20150227

Marina Abramović and Ulay


Marina Abramović (Born November 30, 1946) A performance artist based in New York
Ulay (Born November 30, 1943) An artist based in Amsterdam and Ljubljana



In 1976, after moving to Amsterdam,
Abramović met the West German performance artist Uwe Laysiepen
and began their collaboration, explored the ego and artistic identity.

This was the beginning of a decade of influential collaborative work.

They formed a collective being called “The Other”,
and spoke of themselves as parts of a “two-headed body”.
They dressed and behaved like twins and created a relationship of complete trust.
They devised a series of works in which their bodies created additional spaces for audience interaction.

“The main problem in this relationship was what to do with the two artists’ egos. I had to find out how to put my ego down, as did he, to create something like a hermaphroditic state of being that we called the death self.”

In 1988, after several years of tense relations, Abramović and Ulay decided to make a spiritual journey which would end their relationship. They each walked the Great Wall of China, starting from the two opposite ends and meeting in the middle.

“We needed a certain form of ending, after this huge distance walking towards each other. It is very human. It is in a way more dramatic, more like a film ending … Because in the end you are really alone, whatever you do.”

At her 2010 MoMa retrospective, Marina performed The Artist Is Present, in which she shared a period of silence with each stranger who sat in front of her. Marina have had a deeply emotional reaction to Ulay when he arrived at her performance, reaching to him across the table between them.
















20150226

Benjamin Huseby's Weeds & Aliens


Benjamin Huseby is a Nowegian photographer

"Weeds & Aliens
is an occasionally arbitrary collection
of photographs of some rather wonderful, useful plants, normally considered weeds,"

“It is all at once a field guide, a photography book and an eco-polemic,”

"It is thought of as an introduction to the fragments of nature around us, 
even in the most urban of habitats. 
What is a wild plant, a native plant, an invasive or alien plant, a weed? 
The story of weeds is the story of man and civilisation, of agriculture and migration. 
There are no weeds in the wilderness, 
but, then again, can we truly speak of wild nature?"

“Ever since I was a child I have been obsessed with taste, food and nature. 
I remember vividly how I used to both impress and terrify other children 
by eating raw stinging nettles when I was six.”

" I don't know how I first learned about what plants we could eat, 
but I spent my whole childhood playing in forests and fields. 
I think generally from growing up in Norway it was something ever present, 
 I was always tasting leaves and shoots. 
I just loved the sensation. 
Somehow I knew what not to eat as well. "

" The project started from me simply asking myself a question: 
"What is it that I'm genuinely most interested in?" 
So it is about a personal obsession, 
but also follows in the footsteps of other projects I have done as an artist, 
mostly working with ideas of ecology. 
It also has a connection to food, another obsession, 
as all the plants in the book have be used in meals for me and friends, 
often in my studio."











Cathy Van Hoang


is a LA-based designer and art director
She uses sea urchin shells as upside down planters for air plants to create little aerial jellyfish.






click here to see more beautiful works


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