Aesthetica
The Art & Culture Magazine
www.aestheticamagazine.com
Issue 80 December / January 2018
United progression
liminal Exploration
Cultural Dimensions
A unique fashion label combines online origins with muted styling
Charting revolutionary design through technological hybrids
Architectural tourism is brought to the fore as a global blueprint
Stephen Shore contemplates new methods for digital photography
UK ÂŁ4.95 Europe â‚Ź9.99 USA $13.49
Timeless Minimalism
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Welcome Editor’s Note
On the Cover Dean Bradshaw is a photographer and director interested in the elements that sit below the surface. Conceptually engaging, each composition focuses on the finer details that define the exterior. The Hyper Color series is led by uninhibited narratives that immerse viewers in peculiar, extraordinary microcosms. (p. 120). www.deanbradshaw.com. Cover Image: Photographer: Dean Bradshaw, Production: Jess Herman. Styling & Model: Ann-Marie Hoang (Instagram: @mstr_of_disguise).
I am constantly learning, each and every day of my life. As one year ends and a new one begins, it’s time for reflection. This year has been particularly complicated. We are living in uncertain times. Everything is moving at a cataclysmic speed. The unthinkable happened: Donald Trump is US president and Britain is leaving the EU. North Korea launched nuclear weapons over Japan, the migrant crisis continues, people live without the most basic needs such as food and shelter and terror attacks are increasing in frequency – leading to fear, isolationism and populism. If you created a time line of events throughout the world, you could see the cause and effect of everything. How did all this happen? Where do we go from here? We must look at the unprecedented rate of change and to our cyber world for answers. This level of intervention has not been seen on this scale since the Industrial Revolution. We haven’t even had time to properly digest how it is affecting our lives. We’re just scratching at the surface in getting a wider philosophical meaning of what this new upheaval means for our times. How is this affecting our humanity? What does this do to personal autonomy, self-worth and identity? What about creativity and idea generation? The December / January issue of Aesthetica is about ideas. The notion that progress is continuous, and that we can change things if we want to, is a powerful statement. We take a look at Stephen Shore’s retrospective at MoMA, which not only charts the photographer’s take on the everyday, but how he has always been an innovator. Architecture defines our built world; a new book, Destination Architecture, surveys how buildings play a part in global economies. Meanwhile, Digital Handmade: Craftsmanship and the New Industrial Revolution discusses how technology is making it easier to create. In photography, Cig Harvey and Kevin Cooley return with work that expands upon their practices. Tekla Evelina Severin, Clarissa Bonet, Jeanette Hägglund and Tania Franco Klein explore new possibilities, from blurring genres to redefining narratives. Finally, the last words goes to Nathan Coley. Cherie Federico
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contents
Art 16 Regular Sections Highlights include the 2017 Deutsche Börse prize, Joel Meyerowitz at CO Berlin, Edmund Clark at ICP and Gillian Wearing at ICA Boston.
24 Emotive Metropolis Clarissa Bonet reconstructs the quotidian through memory, using stark lights and deep shadows to strengthen the notion of the singular city.
36 Liminal Exploration Destination Architecture is an exciting collection of iconic structures that reconsider the concept of travel and spectacle within the wider industry.
42 Modes of Communication Kevin Cooley’s At Light’s Edge questions systems of knowledge, providing desolate views of rugged American landscapes that are steeped in history.
54 United Progression Marrying new technologies and tradition, Lucy Johnston’s publication navigates the future for designers through compromise and innovation.
60 Living Detachment Uncovering the darker elements of culture, Tania Franco Klein’s works look at over-consumption, constant stimulation and emotional disconnection.
74 Timeless Minimalism The ever-changing face of fashion is exemplified through Charlie May’s unique label that combines digital origins with clean, muted and ethical styling.
80 Sensory Disconnect Jeanette Hägglund utilises alienated spaces to open minds to new possibilities and larger worlds; flourishing forms and hyperreal colours feature.
94 Seeking Transience Cig Harvey’s You an Orchestra You a Bomb series nestles within split seconds where beauty mingles with a sense of danger and visceral consideration.
104 Cultural Dimensions The work of Stephen Shore is celebrated through an unprecedented retrospective at MoMA, New York, focusing on contemporary techniques.
