In keeping with my pop art strategy, on this blog one post down, I have to decide whether to shelve a couple of haiku books or maintain them as a kind of cover-design experiment where I'm the only one who buys them, yet they still allow me to crank out pop art over a period of time.
Not many people read haiku, and even fewer read a book called e pluribus haiku 2017, and even fewer of those would be willing to buy one, even if it had the best pop art cover a person could possibly imagine. But with making museum-grade pop art as a goal, I have to create a few just to get better at it. It's worth a couple of bucks to me to get a book with my own pop art on it; if I don't like it, who else can I expect to like it? I've worked hard on the haiku. I can wrap it in pop art and call it a product.
Taking three books off the market would free me from worrying about how to keep their ratings from going over the cliff. Two of them no longer show their kindle ratings, as no one has read them in a couple of years. What should I do, make a new account and go read them? No thanks. I don't even want to put them on the table for other authors to read, if it's not the kind of thing people would ordinarily want to read. But the real problem with them is that, as time goes on, the years attached to them (in this ase, 2016, 2017 and 2018) are not really that related to the haiku themselves; these are only the years in which I wrote them. That's right; I wrote a thousand haiku in each of these years, more or less, less in the case of 2016. That's a lot of work and a memory I'd like to preserve. When I put them all in e pluribus haiku anthology: 3487 haiku I figured I'd preserved them, and maybe so. The duplication alone is probably a good enough reason to can the old books. The pop art is the part that makes me reconsider.
Maybe what I should do is make a number of selfies that showcase the different pop art covers, like a museum wall with art on its walls. Show it off while it's here. Celebrate life, and put art in all corners of it.
Sunday, February 12, 2023
Monday, October 24, 2022
I've got a secret that I've been dying to share, and there's no better place than on a blog that very few people read, for who wants to actually read about pop art? People want an exhibit, they want a big Marilyn in their face, they want a bold statement like those that Warhol was good at making. All on the surface. All in a single picture. All with the boldest colors one can imagine.
Here's my secret: I make book covers; that's my medium, and though I'm not great at it, I've found it to be a fascinating way to crank out pop art. First I have the book, of course. The book doesn't need to have all its copies have the same cover; a cover can last a few years, and then I can change it to another cover. In fact I can change that cover after I've sold only a single book. It doesn't seem to be against Amazon's policy and it doesn't even necessarily upset them all that much. If they feel inclined to make a few test copies or have a few sitting around to prepare them for orders, then of course they risk wasting those few as I move on to a different or better cover and they're stuck with the old ones. But I never hear about that. What their machinery tells me is that if I make a new one, they'll put it on there. That can be tomorrow or any day.
What that means is that theoretically, I can print as much pop art as I want. I can get all my pop art out there in the world, one book at a time, and with every bizarre bold pop-art creation someone will look at it and say, wow, that's a wild picture. That's a piece of work. That's like Andy Warhol.
What I'm working toward is to have every book, every cover, every iteration, be as special as an Andy Warhol work. I have twenty-seven books out now and many of them if not all of them have some kind of pop art on the cover. Sometimes the titles and author's name ruin it a little - if it looks too much like a standard book cover, I'm a little disappointed. I want it to be bold, striking, intense. I want them all to be like that. If one of them is not, I want to change it until it is.
The world of pop art requires someone to be the kind of hustler Andy Warhol was. I don't know if I have the kind of genius it took to take a Campbell's soup can and make millions off its image, which actually has some problems with copyright probably, but I do know that Warhol did not let copyright keep him from splashing images all around the world and becoming one of the most easily recognized artists of the modern era. He had a kind of genius that I admire and am following up on. My books will for the most part be full of haiku, but that's ok, you have to have something in a book, otherwise it's just blank pages with pop art on the cover. The haiku is part of the bargain. And you know the kind of thing that goes along with haiku: flowers, roads, monarch butterflies. Vistas of incredible beauty. Impressionism through computer-aided cartoonization.
In this pop art site, I keep my best secrets. In plain sight.
