Ink, Blood, and Magic

Phillip Low

2012-02-28T08:57:00.001-08:00

So it's been a while. I realize that. But what better way to get back into the swing of things than in a discussion of something at the core of every piece of art, architecture, clothing, and object that we encounter--the mindset of the constant consumer. Now I'm not talking about the money-spending type of consumption. I'm referring to the great extent of our unsung consumption of media. With the advent of iphones, Pinterest, and the rabbit hole that is Reddit, we live in an time and space where we are constantly immersed in media-photos, art, video, books. In years past, the power of an artist's work has been defined by the caliber of gallery it resides in, where today, anyone who's made anything (and I mean anything) can find a venue and an audience on the web. Where I am I going with this, you may ask. Here's where--as people begin to constantly consume media of all sorts, subtle motifs that may have been novel in the past quickly become trite and over-worked. Watch a thousand hours of television on netflix and patterns in the chaos begin to emerge, diluting the gravitas of many films to that of a good kitten video on Youtube. While this evens the playing field for some (kitten videographers, for instance), it also forces artists of all genres to step up their game. When an audience has seen almost everything, and has the rest of it at their fingertips, an artist today must completely outshine the enormity of the human consciousness in order to maintain relevancy--not an easy feat, but it gets done often enough. What's even more amazing is when it is done with a subtle delicacy--when a simple idea can capture the short attention span of the digital world and cause a pause, a comma, a breath in the race across the Internet. Today, this artist is Phillip Low.
Originally an sculptor that worked in acrylics, I stumbled onto his work through a design blog who suggested buying his prints to make some kind of decor statement (gross). But, after staring at the facets of his disembodied gems floating in some unseen purgatory, I couldn't help but enjoy them. The colors are soft and subtle, the lighting is impeccable, and I am not pushed to remember something that had come before them. They are lovely in their simplicity, and should be enjoyed for it, even if for only a digital moment.

To purchase a limited edition print of these gems ($45-$65), check them out here:

MNZ Store

Fumi Mini Nakamura

2011-11-22T08:21:00.001-08:00

It's hard to make art that describes the intricate connection the human soul has to the natural. Sure, you can say you relate to the power and majesty of the gray wolf, but try to depict that, most of the time, you're going to end up with some horrible piece of detritus like the three wolf moon shirt, of meme fame. Though, in tri-wolf's defense, the rules for wolf art have been clear cut since at least the early 70's: While one wolf is good, more wolves are better, and none should be depicted without accompanying tye dye, moon, monster truck, or dream catcher. The work of Mini Miku Nakamura, however, decides to break most of these rules in favor of a softness that captures the drama of this subject without the quaint crap. Each of her pieces, cleverly arranged in a whirlwind of color and line, contains a quiet contradiction in human life-- whether it is acceptance of death, the frustration of sex, the realization of our role as a species among species, or the madness that emotions like love create in our classicly animalistic nature. The fact that these are all done in colored pencil only makes these more amazing. Enjoy.

These and more works by Fumi Mini Nakamura can be found at her site:

http://www.miniminiaturemouse.com/

Simon Bent

2011-11-16T06:52:00.001-08:00

In a world dominated by a constant stream of images and sounds, work, and "modern life", it becomes easy to simply stop thinking for ourselves, and allow a comfortable mindlessness to wash over us in in a constant high tide of consumer-driven media. A thinking life becomes an endless struggle against a system that has so much control over your being, your body, your soul. I cannot fault people for taking the easy way out. This, however, makes those individuals that still grasp for a better understanding of the human condition all the more precious--wizard philosophers of untold understanding to whom few can relate, and ever fewer can understand. This is why I find the graphic design series "Science versus Delirium" of Simon Bent all the more mesmerizing. His psychadelic transformations of the scientific and philosopher giants of the past boosts them to an almost godlike state of adoration (or at least to the state of the Beatles circa yellow submarine, but I digress). In an era where love of football trumps the safety of children, and war is the answer to everything, it's important to recognize the great minds that have questioned our animalistic desires, our irrational fears, and our eternal ignorance, in hopes of reestablishing our place in Eden.

These images belong to Simon Bent, and if he had a website, I would post it here. Use your google powers.

James Jirat Patradoon

2011-10-12T22:35:00.000-07:00

As a huge comic book nerd, I've bumbled my way through dozens of colorful narratives, most of the time nitpicking through all the oversized breasts and made up muscle groups that make comics so great. It is not often, however, that I am stunned by this kind of art--I mean, you can only go so far with your art without detracting from the plot (ask Frank Miller), so you could say comic book art is limited. For this reason, I find the comic-book like stylings of James Jirat to be a delightfully funky fresh punch in the face. His colors are aweful and awesome, and who doesn't love hooded luchador wrestler bikers popping pills and punching out super heros? While many of his themes are a throw-back to the amazing punk poster artists of the late 70's and 80's, the tasteful use of punch-out color and bitmap-style line renderings make it all work together somehow. His art is on display out Californie-way this month, so if you're out there, dig on some of this.

