My name is Pete Fecteau and I’m an artist and designer. My fascination with Rubik’s Cubes started in 2008 when I decided to learn how to solve one. It was super addictive once I memorized the algorithms and, within a year, I was solving them in less than a minute.

It never occurred to me to use them for art until it came to me in a dream, literally. I came up with the idea to make one of the world’s largest Rubik’s Cube mosaics as my entry into the ArtPrize competition. I knew it was entirely possible and I used my skills as a designer to create a digital version of the mosaic and then a system for me to navigate and track each cube as I build the mosaic by hand.

The Rubik’s cube has a very limited color palette and I wanted to use 5 of the 6 colors to translate the work of Martin Luther King Jr. into a dynamic, analogous visual. I started by composing the image in black and white and then separated the grey scale into 9 solids.

Those 9 greys were then swapped with the 5 cube colors and the gradients between them. The process was and is a true test of color theory. Once I had the cubes, which was the hardest part of the whole process, the construction was simple. 4,242 Rubik’s Cubes, 5 colors, 1 subject.

I’m too cheap to buy or rent studio space. I’ve always borrowed space. Now that I’m in San Francisco, studio space is even more out of the question. I’m planning another mosaic for 2013 which will be twice as big and will probably rent out storage space in a self-storage facility.

I prefer bleak, featureless spaces because there’s so much to focus on. Any kind of distraction is a huge risk. I don’t listen to music or eat/drink while I’m working. I also prefer to work alone. I guess that makes me an art hermit, huh?

© Pete Fecteau, 2011

We were eager to find out more about how they work as a collaborative pair and how they’re pushing Brosmind as an all-inclusive brand.

Having studied art separately, did you actively try and develop a cohesive style or has your work always been similar to one another?

We have been a creative couple since our childhood. When we were kids, we spent all day making comics, building vehicles for our action figures and creating our own movies with a domestic camcorder. 

Juan is only three years older than me (Alejandro) so we have the same background and influences, we think in the same way and share the same kind of ideas. Having said that, it’s true that there were some slight differences between our drawing styles, but when we started our studio we naturally developed the actual Brosmind style.

How does your process as a duo differ from how you’ve worked previously?

Now is easier for us. We can quickly explain an idea to each other and be sure that he is going to understand it perfectly. The cool thing about being brothers is that we can be totally sincere in our criticism or have really big arguments and still be friends. That helps, for sure, to take our work to a higher level than before.

Is all the work produced as Brosmind totally collaborative or do you sometimes allocate individual parts of a project to one another?

We develop all the ideas in common and also develop the pencilled drawing together. When we decide that the pencil stage is finished, Juan does the ink and Alejandro adds the color on the computer.

As well as your work, you get a lot of positive attention as yourselves as artists. Is this something you’ve always thought would be part of the branding of Brosmind, or is it something that’s happened naturally because of people’s interest in you?

We would love being only artists, but for the moment  it’s easier to live from commercial work. For the moment, we’ve just reached a balance between commercial and personal work that makes us feel really comfortable.

Would you recommend working as a team to other artists out there?

Each person is different. For us, it’s great to work together, but our relationship is so special that it would be really difficult to have anybody else in the studio. We also know really talented artists who work alone and also other studios, which create amazing things being a big team.

Continuing from your venture into other products, such as Brosmind Army and Brosmind City, can we expect to see any further expansion of the Brosmind universe in the near future?

Of course. We have two great projects!

We got invited to do the Main titles for the OFFF Festival in Barcelona 2012. And we’ll be working together with Upper First, and that’s going to be big! We are really excite about this project : ) 

We”ll be presenting them on May 2012, so stay tuned!

And, probably on the same dates, we’ll launch an amazing personal project, but unfortunately for the moment we can’t say WHAT’S INSIDE?, so stay tuned!

© Brosmind Studio, 2011.

They may not always treat each other well, but it’s difficult not to warm towards his characters. Fine pencil strokes swathed in colour will keep your eyes looking for more. Before you know it, you become voyeur into this bizarre place, even relating to its oddities.

© Matt Furie, 2010.

I asked him a couple of questions to accompany these excellent photographs covering some of the work process and the finished products.


How did you get into creating wooden toys?

