Currado Malaspina's Chez-d'oeuvre inconnu

My dear comrade Currado Malaspina sees himself as a modern day Frenhofer.

The truth is, he has all the tragedy and none of the talent.

His recent artist book inspired by Balzac's classic fable is charming and sad in equal measure.

 

@currado6

Much to my astonishment, the decaying, calcified, out-of-step luddite, Currado Malaspina has joined the ranks of TikTok influencers. 

This is both good and bad news.

On the good side, it signals his sentience.

The bad side is all too obvious.

THE LAST OF THE GREAT FLÂNEURS

My dear, eccentric comrade Currado Malaspina, is a relic. He has no cell phone and therefore, no Google Maps. His complete absence from life online has given him no other alternative than to adhere to actual, physical existence. Without texting apparatus or email he is forced to communicate (he is comfortable in at least four languages) with articulated words spoken in full or near-full sentences.

His attention span is still intact and his memory is unfailing. Though he owns a bicycle, he prefers to walk.

As he walks, on occasion he stops, and when he stops he sketches.

Above is an old accordion notebook annotated in english. 

 

The Sweet Guide - La Dolce Guida. Dante & Malaspina

BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE

 

Unlike many of my New York colleagues, my good friend, the French artist Currado Malaspina loves Los Angeles. He visits the city religiously twice a year (though he rarely lets me know he's in town, preferring to spend his time with a bevy of sycophants, art collectors and Hollywood B-listers).

Knowing that both California and his native Paris are doomed to climate catastrophe, he has taken it upon himself to chronicle every detail of each city with some form of visual representation.

The video above is just one of the hundreds of sketchbooks he has devoted to this sanguine lamentation.  

THE SWEET GUIDE

 

I've often wondered what animates my dear, eccentric comrade Currado Malaspina. He has many strange habits and obsessions. He wears scarves in summer, he collects wind chimes and garden ornaments and he reads and rereads Dante in Italian without understanding a word.

His latest folly is imagining Beatrice Portinari as a celestial seducer luring an earnest and vulnerable Alighieri into spasms of desire. His illuminated Paradiso which he impishly titled "La Dolce Guida," is weird and beautiful.

Though still far from finished, we can get an idea of what it might look like by this misleading video:

Paris and Los Angeles: Sister Cities Not Exactly On Speaking Terms

My good friend Currado Malaspina loves to walk. In Paris, this is not unusual. It is not even unusual to interrupt a walk in order to make a few sketches. In Paris, Malaspina is a sparrow in a tree.

Los Angeles is something else. Walking in Los Angeles, though far from a felony, is still something rather freakish. Combine that with squatting on a curb with pen and ink, and you've got yourself an anomaly.

Luckily, squatting on a curb in L.A. is a commonplace and as long as Currado is not publicly defecating, folks leave him alone.