Dream Job

The making-of Video for the Times+ Subscription, 2011 from Su Blackwell on Vimeo.

 I want their jobs, not that I don't love mine, but I want this one as well.

And then came beer

I do love my stop frame animations. I'm also 99% sure that's what they're called.

The latest to add to my clever advertisements corner is this Pilsner advert. Watch the actual ad below and then check out the behind the scenes video below it. And I dare you not to want to watch the first one again. The attention to detail and the time and consideration that goes into literally every second of the process is just incredible.

Above video courtesy of Su Blackwell. Paper Artist extroardinaire.

B is for Bianca

Bianca Chang is an Australian based paper artist who creates these amazingly intricate 3D paper letter sculptures. I love incredible detail to them and that they are all cut by hand.

Detail below

Her website has a video (below) that shows you the process, pretty cool me thinks. 

 

And in case you are at this point going - dude she uses a lot of  paper, well you'de be right. But its all 100% recycled and Chang says that she chose photocopy paper as it 

 "has an archival lifespan of 200 years yet it is treated as a highly disposable material - printed on then thrown away. I craft my sculptures from layers of 80gsm photocopy paper with the intention of transforming a typically consumable medium into a long term piece of art."

A simple idea, beautifully executed.

Comic dogs

Yes I know the pun was weak, but seriously who could resist. They're paper mache dogs covered in old Beano comics. Get it?

 

They are the work of Justine Smith. Her more recent work tends towards the more monetary in subject. She creates sculptures out of currency. Her dogs are still my favourite pieces by her, but I do like her money flowers, subtly done, at first glance the material is not apparent. She gets her point across but doesn't hit you over the head with it. 

Tuesday loves ...paper

Yesterday was a rain day. The equivalent of a snow day but not as much fun. So apologies for the lack of content.

So back to today... paper.
Ts'ai Lun, a Chinese courtier is generally credited with the invention of paper. There is evidence that his paper may not have been the first but clever man that he was he got noticed enough that he is the first recorded papermaker. I could go on about the whole paper making process all day but I'll stop myself here. Suffice is to say that when he first came up with the idea over 2000 years ago I doubt he foresaw the lengths to which it would be stretched in the name of art. 

The backdrop of this Bergdorf Goodman window display is a piece of art in itself. Of course that's the entire point of the exercise. To draw in and entice the customer, to lift the shopping experience above the mundane.  Its also a feat of engineering or a lot of superglue.

The giant telephone in the background is made entirely from paper

 

As is the film themed display below and the giant lobster

Molo, a Canadian design company, is one company with paper very much at its core. Its an offshoot of Forsythe and McAllen a small architecture firm in Vancouver. They design a range of products made entirely from paper, but strong enough to be used as seating

 

Softseating (above)

Urchin softlight. You can see a video on youtube here of how it works. Its an incredibly simple but very clever design.

 The softwall, again made from paper, comes in a few different forms.Above is the natural undyed paper wall.

 

 Here an integrated flexible LED lighting strip turns the wall into a luminous object.

You can see the honeycomb structure of the softwall  above. From what I can see there are some limitations, for one, you would never have straight walls in your house. The softwall appears to always need to be curved. Not that I'm saying that is necessarily a bad thing.

But all in all Molo have created not only functional products but beautiful pieces of art too. And they even manage to be environmentally friendly along the way. 50% of the raw material is from recycled fibre and the end product is 100% recyclable.

Of course Molo aren't the first designers to make furniture from something other than timber.

Frank Gehry created the Wiggle Chair in the 1970's, made entirely from corrugated cardboard. And since then there have been copious copies both good and bad.

Peter Calleson is another paper fan who I just recently discovered. Frankly I found it really hard to select just a few images to show you. So here are some of my favourites from his A4 papercuts (all made using one sheet of A4 paper).

Angel 2006

The short distance between time and shadow

Cradle (above)

Do not enter

He also does works on a larger scale, some are replicates of his smaller works.

Alive but Dead (above)

White Diary - made from an A5 notebook

A detail from White Diary

For me the most beautiful parts of these sculptures are the details, when you look closely the things that are suddenly revealed to you. How he uses the details to comment on the whole. To tell a story beyond just a pretty paper cut out

We've come a long way from beating mulberry bark and bamboo fibres into pulp, but I like to think that along the way we havn't lost our wonder at a simple thing called paper.

Wednesday surfs for ... Su Blackwell

Su Blackwell is an English artist who works with paper, creating miniature worlds that delight and enchant. The first time I heard of her was when she worked on the Beringer Wine Campaign, the video here

is incredible. You have to watch it to believe it, the last 30 seconds are probably the best but the 'making of' is equally interesting. Recently she was in Elle magazine below

Her art is definitely on my wish list of pieces to buy ... someday

Have a nice wednesday