Le Espionner

Just received this image of JSH's first painting of 2011! It's called Le Espionner and we think it speaks quite well for itself.

Skeleton With Magazine

One of several variants, this postcard-sized one (circa 2004) appeared in NYC's Jigsaw Gallery in the year subsequent to the Clowns in Love show. A larger one down in green and brown was in the collection of Barbara Braathen and exhibited by her in her gallery.

Prostitute with Ice Cream Cone

This is one of three different versions of this painting - the first was rendered in muted colors in a somewhat comic-book-panel style. This is the second one, done in a faux-woodcut post-German Expressionist manner. A third one was similar to the second but with thinner, more scratchboard-like lines.

This one was used to illustrate the postcard for the Outhouse in Flames exhibition, the first batch of which were printed with the wrong date. Those misprints were later salvaged for use as paste-up graffiti posters in several cities.

The whereabouts of this one is unknown, having been sold through the Jigsaw Gallery in NYC to an unknown buyer, just before they closed down.

"Toulouse-inations" Poster #1

This is one of two different flyers for the world premiere of Jeffrey Scott Holland's Toulouse-inations at the Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts. The graphics were hand-painted by JSH himself under rather hasty circumstances, as JSH relates:

"The behind-the-scenes problems with the show just boggled the mind. Everything that could go wrong did. Actors had to be replaced. Dance scenes had to be cut. We had no clear-cut lighting plot until the eleventh hour. We had problems with the MeX over their newly waxed floor, which forced us to abandon our entire set. And my car exploded in a huge fireball in my face like Robert DeNiro in Casino as we approached crunch time. I was pulled in all directions and losing my mind, feeling like Geoffrey Tennant in any given episode of Slings and Arrows. And so I threw the flyers together in less than half an hour, rendering an image of the Eiffel Tower so hurriedly and slapdash that it was practically a blink drawing. I can't even remember what I looked off of to get the details of the Tower - must have been one of the fashion magazines we had laying around the costume shop."

Harlequin With Switchblade

Harlequin With Switchblade acrylic on wood construction, 2004.

Part of the same series of work as Portrait of Joey Grimaldi, this piece was exhibited in the Rock Art show at Cinderblock Gallery the following year, where it was acquired by former Kinghorse frontman and fellow painter, Sean Garrison.

The wood panels themselves are odd sandwiches of wood and metal with thick dried tar on the underside. These were reportedly found by JSH while dumpster-diving near a site in Berea where an old house had recently been demolished.

Vermilion Quotations

Among Holland's thousands of trance-channelled "Crispy Cards" (small chipboard sharpie drawings with paint, done as quickly as possible and without conscious or rational thought) are a subset which consists of merely quoting song lyrics.

Although these have never been collected together and arranged as such, they are a vestige of an art exhibition that never came to fruition. Tentatively titled Holland's Vermilion Quotations (apparently punning on the reference book Bartlett's Familiar Quotations), it would have consisted of hundreds of these Crispy Cards papering the walls in a checkerboard pattern. Said Holland of the project:

"Taken alone, a single one of these cards is frankly underwhelming. But when you fill an entire wall with them, then the net effect is... well, probably still underwhelming, but in an audacious way."

Holland has indicated that the show will happen sooner or later, when the time is right. "All in time."

Intergalactic Cupcake

Intergalactic Cupcake, acrylic on paper, 2006.

Painted during Holland's time at the Cinderblock Gallery on Louisville's Main Street, Intergalactic Cupcake has appeared in many places and has been shown in numerous exhibitions.

It has also featured prominently in the backgrounds of Holland's art-photography work, usually shot in his studio. It was displayed at the Jefferson County Confidential solo photo exhibition, alongside photos it appeared in. These photos also have been exhibited in group shows in Europe.

Reportedly, a metal lunchbox featuring the image was planned by a Los Angeles company in 2008 but the merchandising project never materialized.

