As February draws to a close (disturbingly quickly), we’re bringing you some of the best creative news from around the world. Read on to see a video from an 8 year old who’s probably a better animator than you, a music video made entirely from stock footage (it’s better than it sounds) and mental health explored in amazing architectural animations.

8 year old girl animates stop-motion video showing the plight of polar bears

You know what’s really not easy? Stop-motion animation. And that’s why this video created by eight year old Megan Jones is so amazing. This moving animation was created for a homework assignment on animals and endangered species. It shows how polar bears are threatened by climate change. After impressing her teachers and classmates, the video went another step further when it was shared by Greenpeace on their Twitter feed!

Fair warning before you watch it: it might make you cry.

Read more on Cambridge News.

This music video is made entirely from stock footage!

Sevdaliza is a singer-songwriter who has become known for her conceptual and artistic music videos. Putting a music video together from stock footage sounds like a terrible idea when you first hear it, but what we didn’t mention is that she’s in the stock footage! She stood in as a model for Shutterstock and with the help of director Piet Langeveld, made these royalty-free clips into a full music video. The stock videos show her in a variety of roles including “Professional Woman Call Centre Operator” and “Glamorous Woman in Red Silk Night Garment”.

She did this to raise questions about identity; on her Twitter she writes: “You can purchase me performing your preferred daily routine on http://shutterstock.com.” She describes the activities in the stock videos to NPR, as “an extreme extraction of average life, representing a world where we have become so universal all feelings have disappeared.”

Artist Félix D’Eon is saying no to heteronormativity in art

Say what you want about classic illustration work – but it’s not always the most inclusive art. So artist Félix D’Eon decided to change that. He took the styles of classic illustration and replaced the straight characters with his own LGBTQ subjects. In an interview with Out, he explains his influences: “My work derives from many sources; children’s book illustration from the turn of the last century as well as the ’50s, Japanese Ukiyo-e painting and American golden-era comics are a few of the sources I mine for inspiration.” He also points out the thinking behind his work: “The feeling of seeing oneself reflected in art is very important; this is something which I think straight people might take for granted.”

Graphic designer creates colourful, abstract landscapes

Séverine Dietrich is a graphic designer based in Lyon, France. She’s created these gorgeous abstract acrylic paintings, drawing inspiration from natural landscapes like mountains. She tells Creative Boom a bit more: “On canvas as well as on silkscreen prints, my colour palette can be found in landscapes that oscillate between architectural concepts and visions of evolving scenery.”

Federico Babina finds a new way to explore mental health conditions



Mental health conditions like schizophrenia, anxiety and depression can be really difficult to explain in words. In this video, Barcelona digital artist Federico Babina tries a new approach. He takes a basic image of a house and alters it through animation and illustration to explore a range of different conditions. For example, anxiety is a house wrapped in chains, while the house showing insomnia contains a rapidly filling hourglass. The abstract, architectural animation is a really innovative and effective way of exploring these issues.

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