All of these works belong to James Jirat Patradoon, and can be found with more of his work at:

www.jiratpatradoon.com

Alfons Mucha

2011-10-04T07:56:00.000-07:00

Little needs to be said about the tightly controlled, whimsical work of Art Nouveau artsist, Alfons Mucha. His beautiful females have probably graced more puzzles, t-shirts, and black light posters than Bob Marley, and his work never ceases to amaze. Few artists have the intricate mastery of line and color that together make Mucha's work so stunning, and his smooth shading techniques would make a digitial artist envious. Mucha's work is now mostly over 100 years old, however, with his work's emphasis on advertising, it makes you wonder where the "Ad men" went wrong, and how things like "wuu-u-u-uh-zu-u-u-u-uhhh" and that stupid gecko manage to sell anything. One drawback that I've noticed only after researching Mucha's work is the prevalence of horrible Mucha tattoos out there. Take a gander toward google images, and you'll see what I mean. While Mucha's work captures a moment in stunning lines and color, its intricacy and detail doesn't lend itself to good tattoo material without covering, say, your entire back, or...without adaptation by a very good tattoo artist. Moral of the story--tattoo artists are called artists for a reason--if you hand them an image and they say it can't be done, it probably shouldn't be.

Willem de Kooning

2011-09-20T08:13:00.000-07:00

So artists and art critics have been drooling over abstract expressionist Willem deKooning's work for the better half of the last century, and for good reason. The guy painted for over 70 years, and produced a huge body of diverse work, including paintings, drawings, and some particularly lumpy sculptures. But, most of what can be said about his work has already been addressed, either in hours of boring modern art lectures, or in the pompous overwrought musings of internet art nerds (myself not included...ha..ha..) Today, however, I'm not going to talk about his now oh-so-overdone style of action painting, or what his nudes have to say about the condition of women, or how he redefined art through a child-like perspective. What I find interesting about de Kooning's work is much more basic, and to all you aspiring artists out there, much more utilitarian--Color. As many comic book colorists, painters, and graphic designers will attest, figuring out which colors work well together to create a unified image that is pleasing to the eye is no easy task. There have been entire classes and textbooks written on the topic of color theory, and even then, knowing what color to paint a black cat is in the dark, or what the reflection of television light does to the color of fabric can seem almost impossible. De Kooning's work, however, shows a beautiful innate understanding of light and color, to the point where the nature and subjects of his abstractions are rendered inconsequential. Few artists can use color alone to impress mood or atmosphere upon a piece, but de Kooning delivers every time-- invoking feelings of claustrophobia, leisurely ease, or untold femininity without having to beat you over the head with a graphical representation. This alone makes de Kooning's works stand out in the world of abstract art, and makes each of his pieces an interesting study for those that wish to follow in his colorist wake.

All of these images are property of the Willem deKooning estate.

Currently, de Kooning's work is on display at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA)

in New York. For more images, and how to go see them, check out their website:

http://www.moma.org

Walter Potter

2011-08-29T07:16:00.000-07:00

As we move further into the 21st century, it becomes obvious that as a culture, we are at a loss as to how to deal with mortality, to the point where we'd rather hide that fact behind the beauty of innovation, surgery, and media than face it as the only definite truth to our humanity. A hundred years ago, one winter could wipe out one's entire family, and the idea of death was a local, personal idea that was not shied away from. Our move away from this can be seen in the near extinction of funerals held at home, the antagonization of people who kill animals for food, and more interestingly, the demise of the taxidermist. If you have some country cousins, you may have encoutnered the eternally-bored disembodied deer head, or in my family's case--the striking rattlesnake under the glass coffee table, perfectly preserved for whatever reason. While I've previously showcased some modern taxidermy art by Sarina Brewer, recently I was introduced to the grandfather of modern taxidermy art, English artist, Walter Potter. He made most of his morbidly cute little assemblages at the height of the Victorian era when people would put these weird things under glass domes in their sitting rooms (no shit), and they really speak for themselves. If you can get over where this guy got his hundreds of dead kittens, guinea pigs, owls, frogs, and squirrels, each piece is weirdly whimsical and interesting, and incredibly detailed.

