Hello Pretty is Winding Down

After more than ten fulfilling, magical years beginning in the good old days of 2012, Hello Pretty is retiring and heading off to the beach with a drink with a tiny umbrella.

Read our goodbye letter

Art

Pretty Prints and Patterns

I’ll have to admit, I’m a sucker for a great print.  And I’m ESPECIALLY a sucker for these digital painted illustrations by Isabel Arenas.

Being super talented and fabulous, Isabel blows us all out of the water with her work, sketching straight onto her computer via a graphic tablet - it all makes me feel somewhat inferior really… *doodles a stick man*

She’s won a whole bunch of really impressive awards too, and is well worth throwing money at.  This one is on my lust list:

Fill your day with some pretty things by talented people, and hopefully it will end up being fantastic - how can it not?

Happy Wednesday Pretties!

Some street cred for the ballpoint

With only 8 ballpoint pens at hand, Samuel Silva - an attorney, if you can believe it - creates these amazing, hyperrealistic drawings.

His dedication to detail is impressive, given that one piece can take 30 to 50 hours to complete.

Although not the first to use the humble ballpoint medium, his work is pretty incredible. I do love how the man thinks: “It’s not about what you use, it’s about how you use it”.

Prints of Wes Anderson by Laura Weiszer

Yes…  a million times yes!  I have a special place in my lounge earmarked for these Wes Anderson prints by Laura Weiszer.

What makes them that much more impressive is that they are painted in acrylics - guys, painting in acrylic is HARD.  It’s like a constant war on time.  The race to do what you need to do before it dries actually makes me anxious.

No space for prints, or your mom isn’t interested in your ambition to redecorate the house with your obvious good taste?  That’s fine, you can cover yourself, your bags, lampshades and dogs collar with her Wes Anderson buttons.

This illustrator, designer and student is based in Philadelphia, and her prints are available from her etsy store.

*first spotted here.

Ox + Monkey collaborations

Spotted at the IDS West (along with Chris Perron who we've blogged about before), was the work of design and fabrication duo, Ox + Monkey.  Founded by Jeremy Clement (Monkey) and Kez Sherwood (Ox), they collaborate on projects such as “high quality aluminum bicycle trailers, furniture, custom metal fabrication and art projects.”  They work with builders, designers, artists and homeowners.

As for their name, according to Chinese astrology, if both the Ox and the Monkey can co-operate, the result will be a fun and formidable team - a goal I feel they have definitely reached!  With Kez being an artist and designer, and Jeremy having a strong engineering and fabrication background, a dynamic, creative and highly capable team is really the only result.

Check out their website, www.oxandmonkey.ca to keep an eye on their projects… That’s where my eyes will be firmly planted.

Paris in Color by Nichole Robertson

As a serious book fanatic, I window shop on Kalahari and Amazon when I can’t sleep.  My wishlist runs into the thousands, and I know that one day I will have to design my home around my books, and find a very patient and resilient cleaning lady that doesn’t mind all the dusting.  And as a book purist, I am devoted to hard copies, as opposed to e-readers.

That, combined with my fervent wanderlust, secret romantic inclinations and love of beautiful things, makes this book PERFECT for me.  (My birthday is in October. *hint hint)  “Paris in Color” by Nichole Robertson is a beautiful collection of colour coordinated photograph’s of Parisian details.

The book came about as a result of a happy accident - her photography and blogging hobbies took a turn when she took a few photos of similarly coloured environments, and it quickly became an obsession.  And on sharing her obsession, others also quickly became obsessed.  Part of the appeal lay in the fact that it wasn’t the over-glamourized version of Paris - “I didn’t want the Versace-on-the-red-carpet version of Paris, I wanted the Converse and t-shirt Paris.”

Soooo… while you’re getting a copy for yourself over here, feel free to order a second copy for little ol’ me.  I can be reached at the hellopretty.co.za offices!

Colossal NYC by Yoni Alter

I’ve said it before that one of my favourite sources of things that are design-related is the Colour Lovers website. If you haven’t seen them yet I encourage you to pay a visit. They recently linked out to a post on My Modern Met featuring artwork by Yoni Alter called Colossal NYC.

It’s a digital work in which all of New York’s iconic buildings are arranged in a 2-dimensional brightly coloured skyline silhouette, in the order that they were completed. Lovely concept, and fascinating to watch how buildings grew larger and larger over time - check the puny Statue of Liberty compared to the Four World Trade Center (which isn’t actually complete yet).

Pages

Subscribe to RSS - Art