There are so many things to love about this painting by LA based artist Nouar. Let’s start with the title shall we ~  All the Girls Love Ketchup… ah, so true. I’m a sucker for vintage advertising, so this colour palette and highly stylized illustration is next on my list. And last but not least, these two very sexy, pinup worthy, tomatoes in heels.

This piece is from her solo show called You Look Good Enough to Eat! that was hung at the Jonathan Levine Gallery in New York from February to March 2009. {I have mentioned, and linked to, the Jonathan Levine Gallery at least four or five times now. I should probably write a post called “I’m jealous of the Jonathan Levine Gallery” because, well frankly, I am.}

I changed this image four times because I couldn’t decide which of Ashley G and Drew‘s pieces to show. Painting? Illustration? Painting? Illustration?… Ok, an illustration. I picked this one, titled Incognito, because of the colour palette and, well let’s be totally honest, for the moustache.  Ashley and Drew are a team from Portland Oregon who do both paintings and digitally coloured ink illustrations. They seem to have a thing for moustaches and beards, and clearly, so do I.

Astronauts deep in prayer? Beekeeping via virtual reality? I don’t know and I don’t really care, because either way, I love it. You can see more work by Alyson Fox at the Keep Calm Gallery.

I don’t know the title, the dimensions or the story behind this piece.

I do know that it was created by Team Macho ~ a collaborative illustration and fine art effort composed of Lauchie Reid, Chris Buchan, Nicholas Aoki, Jacob Whibley, and Stephen Appleby-Barr.

I also know that I love it and that I’m very jealous… although not of the woman front/centre.

I can honestly say I don’t own one comic book, but I love this piece from Chris Ware‘s “Building Stories” project. It must be my small obsession for mundane, domestic subject matter.

“Building Stories” is made up of a whole bunch of these beautifully drawn, or “cartooned” panels and can be seen online at the Carl Hammer Gallery (Chicago). There is also a great article written by Chris about this project in The Independent. 

French artist & illustrator Julien Pacaud still makes me jealous every time I see his work… and now he has a new site which is being updated with new work more often than his blog that I linked to a few posts back.

I was already so  jealous of Gary Taxali‘s work, but now I’m even more jealous because his first solo show in New York, “Hindi Love Song”, is opening tonight at the Jonathan Levine Gallery. If you’re jealous of Gary too, there’s an exclusive interview with him in Juxtapoz Magazine about his work, his process and this new show.

Cute & Creepy. I’m beginning to discover that that’s one of my favorite combos. Leslie Supnet certainly achieves a fine balance in this piece… cute bear, cute little elf people… that appear to be really drunk and are one by one being taken away and locked up by the cute bear? Hm.

I couldn’t decide between this, and a sea lion parade balloon. The red mary janes pushed this one into the lead though… and the jaunty bow around the polar bear’s neck didn’t hurt either. You can find the sea lion, among other great pieces, at Jennifer Davis‘ site. And if that’s not enough for you, you can check out Davis’ blog to see her most recent work.

Again, such a hard time to pick just one of Gary Taxali‘s pieces to post. He’s been making me jealous since I first saw his work in Toronto back in 2001 or so. His style is so unique that you can recognize his work almost immediately… which makes you look super cool & artsy at cocktail parties. “That must be a Taxali you have hanging there…  ah yes, I’d recognize his work anywhere.”