Prince Philip, a.k.a., the Duke of Edinburgh, and husband of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II, past away last week. There was…
EXPLODED VIEWS: ARTIST SLICES UP EVERYDAY OBJECTS!
Artist Fabian Oefner’s Heisenberg Objects is a collection of sculptural works created by slicing objects — sneakers, a clock, a…
TRUE GRIT: SURFER-MUSICIAN’S VINTAGE, STICKER-FIED STATION WAGON
Would you drive this stickerfied vintage station wagon? We spotted this car parked along a remote stretch of Pacific Coast…
MEDIA DIET: WHAT WERE WATCHING, READING & LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW!
Here it is, folks! A brief run-down of our current media diet: Some of the TV shows and movies we’ve…
CRYPTIC: HIPSTER-BEVERAGE GUERRILLA MARKETING AS STREET ART!
We saw this wheat-pasted poster on an electricity utility box on Fairfax Avenue in Hollywood on Monday. And we thought…
BACK TO THE MUSEUM!: WE VISIT OUR FIRST EXHIBITION IN OVER A YEAR! PANDEMIC BE DAMNED!
On Monday we went to our first art exhibition in over a year. Our first since the start of the…
NIFTY: WE’VE MINTED AND RELEASED AN NFT!
We’ve actually minted and released two NFTs! These are original images of surfers on waves at a couple of legendary…
ESCAPE ARTIST: NEW BANKSY STREET ART DEPICTS MAN SCALING PRISON WALL IN U.K.
. . . Banksy recently painted this stencil street art work on the wall of Reading Prison in the U.K.…
MARK THE SPOT!: EPIC, SPRAWLING “DESERT X” CONTEMPORARY ART EVENT RETURNS TO THE COACHELLA VALLEY!
It’s back! And we are so very happy to see it! Desert X has returned. What’s Desert X? It’s the…
REMOTE CONTROL: AWESOME ONE-TAKE P.O.V. VIDEO OF DRONE FLY-THROUGH OF A BOWLING ALLEY!
. . . . . You’ll want to watch this video at least a couple of times. This well-choreographed and…
ABOUT FACE: MASKS OF THE WORLD, UNMASKED!
. . . . . “Beyond Noh” is short documentary film by Patrick Smith that dives into the subject of…
NIFTY!: DIGITAL N.F.T. ARTWORK SOLD FOR $69 MILLION AT AUCTION! JAWS DROP!
In a groundbreaking auction sale a digital artwork in the form of a JPG file as non-fungible token (or NFT)…
HOME RUN: ARTISTS COMMISSIONED TO RE-IMAGINE ICONIC BASEBALL CARDS!
The Topps chewing gum and baseball card company has launched Project 70 to celebrate seventy years of producing annual baseball…
WHAT PARTY?: FIRST MAJOR KAWS RETROSPECTIVE OPENS IN BROOKLYN!
The New York Times has published a review of the new KAWS exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. KAWS…
A NEW FONT FOR OUR TIME: “CLIMATE CRISIS” TYPEFACE REFLECTS REAL-TIME CLIMATE-CHANGE DATA!
A newspaper in Finland has launched a new variable font called “Climate Crisis.” The font was designed to reflect the…
WHAT DA FUNK? FAMOUSLY UN-FAMOUS FRENCH DUO DAFT PUNK SPLIT UP!
. . . . . Daft Punk has split up. Has ended things. Called it quits. Called it a day.…
“PRETEND IT’S A CITY”: WHY MARTIN SCORSESE’S NETFLIX SERIES WITH FRAN LIEBOWITZ IS MUST-SEE TV!
Netflix’s “Pretend It’s a City” takes its title from a remark by Fran Liebowitz. It’s a command to the tourists…
THE UNLIKELIEST ART STAR: HOW KAWS WENT FROM GRAFFITI-TAGGER TO GLOBAL ART WORLD MEGASTAR!
