Looking at it, Heaven of Delight looks like a beautiful painting, but in reality, it’s made out of one million six hundred thousand jewel-scarab wing cases.

In the 19th century, it was customary for the king of Belgium to give a space in the Royal Palace to contemporary artists. This tradition died with King Leopold II, in 1909. Fortunately, Queen Paola is an art enthusiast and decided to revive the custom by commissioning an artwork by artist Jan Fabre.

With the help of 29 young artists, Fabre created Heaven of Delight,  a fresco in the Hall of Mirrors, completely out of the glowing shells of jewel-scarabs. It contains various shapes that glow in a greenish-blue light, depending on the angle from which they are viewed.

Jewel-beetles are not a protected species so it was easy for Jan Favreau to gather them from countries like Thailand, where they are eaten as a delicacy, and use them for his Heaven of Delight. This masterpiece can be admired in the Royal Palace of Brussels

via Angelos

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British artist Paul Baker spent two months creating an edible map of Britain, made completely out of sweets.

Prior to the creation of the Sweet Map of Britain, a survey was conducted and 1,500 Brits from all around the British Isles named their favorite sweets. That’s when 49-year-old Paul Baker’s job began. He started working on a two square meters map of Britain with the representative sweets for each area.

For example, people in the South East prefer liquorice so the area was created mainly from liquorice, while Middlanders named jelly beans as their favorite sweets and the South-West and North-West opted for wine gums. In the end, the artist used 4,000 sweets for his delicious map.

It took 2 months to complete, twice as long as scheduled, because some of the boiled sweets started melting under the surprisingly hot sun. But now that the model is finished, Baker says it should keep for a few months, as long as it’s not kept in a hot room.

The sweet map of Britain comes complete with popular landmarks, such as The Angel of the North, Tower Bridge, Mount Snowdon, the Silverstone Race Track and even a representation of the Loch Ness Monster.

The artist hopes to donate his sweet map of Britain to a children’s hospital while it’s still edible.

via Daily Mail

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You won’t be able to drive it, but you can sure take a bite out of it.

One of the weirdest Formula 1 cars ever is on display at the Royal Plaza on Scotts, in Singapore and you can see it live until September 27. A Culinary Executive Chef led a team of 6 chefs, 2 artists, 2 technicians and 5 volunteers in an effort to create the largest bread Formula 1 car in Asia. They succeeded and the result is simply delicious.

The team from the Royal Plaza on Scotts used 15 kg of yeast, 14 liters of water, 2 kg of salt and 10800 ml of food varnish to create 1,000 loaves and 22 different kinds of bread. It took $15,000 and 549 hours of assembly work but I’m sure they’re all very proud of their achievement.

Be sure to check the making-of video at the bottom and for more photos just click here.

via Klik.tv

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Grooming a poodle is not easy, but these photos go to show you just how complex this craft can be.

Ren Netherland is the owner of animalphotography.com, an online pet photography studio and the man who tours the country to take photos of winners at grooming competitions all over the United States.

Personally I never considered grooming to be an art, but more like something that needs to be done, but Ren’s photos prove just how wrong I was. And to think groomers complete these living masterpieces in just two hours, amazing!

via Telegraph.co.uk

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These incredible artworks belong to Scott Wade, a man who once again proves anything can be a diamond in the rough, even a dirty car window.

Scott Wade is a talented is a talented graphic designer, from Wimberley, Texas, who loves to get his hands dirty. He paints all kinds of pictures in the back of his and his wife’s car, using only his fingers, dust and a few brushes. From the Mona Lisa to the portrait of Albert Einstein, Wade has created a series of artworks that have often stopped traffic.

He says people often gather around their cars when they go out, just to admire the beauty and detail of his art. Some get out of their vehicles at a red light and take pictures of his car.

Mr. Wade doesn’t drive his cars on a dirt track to get it dirty enough. Instead he uses oil, a special kind of dirt and a hair dryer to spread it across the windows. This takes him about 10 minutes, instead of seven days of driving through the dirt.

Working with dust means his masterpieces are destroyed whenever it rains, but Scott Wade views that as an opportunity to create even more impressive artworks. You have to admit it’s a lot more impressive than writing “wash me” on a car window.

Go to Scott Wade’s official site to check out more photos of his dirty art.

via Daily Mail

Built by artist Alexa Andromeda, the Unlimited Drive motorcycle represents the thousands of giga-byte of hard-drive “to be driven on the Internet data highway”.

Did I mention this 18-inches-long masterpiece was built only with parts from old computers? The thick, shiny wheels are magnetic discs found in hard-disks. Unlimited Drive looks even more impressive when you learn it was built way back in 1995.

Samsam Bubbleman has been making bubbles since 1989, when he first saw a balloon float past him, and now he’s breaking the record for the World’s Largest Free-Floating Soap Bubble.

I didn’t even know such a term  existed, but Samsam (real name Sam Heath) is a bubbleologist. You can say Sam does what he likes for a living since he owns a company that sells bubble mixtures, equipment and throws shows for some of the biggest celebrities. But making bubbles is more than a business for this bubble master, it’s truly a passion.

