Tony Dow, who starred as Wally Cleaver on Leave It to Beaver, will have some of his abstract sculptures displayed at the Louvre. (Take that, Mona Lisa!) He’s not the first celebrity artist we’ve heard of: Tony Bennett, Viggo Mortensen, Sylvester Stallone, James Franco, Billy Dee Williams, and Corey Haim come to mind. (Click on the links to see samples.) But who have you heard is actually good?
I ask this as someone who has a degree in art history… and who went rogue at her sister’s 2001 Vegas bachelorette party so she could check out an exhibit of Steve Martin’s personal art collection at the Bellagio.
Ron Wood is a great artist. He’s done some awesome portraits.
I’m not sure how much of a celeb he is, but former Replacements drummer Chris Mars is now a very successful painter:
http://chrismarspublishing.com/
Paul McCartney is actually pretty good. Some of his paintings remind me of a smeary Picasso ripoff, but some are quite good (I love “Yellow Linda with Piano” and “Unfinished Symphony”, both of which are on the link).
http://www.maccafan.net/Library/Paintings/Paintings.htm
I had heard Viggo was good, and looking at the samples from the above link, I agree that they are appealing and poetic (he is a poet too after all!).
I enjoy Tony Bennett’s paintings. They are as charming as his singing!
I worked at the first Clinton Global Initiative and Tony Bennett was the entertainment at the end of the first day. He auctioned off one of his paintings during his set. It was surreal. He said in his Tony Bennett voice, “My hotel room looks over Central Park and I could see an American flag in the distance so I painted this picture.” Who knew? The whole time he was onstage, I felt like I was watching someone on SNL doing an impersonation of him.
John Mellencamp trumps ‘em all:
http://www.mellencamp.com/index.php?module=paintings
Hey, let’s not forget Red Skelton’s paintings
http://www.artbrokerage.com/art/skelton/