News
Machinima from the Art Box duo.
Not strictly an Art Box project, but an artistic adventure, designed and built by Frankie and Violet as usual, but this time concieved as a film, rather than an interactive 3D sculpture. So we proudly present "The Butterfly Dream" - the story of Chuang Tzu. It's over with our friends at Koinup, or, if you prefer to watch it in HD (high definition) then it's also available at YouTube. We hope you enjoy it, but please leave us a note somewhere - your feedback is always welcome.
Alice / Through the Looking Glass - book sculpture.
The stunning Alice Through the Looking Glass sculpture, made from a copy of the book's own pages, lovingly recreated in SL and coming to Art Box - very soon.
Look out for a series of Alice inspired works in the coming weeks.
The Tree of Life / Klimt
This week's release at Art Box is Gustav Klimt's 'The Tree of Life'. A beautiful gold-foiled lyrical work which we have brought to life with hypnotic movement (not seen in this still image of course) and a set for one or two people to pose within.
The tree has branches everywhere, but there's only one Art Box. Come on over and create a portrait like no other, or we'll beat you with sticks!
A Poem for Art Box
We were delighted and astonished when we were contacted by a gentleman by the name of Fred Ronzales who is an Art Box visitor and Group member, who told us that he had been so inspired by what we do that he'd been moved to write a poem about it. We are extremely honoured by this wonderful gesture and we'd like to present it here for your pleasure.
It's just wonderful to think that our work can inspire the art of others. It's a very great compliment indeed. Thank you Fred.
Pictures in a cyber hall,
posted stamps are stuck on walls.
Ones and noughts create the call.
Only digits after all
make the colours
rise and fall
different from each other one.
But behold
before your eyes.
Sights of visual surprise
show they're made of so much more.
Truth not lies makes up their core.
© Fred Ronzales 2010
Headline. A 'Scream' for the 21st century.
Headline is our first installation created purely for 'Art Box 2'. In other words, the first wave of our original art, created by Frankie and Violet for Art Box as original immersive exhibits.
Reflecting the information overload of the digital era, 'Headline' is a 'Scream' for the 21st century.
You may like to know that this Second Life exhibit is not static. The headlines that cover all surfaces are fragments of real headlines taken in real time (as the set is rezzed) from various news services around the world, and random fragments from each item are selected and pasted on the walls. It changes every single time it's rezzed, with both the selected news services and the items on their pages being randomised anew, and always up to the hour immediate. In short - information overload - the real deal.
At Art Box. Now.
Art Box 2
April 2010 sees the first aniversary of Art Box - we are One! It's been a wonderful year - so much fun, creativity, fun, and did I mention? - fun! We now have a portfolio of well over 50 famous artworks translated into 3D for our visitors to immerse themselves within.
Now it's time for something new.
For the next year we will be creating our own original artworks, not translating existing art into 3D, but creating our own visions completely. We are very excited about this. Not only does it breath new life into the creative process for us, but also it lets us create specifically for the 3D virtual world from inception, taking advantage of the possibilities and technologies to hand to make works that are more engaging than anything originally concieved in 2D could ever be. But of course one isn't 'better' than the other, just different; this is simply a new direction. We call it 'Art Box 2'.
We will continue to add the occassional 'Art Box 1' style exhibit based on established art, whenever the inspiration takes us, but from now on our focus will be on truly original creations by Frankie and Violet. And to mark the birthday transition? A party! We have recreated a slice of famous New York venue CBGB's in 3D for you to hold your own party anytime, complete with extreme grunge, mosh pit and passed out poses. Just don't go in the toilets ok.
Pollice Verso
Art Box turns Coliseum with our latest release featuring Gladiaorial combat in the arena.
The Art Box homage to Jean-Léon Gérôme's 1872 masterpiece depicting Gladiatorial combat, "Pollice Verso" (Thumbs Down).
Pollice verso or verso pollice is a Latin phrase, meaning "with a turned thumb", that is used in the context of Gladiatorial combat. It refers to the hand gesture used by Ancient Roman crowds to pass judgment on a defeated gladiator. Popularly, it is assumed that "thumbs down" was the signal that a defeated gladiator should be condemned to death; "thumbs up", that he should be spared.
This is also the painting that inspired Ridley Scott to create his 2000 epic film Gladiator.
Relax (don't do it..)
Coming soon to Art Box, cover art from the iconic 80's band "Frankie Goes to Hollywood"'s fabulous single "Relax". Banned by the BBC because the cover art was branded 'obscene' (yes, really!) by Radio One DJ Mike Reid, our homage to this stunning artwork by Yvonne Gilbert, will soon be available for you to relax with - or otherwise?
Kilimanjaro
One of our latest pieces in development pays homage to fantasy artist Clemens Konieczka whose original artwork is itself of 3D origin. An immersive exhibit coming to Art Box soon!
Da Vinci's Vetruvian Man
We are delighted to announce another classic artwork recreated at Art Box! This week's new release is Leonardo's Vetruvian Man. The set supports your choice of pose in either the 'starfish' position or the 'T' position, and the option for two people to pose together, taking both positions simultaneously. And if you're feeling coy, there is a fig leaf set in the props crate! Have fun squaring the circle!
Starting the New Year with a Bang.