Deborah Butterfield

2011-08-22T07:17:00.000-07:00

There's nothing that can express the duality of domestication like the horse. They are powerful, spirited, amazing animals capable of incredible feats of majesty and unrestrained force and beauty. At the same time, most of their species exists in the humble service of man, willing to run and work until their backs are broken, or they collapse in death from the struggle against the reigns. This makes the mercurial works of Deborah Butterfield so magical. With each piece, made from metal castings of driftwood and scrap, she encapsulates so many different facets of the life of horses, from their most powerful to their most mundane. Each piece has a life all its own, and a personality that is befitting of its title, which instead of giving glory to the artist, are mostly names that breath life into the memory of these amazing beasts.

Laurie Lipton

2011-08-19T12:16:00.000-07:00

Surrealist art is probably one of the easiest types of art for anyone to make. None of the content really has to make sense (maybe not even to the artist) and any lack of artistic talent can be explained by "stylistic experimentation". However, if you take a stroll through the pages of DeviantArt, and after sifting through all the paintings of furries, you'll find that surrealist art also probably one of the hardest genres to actually do well. As much as art teachers want to say surrealist work is all about juxtaposition-- you know,like putting a train in a fireplace , or this thing, the truth is, the surrealist works that really capture the human imagination are not those about objects, but about atmosphere. Works of artists like Salvador Dali or HR Geiger transport you to an unseen world that exists in each of our subconscious, places we only witness in our dreams, and only return to in unsettling moments of deja vu. While good surrealist art can unsettle you from your moors, the best can force you to question the nature of your own perceptions of reality. I find the works of Laurie Lipton to fall into the latter category. Her works, mostly in pencil, are driven by an intense sense of unease, and each has a morbid atmosphere that is delightful in its unrest. While most of her works surround two themes, the eternally trite and ever important events of birth and death, the melding of these ideas lends for an interesting and morbid appraisal of the human condition.

All of these works and more by Laurie Lipton can be found at her website:

http://www.laurielipton.com

Jenny Odell

2011-08-16T06:22:00.000-07:00

In this day and age, the ubiquity of satellite imagery has left the realm of science fiction, and has moved into the commonplace. As a child of the nineties, I remember revelling in the fear experienced by characters in movies as they tried to escape the ever seeing eye of Big Brother, how something hundreds of miles away in space can pinpoint a zit on your face, and then pop it with a nuclear weapon. Today, however, with the advent of things like Google Earth, these world images are as part of our human condition as radio, print, or television. In this respect, it also has the potential, like these other media, to used as a venue for artistic expression. This is where the art of Jenny Odell comes in. While simple in composition, the items and places in her collages found on Google Earth range from the odd to the mindlessly mundane, but never lose their visual interest. Each piece reminds us of the enormity of our human biome, and the physical mark that we leave with our love of parking lots, baseball fields, swimming pools, and landfills. However you feel about the implications of these facts, Odell's work forces us to reexamine our world from a different view, which is more than most people can say they've done before their second coffee on a Tuesday morning.

Baseball Fields

Basketball Courts

Landfills (my favorite)

Empty Parking lots

Planes

Ponds

Stadiums

Swimming Pools

Silos and Water towers

All of these works and more can be found at Jenny Odell's website:

www.jennyodell.com/satellite.html

John Martin

2011-06-30T11:52:00.000-07:00

So, let's face it, the bible can be boring. For every action-packed pillar of fire and brimstone episode, there's a couple hundred pages of what fabrics not to wear and whose dad was whose. Luckily for us, most of the cool stuff in the bible can be summed up in the works of Christian painter, John Martin. Martin lived during early 1800s, and was actively involved in the romanticism art movement, for all you Art 101 kids searching google images the night before your paper is due. It's okay, I won't tell anyone. Anyway, Martin's work is amazing in the depth and breadth of his landscapes, which are all pretty much apocalyptic. There are no sugary sweet fat Jesus babies being cradled by doe-eyed virgins in these works. Each piece shows the fiery wrath of God in full color, from mountains crashing down, exploding volcanoes, storms, floods, falling angels, you name it. And they are breath-taking. The thunderous crag-like clouds are ominous and foreboding, and you can really get the atmosphere he was going for. When they were made, the paintings were immensely popular, however, at the peak of his popularity, Martin gave up painting to pursue some other wacky enlightened endeavors, like redesigning the London sewage and water systems, railroads, and light houses. He was also considered sort of an odd-ball-- preferring to hiss during the national anthem, for instance. Though his paintings themselves are amazing, his body of work has continued as a major influence to numerous artists today, notably George Lucas, H.P. Lovecraft, and Derek Riggs, that guy that paints the covers for Iron Maiden.

