No, ’cause Kaws

Classic finds

I’m not a fan of the work of conceptual artist Kaws (real name: Brian Donnelly.) I can see where taking someone else’s character and replacing the eyes with Xs may make some statement in some context once or twice, but as a style for a lifetime, no… and when I see a Kaws-traced Simpsons album cover selling for eight figures (while the artist of the cover – a pal of mine – gets $0), I question the general usefulness to the culture.

Apparently, a few years ago Kaws did some Peanuts-oriented work, some of which ended up on Uniqlo products. And there’s a 2016 book of that material, KAWS: Man’s Best Friend. It’s there for any of you who want to spend a couple hundred book on Kaws material, but I think I will allow this hole to remain in my collection.

Kaws book cover - altered PigPen image

New releases
Double Love

Simon Spotlight has dropped two books for the Valentine’s Day Shopping Season, and they’re pretty similar. Love is Everywhere, Snoopy! is a board book that is supposed to be Charlie Brown explaining love to Snoopy (who is said to have asked, which raises the usual how-does-Snoopy-communicate-to-Charlie-Brown question.) Charlie Brown answers …

New releases
“Books”

My grocery shopping today landed me two new Peanuts “books”. The more bookish of the two is the latest edition of The Great Big Book of Peanuts Word Seeks, volume 5 to be precise, which as I’ve mentioned before I’ll allow to qualify as a book… particularly because it not …

Classic finds
Enigmatic Snoopy

Sitting here, patiently waiting months for me to blog about it, is Enigmatica di Snoopy e i suoi amici Peanuts, a full-color 48 page puzzle magazine that is apparently issue 66 of the quarterly Italian magazine Gioca Con Noi. This issue, intended for Dicembre – Febbraio 2022, is Christmas-themed. It …