All You Need is a Little Paint and Some Imagination

In the United States especially on the east cost, demolition of historic structures has become a very controversial topic, with many developers and communities clashing with very different perspectives and agendas. There’s a lot to be learned from experiments that other cities around the world are going through. The borough of Delfshaven located in Rotterdam is the second largest municipality (population wise) in the Netherlands. The buildings pictured above were (and still are) slated for demolition. The borough asked the well known Dutch artist, Florentijn Hofman to come up with a plan for the derelict block of buildings. His solution? Paint them bright blue! The catch is that the buildings will stay blue and intact until there’s a new plan for the area. Since this particular section of houses built in the early 20th century have been painted blue, the most unseen block in the city has become Rotterdam’s most photographed one. It provokes viewers to see the surrounding buildings and engage with the architecture but furthermore it moves them to decide what role the buildings have in the community. This project certainly puts the repercussions of demolition in perspective while attracting visitors who bring life back to the neighborhood while the future of the area is being planned. Who knows, maybe the buildings will be preserved as-is to continually liven the community, attracting painters, photographers and tourists to the unique spectacle.

Tanya Aguiñiga Talks About Her Design Inspiration

Tanya Aguiñiga is a furniture designer who earned an MFA in furniture design from Rhode Island School of Design in 2005. Originally from Tijuana, she’s now based in LA. Spending most of her life living between Tijuana and San Diego, she has found inspiration from both locations and the differences have informed her work drastically.

“In Tijuana, everyone made trash into something beautiful and useful, nothing went to waste. Having grown up in a place where trash is used to construct houses, furniture making has provided me an outlet to create something that is functional while translating emotions into a three-dimensional object.”

In 2006 Tanya was awarded with the United States Artists, Target Fellow Award. “United States Artists (USA) is a grant-making arts organization dedicated to supporting America’s finest living artists working in a diverse array of disciplines. After decades of dwindling public support, artists now have a home where they may find significant private funding—unrestricted cash grants—to ignite the creativity that makes this country great.” Their motivation for continuing to grow the organization stems from a study they conducted, concluding that America is “a country that loves art, not artists.” In their survey, the organization found that 96% of Americans said they were “greatly inspired by various kinds of art and highly value art in their lives and communities.” Only 27% of people that they interviewed however said that they believe “artists contribute a lot to the good of society.”

Check This Out!

Offering some blue sky inspiration for the transportation industry, this particular bad boy is called “the Animaris Rhinoceros Transport”. It was conceived of and designed by Theo Jansen, an artist who creates what he calls “Animari”. They are best described as large, multi-legged creatures that come alive when hit with wind. See more of his work here…

Green Art?

Austin based sculptor, George Sabra is taking the lead (no pun intended), making many of his pieces from reclaimed computer components and driftwood. His motivation is to warn people about the hazards of electronic waste. One of his recent showings was at Austin Earth Day, a large green living festival put on by Austin Green Art.

For more info about George Sabra here.