Visting Daniel Goffin

Today we want to give you a look into the atelier of Daniel Goffin.
I had the chance to visit Daniel just before his takeoff to San Francisco and Los Angeles.












Daniel lives and works in Kassel, Germany. Born in the northern part of Germany he first studied architecture in Kiel while being fascinated in big cities, technology and its impact on humanity. Daniel studied Manga at Kyoto Seika University, Japan and graduated with a degree in Visual Communication (Illustration and Comic) at the University of Kassel, school of art and design. Still being a Master Student he invited me to his studio in the beautiful Atelier built by former architectural teacher and professor Paul Posenenske.

The work of Daniel focuses on the influence of technology on humanity and it’s immediate surroundings such as design, architecture, urbanization. The background stories are inspired by literature and scientific research on the so called “singularity” – a point in time where human and technological progress fuse into one. The presented characters are from various social backgrounds and all have different problems in their lives. His characters take design cues and citations from varied aspects of pop-culture: Haute-Couture fashion, cartoon character design of the 1930’s, Japanese animation and special effect TV-series.

“Forty years into the future amazing developments in nano-technology have finally given humanity the freedom to choose a body of their own design”.

To me it´s amazing to see the figures of Daniel as he mixes Names, Styles and prominent characteristics of comic-figures, pretaporter-designs and organic metarmorphoses to very outstanding personalities. The characters all have a story within their own world and the colors that Daniel uses are really awesome at all.

Please imagine that Daniel developed a whole serie of eatable handmade sugarlike pills that he describes as metamorphin. I´d really like to taste one but if you stay in the U.S. during his show you should get your hands on one of them!

Daniel already had exhibited in various galleries around the globe including the coming solo show at LA’s Toy Art Gallery from 28th of May till 12th of June this Year. If you´re in L.A. at this time you might really like to visit the show and see the beautiful artwork and maybe the master himself. Recently his work has also been featured and sold at Philips De Pury’s “NOW” Contemporary Art auction.

Daniel also runs a blog about handmade art toys called Reduced Figuration. You can visit the Homepage of Daniel at danielgoffin.com and follow him on twitter at twitter.com/danielgoffin

Thanks for inviting, Daniel, and the very best wishes for your show!

Spankystokes Contest followup

Do you remember the contest on SpankyStokes.com in March? Claudia NG and Daniel Yu both won with their Ideas to custom an UrbanHamster as "Rusty Robot" and a "Croshatch-Panda". Finally both customs are finished.

While the rusty robot was rather easy to do, the crosshatched Panda took some time. I was trying many pencils and ways to fix the paint on the white priming coat.

Secondly it was new to me to create even two characters to a toy which didn´t have eyes till now.

Both Hamsters will be sent to the winners in addition of one DIY-style figure. I hope Daniel and Claudia would also enjoy coloring their own customs which i can hopefully show you very soon.

Thanks go out to JeremyBrautman and John Stokes for supporting and managing the contest.









You can have a look at the original Contest in march 2010 at: http://www.spankystokes.com/2010/03/toy-architects-presents-resin-hamster.htmles.com/2010/03/toy-architects-presents-resin-hamster.html

and at the contest followup in May at:
http://www.spankystokes.com/2010/05/mathias-baxs-resin-hamster-contest.html

Please leave your comments on either my blog or spankystokes.com.









If you also want to try some Hamster-customs please have a look at: http://urbanhamster.bigcartel.com/ or contact me directly.

Custom by Rob Losito (smack6102) Part II

I was wondering how much potential sticks within a small figure. The more I´m wondering how much potential sticks in this gentle guy who says not to ba a customer but trying..



Hamster with light and wheels as we get in our second post about Rob looks great and idividual. Please keep in mind we´re posting these pictures as a sneak peak not as finished customs, to give you a look into the designer´s laboratory.



In late April Rob sent us some photos of the already colored HAMBOT. Rusty and metallic paintings have been added.

















I´m really appreciated by the emails and photos been sent already and I´m curious about what´s coming next.


If you also wanna give it a try with an Urban Hamster please contact us at www.urbanhamster.bigcartel.com.

Thank you for the photos Rob, hope to see some more soon :)