Sometimes called the “Willy Wonka of Bubbles”, Samsam has just attempted to set a new record for the world’s largest bubble, using a secret mixture he has been developing for 20 years. If the record will be acknowledged by Guinness, this will be his third world record. He has previously won the award for putting 50 people inside one of his balloons and putting the most balloons inside another balloon, 65.

Samsam Bubbleman says his secret is in the mixture, if the mixture is good than the tools don’t matter very much.

Photos by BARCROFT MEDIA

via Telegraph.co.uk

Rising proudly from the crop fields between Chester and Nantwich, Straw Ben is a straw replica of the famous Big-Ben, in London.

An ice-cream company from Britain thought of an original way to celebrate Big-Ben‘s 150th anniversary and came up with a very original idea. Using a steel frame and 500 bales of hay, they created a 70ft-tall replica of the famous clock-tower, almost a quarter the size of the real thing.

Nicknamed “Straw-Ben“, this straw masterpiece is surrounded by a fence and even has an alarm to discourage anyone who would try to climb it. Chris Sadler, the ice-cream company’s director, says these safety precautions were necessary, since the sculpture was very expensive.

This is just one of the straw works-of art created by this British ice-cream company and you can see some of their other creations in the photos below:

via Daily Mail

Well, I think the name Mocha Lisa fits it best, and it wasn’t exactly painted in coffee, but recreated from thousands of coffee cups.

Mocha Lisa was created during The Rocks Aroma Festival, in Sydney, Australia and attracted the curious eyes of 130,000 people in just one day. This incredible coffee masterpiece took 8 people three hours to complete as well as 3,604 cups of coffee and 564 pints of milk.

The 20ft by 13ft replica of Leonardo da Vinci’s La Gioconda was created by adding various amounts of milk to the cups of coffee. I have to say the sepia effect achieved is simply incredible.

There’s a making-of video at the bottom, if you’re interested.

Photos by Alison Lyons/Solent

via Daily Mail

Mario and Luigi are, without a doubt, some of the most popular video-game characters in history and some people do the most outrageous things to prove their love for them

This dude, for example, got the Super Mario Brothers tattooed on the soles of his feet. I can’t even imagine how much this hurt and, even though the tattoo artist did a terrific job, I seriously doubt these tattoos are going to last a lifetime.

Photos by SimonMarcus

via Pure Nintendo

With the world going crazy over the Transformers and the Gundam statue of Tokyo, people have forgotten all about nice old Thomas the Tank. But someone found a way to make him popular again by turning him into some sort of Transformer train.

This weird little toy has been auctioned on eBay by a person from Singapore, for a price of S$10. That’s 10 Singapore dollars, which translates to around 6 dollars US. The package is made up of three different color Thomas trains that come together to form the ultimate Trainsformer.

via Like Cool

Taken at the beginning of the 20th century, by English photographer Arthur S. Mole and his American colleague John D. Thomas, these living photographs show thousands of American soldiers posing as symbols of American history.

I’ve seen a few of these living photos on the internet before, but it’s nice to finally find some real info about them, like what they represent and how many people were needed to create them.

via Telegraph.co.uk

The Living Uncle Sam: 19,000 officers and men at Camp Lee, Virginia, January 13, 1919

The Human US Shield: 30,000 officers and men at Camp Custer, Battle Creek, Michigan, 1918

The living emblem of the United States Marines, formed by 100 officers and 9,000 enlisted men at the Marine Barracks, Paris Island, South Carolina

A portrait of President Woodrow Wilson, formed of 21,000 officers and men at Camp Sherman, Chillicothe, Ohio, 1918

The Human Liberty Bell, formed by 25,000 officers and men at Camp Dix, New Jersey, 1918

The Human American Eagle: 12,500 officers, nurses and men at Camp Gordon, Atlanta, Georgia, 1918

Living insignia of the 27th Division, New York’s Own, breakers of the Hindenberg Line. Formed of 10,000 officers and enlisted men, March 18, 1919

In the picture of the Statue of Liberty there are 18,000 men: 12,000 of them in the torch alone, but just 17 at the base. The men at the top of the picture are actually half a mile away from the men at the bottom

Have you ever fantasized about making-out with an animal? You have?!? That’s just twisted…

Although zoophilia and bestiality are taboo subjects in our modern society, artist Saiman Chow tackles these delicate issues in his latest artworks. It’s not my thing, but maybe someone out there appreciates this more.

via Trend Hunter

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What looks like the world’s biggest videotape collection, is actually an artistic display presented at this year’s Venice Biennale of Contemporary Art.

Entitled Life Span and displayed in a small church on Garibaldi Street, this giant block full of VHS videotapes is the work of Australian artists Claire Healey and Sean Cordeiro. In numbers 195,774 tapes and features a total recording time of 66 years.

Life Span is a physical representation of what a human being can see from its birth, to the day it dies.

via Drugoi

If you thought you were going to see a hand-sown flag, then I’m going to have to disappoint you, but this is something way cooler.

The “left behind children” of migrant workers  went to work in China’s larger cities or abroad, together with volunteers from the University of Science and Technology, have made a 60-square-meters flag of China, using their hand imprints. The artwork was unveiled at Lintou middle-school, Hashan county, on July 21, 2009.

This is was their way of celebrating the 60th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China.

via China.org