thomas broomé illustrations

perhaps you know swedish artist thomas broomé for his low res man sculpture, but i also love what clever pieces he has created here in his modern mantra collection. he is using a liberal amount of the alphabet to create texture, depth and positive/negative space in his clean lined drawings, and takes us on a very funky house tour at the same time.

i love the walk-in closet.

thomas is represented by the galleri magnus karlsson in stockholm. you can see lots more intriguing artwork in a variety of media from thomas on his website too.

via fabrica

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amy walsh silkscreens & sculpture - let’s chat!

philadelphia artist amy walsh could have easily been a scientist or an architect after having a look at her intriguing mixed media art. her gallery installations are a dreamy, intimate look into foundations, demolition and purpose. peering through little peepholes into other tiny worlds leaves debris floating in my head. it doesn’t seem necessarily determined to have a ending either; rather, it seems satisfied enough to saturate the viewer’s mind without a tidy conclusion like some romantic comedy you’d see at the cinema. it’s a private, contemplative place.

more intimacy can be found in amy’s gorgeous hand silkscreened specimen prints on vintage book pages, called the beastiarium. looking at these inspired animal combinations reminds me of thumbing through an old college biology textbook and coming upon a page covered with someone else’s notes, triumphantly bursting with rich color. it’s like some unfinished lesson from long ago, discovered serendipitously, that we were meant to find and keep in our minds. let’s have a chat with amy and find out more!

q: where do you live?
a: i live in west philadelphia with my hubby (an acupuncturist) and my cat izzy. my art studio is in fishtown in a warehouse.

q: what is your background, and did you study art formally?
a: i’ve been making things like crazy all my life. i majored in painting as an undergrad (university of massachusetts), and in sculpture in graduate school (pennsylvania academy of the fine arts). i took ten years off in between, and i am glad i did. i actually went to graduate school to continue painting, but switched to sculpture in my first semester in a moment of big transformation.

q: how are your pieces made? what types of media do you use and do you have a favorite?
a: in my 2D and 3D work i like to use found materials, decayed materials, stuff i just find around me. ever since i was a kid i have enjoyed making everyday materials like twigs and cardboard and paper and string transform into something otherworldly or totally convincing as its own little reality.

q: how large are these pieces and are they for sale? if so, what is their price range?
a: my sculptures are large, and they disappear when I am done exhibiting them. they are too fragile to move around from place to place, and they are made of materials that easily decay. so i build them in the exhibition space (after working on all the parts and fragments in my studio) and when the show is over, i deconstruct them, and often use many of the fragments in the next piece.

the specimen prints are all under 8″ x 10″ and are all $29 through my etsy shop. soon i am going to make some original gouache paintings based on the specimen designs, and those will be in the shop too.

q: what is your inspiration and message you want to send through these pieces?
a: the way i work now is similar to how i worked as a kid: my first “sculptures” were little villages made out of pine needles in the woods, when i was five or six years old. i don’t know if i am looking to send a message as much as just exploring as deeply as I can things that give me a sense of wonder, hope, sadness, etc. i think of these current sculptures as evidence of a world that is fragile, transient, and decaying, and at the same time is being rebuilt and reimagined. i am also really into the relationship of the inside and the outside, and playing with people’s expectations. i like the viewer to be surprised, to be let in on a little magic, a secret, something out of the ordinary. so, i keep a lot of dualities in my mind while i make the sculptures: order/chaos, collapse/rebuilding, interior/exterior, dark/light, delight/despair.

all that said, while i am working, i am really playing. the words and descriptions come later.

with the specimen prints, i am not sure what drives them. i am drawn to the old book pages for the same reasons i am drawn to dirty cardboard and wood scraps - they already have a history and a use. the animals and plants and sea creatures that i cobble together are just really beautiful to me, and combining them makes them nicely strange and sometimes a little yucky, which is a good combo. i have so much fun finding the places where these creatures can merge and become hybrids. maybe it’s a way to appreciate how weird real animals are.

q: are you currently exhibiting in any shows or is there any other meaningful information you would like to mention?
a: i sell my specimen prints at vix, and at occasional trunk shows at the mew gallery, both in philadelphia (the next one is this friday night, february 8th!). my etsy shop is a good place to find the specimen prints online. i sell them inexpensively so everyone can have one! and i update my blog and flickr stream with new work all the time. i love getting comments and critiques about my work, so i invite anyone to visit and say hello.

see amy’s graphic design portfolio here, and check out her website to see more paintings and large scale sculpture works!

thank you amy!

