Using only a plasma-cutter, Cal Lane turns ordinary steel objects into intricate works of art.

She started out as a a hairdresser,toying with people’s hair, but she always felt more comfortable holding a blowtorch in her hand, rather than scissors, so she decided to mix her two vocations into her art. Now Cal Lane is an established artist who’s art reflects the contrast between the industrial and the fancy.

Miss Lane specializes in cutting intricate patterns in steel objects like barrels, wheelbarrows and shovels.  She says she enjoys making art-pieces out of objects people normally ignore. Visit her official website for more of her amazing work.

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Guido Mocafico, a Swiss artist of Italian descent, uses one of the most feared creatures on Earth to create beautiful art.

Out of 2,700 species of snakes, just few are dangerous to man and Guido Mocafico used them in his art to show there is a less frightening side to snakes. Take a look at his amazing coiled-snakes artworks and know they can be purchased from Steidlville.com

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Run for your lives, Godz…Childzillas are coming!!!

A charity organization in the Ukraine had the brilliant idea to create posters of giant children terrorizing various major cities around the world. It hopes the offbeat images will draw attention t children’s issues, not only in the Ukraine, but at an international level.

As a tribute to Godzilla, the original havoc-wreaking monster, most of the images show Childzillas in Tokyo.

Photos by CATERS NEWS

via Telegraph.co.uk

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If you want to make sure you’re watched over by heavenly angels, I suggest you go straight to the Holy Cross Church, in Munich.

German artist Ottmar Hoerl set up a divine exhibition inside the Holy Cross church, by attaching 300 golden angels on a scaffolding. Entitled “Guardian Angels over Munich“, Hoerl’s artwork allows people to actually experience what it’s like to have not one, but hundreds of angels watching over you. Not a bad idea…

Photos by REUTERS via EastDay

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What can you do with an old Ford Capri bought on eBay? Cover it in small toy cars and turn it into an art project, of course.

Young James Ford has spent the last two years working on General Carbunkle, a homage to General Lee, the legendary race car from The Dukes of Hazard. He thought of an original way to pay tribute to this popular ride and decided he was going to cover it in red and orange toy cars.

Ford relied on toy donations from all over the world, in order to complete his project, but did impersonate a toy-shop owner to get his hands on 2,000 toy cars. In the end he estimates he used between 3,500 and 4,500 cars, mostly T-birds and Double Decker buses.

Ford intends to auction the General Carbunkle on eBay, so his project can come full circle.

via Creative Review

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Announced for over a year now, the world’s largest underwater museum recently received its first exhibits.

The seabed of the Mexican Caribbean is now host to a series of life-size sculptures on display in Mexico’s Underwater Museum. But they are just a few of the 400 statues that will be lowered down to the bottom in the following months.

Located in the National Marine Park, the Underwater Museum aims to raise environmental awareness by creating an artificial reef. Scientists hope the statues will attract young algae that will color them vividly.

Photos by Jason de Caires/BARCROFT MEDIA

via Telegraph.co.uk

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American artist Walton Creel found a way of deweaponizing the gun by taking away its destructive power and using it to create art.

Walton Creel is not the first artist in the world to use guns in his art. As he states on his official site, others have taken high resolution photos of bullets piercing a target or melted down guns and shaped them into something completely different. But he knew he wanted to deweaponize guns by taking away their destructive power and using it as a “tool of creation”.

The Alabama-based artist came across the concept of creating art by puncturing holes and though it was just what he had been searching for. Using painted aluminum sheets instead of canvas, he figured out how far apart the shots are to be fired in order to create a nice pattern. The power of the shot knocks off a little paint and “fuses the image together”.

via Cool Hunting

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I know I’ve said “you can turn anything into art”, but I never imagined someone could actually use household dust as material.

Paul Hazelton collects dust and manages to shape it into incredible works of art. The British artist says his affinity for dust might have something to do with his upbringing in a very clean environment. At one point n his life he noticed a layer of dust on a mask and realized he could pick it up. That was the beginning of an extraordinary dust-shaping career.

Paul works with ordinary household dust, which he gathers from furniture, hanging paintings, pictures, but never from vacuum cleaners. He stores the “precious” matter until he’s ready to mould it. Then he wets it, gives it the desired shape and carefully dries it.

It’s a painful process, but the 43-year-old dust artist loves it.

via Metro.co.uk

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San Francisco has been rendered by many other artists before, but never quite like this.

Scott Weaver always dreamed he would build the world’s largest toothpick model and 34 years ago he started working on it. Fast-forward to present day and he still hasn’t fulfilled his dream, but he did create one of the most impressive toothpick sculptures in the world.

“Rolling through the Bay” is a 9 feet tall, 7 feet wide and 2 feet deep toothpick model of san Francisco that features 4 pingpong ball rolling tracks and several entry points. That’s right, it’s the tracks that make this wooden masterpiece so unique. That’s how Mr. Weaver began his adventure in the world of toothpicks, by building abstract models and rolling pingpong balls on them. It just got out of hand at some point and turned into this amazing model.

Though “Rolling through the Bay” does feature some of the most iconic sights in San Francisco, like the Bay Bridge, Golden State Park, Fisherman’s Wharf, Alamo Square or the Cable Car tour, Scott Weaver says it’s just his view of the city and unlike more traditional models, his has rolling pingpong balls.

The toothpick model of San Fracisco took over 3,000 hours of work to complete and over 1,000,000 toothpicks. Luckily, a pack of 750 toothpicks costs just 99 cents, so Weaver can’t say his hobby is too expensive. Ripley’s Believe It or Not offered Scott $40,000 for his unique model, but he isn’t ready to part with it just yet.

