Friends with the monster…

Hey everyone! I can across a really unique artistic interpretation of various types of mental illness. That being said I’m in no way trying to trivialize mental illness because it is a very serious disease that many people suffer from. I just wanted to share how an artist interpreted these illnesses through an artistic form. From what I know about the artist, Toby Allen,  he has suffered from social anxiety and he wanted a way to express his feelings through art. When I first saw this I thought of it as not only art but as a form of therapy. Writing has always been a good way for me to express my feelings and just get them out because I can write whatever I want without having to have anyone see or be judged. I thought this was a great idea as a form of therapy and releasing some of the feelings we may have some times. I also think to turn them into monsters was a good choice as well. Often what we think of a monster is something that seems scary to us or that we don’t understand. Mental illness is highly stigmatized and many people still don’t even believe it is a true illness. I think that by creating more awareness and hopefully reaching out to others and offering compassion instead of judgment. Anyway I hope you guys like these and are inspired by them, I think it’d be a great exercise for any artist because we all have things in our lives that act as “monsters”. Below will be a link to the entire article but I’ll have my favorites on this post. Until next time guys!

Link to article: http://www.fastcocreate.com/3018089/schizophrenia-paranoia-depression-and-other-mental-illness-brought-to-life-as-real-monsters#1

Just Add Water

Hey everyone! I kind of have somewhat of an underwater theme going on since once again we’ll be diving in 😉  to some underwater art. These photos were taken by photographer Benjamin Von Wong who I may need to take a closer look at later since I love these photos so much! I don’t know what it is but I think the vastness and mystery of the ocean is something that has always intrigued me. I don’t know how to swim and I think that adds a certain aspect of spookiness to the big blue. Whatever the reason, these photos are hauntingly beautiful. I just love the way the clothing and hair of the models move. This is especially true for the first photo. It looks as if she is descending from some world up above and is floating down into another realm. It comes across as very angelic to me.

I also love the movement and flow in all of these, it makes these models seem like they actually belong in these setting and are not just people being placed in a scene to make a pretty picture. I’m going to put the link to the article and images down below but let me just tell you now that these photos took a lot of work. In order to pull this off Von Wong needed freedivers who would also be the models, stylists, makeup, etc. This is one of the qualities of a good artist that I really admire. He had a vision and did what he had to make it come to life and he did it right without cutting corners. No one’s perfect and I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not exactly diligent when it comes to my craft. However, when I do something I try to put my best in it and do the best I can with what I know I can do. Effort is everything and it certainly paid off for Von Wong! As always below are my favorites (which in this case is all of them)and the link to the article! Until next time!

 

Link to article: http://blog.flickr.net/2014/08/08/surreal-underwater-photo-shoot/

Books Bound with Skin?!

Hey everyone! Sorry for my hiatus but life happened and things have finally settled so here I am again! I first saw this story on Facebook that announced that books that were bound with human skin were found in Harvard’s library collection. Some of these were made from the skin of the deceased after autopsies were performed however that was not the case for all of the books. One was made from the skin of a person that was flayed alive…yeah. These books will actually be on display and people can go and see them.

I know that awhile ago I did a post on an artist that uses his own blood to create paintings so I wanted to talk about this for a couple of reasons. My initial reaction to this was that not only was it inhumane and it was also very creepy.  I voiced my opinion about it and one of my friends felt that I was dismissing it because I didn’t fully understand the practice. They also thought it was immature of me to react that way. I think that I’m a pretty laid back and non-judgemental person, or at least I try to be, so I thought about their perspective.

After thinking about it for a while and really trying to look at this differently I found I couldn’t. It still bothered me and I still stand by my action even if being uncomfortable with something like this is immature. At least one person was tortured in order to make this book and that’s not okay. At least the blood paintings are created by the artist willing, I can’t say the same for these books. I thought that this article was interesting and at the same time I was hoping for some feedback on what you guys think. Let me know in the comments! Did I overreact to this?

Link to this article: https://roadtrippers.com/blog/harvard-discovers-three-of-its-library-books-are-bound-in-human-flesh

One Man’s Trash is Another Man’s…

Hey everyone! Since my last post was a bit serious I thought I’d do something a little more light-hearted and fun. I’m always amazed at what artists can create out of junk. Maybe I’m over thinking this but I don’t think it’s as simple is gathering up a whole bunch of junk and whipping out a bottle of Elmer’s glue. You have to not only gather more materials than you probably need but you also have to figure out a way to use each item so that it has a purpose other than being a stand-in because nothing else fits or connects. That being said I have a great appreciation for artists who can take a whole bunch of random objects and make them into something meaningful.

These were created by Jane Perkins and you can obviously see the amount of work that would have gone into one of these because the attention to use of different shades in each piece. The skin in these is really amazing and really precise. I also loved how Mona Lisa’s hair was made out of beads, I thought it was a nice touch! I know that I would not have the patience to do this so I can really appreciate this artwork and I wanted to share it with you guys! Below are my favorites but you can check out the link  below for the rest.

Link: http://news.yahoo.com/lightbox/art-made-from-junk-slideshow/art-made-from-junk-photo-1393273044770.html

Be My Guest

Hi everyone! I’ve been working on creating some invitations for my Graphic Design class and in order to do that I’ve had to do some research. I’ve been looking for a lot of sources of inspiration and I thought that I’d share some invitation designs that I really liked! I was looking for not only the design of the invitations but also the packaging since I feel that its also a very important aspect. One thing I keep trying to tell myself and look out for is to not over do it. I tend to embellish things more than necessary which leads to too much going on it the design. For my project I’m doing an Alice in Wonderland/Queen of Hearts theme that I talk more about later but for now here are some invites that I think are pretty cool! By the way clicking on the pictures will lead to the site if I was able find one for it! 🙂

Are Google Searches Sexist?

