Josh “Shag” Agle is one of my favourite lowbrow artists. Hailing from America, Shag is best known for his flat perspective, vivid colour paintings depicting lounge and tiki-themed scenes.

His paintings are visually influenced by avant-garde animation of the early fifties and sixties and usually have a subtle sense of humour to them leaving the viewer asking the question, “What’s actually going on in this scene?”

To me his paintings have a cool nostalgic feel, depicting the jet-setting high life of the 1950’s. Another great subtle feature in some of his paintings is his reference to classic mid-century modern houses. A number of his paintings have featured the work of Australian and American mid-century architects such as Robin Boyd, Harry Seidler, John Lautner and Pierre Koenig.

For more info visit www.shag.com

Above: Robin Boyd House II – Robin Boyd

Above: Robin Boyd House II – Robin Boyd

Above: Rose Seidler House – Harry Seidler

Above: Rose Seidler House – Harry Seidler

Above: Malin Residence “Chemosphere” – John Lautner

(I’ll put money on it that the photographer in this painting is a nod to the modernist architectural photographer Julius Shulman who famously photographed the Stahl House)Above: Stahl House (Case Study House #22) – Pierre Koenig (Photo – Julius Shulman)

Related Post:

• Stahl House (Case Study House #22) (1960) – Pierre Koenig