miniature

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Art

Hugging and Hungry, Adorable Cats Are Hand-Carved as Miniature Sculptures

All images © Sakura Hanafusa, shared with permission

Japanese sculptor Sakura Hanafusa carves whimsical cat sculptures often carrying a range of foods, including vegetables, sweets, and biscuits. In one of the feline statues, a snowy-haired creature peeks out from underneath a vanilla ice cream cone, while in another, a smiling duo clings to mushrooms and acorns. Adorable and playful, Hanafusa’s poses sometimes prompt interaction and mimicry like with the seven cats pawing for high fives, which ask passersby to raise their hands, too.

Hanafusa whittles camphor and then adds details to their noses, paws, and whiskers with oil paint. The characters are modeled from family and friends’ pets, all of which have playful expressions whether grinning or shy and coy. While a few of Hanafusa’s pieces are the size of real animals, others would only fit into the palm of a hand, and some merge with other objects, such as his collection of plump felines with orange, satsuma bodies.

To view more of Hanafusa’s work, visit the artist’s website and Instagram. (via Supersonic Art)

Art Photography

A Daily Project by Tatsuya Tanaka Turns Everyday Goods into Quirky Miniatures

All images © Tatsuya Tanaka

A scroll through Tatsuya Tanaka’s Instagram chronicles the everyday happenings of a cleverly designed world in miniature. The Japanese artist (previously) has spent the last decade reimaging life-sized objects like pencil sharpeners, sponges, and slippers as tiny sets for his cast of characters: a “P” key rests on a painter’s easel, bobsledders barrel through a bowl on a hot pepper, and ice skaters race across a white surgical mask.

Released daily as part of his ongoing Miniature Calendar project, the works often correspond with current events and cultural moments, including Tanaka’s recent scenarios referencing the Winter Olympic Games. “The theme of my work is ‘mitate’… to replace something around us with something similar or that looks like it. It is important to use something that everyone knows as a motif for my work,” he writes.

For a look behind-the-scenes, click through each day on Tanaka’s site, where he shares multiple perspectives of every work.

Art

Minuscule Landscapes and Tiny Creatures Nestle Inside Painted Pennies and Other Coins

All images © Bryanna Marie, courtesy of Abend Gallery

Within the confines of a coin, Bryanna Marie paints quaint cabins, idyllic landscapes, and whimsical mushrooms with spotted caps. The Tucson-based artist’s fascination with miniature canvases started back in 2014 when she painted a 3 x 3-inch piece, and she’s since gravitated toward smaller spaces, ending up with the 1-inch diameters of pennies and other currencies. Rendered in oil paint, each work corresponds to the coin’s origin. “For instance, I’ll use an Irish penny for their rolling hills, or a Euro to paint my trips to France,” she shares.

For more of the artist’s miniature creations, visit her site and Instagram, and shop available pieces at Abend Gallery. (via Escape Kit)

Craft

Kaleidoscopic Patterns Coil Around Miniature Snakes Exquisitely Cast in Glass

All images © Ryan Eicher

Intricate linework and trippy, geometric motifs flow through the minuscule glass-blown serpents by Ryan Eicher. The Maryland-based artist casts smooth, colorful gradients, rainbow stripes, thin parallel bands, and intersecting helices within the snakes’ coiled bodies, a challenge considering the structure of the patterns shifts as he shapes the forms. Each miniature creature stretches only a few millimeters wide, and many of Eicher’s most recent pieces feature a mishmash of lines and shapes created with artists like Future Glass and Emerson, among others. You can find details about those collaborative pieces on Instagram, and head to Etsy to add one of the tiny snakes to your collection.

Art

Outlandish Cat High-Jinks Become Adorable Miniatures Sculpted by Meetissai

All images © Meetissai

Fluffy catpuccinos, stealthy shorthairs squeezed into bizarre positions, and gymnastics-prone tabbies: Inspired by the real life antics of feline companions, Meetissai crafts tiny sculptures that preserve the ridiculous, most charming moments of cat life—these include fluffy characters flattened like rugs and cartoon-like distortions—as adorable miniatures. The artist often references popular memes and glitched photos, skewed perspectives, and serendipitous timing to craft the fantastically posed animals, and you can find an entire menagerie of epoxy creatures on Twitter and Instagram.

Art Illustration

Miniature Watercolor Works by Ruby Silvious Are Painted on Stained Teabags

All images © Ruby Silvious, shared with permission

Ruby Silvious’s quaint seaside scenes and bucolic landscapes nestle between the torn edges and wrinkled folds of a used teabag. The Coxsackie, New York-based artist (previously) paints miniature scenes of everyday life on the stained paper pouches, leaving the string and tags intact as a reminder of the repurposed material’s origin. Silvious sells prints of her watercolor pieces on her site, and you can follow her latest projects and news about upcoming exhibitions—she will be showing her upcycled works in France and Japan in 2022—on Instagram.