I Heart Hundertwasser

Friedensreich Hundertwasser (1928-2000) was an Austrian born painter, architect, environmentalist, and activist. (I am obviously obsessed with early 20th Century Austrian art/artists)! He is widely known for his architecture and vibrant, organic paintings. He lived by the mantra that the straight line was "evil" and much preferred a beautiful organic line in buildings as well as paintings. He was well known for his Mouldiness Manifesto in which he stated that any renter should have the right to extend his arm out his window and chip at the facade and paint and create a space within arm's reach out the window that would let the inhabited publicly declare that "someone lives there who is different from the imprisoned, enslaved, standardised man who lives next door." Quite a unique concept!!

Hundertwasser was a strong believer in incorporating living plants into the architecture as well insisting on plants on rooftops and plants growing out of windows. Some ideas for his buildings included uneven floors and irregular windows and said for these reasons the buildings would be constructed quicker due to the fact that the workers liked working there. He found the workers to be interested in creating unique spaces and in turn did not feel like robots. Hundertwasser was really incorporating freedom of life into every aspect that went into the building. He had many architectural concepts he developed. One that I would have loved to see developed was his model of a green motorway. Pictures of these models are also included below. As well as pictures of his living roof house in New Zealand a land that he felt deeply connected to and considered to be his true home. I think Hundertwasser was way ahead of his time, and just right for ours. He was a true visionary.

Text and images compiled from different sources but mostly Wikipedia and Taschen.

I Heart Walton Ford

I first heard of Walton Ford when I was flipping through Elle Decor (May 2008 issue). I was immediately drawn to this photo of a Walton Ford watercolor hanging above the couch in the apartment of actor Hank Azaria.

I started trying to find out any information about the artist that I could. He had been featured in Men's Vogue Fall 2005. Here is a beautiful photograph taken for the article by Martin Schoeller.

Walton Ford also has a book titled Pancha Tantra. The name being a reference to the ancient Indian animal mythology believed to be a precursor to Aesop's Fables. Walton Ford's work is steeped in layers of history. His work is very obviously and intentionally influenced by great masters of the past such as John James Audubon, whom he regularly features as a figure in his paintings to George Catlin. He follows in their traditions in the style of painting as well as in the method and lifestyle, by using the great outdoors as his source of inspiration. As noted in the Vogue article he regularly makes the 80 mile walk from his home in the Berkshires to Vermont to meet with his printer!! The printer he meets with makes prints of his original pieces so that they can be more affordable when one cannot shell out the 30,000 plus dollars for an original! His work is visually and meaningfully complex and the watercolors are meticulously painted. I love how at first glance the watercolors appear to be old and classic biological paintings but upon closer inspection they are often twisted and dark. Here are a few to feast your eyes on:

And here is an image from the Paul Kasmin Gallery that shows the works in person so you can really get a sense of the scale, incredible!

My only regret is not being able to see the works in person. His new works are currently on exhibit at the Paul Kasmin Gallery until December 23rd. If anyone is New York between now and then and gets to check it out let me know how it was!