We're not 100% sure which part of the typewriter artist Gabriel Dishaw used to give his "Pgymy C3P0" bust those golden head spikes, or what kind of Nikes he used for "Air Vader's" helmet, but we do know his series is much more interesting fan art than another creepy piece of Boba Fett fan fiction. In addition to "Air Vader" and "Pygmy C3P0," the series is rounded out by "Samurai Vader," a black-clad two-part bust complete with metal horns. [images courtesy of the Gabriel Dishaw, via Designboom]
For those of us with mild resurgence of Star Wars obsession, finding out that something as typically ephemeral as a movie set for Luke Skywalker's adventures on Tatooine still exists elicits a mix of nostalgia, wonder and excitement. Visual artist and filmmaker Rä di Martino set out to shoot old film sets in North Africa and eventually found her way by word-of-mouth to the mother of all desert film sets, a miraculously well-kept Skywalker Ranch as well as two other Tatooine sets from the original Star Wars film. Oddly enough, fans who saw her photos a few years back were concerned about the distressed state of Luke's "boyhood home" itself and eventually raised money to refurbish it and mark it for tourists fans.
di Martino writes us she was exploring the sets not as a documentarian, but rather as an artist exploring our dreamscapes. "These photo series are part of a research on abandoned movie sets in North Africa (which also ended up in a video), but is not reportage. I just liked the poetic potential of those ruins—being ruins of something that is our future in our imagination."
Photos by Ra di Martino. Follow her on Tumblr.
Restoration photo by Mark Dermul / savelars.com
In January of 1978, just a few months after the world experienced the first chapter in the Star Wars franchise on the big screen, a factory in Cincinnati, Ohio was hard at work producing the first line of Star Wars action figures. Kenner Products, famous for introducing Play-Doh, the Easy-Bake Oven, and many familiar childhood toys, produced official Star Wars toys for over 20 years until the brand was dissolved by its parent company Hasbro in 2000. Flickr user and Star Wars toy historian Darth Ray recently unearthed these photos from the original Kenner factory, including shots of the production line, a board showing employees how to assemble the Millennium Falcon, and some early promo photos featuring incredibly psyched little kids.
We're bonkers for the "He Wears It" series from Hong Kong-based designer/illustrator John Woo (not the director of Face/Off, or so he says). We just got word that Woo has released a new batch ("He Wears It 3") of his acrylic paintings of characters from Star Wars, Superman, Rambo and others sporting the most bloggable menswear. The new series includes a Clone Shock Trooper in Watanabe, Edward Scissorhands in Band of Outsiders and Superman in D&G. Better yet, he sells prints in his wooszoo Etsy shop, so we can proudly display our Woo wares at home.