JOB update

2011-06-09T09:29:00.000-07:00

The kickstarter for JOB is up and running and ready for donations. JOB has recently been added as a recommended project, so please get out there and start donating to get this project underway.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/762567073/job-a-comic-by-egan?ref=email

Thanks,
Egan

JOB

2011-06-01T14:21:00.000-07:00

I regularly feature different artists on this blog, but since one of my personal projects is really getting under way, I'd like to invite you to check out some of my own work, namely my comic book, "JOB". JOB chronicles the life of seventeen year old Job Freewell, a homeless girl in southern Louisiana who is the subject of a wager between God and the Devil. The devil has one year to corrupt her by any means necessary. Once Job finds out about this endeavor, however, she sets out to get back at heaven for destroying her life, and this time, God had better be looking over his shoulder.

For more information, check out the official JOB blog:

http://www.jobcomics.blogspot.com

Alex Pardee

2011-05-25T22:20:00.000-07:00

To be honest, I'm not a big fan of cutesy art, especially paintings. I feel like the art medium of splashy watercolor backdrops behind over-rendered, graffiti knock-off line art is over and done, and any issue of High Fructose can attest to that. But, I happened to break this trend in my oh so refined tastes with the art of Alex Pardee. While he subscribes to the aforementioned painting trend, his subject matter is gruesome and creepy enough to keep the eye interested. Some of his pieces, especially the ones with creepy critters riding each other, keep the viewer pleasantly uncomfortable about each seemingly innocuous image, which is more than I can say for most modern painting. That being said, while I was impressed with the scope of Pardee's monster factory, he seems to lean on making art as marketing rather than craft, but then again, even artists have to eat.

All of these works belong to Alex Pardee, and can be found with much of his other work at

http://www.eyessuckink.com/

Abelardo Morell

2011-05-14T10:15:00.000-07:00

Photography can seem like one of those mediums that has been explored to its limit. With the dawn of digital technology and phones that can take better photos than most cameras I've ever owned, now everyone's an artist...and a critic. It's harder and harder to impress the world with that perfect composition, and if you want notoriety, it seems like every worthwhile piece has to capture that infinitely deep emotion caught only in the perfect context. The art of Abelardo Morell, a Cuban native, pleasantly turns this idea on its head. Rather than photograph the world directly, he implements the age-old process of camera-obscura into his photography. By creating a pin-hole in the wall of a room, the inverse image of the world outside is projected magically onto the wall inside. If this is confusing, check out his piece below, entitled "Light bulb," which explains the process visually. The juxtaposition of each of the outdoor landscapes with the simple room assemblies he creates are beautiful, understated, and whimsical; and they force the viewer to reevaluate the colors, shapes, and visual quality of the outside world in ways that you'd never imagine. As a side note, currently, Morell's work is on display in National Geographic magazine this month, so if you want some impromptu posters of Morell's work on the cheap, you know where to find them.

The magic of camera obscura: A small slit in the box allows the inverted image of the light bulb to filter in, projecting an image onto the back wall of the box.

All of these works belong to Abelardo Morell, and can be found with more of his work at http://www.abelardomorell.net/

Ron Mueck

2011-04-15T07:34:00.000-07:00

Some of my favorite art is that which causes the viewer to give a double take--art whose illusion of reality nearly overwhelms the act of its creation. Ron Mueck's work is an example of such art. While Mueck began his artistic career working on scenery and lending voices to characters on an Australian children's show, he found a higher calling, producing the fantastic, hyper-realistist human forms. This alone isn't that exciting. Special effects people have been recreating the human form for decades. The factor that make's Mueck's work different is not readily aparent in photographs--but when you notice the size of the viewers present, it's jarringly obvious. Scale. Each of Mueck's figures has been exanpded to 2 or 3 times their normal size, or inversely, has been shrunken to fit in your pocket. One of the beauties of this work is that these changes in size do not come at the expense of detail, or proportion. Each figure exists alone in its own surreal world of enormity or insignificance, and each has something to say about those factors in every human being.

Ernst Haekel

2011-04-02T17:33:00.000-07:00

If you ever want to feel like an under achiever, look no further than the works of Ernst Haekel, actually, just look at his life. Haekel lived from 1834 to 1919, and was notable for simultaneously being a biologist, artist, physician, professor, and naturalist. He catalogued over a thousand new species, often meticulously depicting them in his fine art. He tirelessly promoted Charles Darwin's work and the theory of evolution. He did slip up however, in his uninformed assumption that different races of people comprised different species. Oops. I guess we'll have to let that one slide in the light of how fantastic his depictions of his biological escapades turned out. I'm especially fond of the multi-colored sea creatures, which I wish were printed on my shower curtain instead of the map of the world.

