Christopher Butler

November 22nd 2009

From Art Knowledge News:

Pope Benedict met artists from around the world in the Sistine Chapel on Saturday and urged them to inject spirituality into their work, saying contemporary beauty was often “illusory and deceitful.” The Pope told the gathering of hundreds of painters, sculptors, architects, poets and directors, held beneath the vaulted ceiling of the chapel painted by Michelangelo, that he wanted to “renew the Church’s friendship with the world of art.” Against the backdrop of Michelangelo’s vast fresco of the Last Judgment, which adorns the chapel’s altar wall, Benedict lamented that the once-close cooperation between the Church and the artistic community had weakened.

Posted at 5:24pm and tagged with: art,.

From Art Knowledge News:
Pope Benedict met artists from around the world in the Sistine Chapel on Saturday and urged them to inject spirituality into their work, saying contemporary beauty was often “illusory and deceitful.” The Pope told the gathering of hundreds of painters, sculptors, architects, poets and directors, held beneath the vaulted ceiling of the chapel painted by Michelangelo, that he wanted to “renew the Church’s friendship with the world of art.” Against the backdrop of Michelangelo’s vast fresco of the Last Judgment, which adorns the chapel’s altar wall, Benedict lamented that the once-close cooperation between the Church and the artistic community had weakened.

November 20th 2009

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Artist Jeanne-Claude, Who Co-Created ‘The Gates’ with Husband Christo, Dies at Age 74

From Art Knowledge News:

Artist Jeanne-Claude, who created the 2005 Central Park installation “The Gates” and other large scale “wrapping” projects around the globe with her husband Christo, has died. She was 74. Jeanne-Claude died Wednesday night at a New York hospital from complications of a brain aneurysm, her family said in an e-mail statement. Mayor Michael Bloomberg said he spoke with Christo on Thursday morning and offered condolences on behalf of all New Yorkers.

Posted at 11:04am and tagged with: art,.

Artist Jeanne-Claude, Who Co-Created ‘The Gates’ with Husband Christo, Dies at Age 74
From Art Knowledge News:
Artist Jeanne-Claude, who created the 2005 Central Park installation “The Gates” and other large scale “wrapping” projects around the globe with her husband Christo, has died. She was 74. Jeanne-Claude died Wednesday night at a New York hospital from complications of a brain aneurysm, her family said in an e-mail statement. Mayor Michael Bloomberg said he spoke with Christo on Thursday morning and offered condolences on behalf of all New Yorkers.

November 19th 2009

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From Art Knowledge News:

Two artists with Ozark connections will create new sculptures for the grounds of Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. George Dombek, a native of Paris, Ark. who is well known for his finely detailed watercolors, is casting a bronze sculpture of a stick bicycle and an apple tree in the 12-foot-high Tour de Tree. Pat Musick, who lived and worked in Huntsville, Ark. for 22 years, will create A Place Where They Cried, a tribute to the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee Creek and Seminole people who traveled through Arkansas as part of the Trail of Tears forced migration in 1837-39.

Posted at 1:04pm and tagged with: art,.

From Art Knowledge News:
Two artists with Ozark connections will create new sculptures for the grounds of Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. George Dombek, a native of Paris, Ark. who is well known for his finely detailed watercolors, is casting a bronze sculpture of a stick bicycle and an apple tree in the 12-foot-high Tour de Tree. Pat Musick, who lived and worked in Huntsville, Ark. for 22 years, will create A Place Where They Cried, a tribute to the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee Creek and Seminole people who traveled through Arkansas as part of the Trail of Tears forced migration in 1837-39.

November 18th 2009

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artwork by Christine Nguyen

Posted at 3:04pm and tagged with: art,.

November 17th 2009

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These photos are beautiful.

(via BLDGBLOG):

The Johansson Projects gallery over in Oakland is hosting an exhibition of photographs by Barry Underwood, called Earth Engines; the show also includes a series of sound installations by artist Oliver diCicco.

Posted at 6:04pm and tagged with: art,.

These photos are beautiful.
(via BLDGBLOG):
The Johansson Projects gallery over in Oakland is hosting an exhibition of photographs by Barry Underwood, called Earth Engines; the show also includes a series of sound installations by artist Oliver diCicco.

November 17th 2009

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John Maeda get’s excited about art! I actually love how he responds with such sincere wonder to this stuff. He could be jaded, but he’s not:

The above object from the recent Design Science symposium held here at RISD gives you a sense of the wonderment we all observed together.

Posted at 4:04pm and tagged with: video, art,.

November 17th 2009

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Beauty.

Posted at 12:03pm and tagged with: art,.

November 17th 2009

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Luke Jerram has designed these extremely beautiful representations of some of man’s deadliest enemies, ranging from H1N1 to HIV. I think smaller versions of these would look wonderful on my Christmas tree!

It’s great to be exploring the edges of scientific understanding and visualization of a virus. Scientists aren’t able to answer many of the questions I ask them, such as how the RNA is exactly fitted within the Capsid? At the moment, camera technology can’t answer these questions either. I’m also pushing the boundaries of glassblowing. Some of my designs simply can’t be created in glass. Some are simply too fragile and gravity would cause them to collapse under their own weight. So there’s a very careful balancing act that needs to take place, between exploring current scientific knowledge and the limitations of glassblowing techniques.