I guess that's the sound that signals a puncture, and the context for our hot first release of 2010 - Yellow Rose by Greg Hildenbrandt. If you don't mind getting your hands dirty, maybe you can help out - at Art Box now.
Back in the New Year !
We are suspending our weekly new release program for two weeks over Christmas and New Year, but will be back with some amazing new 3D sets for you in the first week of the New Year.
Have a good holiday and see you again first week of 2010.
Happy Holidays from Art Box
We've added a fun picture to help get you in the holiday spirit. Put on your warmest winter gear, grab your credit card, and your strongest friend -- It's time to do your holiday shopping. You can stick with the 1950's retro feel or add your own flavor.
Remember, you are the art and the artist here.
Second Life Action Figure
We are delighted to announce the start of a new chapter in the evolution of Art Box. We have just completed our own original composition, concieved of as an immersive exhibit from the outset, and not in any way related to the work of other artists as homage. We will continue to create 3D exhibits inspired by the work of established artists, but we will also develop more of our own projects alongside them.
The first in this new series is the "Action Figure", which models your avatar as a toy representation of itself and in so doing explores the idea of ever increasingly removed / abstracted / recursive and diminishing representations of the self, but does so in a way that is both playful and engaging.
"A Mermaid" by John William Waterhouse
"A Mermaid" by John William Waterhouse will be added to the Art Box collection in the next few weeks. This pose/picture works equally well with or without a mermaid tail.
Pin-up Girl Tryptych
Famous American illustrator Gil Elvgren, renowned for his classic female pin-ups, is the focus of a future Art Box immersive artwork development. We will be creating a very sexy tryptych from his canon of over 500 works, choosing three of our favourite hotties for you to enjoy! What do the other two look like? Check back at Art Box regularly - or join the group, to stay informed.
Spike - Coming Soon
We currently have a number of builds held in reserve ready for our weekly release cycle. One of these is our homage to 'Spike' by Jim Sweet, now in all it's beautiful and terrible 3D glory. Should be going live sometime in the next month. Watch Art Box Group announcements; they will point you to the exact day.
Marc Chagall - 'Birthday'
This weeks new release is Chagall's beautiful 'Birthday' composition. As well as (re)creating a gentle, lyrical scene, we added a technical 'first' to this set, namely to enable the poses to control your camera view of the scene. This allows us to set up a 'perfect' (i.e. faithful) framing of the scene in advance for our guests to take advantage of. You can easily over-ride this with your remote camera and take any perspective you want of course, but for those less adept with the remote camera controls we thought we'd make an exception and offer this support for what is a particularly tricky scene to get just right.
Female Divers Beneath a Catamaran
We just added a new set to Art Box in homage to "Female Divers" by Amos Nachoum. It's a 'split screen' photo showing the action above and below the waterline, so you can capture both or zoom in on one or the other in detail. So lots of scope for innovation in this beautiful aquatic world. It gives new meaning to the term 'immersive', so go on, dip your toe in - the water's lovely!
Art Box Book
We are putting together a series of high quality images towards a book we will be publishing in-world. In addition to a verite secton dealing with accurate emulations of the originals, we will also have a section dealing with radical re-interpretations, be they whimsical, dramatic or just plain disturbed. If you have such a photo (1024 x 720 resolution or thereabouts) and would like to contribute your image then we want to hear from you. Contributors of images used will get a free copy of this lush cofee-table publication on completion - around Christmas '09. Thanks!
Whistler wishes this was his Mum....
We've gone back to the classics at Art Box with a build of "Whistler's Mother" by James McNeill Whistler. You can take this picture in any direction from the traditional long black dress to your fav BDSM outfit to nothing at all.
Have a sneak peak.
Have you been to Art Box this week?
The Wine of Tokai
We are currently putting the finishing touches to 'The Wine of Tokai' by Spanish painter Luis Ricardo Falero (1851 - 1896). If features a voluptuous nude woman draped around a pitcher of wine, with two glasses close by. She is therefore either minature, or the glassware is giant, but really it's just a fanciful baroque fantasy image. We think it will be pretty popular; sex sells, and we've noticed that people are always keen to disrobe at Art Box! We're cool with that - nudity is fine as long as you're not trying to offend anyone. In fact it transcends 'fine'; it's a key ingredient of so much art, classical and contemporary, that it's just a given. Well I'll drink to that.
Classic Japanese Art Release
Tonight we released a Katsushika Hokusai woodcut print called 'Ariwara no Narihira' (People Crossing an Arched Bridge) at Art Box. It was a joy to build and we're both pleased with the result. Actually it was a commission for a Japanese art sim called 'Imagine Plus' so we were very honoured to be invited to make something targeted primarily at the Japanese community, and to share the platform with some other very talented artists. We released this piece there first a couple of weeks ago and wanted them to have advance viewing on the piece, but now we feel it's time to show it back at base too. If you think you don't know Hokusai you're probably wrong. His image 'Mount Fuji Seen Below a Wave at Kanagawa' (Google that!) is as ubiquitous around the world as it is in Japan.
New Art Box Website
We are delighted to announce the launch of our new website today! The new site contains many new features to keep you informed of new and planned developments and projects. It also contains a database driven section that will allow the administrators to rapidly update the site keeping news fresher, as well as lots of links to related resources, such as visitors blogs, photo sharing sites and other resources. Enjoy the site, and check this page soon for the latest at Art Box!