Ahhh! I can almost feel the warm, sweet, tropical breezes wafting over me {ok, that might be the space heater blowing from under my desk, but a girl can dream}. These are the strange and magical landscapes of South African artist Kirsten Sims. I am completely enamored with all of the lush plants, not to mention the sweet little houses & tents… but what truly takes my breath away… the skies. Oh, the night-time skies! Gorgeous.

Whoa. That’s acrylic paint on linen. A lot of acrylic paint on linen! I think anyone who has ever used acrylic knows, and loves, that feeling when the paint on your palette dries into lumps, blobs, and waves that you can peel off in plastic-ish chunks… well, Spanish artist {Berlin-based} Yago Hortal took that to a WHOLE NEW LEVEL! I don’t actually know how he made these, but I do know that I want to touch them. A lot.

{via ARTNAU}

Well, hello November 1 … that means we can start Christmas shopping, right? Let’s start with any of these! This gorgeous jewelry is the work of Amanda Uber Trentham of LilahV. I absolutely love everything she makes, and I also really love her story:

“My grandmother, Louella, passed away leaving me her collection of jewelry. She was a spit fire and lived a long fantastic life where you dressed up to get on an airplane. Much of the jewelry was broken which I didn’t want to throw away so I began studying jewelry, gems and fine jewelry making.

What inspires me the most are the clean lines of mid century designers like Eames, Herman Miller and Neutra. Their work contains an effortless elegance where every element has a purpose. Combining a love of both old and new, I search the globe to find quality vintage gems which always come with fantastic and harrowing stories. My current collection, The Moderne Line, are gorgeous 1920’s rare German glass beads each handmade and painted with 24k gold.”

Lovely! And even more lovely… Amanda has offered a little discount for all Jealous Curator readers – hey, that’s you! Use JEALOUS20 to get 20% off when you spend over $100. I call dibs on that first piece! >>>>>>

Happy Halloween! Granted, these paintings by Netherlands based artist Tamara Muller are more disturbing than scary… but I thought they might get you in the mood for a strange, creepy, but totally amazing night! I’ve written about Tamara before, and I just keep coming back for more of her bizarre girls. And it’s not a coincidence that they all look like they’re related… all of her eery girls are in fact, her… amazingly beautiful/creepy, stylized self-portraits. Love.

ps. If you’re in Europe, Tamara has two shows opening this fall/winter:

Galerie VCR Antwerpen

7-11- 2013 / 22-12-2013
Opening 7 november 19:30

Leopold de Waelplaats 24A
2000 Antwerpen
www.galerievcr.be

…….

Galerie Bart Amsterdam
21-12-2013 / 1-2-2014
Opening 21 december 16:00

Galerie Bart
Elandsgracht 16
1016TW Amsterdam
www.galeriebart.nl

I hate snakes, so so so so much… but not this snake! I absolutely, crazy LOVE  this snake!

Oh, Rachel Denny. I’ve loved her work for years… and she just keeps getting better! Mirrored snakes, howling wolves, waxy woodpeckers, and of course, her signature deer heads! What I love almost as much as her final pieces, is the glimpse that she gives into her Portland home studio. Boy oh boy, I’d love to spend a day in there with her just makin’ stuff! Well, last year I did the next best thing… I got Rachel to make stuff for me! Yep, I bought a hot pink, cashmere doe to hang above my fireplace. Her name is Rosie, and I love her very very very much:

ps. Rachel is one of the artists featured in CREATIVE BLOCK. Her work looks amazing as a full page spread, and her interview is fantastic!

pps. the other two lovely pieces hanging there are by Ben Skinner {text/wood}, and Sarah Gee Miller {circle drawing}

It seems lately, that a week would not be complete if I didn’t write about something cactus related… enter the ceramics work of Madrid based artist Lina Cofán. I already loved them, and then I found this photo, from a Spanish shop window, that showed scale:

Super duper love.

Whoa. These are the paintings {oil and india ink on linen} of Brooklyn based artist Eric LoPresti. I absolutely love the combination of the lonely landscapes, washes of color, and perfect/graphic lines… oh, and they’re HUGE, ranging between 30″x40″ to 40″x65″!!! I’m sure, if you were to see these in person, that the scale would make these dramatic environments that much more eery. In Eric’s words, his work “investigates the cultural after-effects of dramatic conflict, focusing on the aftermath of the Cold War and its associated landscapes.” Chills.

{A few of his originals are available for purchase on Uprise Art}

I don’t often write about animated films, but when Warsaw based artist/illustrator Marcelina Jarnuszkiewicz sent me a link to Półczłowiek Półkoń / Halfman Halfhorse, I had no choice! It’s so lovely… and really weird. The illustrations are gorgeous, the story is wonderfully bizarre, and the music is perfect {I’d even venture to say that it’s a bit Wes Anderson-ish}. Essentially it’s a day-in-the-life of a horse/man… unfortunately he faces a very traumatic moment and turns to cigarettes and alcohol to steady his nerves. Hilarious, totally weird, and really really beautiful:

Oh dear… poor horse/man. Those were a few of my favorite stills, but here is the full animation in all it’s bizarre glory. Please watch… it’s so good!

Well, hello there. Are you dizzy? Quite the scroll to get down here, wasn’t it!? That’s all thanks to these very looooooooong, very cool images by American artist Frances Berry. They are from her series titled “Memory Extended”. You know I love a good vintage photo, and I love it even more when something contemporary has been done to it!

ps. Check out her portfolio – she has so much good work, and it’s all slightly different. Like these two amazing works on paper, for example:

♥

Sweet little floating baby bubbles? Oh yes… I’m in! These delicate little babies are the work of Brooklyn based artist Cameron Cundiff. Here is his his description of this work:

“This series is about meditation. My idea of meditation is that it is very human and personal, so I wanted to represent the idea through figures. I chose babies because there’s no baked in narrative with babies; they are souls without stories.”

These paintings are part of the latest show on Buy Some Damn Art, and at $300 for an original I think we should all go over there right now and get our floaty-baby-meditation on… Om.