During my "eat lunch with Art Stump" days in Santa Monica in the '60s I was into the old car thing as well as the bicycle thing. As a matter of fact, that is how I happened to meet Art whose workshop was in the same industrial bay area as the master auto painter I was dickering with to paint my 726 Packard. In any case, it turned out that both the bike guys and the car guys used the same pinstriper and this old geezer did pinstripe work that leaped off the paint surface and into your eyes. Incredible energy but still in subdued good taste. Yes, yes, I know. These are mutually incompatible but you had to have been there.
The first time (and every time thereafter) that I saw this guy at work I felt that I was on the verge of having my heart attack me. You see, the master pinstriper was an elderly, alcoholic, malodorous and cantankerous curmudgeon who could barely stagger to the job site. His hands shook so badly that he could barely hold the pint of Montauk muscatel "concealed" in a paper bag that he drank from constantly. Watching him work was a transcendental experience.
With trembling hands he would dip his brush in the paint. With even greater trembling, his hand would slowly approach the bike (or auto). Then, for a single micro second, the trembling would disappear and he'd draw an incredible perfect freehand stripe and lift the brush from the bike with a spastically trembling hand. This would call for a sip of muscatel and then the work continued as described. You had to see it to believe it and it was hard to believe regardless of what you saw.
They don't make them like that anymore.
Martin Needleman Annapolis, MD
Dennis Young wrote:
> Charles' comments with regard to the pinstriping effect as manifested by the
> stripers technique are thought provoking. Skilled spontaneity is a much
> appreciated quality in eastern art as well. Are there considerations given
> to frame ornamentation in terms of it's intended appeal when the bike is in
> motion, as seen by another rider in motion? The movement generates a kind
> of spontaneous effect in it's own right. I was following my friend on his
> Hetchins at the track the other day, and the gold pinstriping around the
> black painted seat stay bridge came alive in almost a hypnotic fashion.
> Contemplating it, the track surface going by was conversing with the
> pinstriping, while the black painted tubes provided the drone in the
> background. Many times I have looked closely at the pinstriping when the
> bike is stationary, but never did it have such appeal. Do some frame
> builders and painters think about this aspect when considering design? I'll
> save the wiseguys the trouble, and agree that all bikes look beautiful when
> you are passing them in a race!
>
> Dennis Young
> Spinning the wheels in Hotoka, Japan
>
>
>
>>At the risk of getting that creature down in SD annoyed at me, unless
>>things have changed, Brian outsources pinstriping. He has a
>>good striper he uses, apparently. To judge from what I've seen
>>of this striper's work, I'd have to agree with Ken.
>>
>>Pinstripes are an interesting problem in restorations. I've seen
>>a number of Mondia, Taylor, Allegro, and other restorations where
>>the pinstripes were flawless, but leaden. They just sat there on the
>>tubes, doing nothing.
>>
>>A proper pin-stripe job should be very lively, even skittish, if I can
>>use that word to refer to pin-stripes. Check out the pinstripes on
>>an early 70s Mondia Special or Allegro. Whoever was doing them
>>really WAS a genius for the job. The stripes appear to have been
>>applied very rapidly, but with great precision, and they look like they're
>>about to fly right off the tubes. A proper pinstripe job like this
>>gives a frame a wonderfully raffish effect.
>>
>>Risking a bit of egoboo here, the late 1950s Condor Pathracer I have
>>that won Best Original at the last Velo-Rendezvous (Thanks Sterling..!)
>>has pinstripes similar to an Allegro or Mondia, but even more elegant,
>>in my opinion, and with the same liveliness..
>>
>>The 60s Paramount pinstripes have that same liveliness (I'm still jonesin'
>>for a canary yellow 60s Paramount with chrome head-lugs and the
>>red pinstripes throughout. What a lovely frame that is. Anyone have one
>>to sell in a 56 or 57cm c-t in clean, original condition?????)
>>
>>It's an art, and, I imagine, something that can be learned, but not easily.
>>It'd
>>take a fair amount of practice to get it just right.
>>
>>So, if you're gonna have pinstripes done in a resto, make sure whoever
>>does it, understands this problem, and understands how to do it right.
>>
>>Charles "Mondia nut" Andrews
>>SoCal
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