0 WOODEN SCULPTORS BY TOM ECKERT

Tom Eckert creates everything out of wood and we mean EVERYTHING.  His sculptures are formed entirely of wood and then painted.  He uses traditional processes to carve, construct, laminate and paint his pieces.  The woods he prefers working with are basswood, linden and limewood (all very similar) chosen because they carve and paint well and are very stable.

Transcendence

Coming from a painting and drawing background, he applys some of these techniques to his sculptures.   His choice of paint is mostly waterborne lacquer applied using both spray guns and brushes.

Forms carved to suggest cloth recur in many of his pieces.  As he explains on his site: By tradition, cloth has been widely used to conceal and shroud objects in practices ranging from advertising to church rituals.  Covered forms are often more evocative - with a sense of mystery absent from the uncovered object by itself.  As he recalls: "I remember in church one Lent, as a child, being mystified while gazing at the statues shrouded with purple cloth."

He further goes on to say: “Cloth” carved of wood has much different structural qualities than real cloth. When this idea is applied to my compositions (floating book, floating cards, floating rock) a sense of the impossible happens - for me, magic.

0 THE HYPERREALIST SCULPTORS OF RON MUECK

Just when you think they couldn't get better, meet life-like sculpturist Ron Mueck.

Ronald "Ron" Mueck is an Australian hyperrealist sculptor working in the United Kingdom.

Ron was born in Australia to German parents. He began his career working on the Australian children's television program Shirl's Neighbourhood. He was the creative director and made, voiced and operated the puppets Greenfinger the Garden Gnome, Ol' Possum, Stanley the snake and Claude the Crow amongst many others. The show was made for Channel 7 Melbourne between 1979 and 1984, broadcast nationally and starred the ex-lead singer of Skyhooks, Graeme "Shirley" Strachan.

Mueck's early career was as a model maker and puppeteer for children's television and films, notably the film Labyrinth for which he also contributed the voice of Ludo, and the Jim Henson series The Storyteller.
Mueck moved on to establish his own company in London, making photo-realistic props and animatronics for the advertising industry. Although highly detailed, these props were usually designed to be photographed from one specific angle hiding the mess of construction seen from the other side. Mueck increasingly wanted to produce realistic sculptures which looked perfect from all angles.

In 1996 Mueck transitioned to fine art, collaborating with his mother-in-law, Paula Rego, to produce small figures as part of a tableau she was showing at the Hayward Gallery. Rego introduced him to Charles Saatchi who was immediately impressed and started to collect and commission work. This led to the piece which made Mueck's name, Dead Dad, being included in the Sensation show at the Royal Academy the following year. Dead Dad is a silicone and mixed media sculpture of the corpse of Mueck's father reduced to about two thirds of its natural scale. It is the only work of Mueck's that uses his own hair for the finished product.

Photo: Raoul Wegat/Getty Images

0 BENT OBJECTS By Terry Border

Terry Border, a guy with an amusing sense of humour who worked as a commercial photographer for many years,  started a blog in 2006 posting just a few pictures of some objects he had created using everyday household items and... wire.  The rest as they say, is history.

0 FOOD ART By HONG YI

Hong Yi, is the artist who gives a whole new meaning to the phrase 'playing with your food'!  A Malaysian born artist-architect, she goes by the nickname 'Red', because her surname, Hong, sounds like the word 'red' in Mandarin.

Hong Yi doesn't ask for much when creating these works of art: the image had to be comprised entirely of food and the only backdrop could be a white plate.

Her painting of Yao Ming with a basketball and Jay Chou using coffee were Youtube hits, and she was featured in media around the world including Huffington Post, Wall Street Journal, ABC and the Daily Mail. Her other work includes portraits Ai Weiwei using 100,000 sunflower seeds and Zhang Yimou with 750 pairs of socks and bamboo sticks.

2 AMAZING ANIMAL CHAIR COLLECTIONS BY MAXIMO RIERA

Máximo Riera's animal chair collections are a testament to what the creative mind can accomplish!  These are not your average furniture pieces and any addition of these collection to one's home will speak volumes of the owner's themselves! Máximo's inspiration comes from his travel and experiences through Europe and the Caribbean Islands.  His attention to detail is amazing!

Born in Asturias, Northern Spain, Máximo has now retired to his studio in Cadiz, where he paints and sculpts each day.



His Animal Chair collection constitutes a diverse range of species, from mammals to reptiles, and even including insects. Each creation retains the animal's natural vitality whilst being totally biological accurate in their appearance. This collection is homage to these animals and the whole animal kingdom which inhabits our planet, as an attempt to reflect and capture the beauty of nature in each living thing.





Octopus...

0 PERSPECTIVE PAINTINGS BY FELICE VARINI

Felice Varini, a Swiss artist, is an artist who is known for his geometric perspective paintings, (often called anomorphic illusions), in rooms and other architectural spaces.  We found his works very fascinating as it gives the illusion of one type of perspective - the complete painting from the vantage point, (usually a simple geometric shape such as circle, square, line), and a whole other perspective from outside the vantage point, the viewer will see ‘broken’ fragmented shapes, and all this using the vast urban space around him such as buildings, walls and streets - as his canvas!

For example:

What is actually a circle or made to look like a circle from this vantage point....

Is actually perceived differently when looking at it from different angles or outside the vantage point...

Varini argues that the work exists as a whole - with its complete shape as well as the fragments. “My concern,” he says “is what happens outside the vantage point of view.

0 CHALK ART BY DAVID ZINN

Remember how fun it used to be as kids, when we could draw on the sidewalks with our coloured chalks? Well, David isn't a kid anymore but he still gets to draw on sidewalks with his coloured chalks!  It's always exciting when we come across great works using such simple tools to create unique works of art.  Meet David Zinn, the chalk artist and his creatures - including his best-known, Sluggo...

'Lizard in Progress' by David Zinn

0 BALLOON DRESSES BY RIE HOSAKAI AND TAKASHI KAWADA

Daisy Balloon is Japanese balloon artist Rie Hosokai (born 1976) and art director/graphic designer Takashi Kawada (born 1976). Making the world their stage, this balloon unit travels the globe to exhibit their art.  Using the world as their stage, the duo travel the globe to show-off their art.


The elaborate dresses are made from the inflated material to create striking haute couture with an unlikely fabric. The latest fashion piece was constructed as part of 'piece for peace' - a charity art exhibition at parco gallery in tokyo until the 9th of january, 2013 - in conjunction with a lego dress hosokai made of a similar style. The work was produced through a custom type 'knitting' of white balloons to gradually build a fragile,
but wearable frock, immaculately captured through the art direction of hosokai's partner takashi kawada.

art work and art direction by daisy balloon

image © hiroshi manaka

0 COOL FIND(S) COLLECTION #1

Horse Made From Computer Keys

Via



A Great Design For Shoes-Packaging
Design of packaging for shoes that allows them to be carried without a plastic bag, while making the brand stand out - by Shyamali Verma

Opened Up