Lawrence Fox

Secret Museum Lawrence Fox

"The Secret Museum" by Lawrence Fox is a "museum of the mind," from the observations of Lawrence Fox. He has made paintings, photographed places and people and made collages that has been inspired by obsessions of the Orient, and other places around the world. Since he was small child, Larry studied and collected pictures from magazines like the Life, National Geographic and other illustrated magazines and books. He has always been possessed by the images that he saw of different peoples, cultures and colors that seemed so different from growing up in California, U. S. A. The folk costumes that the people in the pictures wore and and the conveyances they used, seemed so exotic. He realized that they never probably really existed like the pictures showed. They were as much a dream as America really is. Going through school, he drew and painted people and things that spoke to him. He collected pictures and cut them out of the magazines and made his own collection of faces, bodies, clothes and situations in notebooks. From these he would also draw and paint his own pictures. When Larry graduated from college with a Masters in Art, he found an opportunity to travel away from home and become part of the Peace Corps. He volunteered in Iran. In Tehran, he worked for the Community Welfare Centers teaching Art and English. His ultimate boss turned out to be Sattareh Farman-Farmaian, was one of the daughters of Persian nobleman Abdol Hossein Mirza Farmanfarma of the Qajar dynasty. Fath Ali Shah Qajar was her great-great-grandfather. Between 1974 and 1979, Larry spent four and a half years in Iran with the Peace Corps and later working for Bell Helicopter at Tehran and Isfahan. Iran was quite an eye opener. The Iranians were very class-conscious and tribal. For a modern nation, it didn't make sense to him at first. The longer he lived, there, the more he came to understand it's complexities and was able to translate it to the American culture he grew up in. This book is not just about the Orient but contains images of other interests and obsessions. Enjoy! Let the pictures speak for themselves!