Talking Heads: Little Creatures

Object Details

Design Director

Tibor Kalman, American, b. Hungary, 1949–1999

Design Team member

David Byrne

Stephen Doyle, American, b. 1956

Tom Kluepfel, b. 1955

Artist

Howard Finster

Photographer

Neil Selkirk

Firm

M&Co, New York, New York, USA, 1979–1992

Catalogue Status

Research in Progress

Description

Recto: The folk art drawing in a naive style comprises human, animal and alien or ghost-like figures; houses and tall "wedding cake" structures; trees and plants; and quotations from David Byrne's song lyrics, as well as from other unidentified narrative sources. Talking Heads is imprinted in red, centered, across the top, against a background of blue sky and small cloud-like puffs (the "heads") wearing varying facial expressions, interspersed with spaceships and other flying figures and objects. A row of four joined ghost-like creatures in black might also be seen as a mountain range; in its center, Talking Heads is printed, as if handwritten, in block capitals. In the lower half, centered, is a globe in blue, upheld by the outstretched arms of a crouching figure, a man wearing only a pair of white underpants, displaying David [Byrne] in small capitals, and a pair of black sneakers. Worlds Talking Heads, World on my shoulders and Who knows this world's weight are written on the globe. To the right of the David Byrne figure is a figure identified as Chris [Frantz], one of the musicians, and above the globe, behind three additional black ghost-like creatures, are two additional busts of musicians, one of a woman labelled Tina [Weymouth] and the other of a man labelled Jerry [Harrison]. Quotations, always in the same handwritten block lettered style, are interspersed throughout, and frequently include references to "worlds." In the lower right corner is a seven-line message from the artist, Howard Finster, identifying the design as his "4000.411th piece of art."

Verso: On a dark blue background, a photograph of the four featured musicians, wearing colorful, richly patterned clothing and standing stiffly with their arms at their sides, occupies almost the entire space. The man second from the right and the woman are wearing hats; the other two men are bareheaded. The only reference to the album title, Little Creatures, is imprinted in small capitals at the top on the left, followed by a vertcal listing of the song titles. Additional production information is imprinted in three columns situated in three columns in the lower half.

Credit Line

Gift of Tibor Kalman/ M & Co.

1985

Accession Number

1993-151-75

Restrictions & Rights

Usage conditions apply

Object Name

Record cover

Type

Record cover

Medium

Offset lithograph on paper

Dimensions

31.2 x 31.3 cm (12 1/4 x 12 5/8 in.)

Place

USA

See more items in

Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum Collection

Drawings, Prints, and Graphic Design Department

Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Record ID

chndm_1993-151-75

Metadata Usage (text)

Not determined

GUID (Link to Original Record)

http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/kq4c7b27873-201c-428a-927f-fce8c0d8b9ef