The New York Times has published an excellent profile of artist Brian Donnelly. Who is Brian Donnelly you ask? He’s…
ADVENTURES IN AUDIO: BRILLIANT A CAPPELLA VERSIONS OF WINDOWS & iPHONE SOUND FX + SUPER MARIO BROS., TETRIS SOUNDTRACKS!
. . . . . This South Korean vocal group’s a cappella versions of Windows and iPhone sound effects and…
FUZZY LOGIC: CULTURE OF MISAKI KAWAI!
Artist Misaki Kawai‘s current exhibition of new work at the Hole Gallery in New York City could at a brief…
WORLDS COLLIDE: FILMMAKER WERNER HERZOG INTERVIEWED BY SKATEBOARDING MAGAZINE!
Skateboarding magazine Jenkem interviewed Werner Herzog. Yes, THAT Werner Herzog, the auteur German film director and actor whose directorial credits…
IN PASSING, IN MAKE OUT CITY: THE PHOTOGRAPHY OF IAN HOLWORTH
British photographer Ian Holworth‘s images remind us of the work of another photographer, William Eggleston, and the painter Edward Hopper.…
IN MOTION: OREGON TOURISM CAMPAIGN LOOKS LIKE A JAPANESE ANIME FILM!
. . . . . Travel Oregon‘s newest campaign promoting tourism to the state includes an animated commercial that’s a…
FLAKEY: WEB-BASED SNOWFLAKE GENERATOR IS SUBLIME (AMONG OTHER THINGS)!
Here’s a fun way to wile away a couple of hours. The Snowflake Generator is the awesome work of California-based…
BEACH GRIT: THE CINEMATIC ART, MUSIC, SURFING AND LAUGHS OF “FREE SCRUBBER”!
. . . Regular readers of Global Graphica will know that among our many passions is surfing. (Or is it…
FORCE BE WITH YOU: U.S. POST OFFICE ISSUES STAMPS CELEBRATING “STARS WARS” ANDROIDS!
The United States Postal Service has announced that this spring they will be issuing a new series of stamps featuring…
EMBARRASSMENT OF RICHES: ENOUGH WITH THE BUNDLED-UP BERNIE MEME ALREADY!
It was brilliant and funny for the first 24 -48 hours. The meme of U.S. Senator and former presidential candidate…
HOT TYPES: LIST OF SOME FAVORITE NEW TYPEFACES FROM 2020!
I Love Typography’s “My Favorite Typefaces of 2020” is a list of notable new fonts produced last year. The typefaces…
MAKING WAVES: OLAFUR ELIASSON’S “ATMOSPHERIC WAVE WALL” BREAKS IN CHICAGO!
Danish-Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson has built a career on ambitious, large-scale and innovative public installation art projects that lean into…
VISUAL CULTURE: THE TIMES’ BEST OF 2020 ILLUSTRATION!
The New York Times art directors have picked their favorite illustration of 2020. It’s an excellent survey of some of…
SKATE BRAZIL: MESMERIZING VIDEO SHOWS OFF SKILLS OF BRAZILIAN SKATEBOARDING CREW!
A short skate film called “The Girls of Guanabara” is a mesmerizing clip that showcases the dance-like skateboarding moves of…
WHOPPER: GLOBAL FAST-FOOD CHAIN ROLLS OUT NEW LOGO AND BRANDING!
Worldwide fast-food restaurant chain Burger King has revamped its brand identity, including its iconic burger logotype, color palette, typography and…
NAILED IT!: GERMAN MAGAZINE DER SPIEGEL’S UNCANNILY PREDICTIVE COVERS OF TRUMP AND THE WASHINGTON CAPITOL RIOT!
Like many news magazines around the world, the highly-respected weekly German news magazine Der Spiegal has over the past five…
AUDIO FILES: THIS IS POSSIBLY THE COOLEST MUSIC PODCAST IN THE UNIVERSE!
