This has got to be the tiniest piece of street art ever. Artist Slinkachu, who is known for his small scale art, created this piece in a narrow alley of Grottaglie, Italy as part of the FAME Festival. From the details of the shutters and human forms to the perfectly aged balconies, the detail and intricacy of Slinkachu’s colourful clothesline is just plain unbelievable. One of the most magical and joyful pieces of street art I’ve ever come across.
(via unurth)
The first time I popped open a Mac and realized colour-coding or highlighting folders in colours was now possible, I was ecstatic. To be honest, it was because it was fun to play with. However, it is now an indispensable part of my work as it organizes projects in one glance. But, let’s not forget that it is still a lot of fun too! Artist and designer JK Keller created an application called “Songs About Rainbows” that, upon downloading and selecting a folder, will colour-code all of the files contained in rainbow order. Such a quirky idea that I love. More than anything, I love the example JK created in honour of his app. Each folder contains one word from Kermit the Frog’s “Rainbow Connection” which, it cannot be argued, is one of the sweetest and most colourful songs around.
(to download the app, go here)
I think I stopped dead in my tracks when I saw these illustrated and hand-embriodered Penguin Classic book covers by Jillian Tamaki. They are a stunning piece of craftmanship. Not only beautiful illustrations but incredible embroidery detail and colour. After a commission from Penguin, Jillian took two months to create the wraparound covers with French flaps. What a mesmerizing update to the covers of classic literature and yet another fantastic Penguin book cover. Wow Jillian. That is all I can say! (p.s. the books will be available in Fall 2011)
(via sampaints)
It is hard to believe that only a week has gone by since the earthquake and tsunami in Japan took place. With every horrifying image that emerges, it is hard to think of much else. The only positive that has come to light is not only the courage and resolve of Japan but the support issued by people all over the world. Over at poppytalk, I read about University of British Columbia students who are selling paper origami cranes to raise money for Japan aid. Cranes are a symbol of good luck and legend has it that if one folds a thousand cranes, they will be granted a wish. With a similar passionate wish for Japan’s recovery in mind, I made this week’s colour me happy theme the intricate and beautiful art of origami. Learn more about the UBC crane project and other ways to aid Japan here.
(images via bethan phillips, gregoire alexandre, christine, sipho mabona, dasa severova, andrea russo, bohemian summer, roman diaz, fumiaki kawahata, burda style, lisa occhipinti, t, style me pretty)
I guess I am a little obsessed with modern embroidery lately. The work of Japanese-born and now Winnipeg-based artist Takashi Iwasaki crosses all areas of art including painting and illustration but it is his hand embroidery on canvas creations that I just love. The playful abstract shapes, bold bright colours and magnificent attention to detail are incredible. Have you ever seen anything embroidered like this before? Such beautiful, unique and handcrafted work.
I have always admired the craftsmanship and detail required to do embroidery. It is a beautiful form of art that adds so much texture, value and intrigue to fabric and other projects. I have become semi-obsessed with the work of Sydney-based studio maricor maricar. On top of fantastic design, illustration and motion work, they create the most gorgeous embroidery I may have ever seen. It is easy to dismiss embroidery as a traditional art form but one look at the modern, colourful and typographically exquisite work of maricor maricar and your mind will be changed forever! Their embroidery, with its bold colours and incredible layers and patterns is just breathtaking. The detail and vibrancy is unreal. Fingers crossed one day I work on a project with maricor maricar and see how they create such jaw-dropping work!
Raging Bull (1980)
Pulp Fiction (1994)
Bambi (1942)
The Matrix (1999)
Black Swan (2010)
The King’s Speech (2010)
The Wizard of Oz (1939)
Alice in Wonderland (1951)
Jaws (1975)
Many films have a specific colour palette that creates a mood, highlights change in time or viewpoint and overall, creates a creative vision for how the story plays out. My new fascination is a blog called movie barcode that takes every frame of a film, compresses it into a sliver of colour and puts them next to each other. The result? A movie barcode. It is quite incredible how these barcodes capture the colours that dominate a film. From the examples above you can see the gritty brown of Pulp Fiction, the bright colours of animated films Alice in Wonderland and Bambi, the blue hues of ocean-focused Jaws, the dominating green of The Matrix and the teal opulence of The King’s Speech. It is amazing that one can follow the plot through the shifts in colour. I can’t wait to see what film movie barcode captures next!
(via flowing data)
The Boston Globe’s Big Picture is one of my often visited bookmarks as it tells a news story through incredible photography sets. Their recent feature behind the scenes of New York Fashion Week has some great shots of how such a massive scale event comes to life. I love the photos with striking bits of colour. In particular, I have always wondered how runway shows are organized so I was excited to see the photos of fashion designer Jason Wu’s seating and model charts. Love how the model charts use colour coding to ensure all pieces come together (writing specific style names on top of blue dot for belts, yellow dot for handbags, red dot for necklaces, green dot for sunglasses and purple strips for bracelets or pins.) A strange detail but I really do enjoy colour coding! I recommend checking out the whole set here.
How can you not love a pop-up book? This series by graphic designer Daisy Lew is a unique type of pop-up book as it takes advantage of every angle. Each spread features New York’s famous cityscape from the sideview and a famous New York icon such as the Big Apple, the Chrysler Building and taxi cab from the top view. Such a fantastic piece of paper art.
I have always been fascinated by sequins, particularly the vintage and one-of-a-kind varieties. The shining, sparkling discs of colour just have so much joy and life to them. Many historians believe that sequins have been around since 2500 BC. Egyptians would cut thin discs of real gold, glaze the top to prevent scratches and adorn swanky people like King Tut. Now no longer reserved for royalty, sequins remain a central design element in fashion, accessories, textiles and craft. On her blog puglypixel, Katrina showcases her amazing vintage pre-war Belgian, Czechoslovakian, and Japanese sequin collection. I envy her trays of inspiring sequins and love the beautiful colour palettes they create.
Diem Chau carves crayons (and sometimes pencils) with mind-boggling artistry and attention to detail. She turns everyday crayons into tiny, exquisite sculptures. Diem creates custom pieces for anyone seeking a crayon version of their family, friends or animals. I love her commissioned word currency and chinese zodiac sets and their corresponding colour choices. Diem also created one-of-a-kind metallic crayon cravings of iconic World Cup athletes for Nike. I love the way they were packaged and displayed in an engraved wood stand. I just love Diem’s work and would love to go to an artist or designer’s wedding and see her crayons as the cake topper!
(images via diem chau)
I love Steven Emmanuel’s “Sorting the hundreds from the thousands”. It’s amazing how rearranging an equal number of objects can result in such different colour patterns. It makes me a bit cross-eyed to imagine sorting all of those sprinkles!
(image via steven emmanuel)
Now this is some intense attention to detail! Artist Lauren Dicioccio assigned a specific colour to every letter of the alphabet and a different shade of grey to every number. Laying a sheet of mylar over select pages of text from Vogue fashion magazines (such as the masthead up top), she meticulously translated the entire page into her very own language of colour. I love how she calls it “a system of Braille for the colour inclined”.