110 Simulated Environment Complementary colours and subtle choreography come to the fore in Tekla Evelina Severin’s assorted series – interiors are captured with visual flair.
120 Opulent Scenarios Dean Bradshaw creates multi-layered realities which truly reflect the desire to balance intrigue with attraction; the ordinary becomes illusory.
Exhibitions
Film
Music
132 The Latest Shows Included in this issue: Camden Arts Centre, Tate Modern, Jeu de Paume, Great Eastern Wall Gallery, The Broad and Marian Goodman Gallery, London.
136 Inspired by Ideas The Aesthetica Short Film Festival returns for its seventh edition, showcasing 300 films that reflect upon both personal and universal narratives.
138 Theatrical Meditation Soho Rezanejad releases a debut full-length album that poses questions about existential archetypes and identities under construction.
Books
Artists’ Directory
Last Words
140 Colour as Multiplicity Black: Architecture in Monochrome, published by Phaidon, addresses the psychology of form and the aesthetics of present-day exteriors.
152 Innovative Practitioners Our selection of artists includes visionaries who are pushing the boundaries of composition and in bold, original and unexpected ways.
162 Nathan Coley Nathan Coley’s THE SAME FOR EVERYONE offers an authoritative, accusatory and demanding – yet anonymous – voice through illuminated signage.
Aesthetica Magazine is trade marked worldwide. © Aesthetica Magazine Ltd 2017.
The Aesthetica Team: Editor: Cherie Federico Assistant Editor: Kate Simpson Digital Assistant: Eleanor Sutherland Staff Writer: David Martin
Advertisement Enquiries: Jeremy Appleyard (0044) (0)844 568 2001 advertising@aestheticamagazine.com
ISSN 1743-2715. All work is copyrighted to the author or artist. All rights reserved. No part of this magazine may be used or reproduced without permission from the publisher.
Advertising Coordinator: Jeremy Appleyard Marketing Coordinator: Hannah Skidmore Artists’ Directory Coordinator: Katherine Smira
Artists’ Directory Enquiries: Katherine Smira (0044) (0)844 568 2001 directory@aestheticamagazine.com
Published by Cherie Federico and Dale Donley. Aesthetica Magazine PO Box 371, York, YO23 1WL, UK (0044) (0)844 568 2001 Newstrade Distribution: Warners Group Publications plc. Gallery & Specialist Distribution: Central Books.
Production Director: Dale Donley Designer: Laura Tordoff Administrator: Cassandra Weston Marketing & Administration Assistant: Sophie Lake Festival Assistant: Eleanor Turner Technician: Andy Guy Interns: Sean Hanson, Ben Callies Contributors: Niamh Coghlan, Colin Herd, Anna Feintuck, Beth Webb, Charlotte R.A, Gunseli Yalcinkaya.
Printed by Warners Midlands plc. Reviewers: Ruby Beesley, Henry Broome, Kyle Bryony, Grace Caffyn, Ashton Chandler, Tony Earnshaw, Sarah Jilani, Erik Martiny, Ned Carter Miles, Carolina Mostert, James Mottram, Paul Risker, Matt Swain, Jill Thayer.
Subscriptions: subscriptions@aestheticamagazine.com (0044) (0)844 568 2001 General Enquiries: info@aestheticamagazine.com Press Releases: pr@aestheticamagazine.com
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Port House by Zaha Hadid. Image: © HeleneBinet.
