Von Dutch Monday IV

Here's some Von Dutch art that you may not have seen, because I've never seen them in any of the recent Von Dutch books that I have. The photo was taken at one of the Rod and Custom shows that used to be held in the Pan-Pacific Auditorium in L.A.

Too bad we can't see the rest of the painting on the right, but it all looks like Dutch's painting style in the '50's. I especially like the "Over Head Cam" wall piece, and the dashboard/package tray-sized flamed and striped bongos are pretty cool. The real surprise in this group of Dutch's art, is the desert scene on the left. It's a pretty straight forward desert landscape, but there's no mistaking Dutch's style of art in it.

It might have been one of the pieces that he did for an art dealer in L.A. This art dealer saw some of Dutch's work, and talked him into bringing his paintings down to his gallery to display and sell. He promoted Dutch as "the next Dali....", and talked him into doing some more works for the gallery. Well, in typical Von Dutch fashion, he somehow soured on the whole deal, and went down to the gallery one day, and took all his art back again, and hung it all in his house.

Here's my (getting raggedy) copy of Car Craft, Oct. '56. The top '40 Ford coupe was painted by Von Dutch, and owned by Manuel Gonzales, and the '40 sedan was owned by Bob McCoy, and painted by Ray Cook. What do these two '40 Fords have in common, then?

Well, both cars were "flamed" using a technique that was developed by Von Dutch. Instead of blending the flame colors using a spray gun, the flame color blending was done by spraying multiple coats of different colors over the top of each other, then wet sanding thru the paint with 600grit paper in different areas, to different depths, to create the fades and blends on the flame's "licks". Von Dutch was still doing this type of flame color blending way up into the '70's.

I've done this type of flame painting, just to see if I could do it. It's pretty labor intensive, and your arms sure get tired between the painting and the sanding by the end! But, I've never seen the effect duplicated any other way. You should try it some time.......