Tired of the common anonymous covers of the latest generation of mobile phones? Now an entire community of artists and a new company are available to help you personalize your cellular phone. .
Uncommon lets you print a one of your own creations – or choose from the works of talented artists and graphic designers – directly onto the object you hold dearest in your bag. A cost-effective, valid and long-lasting concept.
Josef Schulz combines photography, design and architecture and has probably had “Less is more” tattooed on his body somewhere. He’s a master in the technique of removing written messages and graphic signs from advertising hoardings, office block facades and city store names and ads. What’s left is just a silhouette, a blank, an outline and a colour to be added to the overall look of the landscape. And the most interesting aspect of all this is the fact our attention is caught – even if the actual information is missing.
The latest Google street view craze is to view the ski slopes of Whistler Mountain directly on your own pc. To mark the Vancouver Winter Olympic Games, the TV cameras of Google street have been set up in the mountains to observe and cover the slopes where events are taking place. A great way of enjoying the spectacular landscape without really having a clue how to ski!
This guy – an artist and lecturer in the field – is one of the few personalities on the scene of interactive digital art to exploit the concept of interactivity between art and its spectator. Daniel Rozin makes works that behave as though they were mirrors. And so the key player in all this is the spectator himself – he becomes an active and interactive part of the work in question. These creations look simple but are actually quite complex in terms of digital technology and software.
A blend of architecture, engineering, biology and experimental 3D. Matsys is an architectural studio whose work is founded on the belief that architecture can be seen as body-related material – in other words capable of reacting to the forms and spaces in which it is contained. And the result? Matsys’s creations resemble vibrating molecular organisms that morph into constantly changing visual effects – highly suggestive.
A rug that combines elements of sculpture with interior design. The idea springs from the creative mind of the young designer Elisa Stroyzk of rooms in Berlin. Small geometrical weaves in wood cut by laser composed within a soft structure that can be shaped into infinite forms with a range of uses and functions – rugs, works of art and covers
Japan’s capital is becoming more and more digital – unlike the usual advertising hoardings and billboards, the façade of this Tokyo building displays a QR code to allow mobile phone users to access sets of information on stores, make bookings, download materials, tweets and animations that come to life on the screens of their phones. All in all a way of knowing what’s going on in the block down the road without having to visit it directly.
A new life for paper not just used for scribbles or printing documents but as creative material for ideas themselves. One interesting example – completely original make-up by the designer Hector Sos.
Travellers throughout the world – listen up! From today the top ten best-selling Wallpaper City Guides are also available on iPhone.
You can decide whether to check out Amsterdam’s secret venues, visit Barcelona’s coolest nightspots, view the best London theatres or most famous sights of Berlin or the hottest addresses of Los Angeles and New York. And why not discover Paris, Milan, Rome and Tokyo. And the cost? $3.99 with Berlin thrown in free.
This latest iPhone application is just great for the demanding globe-trotter who’s well educated and prefers to travel light!
How can you transform a table, a fridge or even the floor into a PC? You just need Light Touch – an interactive projector that instantly converts any surface into a touch-screen. Its holographic HLP lasers create high quality video images that let you use the projected image as a touch screen. Chic technology!
Polish photographer Szymon Roginski teamed up with fellow photographer Kasia Korzeniecka to create this unusual collection of photo sculptures for fashion designer Ania Kuczynska’s 2009 spring/summer line. Each piece showcases the designer’s clothing by setting a model in a natural landscape. These photos were then re-imagined as three-dimensional sculptures. The photos were printed and then transformed into a variety of shapes and assembled back together to display the image. The photo sculptures were then re-photographed for the final pieces.
The Canadian artist Sean Martindale has chosen an unremarkable public place for his latest installation. The aim is to represent the concept of confines and borders – the boundaries of property, but also as kind of cage or closed–off area. It took him 24 hours to weave this “freedom sculpture” using nylon thread.
Another interesting example of low-cost art from the Italian artists Viviana Checchia and Anna Santomauro: an hour of free art made up of installations, exhibitions and workshops set up directly at home, in the office or in a public place. A great way of bringing the general public and contemporary art together. Check out their site where you can select the artist nearest to you and order him or her by email!
Low-cost contemporary art at home. This is the latest challenge launched by the Spanish group La Casa de los Fideos which has come up with TONG, a publication with a surprise-envelope format that contains a mix of variavble contents. These range from engravings, photographs, videos and other arty items. It all costs just twenty euros and is currently distributed by a circuit of galleries in Barcelona, London and Rome. All in all a good way of starting out as an art collector.
Trendsetters of all the world listen up – you won’t root out the latest trends and seasonal must-have items in New York, London or Paris. Much better to look around in Brazzaville in Congo. Just leaf through the book entitled Gentlemen of Bacongo to discover all the charm of the Le Sape culture. It combines French taste with pink-coloured dresses and accessories from the latest fashion collections.
Just two square metres. Yet inside there’s room for 24 artists. We’re not inside Gulliver’s Lilliput but in Berlin at the world’s smallest art gallery: Smallery. Designed to resemble a small mountain hut with wooden walls and a moveable roof, Smallery was created by the advertising agency Pulk to promote upcoming artists. Thorsten Herker the agency’s creative director explains: “Berlin is full of enormous galleries and so to attract attention we set out to do something quite different.”
There’s even a poetic side to rainclouds if you look hard enough – and it’s creative and really quite surprising. In the skies of Paris – or rather on the façades of buildings you can now admire clouds dripping wet with rain and enlivened with fluorescent colours. So who’s behind it all? The creative group Superbien. Where? Not far from Rue du Fabourg Poissonière. Make sure you take an umbrella just to be on the safe side!
To celebrate the 150th anniversary of the birth of the Eixample district, Barcelona has decided to look into its future by asking citizens and tourists how they imagine the Catalan capital will be in a century and a half’s time.
You have until 10 June 2010 to entrust your wishes and predictions to a special webcam which will be roving around the entire city. The results will then be gathered and inserted into a sort of time capsule not to be opened until 2159! If you’re dying of curiosity, have a look at the forum where you can confront imaginary ideas and expectancies.
Meticulous, visionary, complex, enlightening. Ryan Schude is a brilliant Los Angeles-based photographer. He loves constructing bizarre stories halfway between life’s ironic and grotesque perspectives.
Feeling hesitant because you’re going to Helsinki for Christmas but don’t know even one word of Finnish? You can relax because from today talks to the Airline company Emirates is making available a very useful i-phone application. Once you’ve reached your foreign destination all you have to do is to select the language, male or female voice and one of the 400 language-chunks available for translation. Just stick your cell-phone in front of your mouth and watch the sales assistant’s face as it talks! Have a look to the video.
This is an easy task to try out on Photoshop. It comes from an interesting idea from the Australian photographer Khristian Mendoza. He photographs, retouches and publishes snaps on his blog with parts of the subject’s face and body removed not unlike a conjuror with his magic box.
Obsessions from the web: on-line 7/24 and constantly connected to friends to tell the world what you’ve done, said, eaten, what look you chose today to go to work or out with friends. There really are people who have the irresistible urge to communicate to everyone everything they have bought – and above all how much they’ve spent. A kilo of pears, in a bookshop, a pair of gloves or the latest dress or jacket.
It’s no surprise Kate Bingaman-Burt’s blog is called Obsessive Consumption: an unending, illustrated shopping list. No doubt an original and useful idea because often half-way through the month coffers are empty! …So what’s the next purchase to be highlighted that’s outside her budget?!
It’s an inevitable development considering the times: street artists and wall writers fed up with spray cans and the like are now on the look-out for something more cutting- edge.
