20110530

Collarbones

Even being apart over miles the duo from Collarbones, Travis and Marcus, have managed to collaborate and produce cohesive and polished electro-pop music together. Their LP  Iconography is available here

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Travis Cook (Cyst Impaled) and Marcus Whale (Scissor Lock) formed Collarbones over the internet in late 2007, and within a few short weeks they had committed to a long-term music-making relationship. Since then they've divided time between Adelaide, Sydney and Melbourne, playing shows with the likes of Samiyam, making mix tapes, covering Justin Bieber with great fondness and releasing the Pitchfork adored single 'Beaman Park' in 2010.
Marcus Whale and Travis Cook shared files until instrumentals were at a point where Whale could lay down elegant RnB laden hooks over the chopped samples and digital soundscapes. The album is an assured debut, full of confidence and brimming with ideas that pull in diverse influences from the experimental to the mainstream.


20110518

Erika Janunger


The work of Erika Janunger spans the fields of architecture, interior design and music, however her latest piece Weightless adds filmmaking into the mix to create a hypnotic film that itself defies categorisation, and has spawned a bookcase that is currently produced by Carl Malmsten. Erika joins us to discuss how space, movement and music can be combine to create and explore the worlds we inhabit.


"There is so much to love and to be fascinated by in this world. How things move and sound and behave. But mostly I can't stop thinking about how we behave when we take in the world around us, how we move in it, how we react to it and how we interpret everything we experience. "


"I have a mastersdegree in fine arts, or interior architecture, to be exact. I also love to work with music, and to combine the two, the ear and the eye, is the most magical thing I know."

In bedroom Malin Stattin, In livingroom Tuva Lundkvist, Directed byErika Janunger, Scenography Erika Janunger, Photography and lightDavid Grehn, Costume Johanna Adebäck, Hair and Makeup Klara Janunger, Editing Josefine Truedsson, Postproduction Gustaf Holmsten, Music/ Lyrics/Vocals Erika Janunger, PercussionPontus Langendorf, Keyharp Erik Rydvall, Saxophones Nis Bäckvall, Produced by Henrik Svensson

Hellen van Meene







Dutch photographer Hellen van Meene was herself barely out of girlhood when she began to photograph adolescent girls whom she knew, or found, in her home town of Alkmaar in the north of Holland. Invited to photograph in Japan in 2000, she found that while she could not communicate directly with her subjects, her instincts regarding the universality of adolescent experience, and her visual and stylistic approach to it, were translatable. In her square-format, medium-focal-length pictures of unnamed girls, van Meene strives to compose "photographs of adolescent situations and attitudes, which represent the type of 'normality' we don't usually share with others, but keep to ourselves."


"Actually it's the classical story. When I turned fifteen my mother gave me a small camera and immediately I started to photograph my friends. At eighteen I went to the Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam and from my new 'hobby' it followed naturally that I chose the photography department. The advantage of photography is that you achieve your goal much faster, that you have instant result. This fast way of working suits me. I don't have the patience for painting; it takes too long and it is too complicated for me. What I liked at the Academy was the sincerity with which the teachers encouraged you to develop ideas and follow your own track. Their emphasis lay not so much on directing, but much more on supervising the process. They stressed the importance of content and not so much of technique. You had to justify yourself continually, but you had the freedom to do your own thing and there was enough space to experiment.

