Rachael Rice’s dreamy work.

April 12, 2013 ~ Katy Kelleher ~ Leave a comment

When I was little, I used to make dreamcatchers all the time. I was obsessed with Native American mythology and culture. I read every book in our elementary school library on fairy tales, myths, and legends. I didn’t really like any other kind of book. I wanted to hear about the girl who married the moon, or the boy who turned into a bear.

I think that’s why I’m still so drawn to dreamcatchers. Though sometimes a little cheesy, they’re gorgeous when made right, and artist Racheal Rice does it right. She turns the dreamcatcher into a glorious mess of ribbon and beads. The woven center holds it all together, gives it a depth and geometric balance. I would love to have one of these hanging above my bed.

But I might need to settle for a dreamcatcher print. Society 6 has some nice ones…

The History of Pretty: The most beautiful sculpture I have never seen.

April 9, 2013December 31, 2014 ~ Katy Kelleher ~ 3 Comments

If you asked me to name my favorite sculpture, the answer would be easy: Bernini’s Apollo and Daphne. While baroque painting was never my favorite—except Caravaggio, because it is impossible not to adore Caravaggio and his bloody, beautiful youths—baroque sculpture and architecture is truly amazing. And what Bernini could do with a slab of marble is particularly amazing.

Just look at the way her limbs change into trees! It’s like looking at music. It’s so poetic and deeply alive. This sculpture shows the culmination of the myth of Daphne, a river nymph (and thus a woman after my own waterlogged heart) who is chased by the god Apollo, who seeks to possess her after being hit with Cupid’s mischievous arrow. Daphne calls out to her father, the god Poseidon, and begs for some way to avoid the seemingly inevitable rape. He decides the best thing to do is to turn her into a tree, because this is before we had words for everything and dendrophilia hadn’t yet been invented. Bernini, like all baroque artists, seemed drunk with drama, and so he chose to depict the “couple” at the moment of her transformation.

Yes, it’s a statue of a woman escaping her rapist by becoming a plant. It is dark and a little terrible, but it’s also breathtakingly beautiful and amazingly detailed. I hope someday I get to see it in person.

Where the wild things are.

April 3, 2013 ~ Katy Kelleher ~ Leave a comment

I find it endlessly fascinating how people around the globe have created folklore and mythology that falls along the same basic narrative structures. People as beasts, beasts as people. Spirits that need to be appeased, and sacrifices that must be made. The dead who walk again, and the living who wander into the twilight land between. These stories are told again and again, from language to language and mouth to mouth. It’s beautiful, if you think about it. We’re all beasts, inside. Wild men, in the words of photographer Charles Freger.

Freger captures the wild men of Europe in their various costumes and headdresses. With a few simple materials, the human body is transformed into fantastical shapes, shaggy creatures of imagination and deep symbolism.

Looking at his photographs, I find myself feeling an odd envy. I have never enjoyed Halloween and the skimpy outfits it seems to inspire, but I would love to turn myself into a fearsome (yet wooly) creature, a brute straight out of a fairytale.

Alternatively, it would be nice to go around Europe snapping pictures of these colorful rituals. Feed your own envy here.

Kiyoshi Mino makes furry friends from felt.

March 31, 2013 ~ Katy Kelleher ~ Leave a comment

I’ve probably mentioned my undying love for foxes on this blog before, but for good measure, I’ll say it again: If I had to choose a favorite animal, it would always (and forever) be the clever, wily fox. Once, when I was in college, I had a girl I worked with tell me that I reminded her of a fox because “you can be very cunning, and I bet you’re good at manipulating people.” I was kind of offended, but I have to admit, it was a little flattering, in a weird way. I like to think I’m nicer than that, but who knows? Maybe being a fox is a good thing.

As usual, I’m rambling about myself in order to introduce a very talented artist. Kiyoshi Mino is currently attending The Farm School down in Massachusetts (a place I had never heard of, but after googling it I immediately wanted to drop everything and enroll). It was there that he found his artistic medium: needle felt. He now creates detailed sculptures of animals out of wool. But as much as I want to snuggle them, they’re not stuffed toys. He sells his pieces for around $500 a pop. His menagerie includes a variety of fauna, both wild and domesticated. His portfolio includes owls, cranes, sheep, cats, donkeys, and other beasts.

I admit, I don’t know much about needle felt, but it seems like a great technique. I really admire anyone who works with fiber arts, especially since it seems at once so traditional, and yet so modern.

Check out Mino’s website here, and be sure to read the “about” section. He’s lived a very interesting life.

Speaking of plants, let’s drink some…

March 29, 2013 ~ Katy Kelleher ~ Leave a comment

I think plants are just on my mind this week, seeing as it’s early spring and all. I spotted my first crocuses today when I was at a meeting up in Wiscasset today and I gave a tiny shout. My co-worker thought I dropped my coffee, but I was really just excited about FINALLY seeing a little flora in Maine.

I’m rambling a bit, and it’s probably because I’ve had a few glasses of wine, and while that didn’t exactly inspire me to post about Amy Stewart’s very cool sounding book, it does seem fitting, right? As I type this, I’m sipping at my own glass of alcohol and contemplating the grapes that made it, and all the many fruits and leaves and grains that go into a truly fantastic cocktail. In The Drunken Botanist, Stewart chronicles the vast variety of plant life that has been transformed by our greedy hands into creative libations and delicious intoxications.

Oh, and because I can’t not mention this fact, it’s a beautiful book with truly awesome typography. I should probably buy it for my boyfriend, who could frequently be described as a drunken botanist (when he’s not busy being a “mad scientist”).

