Teenage Armchair Fandom (Subbuteo-style)

Continuing with the Half Man Half Biscuit-inflected 'Subbuteo' -themed series of still life paintings, this latest composition - essentially a study of a slight reduction in scale of the represented objects exploring the potential of a larger, more complex proposition - references the title and subject of the song 'I Was a Teenage Armchair Honved Fan' and thus features our miniature heroes sporting the colours of Honved on the left, in the red and black strip, and their Budapest neighbours and rivals - to whom I became attracted and attached as a pre-teen and have favoured since - Ferencváros in the green and white to the right. I've blogged on the subject of this very teenage armchair fandom as it relates to European clubs teams previously, at some length and in some detail, but this seems to be the first time I've made such an allusion in paint.

'Teenage Armchair Fandom (Subbuteo Budapest derby)'

oil on canvas/25cm x 35cm/June 2018

The pair of miniature figures are here represented as being placed in their cutout slots in the cardboard box of the type in which complete teams of players were/are presented for sale or otherwise in the boxed sets of the Subbuteo game, as will be obvious to anyone with even a passing acquaintance with such. It's noticeable that the plastic bases reflect more highlights in this state than being placed on a horizontal surface as previous examples have been, which helps give a bit more painterly 'zip' to proceedings.

An Alternative Christmas 'Want'?

Following-on from the previous post, the latest painting on and off the easel mines the same Half Man Half Biscuit-inspired subject-matter a little more deeply and quite possibly obscurely, this time depicting a vintage Subbuteo football (soccer) player figure sporting something of an Ujpest Dozsa 'away' kit.

'Subbuteo Footballer #6 (Ujpest Dozsa 'Away')

oil on canvas/35cm x 25cm/June 2018

Christmas 'Wants'

Continuing with the current series of small still life paintings, the latest pair (as they’ve become, related) again feature vintage ‘heavyweight’ Subbuteo football player figures (circa 1960s-70s), empirically observed as objects, but here sporting invented colours, the first inspired by the title and lyrics of the legendary and much-beloved in this parish  Half Man Half Biscuit‘s early song ‘All I Want For Christmas is a Dukla Prague Away Kit’, thus being an idiosyncratic representation of, based upon what research reveals to be pretty much established facts, with a nod to period generalities of Subbuteo style.

'Subbuteo Footballer #4 (Dukla Prague)

oil on canvas/40cm x 30cm/May 2018

The matter was by no means laid to rest upon the resolution of this painting (as I assumed it would be), however, as a particular research find served to rock the concept to its very foundation, with Nigel Blackwell‘s revelation here that it was his initial intention to lyrically reference not Dukla Prague but another East European football club – indeed, another Hungarian one to accompany the also-legendary Honved, of whom he wrote and sang of being ‘a teenage armchair fan’ (see here for a personal ‘adversarial’ response to this, which might help explain a lot, not least an obsession with the romantically-named football clubs of Hungary and Budapest in particular which began in the 1970s and continues to this day) – in the form of Ujpesti Dozsa, who’d opposed British teams in numerous European club competition ties during the late Sixties to mid-Seventies, but had unfortunately been unable to make such a lyric scan.

Accordingly, and in particularly multi-nerdy manner, what is (re)presented below is a ‘hand-painted’ interpretation/approximation of the traditional Ujpesti Dozsa colours of purple and white – the former of which is perhaps a little too blue in hue, especially when compared to the mauve of Subbuteo vintage as they represented teams such as Anderlecht and ‘Austria Vienna’.

'Subbuteo Footballer #5 (Ujpesti Dozsa)

oil on canvas/35cm x 25cm/June 2018

This imagining of the ‘home’ colours of Ujpesti yet creates another doubt, of course – did the song’s character instead desire the ‘away’ version, and is another painting in order to address this possibility? To be brutally honest, another painting is already in order to address the failure of this unsatisfactory offering, so perhaps watch this space for further developments.

In other, more important news, there is coincidentally a brand-new Half Man Half Biscuit album, in vinyl LP, CD and mp3 download format, to enjoy, which is most advisable under these and indeed any circumstances.