Biography courtesy of Wikipedia

Frank Frazetta

2011-03-24T09:39:00.000-07:00

We've probably all seen some of Frank Frazetta's work. Back when quality still counted when it came to book covers, movie posters, and pin ups of Arnold Swarzinegger, Frank Frazetta's paintings were everywhere. He's done a huge amount of work for the Conan the Barbarian franchise, as well as the "Vacation" series, and Tarzan. While most of his work follows a pretty firm theme of monsters, tits, swords, and sweat, they're all fabulous and very well rendered, despite the metal bikinis. If you're thinking this may just be art for meathead fantasy jerk offs, I have to give Franzetta some credit for his love of powerful weapon-wielding women who definitely make up for the damsels in distress. Anyway, these are some of the best fantasy paintings I've found, and I've yet to see anyone match him in painting sweaty muscles. Enjoy.

Frazetta died a few years ago, but his work lives on through his estate, which runs his website with literally hundreds of photos in a dozen galleries:

http://www.frankfrazetta.net/

Sarina Brewer

2011-03-22T08:39:00.000-07:00

When we think about sculpture, there are always a few mediums that come to mind: wood, stone, metal, paper mache. These are all versatile, and many great things have been made out of them. However, it is the deviation from the norm that I find most well-stuck in my memory- the oddities and strange charismatic formations that people make on the fringe. The work of Sarina Brewer falls into this latter category. Rather than typical media, she uses dead animals in the lost traditions of sideshow taxidermy. her creations are amazingly lifelike, even compared to other fine art taxidermists I've seen. Her mythical creatures leap and snarl from their wooden plaques and stands with a vitality that only an expert could breathe into them. Sarina is also unique in the fact that she is a female taxidermist, and beside her craft, she has developed a macabre, eccentric persona as an artist that is as intriguing as her work. I wish I could have found more examples of her work, but since they are for sale, many are snatched up with the utmost quickness.

This piece, entitled "Franken-pussy" is made entirely of a single cat-skin, fur, skin and all. It's amazing.

Because Brewer believes in using all of the animal, she also preserves the skinned forms of some animals in an alternate process she calls "esodermy", using parts other taxidermists would throw out.

Check out Sarina's work, which also includes jewelry and traditional-type taxidermy, at her website:

http://www.customcreaturetaxidermy.com/

Will Cotton

2011-03-18T08:55:00.000-07:00

If there's two things Americans love, it's beautiful women and high fructose corn syrup. This can be seen no better than in the sultry, sugary works of Will Cotton. Cotton's paintings (yes, they are all paintings), can be described as surrealist, but I'd rather call it magical realism. The flocculant, whimsical landscapes are rendered with the utmost detail-- to the point where you can almost feel how sticky Cotton's figures must be as they lounge in cotton candy or metling ice cream. Obsessed wtih this sugary delight, Cotton also sponsored a bakery exhibit in 2009, where he displayed an assortment of candy and cake goodies that inspired him for people to enjoy in real life. I'm particularly impressed with the models Cotton uses in his work- women that are not all uniform in their look and build. Sure, some fall into the stick-thin creepy model look that is so pervasive in our culture today (Check out Katie Perry's lackluster Cotton-inspired video, "California Girls"), but others have the fabulous, thick, creamy figures that fit so well into Cotton's pin up cotton-candy landscapes.

Check out more sweet stuff at Cotton's website, http://www.willcotton.com/

David O'Brien

2011-03-17T09:13:00.000-07:00

There are a lot of artists out there whose work is a dry one note; a single image repeated to the point of creating a nauseating corporate logo passed off as art (I'm talking to you, George Rodrigue). Then there are some artists that diversify in their medium so much that none of their pieces are cohesive, and their voice is lost in the variety. Then there are guys like David O'Brien, whose work has both visual variety and the unifying themes of what I see as the intricate complexity of the biological world (but I'm in medicine, I see biology everywhere). His fabulous mazes are reminiscent of bacteria under a microscope, and his series of "swarm" photo-collages are phenomenal. I'll admit, some of his work borders on artistic indulgence: While I haven't included any of them here, his series of "Scribbles" and tetrahedrons on his website are disappointingly boring and overdone this far out of the expressionist movement, but the rest of his work makes up for it. Enjoy.

Each tiny figure in each of the "swarm" pieces is a photograph of an individual person, with some repeats, but who can tell one locust from another in a swarm anyway?

