Oil painter Danny Heller is back and has created a new, breathtaking series titled “City Modernism”. I’ve been following Danny for almost seven years now and as he keeps tacking on the years of experience, one can see the subtle growth and maturity in his works. I cannot praise Danny’s work enough. I never really understood what people meant when they talked about finding art that hits your soul in a way that you must own it until I saw Danny’s work for the first time. His work is really something to see in person. Speaking of which…
Danny will be presenting his new works at the George Billis gallery here in Los Angeles this weekend. If you live in the Los Angeles area, drop by the opening reception and check his work out, meet Danny and I’ll be there as well on Saturday. Details for Danny’s “City Modernism” are listed below:
Opening Reception: Saturday October 19, 5-8 pm
October 19 – November 26
George Billis Gallery
2716 La Cienega Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90034
I remember the first time I laid eyes on a photo of Brasilia. I actually thought it was from a science fiction movie or computer generated 3D model. In fact, it’s still hard to believe these buildings really exist on our planet today.
Yesterday, the legendary architect behind Brasilia and many more modernist works of art, passed away at the age of 104.
Oscar Niemeyer was an architect by trade, but his buildings embodied much more than the engineering or utility behind them; they were, to borrow a phrase I read in a recent obituary, “a poetic vision of the future.”
And nowhere was Oscar’s vision better demonstrated than in Brasilia, a planned utopia conceived in Brazil’s interior that resembles a spaceport more than anything we might recognize as a city. In fact, after flying over Brasilia’s futuristic presidential palace and modular ministries in 1961, Yuri Gagarin, the Russian cosmonaut and first man in space, said “the impression was like arriving on another planet.”
The photos presented here are from two photographers and sources. Marcel Gautherot’s photos of ‘The Construction of Brasilia’ are sourced from an Arch Daily article you should read and see. The others are from Rene Burri, and you can view more of them through Magnum Photo’s website.
This Lake Washington Residence is a 4,000 square foot home designed by Miller Hull Architects. It was built on Mercer Island overlooking Lake Washington, just outside of Seattle. It faces outward from the edge of a steep hill and heavily forested area over the lake. The view alone is just as captivating as the actual house.
The main entrance of this residence is from the hillside above via a bridge to the third floor. The uppermost level of the residence is used as a place for guests to stay. The residence was designed to be naturally ventilated where the main staircase would pull air up and through the house. I do wonder how well insulated the home is.
Casa Kimball is the ultimate getaway house that we all wish to acquire sometime in our lifetime. The house is situated on a cliff alongside the beautiful Atlantic Ocean coastline and clocks in at an outstanding 20,000 square feet in size.
The house is also accompanied by a long seamless-edge pool and hot tub. However, I don’t see a floating green like I would hope. Perhaps when paying the $4,000 daily or $24,500 weekly rate to rent out the house, they would accommodate that desire.
Besides this house being enormous, I’m particularly interested in the way the architect intended light to be a part of the design. It would be great to see photos from the inside of the house looking through the grated wall during sunset and also looking out of the side slots in the house during sunrise.
It always seemed odd to me that I never see these beautiful houses while out and about. But then again, if you have the money to build an amazing house, chances are you’ll have the money to properly gate it or purchase secluded property. In this case though, this house was built smack dab on a steep hill just outside of Seattle.
After coming across the house on Deforest Architect’s website I realized that I had seen it before while it was being constructed. By its looks at the time, it appeared substantially nicer than any of the surrounding houses. Because of that I had assumed it was an oddly placed office building rather than a home.
As you go inside the house it opens up with a modern, metal and wood theme. The wood is even complimented by the metal of two turntables and a mixer atop a small, raised cove above the living room.
If you’re a fan of the 60’s style illustrations I’m fond of posting sometimes, you will love this book: Naïve: Modernism and Folklore in Contemporary Graphic Design. I picked it up the other day to assist me in an illustration project I’m working on now (more on that later). It’s been especially great for sourcing inspiration about color palettes. Could use a little more text though (there isn’t a word in there). There are a lot of familiar favorites inside (was nice to see Siggi Odds make an appearance), and also a ton of artists I had never seen before. Highly recommended if you’re on an illustration kick.
Naïve documents the extraordinary renaissance of Classic Modernism, from the 1940s to 1960s, in contemporary graphic design. This compilation introduces a new wave of young designers who are rediscovering the stylistic elements reminiscent of classic graphic design such as silkscreen printing, classical typography, hand lettering, woodcutting and folk art and integrating them into their work. [Link]
Everything you see in these stills and videos by Alex Roman is 100% computer generated. This is certainly the best CGI I’ve ever seen; I would normally say “virtually” indistinguishable from reality, but in this case the “virtually” doesn’t belong. The videos were created using 3dsmax, Vray, After Effects, and Premier. But what amazes me here isn’t just the execution, Roman crafts truly beautiful images with impeccable taste, something often missing from highly technical productions such as this. The man perfectly rendered a Mies van Der Rohe and an Eames, give him a medal! Maybe I can get some VR googles and map his work to the interior of my house and pretend to live in some modernist paradise.
I thought I had a bad workload trying to finish this new album, I can’t even imagine the man hours that went into just one minute of these videos. More videos at Roman’s Vimeo page and lot’s of stills and info at his portfolio site.
