Heard about this on NPR this yesterday and could not believe that LA doesn’t have a Velvet Painting Museum..Portland Oregon does in the Veveteria. UHG! That is so depressing, in the city where “Cool” and “Hip” were born by Hollywood Masterminds generations ago, we could not get our shit together enough to have a velvet painting museum. I would pay big money to see that. I remember seeing black velvet painting of naked women being sold out of 70’s Vans as a kid at the local swap meet, and thought, “damn how cool” and “how can I buy one without my parents finding out”. Why the allure, I have no idea, but they are still as cool and intriguing to me today as they were as a kid.
Check out the Velveteria here. They have thousands of these painting in this personal collection they call a museum. They NEED to do an LA showing of that!
Some Frequently Asked Questions from their site:
1.) Are the paintings for sale?
No, the paintings are from our personal collection. They are not for sale.
2.) How long have you been collecting?
Ten years
3.) Where did you get them?
Thrift stores, antique malls, estate sales, private donations, internet, and many many road trips. (All that bad road food almost killed us.)
4.) Do you have favorites?
I think we both really like the Banditos, but then there’s the black light ones, the dog-children and the naked ladies
5.) How many paintings are here?
Around 300 are in the museum but we have a thousand or so in our collection.
6.) Do you continue to collect new paintings?
We collect an average of 5 new paintings a week, in all subject matters. We never stop collecting.
7 responses so far ↓
1 caren anderson // May 23, 2008
We are the epicenter of Art and our book is the greatest book written about art in the last 100 years and the second greatest story ever told. We are from L.A we are Los Angelenos originales, we would love to have a Velveteria 2 from Clowntacular to Poodletopia.Is L.A. ready for us?
2 April Whitney // May 23, 2008
You can buy it for only $24.95…. Pick up the book, “Black Velvet Masterpieces: Highlights from the Collection of the Velveteria Museum” at your local bookstore or chroniclebooks.com.
3 Jonathan // May 23, 2008
My Aunt has two Velvet Elvis paintings. And I love her enough to still claim her as my Aunt.
4 Bernhard // May 24, 2008
Here well arranged and varied posts appear again and again. I look gladly here past. Many greetings from the center of Germany!
5 Ling // May 24, 2008
Interesting. Caren, are you guys really interested in opening another museum in Los Angeles? If so, I’d like to ask some questions for my blog. Reply back here, and if necessary, I’ll get in touch with you.
6 Zip Submits // May 24, 2008
it either dont have in my country also
7 caren anderson // May 24, 2008
dear ling please e mail the velveteria, we miss L.A. all but the traffic
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