Sean Cahill our new artist of the week mixes art history, design and personality in his projects. I really enjoyed two of his projects: The Bar Cara Custom Art and the Google Picture project. His Bar Cara custom art kind of reminded me of a project I did not too long ago. I love mixing art history and design, I think it’s a great tribute. His Google picture project is very unique you’ll have to check out his site or read this entry to learn exactly how awesome it is 
Sean Cahill on his projects:
Bar Cara, a recent client of ours, is a new Italian based restaurant in
Bloomfield, NJ who prides themselves on being a modern take on a traditional
taste. I decided to show this through the art on the walls. My goal was to
combine the traditional with the modern. I achieved this by juxtaposing
Modern imagery with traditional sculpture and historical landmarks. One of
my favorites is Rodin’s thinker sitting in front of a graffiti wall. I think
the imagery is particularly strong in this piece due to the duality of
street art. On one hand grafitti’s art, and on the other hand it’s
destructive. Considering both sides of the coin can lead to much though with
is expressed by The Thinker. I also snuck the Bar Cara logo into the
grafitti on the wall, it’s the black and yellow star.
The Statue of David was also a fun piece to put together. Chef Ryan DePersio
is a really hip guy who fuels the energy of Bar Cara so I wanted to include
him in the art in some way. I actually took a photo Chef Ryan’s arm and
photoshopped his tattoo’s onto David’s arm. The background is photo of SoHo
New York. This pieces was very well received by Chef Ryan and also his son
Nicholas who’s name is tattooed on the arm.
The Venus Di Milo made me laugh because I put her on stage as if she was the
lead singer of a band. Without arms it’s tough to look very active on stage!
The pieces that read “italiana” was also based on music. I placed a bass
guitar in the angels hands. I though her natural position was asking for it.
The Angel with the tank is the most impactful for me. The imagery speaks for
itself and I think the Bar Cara logo (star) and sunrays compliment the whole
situation.
All the artwork was created in Photoshop at full size (roughly 3′x5′ each).
The documents ended up being huge files. It’s tedious working in
hi-resolution at such a large size because each move or change can take up
to 10 minutes to process, depending on detail. I worked with many blending
modes and of course a lot of masking. In the end the pieces turned out to
fit the motif of the restaurant very well.
The Google Picture Project was an exercise I created for myself to stay
sharp and keep my mind focused on art. In my line of work all the art I
produce is based on clients needs. I’m always designing within certain
requirements. Therefore I wanted to bring such “constraints” to my personal
expression. Thus the Google Picture Project was born. The concept behind the
Project is that I’ll create an Image, Picture or Poster using ONLY the
images Google provides based on a Image Searching a specific phrase. I don’t
get to choose the search phrases, instead they’re all suggested to me by
others. This method restricts the amount of images I can create with.
Sometimes I get a whole bunch of great images, sometimes nothing. It’s
interesting to see what searches turn up what images. More often than not, a
search that I think will be good ends up bad and the ones I think will turn
up nothing yeild the most.
One of my favorites was “Great White Beavers.” This was one of the strangest
phrases that was suggested to me. I ended up making the image much like a
screen print. I keep the colors solid and the amount of colors to a minimum.
I used about 3 separate images and combined them into one composition. This
is the same method I use for all the Google Picture Projects. I don’t know
of anyone doing design this way…using viewer input as jump off point. But
it’s proven very rewarding for me and the other participants. I often print
out the image and mail it to the people who suggested the phrase. Suggest
one and I’ll design it for you!
You can find out more about Sean Cahill at www.cahillstudio.com and www.radkidcool.com
I truly think he nailed the composition beautifully as well. 