"Braid"

While I'm not the biggest fan of this cutesy flocculent colored pencil stuff, I've included one of the better ones for completeness (there are a LOT of these)

This is the piece that to me resembles bacteria under magnification. The way they congregate, the mass in the center, even the arching loops and strings are fabulous. Oh, and this crazy mess is a solvable maze. Really.

A swarm of colored pencil "potato people" with close up.

Another swarm of people, this time with a close-up below.

If you like what you see, check out David O'Brien's Website:
http://www.davidobrienartwork.com/

Hakuin

2011-03-16T22:36:00.000-07:00

What is the sound of one hand clapping? Don't ask me, I'm not a big clapper. Japanese Zen Master Hakuin ("shrouded in white"), however, asked this question pretty much of everyone he knew until he figured it out for himself. Born in 1686, he achieved enlightment by the time he was forty-one and spent the second forty years of his life trying to get all of his deciples there too. He was widely reknowned for his emphasis on the intense study of koans, a concept in Zen buddhism of meditating at length on an abstract concept or statement until you understand it. Between doing this all the time, he also mananged to make some of the greatest calligraphy drawings to come out of Japan for this period of time. His works are stunning in their illustrative and comical nature, as well as the ease and subtle strength of each brush stroke. His antromorphised animals are charming, especially the sumor wrestling rats. It's amazing how close this man's work, put to page over 300 years ago, manages to retain its relevance and beauty in a way most modern animation could never achieve.

If you're in the New Orleans area, the New Orleans Museum of Art is hosting an exhibit of Hakuin's work throughout this and next month. These and many other classic Hakuin pieces are on display, and frankly, the computer does not do them justice.

Dust

2011-03-01T07:29:00.000-08:00

I guess I've been on a photography kick lately. This series of images, entitled "Dust," was put together by photographers Ujin Lee and Tom Edwards, both known individually for a variety of photography styles-- mostly revolving around capturing heavily-make upped skeletal fashion models. The photographs in "Dust" however, have a murcurial, magnetic quality that draws your eye in to these seemingly placid scenes. The Dust itself to me plays out like an unwanted phantom in each piece, the subtle ghost that passes through the room when no one watches. The sensless lack of design of the dust in the air is welcoming in its visual interest as it is unsettling. As a side note, before Lee and Edwards put together the "Dust" series, they combined the same concept (throw dust in the air, photograph it) to the aformentioned skinny fashion model staple, covering some girls in expensive clothes with pink dust. Needless to say, the effect was not the same.

For more photograph by Ujin Lee, check out his website at http://www.ujinlee.com/

Philip Lorca de Corcia

2011-02-22T08:56:00.000-08:00

I'm not usually impressed with most modern photography. I find most photographers focus on dragging unimaginative, uncompelling compositions through a fancy filter and then expect everyone to care. This is especially moot considering the ease of deriving these effects with digital technology that even a I-phone camera can accomplish. That is why I love the work of this next artist, Philip Lorca de Corcia. He's been working in photography since the 1970's, mostly in the North east. His work focuses on people taking part in rather mundane activities: going to the bar, tripping over the sidewalk, going to the store, etc. I know, this has all been done before. However, de Corcia's work lends such gravity and drama to each of these activities that each moment captured is heart-wrenching, isolating, and moving. While some of his pieces are assembled tableaus, a lot of his photos were taken of regular people on the street (some of which were not very happy about it: see below). I was especially impressed with a series of photos de Corcia took of pole dancers in baroque-esque lighting. I've included one below, but you should check out the others, since they are awesome.

When de Corcia took this photo of an Orthodox Jew on the street of New York, he was sued by the man, who claimed the piece went against his religion, and shouldn't be used to make money. de Corcia won the suit based on the 1st Amendment protection of artistic freedom, even if the art is sold.

Miss Rockaway Armada

2011-02-15T08:45:00.000-08:00

So I set out today searching for information on one of my favorite street artists, Swoon, whose wheatpaste work has tickled my whimsey for a while. In my net wanderings, however, I came across a project that she has been a part of that is, to be blunt, absolutely amazing: The Miss Rockaway Armada. The concept is fairly simple: a few dozen or so artists, sculptors, musicians, builders, and dreamers collect a mountain of junk and garbage and make a few rafts and, Huck Finn style, sail them down the Mississippi river from Minneapolis to New Orleans. "Well that's cute. But why should I care?" you ask. Because they're beautiful, functional, and fabulous, that's why. Each raft, while functional as a mobile river home with electricity and motors, also contains several different art installations by the builders themselves. True to the DIY spirit, all the motors are refabbed deisel car engines that run off of used veggie oil, and no one spends any money on any of the installations. While the pictures below provide a sampling of the type of work that comes out of the armada, their website, http://www.missrockawayarmada.com/, has more information if you have river raft fever. Particularly, check out some of their non-mobile installations, which their Flicker account wouldn't let me post. But I won't hold that against them.