The podcast Lost Notes 1980 from the massively influential Los Angeles public radio station KCRW takes deep dives into significant…
STREET ART: SPEAK NO MONEY, SEE NO MONEY, HEAR NO MONEY!
This wonderful mural in Downtown Los Angeles is a visual play on the age-old proverb “Speak no evil, See no…
DOING IT FOR THE GRAM: IT’S JANUARY! JANUARY JONES, THAT IS!
January Jones, star of such television shows such as Madmen and the Last Man on Earth, is a celebrity who…
HAPPY NEW YEAR! WE WENT SURFING!
Happy New Year, everybody! We’ve started 2021 right by going surfing! The waves have been pumpin’! Hopefully this is the…
LIVIN’ LARGE: WHAT A HOME FILLED WITH MINIMALIST ART LOOKS LIKE!
The MoMA dives into what it’s like to live with some amazing minimalist artwork in the home and workplace. In…
TRAIN STATION FROM HELL FINALLY SAVED FROM ARCHITECTURAL DAMNATION!
If you’ve ever been to New York City’s Penn Station then you are familiar with one of the world’s most…
AMERICAN “DEAD MALL” GOTHIC: PHOTO ESSAY DOCUMENTS THE EMPTYING OUT OF ABANDONED SHOPPING MALLS
Cool article and photo essay in the New York Times on dead malls, how these are emptied out through the…
REVEALED: LONGEST PHOTO EXPOSURE EVER — 8 YEARS! — CAPTURED WITH PIN-HOLE CAMERA MADE WITH BEER CAN! REALLY!
True story: An MFA student at the University of Hertfordshire in the U.K. made a pin-hole camera using an empty…
PRIVATE EYES: MULTI-MILLION DOLLAR TOILETS WITH A VIEW AND MORE!
Artist-photographer Andi Schmied’s latest project called “Private Views” is a photo collection documenting the incredible views from some ultra-luxury high-rise…
WATCH: MIND-BLOWING OPTICAL ILLUSION FUN WITH ROTATING CIRCLES AND ARROWS
This mesmerizing animated GIF is an excellent illustration of an optical illusion where our human cognitive system plays a trick…
FROM LONDON WITH LOVE: MASTER OF THE SPY NOVEL COMES IN FROM THE COLD! RIP JOHN LE CARRE !
British novelist John le Carré passed away this past weekend at the age of 89. As the Guardian newspaper reported…
BREAKING! NEW BANKSY “AACHOO” ARTWORK GOES UP IN U.K.!
The Guardian newspaper in the U.K. has reported that a new work of street art has been put up by…
IT’S HERE! THE “ALOHA DEATH” PLAYLIST!
Yup, by popular demand we’ve finally set up a proper playlist for GlobalGraphica’s indie-rock-electronic soundtrack music project “Aloha Death.” AND…
MUSIC: OUR NEW WINTER 2020-21 PLAYLIST IS HERE!!!
Our new Spotify playlist for Winter 2020-21 is here with lots of new tunes, lots of favorites and some obscure…
MEDIA DIET: WHAT WE’RE WATCHING, READING, AND LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW!
In a new installment of “media Diet” here we’re sharing some of what we’ve been consuming across the cultural landscape.…
ADDICTIONS: COFFEE, IT’S NEVER ENOUGH!
As many Global Graphica readers will know, we’re big — BIG! — coffee drinkers here. We drink a lot of…
FINALLY! NEWS OF TRUMP DEFEAT AS ANNOUNCED BY NEWSPAPERS AROUND THE WORLD!
We woke to the news this Saturday morning that the U.S. presidential election result finally has been called in favor…
POLITICAL CARTOONS: ARTIST’S ILLUSTATIONS SERVE UP SCATHING CRITIQUE OF DONALD TRUMP’S PRESIDENCY IN WAKE OF ELECTION!
New York artist Edel Rodriguez, has made a sub-career the past few years of creating clever illustrations that offer scathing…
PHOTOGRAPHIC: WHAT GORDON PARKS SAW!
