Harnessing the rich, organic textures of soil, stone, and timber, Ukrainian artists Andriy and Olesya Voznicki of Natura Ceramica create voluminous ceramic vessels and sculptures. Based in Amsterdam, the duo draw inspiration from natural phenomena like the changing seasons, patinas and aging, and elements like fire or earth. The pieces mirror the shapes and textures of boulders or lava rock, suggesting both beauty and resiliency and influenced by a concept called bionic design, which mimics characteristics and adaptations in nature.

While many pieces are presented series—such as Gonta, which often features old oak shingles nestled into cushion-like clay forms—each piece is unique. “The inspiration for the vases comes from both ancient Carpathian architecture and modern bionic design,” reads a statement. “The use of old shingle roofs that have their own history adds a sense of nostalgia and a connection to the past.”

Find more on the Natura Ceramica website and Instagram.

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $5 per month. The article Traditional Design Meets Modern Function in Natura Ceramica’s Elemental Earthenware Vessels appeared first on Colossal.

Thousands of thin, intricately placed metal strips form powerful wildlife portraits by Selçuk Yılmaz (previously). Adding new meaning to “big cats,” his recent series explores the legendary power, courage, and resilience of jaguars, lions, and the prehistoric saber-tooth tiger. A painstaking process of hammering, layering and welding individual pieces links realistic representation and the addition of artistic elements, such as the regal adornment on the forehead of the lion, which is titled “King.”

Minimal, abstracted contours delineate the form of Yılmaz’s saber-tooth tiger, a huge cat that roamed what is now North and South America for millennia until they became extinct about 10,000 years ago. Combining a realistic face with a simple outline, the artist draws attention to its snarling expression and the fact that we can only imagine what the early mammals actually looked like. In “Jaguar,” a lifelike portrayal of a muscular feline interacts with the light through layered textures. “Since light and metal have opposite properties, they can create an interesting balance and contrast when they come together,” the artist tells Colossal. “It gives the feeling that light has a soul.”

Find more of Yılmaz’s work on Instagram and Behance.

“King”

“Saber-tooth Tiger”

Detail of “Saber-tooth Tiger”

Detail of “Saber-tooth Tiger”

“Jaguar”

The artist with “Jaguar”

“Saber-tooth Tiger” in progress

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $5 per month. The article Thousands of Meticulously Layered Strips of Metal Bring Selçuk Yılmaz’s Big Cat Sculptures to Life appeared first on Colossal.

CEO Dana Edwards Manatos gets visibly animated when she talks about crafting the flagship dessert for the business she launched 20 years ago and is now franchising.

“There is an art to making milkshakes,” said Manatos as she described the perfect dairy ratios of milk and ice cream required for one of Milkshake Factory’s hand-spun creations. “Our whole family legacy is our product.”

It’s a legacy that stretches back to 1914, when her great-grandparents, Greek immigrants Orania and Charlie Sarandou, opened a chocolate shop and soda fountain in Pittsburgh’s Lawrenceville neighborhood. Jump ahead four generations and Manatos, along with brothers Chris and Mark Edwards, were running the business, which they rebranded as Edward Marc Brands and grew as a chocolatier with a line of chocolate products sold in retailers across the country.

The Milkshake Factory was born in 2003 when Manatos, drawing on a college business project, worked to renovate the chocolate shop her mom, Dona, was still running on Pittsburgh’s south side. “I was trying to figure out how to even out the sales and drive revenue all year round,” said Manatos, as she noted the seasonality of the business and its reliance on special occasions such as Valentine’s Day.

The gourmet milkshakes—made using specially crafted syrups and with flavors such as chocolate-dipped strawberry, cookie dough fudge and bananas Foster—were a hit and the shop became a popular destination for locals, tourists and the occasional A-list actor.

“We’re visited by lots of celebrities. Tom Cruise, Katie Holmes, Alec Baldwin … I could name a bunch of others,” said Manatos. A second store, at PNC Plaza in downtown Pittsburgh, opened in 2016. Today, there are 11 company-owned locations and a newly launched franchise program in partnership with shared services and consulting firm Franworth.

President Dan Reese, who was a marketing executive at Kraft Heinz and ran its $2 billion condiments portfolio, said the “elevated, premium twist” Milkshake Factory puts on its products have helped it carve out a niche for itself while tapping into the “broad, universal appeal of milkshakes.”

