Takayuki Hori

Via DesignBoom:

‘oritsunagumono’ (translated as ‘things folded and connected’) is a collection of origami works by artist Takayuki Hori, created to highlight the environmental threat of pollution to a number of species native to Japan’s coastal waterways.

each translucent sheet is first printed with either the images of fragments of an animal’s skeleton, or, on some pages, human-made discarded objects that are often ingested by the animals in the wild.
using the ancient tradition of folded paper, hori assembles the pages into a three-dimensional model.Once the paper is folded, the printed components are united as a whole, telling the visual story of the animal’s plight to survive in an increasingly polluted and hazardous ecosystem.

The Poster Cause Project…

via The Poster Cause Project.com:

“We have released the first batch in a large series of prints to directly aid Doctors Without Borders with their Japan earthquake relief efforts. On March 11th, 2011, Japan was hit by the most powerful earthquake in at least 100 years at 8.9 magnitude, the fifth largest in history. All Japan Earthquake Relief Prints are $15 and 75% of profits from these prints go to support Doctors Without Borders earthquake and disaster relief efforts in Japan.”

Posters featuring artwork from Piktorama, MONK, Meme Machine, Shin Tanaka, Scarecrowoven, Patricio Oliver, Optikmass, James Walker, DGPH, Oliver KOA Cramm and more to come. Really nice posters for $15 bucks a pop going to very worthy cause. This is the first series and more work in on the way! For more info, check out the website: www.thepostercauseproject.com . -eb5k

International Spotlight: Grape Brain!

Via Grapebrain.net:
“grotesque yet cute. dated yet cool. erotic yet pure. rock yet pop. japanese-style yet western-style. digital yet analog. violent yet peaceful. a fool yet a genius. a grown up yet a child.
GRAPE BRAIN – a graphic machine, possessed by a ‘Grape Brain (Matter)’ full of paradoxes. GRAPE BRAIN represents the way of life of a perverted man named ‘RAGE’, who can’t do anything other than drawing.”

I’m really digging the Eastern and Western influences in Grape Brain’s work. I wish I had more info on the guy. He has a bunch of work online and a blog. Looks like he’s been doing everything from character design, logos, shirts, and it looks like he has been is some high profile exhibitions in Japan. I look forward to seeing more work from “RAGE”. -eb5k

Check out more of Grape Brain’w work(Japanese):

Grapebrain.net

Japanese Rice Patty Crop Art!

From the Land of the Rising Sun (and from really cool Asian pop culture site Pink Tentacle) comes rice patty crop art! This is done by lots of planning and arranging of different colored rice plants. The scope of these are incredible! For more photos click here. -eb5k