. . . . . Gordon Parks was a multi-faceted artist who worked across diverse mediums, but his photography capturing…
UPLIFTING: JAPANESE ARTIST TAKASHI MURAKAMI DECORATES CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL WITH ICONIC ARTWORK
Mega-superstar Japanese artist Takashi Murakami recently decorated part of the Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C., with his iconic cartoon-like…
ZEITGEISTY: STREET ART REFLECTS COVID PANDEMIC AND BLACK LIVES MATTER PROTESTS
With urban architectural surfaces an almost always available canvas for street art and graffiti art, new artwork can emerge quickly…
SPACEY: MAN GENERATES 2.5 GIGAPIXEL IMAGE FROM MORE THAN 2,500 PHOTOS OF ORION TAKEN OVER 5 YEARS!
A man in Tennessee has spent over five years taking detailed telescopic photos of a single constellation. The man is…
GREAT SCOT! RIP, SEAN CONNERY
Scottish actor Sean Connery passed away this past weekend at the age of 90. Connery was a bona fide movie…
CINEMATIC: NEW PHOTO-BOOK “ACCIDENTALLY WES ANDERSON” TAKE INSPO, STEALS STYLE OF AUTEUR FILM DIRECTOR!
“Accidentally Wes Anderson” is a new book of photography compiled by the folks behind the Instagram account @accidentallywesanderson. The account…
COOL: BIDEN FRIDGE OR TRUMP FRIDGE? TAKE THE PHOTO QUIZ!
Is it possible to discern which U.S. Presidential candidate an American voter supports by merely looking at the contents of…
JUST FOR HUE: THE QUARANTINE COLOR PALETTE IS REAL AND IT’S HERE!
As many people enter the eight consecutive month of Life in the Time of COVID and further come to terms…
LA LA LAND: INTERACTIVE DRIVE-BY PHOTO ARCHIVE OF EVERY BUILDING ON EVERY BLOCK OF SUNSET BLVD IN L.A.!
The Getty Museum has launched a website called 12 Sunsets that is a fascinating interactive archive of 65,000 photos taken…
VIDEO REWIND: REVISITING WES ANDERSON’S FANTASTIC “RUSHMORE”
Earlier this week we re-watched “Rushmore,” the early-career Wes Anderson film starring Bill Murray and Jason Schwartzman. The movie was…
CURATORS GONE WILD: A SELECT LIST OF WONDERFULLY OBSCURE AND UNUSUAL MUSEUMS!
From professionally curated museums devoted to specific sub-genres of art to suburban homes-turned-museums devoted to the usually discarded ephemera of…
CYCLICAL: BALLET MOVES ON TWO WHEELS!
Awesome short little video of a ballet-like performance on a bicycle in the ballroom of a beautiful old European castle…
THRILLS, PILLS & SHARKS: NEW DAMIEN HIRST EXHIBITION BRINGS BACK THE FORMALDEHYDE SHARK AND MUCH, MUCH MORE!
British artist Damien Hirst made a name for himself in the early 1990s with a sensational exhibition of works that…
DESIGNED! HEAT-ACTIVATED POSTAGE STAMPS REVEAL CLIMATE CHANGE INFO!
The Post Office of Finland recently commissioned a new set of stamps designed to reveal informative stories about climate change…
HERE TODAY, GONE TOMORROW: WHAT HAPPENS WHEN ARTWORK SELF-DESTRUCTS, ROTS, FALLS APART, BREAKS, ETC.?
Museums are increasingly having to deal with works of art that require regular maintenance during periods of exhibition and throughout…
KNOCK KNOCK! : PHOTOS OF STARS IN THEIR DRESSING ROOMS!
Photographer Simon Annand has had incredible access to the backstage dressing rooms of London’s theatres for decades. As the Guardian…
DENIED! BANKSY TRIES AND FAILS TO TRADEMARK GRAFFITI ARTWORK!