The answer – in perfect 2.0 style is called SweatShoppe and it’s the latest creation of the duo made up of the two artists Bruno Levy and Blake Shaw. They have developed “video graffiti” obtained with green LEDs.
So what is it? All you need is a video paint roller that doesn’t leave marks on the wall, a camcorder connected to a projector that follows the roller as it moves and the video that in real time projects every time the artists “paints” on the wall.
We can’t wait to see it go live! Check out the video!
Parallel Universes by Kristina Kostadinova, a collection of snapshots of each individual, windows into each person’s
universe. A truly inspiring concept that explores individual personality and the relationships between them.
Female photographer Chenman is known for her photographs that were placed on the cover of Vision magazine. Her diverse photograph style compliments a high end fashion aesthetic that is fused by seamless 3-D renderings. All of her work including the 3-D renderings she produces is done by Chenman. Born and raised in China, Chenman has been able to make her mark in the western world by having her works published by New York Magazine, Nylon and Sport & Street. Check out the rest of the images after the post.
Quoteskin is the brainchild of Lee Crutchley, a graphic designer who, armed with nothing but a Moleskin and some Asda pens, doodles euphemisms, quotes, song lyrics, and whatever else he wants in his journal.
Then he scans the images and posts them on his Tumblr blog.
Pretty cool idea.
Hair’em Scare’em presents an extraordinary exploration through the fascinating beauty and inventive possibilities of hair as a medium for artistic expression in contemporary art and design. The book documents this palpable trend into a visual sourcebook that presents a captivating collection of hairy works in graphic design, photography, illustration and art as well as interior design, fashion and jewelry design. The extraordinary works featured in this book are the best indication of trends in hair outside the mainstream.
One Year Walk/Beard Grow Time Lapse by Christoph Rehage
November 9th 2007 – November 13th 2008
one year on foot – 4646km through China
unlimited beard & hair growth
The fantastic spectacles of color – the latest trend in street art – are as impressive as fireworks. A host of light sources, from flash lights, bike lights to blinking LED lights, are used to ‘paint’ a picture straight onto the camera lens.
Our friends at Concept Feedback have launched an awesome online (free) review tool that gives designers, marketers and developers a place to exchange feedback and ideas on design projects (websites, logos, etc.).
The website has a very clean design and it works as easy as 1-2-3;
1. Submit a concept.
2. Receive free feedback.
3. Get better results.
Visit the website at www.conceptfeedback.com
A bunch of videos that show the world from the perspective of several animals, including an armadillo, a wolf, a scorpion, a sheep, a bison and a house fly
Designer Roland Tiangco presents not only a fully-interactive poster, but a siren call: This is the first day of the rest of your life! It is you, future person, who has the future in your futuristic, super dirty hands!
Big news for all the blog addicted: Tangs 10×24 Blogathon in Singapore ~ Probably the world’s first Wordpress blog that integrates with Flash. And yes, this is a blog.
The Portable Interactive Display doesn’t have a catchy name but the student concept does provide a solution to architects and others involved in building design. The concept provides a way for
professionals to take all their (digital) building plans and discuss them anywhere.
New York – it’s a scorching summer, hot and torrid and there’s not a trace of cool air to be found. There you are, lost and trapped somewhere down in the subway system trying to find the L Line – the one that goes to Willyamsburg where you can cool out and have a drink with friends. So what’s the answer? Well thank God you can now download a new iPhone application to show you the nearest subway stations and the right direction to take including the right connecting passages, stairs and elevators.
Central St Martin’s Jewellery Design graduate, Maiko Takeda, having worked for Stephen Jones Millinery, Scott Stephens and Erickson Beamon since 2006, shows her new collection using pierced metal, made to be worn so the shadows do the talking.
Beck’s asked 10 Illustrators including McBess, Hellovon, Kid Acne, Si Scott, and Laura Jackaman to re-think the best albums of the last 40 years (gleaned from Pitchfork lists). Now the project is open to the public to contribute and complete the collection of 100. Head over here to get involved.
Check out this amazing and astonishing body of photographs by Lina Scheynius, it blows my mind to see how down to earth they are and the realness that is captured in every single picture.
For years now we’ve been watching the development of the High Line, an inspiring landscape design/urban design/regeneration project along Manhattan’s West Side that has only recently opened to the public.
Instead of merely reducing an historic piece of city infrastructure into rubble, landscape architects James Corner Field Operations and architects Diller Scofidio + Renfro have transformed an abandoned elevated train line into a place of robust urban beauty.
If you happen to be cruising along Meat Packing-District, take a break from retail therapy/partying/people watching and have a little look around. You’ll love it, we promise!
A clever little book created and edited by industrial designers, The Melbourne Design Guide one-ups most guidebooks. The 450-page flip book teems with current design intelligence from Melbourne’s creative community, making the publication as attractive to design professionals as it is to savvy locals or travelers wanting a different take on the scene.
Everyone agrees that green is the new black and that the market has room for a range of differing and often hard-hitting and even “extravagant” new ideas.
That’s certainly the case with botanicalls Twitter DIY project that allows plants to communicate through Twitter and Arduino software (an open-source platform to which you can attach a series of sensors). It’s the plants themselves that will remind you when they need water by providing you information on the humidity of the earth and their state of health – and then at the end they thank you!
This twenty-six year old French photographer has an innate sense of the aesthetic. His eye-catching pictures have led him to travel far and wide immortalizing subjects in France, California and Australia. His website is a mix of scene fashion, instant shots and poetic angles imbued with a melancholy vein of rock & roll. Lechat’s diary is particularly poignant even though it comes over as a little too reminiscent of Slimane’s!
In tune with the theme: green is the new black, Japanese studio microworks has come up with a new look for the classic black battery-charger – which is now available in striking chlorophyll green!
This French art group is besotted with the 1980s and pop colours and has chosen paper as its favourite mode of expression. They have built an eccentric and brightly coloured world of fashion consisting of etching, tricks, origami and collages. And all strictly made from paper. From the “do it yourself” series.
A name taken from the Schnitzler novel (which inspired Kubrick film Eyes Wide Shut) and one that promises a different viewpoint in the glossy and ultra-branded world of commercial fashion. Traumnovelle looks like a fanzine. It stands out from the crowd for its cinematographic approach to its fashion features and the absolute purism and veto it applies to any retouching of images.
This to such an extent that if you fill in the removable coupon on the inside back page (as people once did!) they’ll send you an original unpublished photograph taken on the set.
So what can we find that’s authentic and untouched in the thousands of photographs published on sites, in magazines and fanzines throughout the world? Since the advent of photoshop not much. This is the issue highlighted by the English graphic artist Henry Hadlow who thanks to photoshop changes colour, goes out of focus and finally cancels himself from the screen!
Serigraphy is now seen as rather an old-fashioned technique once made famous by Andy Warhol, the king of pop-art. It’s now been dusted down by a new American brand with a strange name: Young Monsters. The people behind Young Monsters hail from far-off Tennessee – four creatives with the yen to put themselves to the test have come up with T-shirts, posters and clotheswear items bearing quirkily interesting graphics and indeed it’s all been done using serigraphy or screen printing.
Again an amusing new application worth downloading for your iPhone. Choose patterns made by the artist Joshua Davis and then draw, colour and mix your creation to kaleidoscopic effect! You then save your final result and share it with your friends. As you would do anyway.
Dragonette: keep an eye for this Canadian electro-pop band – currently one of our favourites.
The “Fixin To Thrill”, video directed by Wendy Morgan, is the first single taken from their latest album. We ♥ CANADA!
