,the man, mark II

Vosdanig Adoian. known as ArshIle (1904-1948)

Okay, okay I know he doesn't have anything to do with Gorky's but you've guessed it- it's tenuous link time. And you've probably never heard of him and you should have done because he is a very important person. He was the pioneer of Abstract Expressionism and was the movement's single most important member. (A. E. basically being another term for 'action painting' You know the stuff- Jackson Pollack's splatters and swirly surrealist looking things) He introduced Roth ko, Pollack, De Kooning, Kline, Motherwell et alto the wonders of Cezanne, Matisse, and Kandinsky, but personally also drew on the folk tales and art of his native Turkish Armenia. Towards the end of his life he worked increasingly in series and the paintings are marked by a bitter note of melancholy that was definitely genuine. Age 43 he killed himself and De Kooning lost his friend and mentor whom he referred to as 'sweet Arshile' and the world lost a really talented, lovely bloke.

Bonus reasons to love Gorky's:
1. They have to be the only band in the world which can boast of 2 Euros' in it's line up
2. They adhered to radio broadcasting rulings and changed Sweet Johnny to read "why don't I
get my daddy's car and knock those rotters down 'cos they've gone too far and blissfully
disregarded it on others, eg. "0- oh isn't it a lovely day voting new labour with you," or "you know
I wrote that shit to sell ya, sell ya," and other obscenities in that particular song
3. They have a song called Poodle Rockin' which has John yelping and barking
4. They have done a cover of a Richard Thompson song and played it on the radio so it can be had
for all eternity
5. They eulogised freckles

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