The Late ’80s: working in advertising

January 29, 2017

Artwork created for use in a print-ad for Lotrisone, an anti-fungal cream produced by Merck & Co., one of the major clients of Roberts & Raymond Associates, the Philadelphia advertising agency for whom I worked from 1986-96, my first decade in the city. On May 1, 1986 when I arrived in Philadelphia, I was jobless; […]

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Self-knowledge: I am a serial limerent

January 22, 2017

lim·er·ence/ˈlimərəns/ noun “the state of being infatuated or obsessed with another person, typically experienced involuntarily and characterized by a strong desire for reciprocation of one’s feelings but not primarily for a sexual relationship.” I was 41 and living in Portsmouth NH when I first heard the term “limerence” during a psycho-therapy session with a fellow […]

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1986: the beginnings of Conscious World Art

January 15, 2017

In June 1978 when I was in Santa Fe NM visiting friends Pasha Buck and Amelia Hartzel I first encountered the Creed of the Magi (quoted in full at the end of this posting) which immediately struck a responsive chord in me. Once back in NYC I was inspired to create a b&w poster incorporating […]

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Backtracking to 1985…

January 9, 2017

1985, living in Portsmouth NH, working for Sameul Weiser Inc., book publisher/distributor, relocated from NYC to Cape Neddick ME. Early in the winter of ’85 Betty Lundsted Weiser apprised me of the fact that she had volunteered our office’s design services – i.e. myself – to help a friend, fellow astrologer Wendy Ashman, by designing […]

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1987: my first year in Philadelphia

January 2, 2017

The Slow-Motion Art Memoir continues; Drawn in Portsmouth; Revised in Philadelphia – a September 6 posting – was the most recent in this ongoing series revealing my life story. at left, my adios to 2016 and bienvenu to 2017, utilizing artworks created during my first year in Philadephia, thirty years ago. Further below you’ll find […]

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Blue Show Recap – the joy of selling art

December 27, 2016

“For an artist, one of life’s greatest pleasures is having others purchase what we have conjured into existence with our own hands.” – Alden Cole (18 Jun 1944 – ) For those of you who weren’t able to attend either of my recent Blue Show Open Houses, check out what you missed by going to […]

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The BlueShow goes RGB

December 17, 2016

The BlueShow — Part 2 Sunday 12/18/16 • 2-5pm 717 Federal Street South Philadelphia The BlueShow goes RGB for Part 2 of this holiday sale which has my first floor aglow with red, the second a lively green, the third a cooling blue; as seen in the night photo at left; even the basement gets […]

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More Blue-Show Evening Lamps #19-36

December 13, 2016

The Blue Show Part 2 Sunday 12/18/16 2-5pm 717 Federal St. Philadelphia PA 19147 Another posting previewing The Blue Show, happening again this weekend; displaying eighteen (actually twenty) more Evening Lamps by Alden Willard Cole. Inspired by The Blue Grotto (in its many incarnations), the life-work of Randy Dalton – Philadelphia’s arts activist Mr. Blue […]

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The Blue Show Evening Lamps – #1-18

November 19, 2016

“The deeper the blue becomes, the more strongly it calls man towards the infinite, awakening in him a desire for the pure and, finally, for the supernatural… The brighter it becomes, the more it loses its sound, until it turns into silent stillness and becomes white.” _ Wassily Kandinsky (18 Dec 1866 – 13 Dec […]

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Maine Vacation 2016 – Reconnections

November 16, 2016

“Laughter is the sun that drives winter from the human face.” – Victor Hugo (26 Feb 1802 – 22 May 1885) A major highlight of the September vacation to Maine was reconnecting with my friend Heidi, whom I had known in Portsmouth, NH while living there in the mid ’80s, and whom I had not […]

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The Blue Book: RISD Class of 1966

November 11, 2016

Last week I received a copy of the small 5×8 blue booklet, shown at left along with the 2-page spread focused on yours truly, recently published by my alma mater, Rhode Island School of Design. The publication celebrates the 50th Reunion of the Class of 1966, an event that happened in early October in Providence […]

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The Art of Nancy Goodwin-Hegg

November 1, 2016

“Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.” – quote by Thomas Merton (31 Jan 1915 – 10 Dec 1968) Nancy Goodwin, a fellow artist and friend of long-standing, is seen at left in a photograph I took while visiting in late September, with her husband Garry Hegg, sitting on […]

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Whadizit? A 7-hole latrine from a Dayton, Maine outhouse, circa 1933

October 13, 2016

“Life on earth is such a good story you cannot afford to miss the beginning… Beneath our superficial differences we are all of us walking communities of bacteria. The world shimmers, a pointillist landscape made of tiny living beings.” – Lynn Margulis (5 Mar 1938 – 22 Nov 2011) So what is this wooden plank […]

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Thornton Academy football team 1895

October 9, 2016

“It’s not the will to win that matters – everyone has that. It’s the will to prepare to win that matters.” – Paul William “Bear” Bryant (11 Sep 1913 – 26 Jan 1983) Among the photographs in the Cole Family archives is one of Thornton Academy’s 1895 football team, which includes my grandfather Weymouth Harris […]

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Drawn in Portsmouth; revised in Philadelphia

September 6, 2016

Lincoln Perry • Pete’s Porch • oil on masonite panel, 8″ x 10″ • collection of Alden Cole Picking up where I left off with my August 23rd posting: Drawing Heidi R. with Lincoln Perry: To reiterate, Lincoln lived with me for a few months in Portsmouth, NH while he was in town working on […]

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