Ready...Proof...Go!

The project i've been working on is coming along! It should all be printed by the very beginning of the year 09 by the very helpful people from Generation Press. I'll post some pictures as soon as possible. (looking forward to seeing it all done!)

Illustration

I'm liking Marc John's work.

Messiaen Festival

A.MA.ZING.
Ensemble Intercontemporain: Messiaen Centenary Concert

Knoc knoc...

I know, long time, long time...
I've been fairly busy lately. I will post some pictures of the things i've been working on for the last weeks (months?) very soon.
Hopefully the flow of new posts should return to normal now!

Tube

Untitled from mudlevel on Vimeo.

Triple bill

Yesterday was another busy night.
-
First, it was the opening of Barbican's new (triple) exhibition around the notion of conflict and its visual representation. The ground floor is dedicated to "
On the Subject of War ", a collection of thoughts around the idea of war in Iraq and Afghanistan and its visualisation.

I have to say i got really impressed by Omer Fast’s "The Casting" (2007) piece. Between fiction and documentary, video and photography, "The casting" asks disturbing questions about images, reality and narration.

The upper floor is dedicated to Robert Capa and Gerda Taro works. Amazing pictures, amazing stories. (very interesting to see some of the picture as they were taken, and then how they were edited for magazines/newspapers).
Overall the set design, and particularly the font design, give the exhibition an appropriate look and feel, while still being consistant with the Barbican's identity. Good job.

-

For the second part of the evening, we headed to Hoxton Square for the opening of Yvon Lambert's new gallery. After Paris and New-York, it's in London that the talented people from Yvon Lambert decided to settle down. A very cool new space for art in the neighbourhood. The first to inaugurate it is mexican artist Carlos Amorales. Make sure you see his sculpture of a shattered bird at the first floor of the gallery. Impressive.

Art Orgy

Yesterday was the opening of the famous Frieze Art Fair.
I feel like i've flicked through a 5000 pages giant art book at once. Some quality art pieces though.

Mad fonts

Interesting post about fonts used throughout Abc serie Mad Men.

Aussies

Yesterday evening was Pivot's gig at the 100 club on Oxford street. Very good gig indeed, intimist venue, and apart from some bass amp issues, the sound was generally good.
Although Pivot was brilliant, i got really impressed by Snowman's performance. Energetic, dark with a punkish taste. Nice.
Snowman - We Are The Plague

3 in 1

Monday evening was the private view of the Warhol exhibition at the Hayward gallery. But it was really a 3 in 1 as you could also see Robin Rhode's work at the 1sr floor and Cyprien Gaillard's works at the Project Space.
One must admit that the set design throughout the Warhol's area is fantastic. Very nice materials, nice use of the space. Although, you do want to allow yourself a reasonable amount of time to see everything: there are loads of videos (Warhol tv is a must see), sound recordings etc... The exhibition lasts until the 18th January. Link here.
At the 1st floor, Robin Rhode displays different kind of work: photography, installations, videos...Personally, i'm not very found of Robin Rhode's work. I do think it is a little bit "dry" and that the poetical feel doesn't make it up for the the lack of depth.
Finally, Cyprien Gaillard's work is located in the Project Space (small exhibition space at the very entrance) of the Hayward gallery. Also, one of the piece is located in the basement of the Gallery. Interesting approach, interesting work.
The later artist will be competing with 8 other young artists for the Prix fondation d'entreprise Ricard on thursday 9th October. Amongst them, my parisian artist friend Julien Discrit will be running for this. Fingers crossed Julien! Make sure to check his work here.

White nights

I really like this year's identity of french festival Nuits Blanches,
designed by atelier trois.

Tut

A very clever tutorial for all of you who want to learn
all the ropes of the Pen tool in Illustrator.

Chou-chou

Salt me up

What to (re)start with? hmmm.
This for example (i LOVE this. Proper magic):

Via Make.

BACK!

I know, i know, i've been bad. I've been properly rubbish with keeping up with my posts since last summer. Mostly because i've been a busy bee. But it's now over and i'm ready to be all post-crazy again and yes,i promise i won't do it again mum!

Pivot

New Warp records gem.
Nice name, nice artwork cover, nice music, nice video (: a low-fi mix between Jaws and Thunderbird. Nice!)
-
“Creeping along like a John Carpenter soundtrack re-imagined by Battles, this is the place where intricate and party collide.” NME
-
Launch of the new album tonight at the Roundhouse London.
Website here.

Street and Studio

If you havn't seen the Tate modern exhibition "Street and Studio" you should hurry up as it ends at the end of the month and as it is one that shouldn't be missed. I can't really start making a list of all the work i liked as there are too many, but the exhibtion is well thought, consistent and trully inspirational.

The very last piece, "The Buzz club" by Rineke Dijkstra is absolutely stunning and made me chuckle. Something blatantly true about it. Great stuff.
Info here.

