dan mccarthy art

i love the dark blue hues in these very cool prints, drawings and paintings from multi-talented boston area artist dan mccarthy.

dan creates work in many other colors besides blue of course, and even has a print club you can join, so you can receive several signed and limited edition prints a year. check out the details of the club and see a lot more work on his website.

via design crush

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christina vantzou illustrations

look at all the stories being told in these soft and lovely limited edition screenprints from belgian artist christina vantzou.

purchase these prints at christina’s supermarket shop, and see more works on her website.

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carmel killin textile design: miniview

i enjoy the work of sydney artist carmel killin, aka etsy seller feedthedog. there is something hopeful and inviting in the appealing limited edition and one-off screenprinted cushion covers and wall hangings she creates. i like her textures and earthy colors and simple art styles, and i like the natural fabric she uses. ever curious to know a little bit more about the brains behind the operation, i asked two quick questions…

q: how did you get into designing?
a: the truth of it is, i’ve been “seeing” and visually “re-imagining” the world around me since the dawn of time, or at least since the age of 12 when my parents (who have no taste whatsoever, god bless ‘em) moved the family to a hideous new brick house in a freshly created suburb with no trees. the unbelievable ugliness of my interior and exterior surroundings at such an impressionable age had me begging my parents for years to follow my fabulously detailed design suggestions. to no avail. at the same time i was writing short stories and had a spurt of published fiction in my 20s. at university i dabbled in photography and film making, which led to many years working in the film industry. i’ve had no formal training as a designer, i have just always been attracted to the visual world and the desire to interpret what i see, give a common object a new visual story. as a devotee of DIY philosophy, i love doing short courses. knitting, sewing, screen prining, felting, welding, dyeing… done it. with a few non-design-related degrees under my belt i fell into tertiary teaching, but after learning the basics of computer design applications started teaching graphic design to university students. i still teach design, though these days it’s all studio-based and hand-crafted projects. which of course i adore.

q: what inspires you?
a: i think my love of story telling informs a lot of my visual work, though not in any obvious way. i’m also really captivated by the wonderful skewed shapes and lines of children’s drawings and their rough, scribbly colouring-in technique. i love odd creatures, plain creatures and silhouetted shapes. old national geographic magazines from the 60s and 70s have fabulous animals with wonderful personalities. a blank piece of highly textured fabric excites me with all the possibilities and challenges it presents. i love shapes and lines in the landscape, shapes and lines in common, plain objects. details, like stitching, shading, trims, buttons, are delicious to me. so too, unexpected combinations of pattern and texture, objects and things. oddness, whimsy, humour are very attractive to me.

well, after reading her answers doesn’t it all makes sense now!? two thumbs up!

if you’re a local, you can frequently find carmel at the paddington market in sydney. if not, see and purchase the available collection at carmel’s etsy shop, and be sure to check out her humorous, well-written blog too!

thank you carmel!

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spaghetti kiss ceramics and apparel

look at this absolutely lovely stoneware from baltimore husband and wife artists shawna pincus and mike bracco from spaghetti kiss. shawna focuses on ceramics and has a bfa from the maryland institute college of art. she fires the pieces to cone 6, adds and removes glazes, and the appealing texture is achieved by pressing found objects into the clay before it is dry.

i have to confess i was so obsessed with these ceramics at the fair that it would seem like i missed mike’s apparel, but i must mention it too! the images are drawn by hand of course, and screened onto soft cotton tees:

mike has also created a graphic novel called birth that will soon be available in comic stores near you.

quite a talented couple, and oh! did i mention that shawna has a blog?

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1st glimpse - renegade craft fair chicago!

i was like a kid in a candy store when i walked crisp and sunny division street yesterday to peruse the renegade craft fair in chicago. this event was much larger than those in prior years, with spectacular, high quality items from 200 crafters and artists. bonus: the fair is still taking place today (sunday) and many of the artists have online shops or etsy stores, so you might not miss as much as you thought! may i present just a small sampling…

fun jewelry from oklahoma husband and wife artists mike and mary

delightful textiles from michigan artist lisa price’s artgoodies

avant wood designs from the budding local designers at eight gang switch

playful tees from virginia artist david murray’s seibei

art, jewelry and trinkets from san francisco artist jenifer lake’s sprout studio

progressive art and functional porcelain from ohio artist guy michael davis

much love to my trusty hand model featured in some of these photos.

be sure to check back here later today and this week for more coverage of one of the city’s best, and most beloved, handmade art and craft fairs — there’s so much more!

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