What if, after the demolition of a neglected building, all that was left behind was the leafy exoskeleton of ivy that once grew up its outer walls? As shanty towns all along the Yuan River in the Hunan province of China are dismantled, a piece of them remains behind, paying tribute to their historical value in this setting. V Studio presents ‘Home for Boston Ivy,’ a recreation of these building-shaped ivy structures in metal, which will serve as a trellis for real ivy in the future. These welded shapes will be placed within the new, modernized version of the city so future inhabitants can get a sense of its past.

“Houses being covered with Boston ivy can be seen everywhere in shanty towns,” they explain. “While presenting a picture of harmonious coexistence between human and nature, it is also the memory of a home for residents of shanty towns. When the ivy attaches to the building and grows, it forms the turns and enclosures of the space. V Studio’s artwork has pulled away the building which the plant has attached to, and left only the Boston ivy with twisted roots and gnarled branches in the shape of the building.”

V Studio previously completed a series of sculptures relating to the same theme, all using materials from the same site in the Hunan Changde Yuanshui right bank shantytowns. ‘Sealing’ preserved building debris in a collection of cubes that function as urban seating; information about each home that was demolished is imprinted on the cement that contains the debris.

“At present, the shantytowns are being demolished,” they say (translated from Chinese.) “In the near future, a modernized metropolis will completely cover the area and all that is available here will cease to exist. How to preserve the emory of the old city and inject the memory of the origin into the new town in the process of demolishing the old building and building a new one is the basic starting point for the creation of the series of works.”

Their body panels consist of a lacework of metal gears, their windshields no more than mesh, their seats steel and the spaces under their hoods hollow, but these life-sized car sculptures still manage to look like they could fly down the street at top speeds at any moment. A group of 50 artists raids the scrapyards of Pruszków, Poland for trash they can integrate into their Gallery of Steel Figures, a museum full of impressively lifelike recycled art.

The art collective previously wowed the internet with their sculptural recreations of pop culture figures, including Predator, the Na’avi from Avatar and Transformers. Their latest creation includes faithfully reproduced replicas of iconic cars, including a Bugatti Veyron, Lamborghini Aventador, Fiat 500, Maserati GranTurismo and a Mercedes-Benz 300 SL.

Built to scale with operable doors and interiors that match the originals down to the insignias and dash instruments, the models are made entirely from scrap metal welded into shape. The exposed engine of the Bugatti is a particularly impressive detail. Check out the whole gallery on their Facebook page.

There’s something alien about the way these metallic structures move, a fluidity that makes them seem as if they’re alive. Each one transforms so completely as it spins, the results almost seem like optical illusions. It’s really all a play of light and shadow on cleverly designed kinetic sculptures, which are engineered to spin effortlessly whether the winds are barely blowing or gusting with extreme force.

Working through many a night in his remote workshop on Orcas Island, Washington, Howe refuses commissioned orders, working only from his personal creative inspiration. Hundreds of his sculptures have sold to private and public collections around the world, including large-scale urban works in several cities.

“Kinetic sculpture resides at the intersection of artistic inspiration and mechanical complexity. The making of one of my nieces relies on creative expression, metal fabrication, and a slow design process in equal parts. It aims to alter one’s experience of time and space when witnessed. It also needs to weather winds of 90mph and still move in a one mile per hour breeze and do so for hundreds of years.”

As seen through the eyes of sculptors, painters, street artists, photographers and even knitters, the animal kingdom flourishes in curlicues of steel and paper, splatters of ink and trailing thread. Working in styles that range from the hyperrealistic to the fantastically surreal, these artists manage to capture some of the complexity of Earth’s incredible wild creatures.

Swirling, Ornate Animal Sculptures by Ellen Jewett

Flora and fauna come together in stunning ceramic compositions by Ellen Jewett. The animals themselves consist of flowers, snails, vines and other plant matter, leaving hollows within each creature’s body to make them seem weightless.

Urban Swarms by Pantonio

Fluid swarms of blue-toned fish, birds and other animals flow across urban surfaces on a large scale in a stunning new series by Portuguese street artist Antonio Correia, aka Pantonio. Set against stark white, the colorful creatures provide a striking contrast to the gaining historic settings in which they’re painted.

Delicate Paper Animal Art by Calvin Nicholls

Tiny scraps of paper are cut and layered to create birds, dogs and other creatures in the relief sculptures of Calvin Nicholls. Using an X-acto knife, scalpel and scissors, the artist shapes pieces of paper that can be just fractions of a millimeter in size and builds them on to p of each other until a three-dimensional form is created. Each piece takes three weeks to an incredible two years to complete.

Vivid Microscopic Underworlds by Robert S. Connett

Creatures too small for us to see with the naked eye are revealed in brilliant color by illustrator Robert S. Connett – whether they’re representations of actual living microorganisms, or plucked from the artist’s imagination. Connett refers to these scenes as “underworlds,” shining a light on fantastical pockets of flourishing life lurking in dark, wet places.

Hammered Steel Animals by Selcuk Yilmaz

Turkish sculptor Selcuk Yilmaz forms thin strips of steel into mask-like animal heads, including a lynx, tiger and fox., as well as the full body of a majestic lion. Hammering and welding the pieces into form, the artist produces incredibly powerful-looking, life-sized creatures that shimmer in the light.

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Amazing Animal Art 50 Creature Inspired Creations

Most people use nails just to hang art on the wall, but Maine-based sculptor John Bisbee collects thousands of them to craft incredibly intricate sculptures into spiked balls, undulating waves, tree-like structures and towering geometric stacks.

Bisbee got the idea after entering an abandoned house looking for found objects to use in his art, and finding a bucket full of old nails. “I kicked the bucket and it flipped over,” he told NPR, “and the nails had cohered, oxidized – they’d rusted into the bucket shape. And it was just such an obvious thing of beauty – it was so clearly above anything I had ever envisioned making myself. And I sat down on the bed, and I knew that I needed to get some nails.”

Since then, Bisbee has created dozens of sculptures using nothing but nails in a free-flowing process that the artist improvises, getting them “into my hands and out into space.”

It was only recently, after spending years welding and bending the nails into shapes, that Bisbee realized there’s something really obvious he can do with them as well: hit them with a hammer. From this revelation has come lots of wall-based art made with a pneumatic power hammer.