Drew Melton recently sent us a link to his website The Phraseology Project, a collaborative project of sorts where you submit a letter, word or phrase and he and a few of his friends turn it into a piece of typographic artwork. In addition to this, Drew created a series of typographic prints around his own set of phrases, to help support The Phraseology Project. These are some of my favorite prints – the ‘Til Death Do Us Part print would be great in a bedroom, and Milk would be awesome in a kid’s room, right? I might have to get one for our babe.

I immediately loved this print, The Hollow City, by Gustavo Aimar. It is both delicate and detailed, yet  complex and layered in the way that cities are.  Gustavo really describes his print best:

The Hollow City belongs to my personal work. Lately, I’ve been making artwork in which the human figure, and even animals, are completely absent. I like representing inanimate objects. Instead of recreating a landscape, I represent objects and places that are related to human activity. A hollow city represents to me the silence – an uncertain pause – a place where nothing moves and nothing has weight, which is very disturbing. The little magazine trimmings and pictures that appear as backgrounds speak about the same thing; they are there but they are not. They are like authentic ghosts or testimonials of something that happened there before.

15% of each print sold benefits Farm Sanctuary. Read our interview with Gustavo here, and buy the print here.

Sorry for the lack of posts yesterday. We are in Seattle for a week on vacation, and I never got around to scheduling posts for Tuesday. Whoops! I guess we really are on vacation, huh?

This week’s print at The Working Proof is especially appropriate, given that we are in the Pacific Northwest, and I almost stepped on two of these bad boys today on our hike up Deception Pass today. Snail Moss is a print by Jill Bliss, a Portland-based artist and Jill-of-all-trades. Snail Moss is a print from Jill’s anima series, which is an ongoing study of native Pacific Northwest animals and the ecosystems in which they live.

It also seems appropriate that Jill’s print should benefit American Forests. As she mentions in her interview – “I love forests! And so do snails and moss!” If you love forests, support American Forests by buying Jill’s print here.

Andrew Hem is just so talented. I wish that I were located in Culver City, CA, so that I could check out his new show, Cold Water, which is opening at LeBasse Projects on July 16th, from 7pm-10pm. The show will run from the 16th through August 13th, 2011.

In this highly anticipated solo project, Hem confronts the viewer with themes of isolation and personal conflict. After focusing his 2010 body of work on his Cambodian heritage and how different his life might have been should his family have stayed during the regime of the Khmer Rouge, Hem now moves forward with an even more introspective series of paintings.

The new paintings explore the feeling of isolation we get when removed from those close to us – and the ensuing personal darkness that follows. As the viewer progresses through the paintings we can see how Hem emerges from those dark places and finds the road back to happiness.

Hem states that the title ‘Cold Water’ is a reference to that feeling of ‘being surrounded by cold situations and places.’ Hem masterfully builds lush, yet cold, landscapes wherein his portraits longingly stare for someone to connect with. Filled with personal references, Hem’s paintings still create a canvas all should be able to find themselves in.

Have a great 4th of July, if you are celebrating. We’ll be taking Monday off, and will be back on Tuesday with posts.

This is really very cool – PlayMo is an urban intervention by City Leaks in Melbourne, Australia, that desires to “inspire urban dwellers to explore moments, spaces and places where one can deposit themselves. The challenge is to reconsider how we inhabit and identify ourselves in the cities.”

PlayMo was born from the intention of inventing a space that turns into a place where people meet, spend time and play. Its name comes from “playmobil”, a Lego styled child’s creative play toy. Using milk crates was like playing with big Lego pieces.

Milk crates are a fantastic material for many reasons; they are structural, light, modular and they have an iconic role in Melbourne’s cafe image and laneways. We believe that familiarity to a material plays an important role in engaging with it.

PlayMo uses 3 different types of crates. Black = platforms, Grey= stairs, Green=moveable. The green crates provide the undefined random element; people rearrange their seats or even build small stairs themselves. There hasn’t been a single day where we found them in the same place.

Finally, PlayMo is designed to grow and adapt. People are encouraged to leave things behind and to add to the structure. We found artworks, plants, toys, pillows, new crates and received hundreds of letters. We even found that people had constructed a bin so that it could be kept clean.

The Magician and the Owl by Sergio Membrillas is a continuation of one of Sergio’s personal projects called Beards and Trees, a project where he imagines bearded people and their union with nature. Sergio’s hopes that the prints will evoke some kind of reflection about how important nature is in our lives.

This is a digital print on acid free, Neenah uncoated matte 100lb cover paper that is 80% recycled. It was digitally signed by the artist and was numbered by The Working Proof. The Magician and the Owl is perfectly paired with American Forests, whose mission is to grow a healthier world with trees. Read our interview with Sergio here, and buy the print here.

I love this as a simple decor idea. Studio Lawrence created this wall hanging of felt suspended from a steel rail. Called Along These Lines, it was designed for the London Design Museum, to reduce the echo within their conference room. Functional and beautiful.

Available in twelve colours, the lanes are cut in widths of the first five values of the Fibonacci sequence and run parallel. The lanes can be layered up to create texture and the easy-to-manage hanging system means the lanes can be rearranged, creating a constantly changing composition. Using a double-sided rail, Along These Lines can also become a soft partition wall to divide living spaces within the home, to separate workplaces or to enclose a meeting-room table.

This book design by Bunch Design is pretty cool. Condiments & Entrails features a collection of poetry by John Durak. Each copy has one of three different stickers on the cover, which when removed reveals a hidden message, and leaves the book title-less. The inside of the book is nicely designed, too, with awesome illustrations by OmegaTheKid!Phoenix that accompany each poem. There is also a limited edition screenprint inspired by the cover available here.

An insane DIY Hot Wheels racetrack by Chris Burden featured in the new issue of MAKE

via Notcot/Make

This week we have another new print by Emily Dumas, aka Flowers in May. If you know Emily’s work, you know that she illustrates collections, and this is a collection of the objects that help us express our creativity – crayons, pantone chips, paints, erasers, t-squares…Eat, Sleep, Create is about immersing yourself in creativity and making.

Emily has chosen to continue to support Little Kids Rock, so as with her last print, 15% of each print sold will benefit the charity, an organization that brings free musical instruments and music instruction to public school children. Read our interview with Emily here, and buy the print here.