The central theme in my work is photographing girls who are at the point of budding into maturity. Girls who are in that stage of their lives in which they become a woman. This theme actually came about quite spontaneously and almost intuitively. It stays close to myself. I can relate to them, I understand them better, I see in them what I once was. Their attitude is still open; they are not really committed yet, they are still playful and open-minded, they still have this touching susceptibility, they are still themselves.
The photographs are not meant to be portraits, which is why they have no titles. It is not my intention to give expression to their personality or state of mind. Nor do I want to sketch a sociological image of contemporary youth or girls at the moment of puberty. I look for a certain mood in the pictures, in which the girls almost figure as actors. As a matter of fact I treat my models as objects which you can direct and guide. They are simply material for me.
I am mainly concerned with things such as the lightfall on a white skin, bruises on an arm, hands which disfigure in water, and starting goose-pimples in frosty weather. Only then you see the texture of the skin so beautifully. It is exciting to see what happens when you put a leg over a horizontal bar or when you hang a person's hair in a bush. Besides this I pay a lot of attention to the right position, to the mise-en-scene, to matching clothes as well as their colour, to the gaze and posture of the model. I arrange everything, to the smallest detail, such as the nail polish on their fingers.
It is not that I work from a clearly defined idea, to which I will stick exactly. Of course I have something in mind, but the execution of it can go either way. Often it is something I happen to see, which I then translate into my own image and which I transform into my own world. While photographing, chance plays an important role, because all kind of things happen that cannot be foreseen. Things just come about and do not always let themselves be directed.
Usually I work with a regular group of models from my neighbourhood. I have, as it were, my own model agency. Because I know them, I know exactly which girl matches the situation. They know me and that is why I don't really have to explain or excuse myself anymore. They vary from a Korean girl to a blushing red head. The advantage is that you know each other and that they can be called up immediately. I am far too impatient to spend a lot of time looking for the right model. I must be able to react at once.
In 2000 I left these familiar surroundings, when I was invited by the Japan Foundation to contribute to the Japanese pavilion at the Architectural Biennial in Venice. In the line of the central theme 'City of Girls', they asked me to take photographs of Japanese girls. Amongst others I went to Tokyo, Atami, Osaka and Kyoto, and in three weeks' time I took thirty-one photographs. Spontaneously I would ask girls in the street, whom I found interesting, to pose for me. Sometimes it was a bit awkward and difficult to win their confidence, or that of their parents, but most of the time it all ran very smoothly and they were very co-operative. At times I did already have a certain location in mind, such as the small wooden house that I could see from my hotel window, but often the location was pure coincidence. Mostly the girls would bring their own clothes, but it also happened that I quickly bought something. You are forced to improvise in such a situation. It is a matter of looking and reacting instantly."


Haarlem, 15 January 2002

20110517

NewVillager



Ben Bromley and Ross Simonini, splitting their time between Brooklyn and San Fransicso, lead the project and weave mythology throughout their music and art. 


Functioning as an artist collective, NewVillager brings multiple dimensions to their sound with visual direction from Ben Dickinson (LCD Soundsystem, the Rapture, Q-tip, etc), live drums and video by Collin Palmer and a cast of characters reminiscient of a Wonderland-esque board game come to life.  



To coincide with the album release, there are plans for art shows and installations across the U.S as well as live tour and a book release to follow.  The album will be availble digitally and in retail stores around the world this summer 2011. 


Their official self-titled debut coming June 21 on IAMSOUND


Here we talked to NewVillager about themselves


20110509

Anish Kapoor




Anish Kapoor is a renowned British abstract sculptor, born in India in 1954. He was then settled in London in 1973 and was awarded the Turner Prize in 1990 and in 1991. His work is minimal, yet powerful and large in shape, form or number. Very often the sculptures are in curved forms, monochromatic and brightly coloured. The use of red wax is part of his current repertoire, evocative of flesh, blood and transfiguration.



20110507

define us five




55%linen  45%cotton, dyeing and sewing by myself

"Don't try to pretend you understand me,
it's because, basically, you don't."

