Neon Museum announces expansion, set to double in size
The 32,000-square-foot space will provide room for an indoor gallery, storage for the collection of vintage Las Vegas signs and classrooms as well as administrative offices. Rendering Courtesy Neon Museum
From Channel 3 News: LAS VEGAS (KSNV) — The Neon Museum announced Wednesday that it will be expanding after it acquired the now-closed Reed Whipple Cultural Center, located across Las Vegas Boulevard from its current location.
This next phase of development has been named Neon2020, and will double the size of the museum’s presence.
A photographer’s love letter to the great American motel
The Yucca Motel from Motel Vegas by Fred Sigman
From the Evening Standard: There are few things as quintessentially American as the motel.
These roadside boltholes have featured in so much popular culture from music videos, to beat novels to films like True Romance that they have become imbued with a kind of romanticism that belies their dilapidated exterior. Try as Lenny Henry might, a Premier Inn off the M25 just doesn’t inspire the same kind of rock and roll idealism.
Photographer Fred Sigman pays homage to the original 1950s Las Vegas motels in a new book, “Motel Vegas”. Sigman, who is one of the very few people ever permitted to photograph inside a casino, was commissioned to take his motel pictures by Ivan Karp, a prominent New York gallerist instrumental in the Pop Art movement.
Building happiness: Sculptor Mark Cline offers a double take through roadside attractions
Artist Mark Cline is known for his eye-catching, large-scale foam and fiberglass sculptures that are installed in unexpected places. He and his apprentice, Brently Hilliard, will be celebrated at the Virginia Folklife Apprenticeship Showcase, along with 14 other master/apprentice pairs on May 5 at James Monroe’s Highland. Photo by Pat Jarrett/Virginia Humanities
From C-Ville: If you’ve seen a parade of 8-foot-tall ants climbing the side of a building, a life-sized foam replica of Stonehenge, or a T-Rex lunging through the trees with a Union soldier in its mouth, then you know the work of Mark Cline.
Dubbed “Virginia’s Roadside Attraction King” by Atlas Obscura, Cline has spent decades building foam and fiberglass sculptures, many inspired by monster and science-fiction movies. He’s got thousands of works at truck stops, amusement parks, restaurants, and other unexpected sites in the commonwealth and around the country.
How One Photographer Learned to Truly See Buildings
Former Pure Oil station, Cape Charles, Virginia.
From the National Trust for Historic Preservation: Off the cuff, photographer Kate Scott can’t pinpoint the exact types of architecture that catch her eye. “Sometimes, it’s just sort of a feeling—‘Oh, that’s cool’—and I can’t necessarily tell you what I think is cool about it. I just go toward it,” she says. But the details that make it into her photographs of cityscapes and historic buildings tend to be the small ones—gargoyles atop skyscrapers, older brick bonds, and inscriptions in stone. She looks for “the evidence of the craftsmanship and the detail, that there was some time taken with it,” she says. “Obviously that time was worth it, because it’s still standing.
America’s 10 Favorite Regional Fast-Food Chains
Habit Burger
From QSR: As a part of its 2019 Reader’s Choice Awards, USAToday announced the Top 10 Best Regional Fast Food brands. From a small biscuit chain in North Carolina to a beloved burger brand in California, here were the winners.