Focus, focus, focus

Tips for Managing Distractions...a mind map!

Hat tip to Mark Hurst at Good Experience.

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Mr. Stikman, Sing Me A Song

6th and Spruce, Philadelphia

Have you seen him in your city?

8th and Market, Philadelphia

Lying around on the pavement, looking melty and robotic.

He makes me happy.

Thank you, "Bob", Stikman's creator.

Stikman - a Look at Mysterious Stickman Street Art in Crosswalks...a Washington Post reporter did have an exchange with someone claiming responsibilities for these diminutive glyphs. Calling himself "Bob," to maintain his obscurity, this individual explained that "He considers himself an artistic Johnny Appleseed, spreading stikmen instead of seeds."

On the Trail of the Mysterious Stikman
Created by an unknown guerrilla street artist from corrugated plastic, vinyl records, burlap sacks or scraps of wood, metal or cloth, the robot figure, dubbed stikman, can be seen all over town. From the District to Boston and as far away as Hollywood, it has been spotted on building walls, newspaper boxes and traffic signs. But stikman is seen most often in crosswalks, as a sticker pasted to the pavement.

At first, I found something zombielike about stikman. Maybe it was the vacant stare and stiff pose. When I introduced him to a friend, she was dismissive, declaring him "creepy." Yet by the time I was pointing him out to other people, my affection had grown. He was a wallflower at a party of tourists and nine-to-fivers. He was shy, awkward and often frozen alone in traffic.

More images:
Stikman in D.C.
Philadelphia Stikman Flickr group photos
Stikman in NYC
Another Flickr collection

Related street art:
Toynbee tiles

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Hat tip to my brother for discovering the origins of stikman for me.

Addendum: My daughter found this one in near South station in Boston.

Near South station in Boston

Sketching is good for the soul

SketchBlog

Sketching in Nature

Liz Steel

Urban Sketchers

CrackSkullBob
(look at the cool widget on the right side of his site)

Rebecca Venn

Stephen Gardner

Indexed

Freekhand

SeaHeff

Laurelines

The Seattle Sketcher

Mattias Inks

Even when they're not your sketches.

Thanks all for the lift tonight!

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(Hat Tip to SketchBlog for putting me on to so many great artists. Be sure to visit their sites or blogs!)

Speaking of yarn art...see nature's version

See Spiders That Decorate Their Own Webs, on The Ark in Space. [If you or your kids love animals, you'll love this site. Don't miss the Cats are evil post. :-]

Now that is the original yarn bombing!

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Photo by CharlesLam

About the power of art

John Constable, The Hay Wain

Brain scans reveal works of art can give you as much pleasure as being in love.

I like that.

Professor Semir Zeki, chair in neuroaesthetics at University College London talks about the results of a recent study, as reported here:

What we found is when you look at art – whether it is a landscape, a still life, an abstract or a portrait – there is strong activity in that part of the brain related to pleasure.

We put people in a scanner and showed them a series of paintings every ten seconds. We then measured the change in blood flow in one part of the brain.

The reaction was immediate. What we found was the increase in blood flow was in proportion to how much the painting was liked.

The blood flow increased for a beautiful painting just as it increases when you look at somebody you love. It tells us art induces a feel good sensation direct to the brain.

Zeki’s study confirms what arts educators have always known, that beautiful images generate pleasure and a sense of well being.

That's an invitation to visit a nearby art museum or to seek out an art exhibit, or maybe just stop and smell the roses.

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Professor Zeki's other musings.
What is neuroesthetics?