Here's my secret: I make book covers; that's my medium, and though I'm not great at it, I've found it to be a fascinating way to crank out pop art. First I have the book, of course. The book doesn't need to have all its copies have the same cover; a cover can last a few years, and then I can change it to another cover. In fact I can change that cover after I've sold only a single book. It doesn't seem to be against Amazon's policy and it doesn't even necessarily upset them all that much. If they feel inclined to make a few test copies or have a few sitting around to prepare them for orders, then of course they risk wasting those few as I move on to a different or better cover and they're stuck with the old ones. But I never hear about that. What their machinery tells me is that if I make a new one, they'll put it on there. That can be tomorrow or any day.
What that means is that theoretically, I can print as much pop art as I want. I can get all my pop art out there in the world, one book at a time, and with every bizarre bold pop-art creation someone will look at it and say, wow, that's a wild picture. That's a piece of work. That's like Andy Warhol.
What I'm working toward is to have every book, every cover, every iteration, be as special as an Andy Warhol work. I have twenty-seven books out now and many of them if not all of them have some kind of pop art on the cover. Sometimes the titles and author's name ruin it a little - if it looks too much like a standard book cover, I'm a little disappointed. I want it to be bold, striking, intense. I want them all to be like that. If one of them is not, I want to change it until it is.
The world of pop art requires someone to be the kind of hustler Andy Warhol was. I don't know if I have the kind of genius it took to take a Campbell's soup can and make millions off its image, which actually has some problems with copyright probably, but I do know that Warhol did not let copyright keep him from splashing images all around the world and becoming one of the most easily recognized artists of the modern era. He had a kind of genius that I admire and am following up on. My books will for the most part be full of haiku, but that's ok, you have to have something in a book, otherwise it's just blank pages with pop art on the cover. The haiku is part of the bargain. And you know the kind of thing that goes along with haiku: flowers, roads, monarch butterflies. Vistas of incredible beauty. Impressionism through computer-aided cartoonization.
In this pop art site, I keep my best secrets. In plain sight.
Monday, September 5, 2022
covers to die for
Nobody buys haiku; the market for any poetry whatsoever appears to be pretty small. When I buy one of my own, I shoot straight up in the ratings and become one of the best sellers ever. With a single book buy I can own the haiku ratings.
Of course I could get the "author's copy" where it only costs a couple bucks but they charge a couple more for shipping - they have to make back on the shipping what they don't make simply printing the book - but I'm too cheap to pay any shipping whatsoever. And besides, it comes out to about the same. You pay over the top, you get about a buck royalty and your ratings skyrocket. So when my ratings swoon I've taken to just buying my own.
And if I'm going to do that, then I'm going to have my own pop exhibit, by having pop covers that are essentially the best I can make them. I'm only at the beginning stages. I'm not sure I've mastered this art of covers. These books that have professionally made covers seem to have gold and silver embossed lettering on them or something like that, and mine are not quite like that yet. Also they tend to make the author's name really big like it's more of a draw than the book itself - I'm not sure if I'm ready for that either.
But the covers themselves are the new pop exhibit. It appears to be a book. But actually it's pop art, in your face.
Of course I could get the "author's copy" where it only costs a couple bucks but they charge a couple more for shipping - they have to make back on the shipping what they don't make simply printing the book - but I'm too cheap to pay any shipping whatsoever. And besides, it comes out to about the same. You pay over the top, you get about a buck royalty and your ratings skyrocket. So when my ratings swoon I've taken to just buying my own.
And if I'm going to do that, then I'm going to have my own pop exhibit, by having pop covers that are essentially the best I can make them. I'm only at the beginning stages. I'm not sure I've mastered this art of covers. These books that have professionally made covers seem to have gold and silver embossed lettering on them or something like that, and mine are not quite like that yet. Also they tend to make the author's name really big like it's more of a draw than the book itself - I'm not sure if I'm ready for that either.
But the covers themselves are the new pop exhibit. It appears to be a book. But actually it's pop art, in your face.
Wednesday, May 18, 2022
update
I'm in the doldrums with my pop art. I've been Kandinskying things - almost all my pop art over the last couple years has been Kandinskyed (sp?) photos - and it hasn't really run its course. I produce one for the Quakers every week. I produce book covers. That's about the run of my pop art these days.
On the topic of book covers, I've had trouble, actually, getting the inspiration to remake all the ones that need to be remade. I've remade a few - Kandinskyed, in most cases - but have a dozen to redo. I've had a few ideas but I'm having fewer hours to click together to pull them together.
