Last year, someone pointed me to The Beholder, an amazing online gallery based in San Francisco… and it was love at first click. So many fantastic artists all in one place! Leigh Wells, Martha Rich, Jennifer Sanchez, Jennifer Davis, Mike Monteiro… shall I go on?  Yep, that’s when I knew I was officially jealous of Suzanne Shade, Director & Curator of The Beholder. About five minutes after finding her site, I was writing a post about it. Not only does she have fabulous taste, but she’s also incredibly nice! Don’t you just love it when that happens?

Anyway, enough about really talented, super nice curators who make me jealous… here’s a curator that makes Suzanne jealous {I’ll let her add the adjectives}:

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I’m jealous of Folkert Gorter

When you think of what a curator does (and I’ve been thinking a lot of that recently) it’s pretty simple: you are drawn by something, and you want to share it with the world. And sometimes, happily, the act of sharing helps you to discover what about that thing made you love it in the first place.

The really hard part about curating is giving your audience not only what you think is good, but giving them a way to see something that they may not have seen on their own. Crafting that moment where a work becomes so vividly clear: Ahhh yes. I GET IT now.

Folkert Gorter is one of those curators who can do that to you every time. That’s where the jealous part comes in. Folkert helps run a blog called “But Does It Float?”  His method is simple. He marries a ‘title’ (pulled quotes from folks like Bertolt Brecht and Jan Tschichold) which often are illuminating in themselves. He pairs that with the work of a selected artist. As the images float onto the screen, you are lifted up… it’s so addicting to scroll down a whole page and have it happen time after time.

Folkert is a Dutch interaction designer living in Los Angeles, and besides being an amazing curator, he’s also one of the founding creators of Cargo Collective, a web tool that powers a variety of creative communities in the fields of Education, Design, Research, and Conceptual Art. He’s the designer behind a site called Space Collective: The Future of Everything, and also developed a publishing platform for Good Magazine.

Oh, and did I mention that he’s also totally adorable?

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Adorable. Damn, I wish I’d put that in my list of adjectives! I’ll add that to your list Suzanne ; )

Thanks so much for this amazing post!

Um, can you say every little girl’s dream?! Yes, it’s a real-life dollhouse. I really, really, really want to live in this amazing on-site installation by Canadian artist Heather Benning. Granted, that huge plexiglass wall might leave me a little exposed to the local farmers and the odd cow, but that’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make for art! Below are images of the transformation… from an old abandoned farmhouse in Manitoba, into, well, my new home:

Sigh… amazing. And, it even comes with a rainbow! Throw in a unicorn grazing on the grass and you’re lookin’ at my childhood dream!

I’m not sure how many Brooklynites I’ve written about {I’m gonna guess 53}, but if you want the real skinny on the art community there, then I suggest you pick up a copy of Working Class Magazine. Why? Well, I’ll let them tell you in their own words:

“Working Class represents a community of local artists in New York… writers, photographers, poets, illustrators, models, small business owners, actors, musicians. We all work and live in this big city, and know the struggles of things like bad tippers, overpriced rents, and disagreeable weather. Working Class taps the pulse of the underground art world, and discusses why we all stick around.”

Sigh. So cool. Ok, it’s official, I’m jealous... and thinking about moving to New York, despite the overpriced rent.

{Working Class is a quarterly zine available in print or online, so pick up a copy, or grab your laptop, and get yourself down to a hip little coffee shop… oh, and don’t forget to tip!}

Here’s a little quiz for you on a Tuesday morning. These photographs, titled Totems, by Paris based artist Alain Delorme are:

a. a true documentation of the unbelievable towers of stuff, that are moved around the streets of Shanghai by some very skilled bicyclists,

b. beautifully staged sculptures,

c. unbelievable Photoshop work, or

d. I have absolutely no idea, but I love them anyway!

That’s right… The answer is d. Gold star for you!

{If you happen to be in Paris, I’m very jealous of you… oh, and also, you can see this show on at the Galerie Magda Danysz until Saturday September 25th}

I first happened upon Sydney based interior designer Dana Hughes through a guest post that she did on sfgirlbybay. I was guest blogging that week too, and was quite happy with my contribution… until I read Dana’s. It was good. Really good. I immediately linked through to her lovely blog, and was hooked. If you’re looking for inspirational interiors, beautiful installations or stunning architecture then you owe yourself a visit to yellowtrace. But before you go, take a gander below this little dotted line to get a taste of the kind of amazing work that makes her jealous…

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I am jealous of Tokujin Yoshioka.