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They may look like just elaborate models of Christian, Jewish and Islamic holy places, but Al Farrow’s artworks have a much deeper meaning.

Al Farrow’s Religious Trifecta: A Synagogue, a Cathedral and a Mosque tries to reinterpret three of the world’s major religions according to their political, military and cultural history. As you surely know, religion played a major role in some of the greatest conflicts in history and that’s what the artist is trying to emphasize through his models. Built with used gun components, bullets and steel shots, these unusual holy places reveal the violent side of religion.

Al Farrow‘s steel masterpieces are displayed at the de Young Museum, in San Francisco.

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A polar bear statue, carved out of a nine-ton block of ice and placed outside Copenhagen climate change conference center, sends a frightening environmental message.

Mark Coreth, the artist behind the Ice Bear Project created the sculpture in the hope of raising awareness to the melting of arctic ice due to increasing temperatures. A huge pool of water and the bronze skeleton of a polar bear is all that will remain as the ice statue gradually melts, revealing the fate of all real life polar bears, unless the global warming issue is addressed.

Coreth is urging all passers-by not only to look at the bear-sculpture, but also to touch it and help it melt, in the hope that more people understand how mankind “contributes” to the melting of the Arctic. Asked when his ice polar bear is going to completely melt, the artists said it is impossible to tell, just like nobody knows how long the Arctic will last.

Photos by XINHUA/ZHANG YUWEI

via People.com.cn

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The Grotto of the Redemption is an excellent example of what man can achieve with faith and hard work.

Paul Dobberstein was a German immigrant ordained as a priest in 1897. At some point he fell critically  ill with pneumonia and vowed he would dedicate his life to building a shrine to The Virgin Mary, if she would save his life. Father Dobberstein survived and soon after his recovery began gathering piles of rocks for his mission. His search for materials lasted 14 years.

Construction of the Grotto of the Redemption, in West Bend, Iowa,  began in 1912. Foundations were poured, stone slabs were set into place, all in the name of The Holy Virgin. Father Dobberson was actively involved in the building process and many times his hands would crack and bleed from all the cement. He would say “there isn’t any redemption without a little blood”.

Though West Bend isn’t the best place to look for crystals and semi-precious stones, Paul Dobberstein traveled to Hot Springs, Black Hills and Carlsbad Caverns and managed to gather truckloads of materials for his Grotto of the Redemption. The redeeming priest worked on expanding and improving the grotto until he died, in 1954, at the end of a long day’s work.

At the time of Dobberstein’s death, the Grotto of the Redemption was the size of a city block and is still expanding today. The crystals, semi-precious stones and petrified wood used to decorate the structures of the grotto are said to be worth over $4,300,000.

Considered “the world’s most complete man-made collection of minerals, fossils, shells and petrifications in one place”, the Grotto of the Redemption welcomes over 100,000 visitors every year. It reminds me a lot of the Ideal Palace.

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Do you know those dreams that start out all nice and dandy only they turn into horrible nightmares in the end? That’s sort of what Cakeland is like.

Cakeland is an art installation in Oakland, created to look like a delicious collection of cakes. Featuring cakes placed on tables, stacked on top of other cakes, mounted on walls and even hanging from the ceiling, Cakeland literally looks like heaven for sweet addicts. But alas Scott Hove’s cakes are anything but edible. Unlike the regular treats that last only until celebrations end, Cakeland cakes are made from acrylic, wood and cardboard and will last “as long as the artist or society have the wherewithal to preserve them”.

But that’s not the worst part of our nightmare. In order to protect their delicious beauty, the artists equipped some of the cakes with sharp teeth that act as defense. Hove says “without this aggressive aspect– call it the anti-cake– the beauty is vulnerable, transitory, and not to be respected”.

Cakeland is a very interesting place, but unlike Scott Hove who sees it as a pilgrimage site away from the problems of reality, some might consider it torture. After all finding yourself surrounded by seemingly delicious cakes, without the possibility of even tasting them can be a grueling experience.

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A group of 12 overgrown pink snails have taken over Plazza Scala, in Italy’s fashion capital, Milan.

These unusual plastic models were created by the Italian Cracking Art group and are on a mission to change people’s lifestyle. In a world where everything is happening so fast, the pink snails are here to let you know “speed isn’t always a virtue” and slowing down to enjoy the beauty of the city can be quite refreshing.

“We need to play with the city to break with our obvious daily routine and rediscover the experience of moving about the city” said Finazzer Flory, Milan’s culture counselor. He added that the giant pink snails are shaped to resemble an ear to also make people listen to what’s going on around them

The slimy giants will be moved periodically towards the Palazzo Reale and, in January, they’ll make an appearance at the central train station. They’ll then go on a series of international visits to Amman, Tel Aviv and Chicago. They’ll return to Milan in 2015, as part of a 120-snail army. That sounds kind of scary…

via UPI

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The Falling Photographer, as he is commonly known, shoots photo of himself right in the middle of a big fall, in the name of art.

Kerry Skarbakka says he first began taking falling pictures right after the events of 9/11 and uses his body ” as a metaphor to describe the tensions and anxieties we all feel.” For some of his works, the artist uses special rigging and climbing equipment to achieve the desired effect, but he often  plunges dangerously, with no protection.

The Falling Photographer travels all over the world in search for suitable locations to shoot his photos and he also sets up scenes in his personal studio. For the bathtub photo below, he installed an installation to make him flip in the air, but he still banged his head on the side of the tub a few times.

Kerry’s works have been exhibited in art galleries across the world and he plans to shoot enough photos to put together a book. So far he has around 40 photos that can be purchased for as much as 4,500 pounds.

Photos by KERRY SKARBAKKA/BARCROFT MEDIA

via Telegraph.co.uk

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