If stumbled onto this page looking for Swoon's work, check out the second door from the right.

Beginning this year's barge: you have to start somewhere.

Another new raft begins for this year

Apocalyptic Hedonism: Kris Kuksi

2011-02-03T08:31:00.000-08:00

”When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall; And when Rome falls – the world”. This quote by Lord Byron begins the web biography of Kris Kuksi, sculptor, genius, and general madman. His sculptural pieces, self-described as post-industrial rococo, are as beautiful as they are unsettling. While death and destruction make up much of the subject matter in Kuksi's pieces, the soft touch of a Rococo aesthetic is as welcomed as it is well-placed.The assemblages of smaller, infinitely detailed figurines and mechanical wonders add a claustrophobic intensity to the subject matter surrounding the end of the world. Each piece teeters on the edge between subtle beauty and hopeless destruction, war and unfettered hedonism, tyranny, life, and death. I've tried to include some close-ups in order to fully realize the intricacy of these works, which really can only be fully enjoyed in person, but you can see what I mean:

Close up:

Check out more work and different angles and close ups of these works at

http://www.kuksi.com/

John Williams Waterhouse

2011-02-02T07:45:00.000-08:00

Depicting human drama in two dimensions is a challenge that artists have grappled with prettty much since the beginning of time. I mean, without sound, or movement, how can one really touch each of the senses in a single painting? Sure, methods have been developed to help, like using variable light intensity and colors that suggest a certain mood. But light can't always capture anguish, and there is no color of fear. This is why the work of John Williams Waterhouse has always appealed to me. Waterhouse lived and worked in London at the end of the 19th century, and unlike many of his contemporaries, enjoyed great success in his painting career. Each of the figures in his paintings is engaged in some high drama, and the pain, the fear, the wonder, is aparent in each of the faces he depicts. The mythological and biblical women of Waterhouse's work are beautiful, and perfectly rendered in their highly atmospheric realms. Beside having a real understanding of depicting human emotion, Waterhouse also really knew how to set the scene, creating places of wonder and mystery for his characters while still engaging the viewer with a myriad of textures and colors.

To see more work from J W Waterhouse, check out the website dedicated to his work:

http://www.jwwaterhouse.com/

Jennifer Maestre

2011-02-01T08:53:00.000-08:00

I'll admit it, I'm a biology nerd. All kinds of living things delight and fascinate me, which may be why I find the work of Sculptor Jennifer Meastre particularly amusing. Her undulating forms are reminiscent of overlooked deep sea creatures, like the lowly sponge or the understated sea urchin. Each piece has a unique personality and and creates a visual interest that sets each one apart from the next. Oh, and they're all made of colored pencils. Really. It's really hard to tie your entire body of work to a single medium in sculpture without coming off as kitchy or one-note, but I never get tired of the variety of shapes and color that Maestre can extract from pencil tips. As her work has been picked up by several notable galleries across the US, Meastre has recently moved away from her sculptural work to focus on jewelry-making out of...you guessed it...colored pencils. While completely different from her previous work, I would wear any one of her pieces, which she sells at her store on the online craft mall, www.Etsy.com/jenmeastre. Unfortunately, she is on hiatus, but may be taking personal orders if you're interested.

This final piece, entitled, "Persephone," is particularly neat because it is completley reversable due to several strategically-placed zippers that can change the entire feel of the piece. It's awesome.

For more beautiful creations from Jennifer Maestre, check out her website, http://www.jennifermaestre.com/

Craig Tracy

2011-01-31T07:51:00.000-08:00

When most people hear the term, "body painting," they usually think of either that cheezy Pink Floyd poster or a strategically-placed butterfly flitting across some lady's titties at Bonnaroo. At this point, it's safe to say that most of the world can only do so much by painting on a live person, myself included. That is why I was so delighted and surprised to run into the gallery of Craig Tracy in the French Quarter this weekend. Tracy's a New Orleans native, and has actually developed a body painting style that is both captivating and original. Because his work is painted on actual nudes, all of his work is presented as photography. However, without knowing exactly what you were looking at, you may mistake the entire photograph, and the live nude in it, for a painting. They're that good. If you check out his web site, there are of course some duds that come along with this kind of medium, like some generic girls and babies painted gold or striped, but the rest truly make up for it. I'm particularly a big fan of the piece, "Butterfly" that he has on his site. I didn't include it here because the mastery of it is really in the photos he posted of his process more than anything. Few people can hide a girl's booty in a painting without taking something away from the piece. 'Nuff said.