I’m a senior industrial design student at Carnegie Mellon University and I was able to do a project of my choosing for one of my classes this past semester. I worked at Radio Flyer this past summer where I learned the value and fun involved in making toys.

After seeing the work of Take-g (a Japanese woodworker) I decided to learn how to inlay and sculpt wood through the creation of toys. After researching preexisting toy forms and themes I decided to choose a theme rich with information and meaning, hence, the theme of recently extinct animals, rich with interesting forms.

What was your work process in making these?

Step One. I chose four extinct mammals I found interesting in terms of form, pattern, and information about the behavior, habitat, reasons for extinction, and so on.

Step Two. I collected all the images I could find of each animal.

Step Three. I sketched until I found forms that I liked and I thought I could make.

Step Four. I sculpted a foam model of each toy to evaluate size and form helping me to make changes to the wood ones to come.


Step Five. I made the wood toys first as block elements cutting (table saw) and gluing different types of wood together.

I cut (band saw) front and side profiles out of the block elements. I drilled (mill) holes for heads, arms, tails. I sculpted (rasps) the wood into final shapes. I sanded, oiled, and steel wooled all pieces.

Step Six. Packaging: I purchased different size glass display domes and turned (lathe) a base to fit each one.

I hand drew (copic multiliner sp size .1) an information graphic for each animal, printed it on thick paper, cut out the package template, and folded it into its final shape.

ⓒ Josh Finkle, 2009

What are you working on at the moment?

This is my last semester of school. I am working on exhibits for the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh and more furniture for my furniture class.

MoonApe.

Let’s hope to see much more of this fellow in the future.

MoonApe

Mike is known not only for his trademark style that is busy, organic and vivacious, but also his work in other areas, including authoring several books on hand-drawn illustration topics that include hand-drawn typography in: ‘Hand Job’, and hand-drawn patterns in: ‘Over and Over’. He started a magazine called ‘Untitled’ in 2007, which covers his own various interests. I talked to him about his work and what he’s working on at the moment.

Mike has always been drawing, but after studying painting at college, decided to focus more closely on design and illustration. As is evident in the work he does, Mike is keen to avoid the use of the computer, believing that with hand-drawn work, the character and true style of the illustrator is more clearly revealed than through digital means. His most treasured tool is understandably his pencil.

Mike’s work process for his recent pattern work involve ‘sitting down and going for it, then hope it works out.’ This advice is important for all illustrators out there, who might struggle to get work started, or even finished. It just takes an initial effort to get started, even if the outcome is not yet realised, and push it until the work is complete.

At the moment Mike is working on ‘a good pile of things. Some stuff for the x-games, some packaging for Brooklyn-based chocolatiers the ‘Mast Brothers’, an art show at Giant Robot SF, second issue of my magazine, and yes a new book…’

ⓒ Mike Perry, 2009

There is no doubt that Mike’s style and the styles he has inspired make a refreshing change from much of the purely digitally produced work we are seeing in this age. His continuing success demonstrates the popularity and requirement of hand-drawn styles that we are seeing more and more of today.

Good luck with everything, Mike!

Moonape: Follow me on Twitter for updates

3D toy designs at Gumliens sprung out of various ideas and paintings made a few years ago by the two members of the group: ‘Gumtaro’ and ‘Hirayama’.

The work process involves alternative work by each of the two designers. Gumtaro starts of with a ‘scribble‘. The lines are cleaned and drawn out clearly by Hirayama. Gumtaro will then paint the character out with acrylic paint.

The image will be ‘made more beautiful with a computer‘. Both Gumtaro and Hirayama will then get to work crafting a 3D model out of clay based on the computer design.

In terms of the actual manufacture of the toys, most work is done in house with the stone dust clay and resin modelling in the early stages done in their home studio. The soft vinyl toy is produced with toy manufacturer ‘One Up’.

Gumliens’ toys will be exhibited at both ‘Fewmany‘ and ‘One Up‘ in Japan from June 29th 2009 to July 5th. Their vinyl toys will be on sale at the ‘One Up’ booth at the Taipei Toy Festival in July.

Gumliens is also currently working on toys for a personal booth for an event called ‘Popbox’ held in ‘Loft‘ in Shibuya, Tokyo in August this year.

Good luck Gumtaro and Hirayama!

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