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21st Century Innovation Beazley Designs of the Year From activism and protest to celebrity and virtual reality, a IKEA return, with the welcome concept of a new generation of year of political and cultural turbulence has clearly found its self-assembly furniture that does not require screws or allen physical expression right across the spectrum of design. The keys. Architectural entries include the National Museum of Afobjects and concepts shortlisted for the Design Museum’s rican American History and Culture in Washington DC which 10th annual awards include products created in response to was designed by the recently knighted Sir David Adjaye. Amongst all the high-tech innovation, one nominee is a the refugee crisis, the British referendum on leaving the EU and the rise of Donald Trump. They follow on from last year’s simple pink handmade hat. The Pussyhat design was invented winner, IKEA’s Better Shelter, a flat-packed shelter which has for the Women’s March on Washington in 2016, and has been directly addressed the needs of an age of conflict and the worn by thousands of women since in response to the derogatory remarks of now-President Donald Trump. Also on a resulting mass displacement of millions. The annual exhibition and awards, supported by specialist political theme, Wolfgang Tillmans’ Remain Campaign poster insurer Beazley, features a shortlist of 62 nominations across designs for the Brexit referendum feature, as does Me & EU by six categories: Architecture, Digital, Fashion, Graphics, Product Nathan and Sam Smith. IC4Design’s Finding Her is a Where’s and Transport. Selected by a panel of designers, curators and Wally-style advertisement campaign highlighting low levels creatives, the awards showcase transformative products, con- of gender equality in professions in Egypt. Alongside Pokemon Go and the Premier League TV graphics cepts and designers. Innovation in technology and materials is at the fore, with items such as the world’s first translating by DixonBaxi, which have an estimated viewer reach of 4.7 billion people, the Digital category shows a darker side with an earpiece, and a range of furniture made from molten lava. This year’s collection includes a hijab designed by Nike in interactive, 3D recreation of Saydnaya, a Syrian torture prison the Fashion category, and a clothing line by Kanye West for near Damascus. It has been constructed from the testimony of his The Life of Pablo tour, whilst Pokémon Go, the augmented survivors by Forensic Architecture for Amnesty International. Sketches, models, physical pieces, videos and photography reality mobile game which was a global sensation in July 2016, is a contender in the Digital category. The emergence are on display to offer insight into the nominees and their of new technologies is recognised with Olli, the world’s first creative process. A winner is chosen in each category and the 3D printed self-driving bus, featuring under Transport. And overall winner is announced on 25 January.
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“The annual exhibition and awards, supported by specialist insurer Beazley, features a shortlist of 62 nominations across six categories: Architecture, Digital, Fashion, Graphics, Product and Transport.”
Design Museum, London Until 28 January www.designmuseum.org
Painting with Light Joel Meyerowitz: Why Color? of skyscrapers, steam rising from manhole covers, beauty “C/O Berlin’s salons, billboards and diners, with a multi-chromatic palette retrospective of drawing the eye to fine details of the people. Meyerowitz makes From the mid-1970s onwards, having become a master of the case for colour as capturing colour on film, Meyerowitz created studies in light a way of capturing on Cape Cod on the East Coast. These range from the subtle- nuances and ties of the early morning to the last light before nightfall, to approaching lurid neon signs bright against the night sky. The sense of composition in a tension and transition became a defining element in his style. painterly way The biggest trauma to befall his native city led to a more which is distinct recent significant body of work. In Aftermath (2001), he was from the monochrome the only photographer given access to document the recovery approach.” and reconstruction operation at Ground Zero, following the 9/11 terror attack which destroyed the World Trade Center. Having built relationships with fire fighters, emergency services and construction workers, he captured the whole process from initial emergency response to demolition and excavation of the wreckage and the returning of the site to level ground. Now considered one of the most influential founding figures in both street and colour photography, Meyerowitz has received numerous awards including the 2017 Leica Hall of Fame Award in recognition of his life’s work. Countless C/O Berlin museums and institutions around the globe have shown his Until 11 March images, including the NRW-Forum in Düsseldorf (2014) and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York (2004). www.co-berlin.org
Dairy Land, Provincetown, Massachusetts, 1976. © Joel Meyerowitz / Courtesy Howard Greenberg.
For many decades after the invention of colour film, the language of serious photography and photojournalism remained strictly black and white, whilst colour imagery was associated with the worlds of advertising and commerce. That this situation underwent a profound shift and colour photography took its place in the art historical canon is down to the pioneering work of several key figures, with Joel Meyerowitz (b. 1938) eminent amongst them, alongside the contributions of Stephen Shore and William Eggleston. As the title suggests, C/O Berlin’s retrospective of Meyerowitz makes the case for colour as a way of capturing nuances and approaching composition in a painterly way which is distinct from the monochrome approach, with subject matter ranging from captured moments of New York City’s street life to studies in the play of light on sky and sea. Classically trained in painting at Ohio State University, Meyerowitz, who grew up in the Bronx, designed graphics for advertisements. A meeting with Robert Frank in 1962 led to his move into photography. Initially he employed both black and white and colour film, travelling across the whole of Europe as he developed his craft, then moving into exclusively working in the latter, taking advantage of the spontaneity of a highly portable small format camera in order to find the extraordinary in the everyday. His vivid images from the streets throughout the 1960s and 1970s capture a world
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Paul Scannell, McCarthy, Alaska - a Frontier Town.