This piece, "Sixtree" is my favorite and the only non-studio photo on Tracy's site. The tree in the center is made up of six painted people. I like it because it is beautifully understated. Hopefully, we'll see more work like this from Tracy in the future.

I have some personal envy for the kid who's mom heard, "I want to turn your womb into a radioactive, glowing space coccoon for hearts," and she was like, "Hell yeah. That'll go great in the blacklight room."

Troll Country

2011-01-28T08:40:00.000-08:00

Very few mythical creatures can capture the imagination like those from the nordic tradition. Children the world over can tell you what a troll is, or describe a fairie, without ever opening a text book, or being tested on what Gods control whom. The mysterious creatures of Norse mythology are not sweet little critters like those in Aesop's fables. They are murderous, calculating, ravenous creatures more likely to steal your children than to help you out, and interactions with them mostly result in people wandering around in a fog of confusion in a deep dark forest. While much of this mythology has been replaced by the more macho, modern updates in Lord of the Rings series, a glimmer of the world of trolls and fairies can be greatly appreciated in the work of early 20th century illustrator, John Bauer. His work captures a world of dark winding forest roads with fleeting light, inhabited by creatures born of the imagination. His most notable work, "Among Gnomes and Trolls", while relatively unknown, served as the basis for Jim Hensen's Dark Crystal, and it's obvious. His attention to detail and meticulous articulation of light and texture are breath-taking. It is unfornate that he was able to produce so little work, as his life was cut short in the wreck of the ship Per Brahe, which he ironically took instead of the train, which he thought unsafe. Go figure.

McBess

2011-01-27T08:08:00.001-08:00

I first ran into the work of French artist, McBess on the now defunct art critique forum, Eatpoo. He was there for critique on his large volume of illustration, I was snooping around for inspiration. To cut a long story short, McBess was one of the people that got me back into drawing again, and renewed my faith in the animation medium. His work has obvious influence from early 20th century animators like Disney and the kids over at Merry Melodies, but his style is unmistakable. Many of his images revolve around a mystical dreamscape, where pirates, ghosts, and dangerously cute topless girls are he norm. The depth of each piece is wonderful, and few people can transfer palpable textures to two-dimensional animation like he can. Beside his work as an illustrator, McBess has also produced several short animations, mostly surrounding his band, the Dead Pirates. Yes, this man does everything...and he has a wonderful beard.

Check out more work by McBess at his website: http://www.mcbess.com/

E A Seguy

2011-01-27T08:07:00.000-08:00

When considering the art that emerged out of the Art Neuveu and Art Deco periods, several elements typically come to mind: heavy line work, meticulous design, and vivid color, for example. Most people are content to revisit the work of Alfons Mucha as the pinnacle of that era, and leave it at that. That is because they have not been exposed to the understated beauty in the work of Eugene Alain Seguy. Seguy worked in France primarilly as a textile pattern designer, but made numerous books of illustration along those same designs, all surrounding a single topic: bugs. The books of illustration, 'Insectes' and 'Papillons' are masterpieces in themselves, depicting butterflies and other insects with a vivid, scientific accuracy that makes Audubon look like a talentless hack. Beside this, the composition technique of clustering the different creepy crawlies together on each page is unnerving and claustrophic, reminding the viewer that bugs are in fact everywhere, in colors and numbers we cannot begin to fathom.

This is one of his patterns based off a beetle:

Sylvia Ji

2011-01-27T08:06:00.000-08:00

A native of San Francisco, Sylvia Ji has been producing amazing paintings for years now, and frankly, it's disappointing how little national attention her work has garnered, despite numerous showings across America. This may be because her subject matter is limited mostly to paintings of women with a Day of the Dead catrina motif, which, without actually seeing them, can sound a little trite and over-worked. I mean, we've all seen Mexican folk art, right? However, each piece I've encountered is so completely different and more amazing than the next that one cannot help but admire her mastery of the subject. Few people are able to capture both whimsy and a direct sensuality that doesn't beat you over the head in a single piece, but Ji pulls it off nicely. This isn't hurt by a strong collaboration with the bevy of beautiful ladies of alt-porn website http://www.godsgirls.com/ , a competitor of the widely loved/hated Suicide girls franchise. Ji worked with several Godsgirls models in creating a portraiture exhibition with fellow artist Joshua Petker entitled, "Behind Bedroom Doors." Steamy and stunning is about all I can say about it, but you can decide for yourself.

For more amazing images from Sylvia Ji's portfolia, visit her website: http://www.sylviaji.com/