I Think I Am In Friend-Love With Yumi Sakugawa's New Book.

I have a confession to make.
I think I am in Friend-Love with you.

What's friend-love?
It's that super-awesome bond you share with someone who makes you happy every time you text each other, or meet up for an epic outing. It's not love-love. You don't want to swap saliva; you want to swap favorite books. But it's just as intense and just as amazing.



I Think I Am In Friend-Love With You is one of the sweetest little books I've ever seen and would make a fabulous Valentine's Day gift for anyone with a BFF (of the same sex or opposite gender).



Originally published online in Sadie Magazine in 2012, comic-book strip artist Yumi Sakugawa's charming illustrated tale has been published as a hardcover book by Adams Media.



The 128 page book is perfect if you've ever fallen in friend-love and want to show that person how much you love them...in a platonic way, of course.




PRAISE FOR I THINK I AM IN FRIEND-LOVE WITH YOU

"Look around. You won’t find anything sweeter than this lonely little book anywhere in your immediate vicinity. Unless for some reason there’s, like, a bunny knitting a scarf for a puppy. That might be sweeter. Aside from that, this book is definitely your best bet." —Avery Monsen, coauthor of K is for Knifeball and All My Friends Are Dead

"This is one of my favorite comics ever, a sweet ode to platonic love that will echo through the ages." —MariNaomi, author of Kiss & Tell

"Funny and beautifully drawn, I Think I Am In Friend-Love With You is the bittersweet tale of friendships in the age of social media in which many can relate.” —Esther Pearl Watson, author of Unlovable

"The warmth of Yumi’s soft brushstrokes and vulnerability of her words make me feel less alone in this weird world. I think I am in book-love." —Lisa Hanawalt, author of My Dirty Dumb Eyes

"Yumi Sakugawa’s small, sweet hardcover I Think I am in Friend-Love With You (Adams Media) feels so necessary. Sakugawa’s one-eyed, vaguely socklike protagonist fantasizes a future of book-swapping, Tumblr post–reblogging, coffee-sipping platonic love, but reveals the most simple of needs in the book’s simple black-and-white illustrations.” - Bitch Magazine

“I Think I am In Friend Love With You…chronicles a bashful cyclops with a good old fashioned friend crush. Sakaguwa’s comics, while being hilarious, are imbued with a quiet magic that somehow makes a glowing computer screen as ripe with beauty and mystery as a night sky full of twinkling stars.” - Huffington Post Arts

The comic…expresses all the delightful, little things we hope our best…pals will do for us…. [Yumi’s] work has an eerie, wondrous quality to it, blipped with panels that will make your heart soar and dip and soar again. Themes of space and love pull readers into a pensive world of fantastical creatures.” - NPR’s Code Switch


Yumi Sakugawa is a comic book artist and illustrator based in Southern California. A graduate of the fine art program of University of California, Los Angeles, Yumi is a regular comic contributor for The Rumpus and Wonderhowto. Her illustrations and comics have been featured on Buzzfeed, Lifehacker, PAPERMAG, Apartment Therapy and all over Tumblr. Her short comic story "Mundane Fortunes for the Next Ten Billion Years" was selected as Notable Comics of 2012 by the Best American Comics anthology editors. I Think I Am In Friend-Love With You (Adams Media, Dec 2013 release) is her first published book.

Visit her on the web at www.yumisakugawa.com.



Buy I Think I Am In Friend-Love With You

Airfix Build Your Own Valentine!

I was remiss in not posting this fun card inspired by Airfix scale model kits, a collaboration between Rich Storey Designs and JollySmith Design earlier this month so you could purchase it in time for V-Day. However, you can still enjoy the fun graphics and cool design. Buy it for next year!

All cards are printed in the UK from a sustainable source and supplied individually packaged in a cello bag with a white envelope.

buy it here

Have A Little Heart This Valentine's Day. Here's 64 To Choose From.

This large selection of handmade Italian ceramic hearts designed and decorated by various artists are designed to cover every gamut of love from desire to heartbreak. Each individual heart measures approximately 5x12 cm and makes a great paperweight in addition to being a declaration of feelings. Some are interactive and others are simply decorative, but all of them are sweet.









In addition to unique ceramic hearts, Creativando makes other ceramic wares such as vases, paperweights and artist decorated butterflies. They also create furniture.

Creativando is inspired by a passion. From the passion of Laura Ellero and Mauro Bassani, the founders, for contemporary art and design. Hence the idea, at the beginning just a hobby, to "produce" gifts and everyday objects revisited with an artistic and graphic point of view. Nowadays Creativando distributes its products worldwide. The philosophy is very simple. A small artisan entreprise who made of creativity and service its strength. And that puts a lot of passion in all its work.

