This body of art by Francesca Pasquali does not suck, though the materials sure do. Made of nothing but drinking straws, these canvasses become 3D forms that resemble coral, clouds, and even digital renderings.
There’s something magical about the nostalgia that lives in Anton Van Hertbruggen’s paintings. The color palette seems somehow vintage, while giving a lovely feeling of summers spent relaxing and exploring the woods. With giant wild creatures. Love them.
An artist named Klari Reis has an ongoing project creating one petri dish art piece per day for the whole year. An interesting canvas which lends a medical bent to the colorful gallery, with names like Beam Me Up Scotty and Raspberry Punch. Via their Facebook page: “the paintings are created using reflective epoxy polymer and are an attempt to “explore our complex relationship with today’s biotechnological industry.” Via LaughingSquid
Some very expressive and poignant drawings and paintings by Michigan artist Pat Perry. Via Colossal:
I wish I could see Yang Yongliang’s work in person, because it’s otherworldly and stunning. A vision of a future that is calming yet exhilarating. Click on this top image for a more detailed look.
Yongliang is known for his sprawling photographic collages that depict the devastating effects of uncontrolled urbanisation and industrialisation. At a distance the works look like traditional Chinese painting and calligraphy but when viewed up close, the peaceful mountains and seascapes are found to be choked with buildings, factories, and machinery.
Sleepless Wonderland, Lightbox, 2012
Sleepless Wonderland, Lightbox, 2012 (detail)
Sleepless Wonderland, Lightbox, 2012 (detail)
Sleepless Wonderland, Lightbox, 2012 (detail)
Snake and Grenade, Lightbox, 2012
Snake and Grenade, Lightbox, 2012 (detail)
Wolf and Landmines, Lightbox, 2012
Full Moon, Lightbox, 2012
Bowl of Tapei No. 03, 2012
Bowl of Tapei No. 04, 2012
Artists Andrew Neyer and Andy J. Miller have a cute and fun art installation at the Indianapolis Museum of Contemporary Art.
The giant markers are a fantastic touch, and lend a playful awkwardness to the interactivity.
U.S.A. (burnt/unburnt) is a 2011 installation by Paris-based artist Claire Fontaine constructed from thousands of green matches that were inserted into a wall at the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art as part art of “Evidence of Bricks” at the 2011 Time-Based Art Festival. Fontaine has made somewhat of a name for herself with her match installations and flaming geography, most recently completing a similar U.S.A. map at Queens Nails Gallery in San Francisco. Unlike the installation in Portland above, the Queens Nails artwork was actually set on fire, and while it may not have gone exactly as intended, the final post-flame artwork is impressive nonetheless. Photographs above for PICA by Dan Kvitka.
Sometimes art just brings a grin to your face. Simply fantastic.
When first viewing the artwork of Shintaro Ohata up close it appears the scenes are made from simple oil paints, but take a step back and you’re in for a surprise. Each piece is actually a hybrid of painted canvas and sculpture that blend almost flawlessly in color and texture to create a single image. The cinematic figures are sculpted from polystyrene while the backgrounds are made from traditional painting techniques. Via his artist statement:
Shintaro Ohata is an artist who depicts little things in everyday life like scenes of a movie and captures all sorts of light in his work with a unique touch: convenience stores at night, city roads on rainy day and fast-food shops at dawn etc. His paintings show us ordinary sceneries as dramas. He is also known for his characteristic style; placing sculptures in front of paintings, and shows them as one work, a combination of 2-D and 3-D world. He says that it all started from when he wondered “I could bring the atmosphere or dynamism of my paintings with a more different way if I place sculptures in front of paintings”. Many viewers tend to assume that there is a light source set into his work itself because of the strong expression of lights in his sculpture.
More of Ohata’s work can be seen here.
Astounding sculptures made entirely of pencils, by Jessica Drenk. Via Colossal:
South Carolina-based artist Jessica Drenk was born and raised in Montana where she developed an understanding and appreciation of the natural world that has since deeply influenced the course of her artistic career. Her installations and sculptures often imitate organic shapes, patterns, and textures even when using a medium that is often manufactured by human hands. Drenk’s most recent sculptures are a series called Implements, each of which begins with a mass of standard No. 2 pencils that have been tightly glued together. Using an electric sander she then molds the piece into a form that seems more likely to have originated in a dark cave or deep within the ocean than from a school desk. Of her work she says:
By transforming familiar objects into nature-inspired forms and patterns, I examine how we classify the world around us. Manufactured goods appear as natural objects, something functional becomes something decorative, a simple material is made complex, and the commonplace becomes unique. In changing books into fossilized remnants of our culture, or in arranging elegantly sliced PVC pipes to suggest ripple and wave patterns, I create a connection between the man-made and the natural.