Little Red Riding-Hood is now fat and overweight after too many cheeseburgers and French fries. Instead poor Snow White, like all housewives is feeling a little desperate while Sleeping Beauty still hasn’t woken up so the seven dwarfs have had to take her to an old people’s home. These are all examples of Fallen Princesses by photographer Dina Goldstein and they’re all rather more jaded and less romantic than their colleagues – the ones that lived happily ever after!
The proof of the pudding is . . . in waiting the right amount of time; and this time you need exactly a year till the project’s complete! What are we talking about here? Well the Spanish designer Oscar Diaz has made a calendar based on the capacity of paper to absorb ink in such a way it lets you view days and the passing of time. The kit contains twelve tubes of ink in different colours.
Cute idea from Toyota. To get internet surfers talking about its latest small car – the IQ – it’s come up with a phantom font created with the acrobatics of a courageous racing driver. Check out the how-to technologies used by the interactive-artist Zachary Lieberman. He filmed the car’s movements which were then converted into letters by the creative duo Pierre & Damien.
Cape Town born artist Robin Rhode (now based in Berlin) succeeds in creating urbane performances of extraordinary freshness. His canvas is the street and his installations take shape in the German capital’s more anonymous corners with simple actions and stylized drawings.
Classical art museums will always be unending sources of inspiration for every artist. Yet if you still don’t find any satisfaction in classical art, Flemish masterpieces, equestrian statues and ancient Roman busts you can at least seek out some of the curious shots now on offer from the American photographer Andy Freeber.
In 1913 Marcel Duchamp went out and picked up objects from the street and put them in museums. If he were still alive he’d probably do the reverse. That’s the idea of Ji Lee, Creative Director of Google Creative Labs with his new “Duchamp Reloaded” project. This involves setting up a series of installations outside New York’s main museums.
Rings, earrings. necklaces, belts and gloves with a kind of scratchy, chunky and slightly feline appeal that certainly won’t go unnoticed. Behind them is the Domenican designer Dominic Jones who works in London.
Kalos+eidos+scopeo, from Greek – to look at a beautiful shape. The first kaleidoscope appeared back in 1816 with David Brewster but the concept was already known to the Greeks. It usually consists of a tube with mirrors at one end, filters and ball bearings that create an infinity of pleasing shapes within. Every so often on youtube there are some interesting kaleidscope videos – here the ball bearings are replaced by animals that really move!
It all goes to show that to emerge in the internet age you don’t need much – just two yo-yos, a simple but effective graphic design and perhaps some apples, beetles and the Eiffel Tower. And then just upload them all to Vimeo or some other wonderful social networking site. The world’s your oyster!
So what are the interiors of the homes of designers, graphic artists and creatives in general like? You know, the kind of people who shop at Colette’s or down on NY’s Lower East Side – those who love to visit vintage jungles and contemporary art shows and sift through antique markets and stores of every kind as they travel from city to city. “Creative Space” is a book that portrays a world rather like “The Selby” and it’s the work of journalist Francesca Gavin. The homes she focuses on belong to the likes of Julie Verhoeven and Maharishi, Fafi, Ryan McGinness, Wes Lang, Jaybo, Lucio Auri, Roger Gual, Yasumusa Yonehara and Aya Takano. A trip from Berlin to Tokyo, London, Paris and New York.
When you’re away from home are you always looking out for a WiFi connection just like a water diviner? You can now leave the divining up to your WiFi detecting cap with its built-in signal indicator. So from now on it’s easy to stay connected to the internet wherever you may be– with radar on your head!
via | current.com
You need to make the video for your first single but though you’ve got lots of friends around the world don’t have much money available? Well take a look at an amusing experiment conducted by The Sours who certainly exploit webcams in creative ways. Of course some time’s needed to coordinate all the extras but this way satisfaction and results are assured!
Something new from the world of internet search engines! Spezify is a visual search engine that provides a more intuitive way of finding and displaying information. Just key in any name or word and you’ll get a collage of blog posts, photos and videos. It’s not unlike a page from a magazine or newspaper – and it’s all online!
Great for googling your own name and those of your friends! Try it.
In this age of digital information and specially in times of crisis the The New York Times Magazine is changing size and coming out in a smaller format (after over a hundred years of activity this is only the second time this has happened!). But don’t worry – the magazine has gained in terms of sharper graphics and a new colour scheme in its layout. It goes without saying that a valid project and a talented Art Director will always solve all problems!
Every 12 hours, 321 watches communicate a message: “Every 12 hours in Africa, more than 2000 people die of AIDS because they have no access to treatment. Set up by the Paris-based Africa AIDS Solidarity Fund, the installation is based on a work by the artist Nadine Grenier who went all out to make the most of watches and clocks during the Biennale of International Design in Saint-Etienne, France.
The focus here is on global warming. MTV, in collaboration with Ubik, draws our attention to it in a 50-second short that mixes live action with cartoon techniques.
Key elements are a world map in a classroom, toy cars, small planes and clouds.
Check out these mags!
Get going with some wild browsing!
Fashion, art, indie brands, photo-shoots, amazing illustrators and designers capable of planning entire universes not to mention new bands to listen to and lots, lots more.
Just click on magazines for convenient, full-screen viewing.
Have you ever wondered what the world’s most famous encyclopaedia would look like if it were printed in book form? Well artist Rob Matthews has just created the first edition of Wikipedia with over 5000 pages. It’s quite an effort to consult and the work is little more than an interesting artistic exercise. What booksellers will make of it remains to be seen.
Just imagine a building’s facade equipped with a brain and consciousness and so able to sleep and dream. Then go on to imagine this surreal concept in a visible form and you have: BUILDING URBAN MOTION, the latest project from the abstr^ct:groove group. It’s a hybrid from a creative collective and a mobile design studio which has transformed the face of Hotel St. George, in Milan’s Viale Tunisia as the canvas for a multi-sensorial, audio-visual experiment in which narration interacts with architectural design.
A world peopled with pop and electro-soul icons such as M.I.A., Amy Winehouse and Lykke Li. Images with power and provocation often inspired by the irreverent Terry Richardson. Brooke Nipar, Missbehave Mag’s young photo editor is a name to keep an eye on just like his more “exuberant” works.
It’s amazing what can be done with coloured balloons – a lot more than the usual funny animals modelled by smiling clowns.
The Japanese artist Daisy uses balloons in extraordinary compositions – they become decorations, flowers, clothes and brides’ veils – and extremely light-weight of course!
The internet world is a massive crossroads where you can find inspiration; unfortunately it is also a place where creative people often have their ideas ripped off by others. Yet there are folk out there keen to have their ideas “stolen”. In particular we’re talking here about Adam and Jon whose blog Steal Our Ideas is packed with explosive ideas and both funny and at times even poetic provocations on how best to use an I-phone, plan out the new Converce project or just project oneself into the future – a possible spark for other creatives – out and out rabid illumination!
Printed Matter is an interesting visual project developed by designer Evelin Kasikov. It provides three-dimensional reading. What’s it about exactly? Well, integrating graphic design and the world of textiles with a series of books that can help investigate visual perception and the very act of seeing and touching. Most tactile!
So how can you spread the word about your own creative ideas without using the internet? The Berlin-based magazine Papergirl has come up with a most interesting idea – to create works of art by hand, roll them up into tube shapes and then distribute around the city from a bicycle. Ecological, new and a great way of meeting new people!
If you like you can send in your own creations for distribution. Here’s the email to contact mail.
In India people hold a rather special festival to celebrate the arrival of Spring and the triumph of Good over Evil. It’s called Holi, the Festival of Colours.
So what does it consist of? A sort of street fight with coloured water, dusts and multi-coloured tints to shift moods up a gear and banish the winter blues. If you’re keen on seeing it next year, go dressed in white, mix with the crowds and let yourself get coloured.
