The story behind Art-o-mat

The inspiration for Art-o-mat came to artist Clark Whittington while observing a friend who had a Pavlovian reaction to the crinkle of cellophane. When Whittington's friend heard someone opening a snack, he had the uncontrollable urge to have one too.

The year was 1997, the town was Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Whittington was set to have a solo art show at a local cafe, Penny Universitie (which eventually became Mary's Of Course Cafe). This is when Whittington used a recently-banned cigarette machine to create the first Art-o=mat. In June 1997, it was installed, along with 12 of his paintings. The machine sold Whittington's black & white photographs for $1.00 each.

This art show was scheduled to be dismantled in July 1997. However, Cynthia Giles (owner of the Penny Universitie) loved the machine and asked that it stay permanently and machine remains unaltered in its original location to this day. At that point, it was clear that involvement of other artists was needed if the project was going to continue. Giles introduced Whittington to a handful of other local artists and Artists in Cellophane was formed.

Artists in Cellophane (A.I.C.), the sponsoring organization of Art*o*mat® is based on the concept of taking art and "repackaging" it to make it part of our daily lives. The mission of A.I.C. is to encourage art consumption by combining the worlds of art and commerce in an innovative form. A.I.C believes that art should be progressive, yet personal and approachable. What better way to do this, than with a heavy cold steel machine?  The machines, once Clark is through with them, look like this.

Bob is one of 400 contract Artomat Artists.  What is Artomat and where are the promised monsters?

Yes, Bob has become MonsterBob  Bob has created a series of 100 monsters, mostly from movies.  Each monster is hand painted on a wood block the size of a cigarette pack. Bob then adds a biography of the Monster (sometimes known as a "Monster Statement") and a monster business card which gives Bob's contact information and the chance for the buyer to order Commission Monsters of his evil chosing.

There are about 100 machines scattered around the country and a few overseas (one in Austria: Achtung!)  Some of the venues are "humble" like a hotel or restaurant but some are not so humble like the Whitney museum in NYC, the Smithsonian in Washington DC or the Miami Museum of Art.  So what's the purchase "experience" like?  The price is $5-7.00.  You approach the machine, money or token in hand.  And you look down at "placards" which used to say things like "Camel Filters" but now announce in 2 inches square the artist and his/her theme.  The artist needs a theme because the buyer cannot see exactly what he's getting.  He just sees the placard.  Here's Bob's placard:

Bob's sold hundreds of these.  It makes a little money, it promotes art, it's fun, and knocking out these little paintings is great practice for portrait works (except the teeth are generally longer and the skin, greener).  "Artistic push-ups", Bob calls them.  Here's a sampling of the series.  Click to expand.