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James Franco is a jack of all trades: actor, director, student, and an artist. His first exhibition was at the now-defunct Glu Gallery in Los Angeles in 2006, where he showed several large-scale mixed-media pieces that resembled the work of J.M. Basquiat. In an incredibly meta-moment, Franco appeared on "General Hospital" as an artist named Franco in an episode that was shot at Los Angeles’s Museum of Contemporary Art. Most recently, the actor returned to the museum to headline a show, "Rebel," which closed on Saturday. It featured several drawings and mixed-media pieces taken from his work called "The Dangerous Book Four Boys" (in which he vandalized a book called "The Dangerous Book for Boys"), a giant wooden rocket ship, and large-scale collage paintings. As MOCA director Jeffrey Deitch put it, “It’s one of the most significant things going on right now—not just in art but also in progressive culture—this convergence, the dissolving of boundaries between what is art, what’s music, what is performance ... and it’s also the convergence between a more elevated fine-art culture and popular culture. Franco is one of these people who is leading this convergence.”
Former Beatle Ringo Starr is opening a new exhibition, ‘Ringo 2012,’ this week. From James Franco to Prince Charles, see our gallery of art’s most unexpected celebrity stars.
The Beatles legend originally took up making art on his computer as a way to kill time on the road while he was touring. But it’s flourished into a full-time career. Now his work is on display in a show called "Ringo 2012" at the Pop International Gallery in New York, marking the first solo exhibition he has had since 2005.
James Franco is a jack of all trades: actor, director, student, and an artist. His first exhibition was at the now-defunct Glu Gallery in Los Angeles in 2006, where he showed several large-scale mixed-media pieces that resembled the work of J.M. Basquiat. In an incredibly meta-moment, Franco appeared on "General Hospital" as an artist named Franco in an episode that was shot at Los Angeles’s Museum of Contemporary Art. Most recently, the actor returned to the museum to headline a show, "Rebel," which closed on Saturday. It featured several drawings and mixed-media pieces taken from his work called "The Dangerous Book Four Boys" (in which he vandalized a book called "The Dangerous Book for Boys"), a giant wooden rocket ship, and large-scale collage paintings. As MOCA director Jeffrey Deitch put it, “It’s one of the most significant things going on right now—not just in art but also in progressive culture—this convergence, the dissolving of boundaries between what is art, what’s music, what is performance ... and it’s also the convergence between a more elevated fine-art culture and popular culture. Franco is one of these people who is leading this convergence.”
He may be Hollywood’s $25 million man, but Jim Carrey has another passion: street art. The actor reinvented himself as a graffiti artist last year, by spray-painting the door of his Brooklyn studio. In January Carrey opened a show called "Nothing to See Here" in Palm Springs, Calif., where he debuted more than 40 works, including one giant painting called "High Visibility" and a video projection set to a John Mayer soundtrack called "One Last Push." “At best, I think an artist’s work also stops the viewer from thinking, worrying, or dressing what they are looking at with their mood or interpretation, bringing them into presence as well,” Carrey said in a statement.
The real estate of the British royal family includes stately city homes and sweeping country manors—all of which have provided endless inspiration for Prince Charles. The prince has been an en plein air watercolorist for most of his adult life, staking out at his family’s homes at Windsor Castle, Balmoral, Highgrove, and Sandringham, and on vacations to Switzerland, Greece, and Scotland. In 1990 he began producing lithographs of his works, the sales of which go to the Prince of Wales Charitable Foundation.
Courtney Love may have a noisy Twitter page and an angsty songbook under her belt, but as of last month, she’s an artist as well. The singer-songwriter opened her first solo show at the Fred Torres Collaborations gallery in New York on May 3rd, which she titled "And She’s Not Even Pretty." The show featured several fraught (and slightly deranged) sketches on paper, with images of women and phrases like “I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here,” and “He Is the Love of My Life.”
His character in "The Thomas Crown Affair" may have an affinity for paintings—and the real-life Pierce Brosnan is no different. The actor began painting in the 1980s, when his first wife became ill (one of his most famous paintings, "Fiji," he painted for her on their vacation in 1995), and he still paints in his spare time. Brosnan reportedly sells the works—which are boldly colorful impressionist canvases—to raise money for a trust in his name, which distributes money to environmental and women’s charities.
With a résumé as jam-packed as Sylvester Stallone’s, it’s difficult to image there would be any room for a hobby. But the "Rocky" star has had a lively second career as a painter, and works out of his California garage. He has painted everything from self-portraits to nudes—all bright and wildly abstract. In 2010 the actor had a solo show at the Gmurzynska Gallery in Zurich, which featured 30 paintings from his 35-year career. But, he has said, “I’m not just painting for painting’s sake. I want to be truthful.” When his show opened, he wasn’t exactly overwhelmed with rave reviews. “[He] may not want to give up his day job just yet,” wrote the Daily Mail.
