Skull-A-Day on Tour: Virginia Festival of The Book

I'm delighted to announce that I will be taking part in this year's Virginia Festival of The Book! The five day event in Charlottesville starts March 17th and features tons of opportunities to hear from a wide range of authors from all over the state of Virginia. I will be doing a talk called "Visual Literacy" with steampunk author Nick Valentino at 8pm on Wednesday, March 17th at Random Row books. The event is Free and should be a lot of fun. Please stop by and say hi if you're in the area. More details can be found HERE.

Visual Literacy
at the Virginia Festival of The Book
March 17th @ 8pm
Random Row Books
315 West Main Street
Charlottesville, VA
434.326.5501 
Free!


image shown: Skullphabet #1

Calaveras Screen Print Skulls

Valerie Pierce knows that doing something you love is best shared with friends. She writes, "Recently I have started a screen printing company with a friend of mine called Calaveras Apparel that is focused around Day of the Dead, skulls, fine art, and tattoo work. I designed the logo by hand, drawing the image and creating the font used for the company name, then we hand screen printed it on a few t-shirts."



I really like the old school vintage look of your shirts. As a matter of fact, all of the stuff in your etsy store is great. I'm such a sucker for handmade goods. Thanks, Valerie(and thank your friend, too)!

C-Rations: 0C100110

This week’s offering is Courtesy of a Cat.

“Cleaning Killed the Caretaker” 12" X 8" Arranged litter box material

Sitter C says:

I thought a cherry pie today was just too predictable. I wish I could tell you, I was trying to collect some of the World’s Most Expensive Coffee, but sadly no I am not getting rich with this. The responsibility for today’s inspiration goes to a neighbor who is away leaving me to cat sit. I told them I wouldn't mind, but needing to clean the litter box would be the death of me.

I can clearly tell you the moment when I had my doubts about doing this one. However, if you don't have a cat or even if you do, here is a more palatable way in which you can have fun replicating this one at home. As for this one's final location... sometimes good art ends up in the dumpster.


Remember each Monday during the 3.0 year I am posting an original skull design. My weekly offerings are nothing compared to the one-a-day massive project done by the Skullmaster in 1.0, but hopefully you will find some nourishment in these weekly offerings.

Need more nourishment? You can always Friend or Follow.

Pointed Skull

BALDEK from France said: "No comment, no link (but a lot of pointers!)"


Directional C says:

This is wonderful work. Taking an object that many of us see many times a day and never think about, and turning it into a piece of art that displays so much movement is an incredible feat. My favorite part of the whole piece is the creation of the teeth using a natural source. Thank you for submitting your work for us to share.

Sunday Simulacra - Version 3.38

It seems that Mother Nature is doing her fair share of the work to create the skull simulacrum that all of our keen eyed skull hunters are finding. These tree skulls are just some of the ways that she is reminding us that someday our skulls will return to the Earth.

Morté (aka Matt) found the first of today's trees. "I took this picture this last summer at the Kanawha State Forest in WV on one of their nature trails. I see a large skull in the tree trunk, but I did not notice it when I took the picture, just after I got it on my phone and looked at it."



Christopher had some help from some canine friends with this one. "I took the attached picture while hiking with my cousin's poodles in a park in Toronto, Canada. I immediately thought of Skull-A-Day when I saw this broken tree in the woods."



And Chelsea Park found this stumperrific skull hiding in a tree on the big island of Hawaii, on the way to the Lagoon at Kiholo Bay.



Thanks to everyone for getting out there and staying active with physical activity and for keeping your skull eyes open. If you are lucky enough to find one of Mother Nature's hidden skulls then feel free to submit them through our submissions page.

T-Bucket Skull

Alexandre Machado is a designer from Brazil who creates all kinds of great illustrations. This is just one of the many skulls he's done.



I'm sure that this will be a hit with any gearheads out there. Thanks for power shifting it over to us, Alexandre!

[Flashback Friday] 268. Skull Island

Flashback Friday is a weekly countdown of the fan selected top 52 skulls of Skull-A-Day 1.0. Each week I'll be posting an original skull along with some additional commentary in order from lowest to highest rated, with the #1 skull appearing in the last week of year 3 of the project...

#15: 268. Skull Island

I love maps, so it seemed an obvious choice to make one of a Skull Island. Of course any good map needs place names on it. I decided to made things in tribute to some of my dedicated friends, fans, and fellow bloggers. You might recognize a few names on there, though it seems like it might be time to make an updated version with some of my new pals. Maybe a print of this is in order, would you be interested in one?

Leather Cuff Skull

Graham Tench from Bournemouth, UK wrote: “hi, inspired by your quest a year ago i made this, thought it was time i showed you.”

In Use

Themyscira C says:

I am not so sure if this could “Stop a bullet cold”, but it certainly could “Make the Axis fall.” I am very impressed with your work. The details and coloration are exquisite on this. I am glad you included a picture of it in use, it makes this work that much more tangible to the viewer. Thank you for submitting your work to share.

[BONUS] Skull Cross-Stitch in Use

 Christina did an excellent job making my Cross-Stitch pattern into a pillow and she says she plans to make more!

Jewelry Of The Skulls

London jewelry designer Gisèle Ganne graces our blog today with her exquisite skull designs. Her first piece is a beautiful twin stag skull that is a true trophy rack.



And this second piece is just something that defies definition. A terrific shoulder piece that would make any head turn. Especially if you were dancing face to face with the skulls of the Black Widow.



If you like these then you will love all of her other fine jewelry at her website. Some of my favorites are the army men rings. Thanks for sharing your wonderful jewelry with all of us, Gisèle.

