His music is lodged forever in the collective memory. In a way, it’s easy to believe that Elvis now is bigger than he ever was when he was alive. Medical examiners found that he had traces of 14 drugs in his system at the time of his death, 10 of which were present in significant quantities, including codeine, morphine, diazepam, pentobarbital and ethinamate - drugs most commonly prescribed for anxiety and insomnia. “The pure products of America go crazy,” wrote the poet and writer William Carlos Williams, and none went crazier than Elvis, his heart giving out on 16th August 1977 as he sat on his lavatory in his Graceland mansion, bloated and broken and bemused by the ingestion of some 10,000 pills in the last year of his life. Twenty years later, he would be dead.Įlvis was America writ large, in all its greatness and tawdriness, its promise and its disappointments, its fractured history and its promise of redemption. He was 22 years old, already the hottest property in American music, soon to be the most famous singer in the world. In the space of three years, he had recorded eight number-one records, among them “Heartbreak Hotel”, “Hound Dog”, “Love Me Tender” and “All Shook Up”. Elvis first wore the suit at a performance at Chicago’s International Amphitheatre in March 1957. The “$10,000” price tag, like most things to do with the Colonel, was an exaggeration, showmanship the actual bill of sale was for $2,500. The suit was made by Nudie’s Rodeo Tailors of Hollywood at the behest of Elvis’s manager Colonel Tom Parker, who wanted a golden suit for his Golden Boy - “boy”, in the proprietorial sense being how the Colonel would often refer to his charge, gold being the currency that Elvis was minting, not least for the Colonel, at the height of his fame.
There in his $10,000 gold lamé suit, the chiselled face, the saturnine eyes, the greased-back pompadour hair, a cowlick falling over his forehead, the curl of the lip, arrogant and amused.
Breathtakingly - almost indecently - handsome. Lladro figurines and sculptures have collectors around the world and they can also be seen in the Hermitage Museum of Saint Petersburg, the Valencia Pavilion in the Universal Show of Seville, as well as in the Museum of Modern Art of Santo Domingo.In 1957, he looked truly like a god.
In the 1990's Lladro was awarded the Príncipe Felipe awards for Internationalization, Competitiveness and Renown Brand Management. Lladro's production innovations not only in the design and style of the figurines but also in the firing techniques have earned them many acknowledgements and awards. In 1969 their facility in the City of Porcelain (Valencia) was completed and today is still home to the creative process and production of some of the highest artistic and technical quality porcelain in the world. In 1953 Juan, José and Vicente Lladró made their first porcelain creations in a Moorish furnace built in their own home in Almàssera (Valencia). Fired for approximately 24 hours in a kiln at over 1300º C.Extensive molding process requiring between 15 and 20 molds.This unique piece is finished in Lladro's signature high-gloss "crystalline" finish. The hand-painted details in this sweet kitten sculpture showcase the artist's love of the feline form. Designed by artist and sculptor Juan Huerta, this Cat Porcelain Figurine "Dreamy Kitten" is a handmade work of art crafted from fine Spanish porcelain.