Design

Section

Art Design

Knife Typography

Life is Beautiful is a 2009 installation by Iranian artist Farhad Moshiri using hundreds of kitchen knives to create some exquisite typography.

 

Art Design

Embodiment: A Neon Skeleton by Eric Franklin

Portland-based sculptor Eric Franklin constructs stunning (if not slightly disconcerting) anatomical light structures that are fully hollow and filled with ionized krypton, causing them to glow similar to a neon light. The glass skeleton above, Embodiment, is my jaw-dropping favorite of this series. The piece took over 1,000 hours of work over a two year period and is actually built from 10 separate units of glass formed from borosilicate glass tubing. The process of creating something like this is unbelievably painstaking as Franklin shares via email:

Every glass seal has to be perfect, and this piece contains hundreds. Everywhere one tube joins another, or a tube terminates, glass tubes were sealed together. They have to be perfect in order to preserve the luminosity of the krypton. If one rogue molecule gets inside the void of the glass tubing it can eventually contaminate the gas and it will no longer glow. There are times when the holes in the seals are so small that you cannot actually see them with your eyes without the help of a leak detector. Once the glass pieces are ready to get filled with gas, I pull a high vacuum while the glass is hot in order to evacuate any dust or water vapor from the interior surface until there are literally no molecules inside the void of the glass. Then the krypton can be introduced and the glass sealed off. It’s an extremely tedious process, one I have somewhat of a love/hate relationship with.

You can see much more of Franklin’s work on his website, and if you liked this also check out the work of Jessica Lloyd-Jones. Photos above courtesy Brad Carlile. (via my amp goes to 11)

Art Design

Geometric Currency Sculptures Folded by Kristi Malakoff

I’m really enjoying these folded and pasted currency sculptures by Canadian visual artist Kristi Malakoff (previously). Each polyhedra is folded, cut and pasted together from several bills, blending the textures and colors from multiple worldwide currencies. (via my modern met)

Update: These particular pieces were designed by Tom Hull, Meenakshi Mukerji, Heinz Strobl, and Makoto Yamaguchi.

Design Photography

Gravity Defying Photography for Chocolate Trail by NAM

First: everything in these photos, liquid typography included, is part of a single photograph, and if you don’t believe it just watch the video. This new series of ads was created by art/design collective NAM (previously here and here) for the Harbour City Chocolate Trail, a charity project for the Hong Kong Blood Cancer Foundation. The series uses their signature method of suspending objects and people with strings and cables to create weightless environments that appear to be caught mid-explosion. See many more photos and behind the scenes videos of the project here. If you like this style of non-digital execution, make sure you’re also familiar with Le Creative Sweatshop.

Art Design

A French Hotel Room Half Covered in Graffiti

Internationally recognized graffiti artist Tilt has just completed this eye-popping interior design work for the Au Vieux Panier hotel in Marseille, France. The hotel has just five rooms that are annually reconceptualized by commissioned artists and designers, somewhat similar to NYC’s Carlton Arms. For this space entitled Panic Room (which might aptly describe your mental state after a few nights in this Willy Wonkaesque environment) Tilt divided the room perfectly down the middle, one half covered entirely in his trademark vibrant and bubbly graffiti and the other half left stark white. See a sneak peek of all five concepts at Au Vieux Panier, including a room by Philippe Baudelocque who draws fantastic illustrations of animals using chalk. All in all, if I were checking in, Panic Room would be the clear choice. Photography above by the Big Addict. (via my modern met)

 

Animation Design

Kinetic Rings Mimic the Flight of Birds

Kansas-based metalsmith and jeweler Dukno Yoon creates rings, bracelets, and other devices that mimic the movements of birds by harnessing the motion caused by the flick of the wrist or flexing of fingers. Yoon received his BFA from Kookmin University, Seoul and a MFA from Miami University, Oxford, Ohio and most recently has been working on a series of metronomes that also explore the movement of birds. Though I was only able to embed a few of the animated examples of his work above, head over to his Wings gallery to see many more devices in action, the bracelets in particular are really fun to watch.