Close your eyes and imagine… no wait, close your eyes just enough so you can still read this.. and imagine you are the CEO of a company that manufactures and produces X-Ray machines.  Fun, right?  Now imagine that the holidays have rolled around and it’s time to wow your medical clients with a gift that says “thanks for buying 18 million dollars worth of x-ray machines for your hospitals.”  You can’t just send a fruit basket.

Enter Japanese X-Ray Machine manufacturer, EIZO.  Along with their advertising agency,  Butter, EIZO created this x-ray pinup calendar to, um, spread some holiday cheer.  Ms June is shown above.

Ms. August

Ms. September

Ms. November

For the full calendar, click HERE

I’ve posted before about how much I love Swiss artist Felice Varini’s eye popping large scale work:

Until now his work could only be viewed in person when overseas, but non profit group Site Projects has brought Felice to New Haven, Connecticut, for his American debut. His signature perspective dependent graphics have taken over Temple Square and the result is predictably magical. If you happen to live the area, head over before the end of June to see some free, amazing public art. The rest of us can enjoy this backstage peek into the making of a megalith.

So, how does this ordinary alley and parking garage:

Become a mind bending play on space?

First you have to set up a giant projector:

And then you wait for darkness.

Once night falls, Felice gets busy taping out the design.

Then come the cranes, ladders, and paint.

Plus cute boys. Wait — did I just type that out loud?

Once the painting is finished, every surface becomes a canvas, changing its shape depending on the viewer’s perspective.

Magic!

Thanks to Site Projects for giving us this insight into the makings of a masterpiece. Now, you’ll have to excuse me while I whip out my projector and start drawing on the walls… imagine the possibilities!

I’ll let you know how it goes.

As you can imagine, the largest decor undertaking in my house right now is la bambino’s room.  In fact, I was more stressed about how to decorate it then I was about whether he’d be a boy or a girl (I figured I had no control over that).  Over the last few months I’ve already picked up quite a few prints that will eventually form the little dude’s first cluster art wall.  Don’t you just think he’s going to be so excited to come home to all this:

Since he’s going to be born in the year of the tiger (as was his father, uncle, grandfather, great grandfather and great grandmother) I thought we should pay homage with a few pieces of tiger art.  Note: THIS ROOM IS NOT TIGER THEMED, just tiger friendly.  This print, rock candy, was found by Erin and purchased by me in approximately 2.2 seconds.

Continuing the tiger non-theme I also grabbed this year of the tiger print from the same shop.

And finally, I picked up Tiger Phone from the Two Rabbits Studios booth at the Renegade Craft Fair.

In fact, all the remaining prints were picked up at renegade.  If you have one happening in your area, I highly suggest you go.

Because I am having a wee little baby, I thought I should get a few little-kid friendly prints too.  Not just a bunch of insane tigers.  I grabbed this beep beep bike print from Tad Carpenter.

This 2-part pink monster is also by Tad Carpenter, but unfortunately, I couldn’t find it on his site and I think he’s sold out.

And because I bought so much at his booth, Tad threw this tiny bird print in for zero dollars.  Thanks, Tad!

Having stocked up on some baby goodies, I felt like I could return to my crazy art comfort zone.  I bought this Will Bryant print at the Public School booth.

And finally, because babies go goo goo ga ga over black and white prints, stimulating their little brains straight into mensa, I picked up this crazy eye print for the little dude.

Don’t be scared if you feel like some of these don’t go together, remember we have several walls to work with here.  Anything that doesn’t make the baby’s room cut will land in my office, but overall I’m feeling good.  I think he’s just going to swoon when he comes home!

Every once in a while a little tidbit this way comes that has both of us rubbing our hands in glee. This is such a bit. Courtesy of our friend Andrea, check out these Babies With Laser Eyes.

Yep. That’s a baby with laser eyes.

Now, I know that DC is ultimately a design blog. We present you with hard hitting entertainicles on the best paint colors and furnishing trends, with a healthy dose of hip artwork and graphic design to round out the awesomeness. Do laser babies fit into any of these categories? I don’t know. Blow one of these bad boys up into a poster and stick it on your wall. Your mom will love it.

Who knew that babies could be raised on a steady diet of magic mushroom milk and Pink Floyd? The baby instruction manuals I read completely glossed over this important information.

I’m pretty sure The Hunny is going to want a T-shirt of this one.

Angry laser baby bad!

This little dude is going to haunt my dreams, for reals.

Can you say hot tub?

Let’s just pretend for one minute that you don’t like babies. Well, first of all that would be ridiculous. But whatever, we can’t all be obsessed with chubby cheeks and giggles and precious bodily fluids. But if you don’t like baby animals with lasers, then you are going to have to go somewhere else. Psycho.