[BONUS] 376. NYC Blizzard Skull

I was recently in NYC on a business trip just in time to have several plans canceled by an impending blizzard. In reality the storm only dumped a few inches, but I still ended up with some free time on my hands so I made this piece out of the snow on a subway grate while running from one nice warm location to another...

Wartercolor Skull

Maria from Kingston, NY wrote: “I've been reading your blog for quite a while and I love it. I thought that while my slight obsession with skulls was shared, I would send along one of my paintings. There are more details about it on my deviantart page here.”


Rough C says:

Thank you for submitting your work. At first look one may not recognize this as watercolor. You have such a deep dimension of colors that I thought it was another medium. This is wonderful work and I like the story behind it's creation, thanks for pointing us there.

Tuesdays With Tatman #37

I may be a day late for National Flag of Canada Day, but that won't stop me from paying homage to my neighbor to the North (or as some people may call it- America's hat).



O Canada! You are a great country. Whether you're doing a great job of hosting the Olympics, or just circling the pond for a friendly game of hockey, you truly know how to spread brotherhood and friendship. Thanks for being so understanding of your spoiled neighbors to the South(or as some call us- Canada's pants).

Each Tuesday in the 3.0 year will bring a new Tuesday With Tatman. As a tribute to the Skull Master's astounding feat let's all get creative and try something new(and hopefully skull related).
In all seriousness, I mean no disrespect to the country of Canada in general. It's a really nice place, eh.

Ultraviolet Transparent Skulls

These two paintings come from Michael Aaron Casares. He tells us, "They are ultraviolet transparency paintings. I use acrylic and glass. They glow in the black light."

"Transitioning"


"You Will Recall"


These are some totally trippy paintings. The pics look good, but I can imagine that the real thing under black light is the best. Thanks for the flashback, Michael!

C-Rations: 0C100101

This week’s offering is a Celebration Custom.

“Skull of the Tiger ” 7" X 3" Handmade red paper envelope with gold paint

Survivor C says:

♫ Dunt Dunt Dunt Dunt... it's the Year of the Tiger! ♫

Happy Chinese New Year everyone, during the celebration it is customary to give red envelops that contain money as a way to insure luck in the new year. Wishing you all good fortune this year. The new year began yesterday and it is now the second day, traditionally today is the day in which one's ancestors are remembered.

Remember each Monday during the 3.0 year I am posting an original skull design. My weekly offerings are nothing compared to the one-a-day massive project done by the Skullmaster in 1.0, but hopefully you will find some nourishment in these weekly offerings.

Need more nourishment? You can always Friend or Follow.

[CONTEST] Win a pair of Skull Headphones!

The fine folks at Clooci have kindly offered to give away a pair of their fun skull headphones to two lucky Skull-A-Day readers! 

Morbid King 

 Roco Diablo

To be entered in the drawing just leave a comment below saying what audio book you think a skull would enjoy listening to. [NOTE: If you're reading this on Facebook, be sure to leave your comment on the original Skull-A-Day.com post if you want to be actually entered in the contest]

IMPORTANT: Don't forget to include a way to contact you (either an e-mail in the post OR make sure your Blogger profile has an e-mail link for you on it).

Everyone is welcome to enter, but please note that if you're out of the US you will need to pay for shipping.

You have until just Midnight Eastern Time February 22nd to enter so don't delay!

[UPDATE: The contest is over! Thanks to everyone for participating, the winners will be announced shortly.]

And of course you don't have to wait til the end of the contest to get some nifty headphones from Clooci, you can see them all HERE!

Good luck!

p.s. A fun side note, Clooci actually used my Skullphabet #1 font in the logo for these headphones...

Nonpareils Skull

Michelle Felt from Batavia IL sent us this: “New Years Cupboard Clean out = fun artwork”


Confectioner C says:

Yum! I have a safe place for this skull... in my belly! I like this skull very much. It is interesting to see the colors interacting with each other, as well as the appearance of the wet area which gives it a feeling of blood around the skull. Thank You for submitting this work for us

And the Etched Glass winner is...

Congratulations to theNWelcamino who was the randomly chosen winner of the Etched Skull-A-Day Glass Giveaway!

Thanks again to everyone for participating, don't forget you can still get other glasses, including custom designs from Tatman HERE.

Stay tuned for another giveaway starting tomorrow!

[BONUS] Skull In Use: Happy Valentine's Day

Amanda Hicks says, "I created a Valentine's day wreath to show my love of skulls. Some of the images are from you Noah, and some are from Rich's flicker page, which I saw posted on Skull-a-Day. I asked Rich if I could use and post his images, and he said it was fine. I found some others by just surfing the net. I made the images into beads by glazing them onto flat bottom glass beads, then attached them to the frame. I also added the black flowers to make it pop a little more. I hope you like it. Happy Valentine's Day."

Detail:

Sunday Simulacra - Version 3.37

Today is a chance to experience
Skull on the Rocks...

Nastya says: “Hi! I visited Irkutsk, Russia. At Baikal Lake there is giant junkyard in the forest on Olkhon Island . On the coast of the Lake, near the popular place on the island, is this stone .”

Gustavo Jaramillo wrote: “This picture was taken in Bogotá. Colombia, in the botanic garden. [Since I found out about the site,] I've been looking for skull-like shapes in the city. This is a kind of alien skull!”


Pat in Red Hill, PA told us: “The other night at dinner I peered into my glass to see this. No rearrangement whatsoever. Somewhat of a natural skull.”


C. Diamnond says:

From Red Hill, PA to Russia with love, and that love is simulacra. Thank you all for submitting your finds.

Keep sending those pictures in to our submissions address. Just keep in mind that since we only post simulacra once a week it might take a little longer than normal for it to be posted.