Sand castle artist Calvin Seibert manages to construct nearly impossible shapes from one of the world’s most delicate mediums. While Colossal has seen its fair share of art made with sand I’ve never seen anything so perfectly angular and geometric. See much more of his work over on Flickr. (via fasels suppe)
‘fore!’ by allan teger as part of the bodyscapes® photographic series
Carrying on the awesome miniature work of “Big Appetites“, Designboom has a great look at the nude landscape photography of Allan Teger. Funny, poignant and full of form, his work brings the naked body into a dramatic light, albeit one of golfing greens, sledding hills and train trestles.
Self-taught American photographer Allan Teger has sent designboom new images from his body of work ‘Bodyscapes®’, with a series of black and white photographs depicting miniature scenes on the nude body mimicking various landscapes. The images are not double exposures and uses no digital manipulation, only small scale figures arranged on the naked form to illustrate predominantly outdoor activities, where a belly-button may act as a lake or a sculpted derrière as a mountain.
Teger was initially trained as a psychologist, with the Bodyscapes® concept evolving from his teaching as an academic counselor. Teger would lecture readings on tao te ching, the bhagavad-gita, books by ram Dass, carl rogers, huxley, watts and others. The notions of altered realities, subjective reality, and mystical consciousness became part of his artistic understanding.
Teger describes the development of his work:
‘I remember the moment that the idea for bodyscapes® came to me. I was thinking that the shape and structure of the universe repeated itself at every level and suddenly I had the image in my mind of a skier going down a breast. This was it – the universe repeating its shapes – a body looking like a mountain. It was also an example of two realities coexisting. The picture could be seen as a landscape and it could also be seen as a body. Although they were different, both perceptions were right at the same time. I knew instantly that I had an entire series of images waiting to be captured on film.’
The ongoing project started in 1976, with the set updated regularly to this day, most are shot with a medium format mamiya RB67 and either tri-X or t-max film.
‘sailboat couple’
‘sailing’
‘tubes’
‘shark’
‘two riders’
‘train’
‘diver’
‘lovers’
‘golfing the rough’
‘dolphins’
‘fishing’
‘bikes’
‘high wire’
Via Colossal: Mechanical Sculptures Built from Discarded Objects by Andrea Petrachi
Calculators, old cameras, pliers, knives, and even electric razors become creatures in Andrea Petrachi‘s sculptures.
Despite their sleek design, the characters are quite whimsical, often taking the persona of faces and heads removed from dolls and other children’s toys. Petrachi says his work is generally a symbol of our cultures out-of-control consumerism. See much more in his portfolio. (via daily art fixx)
Via Colossal:
Berlin-based artist Bjoern Ewers has some striking bubble photography. They are offered as large prints on Art Flakes.
Cailan Burns is an illustrator from Adelaide, Australia. His work is both trippy and charming. The piece above, entitled Mothface is so dripping with color and depth that I feel like licking the computer screen would result in a high.
Via Grove:
From the artists’ portfolio site:
My works are crafted through the use of a range of mediums including paper collage, acrylics, water colour, canvas, wood, ink, digital collage and composition using Flash, Photoshop and Illustrator.
I draw inspiration from a wide range influences such as Children’s Book Art, 60’s Psychedelic Poster Art, Russian and Czech Animation, Cultural Masks and Costumes, Folk Tales and Japanese Anime and (Yōkai) Ghost Stories.
The Land Art of Sylvain Meyer
Some nice”land art” by Sylvain Meyer, similar in nature (ha!) to Andy Goldsworthy’s work. More on Goldsworthy, the grandfather of land art, soon.
Wonderful land art installations by French artist Sylvain Meyer who modifies wooded areas and landscapes to create various impermanent patterns, sculptures, and textures. Everything seen here was constructed without the use of Photoshop, even the mossy spider. Whoa! See much more over on Flickr. I’ve also finally crated a land art tag for Colossal. (via ruines humaines)
Some really nice examples of light installation art.
Landscape Light Sculptures
Artist Barry Underwood photographs wonderfully mysterious light installations that he installs on-site in forests, mountainsides, or near lakes and rivers. Via his artist statement:
By reading the landscape and altering the vista through lights and photographic effects, I transform everyday scenes into unique images. Light and color alter the perception of space, while defamiliarizing common objects. Space collapses, while the lights that I install appear as intrusions and interventions. This combination renders the forms in the landscape abstract. Inspired by cinema, land art, and contemporary painting, the resulting photographs are both surreal and familiar. They suggest a larger narrative, and yet that narrative remains elusive and mystifying.
You can see much more in his portfolio. (via designboom)