Today was a magical morning. Our heat wave has sadly ended, but I still woke up feeling really, really good. I should mention I am a true believer in manifestation, but I am also a person of action. I felt like Dean Moriarty, buzzing, smiling with bums in the panhandle, having a speedy amazing run, in sync with all of the traffic lights, feeling like every lyric playing from my ipod was a reflection of everything I've been feeling and thinking. And I realized two things: I want to always strive to be gracious (in my actions) and honest (most importantly, with myself.) And I've been flooding with new ideas for some art projects its slightly overwhelming. And then I got to work and my new eskuche headphone arrived (they have amazing customer service, if they break, they replace the pair in about a week) and I got my Sketchbook Project. And I got to eat some free chocolate coconut cake. So really, after a extremely exhausting week, today was wonderful...Now how am I going to begin all these endeavors???? So this is a picture of my good friend Mary, because it makes me happy, and because I know she would understand by having a buzzing day, and because she's in Hong Kong and I miss her. Shout out to Mar!

This is maybe one of the coolest things ever and most difficult to verbalize....

Ok, I'm really excited. I just took a leap and signed up for Art House Co-op's 2010 Sketchbook Project! This is gonna be really good. This is  also one of the most difficult undertakings to verbalize and explain so please, check out the link. I'm kinda nervous but I think this is gonna be very inspiring, and keep me bustling. Everyday on my way to work I keep hoping the sketchbook will arrive, but no dice. So I will keep ya posted when I get it and maybe even show you some of my sketches. Stay tuned!

these shoes don't suck

I think that almost everyone that can afford a pair of the simple vegan shoes would say they are a supporter of Toms. Who doesn't like the idea of being charitable while adding something hip and comfortable to their wardrobe? There is something great about and seeing TOMS as a blank canvas [shoe] and taking them to the next level with some personalized footwear--no more fighting over whose TOMS are whose. Recently, my roommates asked me to customize their TOMS for their birthdays. Here are the results.

to be bright and green

I love DIY, especially for the home. In part because I need to constantly have a creative outlet, and also because I enjoy taking credit for the cool decor accents within my home. For inspiration and ideas, I spend a lot of time on various sites: readymade.com and apartmenttherapy.com are amazing. On Re-nest, I had seen postings of solar-paneled lanterns and loved the idea: It incorporates sustainability, mason jars, and lighting, all things I like. However, I also knew I wanted to take the project a step further to play with color and reflection. These are a couple I have made with glitter and sequins and spray paint. Next I want to try glass beads and tinsel. I aspire to soon have a shelf of these lanterns all glowing together.

The Birds

I'm not gonna even pretend otherwise, I have an amazing apartment. I'm obsessed. And I love to decorate it and use the space as if it were a gallery. Luckily my roommates seem ok with it, I think they might even like it. Installation art has always interested me, and is fun to experiment with. Also, I should mention I work down the street from Paper Source, so I spend a lot of time (and more money than I would like to admit) in the store. These doves bring a sense of color and serenity to a morning in the kitchen with a my coffee.

Double Whammy

Skinner

Skinner

Ferris Plock

Ferris Plock

On Saturday, I went to two art openings at White Walls and Shooting Gallery where two friends of mine have been working hard to get the shows up.  Artists Skinner and Ferris Plock were featured and the turnout was very impressive. Skinner's show "The Fear You May Know" featured a lot of fantasy art, or what I like to think of as art directed to men which reminds them of the comics and plastic figurines of their childhood. Personally, these were not the types of pieces I would want to hang in my home, but because of the attention to small detail and intricate stories of destruction and conflict, were certainly interesting and offered a lot to look at. Luckily, I had the pleasure of going through the work with my dear friend Tim and he continually pointed out aspects that reminded him of his childhood. We both also agreed that Skinner uses a lot of different painting techniques within a single piece (like a hazy spraypainted backdrop) that is very effective. In particular, Skinner's ability to incorporate a drip effect with actually adds to the story.
Ferris Plock, a San Francisco artist, had his "Rest for the Wicked" show where his works depicted the the types of characters I would see when I walk around the city. I really like Ferris's work; it's thoughtful, it also had great attention to detail, without being over the top cutsy or pretentious. I was totally reminded of Klimt's "The Kiss" at this show and was I rich, I would have bought some of work. He is also thematic with his colors, and has a couple different stories grouped within his figures. I loved the sneakers, and all the animalistic faces. It made me smile.

Sweet Ride Creamery

My good friend Rachel makes amazing ice cream. Like, the kind of ice cream that makes a lactose intolerant person (me) devour it. She manages a company that rents bikes and gives bicycle tours around the city, but has many ideas for side businesses. An ice cream bicycle was one her latest ideas, and because I know she has the talent, I wanted to contribute. Her business endeavor was the perfect product to create a brand identity system for. Thus Sweet Ride Creamery was born! For my final project for my intensive Graphic Design course at Parsons, I had to create a logo, table tent, hang tag, packaging and promotional material. These were three very intense days as i worked to create a design for Sweet Ride Creamery which met Rachel's criteria: 

1. Simple

2. Cheap to reproduce

3. Because she was going to sell the ice cream out of a freezer trailer attached to her bicycle, the containers had to be small (no cones) and recyclable--she wanted mason jars that could be returned to her.