Otaku Magazine is a new independent voice that promotesthe visual arts in general (graphics, strip cartoons, illustrations, painting, design, fashion, videos, games and accessories) under the emblem of Japan-oriented entertainment. So if anyone out there has some manga-like ideas or maybe a robot-transformer or just some oriental- mood graphics, do send them in!
Toronto based photographer Ian Pool imagines the lives of superheroes if they were average people. In this series of photographs he captures the super human characters, doing completely ordinary things.
The LightScraper is a custom built aluminium structure, fabricated with a layer or semi translucent mesh. The structure can be easily erected in various compositions in an outdoor or indoor setting. A single computer and two projectors are use to bring the sculptures visuals to life. The LightScraper also acts as a giant musical instrument, people’s location influence the melodies emitting from the sculpture.
A simple and effective idea for recycling umbrellas often used just once by the two Italian designers Alice Bertola and Barbara Civilini. They have created an umbrella from extremely resistant material that’s easy to wash, iron and cut without annoying unravelling. After its time as an umbrella, it’s easy to make use of the material – for paper patterns or to make waterproof items such as leggings, bags and saddle covers for bikes.
To launch its latest creation of simple blocks of painted wood, the Millergoodman firm has come up with a beguiling and unusual video. It shows every possible variety of illustration that can be created.
Designed for kids from the age of four up, it’s also a great game for adults keen to give vent to their creative urge. You can also provide your own shape-making contribution by publishing something on Flickr.
He employs the precision and the tools of a surgeon to carve, cut out and assemble old books to create fanciful and surreal effects. Brian Dettmer has a way of revealing hidden meanings as he tells stories that have a gothic flavour – skeletons, young ladies decorated with fancy lace and clouds of butterflies.
Thousands of small medicine bottles filled with coloured liquids become the pixels for the works of the artist Aleksandra Stratimirovic. The result is a curious mix of mosaics and the stained glass effects so beloved by the Byzantine spirit and DAMIEN HIRST’s series of medical pills.
Sometimes a board, some chalk and a lot of imagination can make far more impact than special effects and flawless 3D creations. Check out the Firekites Autumn Story video by Lucinda Schreiber and Yanni Kronenberg in stop motion. Poetry and animation.
A real revolutionary manifesto! Eleven straightforward and valid reasons for repairing broken or flawed objects rather than throwing them in the bin. The idea comes from Platform21 with a call to prolong the life of everything we’re tempted to chuck out. This protest against the “easy-binning culture” finds its justification in creative recycling and includes a pocket reference for creating so-called eco-compatible objects with a generous sprinkling of design, interpreation and imagination.
So let’s all get going! Platform 21 is inviting everyone to send in the most successful solutions so they can be shared and copied.
Incredible, amazing sculptures whose starting-point is hundreds of photographs on every aspect of life and living. This is followed by the meticulous job of recomposing and positioning the photographs to give life to these photograph-sculptures.
The man behind all this is the Korean artist Gwon Osang whom the critics have hailed as “the photographic sculptures artist.” His works are made first by building a sculpture of bodies or objects which is then covered by 10 x 15 images of the object itself to recreate its natural size. Each work of art features around 300 photographs – and a ton of patience!
Food Concepts by Eating-Designer Marije Vogelzang
A trip dedicated to edible design – to taste, smell and the shape and packaging of food all presented on sensorial shelves made to highlight every possible gastronomic signal. An out and out pleasure trip! Eat Love is an almost edible book by Studio Kluif.
Curvy waves, 3-D effects, a stormy seascape, wrenching movements, curves and exciting cracks. Brazilian artist Henrique Oliveira makes use of pieces of wood retrieved from the streets of Sao Paolo to compose windy and undeniably unusual spaces.
The best of contemporary jewellery by over two hundred international designers in an ADORN collection. Curiosities, one-off pieces and some truly bizarre creations – all sharing one common denominator – every piece is to be worn.
SixthSense is a wearable interface that – with just a few hand gestures and with no laptop or PC monitor – lets you take photographs, shoot video, get further information on supermarket products and make phone calls. How, you may ask? Watch the video. So as we wait for the finishing touches to be put to the system let’s start getting used to using our fingers to read our email, surf the web and take photos.
Russian graphic designer Vladimir Tomin has come up with A4 Fontpack – a really simple font inspired by origami folded paper. You can download it or if you have oodles of spare time, try replicating it yourself!
In Hamburg with Batman but where? On the bus! To promote the release of the film the advertising agency Kolle Rebbe is using mini flying-Batmen hanging from the windows of buses. Take a look! Seeing is believing
Those who experience a frisson of pleasure when they hear the word ATARI can now indulge their nostalgia with a special 18-carat ring! Designer Sakurako Shimizu has come up with the ATARI Ring based on the original chip. There’s also a silver version. Just the thing for a stylish, pc-loving geek.
So what are we going to do with all those old music cassettes? Make portraits! It’s an idea by Missouri artist iRI5. He has transformed tape into a graphic medium and come up with some amazingly accurate pictures of famed musicians.
The young Korean artist Myoung Ho Lee makes unusual images with an interplay of natural elements set against representations an tree photographs. Trees are in fact the main theme of his work. His approach is provoking quite a discussion on ideas about how you represent reality, art visions, icons and the ideal.
Head-decorator Miliner Noel Stewart is an eccentric English designer who composes real sculptures to wear on your head. Certainly a great way of getting noticed.
To be named “The Heartbreak Hotel ” – this conceptual space blends art with sex. It’s somewhere to make love you can rent out for hours at a time – for experiences abetted by a kind of special mix as the pleasure increases– an ascension to ecstasy but all done in an arguably artistic way. Heart Break Hotel will rise up at 104, the contemporary arts centre opened last Fall by Paris Municipality. So what does it cost? Not much – from €10 to €15 an hour.
A dash of pungent surrealism in perfect and aesthetic equilibrium with the fascinating world of Gothic Victoriana. The latest offering by top Jewellery designer Bjørg was also created thanks to two talented twenty-year-olds who have interpreted his world.
This is the French artist Zevs, famous for his dripping logos – from McDonalds to IBM. The latest victim to receive the Zev meltdown is Google and its famous logo. His site is well worth a visit – give it a browse!
People are looking for something fresh and new in street art. Any ideas? Well check out Krystian Czaplicki’s creations. She has fun decorating old walls with amazing 3D graphics. The images speak for themselves!
An approach that’s somewhere between painting, sculpture and photography. What look like pixels are in fact wax pastels. So who’s the artist behind it all? Christian Faur, a modern pointillist with the patience of Job!
Mathias Schmied is a Swiss artist who cuts out in-your-face pin-ups from glossy fashion magazines and then has fun hiding them behind large paper creations or transforming them into artistic streamers. This is no street-artist at Carnival time – Schmied’s work is on display in the Museum of Modern Art, New York.
Watch the world go by from a “miniature” viewpoint: busy little plastic men
going about their daily business. A curious “documentary” by the photographer Vincent Bousserez.
An unusual cultural step up for the world of TV reality shows: the famous British art collector Saatchi is seeking the next Damien Hirst. And he’s doing it with a reality serial due to be screened by the BBC from September.
The onetime advertising guru will choose six finalists – all young artists who will all frequent courses at a specially organized TV art school to help them nurture their own talent. The winning prize is the chance to exhibit their works at the next Charles Saatchi exhibition to be staged inside the world-famous Hermitage in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Iconic images of man, woman and child hanging out downtown. This is Costume Designer Yvette Helin’s curious project which involves observing and recording the reactions of passers-by to these strange creatures.
