The 50th anniversary of Joseph Coco’s “Full Moon Series” is being celebrated with a 260-page, full-color, coffee-table art book.
Frenchtown Bookshop in Frenchtown, N.J., will host a book signing and lecture from 6 to 8 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 5.
“I Paint the Moon” features 126 images, each with a detail, designed by Darlene Mea of Zenfull Living.com and published by Flying Game Press. The book can be purchased through Print-On Demands - LuLu.com.
“A first of its kind, unequaled in the history of world art, no other artist has sustained such a groundbreaking, imaginative endeavor, dedicating 50 years to this subject,” according to art historian Alexandra Olnuf.
Every December Coco paints the full moon as it rises, “an image as a synopsis of the year.” Since 2000, the artist has included January full moon images that “anticipate what the year will look like.” Coco’s themes reflect interests in astronomy, current events, ritual, and synesthesia, (the correlations within color and sound and their effects on body/mind/spirit).
Coco’s fascination for archetypal subjects has led him to create images from the places he has lived: Passaic, N.J.; Flagstaff, Az.; San Francisco, Boston, Manhattan, Lisbon, Rome, Messina-Sicily, and more. Started in Flagstaff, in 1972, the series continues through the present.
Music accompanies the series, composed and recorded by Coco, available through Spotify, ITunes, Amazon, and other outlets. The double-album is titled “I Paint The Moon: with Silver Lamp,” featuring 13 instrumentals; and “I Paint the Moon,” 19 lyric tunes with moon themes culled from many of Coco’s 58 albums.
An American songwriter, singer and guitarist, as well as an artist, Coco has performed around the world. He is an adjunct professor teaching art appreciation, studio and history of rock and rap courses at Centenary University, Delaware Valley University since 2004, and Montclair State University since 1999.
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