Posted at 8:02am and tagged with: art,.

Luke Jerram has designed these extremely beautiful representations of some of man’s deadliest enemies, ranging from H1N1 to HIV. I think smaller versions of these would look wonderful on my Christmas tree!

It’s great to be exploring the edges of scientific understanding and visualization of a virus. Scientists aren’t able to answer many of the questions I ask them, such as how the RNA is exactly fitted within the Capsid? At the moment, camera technology can’t answer these questions either. I’m also pushing the boundaries of glassblowing. Some of my designs simply can’t be created in glass. Some are simply too fragile and gravity would cause them to collapse under their own weight. So there’s a very careful balancing act that needs to take place, between exploring current scientific knowledge and the limitations of glassblowing techniques.

November 13th 2009

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(via GOOD)

Posted at 3:09pm and tagged with: video, art,.

November 13th 2009

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Alex Lukas was a classmate of mine at RISD. He’s an extremely talented artist living in Philadelphia now. Glowlab has just announced his solo show, The Eventuality of Daybreak, opening on November 12. You can see more images of his work at the Glowlab site.

Of course I’m fascinated by it as I am all things post-apocalyptic. Congratulations, Alex!

Posted at 9:03am and tagged with: art,.

Alex Lukas was a classmate of mine at RISD. He’s an extremely talented artist living in Philadelphia now. Glowlab has just announced his solo show, The Eventuality of Daybreak, opening on November 12. You can see more images of his work at the Glowlab site.
Of course I’m fascinated by it as I am all things post-apocalyptic. Congratulations, Alex!

November 12th 2009

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When Janice Lowry turned 11, inspired by reading Each notebook spans about four months, transcending minutiae to record the life of our times as well as her own. Entries touch on events from a child’s birthday to the contested presidential election of 2000 and the anniversary of the September 11 attacks. This past July, the Smithsonian Archives of American Art acquired all 126 volumes.

Check out the interiors- they turned out to be much more than just written diaries…

Posted at 2:06pm and tagged with: art, sketchbooks,.

When Janice Lowry turned 11, inspired by reading Each notebook spans about four months, transcending minutiae to record the life of our times as well as her own. Entries touch on events from a child’s birthday to the contested presidential election of 2000 and the anniversary of the September 11 attacks. This past July, the Smithsonian Archives of American Art acquired all 126 volumes.
Check out the interiors- they turned out to be much more than just written diaries…

November 12th 2009

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Egypt’s famous Tomb of Tutankhamun will undergo a five-year project to clean and restore the lavish wall paintings in the underground chambers of the boy king whose golden mask and artifacts have long awed the world. The project to restore the country’s most famous tomb is the latest collaboration between Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities and the Los Angeles-based Getty Conservation Institute, which in the past restored nearby tombs and designed airtight cases to display Egypt’s mummies.

Posted at 1:07pm and tagged with: art, archaeology,.

Egypt’s famous Tomb of Tutankhamun will undergo a five-year project to clean and restore the lavish wall paintings in the underground chambers of the boy king whose golden mask and artifacts have long awed the world. The project to restore the country’s most famous tomb is the latest collaboration between Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities and the Los Angeles-based Getty Conservation Institute, which in the past restored nearby tombs and designed airtight cases to display Egypt’s mummies.

November 12th 2009

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I’m not a huge graffiti fan, but this project moved me:

The EyeWriter project is an ongoing collaborative research effort to empower people, who are suffering from ALS, with creative technologies. It is a low-cost eye-tracking apparatus & custom software that allows graffiti writers and artists with paralysis resulting from Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis to draw using only their eyes.

Posted at 11:06am and tagged with: video, art,.

November 11th 2009

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I love this idea for the Fourth Plinth in London, the only remaining unused plinth in Trafalgar Square. From BLDGBLOG:

A rain-proof planetarium machine could be installed in public, anchored to the plinth indefinitely. Lurking over the square with its strange insectile geometries, the high-tech projector would rotate, dip, light up, and turn its bowed head to shine the lights of stars onto overcast skies above. Tourists in Covent Garden see Orion’s Belt on the all-enveloping stratus clouds—even a family out in Surrey spies a veil of illuminated nebulae in the sky.

Posted at 11:06am and tagged with: art, science,.

I love this idea for the Fourth Plinth in London, the only remaining unused plinth in Trafalgar Square. From BLDGBLOG:
A rain-proof planetarium machine could be installed in public, anchored to the plinth indefinitely. Lurking over the square with its strange insectile geometries, the high-tech projector would rotate, dip, light up, and turn its bowed head to shine the lights of stars onto overcast skies above. Tourists in Covent Garden see Orion’s Belt on the all-enveloping stratus clouds—even a family out in Surrey spies a veil of illuminated nebulae in the sky.

November 10th 2009

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Hot Air - an inflatable monument

Created by Anca Trandafirescu, with the assistance of Le Nguyen, Hot Air is an inflatable, inhabitable monument commemorating the 20th anniversary of the fall of communism in Romania. The monument takes the shape of the fallen head of a giant statue, lit from within. We’ve seen a few iterations of this floating around the internet before, but we’re happy to announce the inflatable has reached its intended site of Timisoara, Romania. Upon return, it will be shown again at the University of Michigan, where Trandafirescu teaches.

(via Core77)

Posted at 3:29pm and tagged with: art, video,.