Over The City. Done In Hexels2 And Retouched In Photoshop.Took Me Around 4 Hours For This One.

There’s always a taller building…

Guestblogging: Yarn Bombing

The bay windows at Pixel Art Academy are vast and give a panorama from your studio over Retropolis. What’s that? You move towards the glass wall to take a closer look … the park, something’s different, are the trees changing for fall/ autumn? You scramble to put your glasses on to get a better idea, the trees look to be dressed for a carnival with all the colours of the rainbow. What’s going on? You log-in to a local news forum for an answer and are informed that the trees have been yarn-bombed!

If you haven’t come across it, yarn-bombing is where graffiti and crafts combine to make a wonderful art form. The point of it is to use yarn/wool/string/old tape ribbon to cover something like a tree or a statue, bridges are popular targets and if you search for ‘yarn-bombing phone box’ you get some delightful results!

Below are some yarn bombs that one day inspire you to create your own.

Magda Sayeg is credited as being the first yarn-bombing artist after they covered the handle to their shop. So… it seems a good starting point:

This picture is from Sussex St and Kent St, Sydney and taken by Project Jam.

Other Magda Sayeg. This picture is from Kent Ave, New York and taken by Eddie O. 

Moving on. Urban Cross-Stitch use chain link fence to put their design on (for more designs and a how-to guide see here).

Aida Gomez in the project ‘Home is where the heart is’.

If you have been making granny squares for your pixel art realisation projects and have a few spare, this is one idea to use them:

This was a record breaking attempt to make the largest blanket, it’s not your average yarn bomb, Helsinki Cathedral in Finland.

And another inspirational picture without a reference by artist or photographer (I’m sorry):

It’s such a great idea, covering paving blocks in yarn to make up patterns (until it rains and makes it unsafe to walk on but it could look amazing over a whole area) or even a warning for people as to do this the block must be loose first.

Yarn bombing brings colour and vibrancy into overlooked places but may not be legal in every case! Yarn Bombing is also known as Yarn-storning, Yarn Graffiti (if you are looking for more information about it). Also see Urban Cross-Stitch.

Having seen some pictures you now have a better idea of why the trees are dolled up. You decide to take a walk in the park to get a closer look.

ROCKET TRAIN – On a foggy day, a train transports a Soyuz rocket to the launch pad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, October 29, 2000. (NASA)