Hm. I’m not even sure what to say about this piece by Spain’s Carmen Calvo. I’m inspired, I’m jealous, and I’m a little bit scared all at the same time.

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.

Yet again I couldn’t choose just one piece, so here’s nine.

Leah Giberson is my kind of gal. She says, and I quote, “I search for personal meaning in the most ordinary of surroundings.” I don’t know what it is about everyday places & things that appeal to me so much. It feels familiar and comforting I suppose, a common experience that most of us can relate to. Because, come on, who hasn’t played at least one round of “Go Fish” in a musty camper trailer?

I’m not a vegetarian, but I’m thinking about it thanks to Mark Ryden. His beautifully painted, bizarre subject matter is a perfect balance of creepy and cute. I wish my mind worked this way, but alas, I never would have come up with this scene.

ps. If you get an invitation to “Rosie’s Tea Party“, think carefully before you RSVP.

So a few posts back I said that I wasn’t a huge fan of photo-real painting, but here we are again. You have to respect anyone who can paint like this. Could you do this? Nope, me either, but Anselmo Swan can.  Just like Holly Farrell‘s painting of a couch that I posted a few weeks ago, what I love about this is the everyday subject matter. It could also be that I am now thinking about eating a Krispy Kreme doughnut, and that makes pretty much everyone happy.

Hand. Soap.

Hilarious. Beautiful. Kinda creepy. I wish I thought of it.

I want need this. I would never actually use them though. I wouldn’t want to ruin them. They’re like those little rose soaps my grandmother used to put out for guests… but in more of a severed hand kind of way. If you want need them too, you can find them on etsy.com by an artist who goes by the name of “Foliage“.

Oh say can you see by the dawn’s early light… the architecture, the vast mid-west horizon and the brush strokes of American painter Mark Bradley-Shoup all come together to create this lovely, but lonely, landscape titled “Vacancy (Used Car Lot)”. I love the simple shapes, plains of muted colour, and amazing composition.

While reading about Mark I found a site that has images of him hard at work in his studio in Chattanooga, Tennessee. I always like getting a glimpse into where/how the work actually happens.

Here we are again, at the line between art and craft. This subject always hurts my head. What makes something art vs craft? Intent? Venue? Scale? Price? Marketing? Ouch, there’s that headache again. I met this artist, a.k.a etsy name “Poodlebreath“, at a craft show. When I saw her work I was so inspired & so jealous. As far as I’m concerned this beautiful ceramic wall hanging should be hanging on an art gallery wall for lots of money, instead of sitting on a craft table for NOT lots of money.

Simple, beautiful.

This painting is by a young Japanese artist named Yasuhide Kunimoto. At first glance his work looks like screenprints, but it’s not. It’s very meticulous acrylic on canvas. His subject matter ranges from sumos to landscapes to everyday people, but my favourite pieces are the swimmers.