January 1984

Photograph of JSH and camera-shy girlfriend, taken January 1984 by JLK. JSH is working on a Kodalith template for a silkscreen graphic.

Extraterrestrial in Orange

Extraterrestrial in Orange, acrylic on canvas, 2005.

Appeared in the Retrocognition show at Gish Art in September 2005, and was actually painted in the gallery just days prior. Painting was acquired by a patron at the opening, but records are inconclusive about its current whereabouts.

The only comment from JSH about the painting in the show's catalog: "Don't ask me what I think about UFOs and aliens, because I might tell you."

Take With Food Or Milk

Take With Food Or Milk was a miniature (less than an inch long!) coffee-table art book by Jeffrey Scott Holland, each with 36 pages of his original hand-drawn sketches, and no two copies alike.

The hand-drawn book project went through at least two editions, one in 2003 and one in 2004, both for the Creeps Press imprint. Though the miniature books are identical in every way in both editions, one might discern a second edition if it is still in its original cardboard bookmark-shaped packaging. It was sold in this manner at the merch table at Holland's Small Voices show of "microscopic paintings" at the Deatrick Gallery in 2004, and also at subsequent art-sale events like the Cinderblock Gallery's $20-or-less art shows, the St. James Art Fair and the St. James Un-Fair, and the Big Bone Art Show. Still more copies were sold on eBay, and on consignment at Carmichael's Bookstore in Louisville.


The objet d'art book had faux-leather vinyl covers with no text or graphics. Some copies of the book had a handwritten title page and frontispiece; others did not.

Despite being widely distributed and sold, no known copies of it have resurfaced in recent years. Neither we nor JSH have a copy of the book in archives.

From Four Till Late

From Four Till Late was painted in 2007 during an outdoor Dark Observatory live painting performance in Kentucky's Greenbo Lake State Resort Park, where JSH met with then-Governor Ernie Fletcher during the ribbon-cutting event for the park's new amphitheatre.

The piece was then brought over to JSH's adjacent art exhibition, Icons of the Wilderness, which was displayed in the lobby of the park's main lodge, and hung even though it was still not completely dry.

The title refers to the 1937 Robert Johnson song, which may or may not lead one to assume that this is the 78 rpm record the woman is listening to.

The Man Who Wears The Star

One of several sketchy black and white paintings done on bristol board for the Fuel to Build a Fire solo exhibition at the KISS Coffeehouse in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, 2007. It contains the visual pun of Paul Stanley as a wild west sheriff who wears a star-shaped badge, as well as the title's reference to the old Texaco slogan, "Trust Your Car to the Man Who Wears the Star".

None of the bristol works for the KISS show have been exhibited since. Some of the works are now owned by the band and the coffeehouse.

L'archéologie des épiceries

One of just six pieces painted by JSH in 2009, this large-scale piece is markedly more slashing and neo-expressionist, a la Basquiat or DeKooning, than much of the artist's prior oeuvre. JSH declined to comment at all on this piece until it is exhibited later this year. We had to run the title of it through Babelfish for a translation, and it apparently means "The Archaeology of Groceries."

Portrait of Joey Grimaldi

Today is Joseph Grimaldi Day, in which the world's clowns (and clown-curious) converge in the U.K. and gather at All Saints' Church in Hackney. There, they pay tribute to the world's greatest Clown, Joseph "Joey" Grimaldi (1778-1837).

Surprisingly, although this piece was created during the same 2004 found-wood-panel-construction session as the popular Honk Honk (used for the Clowns in Love flyer), Harlequin With Switchblade (currently in the Sean Garrison collection), and Bob Wills as a Clown, it has never been officially exhibited anywhere to our knowledge.

It was, however, displayed on JSH's studio wall for at least two years during his Story Avenue period, and was visible to visitors during gallery-hop open house parties and Deatrick Gallery events.

In celebration of Joey Grimaldi Day, Catclaw Theatre Company is currently offering this painting for sale on eBay: view it here.