If you’re in need of single-color icon inspiration, then Tiny Icon Factory is the site for you.

Created by Luis Blackaller and Brent Fitzgerald, Tiny Icon Factory encourages its visitors to design their own creations — by clicking and dragging over the icon generator in the upper left hand corner. If you’re not in the icon-making mood, you can always browse through the 290,000 designs that have already been created.

I had a little fun and added two designs to their enormous archive.

Tiny Icon Factory

Labels: Brent Fitzgerald, graphic design, illustration, Luis Blackaller, site design, Tiny Icon Factory

While you are most certainly familiar with the characters and stories created by Dr. Seuss, this post goes beyond the well-known work.

I did a bit of digging and discovered interesting links devoted to his personal fine art work, corporate advertisements, political cartoons and a brief article written for mental_floss titled 10 Stories Behind Dr. Seuss Stories...Enjoy.

Dr. Seuss art

Dr. Seuss advertising

Dr. Seuss political cartoons

10 Stories Behind Dr. Seuss Stories

Labels: ad campaign, article, artist, books, Dr. Seuss, fine art, graphic design, mental_floss

Here are several new ads created by Ogilvy & Mather, Mumbai, for World Wildlife Fund.

I really enjoy the complexity of the compositions, the quality of the illustrations and the simplicity of the message. In addition to being great ads, I think this campaign is a fantastic example of what can be accomplished with single-color printing.

WWF Ad Campaign

As a bonus, here is a link to previous WWF print campaigns — my favorites are the densely populated areas integrated into detailed leaf imagery.

Additional WWF ads

Labels: ad campaign, graphic design, illustration, Ogilvy and Mather, WWF

If you desperately need to know what day it is, yet can’t stand the convenience of glancing up at your Menu Bar — you’ve come to the right place.

The Human Calendar is a fun and cleverly voyeuristic approach to date retrieval that relies on simple visual innuendo. The calendar is the work of Craig Giffen, founder of The Human Clock.

The Human Calendar

If you are hopelessly confused, and just don’t get this fancy schmancy concept, try this link instead.


Site submission: Brian Herzog

Labels: Brian Herzog, Craig Giffen, photography, resource, The Human Calendar, The Human Clock

Complexity disguised as calming simplicity is not an easily achievable task, but these Japanese fountains accomplish just that.

The first video shows the Canal City fountain in Hakata, Japan — the use of water was so unexpected that it was unclear to me at first what I was looking at. The second video shows a clock fountain in Kanazawa, Japan, and while significantly understated in comparison to Canal City, it is nonetheless impressive in its clever functionality.

Labels: Japanese Fountains, video

Here’s an interesting article from BBC News about Robin McInnes, a coastal engineer that has been studying detailed 19th Century paintings to evaluate coastal growth, change and erosion.

Artistic clues to coastal change

Labels: article, BBC News, fine art

WARNING: Naked Painter Alert!


Does this entry constitute legitimate artistic consideration, or has the blog hit an all-time low? I’ll let you decide.

Based on the quality of the work, Tim Patch is not an artist I would typically bring attention to. I hate to call him a novelty because I have much respect for anyone who loves to create, but his “thing” is penile painting. Yes, his work is produced by applying paint to his penis and using it as a brush.

Classy.

His site is semi-tame, but it may raise eyebrows from your boss or human resource department. As I have neither a boss nor a human resource, I find it to be perfectly acceptable viewing.

Pricasso

Labels: artist, humor, Tim Patch

This is impressive stuff.

I’m not sure I’ve ever used the term “innovative landscape artist,” but that certainly describes the work of Minneapolis artist and educator Gregory Euclide. The composition, color and flow of his works are amazing, but the combination of organic subject matter and line work, is nothing short of extraordinary. I would love to see this work in person.

Gregory Euclide gallery

Labels: artist, fine art, Gregory Euclide

As promised, I have finished adding labels to all 300 blog entries. To maximize their use, I have included direct links to the labels that occurred most often and would be of the greatest search interest; the links are located on the right hand column directly below the Blog Archive.

In addition to the labels, a search feature has been added to the site as well.

Labels: blog, resource, update

After spending much of the week revamping this site, there was very little time for art and design making. So in lieu of spending yesterday putting together a Featured Art update, I spent most of the day creating this 18 x 24" illustrated poster. I based the illustration off of the photograph below — a completely random house that is located in Ypsilanti, MI.

