EXPRESSIVE HANDS

A street artist known as Asbestos has painted an awesome series focused on the hands of fellow street artists. He prefers to paint on discarded surfaces such as weathered wood and tin that he finds on the streets. These hands are so expressive. They touch my heart.

"The hands have been a revelation to paint. They're the tools that seperate us from the animals. They can create and they can destroy and that's why they're so fascinating to paint. Each pair has it's own grain that highlights the personality of the owner." - Asbestos

See the rest of the series here.

After discovering the art of Asbestos at Wooster Collective, beautiful hands seemed to pop up everywhere.

Nickie Owens has painted a hand series which you can see here.

"As a budding artist I was told by my Mum that one of the great painters (I can’t remember who) always struggled with hands and would have an understudy finish his work.
So began my obsession. I thought if I could draw / paint hands I would be great... I just became great at hands!"

The beautifully stitched and collaged hands of Karin Bartimole. You need to visit her blog, Beyond Words, and enlarge her amazing journal pages to see all the details.

SantaCruz-CuevaManos, Argentina. Photo from Wikipedia

Photographs of hands in cave paintings have fascinated me since I was a little girl. They were painted 9,300 to 13,000 years ago. The hand was held against the cave wall and paint was sprayed through a hollow bone pipe to colour the area around the hand.

This photograph was taken by Pim at the Wat Rong Khun temple in Thailand. Donations are thrown into the pot surrounded by grasping hands. You can see Pim's photostream at Flickr.

Etching by Vladimir Gazovic

Drawing Hands by M C Escher