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Ethereal Sources of Life Paul Scannell: McCarthy, Alaska – a Frontier Town The Alaskan wilderness, with its spectacular scenery and over- deposits ran out in 1938, pulling the plug on the local econ- “The region’s whelming sense of remoteness, where great beauty and great omy overnight. They also explore the surrounding land- economic history harshness co-exist, has been an irresistible draw for travellers, scape of the national park, a setting dominated by imposing of mining booms writers and artists for many years. The region’s economic his- mountains and glaciers that dwarf the tiny township. The and busts that once tory of mining booms and busts that once brought workers park alone is two-thirds the size of Scannell’s native Ireland. brought workers flocking has left behind atmospheric and deserted “ghost The town also proved irresistible to another namesake, the flocking has left Irish travel writer Pete McCarthy, who visited it for his book behind atmospheric towns” set against this dramatic natural backdrop. and deserted It is a town that never quite died that caught the imagination exploring the Irish diaspora, The Road To McCarthy (2002). Scannell’s travels have increasingly led him further north. ‘ghost towns’ of Dublin-born photographer Paul Scannell. Originally named after an Irishman, James McCarthy, and made He came to McCarthy after hiking to the site of the “Magic set against this possible by another, railroad builder Michael Heney, the Bus”, the shelter deep in the Alaskan wilderness where the dramatic natural frontier town of McCarthy, Alaska, today has a population remains of Christopher McCandless, a young traveller fasci- backdrop.” of 28 and sits in the splendid isolation of the Wrangell St nated by the wild, who starved to death whilst hiking in the Elias National Park. Scannell spent five months living area, were found in 1992. The site has become a place of pilthere in the summer of 2016, and his collection McCarthy, grimage after McCandless’s story became a book and a film. Scannell originally worked as an interiors photographer Alaska – A Frontier Town reveals a community very much alive – welcoming of wanderers, generous with its quirks, and, in the process, developed a passion for derelict resihistory, secrets and soul. After making its debut in Dublin, dential spaces and abandoned industrial premises. Defining this exhibition of images shot in and around McCarthy is on buildings not simply by people but also their absence, his work examines the remnants left by human habitation. show at new South London venue Tart. His nature photography has been published on the front The photographs explore the architecture and the subtle marks left by human history on the town, which was once cover of the Oxford Medical Journal and his architectural and Art at Tart, London home to more than 1,000 people and a riotous assembly of interiors images have featured extensively in both the UK Until 31 December bars and brothels catering to the copper miners of the area and Irish press. Recent collaborations demonstrate a growing during its commercial heyday of the early 1900s – until the interest in ecological and architectural conservation. www.tartlondon.com
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Documenting Complexities Deutsche Börse Photography Prize
Awoiska van der Molen, #364-18, 2013. © Awoiska van der Molen, Courtesy of the artist, Purdy Hicks Gallery and Kristof De Clercq gallery.
