Jesus, matadors, panthers, bandits, Native Americans, movie stars, waifs, and, of course, Elvis are recognized icons of the oft-despised, uber-kitsch art form of black velvet painting. In Black Velvet Art author Eric A. Eliason and photographer Scott Squire present a comprehensive overview of this covertly loved and overtly reviled tradition. In cooperation with a network of artists, collectors, importers, and gallery owners in Tijuana, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Calgary, this book draws from the largest survey of velvet painting ever undertaken. The book traces velvet's historical development as a folk art shaped by both Indigenous traditions as well as Western consumer expectations in such markets as the South Pacific, Southeast Asia, and particularly the US-Mexico border and the black velvet capital of Tijuana. In black velvet, class and taste challenge art as a consumer phenomenon, democratic spirit faces down elitism, reproduction questions originality, and sexuality seduces and provokes religiosity. What is most significant about black velvet art to many Americans is its signaling of the nadir of bad taste. Black velvet is the “anti-art” in many ways. Eliason seeks to explore how and why black velvet serves this function and to examine ways it deserves a glowing redemption.

This book contains 275 reproductions of black velvet paintings. It traces the roots of the art form from ancient China and Japan through to Victorian England, the Pacific, Southeast Asia and the Americas.

There would be times when Riah Millican came to regret that her husband had learned to read and write, and then shared his knowledge with her and their children. For this was Durham in the 1830's, when employers tended to regard the spread of education with suspicion. But now Seth Millican was dead and she was a widow with the need to find a home and a living for herself and her children. The chance of becoming a housekeeper didn't work out, but it led to Moor House and a scholarly recluse obsessed with that very book learning that could open so many doors and yet create so many problems; especially with her daughter, Biddy, who was not only bright, but witful... THE BLACK VELVET GOWN is the story of a mother and daughter, often at odds with each other, facing the need to challenge and fight the prejudice of an age--a narrative of great power and diversity that is one of Catherine Cookson's major achievements. "From the Paperback edition.

The King himself puts in a cameo appearance at a rural Quebec Gas-Bar de la Nuit where the glowing ends of several dozen cigarettes counterpoint an urgent bass line to the syncopated doo-wap of several tens of thousands of fireflies.

This collection of stories are multiform and imaginative, solidly written and seductive. Their plots deal primarily with men who yearn: to go someplace else, to do something else, to be someone else...13 tender stories, running the gamut from fantasy to reality, and doing so quite gloriously.

Philip was unhappy until he put on his Uncle's black velvet jacket and then something amazing happened. How can a dusty, rolled up, thirty-year-old jacket make a boy's birthday wish come true? "The Black Velvet Jacket" is a true story of a young man's coming of age. It inspires all those who believe that wishes really do come true.

When the current owner of a black velvet coat--a San Francisco artist in search of inspiration--and the original owner, a 1960s heiress who fled her affluent life fifty years earlier, cross paths, their lives are forever changed . . . for the better.