I know I recently did a blog post on sexism in ads but I really liked how a point was made in these ads. I found a series of ads for UN Women that shows how sexism can be found everywhere, even in a Google search. The ad shows how the use of auto complete on Google has come up with some interesting searches about women. By simply typing in the words ‘women should’, ‘women need to’, or ‘women cannot’ auto complete comes up with several negative suggestions. To be honest at first glance I was a bit unsure if this was true or if the designer had just put these suggestions in to make a point.

So I ended up going to Google and typing in the same words as the ad and unfortunately I got very similar suggestions. When I typed in ‘women shouldn’t’ I got that women shouldn’t vote, drive, or have self-esteem. Its not exactly what the ad says but I did does this several different times and got different results, most of which were negative. These ads were not only a good way to make a statement but they also made me realize how sexist our society is. I never really noticed the things that come up when I search for topics about women so this was really shocking to me.

I really wouldn’t have expected to see something like this. That being said I wanted to do an experiment and look up what men shouldn’t do. The results said that men shouldn’t cry, have a say in abortion or get married. Not the most positive results either but their basic rights aren’t really being questioned. I used some of the same searches on men and it was really amazing because the results weren’t as harsh as the ones from women. The searches on men were more of critiques like men should pray or be what they seem. Below are the ads which I think speak for themselves and a link to the article I found on them!

Link: http://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2013/10/women-should-ads

X-ray Photography?

Hey everyone! I found some cool photographs that are actually x-rays of everyday objects. The x-rays were created by Bryan Whitney and they have a really beautiful effect to them. Its funny but I’ve never really thought of x-raying objects other than living things but this artist goes so far as to use a shirt and iron in his work. I really like any work that has to do with flowers but I really loved how beautiful some of the flowers he scanned came out.

I also really like the variation of opacity within these pieces which were created by any overlaps in the object. Adding color to these was also a nice touch I think the images may have gotten lost in just black and white so using color was definitely a good choice. I also couldn’t help but notice how these images look similar to the post I did a long time ago about photographing ink in water. It has the same ghostly feel to it that I liked. My favorites are below, as always, but I’ll put a link to the others down below! Until next time!

Link to article: http://news.yahoo.com/lightbox/x-ray-photography-hidden-beauty-inside-1376578462-slideshow/x-ray-photography-hidden-beauty-inside-photo-1376578290559.html

Getting Drawn In

Hey everyone!  I found this really cool artist a little while back and I wanted to include him in one of my posts. His name is Ben Heine and he’s a photographer and illustrator.  I thought it was really interesting how he was able to combine the photography and his drawing skills. I really like this approach and since I like both photography and drawing this interested me. It was a nice way to incorporate both of his talents into one piece of work.

These drawings also add a nice effect to the photographs and add another level of interest. He does some in color but most of them are black and white which is what I actually prefer. I think having the drawing in black and white makes me feel like I’m seeing what’s beneath the surface in these photos. It’s almost as if the colored portion of the photo is the surface and we’re peaking underneath. I thought these were really well done and I wanted to share them with you guys. Below are my favorites but I’ll also include a link below to the article I found on him. Until next time!

Link to article: http://blog.flickr.net/2013/09/27/photographer-literally-draws-life-into-his-photos/

Flowerbombing!

Hey everyone! So what is flowerbombing you ask? Well, its photographing flowers while they explode, at least in my definition. Got your attention, right? Mark Klimas has found this unusual way to create some very unique and beautiful photographs.  I was really attracted to these photos because of the shattering effect that they have. It was something that really caught my attention because it was something I’ve never seen before.

Now you might say ‘exploding flowers, what’s the big deal?’ but I there’s just something about them that is really intriguing to me. His process is also really interesting because he prepares the flowers before they meet their maker. First he puts the flowers in a box with liquid nitrogen to freeze them to about negative 326 degrees fahrenheit. After that point Klimas says that they are as fragile as a snowflake and are really easy to break. In order to get his beautiful photos he  shoots the flowers from behind to get the shattered effect. It’s a really interesting process so I highly recommend that you check out the link below to learn more about this process.

I love the photo of the dark rose, the coloring of the rose is beautiful and I love how the center of the rose is intact while the edges appear to have dissolved. I really love the pink flower, which may or may not be a rose, because of the way the colors blend and layer on each other. I picked the third flower because it looked as if it had been something so solid, almost as if it was ceramic. Remember to check out the link below to see all of the flowers! The ones here are just my favorites! Until next time!

Link: http://shine.yahoo.com/photos/photographer-captures-spectacular-images-shattering-slideshow/-photo-2686260-185600455.html

Mind On His Money, And Money in His Art

Hey everyone, I found these slide show on Yahoo that highlights a very unique artist. I’ve seen artwork using money before however these pieces by Mark Wagner seem to stand apart. His pieces feel really unique to me because the money isn’t really the focus, if that makes any cents (cheesy, but I had to). The designs are just so intricate that what I focus on is the detail and consideration that was put into these pieces. For example, in the piece “Bird in Hand” the shading found in the dollar bills used was really put to good use within the bird.

The shading near the front of the face and beak was really well done. I also love the texture he created for the sleeve of the person. “Petty Cash” was another piece that stood out to me because the text created was just so nice and clean. The “Mona Lisa” blew me away because it seems so detailed and planned. You can just tell by looking at these that there was a great attention to detail. I’m posting my favorites on here but check out the rest by going to the gallery link below. Until next time!

“Bird in Hand”

“Petty Cash”

“Mona Lisa”

Link:Yahoo Gallery