Jump

Denis Darzacq work is surreal.

Morpho Tower

Seriously cool.

Turzi

TURZI - Afghanistan
by RECORDMAKERS

Red light

Rant
*************

Who do you have to "know" to get one of these in this town these days?
-
DAMN YOU DIGITAL ERA! (with my clenched fist raised to the sky)

*************
rant's over.

Z-Z Top!

Yesterday was the beginning of Rough Trade In-store gig series (indulgently sponsored by Converse ;). The first to open this session were the talented people from Zombie Zombie:
"They a two piece French duo that produce krautrock infused electronic nu-disco with a nod to John Carpenter & 60's psychedelics. Vocals come in the form of atmospheric murmurs & screams, processed & heavily drenched with reverb while the drums propel a motorik groove reminiscent of Can, the sound is filled out nicely with the bustle of arpeggiated synths fighting alongside guitars, bass & samples, imagine a less sensitive M83 with 70's horror obsession & you are someway to imagining just how great Zombie Zombie are."
And great it was indeed. I'm containing myself not to run to the nearest store to spend a tenner on their album. You should. (then i can borrow it :)

Fashion V Sport

Yesterday evening was the opening of the new V&A exhibition Fashion V Sport.
Arranged in four small sections the exhibition "explores the creative connections between the two worlds of fashion and sport. Recent developments have seen an increasing number of collaborations and hybrids, from fashion designers producing collections with sportswear brands to sports personalities heading fashion campaigns or even designing their own collections. Fashion V Sport will reveal the complexities and tensions between the two industries."
Maybe it is because i'm not crazy enough about fashion experiments but i found the whole thing a little bit "light" and not that catchy. I do understand the point of it but for me it lacks a bit of interest. (again i'm rarely moved but fashion extravaganza)
The set itself on the other hand was fantastic. Very simple but the attention to details was impressive. Would have been worth seeing another room or two. The overall feeling was a small exhibition with a small content. (Luckily the food/drinks were good :p)

Galleries

This week end i went to a couple of galleries that i could only recommend.
-

The first one was Museum 52 on Redchurch street.
Esther Stocker has a very strong installation there:
"Esther Stocker's installations and associated paintings are abstract compositions in space; drawings animated in three dimensions by material, colour and form. For this exhibition she has created a site-specific installation and a series of painted works, all continuing her investigations into the logics and rules inherent in depictions of space."
-
The second one was Flower's East Domestic Appliance exhibition.
A great selection of work articulated around usual domestic objects. Genuinely , the whole exhibition is fantastic. Personally, i loved Antoine Zgraggen destruction parlour (cf pic) where you get to choose an object and destroy it :), Theo Kaccoufa's pieces (the "Dream River" bed is simply spooky but fascinating) and Max Dean (+ others) "Robotic Chair" was at the time funny and worrying. (cf. video)
The exhibition just started and will be on until the 13th September so if you are in the area, do see this.

Biiiicyle biiicyle

Odd.

Street

Ahah. Love this.

Fosso

"Samuel Fosso is one of Africa's most eminent photographers. [...] Fosso started taking self-portraits using up exposures on his films - to send to his mother in Nigeria, whom he had left behind as a refugee fleeing the Biafran war in the late 1960s. Although his initial aim was to show he was alive and well, his interest in exploring the genre grew steadily, and he experimented with new techniques and poses. [...] His local community remains unaware of Fosso's success, a situation Fosso is keen to maintain. He is happy to keep his costumes out of sight and continue his passport and portrait photography business. His neighbours assume he travels to Europe to take wedding photos."
Via Conscientious.

Szabo

I'm liking Joseph Szabo photography.

Loop

InDesign/File/Print

Printing a Book, Old School from Armin Vit on Vimeo.

Technlogic

Link.

Monsieur Crabtree

Maybe one of the most exciting portfolio (and cv!) i've seen so far.
Top notch work!

Via FormFiftyFive.

Johan Prag

Johan Prag's got some cool work here.

Denny Backhaus

Some nice stuff here.

Darth

Wish i was in Paris right now to see this:
(and the other pieces from the very exciting Superdome
exhibition at Palais de Tokyo.)

J&M

Some new stuff over at Jawa and Midwich since last time i checked. Nice work.

Hawaii

Don't know how recent is this but some new work has
been updated at Hawaii Design since i last checked.
As usual, top notch.

lights

Daniel Firman's work is worth taking a peek at.

oz

Aussie Design studio 3deep Design is doing some nice stuff.

Abi

Abi Huynh has some lovely work.

Mabuse

Last thursday was the premiere of Bock & Vincenzi's performance "The infinte pleasure of the great unknown" introducing Troupe Mabuse at Toynbee Studios (Arts Admin).
"THE INFINITE PLEASURES OF THE GREAT UNKNOWN is a stage show presented within the form of a film. Behind a black cinema screen Troupe Mabuse play a cast of thousands, in a never-ending state of emergency; a storm in which the fear of the unknown conceals its own controlling force. Into this play of possession, King Lear also appears. Having missed his cue to die he wanders eternally in a landscape of his own making, searching for meaning within a scrambled version of Shakespeare’s original storm scene."

