Linden Eller combines found fragments and personal elements to create floating abstract shapes sewn together with thread on paper. Themes of memory, its process, and layers of recollection are a central theme in her work, conveyed through the use of pale colors and tracing paper to create a hazy environment. Linden also communicates the melancholy in unresolved matters, like her brother’s autism, or natural losses.
Emma-Leone Palmer paints faces, but what she strives to capture are the deep wells of feeling and emotion that run beneath the surface of their expressions. Her latest work, the Paint Play series, uses paint, lube, glitter, and water, the mediums smeared, dripped, flicked, and splashed onto the subject’s face to trigger reactions and emotions. It’s not premeditated, rather hundreds of photos are taken and the paintings made as a result.
Ceramicist Julia Haft-Candell‘s The Infinite examines the idea behind the title and concept through a series of two dozen black clay sculptures and five rock-like pieces constructed from the scraps of those sculptures, called Weights. Each looping variation features a pattern across its surface – wave, arch, chain, eye, weave, knot, or braid – and you can read more about each in the project’s accompanying glossary of terms and symbols.
Summertime is definitely nostalgia-filled season, and Kyle Surges‘ paintings – yes, paintings! – bring on the feelings in spades. That perfect rectangle of Hershey’s chocolate is just waiting to become a toasty s’more. Those Coca Colas are begging to be uncapped next to a pool on a sweltering day. Surges is a master of capturing these objects of youth and beyond.
Orbita is a conceptual wall clock that defies the classic concept of clock, where the hands turn on a fixed central point. In Orbita they’ve been replaced by two “turntables” that roll on a fixed plate with only two elements needed to mark the passing of time – two dots that mark hours and minutes.
Abstract expressionism is often thought of as old boys club. Thankfully, Australian painter and contemporary artist Lani Mitchell is challenging the thought with her own work that’s inspired and driven by experiences of love, relationships, and kindness. All of these pieces are from her KIND exhibit which explores these themes within a micro and macro context.
I think we can all agree that beautiful, everyday objects have a way of elevating life. Alissa Bell‘s impeccably designed minimalist modern line of notebooks and stationery embody this mindset completely in the Essentialist Collection. Elegant, clean, and simple, you’ll be sending snail mail and reaching for a notebook rather than your phone to take notes in no time. (She also does custom orders!)
Kelly Beeman‘s unmistakable illustration style is such an inspiration. The Brooklyn-based, self-taught artist has a diverse body of work, from simple black and white contour drawings of nudes to watercolor paintings full of mundane objects and contradictions.
Barbara Dziadosz is a freelancing illustrator from Hamburg, Germany who specializes in printmaking, editorial, illustrated recipes, and character design. Two subjects she returns to again and again are eloquently posed hands holding various flora and different species of insects, both captured in a flat 2D style that I’m partial to. (And that snake? Yeah, I’d love it tattooed on my ribcage.)
Madrid-based designers Tessa Dóniga and Christian Baumgartner – AKA Fragmento Universo – are a creative team that doesn’t limit themselves to any one medium. They work on film, music, and art projects for their clients, usually combining design, art direction, and sound that result in aesthetic concepts that are often lo-fi in nature. What I notice, more than anything else in their work, is the innate sense of balance each campaign offers.
