One man's trash is Francisco de Pajaro's art

When someone creates a painting, a sculpture, or an installation, he or she usually wants it to last forever. But sometimes, an artist just wants to create a piece that will last just a few days, and then be gone forever. That's the case with Francisco de Pajaro, also known in street-art circles as Art Is Trash (El Arte Es Basura).

While Francisco isn't the first person to create art with discarded items, he might just be the most fascinating name in the niche. The Catalan artist travels to cities all over the globe and uses old mattresses, cardboard boxes, bin bags and anything else he can find in the street to create bizarre yet delightfully whimsical human figures, monsters and animals.

Now, his work is being honored in a 192-page book titled Art Is Trash. Published by Promopress, the hardcover is a thick documentation of rubbish bags, abandoned furniture and debris, which were used to "create art that works as a mirror for those who see it, reflecting our boundless, desperate consumerism and our obsession with power."

Here are some of Francisco's most notable creations to date:

Comments

Enigmatic Shapes and Psychedelic Patterns

To say that I love Sanagi 's work is an understatement. Looking at her art feels sort of therapeutic, and I find her drawings refreshingly intricate. They're trippy, psychedelic, and resemble something that you might see under a microscope. Not much is Googleable about Sanagi, but that's fine. There aren't many artists these days that still pull off the whole mysterious vibe, so I commend her for that. By the way... they're all hand-drawn with pen and ink.

James DeRosso's ceramic monsters

I really like these whimsical ceramic creatures by James DeRosso. Yes, they have bulging eyes and toothy grins, but they're not scary at all. The Portland-based artist started making cute monsters while he was a student to jokingly create gargoyle-like guardians for the kiln. After other students kept taking his quirky little figures, he realized there was a market for them. "I'm enjoying the whole monster making niche," James says. "It's amazingly gratifying to be doing ceramics full time and especially to be a teacher introducing kids to the joy of clay." Be sure to visit his website and like his Facebook page for the latest monster news.

Here's a trippy reimagining of the zodiac animals.

These are the animals from the zodiac calendar as created by Japanese artist feebee . I can't even begin to imagine how long painting these hybrid creatures on wood panel must take, but the results are pretty amazing. Some of them look terrifying, some aren't scary at all, and one looks like the Pokemon Meowth. They're all eye-catching, but none of them mean as much to me as the one representing my own sign, the Sheep (also known as the Goat or Ram). The twelve animal signs represent twelve different types of personalities. It is said that people born in the Year of the Sheep can be very indecisive and lazy. Hmmm, I guess Chinese zodiac is pretty much legit.

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