The performance is well thought and the attention to details in order to create such a peculiar Lynch-esque atmosphere was brilliant. Maybe a little long if you ask me but the experment was definitely worth it.

Link Here.

SDL

Nice notebook design by SDL - Stockholm Design Lab -

URTD

I'm liking the work of slovak designer Ondrej Job.
Link here.

Kiwi

Some nice piece of design at kiwi studio InHouse design.
Link Here.

Opt

While i was in Paris, i took the opportunity to go and see Bridget Riley's retrospective show at the Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris.
As i'm usually pretty keen on the Opt art aesthetics, i got absolutely amazed by Riley's work that i only knew in surface. The show presents her work in a chronological order and following each step of her art through various explanations about her choices is a real bliss. Even though my favorite bit would be the early black and white period, the entire path through her graphic and intelectual research is remarkable.

Link here.

Back

Finally back in town after a short break in Paris.
Some catching up to do blog wise.
Here we go.
-

The night before i left for France, i went to see an amazing show
at the Sadler's Well.The performance was Akram Kahn's latest
show in collaboration with the National Ballet of china called Bahok.

Here's the pitch:
"Bahok, named after a Bengali word meaning ‘carrier’ explores the ways
in which the body carries national identity and a sense of belonging.
Khan’s dancers come from diverse cultures, traditions and dance backgrounds –
Chinese, Korean, Indian, South-African and Spanish – and this rich mix of both
spoken and dance language pushes the boundaries of movement vocabulary."

As usual, Khan managed to create an incredibly intimist and moving performance
filled with a mixture of humour, poetry and philosophy. A must see.

Synth Eastwood

Here's my submission for Synth Eastwood exhibition on friday 13th June!
The theme is Flags and anthems. You can't really see it on a saved for
web lowres jpg but basically the poster (A2) is made of 126 anthems.
A globalised flag in a way :)
Check the event details here.

Boom Chack!

Very cool installation by David Byrne in NYC (liking the website design too).
Here's the pitch: " Playing the building is a sound installation in which the infrastructure, the physical plant of the building, is converted into a giant musical instrument. Devices are attached to the building structure — to the metal beams and pillars, the heating pipes, the water pipes — and are used to make these things produce sound. The activations are of three types: wind, vibration, striking. The devices do not produce sound themselves, but they cause the building elements to vibrate, resonate and oscillate so that the building itself becomes a very large musical instrument."

Via today and tomorrow.

CellarDoor

This week end i went to the Institute for Contemporary Arts to see
Loris Greaud's installation. Really nice piece, some weird dark vibes coming out of these Kubrick-esque rooms but a really interesting concept (quite hard to sum-up though so here's an excerpt form the ICA website) :
"Gréaud's installation at the ICA, with its three almost identical rooms, reveals another of the artist's key preoccupations - the notion of doubling and repetition. The repeating elements within the rooms include: high-speed automatic doors which open like shutters; special light-emitting speakers designed by the artist; and a carpet with a pattern derived in part in part from architect Buckminster Fuller's experiments with the geodesic dome. Finally, Greaud's installation at the ICA will be subject to a number of periodic interruptions, one of which is the arrival of three identical figures serving black champagne."
At the ICA, until the 22nd June, info here.

New Work

Veeery nice design for this large format newspaper publication.
Have a look at New Work here.

Via FormFiftyFive.

Gigs

Late double post, the talented Battles were on stage last wed
in London and it was one good gig! http://www.bttls.com/



Also, another recent gig i went too, the southern frenchies
from Marvin (instrumental rock trio) are worth listening to
(especially if you're into the whole math rock thingy).
Very impressed by the performance.
They definitely rock. website or myspace

Scottish Touch

Some nice piece of work by the Edinburgh based Touch design studio.

Julian Red

I don't post a lot of web design stuff usually but i really like this one:
beautiful design, clever navigation and it's always nice to stumble upon a
website without a "big-logo-at-the-top-left-corner" architecture. Nice.

Zhong Guo

Last week end i went to see V&A's exhibition "China Design Now".
Loads of good stuff in it and very well thought exhibition space.
Amongst all the good works displayed (the first Shenzen room is
filled with breath taking posters) i really liked the atmospherical
and sometimes funny photographs by chinese photographer Maleon.
Check his website here.
Info about the exhibition here.

1968-2008

Yesterday was the opening of a little exhibition at the 1st floor
of the Hayward Gallery called "May 68: Street Posters from the Paris Rebellion".
Very interesting to see the original versions of these well-known posters.
It is free and it's definitely worth checking out. Info here, gallery here.

Grain

Grain Edit's Flickr set is filled with graphic goodness.