Eco Dancer

If you have a webcam or pic of your face lying around somewhere have a go at making your own eco dancer. Funny stuff! 

MAD

A redesign of the Museum of Art and Design building by Brad Cloepfil of Allied Works Architecture was followed by a redesign of the museums graphic identity. Pentagram has created this new graphic identity which can already be seen throughout the city, on the side of buses, on street banners, in print ads and in the subways. The geometric-based marks are said to reflect the circles and squares present in the building's shape; its location, on Columbus Circle; and the building's iconic 'lollipop' columns retained in the redesign. The MAD acronym is such a great asset, its short, pronounceable and memorable and the design allows it to appear in different ways on different occasions. See more of the MAD on the pentagram website. Quirky typography with a playful colour palette.

Alex Ostrowski

Alex Ostrowski designed a large book of tear-out posters each with fun illustrations and type designed to help him remember something which he usually forgets from day-to-day such as 'anything i can imagine i can do', 'Leave early walk slow', and 'Dance is exercise'. Simple, personal and well executed. 

Second Lives

Second Lives explore the creative approaches of contemporary artists who give existing objects new life and meaning by transforming them into compelling works of art. The exhibition includes works by well knows designers and internationally acclaimed artists creating beautiful and exciting works from buttons, spools of thread, artificial hair, spoons, forks, shopping bags, syringes, vinyls and many others. Second Lives explores the transformation of the ordinary into the extraordinary and stimulates debate on function, value, and identity.

Body Worlds

Whilst at school we visited an extremely unusual and astonishing exhibition in London featuring real human and animal bodies, where their skin had been peeled off to reveal the inner organs, muscles, nerves etc. It is now to be held in London for the third time. Von Hagens' technique of plastination, in which a polymer is injected into body tissues to stop them breaking down allows it all to happen. Focusing on life from conception through to death, Body Worlds looks at exactly how our bodies age and the effects that longevity have upon us. With disease, distress and accident all taking their toll on our physical form, the exhibition examines how and why the body reacts as it does to age. I probably wouldn't suggest you visit this exhibition if you were slightly squeamish!

Future Systems

Future Systems is an architectural and design practice producing highly original work. The designs are not only architecturally innovative and visually striking, but are also pieces of highly functional equipment, inspired by both nature and technologies transferred from other industries. The image above shows Selfridges department store in Birmingham which was inspired by French designer Paco Rabanne's dresses. The blue exterior of the trendy store boasts 15,000 metallic disks that catches the sun, Selfridges says they 'shine out our commitment to all that is new and innovative'. To see more architecture from Future Systems visit their website.

Book Autopsies

Brian Dettmer carves into books revealing the artwork inside, creating complex layered three-dimensional sculptures. He seals, then cuts into old dictionaries, textbooks, science and engineering books, art books, medical guides, history books, atlases, comic books, wallpaper sample books, and many others, exposing select images and text to create intricate three-dimensional derivative works that reveal new or alternative interpretations of the books. He never inserts or moves any of the books' contents however in more recent work, Dettmer has augmented his artistic process by folding, bending, or rolling one or more books before sealing and cutting them, and in some instances, sanding them. 

In an earlier post artist Jennifer Maestre turned pencils into exciting sculptures, Dettmer is another artist who turns normal everyday objects into exciting works of art!

Pop Up Book

'Welcome to the enchanted universe of the Neiman Marcus Pop Up Book. This limited-edition memento follows a young girl's journey through Neiman Marcus from past to present. Our signature butterfly and an over-the-top Christmas make appearances, as well as our world-renowned art collection.'

Beautifully crafted, where attention to detail is at its upmost. In the top image the womans dress is made out of several black and white photos, even the shadows are actually printed, not real. A truly stunning book.

Of all the people in the world

A new show that uses grains of rice to represent the 6.7 billion of us on the planet has been touring where the rice has been used to replicate a whole range of statistics from the population of the USA (1st image shown above) to the number of people who have walked on the moon (2nd image shown above). People are invited to compare the one grain that is you to the millions that are not. The statistics can be shocking, witty, moving and really thought provoking. 

The show adapts to its setting: the country, city and building it is in. The amount of rice used varies according to which version is performed, Of All The People In All The World: UK is a standard small version using 1,000Kg of rice to represent 60,000,000 people. Of All The People In All The World: Europe at 12,000Kg is an example of a medium size version. So far there has been a single presentation of Of All The People In All The World in which the whole world's population was represented by 104 tons of rice in Stuttgart. See more images at Flickr.