Hatsuki Yamashita: Design Festa Tokyo

Hatsuki Yamashita's mixed media work is haunting. Yamashita's landscapes seem photographic in their detail, but the main character and focus feels empty and sinister. There isn't much information online about the artist (and my Japanese is a little rusty). These pieces were seen at Design Festa Art Fair in Tokyo. Design Festa features the work of about 10,000 artists working in a wide range of media. The two-day show is held biannually and was started in 1994. Next show date: November 10 - 11, 2012.

Nick Van Woert

Nick Van Woert is a sculptor living in Brooklyn. He builds on existing forms to create a new and unusual remix. Van Woert works with metal, glues, resins, and foil tape among other things. His studio resembles a good humored science lab mixed with an impractical, architectural model shop. Van Woert recently graduated from Parsons MFA program, previously having completed a degree in architecture.

Rosemarie Fiore

Rosemarie Fiore creates art out of a volatile medium: fireworks. Enveloped by sulfurous clouds, she resembles a latter-day magus casting spells, donning heavy gloves and a gas mask. The idea came to her on the 4th of July, 2001 when she accidently dropped a smoke bomb on the cement floor and it created a perfect line of dots. Her latest works, "Firework Drawings," is a collaboration between herself and the explosives, an unpredictable and violent working relationship.

Alyson Shotz

New York City artist Alyson Shotz replicates nature as many of us experience it—interfaced with technology and filtered through culture; tamed, trimmed, and patented. Working in a variety of media, from large-scale installations to digital photography and painting, Shotz is intrigued by the notion of nature as “purely a human construction.” Some of her artworks are artificial versions of living things like trees, plants, and flowers. In one of her installations, bamboo reeds are made of wrapped cotton swabs, pools and droplets of water are suggested by mirrors, insects and flowers merge in suspended swarms of glossy petal and wing shapes, and house plants are equipped with their own rubber feeding tubes and wheels for easy transport.

Lisa Solomon

Lisa Solomon is a california artist who comes from a long line of crafters. She creates imaginative drawings from a bevy of mixed media, including thread, wire, charcoal, watercolor, ink, satin, felt, and the wall, as well as paper and canvas. Her work is inspired by childhood themes, found objects and the differences in masculine and feminine attributes. It's simple and sweet at first glance, but underneath layers of thread and transparent swatches of fabric, the domestic imagery can feel unsettlingly intimate.