Korean artist Seungchun Lim creates life-size sculptures. His work is steeped in narrative, each piece a character. Seungchun’s sculptures are, in fact, part of a complex story. The three eyed boy above is born with a hump in his back that turns out to be wings. Eventually his wings are stolen from him. Independent of their grand tale, Seungchun’s sculptures still exude an air lonliness and sadness. His characters wordlessly communicate through their powerful but quiet imagery.
Kim Tucker’s ceramic sculptures are burly messes of gender– exorcising primal desires, akin to a Bukowski or Fante novel, with a dash of Freud, but crafted with more of a surrealistic feminine charge. Each nude, for example, sexually and emotionally gestures at our gentle need for communion from one body to the next, illustrating psychologically how we bleed failure, rejection, isolation or loss.
KCRW’s Laura Schumate laments on each figure’s soft absorption: “There’s a desire to protect them like your own children or a friend, while acknowledging their familiar sorrow within yourself.”
On that note, the entire menagerie evokes not only Tucker’s inner children, but also our own, as they engage in “psychological storytelling”– narrating open wounds we are inclined to protect, lick, mother, or share: a deep commiseration over the tragedy of bodily confinement.
It may surprise you to know that these are not real animals – they’re probably most accurately called paintings. Artist Keng Lye brings these aquatic creatures to life by creating layers of resin and alternating them with acrylic paint. Coupled with his expert play of perspective, the fish (and other creatures) seem ultra realistic. Keng Lye has since added three dimensional portions to his ‘paintings’ as can be seen in these first four images, making them seem even more unbelievably alive and real. [via]
After unknowingly purchasing fake pre-Colombian artifacts, artist Nadín Ospina gave serious thought to Latin-American culture and its ancient roots. His sculptures depicts pop-culture cartoon characters such as Snoopy, Micky Mouse, and Bart Simpson in an often pre-Colombian style. His work is a powerful but simple comment on the globalization of entertainment and information. How much of our personal and collective identities is lost to an increasingly global community?
Like its real-life counterpart, this coral reef is alive in a way. Organized by the LA based non-profit organization, Institute for Figuring, the reef was lovingly constructed by many hands. According to the Institute for Figuring, the institute is “an organization dedicated to the poetic and aesthetic dimensions of science, mathematics and engineering”, and certainly does this with its Crochet Coral Reef.
The public is invited to participate by crocheting different organisms that are added to the larger crochet habitat. The reef has grown to become one of the largest participatory science and art projects in the world. It does much more than organize a community to engage with visual art and craft. It brings attention to the biology of coral reefs, emphasizes their importance, and reminds us of the danger they’re currently in.
The work of artist Joanie Lemercier resembles Tron type imagery that has come to life. This piece’s materials, however, are really rather simple: paper and light. Lemercier folds paper into variously sized pyramids which are then arranged as a composition on the wall. The composition is visually mapped and a light projection is layered onto the installation. The result is a futuristic glowing geometric pattern. Lemercier is a member of AntiVJ – a “visual label”, a collective of artists that focus on light and perception in regards to art. If you enjoy the work of Joanie Lemercier, check out the work of fellow member Olivier Ratsi.
These are much more than simple balloon animals. Jason Hackenwerth‘s creations float like giant swimming organisms. His newest creature, Pisces, which recently debuted at the Edinburgh International Science festival is particularly massive. Pisces is built of thousands of balloons blown up and tied together. It took three of members of the festival six days to blow up all of the balloons for the 40 foot structure. The piece now hangs in the Grand Gallery of the National Museum of Scotland through April 14, 2013.
The sculptures of Naoko Ito are elegant in their simplicity. Indeed, these pieces are entirely constructed of only two materials: a tree and jars. A limb of a tree is cut into several segments and each segment, in turn, is placed in a jar. Naoko carefully arranges the jarred pieces to reconstruct the shape of the limb. A subdued commentary on the relationship between humans and nature, the imagery is immediate all the same. Though the shape and size of the tree limb is intact, the jarred branches are nearly gloomy.
