figures adorning the Sistine Chapel ceiling in the Vatican. Experts identified the sketch as a preparatory drawing created around 1511–1512. It depicts the figure’s right foot with the heel raised and toes pressed down—a specific anatomical detail necessary for the Sibyl’s twisting, weight-bearing pose.

The $27.2 million USD sale price surpasses the previous auction record for a Michelangelo work—a nude study sold in Paris in 2022 for $24.3 million. “In the 23-plus years I have been in the industry, I have been privileged to see many wonderful Old Masters moments, but today topped them all,” said Andrew Fletcher, Christie’s Global Head of Old Masters. With most of Michelangelo’s 600 surviving sketches held in museums, this sale represented perhaps the last opportunity for a private collector to own a direct link to the Sistine Chapel.

current

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Thanks to this excellent post, stumbled across via minifeed, I’ve spent a chunk of the morning playing with a new RSS reader, Current. Beautiful to be certain, a highly-polished 1.0; dig the concept behind it, looking forward to further development. Hopeful that it helps me find what I was looking for in an RSS reader – no clue what that is, but I have to believe that I'll know it when I see it. Maybe.