Pen on paper. Sure, that seems nice and simple.

I love these pink and red tangled up knots by San Francisco artist Leigh Wells. They’re so complex, yet so simple at the same time. Lovely.

Share Some Candy has a section on artist’s work spaces, and I when I stumbled upon it the other day I couldn’t control the jealousy. My favourite studio belongs to a very talented illustrator/artist named Camilla Engman. She’s got a cute & creative loft in Göteborg, Sweden. Such a great space to spread out your supplies and just make beautiful stuff all day long. And the cherry on top of this studio? A little dog on a gold couch… I’ll take one of each please.

Coming up on November 7th, 2009

1 night. 50 artists. Crazy amounts of hot one inch action!

This is such a fun show (I wish I thought of it!). It was started in 2004 and has become an annual event in Vancouver. Here’s how it works… The founders of the show, Chris and Jim, choose 50 artists from the many submissions they get. The artwork is then made into 1″ buttons and hung on the gallery wall. At the show you pay *$5 for 5 random buttons out of the 50. You then spend the rest of the evening in a totally packed out gallery engaged in hot trading action trying to acquire the buttons you really want/love. It’s fun, it’s crazy and you come away with some very cool wearable art… albeit very tiny.

… I have to point it out – how awesome is that nipple button?! Worn strategically on one’s jacket you could be quite the conversation piece.

*Last year is was $5, I assume it will be the same this year, but don’t quote me on it.

Yes. That’s right. Vintage tattoos made of hand-sewn lace.

You’ve got to think that for Theresa Honeywell this painstaking work must be almost as agonizing as getting a real tattoo. This is how she explains her process… “[Each piece is] made in the similar labor intense way that a tattoo is made, using only a needle to draw with, but instead of ink on skin, my medium is only thread on thread.”

I’m getting a headache just thinking about this. Ouch! Hand cramp! Ooh! And now my eyes hurt! Aaaa!

Writing about Diane Arbus the other day got me thinking about Cindy Sherman – another female photographer that I love. Cindy’s subject matter? Cindy… kinda. She is the subject of every single one of her photographs, although you might not be able to tell. She morphs herself into all sorts of characters (I love the the B-Movie starlets) in order to make a commentary on the ‘role and representation of women in society, the media and the nature of the creation of art.’

{Super cool fact: Cindy Sherman recently bought two pieces from another artist that I’ve written about… Martha Rich. Just one more reason for me to be ridiculously jealous of you Martha!}

Oh! Just missed Tina Berning’s solo show at Gallery Hanahou in New York. The show was called Passengers and closed last Friday. If you live in New York, I hope you got to see it. If not, all 29 drawings that were in the show are now up on her site. Enjoy!

{I wrote about Tina for the first time last July… Yep, still jealous.}

How do you make a photo-real painting even more technically difficult? Do it on a series of individual panels and then put it together. Jeff Cohen makes this look easy… I, however, get a bit of a headache just thinking about it.

Julie Morstad‘s website is full of so many amazing drawings, it was pretty hard to decide what to show. After much debate, I opted for a house theme… hundreds being crushed under foot, one that is obviously a bit cramped, and several that have been uprooted and are falling into nothingness. All excellent choices I’d say.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you Canadians out there!

I am thankful for the people who put so much effort and love into their beautiful art blogs. They inspire me, and of course, make me jealous… how do you find time to do 5 posts a day?! Anyway, if I could send each of  them a piece of pumpkin pie I would, but I can’t, so I’ll send a little link love instead. Love love love love…. xo

obsessive consumption //  Pikaland //  share some candy //  BOOOOOOOM! //  my love for you is a stampede of horses //  Design for Mankind //  Book By it’s Cover //  Poppytalk // sfgirlbybay

I usually write about contemporary artists, but today I’m jealous of an artist from a few decades back ~ rewind to the 1960’s if you will. These amazing portraits are by Diane Arbus, one of America’s most influential photographers. She was best known for capturing the images of somewhat strange people, or to be a little less politically correct… ‘freaks’. Her life story is quite interesting but a bit sad, and her completely made up life story in the movie Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus, is even more interesting and even more sad. If you  haven’t seen it, you should! It’s beautiful, very Alice in Wonderland.