The entire poster was created using Adobe Illustrator.

Labels: illustration, poster, studiotwentysix2, Tom Davie

I really dig the work on TYPOZON — the studio of Colombian artist, designer and illustrator, Cristian Vargas. While the mix of art and design appeal to my personal interests, my favorite part of TYPOZON might be the site design.

It’s true that the layout is helped tremendously by the support of good work, but the slightly offset grid, minimal text columns and color palette all combine for a very nice presentation — a site definitely worth checking out.

Cristian Vargas

Labels: artist, Cristian Vargas, fine art, graphic design, site design, TYPOZON

I first saw Dave Kinsey’s work back in 1999, when I was living in San Diego. If you’re unfamiliar with his style, it’s an immensely fascinating combination of expressive painting, line illustration and contemporary design dealing with urban and figurative subject matter. I can remember being immediately taken by the work — as both its scale and technical skill were undeniable.

In addition to being an accomplished artist, Kinsey is also founder of BLK/MRKT, an LA gallery that now specializes in print editions.

Dave Kinsey

Labels: artist, BLK/MRKT, Dave Kinsey, fine art, gallery

In honor of the 44th Presidential Inauguration, Jalopnik has profiled the new and improved Cadillac One. Now that’s how I wanna roll.

Stretched Caddy

Labels: Jalopnik, vote

If an illustration of a trans-sulcus intraocular lens fixation gets your engine started, then this post will set your glomerulus aflutter.

The Association of Medical Illustrators has compiled a collection of past-honored medical illustrations, animations and interactive media — although the motion and interactive work, seem to be only still images.

Medical Illustrators Past Salon Winners

Labels: Association of Medical Illustrators, illustration

It’s not your imagination; things look slightly different around here.

Due to a Blogger conflict, I had to choose between keeping the original layout, and creating a new layout that would allow the recently added labels feature to work properly.

For the past three days, I have been working within the confines of a Blogger-approved layout, to make it similar to the original blog format. There are a few changes for the better, including: slightly larger images, RSS for posts and comments, the ability to email a post, and the troublesome, yet now resolved labels feature — which I am still working to complete.

Feedback is welcome.

Labels: blog, studiotwentysix2, update

I’ve been a fan of Norwegian born Odd Nerdrum’s paintings for quite some time. Using pigments that he personally grinds and mixes, Nerdrum is a contemporary master of light and the human form. The paintings are so detailed and intense, that he typically produces about six to eight paintings a year — with phenomenal results.

His body of work tends to be dark and unsettling in subject matter, but there is beauty within its psychology — similar to that of Caravaggio. The painting above is oil on canvas, and titled, The Astronomer. (2000)

Odd Nerdrum gallery

Labels: artist, fine art, Odd Nerdrum

It’s time once again to bring forth the celebration monkeys, as the blog is rapidly approaching 300 posts.

I’ve been evaluating the site to determine what could improve — from the aspect of retaining old readers and attracting new ones, to encouraging a greater level of participation from all those involved — myself included. So for the short-term, here’s the plan:

#1) I have added a “submit” link, located above “Last posts” in the column to the right. By submitting, you can inform me of interesting links, worthwhile artists and designers, or art happenings that might be of note. If I use your submission, you will be aptly credited by any name you like, and said name will be linked to any site you request.*

#2) I am in the process of adding reference tags to all 300 posts. It’s time consuming, and not terribly exciting, but I think it will dramatically improve the usability of the site — and will aid in the search of older posts that may be difficult to otherwise locate. I’m sure this function will be elementary to many of you, but for those unfamiliar, there will be a series of labels at the end of each post. When clicked, these labels will take you to a page containing all the previous posts with the same keyword.

At this point I am less than a third of the way through the process, but aim to have the labeling completed late next week.

#3) To become more consistent about posting, I am going to (on a temporary trial period) add a new entry Monday through Friday. Each weekday there will be at least one new post, with additional humor and Featured Art posts as they are completed. This will begin on Monday January 19th at noon (EST), and will continue for four weeks — at which point I will reevaluate the response and effectiveness.

