books! art!

Mike Stilkey combines some of my favorite things in his work: books and art. Old, decrepit, books. Dark, whimsical, Tim Burton-esque drawings. Some even have cats and bikes; what's not to love?


I have been wanting to combine literature and painting for some time now and have sort of been struggling with the logistics. Tearing out pages of a book and painting over them is my thought, with patches of text showing through, but then do I need to worry about copyrights? Stilkey's solution to incorporating books is simple and the new canvas creates a wonderfully diverse starting point. He also does larger installation pieces, made up of hundreds or thousands of books. Here, he's coated a piano with book covers giving it a collage feel.

pull on the cord, let it take us away.

I'm currently en route to Portland, and the drive westward reminds me of my road trip with Jess a couple years ago to Albuquerque's Hot Air Balloon Fiesta. I'm not sure how I developed an obsession with hot air balloons, but there is something about them I completely adore. The simplicity of their design. The freedom. The adventure.

Some day, watch for a The Kid Detective's song about their allure.

Here are some of my old photographs from the fiesta as well as some other illustrations and photographs of hot air balloons I find enchanting.

I wanted to hug it.

Watercolour by Raquel Aparicio. The point of view on this piece is absolutely brilliant, as well as the soft colors and use of white space. The balloon is simply part of the flock.
An event poster designed by Minneapolis Fallout Gallery.

Watercolour available for purchase by babouche rouge on etsy.

Jim Datz drawing including hot air balloon and mustaches! win, win.

Dazzling photo on weheartit. I want to go to there.

Wanderlust staitionery by two guitars on etsy.

paper art

magazine cut-out art by nate page. spooky, no?


Paper Plates. Hah! By Joshua Gajownik. Can't beat nerdy, pun-filled dishes.


Rules, by Laser Bread. Simple, and effective. Makes me want to use thread in more projects.

crossword art

I mentioned my first attempts at crossword art poems a while back, but have since realized that individual pieces are more coherent. The first step is combining trendy nouns (pirate, t-rex, zombie) with appropriate pairings (arrgh, rawr, brains). Then I digitally design a crossword to fit and finish each one with a small sketch to keep them unique. To stay hip, my next series is going to have to include vampires, narwhals, and maybe bacon...

tetris in our lives

We all need a little tetris in our lives. With Halloween right around the corner, I am reminded of how amazing a group costume of tetris pieces would be. But impracticality rules it out; how would we dance? How would we drink? I've got another full year to work out these logistics. I still have hope. Photograph above by Patrick Runte- check out his other game inspired works.

A great example of tetris functionality-based designs are shelves. Lauren recieved a birthday gift of tetris shelves similar to the ones below from her new fiancé (congrats)! For those lacking carpentry skills but with ample cash to spend, they are available through Brave Space Design.


And for those without cash or carpentry skills, I urge you to graffiti sketchy neighborhoods with nerdy game references and consider tetris shapes when breaking out windows.

one classy gent

Probably everyone has seen these college pictures of Obama taken by Lisa Frank in 1980, but I'm quite fond of them so I felt like posting regardless. Also, it makes me want to take more photo shoots of my friends. In black and white. With cigarettes and silly hats.

The intimacy and insights of portraits gets lost with our saturation of photographs on sites like facebook, something that an intentional photo shoot brings about. And besides, you never know who will rise to fame in a few decades.

dreams of flying

Jan von Holleben is a German photographer, and as seen in his Dreams of Flying series, has been doing the lay-on-the-ground-sideways-so-it-looks-like-you're-upright thing for quite some time. In fact, so confident is Holleben that he originated this idea that he has a "tribute" section on his website, divided into two catergories. "Greetings" are obvious flattery via imitation, including some great fan photos, and "Finds," which might as well read, "I did it first."



Holleben even turned his still photographs into video form, maybe to compete with imitators? Whatever the reason, I think the outcome lovely.

Bell X1 - The Ribs of a Broken Umbrella.