Awww, sweet double headed laser kitty. I want one so bad.

Little laser puppehs.

Undomesticated laser crossing.

How could this post be complete without featuring some of our own laser babies? First up is Andrea’s brand new little man, Ozzy:

And Ozzy’s crime fighting friend, Ike. These kids are going to get into so much trouble together.

I did make his lasers green, but The Hunny informed me that Superman’s special eye lasers are red. Duh.

For more lasertastic photos, and to learn how to add lasers to, well, anything, go here.

Just imagine the possibilities…

You dudes may remember that not even an entire month ago I got my act together and finally put my horse print up for sale on etsy.  Well, it was such a darn good time I’ve gone and done it again.

Lasers in General is my newest piece, printed in (ahem) METALLIC GOLD and black, he’s 26″ of pure shiny federalist awesomeness.  Limited edition prints are for sale on etsy HERE.  Why do they cost less than the horsey?  Because it’s smaller and was much easier and less expensive to print.  Bada bing.

Thank you, Erin, for your lovely photography and styling skillz.  Don’t you guys j’adore the eagle lamps with the general print?  Can I get a whatwhat?

CLICK HERE to check out Lasers in General on Etsy

And to grab one of the last horsey prints, CLICK HERE

This weekend has brought on a blitz of furniture rearranging, thanks in large part to your awesome enthusiasm for Friday’s post asking for music suggestions. You’ll be happy to know that we’re busy listening to lots of your picks, and that all the fresh and new happening up in here has inspired me to do something about the big black box wall. So while we’re busy employing every sleight of hand trick in the book to conceal, disguise, and reconfigure, our now staggering collection of AV equipment, I am hoping to wow you with some trickery of my own. Watch as this post unfolds before your very eyes, with hardly a word to distract you from its glamor and mystery. See two artists and one interior photographer reinvent the color wheel, turning it into a blaze of kaleidoscopic glory.

Contemporary artist Eileen Quinlan:

Barbara Kasten’s compositions felt stale when I was first starting out in photography, but the sudden resurgence of abstraction in photography has breathed new life into her super 80s imagery.

Funhouse style interiors shot by Christoph Theurer:

Well kids, that’s about it for today. Hope you enjoyed this peek into some crazy parallel universes. I’ve got tons more work to do before my own little world is inhabitable, so I’m gonna scoot on out of here. Don’t worry — I’ll update soon with pictures of the big black box solution.

Dudes, it has been ugly, cold and raining, for the past week in Austin, and I’m pretty well sick of it. Austin is about sunshine and boiling heat, not this stupid apocalyptic rainfall. I think one of Ugo Rondinone’s rainbow signs mounted atop my roof might help rectify the situation. At the very least it would act as a glowing beacon for all the hapless folks swimming around out there. My ‘bow would proudly proclaim: Party At Erin’s Arc! (Everyone Is Welcome).

Or it could say one of these other things… I’m open.

via Internetwork

via mirumir’s Flickr stream

via Aquabotic

via You Have Been Here Sometime

via lisabella’s Flickr stream

via Internetwork

Portrait of John Giorno

via Wooster Collective (hilarious image!)

If you had a giant neon rainbow perched atop your house, what would it say?

If any of you have peeked an eye into the real world lately then you know that the 2010 Winter Olympic Games are upon us.  While winter athletics are the only sport I personally like to participate in, the thought of watching this season’s games isn’t really getting me all fired up.  My lack of muster is 3 fold: 1.  No Michael Phelps, or any hot swimmer ass for that matter.  I’m sure that Johnny Spillane is cute as a button but until he races down the slopes in some swim trunks I’m really not interested.  Reason #2: No time, dude.  As you can see I have Olympic-sized blog posts to write which leaves me with very little Olympic-sized time to watch tv.  Reason #3, and the reason for my post today:  Crappy graphics.  Sure, my HDTV delivers a fine picture, but who cares when the logos, posters and typefaces are so darn bad?

Today’s gigantor post (the proof is in the pudding, ya’ll) is dedicated to the evolution of Olympic graphics, the good, the bad and the just plain not worth watching at all.

In the first quarter of the 20th century most Olympic posters looked like this.  Before the spark of industrialism, they were fancy, flowery and not really appropriate for mass reproduction.  Since the Bauhaus and all those funky Dadaists hadn’t spiffed things up yet, I give them a free pass and say “ok, fine.”

Same goes with the logos.  Ok, in 1932 they should have known a little better, but, hey, it takes a while for the WHOLE WORLD to get all progressive and junk. Again, I assign a “sure whatever” to these designs.

