Without a doubt, one of the challenges facing our world population is the need for sustainable energy sources. With the converging issues of pollution, dwindling fossil fuel supplies and a rising population, it’s high time we work on smart solutions. Now Nautical Torque Technologies is proposing a way of generating electricity that eliminates many of the problems with previous technologies and does it using a readily available energy source: docked ships and tides. [Read more...]
Korean artist Seung Mo Park uses an unusual medium to create his fantastically detailed portraits: wire. The process is one of painstaking addition and subtraction, cutting wires away from his layered mats to reveal a figure or face. To create the works, Park superimposes pieces of square wire mesh or layers of individual wires, later cutting and bending them to release the image he sees hidden inside. It’s a process much like stippling in reverse, and translated to a highly unusual format. [Read more...]
Dog and cat owners already know this, but dressing your pet up in fashionable clothes is perhaps the best entertainment you’ll have. Yago Partal takes a cue from these pet owners and transfers it to something a little more exotic, the zoo. His recent series Zoo Portraits, sees creatures from giraffes to wolves getting spiffed up in trendy clothes; from suits to Hawaiian shirts. It’s one ridiculously fashionable menagerie. [Read more...]
In the wet and cold countryside of the far north reside hardy people with stories to tell. Ambling across the verdant pastures, clad in the plants of the region, senior citizens model in the wilderness of south and eastern Finland. In our modern, often youth-centered world, the photographs are a beautiful and arresting look at unique and interesting characters in strange circumstances. [Read more...]
When I visited Rome last summer I picked up a free, hand-drawn map of the city. To be honest I wasn’t expecting much, but when I started navigating using the small map, I was astounded at the detail it contained in each hand-drawn line. To be finding my way around the ancient city using only someone’s fine penmanship was like stepping back into the bygone era of hand-made cartography. Today we have Google Maps. It’s a tool which blows away any hand-created map as far as accuracy and search-ability, but something is certainly lost in the aesthetic beauty and ability to roll out a large city on the table before you. These fine maps of London from Wellingtons Travel, bring back the maps of old and do it with useful style. [Read more...]
Many people like to leave their spirit carved in a tree, but most of the time it takes the form of a carved heart and a few letters symbolizing the lovers who put it there. Sculptor Keith Jennings takes tree carving in another direction, carving into the bark of living trees and revealing mystical spaces from inside their trunks. It’s a view that would fascinate and potentially frighten those lucky enough to walk by and witness it. [Read more...]
If you have an idea for a startup, you’re an investor, or you’re a journalist looking for information on anything Web 2.0, this is visual research gold: you can now explore CrunchBase visually to find hidden investment connections. CrunchBase, the wiki-style database of Web 2.0 people, investors, and companies that include lists of their key employees – or key events in their business – is a go-to resource for many people doing research in the online investment world. Now, the company Wikisway is giving us the option of exploring the CrunchBase network visually, opening up a whole world of information previously hidden in the text. [Read more...]
“To be a surrealist means barring from your mind all remembrance of what you have seen, and being always on the lookout for what has never been” said the famous surrealist Renè Magritte. That lofty aim is the ideal of contemporary Italian aritst Giuseppe Lo Schiavo and the root of his new series called Levitation. The collection of photo manipulations sees a Little Prince-esque world of historical landmarks – honorable mentions on many a ’7 Wonders’ list – which Lo Schiavo has photographed and placed atop floating rocky worlds which rise above mysterious empty seascapes. [Read more...]
What only look like sculptural piles of rubbish become fascinating studies in light and shadow when illuminated from just the right angle. The work of dutch artist Diet Wiegman, each sculpture is built with a precision at odds with the rough materials from which it is constructed. He uses paper, photos, glass, mirror, cardboard, clay, wood and a host of other ingredients to build just the right forms – forms which subsequently cast shadows of masterworks like Michelangelo’s David or the dancing figure of Michael Jackson. [Read more...]
At first they appear to simply be gigantic swooping shapes painted across buildings around the world… but find the correct focal point and they pop into astounding geometric forms. Swiss artist Felice Varini has been creating these massive pieces since 1979; starting small with room based installations, but later growing to pieces that cover entire villages and require a hike up a mountain to properly appreciate. His anamorphic paintings have impressed a generation of creatives, and continue to be emulated to this day. [Read more...]
