Franz Falckenhaus is an artist originally from Bartoszyce, Poland, but is currently based out of the city of Krakow. Falckenhaus is a self-taught artist, and it was his life-long interest in photography, film, and collage art that motivated him to pursue art as a career. Most of Falckenhaus' work is created digitally comprised of carefully selected vintage illustrations.

Charlie Anderson is an artist hailing from Edinburgh, UK who creates lively large-scale pieces that I want to commission to place in our EK headquarters even if it means to kill a man. Anderson's impressive work explores contemporary culture by sampling images from advertisements, political campaigns, and other mainstream sources, and recreates the aesthetic of the pieces being weathered and torn up through his creative process.

Émilie Léger is an artist and a graphic design student based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Although digital art and writing are her main means of creating, she prioritizes effect, texture and emotion over the medium itself.

Bryan Olson is a collage artist currently based out of North Carolina. Olson draws from Sci-Fi genre films and vintage photos, and meticulously hand-cuts everything that you see in his work.

This year for SXSW Empty Kingdom partnered with the awesome HOPE Campaign to deliver an amazing all day art event in Austin Texas.  Empty Kingdom was most honored to bring Dave Young, Derek Gores, Hugh Leeman, and Joel Daniel Phillips down to Austin to participate and put their various talents to work to make this wall shine.  If you didn't manage to get down there, don't fret y'all!  We've got photos!  And maybe we'll see you next time, in your city... On behalf of all of us at Empty Kingdom, we are incredibly thankful to both the artists as well as everyone who supported this effort, whether financially or by promoting the event via the various methods of social media and by word of mouth.

Kathryn Macnaughton makes her way back to EK since her last two features back in October 2012 and January 2011. On the glorious Tuesday, let's enjoy some of Macnaughton's collage and graphic design work over a cup of coffee and a splash (or two or three) of whiskey. Cheers.

The fourth and final artists that Empty Kingdom is proud to bring to SXSW ReCREATE:ATX will be Derek Gores.  The fantastic master of the collage will undoubtedly be putting something stunning and novel up on the walls in Austin Texas.  Derek understands that this is about community, encouraging anyone near the event to bring something for him to include, a bold offer from a man who knows what art is truly about.

Many moons ago while I was studying art in college, I was introduced to the collage works of Nadine Boughton, an artist originally hailing from Rochester, New York who creates photocollage pieces out of vintage men's adventure magazines. Boughton has exhibited her work in galleries all over the country, and is currently based out of Gloucester, Massachusetts where she teaches photography, collage, and creative writing.

Walking through Higuchi Yuko's world is like a fairytale full of wonder. With her pet kitten and her beautiful studio full of gizmos, it doesn't take much to realize the illustrator's inspiration. Take a look at her work and her tumblr, where she publishes amazing work and her cat consistently.

El Anatsui is a Ghanian sculptor who creates sumptuous textile installations. Using thousands of found objects, he sews together vibrant tapestries of scrap metal and bottle caps, creating fluidity out of shrapnel and tradition. Rather than rigidly controlling the construction and mounting of each piece, he prefers to let it drape naturally, ever-changing to reflect its new surroundings. Utterly magnificent.

[Photo by: Lauren Treece] The beginning is, in fact, finally here. After shifting through exactly 1470 posts for the entire 2012 calendar year, a dozen pots of coffee made, several holes punched in the drywall during heated deliberations, and several concussions suffered from office supplies hurled at each others' heads, we proudly present the third annual EMPTY KINGDOM TOP 100 Artists of 2012!

This is not your auntie's embroidery.

Lola is a strange one.

“Almost all art is about looking at death and trying to defy it somehow.” Artist Mark Mulroney creates highly detailed and intense mixed media illustrations, in where in some of his series, he draws from his traumatic Catholic upbringing and Playboy Magazine.

Collage artist Rafael Cronin scours through hundreds of magazines ranging from a variety of subjects in order to find images that "holds his attention long enough" to be used in his work. Cronin experiments with various combinations of images as he explores the theme of Man vs Nature.

Nicholas Lockyer is a collage artist who explores themes of death, spiritualism, primitivism, popular culture, and trash cinema in his works. Armed with a stock of vintage illustrations/prints, scissors, X-acto knives, glue, and some paint, Lockyer is just as content as a kid in a candy store.

Alexander Korzer-Robinson creates amazing book sculptures that take the traditional collage experience into another realm and deconstructs nostalgia while simultaneously creating nostalgia through introspection by using only the images found in each book.  Does that make sense? He explains it better in his statement.

Behold the glorious return of Philadelphia based illustrator Chris Murray! His creative work was first featured on July 8, 2012 and has come a long way not only in technique but in unadulterated imagination.

Matthew Cusick is an American artist we featured back in 2011, who creates vast, intricate pieces out of ordinary maps and washes of ink. Meticulous, careful and yet incredibly fluid, thunderous even, his latest pieces are something else.