The guy responsible for revitalizing soccer gear is the Spanish designer Klas Herbert – even if you might think twice before stepping out to kick a ball around among the dust and puddles!
Maarten Dullemeijer, Rob Stolte and Jeroen Breen are the people behind the highly creative Dutch design group Autobahn. They’ve invented three new irresistible fonts redesigning Helvetica with toothpaste, ketchup and hair gel. Its name? Heldentica, Tomatica and Gelvetica. Fresh Fonts can be downloaded and used right away!
A bus-library fitted out as a temporary store and decorated by a street artist for a Swedish design project. The aim is to spread information and culture to the remotest of zones, far away from the usual circuits exploited by publishers and journalists.
In 2009 the bus will stop by 32 villages in Kiruna Province, Sweden. The project was conceived and designed by the Muungano studio and the van’s graphics were developped by Fredrik Forsberg of They Graphics. Inside you’ll find an endless collection of books, CDs and DVDs as well as a small room for projecting films.
We mentioned his work a few posts back but his latest creation merits a new one: JR has covered 20,000 square metres with the faces, eyes and smiles of Kenyan women and children including a train. That means when it passes through the village, the faces look complete.
A must to look for on Google Earth!
Sculptural shapes and unusual materials such as expanded polyurethane and moss make the jewellery designer Arthur Hash’s creations curious and captivating objects to wear. His studio is in Richmond, Virginia.
Flying objects captured at the perfect moment, actions frozen at the very moment they are about to explode. This shows us how every single instant of time is in itself extraordinary – and already gone for ever! These are some of the key elements in the work of the German photographer Holger Pooten now based in London. His mission? To immortalize the impossible!
Two new phases in Crush & Lovely’s project known as “Fifty people One Question”: Brooklyn and London. Minor confessions from ordinary people stopped and interviewed in the street. Simple, almost banal questions with often surprising answers that possess the taste of poetry.
From now on you can finally feel proud of the ketchup stains on your shirt – yes, the ones you’ve made so many times and which so many of times you’ve tried to hide. The person we need to thank for freeing us from this stress is the designer Yunju Lee fresh from London’s St. Martin School. His solution is collars already stained with lipstick, iron burns, milk splashes and small pins that create the effect of ink stains. An irresistible collection of silver jewellery.
Kim Keever’s works are reminiscent of Constable and Turner: majestic natural landscapes wrapped in light with the threat of heavy showers, flashes of lightning in a sky just after a storm. However here we’re not talking about paintings but photographs. So what’s the photo-set? All created in a fish tank in which Kim reconstructs miniatures of flowers, hills and trees. He then fills the tank with water, illuminates it and shoots. And voilà!
Somewhere between a sculpture, a highly complex origami and a Zaha Hadid installation. The Italian writer Peta just defines them as three-dimensional graffiti.
We add they are also splendid and most original.
Leonardo’s Mona Lisa continues to be an unfathomable masterpiece and the focus of many different interpretations and readings by creative people from all around the world. The latest is the one from the American graphic designer and illustrator Rafa Jenn. His giclee “You Know What I Mean” might not resemble the original that much but it is clearly inspired by the mysterious lady.
If you notice a rather different whiff in the streets of New York, it will be undoubtedly be because of the launch of the new Diptyque store in West Village. Designed by the Benjamin Noriega Ortiz studio, it has one feature designed to drive you crazy, the store assistants. They are so good-looking and won’t mind the slightest if you and your friends go there to shower yourselves in all the various fragrances.
Downtown Delusional Divas recounts the adventures of three young girls – Oona, Swann, and AgNess as they try to eke themselves out a place in the art world of the galleries and worldly social events of Art Basel.
A nice reality show that’s entertaining with a home-made feel. It describes long afternoons in a Tribeca showroom with semi-serious discussions on art and fashion and genial aspects related to making it and looks that are undergoing constant transformation.
Fascinated by graphic effects based on statistical and geographical data, the English artist Whitey Flagg bases his oil or acrylic-painted canvasses on flow diagrams, ASCII codes, graphics, plans and satellite images. Out and out works of art for nerd salons!
It’s a simple and effective idea – lighten up fonts to save on ink. The concept is to use fonts with letters and symbols with internal white spaces. When printed at fewer than 10 pt, they look full.
This method permits savings of as much as 20% less ink. This is not just favourable for the environment but also means a reduction in printing costs. This excellent idea could be applied to many font letters and symbols. In the meantime it can be tested out by using a variant of Vera Sans.
So many defunct technologies in just a few years starting with the first 3.5” ancestors of the floppy disk.
The Turkish studio Antrepo Design Industry has worked out how many floppy disks would be needed these days to install some of the most common and popular software programs. Here are some figures:
- 6 floppy disks for iTunes 8.02
- 358 floppy disks for Adobe Photoshop CS4
- 1760 floppy disks for the Sims 3
- 12 disk floppy disks for Firefox 3 + 36 floppy disks for its added components.
Single-function, lightweight and compact but above all impossible to lose. The ideal solution for those who can never find their mobile phone hiding in some mysterious corner of your bag! Designed by Shirley A. Roberts, it’s called the pre-paid cellular and is worn like a bracelet. Come on girls, your excuses have run out!
The latest in fonts for writing? Try out these handmade ones made from paper created by the London-based Russian graphic designer, Yulia Brodskaya. Another ecology-friendly proposal for precise people who have bags of time for writing messages.
Taken from official campaign drives projects as well as spontaneous initiatives, this round-up of pictures, posters and graphic projects focuses on how the visual was used in support of the new President’s election campaign.
Unusual jewellery by the designer PUREVILE – vintage pieces, pearls, cameos with details that should not be undervalued such as animal jaws and skulls.
Accessories that will certainly won’t go unnoticed!
Swiss-based Doodah’s limited edition of skateboards is hot, decidedly hot!
Ever wondered whether stilettos and massive heights coincided with the interests of teenage skaters?
What fascinate him most are the common events in the life of a teenager. This explains why the photographer Michael Worful documents cross-country runs, physical education lessons at school, concerts, vacations, skateboard events and diploma award ceremonies. American ways.
So who’s behind twenty hip-hop album covers interpreted from a “kidults” perspective? The Lego men! We’re looking forward to seeing revisited versions of the experiment involving Barbie, Playmobil, Polly Pocket…..
What’s the result of layers of wavy, compressed fibre alternating with polyester foam panels sliced out and ready for re-assembly? A strange, totally soundproofed shell, a true island of relaxation in which to listen to your favourite music. Where do we find it exactly? We put together and tried it out during Tokyo Design Week. We look forward to its imminent movements!
The series of moose and elks that made them famous, the stylized easels and all the new products – from the line of lamps to the new seats. Making a name for itself in Brussels is the BIG-GAME design studio, founded in 2004, with a retrospective approach that’s not to be missed and their very first monograph.
Three passions in one: snowboarding, surfing and skateboarding. Designer Francesco Sommacal has combined all three in his 360, the winning project of the Red Dot: luminary design award. So from today you can also practise your freestyle down mountain paths!
A most unusual interior design element with a farmyard flavour for the lounge of a temporary branch of the HSBC bank designed by the Campana Brothers during Design Miami 08. This Brazilian duo won Designer of the Year prize at Design Miami and drew inspiration for the lounge from the atmospheres of rural straw houses that are common in the Amazon rain forests.
The Hamburg creative agency Jung von Matt has come up with a titanic idea for where to locate its next huge advert. The product in question is the hand-made pasta of a local firm interpreted by the ropes and cords connected to a ship’s anchor.
At times the location can be as important as the message itself…
Once you’ve got your hands on this shopper bag through the Epaulet website, that showcases the Brooklyn store, we really want to know whose name you’re going to write on the line beneath the heart!