“There’s an interesting white space out there—no one is doing exactly what we’re doing,” said Reese, who over the past three years has been working to polish the concept and prepare for expansion. Those efforts included paring down the menu from 55 flavors to about 20 and giving consumers the “illusion of complexity” while streamlining operations and layout in the back of the house.

“It used to be 12 kids behind the counter scooping ice cream. It was not a scalable model,” he said. Working with Director of Operations Shawn Smith, the two “took what was in my head and made it simple and replicable,” added Manatos. “And so that a 16-year-old can understand it and execute it in every store.”

There’s been plenty of give and take—“Dan says ‘cut’ and I say ‘no!’,” said Manatos, sounding very much like the founder she is—but all agree they won’t sacrifice quality, for example sourcing from Pennsylvania dairy farms and making the ice cream daily in each store.

“Our core is our quality. Our heritage and our quality,” said Manatos. “How my great-grandparents created recipes.”

As it rolls out its franchise program, Manatos said the Milkshake Factory’s demonstrated success in different settings and types of real estate mean the concept will translate outside the Pittsburgh market where, she added, “it’s very cold and we sell milkshakes year-round.” A location near a university campus is busy at 10:45 p.m., for example, while making the leap from downtown to suburban locations was “a very a-ha moment for us,” she said.

Milkshake Factory stores also sell the premium salted caramels, truffles and other treats made famous by the family’s earlier generations, providing additional revenue streams. “It’s hard to pass up the chocolate,” she said.

From Long Beach Walls to Art Renzei, Creative Class Collective is an organization behind numerous art initiatives in Long Beach.

While the organization formalized around 2018 or 2019, these initiatives have been ongoing for decades, explained director Cassandra Leeman.

Originally conceptualized through the multicultural marketing agency interTrend Communications, Creative Class Collective became an organization to specifically house its community programming, Leeman said.

All of the nonprofit’s programs foster and support creativity within Long Beach—whether it’s through community engagement or assisting those working in creative industries.

Perhaps one of the organization’s most notable programs is Long Beach Walls, which since 2010 has brought murals to public spaces in cities like Honolulu, Seoul, Washington D.C., Taipei and Tokyo as part of the globally recognized World Wide Walls series of street art events.

While introducing Long Beach Walls was a large endeavor for the city, Leeman said, the annual event, apart from its artistic contribution to Long Beach, provides a bridge between the community and the muralists. Throughout the process, community members are able to engage with the artists and learn the stories behind each mural, Leeman said.

While Long Beach Walls murals are hopefully meant to be forever (although this is not always the case, Leeman said), its accompanying event, Art Renzei, brings a temporary sculpture and multimedia installation to the Long Beach community.

Apart from this, Creative Class Collective programming includes Unexpected Connections, a conference and dinner series where visionaries from different industries come together to inspire and uplift, as well as discuss the creative economy, which Leeman expects will return this October in conjunction with the Long Beach Economic Partnership.

The Port City Creative Guild, meanwhile, is an art exchange program that was developed during the pandemic, which partners professional artists with the Long Beach Unified School District. Initially, 10 artists were given a stipend to create a large-scale artwork, which was intended to be displayed in Community Hospital, but when this plan fell through, the Port City Creative Guild then shifted to its second phase, which included selecting artists to create small-scale artwork to trade with students from six-to-eight middle school and high schools.

Inspired by the 1960s mail art movement, when artists would create small-scale work on envelopes and post cards, the Port City Creative Guild encourages the idea that art doesn’t need to be only found on a canvas, Leeman said.

With the help of art kits created by Creative Class Collective, about 400 students participated in the program, Leeman said.

Of the 100 students who ended up submitting art to be potentially traded, about 60 pieces ended up being selected by professional artists, Leeman said.

“Artists didn’t have to pick anybody, so it was really instilled that if you were chosen, it was because the artists saw value in your work and appreciated what you did,” Leeman said.

In a city like Long Beach that is home to so many creatives, providing the various Creative Class Collective programs creates both an outlet for artists while supporting economic development, Leeman said.

Initiatives such as Long Beach Walls can even help sustain businesses—creating a focal point that people will return to again and again, Leeman said.

People remember the moment they met the artist or learned about the background or the hidden image behind the mural, Leeman said. “It’s just like something really meaningful … to hopefully inspire you to do whatever you’re passionate about,” Leeman said. “I think that’s needed everywhere.”