Learn more here.

Two cool things: Green architecture, plant emotions.

March 28, 2013March 31, 2013 ~ Katy Kelleher ~ 3 Comments

1. Plant-In City. I’ll let their description do the talking:

Mankind is increasingly leaving nature behind, migrating to concrete jungles where green space is at a premium. Yet urban dwellers will always long for a connection to the earth: we build parks, protect nature reserves, and grow gardens. We’ve become adept at shaping nature to fit our multiple spaces and lifestyles.
Plant-in City is a collaboration between architects, designers, and technologists who are building new ways of interacting with nature. Our 21st century sculptural terrariums combine modular architecture, basic laws of physics, embedded technologies, and mobile computing to construct a “Plant City” where the aesthetic meets the pragmatic.

2. Do plants have emotions? We were discussing this at work the other day, and while my first inclination was to be really skeptical, I’ve been a little swayed. No, I don’t think weeping willows actually need Prozac, just that maybe there’s something these living creatures pick up on that is kind of, maybe a little, like our empathy. Further reading can be found on NYT.com, but this is one of those weird moments when I don’t want to know too much more. According to some people, plants react when living things are killed. Perhaps it’s true, perhaps it’s not, but I rather like that idea and for now, I would like it to be so.

I think this must be how people in Iceland “believe” in fairies. According to one article, 80% of Icelanders think fairies are real. Maybe they do, or maybe 80% of the country just has a more whimsical outlook on life than we do. Either way, I want to go to Iceland and see some freaking fairies.

The History of Pretty: I Love Alphonse Mucha.

March 24, 2013December 31, 2014 ~ Katy Kelleher ~ 1 Comment

I decided I need a bit more consistency in my posts, so I’m going to start a series where I highlight my favorite artists from history. It’s one part review (I learned so much wonderful stuff in college and then never used it again) and one part blogging exercise. Two parts futile? Perhaps! But does one really need an excuse to look at Mucha’s gorgeous ladies? If your answer is yes, you’re wasting my time, then I really just don’t know why you’re reading my blog.

Mucha was a Czech artist who lived during the late 19th, early 20th century. As you can see from his works, he was pretty invested in the whole Art Nouveau thing—in fact, he practically invented this particular poster style, which went on to become immensely popular in fin de siecle Paris. But Mucha was also crazy popular in his motherland. Following his international success at the 1900 Universal Exhibition in Paris, he returned to Prague to create art that he felt was truly reflective of the Czech history and character.

While a lot of people know him for his pretty posters that adorn dorm rooms of quasi-artsy young adults all over the world, I have always loved his pieces that depict the “Czech woman.” He idealized the Czech peasant ladies, with their strong bodies and long, flowing hair. He wanted to capture the spirit of his small country, and he often did this through allegories. Sure, he also did plenty of advertisements, but I’ll never forget seeing pieces from “The Slav Epic” and his seasons series at the Mucha Museum in Prague. While his style is stamped all over the city, from twisty, organic-inspired light fixtures to hand-painted flowering vines that adorn the exterior of an otherwise unremarkable building, it was fascinating to see so much of one artist’s work in one place. I brought home a poster, which has since been crushed and wrinkled out of shape. But I don’t think I’ll ever throw it out.

I love public art, especially Filippo Minelli’s man-made clouds.

March 21, 2013 ~ Katy Kelleher ~ 1 Comment

I think artists who create in the public sphere are so goddamn brave and so freaking important. Art doesn’t just belong in museums—it belongs everywhere. In fantastic design, in beautiful typography, in the books we read and in the things we eat. Yes, I’m getting carried away. But I really, fundamentally believe that art is and should be everywhere, and the people who say “but I could do that” should probably be taken away and put in a boring gray cubicle where they can live out the rest of their lives without any aesthetic stimulation or provocative sights.

Whew. Today is apparently a day for rants (it’s also a day for taxes, but I’ll save that rant for my freelance friends). It’s also a good day to look at Filippo Minelli’s gorgeous photographs. The artist has been creating public art works since the early 90’s. A lot of his pieces play with borders and boundaries, liminal spaces and weird half-places. He has plenty of cool work, but I’m particularly drawn to the Silence/Shapes series. It’s an ongoing project of colorful clouds in natural spaces—or, as he describes it:

Decontextualization of a violent tool changing quickly the surroundings, creating chaos, blinding the eyes, used in natural landscapes. The result proves that beauty can be found in clashing visions with an approach and aesthetic similar to romanticism. Showing the power of nature with the implication of religious aspects. Juxtaposing violence and beauty as a political statement. Giving silence a physical shape to be aware of its presence in the age of information and communication technology.

I know you’re interested in silence, but please, Filippo, keep talking. I like the things you say.

More here.

Pink lakes make me wish for some green.

March 17, 2013March 17, 2013 ~ Katy Kelleher ~ Leave a comment

If I had a couple thousand dollars to throw around, a Steve Back print would be one of the first things in my shopping cart. These amazing photographs capture pink lakes (pink lakes!) in Western Australia. The sweet, beautiful hue comes from a naturally occurring algae, which makes it a million times more enjoyable than the shockingly colored sunsets caused by pollution (which I admit, I do enjoy anyway. Hey, if there world is going down in flames, we might as well marvel at the colors, right?).

Sadly, a framed print costs around $2,500. Sigh.

I think waking up and looking at those colors everyday would make me a fundamentally better person. I think I’d be a lot nicer (not to mention cooler) with a pink lake hanging on my wall.