Environment and Made in Italy
Selected materials and maximum attention to product quality and manufacturing, a craftmanship for details, from concept to packaging. This allows us to offer a product that has all the value and reliability of the product Made in Italy.

Creativando

10 Ways To Wish Brody & Carrie A Happy Homeland Valentine's Day.

What do the television show Homeland and Valentine's Day have in common? While the award-winning Showtime drama may have more in common with the St. Valentine's Day Massacre than the day of hearts and cupids, copywriter Deanna Director and designer Caroline Director have had some fun combining their love of both to create some funny (and punny) cards to celebrate.

Playing up the character's roles and personality traits combined with cheesy Valentine heart, floral and doily art, they have made ten humorous Valentine's Day Cards that will make Homeland fans giggle.



















Check out Deanna's tumblr site, Director's Commentary, here

Check out Carloline's tumblr site here

Neon Valentines By Tracey Emin Take Over New York's Times Square.

Not only does this public art installation in New York's Times Square add some colorful romance to the city, but by snapping a pic of yourself amongst it and sharing it, you get a chance to win a digital limited edition by Tracey Emin, and that's something to set one's heart a-flutter.

The installation, "I Promise To Love You"

s[edition], the online platform for the world’s most renowned contemporary artists to sell their digital limited editions, brings celebrated British artist Tracey Emin to Times Square throughout February.


above: Tracey Emin: I Promise to Love You © Tracey Emin, Photograph by Ka-Man Tse, 2013.

“Every year I send valentines. This year I won’t have to. Times Square will do it for me,” said Tracey Emin. The title is her promise to love NYC, as well as individual promises to love one another.


above: artist Tracey Emin

The artwork, a dazzling visual valentine, will be shared with New Yorkers and visitors as part of a synchronized program on over fifteen of the largest digital displays in Times Square.

“I Promise to Love You”, premiered on February 1st and plays throughout the month as part of the “Midnight Moment”, a presentation of the Times Square Advertising Coalition (TSAC) and Times Square Arts. s[edition] helped bring these works to Times Square and they will all be available for sale simultaneously and exclusively at [s]edition.

February “Midnight Moment” features these neon works by Tracey Emin throughout February 2013, every night from 11.57pm – midnight:

above: I promise to love you, 2007

above: Love is what you want, 2011

above: I listen to the ocean and all I hear is you, 2011

above: When I held you I held your heart, 2012

above: can't believe how much (how much) I loved you, 2012

above: You touch my soul, 2012

Get in on the romance and show them your love!
Join Tracey Emin’s Digital Valentines in Times Square, Just Snap + tag + share your photo and they'll give you a digital limited edition by artist Tracey Emin.


above image composited by If It's Hip, It's Here using images from the midnight moment gallery and sedition's site.

• Snap a passionate photo in Times Square between 11:57pm and midnight with Tracey Emin’s art in the background
• Tweet or Instagram your photo with #MidnightMoment
• Follow @seditionart
• Win a Tracey Emin digital limited edition

Images of the installation in Time Square:




all images courtesy of www.seditionart.com

Galleries that represent Tracey Emin:
White Cube
48 Hoxton Square
London N1 6PB
UK
w: www.whitecube.com

Lehmann Maupin
540 West 26th Street
New York
NY10001
USA
w: www.lehmannmaupin.com

Galleria Lorcan O’Neill
1E VIA ORTI D’ALIBERT
ROMA 00165
ITALY
www.lorcanoneill.com

Can You Love Someone So Much It's Creepy? Yep, Says Hubba Welcome.

Unfortunately the sweetly illustrated and hilariously disturbing cards are not available for purchase, but more creative cards by Chris Mundy and Greg Lockhart of Hubbawelcome. Other creative cards by them include the following:




About Hubbawelcome:


Hubbawelcome is a new collective of contemporary artists based in East London, formed by Chris Mundy and Greg Lockhart in 2009. Greg is an award-winning commercial illustrator, most recently recognised for his illustrative work in the awarded MAYOR OF LONDON “Save the Bees” advertising campaign, while Chris is an art director at M&C SAATCHI group, London. Their work is inspired by online culture and the psychology of growing up in the information age.

With a particular interest in social media, their pieces exhibit themes of loneliness, isolation, compulsion and death. Chris Mundy explains, “In our work we visualise the obsessive and disposable nature of how individual people interact online. We feel that being completely connected with ones peers at all times has actually become a catalyst for loneliness, gradually dehumanising relationships and individual identity.”

Hubbawelcome create prints, animations and installations by collecting fragments of online culture and reconstructing them using repetition and grids. Their pieces are bold, single-minded and colourful – appearing almost like ads for obscure products. They site artists David Shrigley, Andy Warhol, Banksy and Steve Powers as influences.

Thanks to TAXI for bringing these fun cards to my attention