Right now, one goal for the Creative Class Collective is to create more permanent, large-scale installations throughout the city, and to truly uplift Long Beach, which has the potential to become a global destination for art, Leeman said.

Back in 2021, the organization placed temporary stained-glass art installations along the beach, an initiative that Leeman said she would love to see on a more permanent scale.

Specifically, Leeman would love to see a sculpture park created in Victory Park right off of Ocean Boulevard. As of now, the area doesn’t really look like a public space due to its proximity to high rise buildings and hotels, but through creating a sculpture park, it has the potential to integrate the beach more to Downtown, which currently seems disconnected, Leeman said.

“I would love to create a reason for people to explore how beautiful our space is,” Leeman said.

“Everybody knows Long Beach has wonderful local artists—everybody within Long Beach, but I don’t know if everybody outside of Long Beach knows how creative we are as a city and community,” Leeman said. “So I would like to make it more known and just really uplift us as this fine art, creative space.”

Here are the 10 finished murals after this year’s Long Beach Walls

“Ladies and Gentlemen, Here’s Grace!”

Every inch of this cover art screams Grace. To this day, the mere sight of art is like discovering lost treasure. From the near-impossible contortion and superhuman form, to her sculpted-by-the-G-d’s shape, there is no mistaking this album hides a sound that echoes the outstanding achievement that was capturing Grace Jones in her prime. Interestingly, Island Life is a compilation album by Jones released in 1985, summing up the first nine years of her musical career. The cover art showcasing this well-oiled goddess was created by long-time creative partner, designer Jean-Paul Goude, an illustrator, photographer and graphic designer.

As Goude was once quoted on the creation of this historic image: “I photographed her in a variety of positions, which I combined into a montage that made it possible to show her simultaneously full frontal and in profile, like an Egyptian bas-relief. Then, having transferred the montage to photographic paper, I used it as the preliminary sketch for a painting meant to give the photographic illusion that she is alone, like a contortionist, though on closer look you can see that from a strictly anatomical point of view the pose is impossible to achieve.” The impact is staggering.

Joe Jackson
Night and Day (1982)

Since the exhibit The Tudors: Art and Majesty in Renaissance England first opened in February at Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) has seen art lovers and anglophiles streaming in to view  the first exhibition in the United State to trace the transformation of the arts in Tudor England.

“The exhibition has been really well-received,” says Todd Mesek, the museum’s chief marketing office. “Attendance is ahead of our projections and it’s drawing both new visitors and people who haven’t been here in a while.”

There are only about two more weeks to catch The Tudors, though, as the exhibit closes on Sunday, May 14.

FreshWater’s managing photographer had the chance recently to view the exhibit and give our readers a peak into the scope of the finest artistic production of the English Renaissance—from intricately wrought armor and precious metal and porcelain objects, to glittering tapestries woven with gold and portraits of sumptuously attired courtiers.

Though the Tudor dynasty ruled for only three generations over the course of 118 years, it oversaw the transformation of England from an impoverished backwater to a major European power operating on a global stage.

The Tudors’ investment in artistic patronage legitimized and promoted a series of tumultuous reigns. A vast network of celebrated foreign artists helped the Tudors compete on an international scale, and the exhibition features more than 90 loans from illustrious institutions.

Seven loans from the Royal Collection are from the soon-to-be-coronated King Charles.

“The Tudors are using art to prove they are legitimate rulers—at a time when they’re coming out of a civil war and just trying to hold the nation together,” observes Mesek. “When you look back and realize that this is the time when England is transitioning from a rural backwater into a political superpower, the role of the art is even more impressive.”

Mesek adds he particularly likes the big portraits of Henry VIII, Elizabeth and Mary Tudor.

“Art was the way the Tudors managed their image as well as a diplomatic tool—sometimes to demonstrate power and sometimes as grift,” he says. “You can see how they manage their images over time. The early portraits of Elizabeth use symbolism to demonstrate she’s open to marriage. Later, her portraits embrace the ‘Virgin Queen’ image, indicating that she’s not interested in sharing power with a man and sees her independence in the same light as England’s.”

Mesek points out that Henry’s early portrait shows an awkward teen, but later, he’s depicted as a larger-than-life character. 

The exhibition is organized by CMA and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, in collaboration with the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.

