Pixelovely Figure Drawing Tool

Bit of a different feature today, this is a fantastic gadget for artists too lazy to head to the local figure drawing class. Eg. Me. You can set it to flash naked people at you in interesting poses for 30s-10m, or you can even take a 'class', where, like in real life, the time ramps up slowly from short to long poses.

Awesome thing. It's got some decent quality photos as well. This shouldn't be a substitute for drawing real people, but if you're a busy beaver who still wants to build skillz this can help a lot.

Drawing Tool, click here!

protip: F11 for fullscreen.

Dennis Hollingsworth

Dennis Hollingsworth's paintings are this wonderful combination of completely un-painterly techniques. I'm talking masking, ruled lines and weird sculptural little hedgehog balls. This is all added to a spot-on sense of composition and colour. Love it.

Cam Floyd

Proving that hipster illustration is still alive and kicking, here's Cam Floyd. Where are the triangles? Where are the deer?

Look, I actually really like these. I just wish I'd seen them about ten years ago when my enjoyment wouldn't have been slightly poisoned by habituation. Looking at stringy lines and Sesame Street colours now makes me feel like I've eaten just two or three too many donuts, but I'm going back for another one anyway, and damn the vomity night ahead.

Jonathan Zawada

These are some interesting works from Jonathan Zawada's painting show last year in Los Angeles. The landscapes " were derived from graph data (displayed as printed mirrors on accompanying plinths), modeled in 3D and then oil paintings created from those 3D renders." Well alright, you win a prize for complicated process! I think these actually stand up really well just as paintings, though. The colours are fabulous and remind me of old Asimov's magazine covers.

Ben Grasso

Ben Grasso paints buildings on the point of spontaneously disassembling. Or maybe they're assembling, is the glass half full?

Chen Haiyang

I visited White Rabbit Gallery and was really pleased to find this repository of great contemporary Chinese art in the wilds near Central Station. Some of my favourites in the current exhibition were Chen Haiyang's gorgeous paintings on wood. These are something like reverse wood-block prints, where the block itself is the artwork. It's hard to tell in the picture but all the highlights are actually chiseled out, as if the thing is about to be used to actually stamp a page in the traditional way.
This initial conception is belied by rich, impressionist sweeps of colour and intricate painted details. These made me very happy. If you live in Sydney, definitely take the time to check out White Rabbit in it's entirety, there was a lot there worth seeing.

Kirsty Whiten

Kirsty Whiten has an eye for strange compositions. I especially like her new series of feral people living in the forest, can't wait for more.

Andrew Hem

Andrew Hem (his name can be shorted to Ahem. ) creates worlds that hover on the edge of reality. These are surreal places, but ones you could almost step into, like when you have a dream about being naked in a shopping center.

Kupcsik Adrián

Kupcsik Adrián creates these meticulous architectural and industrial paintings that on closer inspection turn out to be of completely absurd and non-functional objects. Kind of Escher like.

Tony Cran

Sorry readers for the lack of new posts recently. I've got a mural to do and an exhibition on soon.

Tony Cran's 2010 series consists of charming, magical portraits of gutter weeds, as well as mixed-media sculptures in bell-jars. Somehow they stay just on the right side of twee.  I apologise for the poor image quality. I got them from the Helen Gory gallery's website where they were tiny and had to  ENHANCE like a CSI episode.

Check out his earlier work as well.

Euan Macleod

If you've visited a major gallery in Australia or New Zealand you've probably come across one of Euan Macleod's strange, lonely landscapes. Still, you can't have too much of a good thing. The last one of these is actually the cover of a book about him: Euan Macleod- The Painter in the Painting which is a really fantastic collection of his work. I highly recommend checking your library for it (or buying it if you're flush, it's usually pretty expensive.)

Dave Rapoza

You may have already seen some of Dave Rapoza's fully sick concept art, but if you haven't, take a look at these gritty TMNT re-whateverings. Cowabunga!

Joseba Eskubi

Joseba Eskubi's paintings really put me in mind of early Surrealism, maybe Max Ernst or someone like that. They're lush, mostly abstract and he often uses collage and mixed media.

He also takes sumptuous extreme-close-ups of his own work, for added awesome.

Andy Collins

For some reason I get the impression that Andy Collins paints while watching porn. His work is "lusciously synthetic" according to Saatchi gallery. I concur.

Mark Grotjahn

Mark Grotjahn's recent show at Shane Campbell in NY had some amazing new work in it, exploring a weird, wooly sort of texture. I really enjoy looking for his new work as it comes out, because each show seems to be different and interesting. It must be hard to keep up such a pace of invention.

I wish someone would ship some to Australia.