Lauren DiCiocci makes these wonderful hand-embroidered images. Lots more on her site.

First is this giant insect-web made of sticky tape made by For Use/Numen.

Second, Stephanie Lee is growing her own wardrobe of bacteria.

Oh yes. You read right.

A couple of bathtubs, yeast, green tea and a dash of bacteria…

Read more at BioCouture

Click here to see more designs.

But while I am gone, why don’t you check out this very inspiring and versatile artist I just found: Lisa Kokin. Have a look at all the weird & fun stuff she´s made by clicking  here!

This evening, however, we chose to see HAIR, the hippie-love-musical by Ragni and Rado. It was the first musical I worked with back in 1996. It was an amateur-production, but a big production. This was back in the days, when I was on stage, singing and dancing as the political activist Sheila

I´ve never seen any other production of it (except for the film, which is completely different from the stage-version) and was thrilled I could see it here! This production came from New York, and it was a real feel-good, down-memory-lane- experience for me. Still remember lots of the lyrics, even the spoken text.

I´m not gonna go on chatting about all the impressions of the day, there were plenty! Why don´t you instead tell me what your favorite musical is?

There were a couple of costumes there from The Lion King. I really appreciate the chance to see extravagant costumes up-close, because there are so many details you don´t see when you sit in the back of the theatre.
The picture above is the Lion king´s costume, with lots of leather-details.

Lots of head-wear in another part of the exhibition. I just think the Sidney-opera-house-hat is hysterically funny! It was made for Dame Edna.

In the evening, we saw a fringe-theatre show that Freya had the set- and costume-design for. The Knickerbocker Glories is a trilogy of suffragette-comedies. It was amazing to see what she had magically whipped up on an almost non-existent budget. A complete set and 19 costumes for a couple of hundred £s. She really did a great job.

Such a contrast to yesterdays show, where money obviously wasn´t a subject. I like the opportunity to see different shows at different venues. The big, commercial musical, and the fringe political comedy.

Visiting my dear friend Freya, an excellent costume-designer, we´ve decided to indulge in art and culture this weekend. For us that will most probably include lots of costumes.And where better to find costumes than the theatre?

We started of last night with the number one talk-of-the-town in musical-circles now a days: Andrew Lloyd Webber´s sequel to Phantom of the Opera, “Love Never Dies”. 

Wow, all the things you can do with a nearly unlimited budget! There are so many things to say about the show, it had so many qualities, showed so much talent! Beautiful music, wonderful singers/actors, especially the young boy and the Phantom himself. The costumes were georgeous of course.

But once again, the true winners of my heart are the set-designers in collaboration with the special-effects-department. I´d love to have that chandelier with all the singing Medusa-heads and all the dancing snakes! Or the walking tray-table, half woman, half-skeleton. But also the strange perspectives, the Art Nouveau-architectural-ornaments, the solid sets that all of a sudden liquified and disappeared, the running horses in the smoke… BRAVO!!!

Photography isn´t allowed, so I don´t have any pictures to show you. Hm. Guess that means, you´ll just have to go see the show yourself! It´s well worth it!

I visited this textile exhibition outside Bergen today. Marit, one of my former students is now studying at Art school, and she was one of the participants. Needless to say, I´m very proud of her!

This is her work, the hanging flowers in front. The chords are all elastic, and bounce up and down. She´s called it “Communicating a smile”.

This piece is very low-key. Crochet bucket, gloves and cloth. Its called “It´s a small world, but not for the ones who clean it”

He found hundreds of copper canisters that hold the remains of patients from a psychiatric hospital that have never been claimed. Time, the ashes on the inside and other conditions have changed the canisters into unique masterpieces.

I have always liked close-ups and these abstract landscapes are breath-taking. Knowing the back-story only makes the expression stronger for me.

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Indigorchid said:

Oooo, so pretty! (Happy to see you’re back home safe and sound too!)