4. Labels that wouldn't stick to the glass if she reused the jars.

5. Something awesome!

The promotional card itself was fictitious, but Bees Without Borders is a new non-profit that she is currently interested in, and they also happen to have a stand at the Green Market in Union Square (where she may also purchase some of her ingredients).

For Father with Love

Handmade books are great for special occasions, or as a very personal gift for someone you know and love. Recently, I've been toying with the idea of starting a side business of handmade books for weddings, expectant moms, birthdays, basically any occasion that requires more than a card. (If you have any ideas for the business name, send them my way.)

Presentation is equally important..this was the packaging

My dad hates birthdays, and has never really shown appreciation for the various presents I have given him over the years. This is not to say he's ungrateful; he just knows what he likes and gets it for himself. I can't even tell you how many times I have bought my dad books I thought he would enjoy, only to see them untouched, collecting dust on his dresser. Therefore, this past year, I decided to make him a book, in hopes that it would be short enough for him to actually read it, and he would be paternally obligated to cherish it. I constructed the book by creating 2 pages at a time, and because I chose to make each page a 4 inches square, the paper was small enough to use my typewriter for text. An added element was using a translucent paper so that some images could be seen though a couple pages, and so it would seem double sided. (I really recommend making accordion books double sided, otherwise they can seem very sparse.) The handmade aesthetic also worked well with the story--a father/daughter relationship developing over the years. The images were a combination of sketches, photographs, and other pictures I found. I also included a map of San Francisco, which enabled a second book within a book. The telephone line which runs throughout the text helped tie all of the pages together, and worked well with the long-distance story line.

Highline Book

One of the most serene places I visited in New York was the High Line in Chelsea, a public park built on an old elevated freight train rail. My Graphic Design class took a field trip there, and from our experiences and photographs we were asked to create an accordion book. Though the theme could be of our choice, our book had to include text, some sort of line element, and only two colors plus shades of grey. Because of technology advancements, hand-made books are almost an art form of the past--time consuming and difficult to mass produce. That is also what I think makes them so special.
Here is the book I created. My theme was boundaries and I used the yellow and green to emphasize the contrast between the natural and man-made environments. Because my color and text were incorporated mainly through collage, I played a lot with the various textures of paper, photographs and small touches of ink. I was also able to add in additional pages which gave a more three-dimensional effect to each page.

Nathan's

Chloe was very excited.

If you love corn dogs with big gulps of lemonade, hotdogs, and other fried foods, you must check out Nathan's on Coney Island. Every 4th of July they hold a hot dog eating contest, and if you win, your name is immortalized on the side of the building. Personally, I love their french fries. Nathan's is also one of those food establishments that must have been harassed by the FDA or something because they have to label the caloric intake of each item they sell. Which I hate, and must be bad for business. Because if I wanted to indulge in a seafood basket, I would not like to know that it has over 1000 calories. But I digress. Nathan's is a quintessential part of Coney Island's charm, and because of that, I made a little linoleum print in its honor. (Clearly I am one of those vegetarians who still thinks about processed meat.)

Who woulda guessed? Coney Island twice in 2 weeks!

Growing up in New Jersey, I have visited New York many a time and have seen many of the sites...Ellis Island, FAO Schwartz, Statue of Liberty...the list continues on. For this past month however, there were a couple of less conventional stops I wanted to make in the area. Coney Island to me seemed both decadent and run down, and my childhood friend and I thought it would be a cool day trip to catch some sun, take some pictures, and eat a corn dog--which I made her do as I no longer eat meat but wanted to document her experience. C.I. (as I like to call it) was all I imagined and more; ornate, depressing, run-down, and from another time. Also, expensive. The rides were each about 7 dollars a pop, so we chose the Wonder Wheel, a NYC landmark with a promising view. I had been on ferris wheels before, but I kid you not when I say we were terrified. Some of the carts swing and you feel as though they will become unhinged and you will fly off the wheel and plummet to the bottom. I mean, my palms were sweating and we closed our eyes as we took pictures with our cameras. Never again, we swore to each other. The next day at my first day of class, I learned I would be returning to Coney Island to find a subject to create an 8 page brochure in InDesign. Ha! I felt ahead of the game....

other Coney Island inspired pamplets

Here are both a few photos of the final brochure as well as a minimized page by page layout. The Wonder Wheel was my theme, as I attempted to create a mood of fear and death of the ride...the back cover signifying the idea that no soul that rides the Wonder Wheel ever leaves Coney Island...Ahhh

Experimental Type

back cover

front cover

Finished "Experimental Type" book jacket

One of the first projects we worked on in my Graphic Design course was an exploration of typography. We were asked to design a book jacket using type to express a concept--in this case, experimentation. I was excited, and because it was also required to be a black and white cover, I immediately thought of shadows, and the way signs take on a new type when shadowed on the streets and buildings. I kept 50 or so of the preliminary photos, many of which spark ideas for future projects. Overall, this was one of my favorite projects and I hope to have future opportunities to design more book jackets.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs

This is a poster I created in the digital art session for a Yeah Yeah Yeahs concert held at the MoMA. While I wanted to honor the aesthetic of the YYYs while also keeping the Museum's prestige in consideration. We ended up printing these posters at a grand 28x36 inch size. It was crazy seeing the difference between working on a screen and then having it transformed by enlargement.