I love it when fabulous artists email me with links to their fabulous work! Case in point, this series, titled Calling the Caves, by Halifax based artist Sarah Burwash… but she’s not in Halifax right now, and I’m insanely jealous. She’s currently in residence at Spark Box Studio, in Picton {a beautiful, small town just outside of Toronto}. I would love to spend some time there, quietly working away. I asked Sarah to tell me a little bit about her experience so far {I had planned to paraphrase, but her description was just so lovely, I’ve directly quoted her}:

… it is so blissful to be in a big old house surrounded by corn and hay feilds, it is peaceful and relaxing, and also productive and inspiring. The sun has been out often and the fields are dusted with snow. Chrissy and Kyle who run Spark Box are amazing hosts, light hearted and ambitious pair, they make you feel very comfortable and welcomed and go out of there way for you. I have a large studio space to work, and there is a great library of books from art books, to wild flower books, to old life magazines. There is a bright kitchen with a record player and a spunky dog running about. It is a quiet, relaxing, and beautiful place providing the time and space to work on art, get feedback and meet others. The other artists, Kirsten and JP, have been a real treat to have around, to chat with, share resources and glass of whiskey.

Ok… don’t you want to go there right now?! I do! Good luck with your work Sarah – I can’t wait to see what you create while staying in this amazing place.

A gold skirt, simple portraits, and one very festive sweater. This lovely, day-in-the-life subject matter, by American artist Christina Renfer Vogel, is exactly the kind of work that makes me jealous. Oh, and her hat, of course… I’m jealous of her fantastic, cozy fur hat!

{ps. I want that gold skirt, titled ‘Event’, in a fancy frame on my wall… it’s 36″ x 36″! Gorgeous.}

What do all of these fabulous pieces have in common?

1. I love them.

2. They are open-edition prints {…and I love them.}

3. They are crazy affordable {…and I love them.}

4. They are all at Thumbtack Press just waiting for ME! Sorry, I mean us.

{kimiaki yaegashi // lilly piri // kate pugsley // gianluca foli // martha rich}

Now, that’s my kind of princess! POW!

I wrote about Swedish artist Alexandra Hedberg almost two years ago. In that post, I was jealous of some of her gorgeous, washy watercolor/acrylic paintings… but look what I just found!!! A series of hand-colored screen prints titled {quite appropriately}, Colouring. My favorite images in this series feature Snow White, behaving in very unprincess-like ways! Love ♥

These are easily the most cheerful abandoned spaces that I’ve ever seen! Forgotten places drawn beautifully in candy-hued palettes – such a beautiful/sad combination. Philadelphia based artist Amze Emmons is the artist/illustrator behind these strange gouache & acrylic landscapes … I have to be honest and say that I wish I could hop into that final piece {titled ‘National Treasures’} to grab that aqua couch, and that giant head!

Well, I’m back from Salt Lake City. I am exhausted, inspired, overwhelmed, and I have pretty much completely lost my voice from laughing/talking all day and all night at this year’s Alt Summit. If you weren’t there, I’ll give you a quick rundown… on the very first day of the conference, I was lucky enough to speak on a panel about “Successful Collaborations” with these lovely ladies:

As you can see, as soon as I was finished talking {first day, first panel, first speaker!? Yes, it was nerve-wracking!}, I got myself a giant cup of coffee and spent the next two days learning all sorts of things, from all sorts of amazing people. My favorite talk was from the keynote speaker on Friday… Ben Silberman, the creator of Pinterest. He was funny, humble, and well, totally and completely inspiring!

So, so good! {look how big that lunch crowd is – that tiny white dot in front of the black screen is Ben!} Now, if you’ve never been to Alt, you should know that you’ll learn an insane amount of information about being a blogger, but you’ll also learn how to look fabulous. All the time. Apparently everyone {including me} got the memo that this year, was in fact…

Buns, shoes, accessories, vintage dresses, stripy tights. Yep, the Sartorialist should show up to next year’s event… he’d have an abundance of material to shoot! Speaking of photos, on the final night, the third floor of the hotel was taken over by a whole bunch of fantastic mini-parties put on by some of Alt’s very generous sponsors! I think almost all of them had a photo booth… so, my super-cute roomie {Kathleen, of Jeremy & Kathleen} and I hit as many as we could:

What a couple of weirdos. I’m not sure why we’re attempting the ’sexy pout’ in every shot… oh well, we had fun! And then I lost my voice ; )

If you were there, I hope you had an amazing time. I highly recommend the Alt experience to anyone who is interested in the world of blogging… and photo booths.