Tickets are $15 for adults; $12 for seniors, students and children ages six to 17; children five and under and CMA members free. The CMA recommends reserving tickets through its online platform. Tickets can also be reserved by phone at (216) 421-7350 or on-site at one of the ticket desks. Exhibition tours are offered at 11:15 a.m. daily through May 14.

5th grade students from Sunrise and Summit Elementary School were given the opportunity to design shoes as part of a new project.

It was all a part of the annual art show. This project is teaching kids more than fashion, it is instructing them to create and market their own products. They used 3D printing, laser cutting, along with sewing to make their shoes.

Jordan Colle is just one of 250 students who got to express themselves with a pair of sneakers.

“The flag on it is the Black pride flag and that reflects a lot of who I am. And the shoelaces are made from crochet, which is one of my favorite things to do,” Colle said.

It’s a project that made many students excited about school again.  Alison Smith, an art teacher, says this was the purpose to get these students motivated.

“There were students that were kind of disengaged at the beginning of the school year for 5th graders, both of our school buildings. So, I talk to 5th graders a lot on what kind of things they like to do and what are their interests and we found shoes as a common interest among a lot of our students in our community,” Smith said.

The project is teaching students the basics of marketing, social media influence, networking and fashion design.

“This is a really high level project, usually students don’t do things like this until they are in college. So, creating this project now in elementary school gives students an early advance art experience,” Smith said.

For 5th grader, Mackenna Dickey, this taught her more than that.

“To be yourself and don’t follow other people are trying to make you,” Dickey said. 

After speaking with a couple shoe designers from Nike and Vans, the project became a reality with the help of Cherry Creek Schools Foundation, providing students a budget of $30 each for materials for their sneakers.

“We have a lot of shoes that didn’t turn out the way students had hoped that they would… after like, a lot of research and preparations, months went into it. So, I learned a lot about just pivoting and learning from the process more so than like, the final product,” Smith said. 

Students have until the end of the school year to finish their project. Once finished, they will be able to take their shoes home. 

ATHENS, Ga. — A total of 75 University of Georgia student-athletes were named to the 2022-23 Southeastern Conference Winter Academic Honor Roll for their outstanding performances in the classroom, the SEC announced Wednesday.  

Seventy-five student-athletes is tied with Texas A&M for the second-most among other schools in the SEC. The Winter SEC Academic Honor Roll includes the sports of men’s and women’s basketball, equestrian, gymnastics, as well as men’s and women’s swimming and diving. It is based on grades from the 2022 Spring, Summer and Fall terms.

The following UGA student-athletes were named to the 2022-23 Winter SEC Academic Honor Roll: 
 
Men’s Basketball
Braelen Bridges (Altanta, Ga., Nonprofit Management & Leadership), Jaxon Etter (Woodstock, Ga., Financial Planning), Jailyn Ingram (Madison, Ga., Nonprofit Management & Leadership)
 
Women’s Basketball
Malury Bates (Roanoke, Va., Foods and Nutrition), Chloe Chapman (Mitchellville, Md., Fashion Merchandising), Jordan Isaacs W Basketball (Alpharetta, Ga., Communication Studies)
 
Equestrian
Leah Anderson (Monroe, Wash., Finance), Emily Blecher (Shdema, Isreal, Sport Management), Courtney Blumer (Monroe, N.C., Human Development and Family Science and Psychology), Jax Bound (Fort Atkinson, Wisc., Animal Science), Ceci Bresch (Barrington, Ill., Biology), Kennedy Bryant (South Padre Island, Texas, Landscape Architecture), Jordan Davis (Madisonville, Texas, Sport Management), Melissa Deryn Foster (Toronto, Ontartio, Exercise and Sport Science), Hayley Freeman (Grayson, Ga., Marketing), Kendall Gill (Leesburg, Ga., Biomanufacturing and Bioprocess), Jessica Guginsky (Lake Ronkonkoma, N.Y., Finance), Grace Himes (Bristol, Ind., Accounting), Tori Kendle (New Albany, Ohio, Agricultural and Applied Economics), Harper Lawson (Lincoln, Neb., Journalism), Sara Lewis (Washington, Ind., Comparative Biomedical Science), Hannah Jane Lucas (Ridgeway, S.C., Nutritional Sciences), Sophie Lucas (Mechanicsville, Va., Agricultural Communication), Caitlin Lyons (Mead, Wash., Ecology and French), Jada Mark (Sumpter, S.C., Art), Rachel McMullen (Chagrin Falls, Ohio, Marketing), Kalli Meagher (Virginia Beach, Va., Real Estate), Bay Noland‐Armstrong (Harrison Township, Mich., Fisheries and Wildlife), Sophia Pilla (Ridgefield, Conn., Marketing), Emma Reichow (Menlo Park, Calif., Finance), Savannah Relick (Vero Beach, Fla., Accounting), Ada Rohan (Montpelier, Vt., Management Information Systems), Megan Seidel (Birmingham, Ala., Natural Resources), Hannah Smith (Winston-Salem, N.C., Marketing), Isabelle Song (Charlotte, N.C., Human Development and Family Science), Jillian Stopperich (Venetia, Pa., Psychology), Hazel Taylor (Rising Fawn, Ga., Landscape Architecture), Jordan Toering (Waterford, Va., Electrical and Electronics Engineering), Spencer Toohill (Round Hill, Va., International Affairs)
 