#4) To encourage reader commenting and participation, I’m considering an artwork bribe. Perhaps a screen print or small work to the reader with the most comments over the course of a month, or to whoever is able to bring in a gaggle of new recruits.


Over the Long term, I plan to conduct several artist and designer interviews, as well as evaluate the overall look of the blog. A redesign is something that would not be done hastily, as I can’t stand when sites that I enjoy change their look and functionality. I like the current look, but feel that larger imagery and a wider text column might be beneficial.

Well, that’s it for now. Be on the lookout for my super-epic post that contains the 25 top television opening sequences from 1953 through 1990 — it has been several weeks in the making.

Tom

Labels: blog, studiotwentysix2, update

I really like the style of the new Quicksilver commercial from the “Microsoft People Ready” campaign, created by JWT. I admit that I’m not a huge fan of Microsoft or their products, but I wanted to view the commercial again, so I logged on to Microsoft.com to find the ad. Ironically enough, I could not get the video to work, even after downloading their proprietary media player and using the Internet Explorer browser — so with such flawless technology, I’m sure this campaign will work like aces.

Microsoft, Quicksilver commercial

Labels: ad campaign, commercial, interactive design, JWT, Microsoft, Quicksilver

Ben Samuels has an impressive online collection of classic comic book covers from the 1930s through the 1950s. The comics are categorized by: Super-Hero & War, Good-Girl & Romance and Crime & Horror — the images are excellent quality too, which is a big plus.

EDITOR’S NOTE...studiotwentysix2 does not encourage or condone the use of Radium to melt human faces. It’s messy, morally objectionable and your first grade teacher would probably be disappointed in you — isn’t that right Mrs. Hummel.

Adventures Into Weird Worlds

Labels: books, comic books, ephemera, graphic design

I found this in the New York Times, and thought it was worth sharing.

The article discusses how the economic downturn is affecting museums — specifically older, more established institutions; and how this is compelling several to reevaluate the collections on display, their placement within the museum, and experimenting with making the experience more “people friendly”, as opposed to the lofty separation that museums often establish. There are a few interesting case studies provided, including the Detroit Institute of Arts, pictured above (Photo: Tom Pidgeon).

Museums Look Inward for Their Own Bailouts

Labels: article, Detroit Institute of Arts, museums, New York Times

I have just posted the first Featured Art work of 2009 on the studiotwentysix2 site.

Unfortunately, my time was spread thin towards the end of 2008, and I was unable to update the Featured Art section as much as I would have liked. I have a feeling that my schedule will once again be erratic, but I will make every effort to consistently update the work — perhaps every other week.

To learn more about the mixed-media piece cipher [348], visit the link below.

Featured Art : January 08

Labels: artist, cipher, Featured Art, fine art, studiotwentysix2, Tom Davie

If you have an interest in the works of Miró, then this is a link you’ll want to bookmark. Weinstein Gallery in San Francisco has a high-quality collection of Miró etchings and prints from 1936 to 1979, including the above work, “Femme et chien devant la lune.”

Miró prints at Weinstein Gallery

Labels: artist, fine art, gallery, Joan Miró, Weinstein Gallery

Knee-deep in its branding overhaul, PepsiCo has turned its attention to the redesign of the Gatorade brand. The company is “redesigning everything from the sidelines to the shelf to appeal to a broader range of athletes and active people — headlined by enhanced beverages in bold new packaging.”

I like the “G” design — it’s clean, simple and effective. I’m not quite sold on the divided / broken worded label designs. That style could be the basis for an interesting ad campaign, but I fail to see how the RAH! RAH! clichéd sports saying are going to attract a larger athletic audience. As a matter of fact, I would probably steer clear of the bottles with sayings, just to avoid being mocked.

Gatorade Design Preview

Labels: Gatorade, graphic design, PepsiCo, redesign

I recently came across these two informational graphs, and thought they made an interesting contrast in visual depiction / stylistic approach.

The first map shows the growth of American Walmart locations from 1964 through 2007 — the growth of business is impressive in its expanse, but rather creepy in its virus-like visual depiction.

The second map depicts current global carbon emissions by country — the graphics are quite bright, vibrant and fun, which seems to be in direct contrast to the environmental effects that the graph represents.

Growth of Walmart Across America

Climate Change: The Carbon Atlas

Labels: interactive design, Walmart