All funds deriving from the scheme will go to communities around the world to safeguard agricultural work.
Only a thousand examples of Steven Meisel’s work-cum-puzzle have been produced. One of the most acclaimed photographs in contemporary fashion, Steven Meisel has come up with a brightly coloured Meghan Collison portrayed for Vogue Italia. 1000 cards to fill in have been made available in case you run out ideas during the Christmas holidays!
Ever dreamt of having your stuff published – and printed – by a real publishing house? Here’s your chance.
Just sign up to ARPANet, the cultural information portal that every week publishes the texts of the most talented emerging writers. The best poems and stories selected both by visitors to the site and by the publishing house’s staff, will be printed and published in traditional book form.
Ever dreamt of a free trip around the world asleep on a sofa? If you have, the new fad of “couchsurfing” is right up your street.
Low cost vacations with lots of new friends and relationships guaranteed! Launched back in 2004 by the Californian Cason Fenton, Couchsurfing is now a fast-growing internet community. Members are ready to make a couch available or corner of their homes to host other members.
Influenced by insights born out the gothic, punk rock and even Catholicism, Elizabeth McGrath, is a leading artist of the Pop Surrealism movement. She creates worlds in habited by sinister creatures, puppet theatres of horrors, voodoo dolls, taken apart and reassembled toys. An artist in every sense, she is also the voice of the Miss Derringers. But don’t be taken in by her little sailor-girl’s voice – her world of provocative, irreverent, scary and fascinating creatures is ready to swallow you up! And for those passing through, don’t miss Elizabeth’s latest exhibition in California.
“We’re changing the world with the Self-Portrait.” This is an idea by the photographer Cristina Nuñez who is inviting people to send in their self-portraits to her blog, an international project which shows anyone – specially those without any previous artistic experience – the basic rules for creating their very own work of art. “Since I was 25 I’ve been taking photographs of self-portraits to look at and confront myself, to see the passage of developments and reinterpret the important stages in my life. Now it’s the turn of other people.”
The Towada Art Center is an example of machiokoshi (literally: “wake up the city”) sponsored by the Japanese Arts and Culture Minister on the island of Aomori (population 7,000) located nearer to Russia than to Tokyo.
The museum there exhibits the works of 21 contemporary artists of which two-thirds are foreign and in just a short time has transformed this rich provincial capital into a refined art city.
Her name is Shien Lee, she was born in Taipei but has now conquered New York with her voice, her mix of 1920s style vintage glamour combined with geisha clothes and ultra-gaudy feathers – not to mention Dance of Vice, a series of gothic events in which you can dress up as a rococo lady or Charleston girl. A great opportunity to meet creatives, artists, stylists and musicians – all in all, it’s the New York we all dream about. Have a look!
A limited print-run of 5000 copies, eight-sixA3 posters to be used as inspiration pages for your mood board. All weighing in at more than 2 kg, the package comes with a warning: handle with care – physical properties may change. We’re talking about the very first paper-based edition of NONAME MAGAZINE, a project that focuses on research, fashion, design inspiration, art and music – all conceived under the concept “an expression of our desire to change the fixed mechanisms of the classic publishing product.” Its director Johann Velit says: “We are giving readers the chance to remove the pages, change the order they come in, stick them to walls of their home or even give them to their friends.” And for some months now it’s also an art gallery. Well worth keeping an eye on!
SpY a well-known graffiti artist has been recognized more recently for his ‘public intervention’ art around Madrid.
Playfully tweaking commonplace objects, signs, and landmarks we often take for granted, his work provokes passersby to reconsider how they see the world.
A new Banksy grow up in Spain
There are two ways of playing with your Barbie: changing her clothes and brushing her hair or snipping her up at random and putting her together again in the form of alluring gems. It looks as if designer Margaux Lange has opted for the second approach.
64 balloons that look like the atoms in a compressed molecule and transformed into Bolshoi Ballet ballerinas. They are positioned in patterns carefully studied as though they were choreographies and then illuminated with LEDs, synchronized with sound and animated by a computer that controls the amounts of helium used. The final result is really something to see! WHITEvoid interactive art & design
Portraits of horses …with hair stylist in tow.
This is one approach adopted by Australian photographer Julian Wolkenstein featuring blow-styled horsehair, cotton-based wigs and stallions that wink like Betty Boop and Milli Vanilli.
You can now match the colour of your glasses with the colour of your dress thanks to a concept realized by the designer Luis Porem who works out of Lisbon. You use a plastic structure which you can fill with various tones of ink. Just be careful you don’t sit down on it wearing a nice new white outfit!!
Kate McGuire’s work is often striking for the delicate balance she strikes between the abject and the beautiful and this poetic and rather peculiar spurt of water is an example. She achieved this effect by meticulously assembling thousands of pigeon feathers one by one. She found them in the park while looking around for inspiration for her next installation!
We already knew all about the site. The Selby is an unusual and curious project by Todd Selby, a fashion photographer working out of New York who has converted the homes of famous artists and designer into photo-sets. The point of it all? To zoom in on their private lives and capture them on film in the places they feel most at ease. What we didn’t know is that Selby’s photographs are now on sale! This means if you’re not able to get to know the stars and artists personally, you can now console yourself with a photo!
If you’re also keen to create your very own micro-planet at “The Little Prince” just take some photos of the landscape from lots of different angles including the sky and land and then follow the instructions. Enjoy!
The forerunner of video art, Nam June Paik was originally from Korea. He was the first ever to alternate electronic images blending music and television to create out and out installations I which the spectator himself becomes the focal point of the transmission. He is the inventor of video art as we know it today – visionary, eccentric and far-sighted. An exhibition of Nam June Paik’swork two years after his death is now on show at the appropriately named Nam June Paik Art Center until 5th January 2009
Salzburg’s new media library is a masterpiece of fine graphics and communication. Its designers have abandoned traditional signs in favour of edifying literary texts and quotations. Sentences and quotes adorn the walls and floors her and there not unlike advertising slogans. To help you know where you are they are using fluorescent colour coding and a range of fonts – and in a range of languages given where in the heart of Euroland. Readers are naturally encouraged to interact with their own words.
The mission statement that sums up the approach taken by by Gas Zappers is certainly different albeit ecologically correct: “Saving the earth from the effects of climate change”. Created by the artist Kenneth Tin-Kin Hung this series of three videogames uses photomontage and cut-up photograph techniques. And who are the lead players? The by-now superseded Bush and his thirst for petrol, polar bears who defend the world from the four great producers of carbon emissions: the Usa, China, India and Russia and an unexpected Rajendra Pachauri – the climate scientist and Nobel Peace prize winner who dressed up as a gondolier strives to save a sinking Venice from encroaching high water.
A dozen containers stacked up side by side on a heavily trafficked road. Just another intercontinental haulage company? No – the highly original one-brand shop known as Freitag: the Zurich-based manufacturer of shoulder-bags made from recycled materials (truck tarpaulins rather than car safety belts) now “must-have” unisex items for fashionable city people. This unusual store on several floors contains the most recent designs by the Swiss brand: rucksacks, baby-slings, wallets, eBook and iPod holders.
And when it’s time for shop to move on? All that’s needed is a prominent “look-here” sign!
A pop-up edition with glossy pictures that usher forth unexpectedly from the pages of the latest edition of Visionaire, the cult fashion, design and art magazine from the Big Apple. The artists behind these pictures include really big names such as Steven Klein, Sophie Calle and Mario Testino. Of course it’s a limited edition limited to just 4000 lucky people and can only be bought on-line.