In 1956 things got a little shaken up down under.  The Melbourne poster is leading the way for some pretty sexy Olympic graphics but that junky logo is dragging them down, man.

In 1964 the Japanese came in and put the kibosh on the crappyness.  Cutting out the clutter altogether, the Tokyo Olympic games stuck to clean lines for their logo and highlighted their advanced printing techniques in their poster.

While the Tokyo Olympic graphics were pretty swell, shit went down in 1968:

Designer Lance Wyman made way for a new era in Olympic logos by doing nothing short of balling up perfection and tossing it onto a piece of paper where it blossomed and flourished into the most perfect Olympic logo ever known in the history of mankind.  Finally, a visual worthy of the athletic giant it represented.  Rather than having a separate logo and poster design, Wyman expanded upon his (amazing! awesome!) design above, to create the official poster for the games:

I’m just going to give you all a minute to enjoy this.

From his progressive graphics came a well-spring of art around Mexico City:

Wyman didn’t stop there, he also spiced up the doldrum pictograms that had been used to identify each sport in the games:

Like the logo, the visuals were reinvented throughout Olympic village:

Even the least sporty among us can’t deny how rad these colorful images are.  Juxtaposed with the bold stripes of the logo, I would have attended these games even though my sweet baby Phelps hadn’t even been born yet.

With the wind at his back, designer Otl Aicher was brought in to design the 1972 logo and graphics.  His designs for the games celebrated the rebirth of Germany vis-a-vis colorful posters (a wee too fussy but still stunning) and a fancy light at the end of the tunnel logo.  Do I like it as much as Wyman’s?  Um, no.  But do I still think it’s pretty awesome and that the Olympic officials are moving in the right direction?  Yes, yes, and yes.

Things stay cool for the ‘76 Montreal Games.  Look!  Abstract Expressionism!  I can get behind this.  I can even get behind this:

Sure, it looks a bit like a logo that could slide across the screen before a PBS educational doc, but I like PBS, I like beta graphics and I like what’s happening here.

In 1980 Moscow doesn’t let the Cold War (or 60 boycotting countries) put a damper on their logo. In fact, they hype the hell out of their games with an unprecedented number of official Olympics posters

These graphics are starting to get a little cluttered, but I can really get behind any city that decides to put a good luck teddy bear on their official poster.  Also, that rocket ship poster sets my space-race heart a flutter.

Things start to go a little pear-shaped in the 88 games.  While that Journey-style poster makes me say “don’t stop believin” that swirly logo says to me, “the wheel in the sky just might stop turnin”

By the time the Los Angeles games roll around in 1984, the clean lines and sexy graphics of ‘68 are a distant memory.  Here is a short list of where these snoozy, American-ized stars belong:  on a box of Wheaties;  the cover of a Bruce Springsteen album; or perhaps just team USA’s jerseys, but never, ever ever should they represent the entire kitten-kaboodle.  Also, would anyone care to tell me what the hell is going on in that poster?  I think the background was lifted from the fabric on my childhood sofa.

It’s pretty much down hill from here, with “contemporary” and “whimsical” design taking the place of anything smart, slick or sophisticated.

These are the biggest games in the world, what the fuck is happening?  Is there an underground room filled with ex-disney employees coloring new logos somewhere that I should know about?  If so, how does said room look?  Maybe we could write a blog post about it.

Here is what we have to look forward to this winter.  That inuit come hockey goalie on the left hardly seems worthy of walking in Wyman and Aicher’s footsteps.  The pictograms on the right are ok, but I long for the days of simplified images, when 3 bold strokes instantly conveyed each sports motion.

In 2012 we get to digest this vomit-blob for the entire summer season, I’m not even sure that Phelps’s speedos can make this bearable.  While I appreciate the divergence from the tonka-colored crapfest that’s been taking place since 1992, the 2012 logo is just trying too hard.  Simplicity man, simplicity.

It should also be noted that the 2012 logo is the first ever to allow variation in color throughout it’s use.  Translation:  official Olympic sponsors may now use the logo in their marketing materials in any color they like.  Let’s prey to god that McDonald’s is not a sponsor, I really don’t want to look at this monstrosity in yellow and red.

The Russians shine a wee baby light at the end of the 2014 tunnel with the first decent logo in over 2 decades.

A location has not yet been selected for the 2016 games but, judging by the looks of things, it doesn’t even matter.  Until they hold that Olympic torch under the design committee’s ass and demand some suitable logo work I’m starting my own Olympic boycott.  Well, at least until Phelps is back.