Space Oddity kind of freaked me out when I was a kid, so it probably wouldn’t have been my first choice for a kid’s book. But, Andrew Kolb has changed my mind; his illustrations of David Bowie’s classic are great. His book hasn’t been published, but you can download a PDF here. Oh, and check out this crazy Space Oddity “video.”
UPDATE: As many of you have probably noticed, Andrew Kolb isn’t offering the book for download from his site. He has in fact obscured the lyrics and title on the images he has on his site. You can however, view all of the pages at Wired.com.
Alexa Meade‘s art is awesome. Sure, it is a tiny bit reminiscent of the Pageant of the Masters, but the Pageant of the Masters is pretty awesome too. Her work is a true multi-media experience — an amazing combination of painting, installation, performance and photography. Check out a bunch more work, plus some process shots, in her portfolio and on flickr.
Oh, and here are some videos of Alexa showing her process and speaking about her work.
We posted recently about the launch of swiss-miss‘s fabulous new temporary tattoos Tattly. Well, they are on sale on Fab for the next 3 days. I am a little reluctant to tell more people about Fab, but it is a really great site. It is an invitation only sale site for design-y things and design inspiration. Need an invite to Fab? Well, here you go.
Aren’t these high-speed photographs from Appuru Pai great? I love that they look abstract at first glance and but upon further inspection you begin to see lights and cars and buildings. So pretty! Check our more of Appuru Pai’s here.
We know, we know. It’s been about 400 million years since we did a Schmetsy, which is fitting since that’s almost as long as our fine, featured, fearsome finned friends have been kicking around. In honor of those strong, shrewd stewards of the sea (and everyone’s favorite annual event), this week’s Schmetsy celebrates Shark Week!
Row 1: Monster Shark Can Cozy by Handamade; Great White Shark Silhouette Necklace by ANORIGINALJEWELRY; Tiny Felt Hammerhead Shark by nicolaluke
I love these new Oliver Sacks book covers (due out in August) from Vintage, designed by Cardon Webb. Interestingly, Cardon posted them on Dribbble a few months ago, saying they’d been killed. I’m glad someone realized how great they are and gave them the green light. via Spine Out
I’d meant to post about these a while back when I first saw—and subsequently fell in love with—them. Not only is the animation well done, the images themselves are lovely. I think subtle the movement is in some of them is just amazing.
These cinemagraphs from Jamie Beck and Kevin Burg are already popping up all over the place, like on Gilt Taste (need an invite to Gilt? click here) and The New York Times, and I expect we will be seeing a lot more of them in the future.
Last weekend we saw the new Mike Mills film Beginners. Afterward I said it was my favorite movie of the new decade, and I have yet to take that back. Its got incredible heart, innovative pacing, a fantastic script, and an admirable sense of authenticity. But enough about the film. Do we look like a movie review blog? Just go see it: let’s talk type.
Beginners with its beautifully awkward brushy cursive (shades of Interview masthead and Quiksilver logo but far more humble/charming than both) belongs squarely to the last grouping I mentioned in my analysis of handwriting-on-movie-poster trending — that is, it is typecast with the painfully earnest Freaks and Geeks, Beautiful Losers (which he’s featured in along with handletterer Geoff McFettridge) and Where the Wild Things Are (by fellow Beastie Boys collaborator Spike Jonze and fellow enthusiast for the authentic Dave Eggers). His previous feature film Thumbsucker also falls into this category, as does Me You and Everyone We Know(the first feature film of his wife, artist Miranda July). Indeed, though not movies, so does her book of stories or his great series of products, “Humans.” These are all linked by a raw earnestness signalled by their use of handlettering.
So, wait. I know handwriting and that… some of that is not handwriting, it’s Helvetica. The more I look at Mike Mills’ work (of art rather than design for clients) the more it seems he has two modes: handwriting and Helvetica. And I’m generally not a fan of the font without qualities, but with his content in it, I’m a bit in love. Words from the heart makes sense in scrawled lettering, but it’s a bit obvious. Text about the human experience, or sadness, in the typeface of generics and megacorps is sort of beautiful.
For much more Mike Mills, visit his site. I recommend watching his short film Deformer — though the preview on his site is only a minute of its 17-min run time. If you live by me, I’ll lend you the issue of the Believer it’s in.
Oddly, the Experts are a surprisingly tattoo-free group. Thankfully, Tina Roth Eisenberg (AKA swissmiss) has come to the rescue for those times when you just want a little design-y body art. Inspired by the lack of cool temporary tattoos for her daughter, swissmiss contacted a number of designers to see if they liked her idea for Tattly and to see if they would be interested in submitting designs. Some pretty awesome designers have contributed so far, though unsurprisingly, my two favorites are Frank Chimero’s Knucks and Jessica Hische’s Type Nerd (though I kind of love them all). For the first 2 weeks, you can get the whole set for $35.