All Bologna University students have taken this event to heart. We’re talking about the highly awaited bicycle auction held in the San Vitale university area (Piazza Puntoni). For some years now several associations have collected abandoned bikes that no-one has claimed for resale and brought them to this event which in fact isn’t a true auction at all. The winner is not the person who offers the most money as the price is fixed at €15. The “auctioneer” awards the bicycle to he or she who most successfully manages to catch his eye from the crowd – bizarre noises, improvised masks and witty slogans are often used. The scheme is an answer to the stolen and resold bicycles market – scourge of the city’s myriad porticoes and arcades. An imaginative way to combat theft and illegality! See Flickr for a selection of slogans thought up by aspiring buyers during the last version of the event.
The very first edition of Kikimagazine is now out. Its front cover features Fabee, the Pink is Punk night DJ at Magazzini Generali. Read her interview on fashion, music, on-the-road experiences – not to mention the micro and macro plexi-glass sequins in her new “Bling Fabee Bling” collection.
100copies.com is a collection of electronic music productions from Egypt – an amalgamation of ethnic sounds and atmospheres full of hums and traditional rhythmic effects. The man behind it all, Mahmoud Refat is also a sound sound and music artist keen to revolutionize the Egyptian acoustic scene. When you check it out don’t miss Bekya and Hassen Khan. A new generation of sound artists now a lot less underground.
Next time you’re passing through Tokyo, don’t miss a night out at one the hottest venues of the moment in the company of the “sararimen” (workers with super powers who go straight to their offices without passing by their beds at home). The Womb, is now in the top ten of the world’s best clubs. Get ready for a decidedly unusual welcome – no threatening bouncers at the door – just kind and gentle young people. And what’s more the cloakroom is replaced by a convenient locker room with a cupboard for each guest. Strange that no-one’s ever come up with that idea in Europe. Inside among lighting effects and interactive video devices you’ll find a plethora of international guests ranging from Jeff Mills, Laurent Garnier, Sven Vath, Ellen Allien, Chris Liebing to Carl Cox. That’s if you’re just passing through!
The Selby
Photographer Todd Selby’s new web-based project, The Selby, showcases photos of people – whom you may or may not recognize – in their homes with their stuff. Scrolling through the site is voyeuristic, compelling, and a refreshing departure from the perfect interiors perpetuated by home magazines.
Next time you’re walking past the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts, and you feel you’re being followed – relax! It’s just Double-Taker, a robotic arm 2.5 metres long located on the building’s roof. Its gigantic and disconcerting eye is up there tracking all your movements. Its creator, Professor Golan created it to get us to reflect on the mass of technology which surrounds us every day. An endless battery of CCTV cameras that tracks each step we make and all our movements as we move around the city. At least Double-Taker does its job in an ironic way! It always appears to seem as surprised as we are by the encounter – as if to underline that in each of us there’s something special and unique. Happily we don’t always need a bendy tube with an eye to remind us of that!
Is this Brussels largest permanent interactive installation? The Dexia Tower has 38 floors of events, movement and colours made possible thanks to special LEDs. It was launched using TOUCH technology which allows the public to change the façades’ colours and geometrical patterns with a simple device and now for the next two months the Dexia Tower will act as a giant weather station. We suggest they make interaction possible through the internet and let all the world’s creative people take part as they like! We hope they hear our plea!
ref=”http://www.creative30.net”>The Creative 30, a project that highlights 30 of the U.K.’s most exciting young talents, commences today. The 30 nominees include fine artists, photographers, dancers, designers, musicians and even tattooists, and you can vote as many times as you want between now and November 16th to help your favorite win some career-launching support.
It may look like an ad hoc traffic jam, but the 50+ trucks and buses that make up Guillaume Reymond’s Transformers have been positioned quite purposely. From an aerial POV, the assortment of tow trucks, school buses, and 16-wheelers is transformed into a giant robot.
“Power to the people”, well at least to dancers. This could be the slogan adopted by Watt, Europe’s first sustainable discothèque thought up by the Enviu studio in Rotterdam. What’s the concept? To raise awareness among young people about respect for the environment in a fun way and make it easy for people to get together without wasting resources. The technology at the basis of this project is one that captures the energy generated by the bounces on the dance floor. Rainwater supplies the toilets and the bar only uses recyclable containers. The moral is that there’s a 30% saving on normal electricity consumption and 50% for water.
Protect public art … from the public.
It sounds a bit of a contradiction but that’s what happened in Amsterdam during Urban Play, a creative scheme thought up by Droog Design together with artist and graphic designer Stefan Sagmeister.
Put together with 250,000 1 cent coins , the installation was taken down by the poilice before the public walked off with it! See the report on Flickr! Its birth – and death!
Fed up with normal text messages? Amsterdam Informationlab has come up with another use for your cell phone: creating digital art! Cell Phone Disco is a mesh of LEDs equipped with sensors that let you pick up the electro-magnetic field emitted by active phones so you can reply with a dazzling light show. It’s quite a spectacle! It means you can now “draw” shiny red lights in the air. You’ll be in good company – Picasso also drew with a torch. Have a look!
His temporary installations never fail to charm; his unique point of view amazes; the way he interprets space and the urban landscape can be riveting.
A new street art frontier magnificently interpreted by JR, the London artist who uses old English buildings as his giant, temporary canvases.
Pure poetry – and seeing is believing!
A homage dedicated to the digital sinuous effects of his buildings. Wallpaper’s October edition fetes Iraqi artists Zaha Hadid with a collector’s item issue inspired by “Lothus”. This work will be on display till the end of November with a special, three-dimensional packaging cover at the Venice Archicteture Biennale. But the surprises don’t end there. If you open it up there are eight pages with which you can build a three-dimensional model of the work!
However much we love printed magazine and fanzines we can’t do without the online variety.
So what’s our favourite? Less Common Magazine with a selection of art creations, photography, fashion and music.
Take a look!
Musical experiments on the edge between an Ibiza Club performance and a concert. Deloitte Ignite was held at London’s Royal Opera House last week featuring video artists Robin Rimbaud and Sophie Clements at work.
Famous for events that blend music and sounds, they have created a spectacular sculpture enlivened by video, textures, colours and lights that vibrate with the DJ’s and the artists’ music
A hypnotic happening that lasts all night.
A month packed with events, performances, some well and some less well known artists, exhibitions, music, workshops and film screenings for Megawords, the free Philadelphia-based magazine which launched at 125, 11th Street Philadelphia, a paint-splattered pop-up store. “We are looking forward to a month of working creativeness with the likes of artists such as Ted Passon, Zoe Strauss, Rose Luardo, Meg Baird, and Will Pym. If we’re lucky our community will soon grow!” say the event’s organizers.
It was just an apartment earmarked for demolition but artist Roger Hiorns has converted it into an out and out house of crystal. Walls, ceiling, everything ablaze with a blue of potassium sulphate that glows in the dark. Rubber boots and gloves are obligatory for visitors. This is as fascinating as a work by Yves Klein or Anish Kapoor. Thanks to its blue, of course. Check out Flickr for a set of photos. 157 di Harper Road, London
Cao Fei is one of the leading artists of his generation in China.
His latest work is an experiment on the Second Life community, the internet virtual world. It is inspired by the cultural explosion and architectural transformation that has marked China these last few years – ancient and modern icons, from pandas to the new Birdsnest Stadium built for the Beijing Olympics.
For some time now, “le bike c’est chic” – and following the success of bike-sharing schemes in Paris, Barcelona and Berlin, it should soon be Milan’s turn.