As if 2020 wasn’t a weird, dumpster fire of year already, especially in the United States where political goings-ons of…
FAREWELL: A MASTER PAINTER OF PHOTO-REALISTIC SUBURBIA AND CARS DIES
We just learned of the passing last week of artist Robert Bechtle. If you’ve visited enough art museums and galleries…
CHILLIN’! : PHOTOS OF LIFE IN REMOTE SIBERIAN HINTERLAND ARE STUNNINGLY BEAUTIFUL!
Photogapher Alexey Vasilyev’s images of the Sakha (a.k.a., Yakutia) area of Siberia are a fascinating look at the locales, people…
FONTASTICAL: HOW THE “GENTRIFICATION FONT” BECAME SO! SECRETS REVEALED!
You’ve seen it. You know it. It’s a typeface used across all types of media. But when deployed for street-address…
LOVIN’ IT: TRAVIS SCOTT AND MCDONALDS JOIN FORCES IN LIMITED-TIME COLLABO!
. . . . . For the past two years the tune “Sicko Mode” by rapper Travis Scott has occupied…
APOCALYPSE NOW NOW! VIDEO OF SAN FRANCISCO SHROUDED IN SMOKEY ORANGEY LIGHT DUE TO CALIFORNIA WILDFIRES!
. . . . . . If you live in California, you might say it’s been “a little hot” lately.…
WHIPLASH: LOOKING BACK AT THE “COOL” CARS OF THE 1980s!
Did you live through the 1980s and now pine for the cars of yesteryear in some mid-life crisis-induced reverie of…
VIRULENT: ARTIST AI WEI WEI RELEASES DOCUMENTARY FILM ABOUT CORONAVIRUS OUTBREAK IN WUHAN, CHINA
. . . . . Chinese artist Ai Wei Wei has produced a documentary film about the early days of…
IN IT FOR THE MONEY: ARTIST PAINTS PORTRAITS OF CELEBS AND POLITICAL FIGURES ON U.S. DOLLAR BILLS!
Los Angeles artist Claire Salvo has a new series of portraits that she’s painted on United States dollar bills. The…
RISE AND SHINE: ARTIST-DESIGNER PAINTS SUNRISE VIEWS FROM HIS APT. ON N.Y. TIMES COVERS, HONORS JACOB BLAKE!
The artwork is part of a series by New York City-based artist and designer Sho Shibuya, who paints sunrise view…
DESIGNED! SWEDISH FURNITURE AND MEATBALL JUGGERNAUT IKEA UPLOADS 72-YEARS WORTH OF PRODUCT CATALOGS!
Here’s a bit of Swedish you can bust out at cocktail parties (remember those?) when the global COVID-19 pandemic ends…
“UP!” IN REAL LIFE!: DAVID BLAINE FLOATS TO 25,000 FT. WITH BUNCH OF HELIUM BALLOONS LIKE IN THE PIXAR FILM!
. . . . . Illusionist and extreme endurance performer, dare we say performance artist, David Blaine has just done…
YACHT ROCK: U.K. STREET ARTIST BANKSY FINANCES AND DECORATES REFUGEE RESCUE BOAT IN THE MED!
Mysterious and infamous U.K. artist Banksy has bankrolled a small refugee rescue ship sailing the Mediterranean Sea. The boat is…
LIFE IMITATING ART: WHEN JAPANESE ANIME DICTATES YOUR STYLE, AMAZING THINGS CAN HAPPEN!
Life imitating art imitating life. You’ve got to love it when this happens. Such is the case of some make-up…
GUCCI-FICATION: THE SHOCKING HORROR OF TIK TOK TEENS AND LUXURY FASHION REVEALED!
Fashion yourself a runway model, do ya? Yes, we know you do. We do, too! What’s not to love about…
BEATS: HOW 9TH WONDER MAKES BEATS FOR KENDRICK LAMAR!