20110501

SHINICHIRO ARAKAWA





After studying fine arts in Tokyo, award-winning Japanese fashion designer Shinichiro Arakawa (1965) went to Paris in 1990. Here he took the stylism course at Studio Berçot. During this time he met English fashion designer Christopher Nemeth and began to work for him as his assistant. This period was crucial to Arakawa’s development because it was while working with Nemeth that he acquired the techniques which formed his conception of fashion.
In October 1993, he organized his first show using his own name in Paris. Many presentations in both Paris and Tokyo followed. Arakawa defines a theme for each collection and often chooses a place to reinforce that theme: in 1995, his models strut down a street of a working-class area of Shimo-Kitazawa. In 1996, he showed his Koinobori-themes clothes in the Omote Sando avenue, an expensive area in Tokyo. His kogyaru-schoolgirl walked in uniform around Tokyo University, symbol of the student uprising of the 60’s.
His theme for the 2001 autumn/winter collection: idol pop stars; “I was inspired by Seiko Matsuda.” Matsuda was Japan’s top idol of the 80’s, the time Arakawa grew up. The creations were typical Arakawa, they looked frozen in an eternal dancing motion.
In 1999 Arakawa started working conceptually when he created clothes with a dual function as pictures that could be hung on the wall. Arakawa often says that he feels inspired by fabric. His favorites are wool and linen. His customers are in his words “strange people”. Stubborn and self-willed. They have their own ideas. Not exactly qualities which are admired in Japan.
Red is an important color to Arakawa. “Red is a color with two faces,” he explains, “it radiates power, but also weakness.” That makes red a symbol of humanity. “Sometimes I feel strong, sometimes weak. But nonetheless I want to be myself.” ‘Being yourself’ and ‘knowing yourself’ are two important characteristics of Arakawa’s life philosophy.
When he first arrived in Paris he watched the movie ‘The Last Emperor’, in which the Japanese occupation of China is also shown. “I had already seen the movie in Japan. but the French version was completely different. There were all kinds of documentary materials about the Japanese army.” Arakawa was shocked. “I started to wonder what was true of everything I had learnt at school.”
The young fashion designer came to the conclusion that “if you are not yourself you will be pulled with the current.” That is what is happening in Japan according to Arakawa. “You walk down a street and you see McDonalds everywhere, not sushi shops. “We have to take better care of the Japaneseness of Japan.” Still, you won’t see Arakawa design any kimonos. His clothes are contemporary street fashion as in his Honda line, or conceptual.
Unlike the Japanese designers of the 80’s, Arakawa doesn’t see himself as a revolutionary like Issey Miyake and the like. “They are the same age as my father. They had very different experiences.” The ‘hunger’ Miyake’s generation felt is not part of him he seems to say.
Arakawa opened his first boutique in Paris 1996. Arakawa’s famous collaboration with automaker Honda, creating a line of clothes using the Honda brand, was started in 1997. In 1998 he started his own shop in Tokyo.

Unlimited: Comme des garcons


The world of couture was a traditional and perfect one. It was a fine craftsmanship. Ms. Kawakubo simply destroyed that image. She made amazing clothes that were deconstructed, washed, torn, boiled and dyed. So I think for all generation of students at fashion school, it was a single unique revolution. She is “a designer for designers.  
Maria Luisa,  Poumaillou owner,  Maria Luisa

I think in 1983, Ms. Kawakubo has already proposed some unfinished clothes that were very important and valuable. She was the first to make people understand that clothes do not have to be completely finished, and that they could be very beautiful when it’s made to look old by some artifical means. And I think that is at the center of today’s fashion. She has invented a new fashion way of speech that has become a permanent tendency. Many designer and creators have been influence by her. 
Didier Grumbach, president French federation of haute couture, ready-to –wear and designer.

I have only done what I found to be beautiful at the time. And there was a big backlash against this. Almost for the first time, I learned that beautiful things for me are not necessarily beautiful to everyone else, but they could well be something very scary. That, as a result, inflamed me to go on and simulated my following creations. I would never be content making garments everyone else finds beautiful. Instead, I became defiant asking people why they don’t understand this. 
Rei Kawakubo


Something may be annoying you at the moment, or you may think something is wrong with the world. These feelings could become an ingredient for my creation. It means that even things-yet-to-have-form could possibly be designed. You feel something; a variety of factors influences each other; overlap each other or are created through a aeries of accidents. It is something that comes about from the sequence. It could also be anger, a motivation for new ideas, or a desire to make strangely shaped clothes. 
Rei Kawakubo

Just defining new lines and making paper patterns is not design. Although designing a silhouette used to be enough, design will be more than that from now on. 
Rei Kawakubo

After extensive searching and thinking out for new ideas, just before time ran out, I realised that the clothes could be the body and the body could be the clothes. This was an idea for possible new clothes. I then started to design the body. I didn’t expect them to be easy garments to be worn everyday, but Comme des Garcons’ clothes should always be new to the world and inspiring. It is more important, I think, to translate thought into action rather than to worry about if one’s clothes are worn in the end. This is probably why the collection stimulated strong feelings in many people.
Rei Kawakubo

To both click with the feeling of the times and also be stimulating in your design is probably the best. Even if your garment sell, it would be boring to make clothes that were not exciting, I become very happy when people who don’t actually wear Comme des garcons tell me that they are emotionally touched or excited by just touching our clothes. When our clothes can make a strong impression to those who are only looking, I realise that clothes can do something. 
Rei Kawakubo 

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