So don’t get caught unprepared when it comes to new trends! Read the rest of this entry »
Walls adorned with arty graffiti. Avant-garde video installations. High volume music and the scent of amber in the air. A trip to Year Zero is an unforgettable experience! Louise Michielsens and Rocky Mazzilli’s boutique is one of the top locations for lovers of vintage items where fashion and vintage art are combined – sixties and seventies items and projects are the inspiration for re-created silk polo-necks, T-shirts and hooded plush items. Outstanding the clothes decorated with 3-D cartoons not to mention the limited collection of 1940s- style jackets and Disney T-shirts!
Confettisystem is the name of decorative items for glamorous parties and events. 100% hand-made and more reminiscent of jewelry than of party decorations,? Confettisystem was thought up and realized by? Julie and Nick Andersen together with Karlo Bello.
The trio of diamonds set in a leather and silk context with a surprise inside is definitely worth seeing
The artist Helen Nodding from London likes to paint with musk. Her production? Temporary street graffiti, webs stuck to walls, clouds of musk-drenched steam. This is real green art in the form of murals, tableaux, installations, sculptures and photographs. She doesn’t just use musk but also plants, leaves and of course chlorophyll.
A journey to the extreme south of the world – to Antarctica.
This is where the artist Andrea Poli recorded the murmur of water beneath the Taylor Glacier, the sounds of the cascade at Lake Hoare and the screams of the skua water birds.
His below-zero experience is documented in his blog. Like many of today’s artists she deals with global warming.
Images, words, sounds and visions hold the centre stage of her opus.
She strives to communicate the huge complexity and energy of the forces of nature by moving her public.
If you happen to be in the area for the Olympics you have to go and visit Beijing’s District 798. Five years back this was the capital’s hot spot for artists. It’s a similar story to New York’s Soho or more recently Williamsburg. Artists came across this disused district full of ex-factories and semi-abandoned with lots of Bauhaus-style warehouses to inhabit many still displaying writings on their ceilings dating back to the cultural revolution.
Gold, silver and dance music. A synthetic mix with scintillating side-effects.
So much so that the effect has already mesmerized the likes of Madonna, Moby and the actress Keira Knightley. Ann Foxman is not just one of the two singers in the intellectual-disco band Hercules&Love Affair; she is also a jewellery designer. Read the rest of this entry »
The kids of Brolavoir, fusion of French speakers, Flemish speakers and people of North African origin are a modest example of how to live in harmony on an artistic level. Venue for their actions is the newly-born “Quartier des arts” in the Marolles-Chapelle area in Belgium. This group of young artists is surprisingly homogenous – there are no rivalries just a kind of team spirit in which everyone is involved in a series of art-based projects. Read the rest of this entry »
COOL SCHRANK, in other words cool cupboard. This is the Anglo-German name chosen by Anna Quinz for her Free Magazine project. The theme’s the world of fashion but also art, design and the most innovative creativeness around. The monthly can be found in Italy’s Alto Adige region but also special places in Milan, Bologna and Florence…
Let the hunt for copies begin…!
Cross-media news. Web TV’s here – a synergism of traditional TV and Internet. This is a project that grows thanks to contributions from its users.
Check out Current, Al Gore’s channel. Viewers are free to intervene in the programmes, choose them and comment on them. Users upload the videos to http://current.com/ and the community expresses its satisfaction or otherwise by watching them and commenting.
The ones with the most votes get to become part of the TV channel’s regular programme schedule.
With an original and sophisticated layout based on pressed cut bamboo, Boston’s Banq design lounge is great for tasting Chef Ranveer Brar’s culinary specialities. He provides a menu that’s a fusion of Indian, Vietnamese, Thai and French cuisine. Try it!
Innovations in media marketing: make way for the book-trailer. Times change and so do tools. Book publishers are now exploiting the internet and youtube with this new format.
Booktrailers are video format previews to help you get a feel for the atmosphere of a novel and its plot.
These films will take centre stage at the trailers film festival in Catania, Italy in September.
In the meantime you can check out book-trailers.eu (for the time being only in Italian).
A five-star suite free for the asking to anyone (almost). In return you have to leave behind a personal mark of your art or talent. Hotel Marienbad is not at all formal or stuck-up – despite the five stars displayed on its card and site. This is a complex and intriguing place housed in the historic Auguststrasse 69 building, onetime venue for the KW Institute for Contemporary Art in Berlin.
Defined a rockstar of the graphics world, the Things I have learned in my life so far project – published by Abrams – reconfirms Stefan Sagmeister as one of the brightest designers of our times. Read the rest of this entry »
If you want to read highly respected books about arts and culture you read books published by Phaidon.
And if you want to geek out on graphic design you read their latest mammoth compendium, Area_2.
We dig it for researching and visual trends..
Since we can’t get there as often as we’d like (read: that means ever) we definitely take any Japaneseart and design culture we can get, especially when it’s wrapped up in a book like Tokyolife.
Issue #2 of WON Magazine is out now. A strident melting-pot of pretty words, art, design and photography which we hope wil find its way onto your desk if you’re travelling around Australia. Otherwise you’ll have to make do with the online version. Read the rest of this entry »
Launched just one year ago, NowNow Gallery is now the online platform where Australian photographers (and not only) showcase their work. NowNow has set itself the task of documenting how we live through the highly attentive eyes of artists and photographers Read the rest of this entry »
Even its reputation is found somewhere between vandalism and art academies, the Tate Modern is celebrating it like this. A wall made available to six names in street art for an open air exhibition. The London museum has offered these artists its enormous outer walls (roughly 15 metres per 12). Exhibitions include the Blue Italian, the Faile Collective from New York, Paris-based Jr, and from Sao Paolo, Brazil – Nunca e Os Gemeos not to mention Sixeart Barcelona. These works will stay on show till August and promise to be quite spectacular.
Large-size steel, painted-glass and varnished-wood effects for over-size kitchens whose impact is softened through the addition of traditional ceramic motifs and inserts – for extractor fans and untreated wood layers. To be used as tables.
A textiles application for the world of interior decoration.
Ghirigori is a line of coverings and pieces of furniture in which embroidery work is applied directly to the wood.
Stickers all over the place, a storm of flyers and messages written in the middle of the street or clarion-called to the four winds. What’s important is to communicate, communicate and communicate again. The most plug-generation of diktats?
Great for those i-mac maniac keys!
Irreverent, decorative and de rigueur in the Tortona District.
The Marcel Wanders 2008 press campaign opts for Renaissance paintings worthy of Caravaggio.
They decree an all-encompassing quite genial flair for products.
This coupé style airplane created by the designer Jaime Hayon for Bisazza couldn’t really go by any other name.
For those who love the sensation of the wind blowing their hair even when flying!
Any space in the Tortona District is good for a presentation – the key thing is to be there.
It’s a great venue for unlikely street exhibitions – in bread stores, pensioners’ clubs, and even local firms who pull down their shutters during the event.
A limited edition of items by sculptor Winnie Lui distributed by Innermost includes an eye-catching chandelier made up of random objects and precious details. Read the rest of this entry »
Rain can be wistful and poetically melancholic, specially in England, and London designer Heather Smith has made it her winning card!
She creates decorative elements from iron nails left outside to rust!
A week in which to sniff out the latest trends from young designers and important names.
Time to locate the right spot for a photo-shoot, take notes and work out the direction in which Italy’s – and not just Italy’s – creativeness is moving.
A stroll around Milan’s Tortona district during the world’s leading furniture exhibition is one way of seeking out genial inspiration for tables, chairs and shelves.
As we all know, creativity needs constant feeding!
It’s up to you now.
To collaborate with us the first thing is to see things clearly and look each other directly in the eye!
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There’s a space reserved for you underneath the C’N'C logo.
Click on the image to see the nicknames and origin of the people already registered.
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