Furthermore, I'm not happy about my pop gallerie, which doesn't really display the pop art the way I want it displayed. And, I don't have much time to redo it although I've had plenty of chances.
Life is just so bizarre. I'm going to take my phone out, and try to record more of it.
On the topic of book covers, I've had trouble, actually, getting the inspiration to remake all the ones that need to be remade. I've remade a few - Kandinskyed, in most cases - but have a dozen to redo. I've had a few ideas but I'm having fewer hours to click together to pull them together.
Furthermore, I'm not happy about my pop gallerie, which doesn't really display the pop art the way I want it displayed. And, I don't have much time to redo it although I've had plenty of chances.
Life is just so bizarre. I'm going to take my phone out, and try to record more of it.
Tuesday, October 19, 2021
Book Covers
A book cover can and should be a work of good pop art, put out into the world, published enjoyed by people. While you read a book, whether it takes you a day or a week, you have it out in your life, on the chair or bed, for everyone to see. It should grab their eyes and make an impression. I work on that. Some of mine are clearly better than others.
I am about to go through all my book covers and redo the ones I can. When I do, I will put my best pop art on them. In a general sense my goal is to use the best of pop art so that, of my thirty times two or so of covers, all are my best work. There are a few complications.
In general, since almost all my books are 6 X 9, all my covers are about that size. The biggest complication is that choosing to put the art on there without the title, subtitle, and author's name (because after all you can put that on the spine), is, I think, taking a chance. I have done that but have not been happy with the appearance. One author asked me why I left my own name off of Pile of Leaves: Stories of a Rake since I was the rake in question, and I had to admit, it was really for pop design reasons but not anything I'd really thought through carefully. I have one book, Comin' 'Round to Lovin' It, which even at this moment has no words on its title, although probably it should, and it even has a cool subtitle (23 short stories out of 99 billion served) which gives people a little chuckle. I have now swung around the other way to decide that books should have all three, title, subtitle, and author, on the cover, if at all possible, with whatever you put on the spine as a kind of bonus, which helps it when it's in its shelf, tucked away, not being read.
The question, then, to me, is, should the design lead your eyes to the words? Or should it whack you in the face and make you read the words separately? Does it help if the words are last (bottom right if possible) - or is it better if you get the words, or some of them, before you even look at the picture? Are smaller fonts more annoying in terms of interfering with the impression of the art, because you can't read them without effort? My questions here have more to do with strategy. I have a lot of covers to redo, and my last question is this: Do I need an overall brand/look to tie all thirty of them together? Or is it ok to have outlliers that really don't look like the rest?
I am about to go through all my book covers and redo the ones I can. When I do, I will put my best pop art on them. In a general sense my goal is to use the best of pop art so that, of my thirty times two or so of covers, all are my best work. There are a few complications.
In general, since almost all my books are 6 X 9, all my covers are about that size. The biggest complication is that choosing to put the art on there without the title, subtitle, and author's name (because after all you can put that on the spine), is, I think, taking a chance. I have done that but have not been happy with the appearance. One author asked me why I left my own name off of Pile of Leaves: Stories of a Rake since I was the rake in question, and I had to admit, it was really for pop design reasons but not anything I'd really thought through carefully. I have one book, Comin' 'Round to Lovin' It, which even at this moment has no words on its title, although probably it should, and it even has a cool subtitle (23 short stories out of 99 billion served) which gives people a little chuckle. I have now swung around the other way to decide that books should have all three, title, subtitle, and author, on the cover, if at all possible, with whatever you put on the spine as a kind of bonus, which helps it when it's in its shelf, tucked away, not being read.
The question, then, to me, is, should the design lead your eyes to the words? Or should it whack you in the face and make you read the words separately? Does it help if the words are last (bottom right if possible) - or is it better if you get the words, or some of them, before you even look at the picture? Are smaller fonts more annoying in terms of interfering with the impression of the art, because you can't read them without effort? My questions here have more to do with strategy. I have a lot of covers to redo, and my last question is this: Do I need an overall brand/look to tie all thirty of them together? Or is it ok to have outlliers that really don't look like the rest?
Saturday, September 18, 2021
Sunday, June 27, 2021
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