Exquisite Corpse
“His Face All Red” + “The Book of Soil”
Click the image above to be taken to a wonderful Web comic/story, titled His Face All Red, by Emily Carroll – an eerie, dark, surreal, well-crafted, and intriguing modern fairy tale.
This is an absolutely amazing piece of papercraft genius, and it’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before. The Book of Soil is an experimental book-/paper-making project from designer and illustrator Teagan White.
Click the link below to see more pages from the book.Tags: blood, book-making, bugs, illustrations, modern fairy tales, papercraft, twins/doppelgangers/doubles, Web comics, wolves, woods
MishMash [001]: Animal Skull, Anatomical, Macabre, and Gothy Goodness
+ Leather/jet-black collar and shoulder piece by Mascherina
[Modern Mourning]Tags: anatomical-themed, animal skulls, avant-garde goth, haute couture, jewelry, neo-victorian, religious imagery, skeleton
Reddened Mouths, White Masks, Hungry Fingers
These are ever-so-creepy installation artworks by Israeli sculptor Ronit Baranga
(via Acidolatte):
Tags: conceptual, installation art, masks, sculptures, surreal horror, teacups
Posters for the “Fake Too Fake” Exhibition
Photographed by Giovanni Bortolani and styled by Marcorea Malià
Tags: conceptual, fleshy, meaty, photomanipulation, political, posters
798 Art Zone in Beijing
When I went on my recent trip to China (that’s where I’ve been these last two weeks), I visited this amazing art district in Beijing called 798 Space or 798 Art Zone. Though I liked many other places in Beijing, it was my favorite, and even though 798 seems to be a pretty popular tourist site, it seems different somehow from anywhere else in the city. It’s so nice and quiet there, the aesthetic being minimalist and modern but really interesting, quirky, and quite beautiful, and the art is creative and right down my alley. I loved how we could just walk unobtrusively, stealthily into any lofty, white gallery and check out the art as we liked and go around; there weren’t many people around. It was like a giant First Friday, a fantasy one for me.
798 used to be an industrial area that many artists have since converted into an inspiring contemporary art community with loads of studios, galleries, and cafes. The military factory buildings built in the ’50s in a unique, Bauhaus-influenced architectural style, redesigned and reclaimed by the artists in the ’90s and 2000s, now house works of art and provocative exhibits. Their former status as factories and industrial buildings, in their modern incarnation, serves to give them a beautiful, original, rather than sterile quality. I’ve never seen such spacious and minimalistically majestic indie art galleries and studios. I loved it.
Found on Flickr; not my image.
Not my image
Not my image
A postcard and bookmark I picked up there.There was this amazing installation, “Tears” by Luan Jiaqi, in one of the exhibits. I now regret not taking a picture of it. Even though there were “No photos” signs all over the place, everyone seemed to be taking pictures, anyway. I sadly can’t find any of it on the Internet. If anybody knows what the hell I’m talking about and has pictures of this installation, please let me know. My description would only sound crummy and probably not give you any real idea of what it looks like. The closest comparison that I can draw is to the work of Jin Young Yu; it was a group of expressive, white faces hanging from the ceiling/floating in space, with “tears” streaming down.
It’s kind of ironic that I do this blogging thing, because I don’t feel that any of the art or images I like really need to be explained, or can be. Maybe that’s why I’m liking Tumblr so much.
Tags: 798, beijing, contemporary architecture, pop surrealism, weird sculptures
Victorian Prosthetic Arm
Speaking of Victorian prosthetics, here’s a picture of the hand on a prosthetic arm from the late 19th century, currently resting in the London Science Museum:
via GizmodoI don’t, however, think it’s “creepy” as many others seem to, it just looks very neat and elegant and amazingly detailed. Have they ever seen a modern-day prosthesis? And they think that looks creepy! Hey, if I lost an arm, I think I’d rather have something like that than one of the flesh-colored plastic/hook hand contraptions around now.
Tags: prosthetic, victorian
“Sandman” Adaptation for TV
Warner Bros. TV is adapting The Sandman graphic novel series into a show [article]. I’m not sure if that’s a good or bad thing, but I’m kind of looking forward to it nonetheless, whenever it airs. I can’t help thinking it might turn out better if it was being made by HBO or something, though.
I was super obsessed with Sandman in high school. It was kind of an epiphany for me. It was and still is the most profound, intellectually and visually interesting, artistic, and endearing thing in the comic book world that I’ve ever found. My favorite members of the Endless are Dream, Death, and Delirium; I see myself in each of them. I hope that they find actors who somewhat fit the roles for the Endless. I particularly think it’s important that they find an actress who suits my idea of what Death should look like, for some reason.
Tags: graphic novels, neil gaiman, tee-vee, the endless, the sandman
Prosthetic Doll Leg
I blogged earlier about Marina Bychkova‘s doll creations. She sometimes tattoos her porcelain dolls with the most intricate and interesting designs. I’m just posting this, a doll leg painted as a vintage prosthetic, because it’s so cool.
This doll is based on the tragic literary figure Anna Karenina (if she had survived her ultimate suicide attempt with major damages to her body, consequently having to wear an orthopedic corset, arm brace, and prosthetic left leg). Images of the rest of the doll after the cut.
Tags: dolls, marina bychkova, medical-themed, porcelain, prosthetic
Fairy Tales, Fables, and Ghost Stories [001]
Fox spirit stories are really common in East Asian mythology, and I’m sure this story exists elsewhere in another form, but this particular version of the story I took from the novel Fox Girl by Nora Okja Keller.
“…a big fox visits a country school. It is late at night and the students have decided to sleep in the schoolroom because it is too dark to walk home. All but one of the hundred students have fallen asleep when the one awake hears a soft guttural voice counting pairs of shoes outside…all the way to one hundred.
Through the window, the boy sees the snout of a fox, but as it crawls through the window, it takes the shape of a beautiful young woman. The boy thinks he must be dreaming and rubs his eyes. He strains to see in the darkness and notices: the dirt from a newly dug grave lodged under her nails; the blood like lipstick staining her mouth; the glittering of a hunter’s eyes in the night.
The boy crawls away, hiding in a far corner of the room. He watches the fox girl count the students with a kiss that steals their breaths. With each kiss, a boy stops breathing and dies in middream.
When she approaches the corner where the youngest boy is hiding, he creeps back to his sleeping place. Sick with fear, he lies down among the dead bodies of his friends. When the girls reaches the end of the row of students, she growls. ‘Only ninety-nine! There is one missing. How can that be?’
She rushes outside to recount the pairs of shoes. One hundred. She counts again, to be absolutely certain, and all the while the boy inside tries not to move, tries not to breathe. After again finding exactly one hundred pairs of shoes, the fox girl turns toward the door to recount the boys. Just then, a cock crows. The demon drops to all fours and scampers into the nearby woods. The clever boy is saved, the only one out of a hundred to live.”
Tags: fairy tales, fox stories
Body Remix/Goldberg Variations
I really like this medical/”handicap”-themed dance routine from Compagnie Marie Chouinard:
reposted from Haute MacabreTags: ballet dancers, crutches, medical braces, medical-themed