The contested status of truth at a time of “fake news” where po- offers a new investigation of her own lifetime photographic “She allows each litical battles rage over control of the dominant narrative, and oeuvre, with a postcard from each of her projects to date. location to impress related questions surround the authority of the image itself She creates work by selecting a seemingly arbitrary set of upon her its specific when digital manipulation is readily accessible, inevitably cast constraints or rules, in an approach similar to the 1960s emotional and shadows over this year’s shortlist for the Deutsche Börse prize. literary movement known as Oulipo. Calle’s methods have physical qualities, A running theme of the shortlisted works is the questionable involved following a man from Paris to Venice, hiring a and in doing so opposition between truth and fiction, as well as doubt and detective to spy on herself, and asking blind people to tell moves towards a pure representation of the certainty, and observer and observed. Utilising approaches her about their last memory of sight. Awoiska van der Molen (b. 1972) has been nominated essential nature of from the documentary tradition to the experimental and conceptual, the four selected photographers test how robust for her exhibition Blanco. Solitude and silence are vital to both the landscape the creation of abstracted black and white landscapes. She and her personal these binary oppositions are, or whether they are in flux. This year’s winner is Dana Lixenberg (b. 1964). Since 1992 allows each location to impress upon her its specific emo- reaction to it.” when she first visited the Watts neighbourhood of South Cen- tional and physical qualities, and in doing so moves towards tral Los Angeles, following the riots that erupted in LA in the a pure representation of the essential nature of both the wake of a group of LAPD officers being cleared of the beat- landscape and her personal reaction to it. The partnership of Taiyo Onorato and Nico Krebs (both b. ing of Rodney King, she has constantly returned, creating an evolving picture of this often troubled community through 1979) has been nominated for their show EURASIA at Fotothe stories of individuals. Whilst most of the world only saw museum Winterthur in which they use a mixture of fiction and the area through helicopter footage of the LA riots, Lixen- documentary to play with the iconography of the road trip. berg has built relationships with the people of the Imperial Onorato and Krebs depict communities still grappling with Courts housing project in Watts, the result being a 22-year both ancient tradition and post-Soviet power structures, on Aperture Foundation, collaborative process charting the passage of time, in her the cusp of forging a modern identity. They travel through New York Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Ka- Until 11 January prize-winning publication Imperial Courts. French photographer Sophie Calle (b. 1953) adopts the zakhstan, Russia, and end in Mongolia, making use of anamedium of postcards in her publication My All (2016), which logue and installation-based techniques. www.aperture.org
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Eddo Hartmann, Lady in Blue, Changgwangwon Health Complex, Pyongyang, 2016.
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Individual Versus Collective Eddo Hartmann – Setting the Stage: Pyongyang, North Korea, Part 2 Cloaked in secrecy and enigma, yet never far from the international news headlines, North Korea is currently engaged in a new, dangerous phase of nuclear-armed brinkmanship. The totalitarian communist state and the cult of personality surrounding the ruling Kim dynasty are subjects of fascination in the West, at least partially because behind the images of state newsreaders recounting propaganda, everyday life in the country is hidden from view. Dutch photographer Eddo Hartmann (b.1973) is one of the only Westerners to have been permitted to photograph extensively in this closed country. He was allowed to make four visits to North Korea between 2014 and 2017, albeit under close supervision, and the first part of his project, Setting The Stage: Pyongyang North Korea, was exhibited at Huis Marseille in 2015. The title refers to his impression of the city of Pyongyang as a giant arena for carefully managed performances of state power. This first phase focused on the built environment, creating a portrait of a city which was built on the ruins of the Korean War (1950-1953) as both a utopian experiment and an attempt to express a revolutionary transformation through architecture. The second and final phase of the work, also on view at Huis Marseille, attempts to convey something of the daily lives of the inhabitants, and what it feels like to live in these imposing and surreal surroundings. Even outside of the