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anna woltz illustrations

beloved readers, you may find the little snippets about my life to be a tad dull, but hey, for me this is a creative outlet and a place to seek inspiration and a space to get personal. is that not the essence of the interweb? anyway, today i will tell you that when i was a youngster, i went to a small school where i was the only asian kid. in the whole school. and i can’t really even call myself asian, i am a halfsie pacific islander, being a happy-go-lucky filipino half the time! knowing i was the only one there made it a surreal experience at times, especially when kids would try and guess what nationality i was. i wonder if the reaction would have been the same if this wonderful illustrated book from colorado artist anna woltz had been available then. anna has created a playful soft cover illustrated book and toddler tees which feature a multicultural culinary alphabet lesson for her company, wondertoast. check it out:

i think this is such a terrific way to engage a child’s curiosity while educating them about food and other cultures. maybe if these had been around back in the day, i wouldn’t have been bombarded with that pesky “are you hawaiian?” question all the time. and i actually think the whole alphabet featured as a fun oversized print would be a marvelous piece of art in a kid’s room, or anyone’s kitchen for that matter.

thank you so much for the photos, anna!

buy her adorable and very affordable items at wondertoast, and find anna on her art blog or baby blog.

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vintage typewriters at sundance

psst. i want to let you in on a little secret opinion of mine. i think computers are here to stay. that’s right, you heard it here first, folks. be that as it may, i couldn’t help but smile when i saw these fantastic restored vintage typewriters. since i only rarely use a typewriter these days (and an electric one at that), viewing these photos transported me back to a sentimental place, where hearing the familiar staccato clickety-clackity click clack bing! under my flying fingers was much more satisfying than watching someone do it now on an episode of mad men (and i think those props are electric too).

hey, if these machines were good enough for hemingway, they’re good enough for me.

find the royal quiet deluxe, the royal arrow and a foxy smith corona in all their glory (and replacement ribbons too!) at sundance.

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david b dale packs a literary punch

when i find a gem like the writings of new jersey author david b dale (his pseudonym an homage to his parents, beatrice and dale), it is affirmation to me that the time spent mining the vast hinterlands of the internet for treasure is worthwhile.

david is the prolific writer and creator of very short novels. although he is a skilled technical writer, these stories are where he hones his creative art. characters are developed through his interactions with people he knows, has never met, or who only exist in his imagination, and each tale is 299 words in length -no more, no less. see for yourself:

two-minute monologue

We’re not complicated. Actors, men, all we want is a girl who can play the part. Is that too much? Naturally she has to be attractive. Even the ugly parts are played by attractive girls. You know that. I’m not telling you anything you don’t know. Not so attractive that it doesn’t read right, you understand. Reasonably attractive, but decidedly more reasonably attractive than we are, and by that I mean a nine, nine-and-a-half tops. I don’t make these rules. Men want to see their wishes fulfilled. Women want to be the better man. I tell you, they’ll go looking for a guy they can stupefy; they’ll ignore his flaws, lavish him with love, and every day go out of their way to stroke his ego by staying with him, and all they ask in return is that the stupid schmuck act lucky. Yeah, I miss her. She had a way of looking at me that felt like applause. Smartest girl I ever got. I never had to dumb-down my material. She misses me, too, of course, but she’d never hurt me by letting on. We talk. She’s helped me grow as an actor and a man. I don’t think I’d be this mature about leaving her if she hadn’t. No, wait, that doesn’t read right. One minute he’s drawing blueprints of the female mind and the next minute he’s a witless fathead? No, it doesn’t scan. It’s unplayable. Maybe if it didn’t transition so quickly. I mean, are you married to this script? I’ll tell you what. You get a re-write and find me a leading lady who doesn’t look like my mother and I’ll come back and maybe audition. The way things stand, what makes you think I’d want this lousy part? Thank you for your time.

yep. that’s what i thought you would say.

to me, david’s clever concept is like literary altoids: tiny, refreshing and curiously strong. his writing is consistent and frequently forces an emotional response, just like high quality art should!

i love it and after reading a few pieces, was completely hooked, so fair warning.

click here for a more in-depth interview with this talented man.

get over to very short novels now and read the entire collection!

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