. . . . . We like to think we’ve got a dab hand at music production, and have recorded…
DATA VIZ GONE WILD: ARTIST TURNS VISUALLY BORING-ASS STOCK CHARTS INTO AWESOME LANDSCAPE ART!
You’ve seen financial charts. Maybe they mean nothing to you. Or they mean everything. Maybe you’re a day trader with…
AND NOW YOU KNOW THIS: THE VISUAL LOOP HAS A NAME
You’ve seen it. You know what it is. But did you know there’s a name for this? It’s called the…
ARCHI-TORTURE: SOMEBODY’S BUILDING A MEMORIAL TO THE GLOBAL PANDEMIC
An architecture firm in Montevideo, Uruguay is building the worlds first memorial to the global COVID-19 pandemic. The firm is…
USER EXPERIENCE: THE DESIGN OF LEGO CONTROL PANELS AS GOOD UX DESIGN!
Yes, even the tiny user-interface details of LEGO bricks are given a lot of thought and consideration by the Danish…
STUNNER: VANITY FAIR PUTS BREONNA TAYLOR ON COVER OF SEPTEMBER ISSUE!
The cover of Vanity Fair magazine’s September 2020 issue is a triumph. It’s a beautiful, bittersweet portrait of Breonna Taylor…
WTF!: YOU WON’T BELIEVE WHERE WE SPOTTED AN INFAMOUS NYC STREET ARTIST’S GRAFFITI TAG!
“Wow!” Just “Wow!” That’s what we exclaimed as we approached the stop at the T-intersection in our car. We were…
DIGITALISM: THE FX OF “THE EVER-EVOLVING WALKING FIGURE” GETS A 2020 UPDATE!
. . . The awesomeness of “The Transfiguration“ by Universal Everything studio collective is still spellbinding. The original version of…
BIG BANG THEORY: GIANT CHIMES SCULPTURE AWES US!
. This sublime kinetic, sculptural artwork by Etienne Krahenbruhl is made up of thousands of chimes and absolutely awes us.…
MEDIA: THE SINGULAR GENRE-DEFINING STYLE OF CREEM MAGAZINE
Early rock music journalism and writing was unsparing, fun, raw, crude, effusive, deep, indulgent, sexed-up and complicit in the style…
REVEALED: AUTEUR-HIPSTER FILMMAKER WES ANDERSEN SHOWS OFF HIS STORYBOARDS FOR “GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL”
This is a super awesome video for fans of Wes Andersen and cineastes. It’s an exploration of Andersen’s storyboards for…
DESIGN: THE LOOK OF THE THE FIRST TOKYO OLYMPICS
It’s now August 2020, which is when, had the global COVID-19 pandemic not upturned life as we knew it, the…
DESIGN: THE MAN WHO MADE DAVID BOWIE A STYLE ICON
Pioneering Japanese designer and visionary of sartorial style, Kansai Yamamoto has passed away. He may not have been a household…
“IF YOU DON’T SURF, DON’T START”
“If you don’t surf, don’t start. If you do, never stop.” These were the searing copy lines from an iconic…
STREET ART WILL EAT ITSELF: ART-ON-ART VIOLENCE IN VENICE SHOCKS PASSERSBY
Yes, it’s true, folks! An illegal wheat-paste street artwork on a utility box in Venice Beach, Los Angeles has been…
BREAKING NEWS: VIDEO FRESHNESS – NEW ARTWORK FROM BANKSY ON THE LONDON UNDERGROUND!
. . . Breaking news out of the U.K., where Banksy has unveiled a new coronavirus-inspired series of artworks and…
CAFFEINATED MINIMALISM: ON THE SCENE AT SUR COFFEE
We made a stop at Sur Coffee over the past weekend. It’s a cafe with a roastery in San Clemente,…
SIGN OF THE TIMES, VOL. 08: FASHIONING THE CURVE WITH “WORK YOUR MASK” INITIATIVE
As life in the time of coronavirus continues, the importance of wearing masks as a protective measure is increasingly becoming…
GLOBAL GRAPHICA 