Gymnastics
Amanda Cashman (Belle Meade, N.J., Entertainment & Media Studies), Haley De Jong (Vancouver, Canada, Consumer Economics), Katie Finnegan (Kings Park, N.Y., Psychology), Loulie Hattaway (Blakely, Ga., Biological Science)
 
Men’s Swimming and Diving
Andrew Abruzzo (Plymouth Meeting, Pa., Business Analytics), Jackson Bates (Athens, Ga., Psychology), Tommy‐Lee Camblong (Villelongue de la Salanque, France, Biology), Brennan Cheney (Danville, Calif., Finance), Bradley Dunham (Hoschton, Ga., Marketing), Zach Franklin (Roswell, Ga., Biochemistry and Molecular Biology), Ian Grum (Atlanta, Ga., Sport Management), Zach Hils (Lexington, Ky., Real Estate), Rhett Hopkins (Annapolis, Md., Finance), Nolan Lewis (Thomasville, Ga., Marketing), Ananda Lim (Marietta, Ga., Exercise and Sport Science), Charlie Logan (Watkinsville, Ga., Marketing), Jake Magahey (Dacula, Ga.,Finance), Mitchell Norton (Acworth, Ga., Management), TJ Pittenger (Palmetto, Ga., Environmental Resource Science), Riley Scruggs (Newman, Ga., Mechanical Engineering), Luca Urlando (Sacramento, Calif., Sport Management)
 
Women’s Swimming and Diving
Mia Abruzzo (Plymouth Meeting, Pa., Marketing), Jillian Barczyk (Lafayette, La., Regenerative Bioscience), Callie Dickinson (Virginia Beach, Va., Comparative Biomedical Science), Elsa Fretz (Bristol, Ind., Human Development and Family Science), Zoie Hartman (Danville, Calif., Psychology), Ashley McCauley (Raleigh, N.C., Environmental Resource Science), Abby McCulloh (Lilburn, Ga., Journalism), Sloane Reinstein (Palo Alto, Calif., Advertising), Briana Roberson (Fulshear, Texas, Fisheries and Wildlife), Millie Sansome (Marlow, England, Exercise and Sport Science), Carson Schiller (Peachtree Corners, Ga., Marketing), Rachel Stege (Naperville, Ill., Finance), Julianna Stephens (Roswell, Ga., Human Development and Family Science), Logan Watson‐Brown (Southampton, Bermuda, Management), Meghan Wenzel (Hatfield, Pa., Human Development and Family Science)
 

Six years after the release of a monumental compendium of Dutch birds, the publisher and naturalist Jan Christiaan Sepp (1739-1811) shifted his focus from avians to geology. In 1776, he issued Marmor Soorten, or The Book of Marble, a striking catalog of scientific illustrations and annotations featuring 570 types of the prized stone. This first tome was based on research published by the German engraver Adam Ludwig Wirsing and released in 11 volumes that presented the stunning, crystallized samples in exquisite hues, requiring 100 color plates to print.

A forthcoming release from Taschen reproduces Sepp’s monumental work in its entirety. Based on two first editions of Marmor Soorten held in collections at Dredsen’s State and University Library and the Getty Research Institute, the facsimile offers insight into the vast diversity of the material itself and the Enlightenment-era impulses to share knowledge and information with the public.

The Book of Marble will be available in the U.S. in May, and you can pre-order a copy from Taschen.

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $5 per month. The article An Exquisite Enlightenment-Era Book Catalogs 570 Types of Marble in Vivid Color appeared first on Colossal.

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