Constellations

Philippe Apeloig
Des Bibliothèques à Vivre - Usages, Espaces, Architectures
2009
screenprint (poster)
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Philippe Apeloig
Octobre Fait Danser la Saison
(Octobre en Normandie)
1995
screenprint (poster)
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Philippe Apeloig
New Year Greeting Card
1995
screenprint
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Richard Anuszkiewicz
Trans-Lumina with Turquoise
1986
screenprint
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC

Richard Anuszkiewicz
Greeting Card
before 1982
screenprint
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Richard Anuszkiewicz
Greeting Card
before 1982
screenprint
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Richard Anuszkiewicz
Greeting Card
1978
screenprint
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Richard Anuszkiewicz
Greeting Card
1969
screenprint
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Richard Anuszkiewicz
Banner
1963
appliquéd felt
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC

Hans Arp (Jean Arp)
Sculpture Study
1964
graphite and watercolor on paper
Hirshhorn Museum, Washington DC

Hans Arp (Jean Arp)
Constellation
1960
painted paper collage
Hirshhorn Museum, Washington DC

Hans Arp (Jean Arp)
Amega dans l'Omega
1960
relief of wood, suede and silk, mounted on board
Hirshhorn Museum, Washington DC

Anonymous American Designer
Chickens (Kitchen)
ca. 1950-60
machine-printed wallpaper sample
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous American Designer
Undulating Grid
ca. 1950
screenprinted wallpaper sample
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Designer
Parrots
ca. 1905-1910
block-printed wallpaper sample
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Persian Printmaker
Scene from the Shahnama (Book of Kings)
ca. 1890
hand-colored woodcut
National Museum of Asian Art, Washington DC

Anonymous French Designer
Offering to Cupid
ca. 1800
block-printed wallpaper sample
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Generalissimo Francisco Franco Is Still Dead

Every time I sleep I leave a stain.

When I wake up I climb out of a drain

And step into my feet and it is plain

That when I walk away I leave a lane

Of garbage on the carpet in the train.

Francisco Franco (El Caudillo) pokes his head up from the drain

Where he's been hiding with Saddam Hussein.

He waterboards the peasants with champagne.

Now maybe they'll vote to give this madly inane

Hitler-buffoon his very own nuclear codes, let democracy reign!

Make Spain great again! I shouldn't touch it but I can't refrain

And don't restrain

Myself so what was once a tiny grain

Of pain

Is now a roaring lion with a mane.

Franco needs water for his golf courses so we can't complain

Out loud but it's insane – insane

Monsoons of rain

Drowning the automatic sprinkler systems that maintain

The greens, blinding windshields worldwide, Spain to Maine.

I can't stop rhyming! I can't. It's my domain!

Making more or less musical noise out of my fascist disdain.

I choose Francisco Franco, weakling strong man of Spain,

As my alter ego, bearer of my terror over what I can't attain

In the few years I have left, the minutes that remain.

Lacking tenderness, not something you can go to the store and obtain,

But which anyway does not pertain

To piloting an airplane

Dropping bombs on innocent civilians who remain

In pieces in the street under the boiling sun, Spaniards, pieces of Spain.

Don't drink and drive. Don't text while driving. Don't kill Lorca. Maintain

The good health of your car and tires and don't explain

To anyone when you're in the red-light district but remain

Alert also on the subway and don't feign

Ignorance because, though Franco is still dead, long may Franco reign!

– Frederick Seidel (2018)