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"A famously crazed presence in the hot rod movement of the 1950s, rediscovered in the 1980s when 50s nostalgia swept pop culture, Kenneth "Von Dutch" Howard spent more than a decade essentially missing-in-action from the scene he had helped to create and define. It was during that time--on four consecutive Sundays in 1970--that Richard Karl Koch visited Von Dutch in his Calabasas, California, home to photograph the father of modern pinstriping and soul of the hot rod movement for a cover story for the Los Angeles Times Sunday supplement, West magazine. "
So goes the cover notes. Von Dutch is and was far from the label sown and printed on merchandise across the world. His legacy to the auto industry via his artistic contribution is legendary and his personal antics even more so. By the time this book appeared in print Von Dutch had passed into that legend, but this work is something of a mini-documentary on his later persona and could easily have been discovered on TV rather than in a bookshop.
To say Von Dutch was an interesting character is an understatement. He emerges from the recollections of friends and customers as a character from a Steinbeck novel as much as the person they knew. His talent as an artist, designer and craftsman is beyond question, his reluctance to follow any normal organized form of training and method in his work (other than to develop a vast range of exemplary skills) is part of the legend.
Customers would seek him out because of his 'crazed' reputation, and while this book looks at an older more mature Von Dutch, the glint was obviously still in his eye. It is an entertaining reference on the man and should be read in conjunction with other publications on both Von Dutch and some of his contemporaries.
Review: Dan Burke, DRAGSTER Australia Magazine
Rating:  [5 of 5 Stars!] |
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