{All of these images are from Alt’s Flickr stream. Thank you to the fantastic photographers that documented the past crazy few days for us!}

I’m about to get on a plane to Salt Lake City, because I’m lucky enough to be speaking at Alt Summit tomorrow! While I’m there I’ll be making a little announcement… but I wanted you to know about it first! I’m kicking off a new project in 2012. What is it? Well, it’s called…

Ta-dah! Yep, that’s what’s happening, and here’s why:

The idea for these workshops came out of a couple of things. First, I wrote a post last year called jealous & alone, and the response was unbelievable! I wanted to jump right out of the blog world and actually meet everyone that commented, and keep the honest/inspiring conversation going. Second, I started a series on sfgirlbybay.com called ‘girl crush’, which is all about celebrating amazing women artists. In one of those posts, I made a joke about hosting a girl crush tea party with American artist Alyson Fox - and then a whole bunch of people emailed me saying that they would love to attend a girl crush tea party… so we’re doing it! In fact, I’ve got the table set for four of them in 2012! Listen to the amazing women artists who will be our hosts… Lisa Congdon in San Francisco this March; Samantha French in New York this April; Lisa Golightly {aka Kiki & Polly} in Portland this June; and of course, Alyson Fox in Austin this September. Yep, one day workshops filled with inspiration, art, fancy sandwiches, and pretty cakes… in the real world! For more information {details, how to register, etc} check out my girl crush page {which is also in the right hand nav} or head straight to my shop to sign up. I’m so excited about this little adventure, and I hope you’ll be part of it! Ok, now I have to get myself to the airport! Bye bye… I’ll be back with new posts on Monday {but on twitter, reporting from Alt, from now til then!}

~ danielle xo

Any post that starts with a T-Rex and finishes with a ‘cake’ is a-okay in my book! These fantastic collages are the work of LA based artist Ashlie Chavez. Unfortunately, that’s the only information I’ve got. I’d love to know the stories behind these very detailed, beautifully composed pieces, but for now, we’ll just have to let our imaginations run wild… much like that wild, child-eating dinosaur.

“Directed by Wes Anderson” … translation … a true work of art that will, in fact, make me insanely jealous and should be framed… if it weren’t a movie. Sigh. I love Wes Anderson films. Each one is an amazing story filled with hilariously strange characters, but for me, it’s the artistic attention to detail that pushes me over the edge! I love that every single one of his movies has a very specific color palette, and a perfectly chosen typeface that is present throughout the film. Don’t even get me started on The Royal Tenenbaums {I loved it so much I dressed as Margot Tenenbaum for Hallowe’en in 2002. True story.} Anderson’s latest project, titled Moonrise Kingdom, is going to be in a theatre near you this spring. Here, in an IMDb nutshell, is what it’s about:

“Set on an island off the coast of New England in the 1960s, as a young boy and girl fall in love they are moved to run away together. Various factions of the town mobilize to search for them and the town is turned upside down — which might not be such a bad thing.”

I would happily put any of these stills in fancy frames and hang them on my wall. Each one of them truly is a piece of art:

I. Can’t. Wait.

ps. As I said, one of my favorite things about any Wes Anderson film is the typography – and this time is no different. The script for Moonrise Kingdom is perfect. Thanks to a tweet from Tina Roth Eisenberg of @swissmiss, I found out that it was designed by Brooklyn based letterer/illustrator Jessica Hische. Lovely ♥

Yes, all of this came from one person… one insanely creative, talented person. Her name is Hella Jongerius, and she is the artist/designer behind Jongeriuslab, based in Berlin. Her list of materials goes on forever, as does her portfolio… as does this post! I didn’t want to leave out any of my favorites… like a tea cozy with a porcelain head, for example! How could I not show that?!

Happy weekend! See you on Monday.