how the rich live

While browsing for images of Adam Dant I came across this excellent blog. It features a series about the most expensive real estate worldwide.
Bizarre palaces, villa's, high tech residences. Somewhere down the line you probably financed a tiny part of them.
Check it out.
PS - scroll down

Adam Dant

Adam Dant is a 37 year old London bases artist. His work consist,among other things, of obsessively detailed images of rooms, architecture and public spaces . The works are quite large, but all the same the amount of scribbly lines is unbelievable. He works in pen and ink. Sometimes black and white, sometimes sepia. Sometimes it's colorized.
A nice collection of images (and maybe even still art for sale) is shown here at Adam Baumgold Gallery. The gallery that also sells the Chris Ware work I am often drooling over :)
This picture shows his work in a gallery context (though not baumgold's)



Here he's shown with one of his works.

Charles Verschuuren

Charles Verschuuren was born in 1891 in Tilburg, the Netherlands.
He was schooled as an illustrator and a sculptor in Amsterdam. It turns out he lived three streets down from where I live in Amsterdam.

In the twenties he and his family moved to New York. There he worked for the International Display Company but soon he started working for the Brooklyn Daily Eagle as a cover-designer/illustrator.

His work is characterised by sharp angles and stark contrasts. Somewhat typical for those days, but at the same time more radical than most "art deco" illustrations.
He also worked as a painter and reached illustration Nirwana with works for the famous magazine the New Yorker.
His work is in the collections of the Stedelijk Museum and The Theater Instituut.
He died in 1955

Summarized from this Dutch site

states

Every American State has an official "state tree". This is a nice poster listing all state trees.
American states also have official state flowers, songs, dishes, songs etc. But that is another topic.
I am also a big fan of Smokey the bear, the character that was brought to life in 1944 to support the campaign against forest fires.

nice blog

acejet170 is a nice blog about found typography, old books, good design and smart observations.

It has a great piece on an appearance of Alan Kitching, a god of typography. Here he is holding the poster for his talk.

calligraphy

fantastic video. This guy can truly draw a letter. The kids's not bad either!

mock ups for a new graphic novel by Seth

Gorgeous pages filled with tiny spaced type, studies and Seth's beautiful illustrations. I'd love to have a closer look.
Thanks to drawn & quarterly, my favorite comic publisher.

hotel labels from all periods

not the prettiest site, but a very nice collection of hotel labels. check!

wendingen

A nice collection of of covers of the magazine "wendingen".

great typography site

nice design, and a truckload of information.
I love typography

the swastika

Interesting article about the design and symbolic value of the swastika.
I came across it searching for the designer of the Nazi symbol (logo?).
It is a frighteningly strong symbol. As graphically beautiful as it is symbol of the power of devastation.

Animals in type

Great project by Jeremey Pettis. Twenty Six types of animals. Great typography. Very imaginitive. This is student work but some "pages" and the concept is pro! It is an idea that could flourish if it is developed further.

 

all about homes

This page contains some fine links to the art of dwelling.

incredible yugop

Came across the Yugop Site and still am amazed at their simple but stunning experiments. This one is from 2002 (!) but still amazes me. Lots of others here.

more Rockwell Kent

Rockwell Kent - Moby Dick

Rockwell Kent's beautiful illustrations for Moby Dick.

Alexander Deineka

Alexander Deineka (Alexandr Deineka) was a very politically engaged painter/illustrator. He was born in 1899 in Kharkov (Russia). His best work (in my opinion) is his least political (revolutionary) work. Most of all I like his folky, simple drawings (with the slightest touch of goache, or water color). Unfortunately I couldn't find many examples on this website which is
devoted to his work.
In his later paintings there are traces of the work of Alex Katz, Edward Hopper (Deineka being the influencer obviously, if at all). He keeps combining (social) realism and slavic nostalgia

alex nabaum and Tatsuro Kiuchi

These are two of my favorite illustrators.
They work in a similar style (their technique is dominated by the use of the inkroller, which gives their work a silkscreened appearance) Even conceptually their images are related. Both illustrators seem to have the same eye for human behaviour. I can't decide who I find better, I think they are both unique and brilliant.
Alex Nabaum and Tatsuro Kiuchi

addictive

linegolfer. Silly but very addictive. Linerider 2.0

friendwheel

the friendwheel is a facebook app that visualizes your networks of "friends" in a graphic and beautiful way. This might be a good app in the real world when you can't decide who to ask for your parties.