Toothpicks and Matchsticks Sculpture by Jay Wilson

Artist and full-time professor Jay Wilson uses toothpicks and matches to create these beautiful works.



"The work is complex in arrangement and involves simultaneous contrast and communication between cultural references, composition, scope and tempo of process. It is complexity and the lack of hierarchy that is the work’s thrust and provokes questions as opposed to declaring answers, definitive statements or central themes. By juxtaposing sculpture and imagery that is at once familiar and strange, the work moves from unconscious to conscious and in doing so, provides clarity and compositional resolve."

















Check his website: http://www.jaywilsonart.com/

Matchstick Sculptures by Pei-San Ng

Chicago-based architectural designer and multimedia artist Pei-San Ng created these matchsticks sculptures.



This love sculpture hand drawn and spelled out in vintage type entitled 'Passion' is made up of about 2,500 matchsticks and taking a total of 24 hours to complete.

"I love making models out of sticks. With limited resources, Nathan (her husband) suggested using matches instead of balsa. Thus began my matches series. With every piece finished, came an urge to burn it."

“I like to design with modules. In the past I have created installations using dozens of identical Ikea lamps or Mason jars. These modules end up resembling pixels that form icons or symbols.”

"Love on fire represents romance and passion or destruction and jealousy. It is raw and gritty."



This burning sneakers were made and then burned in honor of a deceased friend.

"In Chinese culture, we burn paper money so the spirit can take these notes with them to the afterlife. These papers are called joss paper. In contemporary culture, they have included paper cell phone, paper credit cards and paper boats. I made a pair of sneakers for Chris to take with. He loves his sneakers and he always have the perfect pair to go with his outfit. He was fashionable. These sneakers were in his Tribute show entitled “Tapedek: The Afters Cool Show” at CAD on April 9th, 2010. One of the pair was burned at the end of the show with a gathering of his friends."



She creates lace work patterns on the wings and body of this half-burned phoenix entitled 'Out of the Ashes'.

"The less density of the matches, the quicker I produce the piece."

"It's a mythical creature born out of fire, out of complete destruction. It's also said that the phoenix is the female equivalent of the Chinese mythical creature of the dragon, symbolizing ultimate power and strength. This piece, made of matches, reminds us that we all have the potential to rise out of the low, the ashes and be reborn or to re-invent ourselves to be purposeful and determined."



"When you look at these pieces you realize that – if you light the matches then you change the work if not burn it completely, there is a tension there, you get a moment of satisfaction and then you have nothing – I like that tease.”



“In Chinese culture red is a very lucky color, matches evoke danger. I think that by mixing those two messages the audience is forced to take a second or third look. I want to tempt the viewer to destroy my artwork.”

Check her website: http://peisanng.com/

The Manhattan Project by Noah Scalin

American artist Noah Scalin created these unique series of portraits of scientists who worked on the creation of the first atomic weapons, titled 'The Manhattan Project'. Each image is meticulously made of 1,000 matches and then burned.



"The resulting burned after images are reminiscent of the permanent nuclear shadows of the victims of the atomic bombing in Hiroshima. Also included are silhouettes of Fatman and LittleBoy, the first two atomic bombs, which were dropped on Japan."











Check his website: http://www.noahscalin.com/

Images from here

Matchstick Church Models by Wieslaw Łaszkiewicz

Polish folk artist Wieslaw Laszkeiwick created beautiful replicas of churches around the world using hundreds of thousands of matches, pieces of cardboard and microscopic slides.



This replica of the 17th century monument, the Church of St. Nicholas in Zamosc stood almost 5 feet tall, using almost half a million matchsticks bound on to matching paper, and was intended to be a gift to Pope Benedict XVI. He covered the completed sculpture with several coats of varnish and special glue.



He also mounted a bulb inside to illuminate the stained glass windows, made from hundreds of pieces of glass. It took him a year to complete the project.



“Not all the matches are suitable, it depends on the manufacturer. Some of them cannot be polished, some cannot be formed. You have to know which one to use for forming, which one to use to be polished, which one can be carved – this kind of match has to be soft, has to be from a different kind of wood. Different wood structures meet in matches; you need to know how to sort them. Because if you don’t know your matches, you can use one wrong match and then not be able to polish the whole structure because one match is wrong.”





Source: odditycentral

Matchstick Rila Monastery by Plamen Ignatov

Bulgarian artist Plamen Ignatov has created a detailed matchstick model of the Rila Monastery - the largest Eastern Orthodox monastery in Bulgaria - using 6 million matchsticks.

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It took him 16 years to complete the project.

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The face of Christ resides in in one of the miniature wooden walls.

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The real Rila Monastery

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Matchstick Art by David Mach

Scottish sculptor and installation artist David Mach creates detailed models of animals, symbols or historical figures using tens of thousands of matchsticks.

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Check his website: http://www.davidmach.com/

All images are © Copyright of David Mach.

Impressive Matchstick Insects of Kyle Bean

Artist Kyle Bean once again amazed me with his artworks.

Check out his project “Stick Insects”, features a series of insect models created entirely out of matchsticks.











More here :)

Amazing Replicas Made of Matchsticks

Artist: Patrick Acton

Patrick Acton took three years to make this awesome “Minas Tirith. City of kings.” He putting this together, using 24,000 small wooden blocks to form Mount Mindolluin, and to comprise the White City itself, about 420,000 matchsticks.

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A series of larger photographs of the model may be found here.

He also made a replica of Hogwart’s School of Witchcraft and Wizardry from J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series — upon which this design, for the film series, was based.

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It has been sold to an attraction in Spain called “The HOUSE OF KATMANDU”. By the time the final building (the Clock Tower buidling) was finished it had taken Acton nearly three years to build, and it contains over a 602,000 matchsticks held together with 15 gallons of carpenter’s wood glue. .

Artist: Michael Williams

Michael Williams spent 10 years designing and building a famous London landmark out of matchsticks.

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He crafted the model out of 1.6 million matchsticks.

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The replica has two household bulbs lighting up the two towers and an illuminated 52 gun galleon underneath. It is lit up with long-life LED bulbs which last for 100,000 hours.

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Artist: David Reynolds

David Reynolds spent more than 10,000 hours gluing over 250,000 matches to form hundreds of his matchstick ships model.

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He has created 20 legendary vessels such as Titanic, Queen Mary, HMS Victory etc

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One of his work, a model of a North Sea oil platform was officially recognised by Guinness World Records as the world's biggest matchstick model.

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It is made up of more than four million matches, weighs half a ton and took 15 years to build.

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He invested £5,000 on glue and matchsticks for this project @__@!!

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The model was so massive that it could not be assembled in one piece at Reynold's home. It had to be split into 14 different sections and finally assembled into one piece at the Bursledon Brickworks Museum in Southampton