Over the weekend, the Premier League match between Everton and Wolverhampton Wanderers had a short delay as a black cat had wandered onto the pitch – and refused to leave. The game, which took place at Goodison Park in Liverpool, saw the four-legged spectator wandering around the goal and sidelines. The crowd looked on in delight as none of the players or officials even tried to chase away the...
The Flaming Lips are known for frontman Wayne Coyne zorbing in a large transparent ball over the crowd at their gigs. So with COVID-19 restrictions putting a halt to most live music since March 2020, the US rock band came up with an inspired way to pull off some unique socially distanced shows.
The band performed two shows in their home state of Oklahoma, with the crowd listening and dancing in “space bubbles”. Coyne shared a video on Instagram of his baby son, Bloom, watching from the balcony as fans enjoyed the music in their capsules.
The band were pictured holding “F*** you COVID-19” balloons on stage during the gig.
Before the first gig, camera operator Nathan Poppe shared a thread on Twitter explaining the logistics, saying the venue was filled with 100 bubbles containing up to three people each.
“There’s a fancy high frequency supplemental speaker inside each bubble as well as a water bottle, a fan, a towel and a ‘I gotta go pee/hot in here’ sign,” he wrote.
It’s in the Canine Tuning tattooshop, located in the sixth arrondissement of Marseille, that Anabelle, aka Zbobinails, created her most beautiful claws. Nostalgic for the 2000s aesthetics, the nail artist make some iconic and almost forgotten characters live again, such as Hello Kitty, Care Bears and The Powerpuff Girls through her creations. Glitter pink, flames, dragons or large rhinestones, nothing is ever “too much” for Zbobinails, which pushes kitsch to fingertips.
In an ongoing series entitled, “Icons Unmasked”, artist and illustrator Alex Solis imagines what the true identities of famous characters in tv and film might be. The Wisconsin-based artist uses a wacom tablet to draw his digital illustrations and he has amassed a huge following online for his entertaining artworks.
Below you will find some of my personal favorites, but you can find dozens more here, here and here.
Dutch artist Daan Roosegaarde’s latest artwork GROW is an homage to the beauty of agriculture. In the world film premiere GROW appears as a luminous dreamscape of red and blue waves of light over an enormous field. GROW is inspired by scientific light recipes which improve plants’ growth and resilience.
Most of the time we hardly notice the huge areas of the Earth which are literally feeding us. GROW highlights the importance of innovation in the agriculture system: How can cutting-edge light design help plants to grow more sustainably? How can we make the farmer the hero?
GROW consists of a design-based light recipe which shines vertically across 20,000m2 of farmland with leek (Allium porrum). You experience the artwork as ‘dancing lights’ across the huge agricultural field. The light is poetic, and inspired by photobiology light science technologies which have shown that certain recipes of blue, red, and ultraviolet light can enhance plant growth and reduce the use of pesticides by up to 50%. GROW is precision lighting.
GROW is part of the artist-in-residence program of Rabobank. Daan Roosegaarde and his team of designers and experts developed GROW over two years, informed by expert knowledge sessions at Studio Roosegaarde, Wageningen University & Research, Springtij Forum, and the World Economic Forum in Davos. It is the first in a series of dreamscapes by Studio Roosegaarde which show the beauty of combining art and science to create a better world.
Specifications:
20,000m2 agricultural field with four systems of light recipes on solar batteries for exhibitions worldwide. GROW is precision lighting, focussed horizontally in a controlled area, which can extend the sunlight for a short time and can only be seen from nearby. This way GROW is in balance with the environment.
With special thanks to Wageningen University & Research, BioLumic and MediaMonks. Photography by Ruben Hamelink and Daan Roosegaarde.
The film GROW shows the development of this luminous dreamscape and how the beauty of light can help plants. It is also a call for enlightenment during these dark times. GROW can be good for nature but also sends hopeful light to people. It gives a new meaning to the word ‘agri-culture’ by reframing the landscape as a living cultural artwork.