I am jealous of Tokujin Yoshioka. Why? First of all, he has a really cool name. And don’t even get me started on his incredible talent and his amazing mind. Tokujin’s work can’t easily be classified into any discipline – more of an artist than a designer, he is true magician of form, materiality and innovation.

His studio, Tokujin Yoshioka Design, was established in 2000 and since then he has done countless projects with Issey Miyake, Hermes, Toyota, BMW, KDDI, Swarowski, Cartier, Camper… ah the list is endless. Some of his most important works are displayed in permanent collections in the world’s best known museums such as Museum of Modern Art in New York, Centre National d’Art et de Culture Georges Pompidou, Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum and Vitra Design Museum.

I am in complete awe of Tokujin’s mind and the way he talks about his pieces. He creates interiors, installations and architecture where people can feel the light with all their senses. He explores beauty born out of coincidence and beyond human imagination; his work echoes the beauty of nature with its ever-changing expression, giving the idea “that the design doesn’t even exist”.

Oh Mr Yoshioka, how I worship you and envy your talent all the same time.

x dana

{Image Credits: 1. Sensing Nature / Snow / Exhibition
Mori Art Museum / Japan 2010 / www.mori.art.museum;  2. Design Miami / Designer of the Year / Exhibition
USA 2007 / www.designmiami.com; 3. Museum Beyond Museum / Rainbow Church / Exhibition
Korea 2006-2010 / www.beyondmuseum.com;  4. WATERFALL / Museum Beyond Museum / Table
Korea 2010 /www.beyondmuseum.com;  5. Moroso / Tokujin x Moroso / Installation
Italy 2007 / www.moroso.it;  6. MOROSO / MEMORY / Chair
Italy 2010 / www.moroso.it}

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Sigh. So beautiful. Ok, now go to yellowtrace… a tonne of inspirational interiors await!

Thanks so much Dana! xx

…can’t. breathe. so. jealous… man oh man, I love these pieces by American artist Jack Pierson. It has long been a dream of mine to take a road trip down to the sign graveyard in Vegas and load up on, well, pretty much everything you see here… hm, although it looks like Jack may have already taken most of the good stuff!

To say that I’m a huge fan of reality TV would be a slight understatement, but when I came across a reality show about art, I have to say… I was pretty skeptical. How were they going to do this? Great art can’t happen in twelve hours… can it?! Well, regardless of my initial doubts, one episode, and a big bowl of ice cream later, I was hooked! In the first few seconds of Work of Art, I was thrilled to see that Peregrine Honig was one of the 14 participating artists. I wrote about her last November, so obviously she was my early pick as the winner! Well, she came close. She was second, but as far as I’m concerned she should have won. Don’t get me wrong, I’m very happy for 23-year-old Abdi Farah who won the title, a whole bunch of cash, and a solo show at the Brooklyn Museum {on now until Oct 17th}, but I really, really, really loved Peregrine’s final show {…a sweet, yet dark carnival theme, complete with cotton candy spun by Peregrine herself!} There is an innocence, a beauty, and a sadness to every single piece. The image that gives me a physical reaction every time I see it is the photograph above, titled The Twin Fawns. Under glass in Peregrine’s studio, these taxidermied baby deer are still huddled together. They were found in this position in their mother’s womb, who died just before they were born. See? Such innocence, beauty, and for me, overwhelming sadness. What an amazing collection of work. Congratulations Peregrine!

{She is currently selling prints of ‘The Twin Fawns’ which you can purchase here, and if you’d like to see her latest work in person, she’s having a solo show with Dwight Hackett Projects, opening October 9th in Santa Fe.}

Unfortunately I don’t know very much about Greek born artist Phillip Estlund… other than the fact that a lot of his subjects are houses {often blue houses} that have seen better days. I really want to know how they ended up like this? Tornados, hurricanes… tangerines? Phillip, if you see this, please let us know. Until then, I’ll be keeping an eye out for any citrus fruits that might be rolling at an unsafe pace toward my little blue house!

Inhale…… aaaand, exhale. Ahhh. These gorgeous installations, by Denmark-based Japanese artist Yuko Takada Keller, make me want to stop for a moment and take a deep cleansing breath. They also make me wish that I knew how to create such beautiful, airy installations using small, triangular, hand-colored pieces of tracing paper. Hmm, perhaps I should take another deep breath.

{via Squid Blog}

‘Now isn’t that lovely’… yes indeed! Oh, and that also happens to be the title of this series by London based artist Stephen Johnson. I’m sure my grandmother had at least half of these little figurines on her living room shelf… why on earth did it never occur to me to stick them all together, delicately balanced on the nose of a brass deer? Damn it.

{via junkculture}