Ontario-based photographer Patty Maher‘s work is hauntingly beautiful. Her inspiration lies in storytelling, set in both natural and urban settings, and through staged and self-portraits. Using posture and gesture the subjects’ faces are hidden, their inner worlds and emotions explored through symbol and color. Maher’s end goal in each piece is to disrupt the boundaries between real life and the otherworldly, the surreal and the fantastic.
British artist and art director Andy Welland creates painted collages rooted in contemporary fine art and commercial graphic design. Welland explores shape and form, familiar motifs, and cultural totems while blurring the line between handmade and digital.
Philadelphia-based artist Lydia Ricci literally turns trash into treasure. Each of her miniature sculptures is created from bits and pieces of scraps she collects and is based on a distinct memory. I like imagining the patience and dexterity that must go into each little creation!
This organic, conceptual chessboard is a real stunner. XYZ Integrated Architecture and Manoshka Kipiani joined talents to create a beautiful piece of pottery – Chess Vase – designed as an abstract take on the classic, using live florals in place of rooks and pawns.
These incredible paint and torn paper creations by Andrea Myers have me straight up mesmerized. They also have me thinking I really, really wish I’d thought of that! So I guess what I’m really saying is that I’m completely inspired, which is what most art aspires to do at the end of the day. (A+++)
You know that person who is super creative and can make just about anything? That’s Gavin Coyle, a studio workshop based in East London dedicated to preserving the skills of traditional craftsmanship in new ways. They’re an incredibly innovative group with a less is more ethos who create as little waste during production as possible. Check out their shop or request a bespoke piece all your own.
I doubt there’s a more fitting start to the new year than Honor Freeman‘s porcelain bars of used soap and sponges. Fresh starts, wiping the slate clean, and many other sentimentalities ring true as each of us hammers out just what it is we’d like to accomplish in the twelve months to come.
Noticing and quietly commemorating the smaller moments that are a constant rhythm of the everyday continues to be a preoccupation in my work. I seek to make visible the relationship between us and the objects we use, the gestures, mundane activities and humble objects, like small markers silently measuring the hours and marking the days. Thoughts of preserving, measuring and marking time’s passing occupy the work during the making. There is a correlation between actions and gestures used when engaging with objects and those used during the process of making that informs the work. Using the mimetic qualities of clay via the process of slipcasting, the work playfully interacts with ideas of liquid made solid due to the processes of making that are fundamental when working with clay. The porcelain casts become echoes of the original (object), the liquid slip becoming solid and forming a memory of a past form, the essence of an object. Small moments caught and made solid as if frozen in time – liquid made solid.
With the exception of one post next week, I’m closing up shop until January! Wishing you all a fantastic end of the year, no matter what holiday(s) you’re celebrating or not celebrating. I hope you’re surrounded by warmth and comfort and love and know that it means the world that you allow Design Crush to be the tiniest part of your life.