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grand set-piece militaristic parades, the people move like “The second and actors, carefully playing out the roles the city and the regime final phase of the which it embodies demand of them. Hartmann’s night-time work, also on view films capture Orwellian loudspeakers playing revolutionary at Huis Marseille, music even though the squares and streets are empty. attempts to convey Working under the constant monitoring of two North something of the Korean minders, Hartmann mainly used a digital medium- daily lives of the format camera and a tripod, which allowed him to observe inhabitants, and what the subjects in great detail. He creates space not only for it feels like to live in minutiae but for the viewer to make their own interpretations. these imposing and Observing the relationships between the individual and surreal surroundings.” the architecture of power around them, the photographer says: “Within the collective character of North Korea, the individual is just a pixel. I looked specifically for that pixel and its significance in the city.” In his images of the subway system, slow shutter speeds turn individual commuters into a single shimmering whole. Yet elsewhere, his concern is with reconstructing the individual from back out of the collective. The portraits are of neat and tidy residents, often dressed in work uniform – and always moving in a public space. Hartmann, born in the Netherlands, studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Art at The Hague. The Cold War, which lives Huis Marseille, Amsterdam on in the division of Korea, also features in his ongoing Half Until 4 March Life series, begun in 2008, which explores sites that played a role in the development of nuclear weapons. www.huismarseille.nl
Sociological Dimension Michael Wolf: Life in Cities broader questions of the transformations of urban life. “Fotomuseum Den This relationship of supply and demand between East and Haag’s major West, and what it means for art, is a theme of Real Fake Art retrospective presents (2007), shot in the streets of Shenzhen, which is home to a mul- a selective overview ti-million dollar business producing counterfeits of modern of the main bodies of Western artworks by the likes of Andy Warhol and Francis work created by Wolf Bacon. Wolf’s pictures of the artists with their fakes also display in which he finds the price each counterfeit work can fetch on the open market. new perspectives and It is Hong Kong, however, which has proved to be his main approaches from theme and source of inspiration as well as his home. Archi- which to examine tecture Of Density (2003-2014) makes use of the vast scale the transformations of the city’s skyscrapers to eliminate the horizon and turn of urban life.” the immense monoliths into pure abstraction, through large format images showing minute detail. The pictures at first glance seem deserted, the presence of life within the structures only present in traces, such as a shirt left out to dry or a shadow behind a blind. Yet these nuances reveal the human need to find space to express individual identity even within such overwhelming formal architectural structures. On closer inspection, a sociological dimension emerges and we see architecture as a framework within which this expression takes place; clothes lines, bird feeders, mops and air conditioning Fotomuseum Den Haag units reveal the human activity behind the exterior. Here, the 20 January - 22 April city is a laboratory for life in a radically changing environment – one that is ultimately of our own creation. www.fotomuseumdenhaag.nl
Michael Wolf, Architecture of Density, Hong Kong 2003-2014. Copyright Michael Wolf 2018.
The thread that runs throughout the photographic projects of Michael Wolf (b. 1954) is the way urbanisation and metropolitan environments shape the reality of individuals’ daily lives. He aims to uncover the symbolic value of seemingly insignificant details, and brings the eye of an outsider; he was born in Germany but raised in the US and Canada, and has made the cities of Asia his primary subject, from the highrises of Hong Kong to the commuter subways of Tokyo. Fotomuseum Den Haag’s major retrospective presents a selective overview of the main bodies of work created by Wolf in which he finds new perspectives from which to examine the transformations of urban life. The shifting cityscapes of China in particular have offered him constant inspiration to document the many faces of this emerging superpower. Initially a photojournalist, Wolf realised his first major art project, The Real Toy Story in 2004, for which he collected more than 20,000 toys made in China from second-hand stores along the California coast, and integrated them with his portraits of workers in Chinese toy factories to create an installation which vividly demonstrates both the scale of China’s mass production industries and the limitless hunger of western consumers for disposable products. It set out some of the key notes of his future practice, including the combination of both macro and micro perspectives, and the ability to use a specific theme or focal point to address the
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art 1. COS x Studio Swine – Miami 2017. Courtesy of COS. 2. Zanele Muholi, Ntozakhe II, (Parktown), 2016 from the Somnyama Ngonyama series 2015-16, gelatin silver photograph. National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Bowness Family Fund for Photography, 2017. © Zanele Muholi, Courtesy Zanele Muholi, STEVENSON, Cape Town and Richardson, New York. 3. Loui Johannesburg and Yancey siana Museum of Modern Art, Being There, 10.10.2017-17.2.2018, Installation shot. Artist: Pamela Rosenkranz, Photo: Anders Sune Berg, Credit: Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebaek, DK. 4. Onoaida 6, Unwired Landscapes, 30°17’59”N 130°31’49”E, Onoaida trail, Yakushima, Japan, Fall, 2 October 2016.© Jacqueline Hassink. 5. Edmund Clark, A room formerly used for interrogations in the Libyan intelligence service facility at Tajoura, Tripoli, from the series Negative Publicity: Artefacts of Extraordinary Rendition, 2012. © Edmund Clark.
10 to See Recommended Exhibitions this Season
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Design Miami
Miami Beach 6-10 December
www.miami2017. designmiami.com Design Miami is a global forum, bringing together practitioners, collectors, curators and critics in a celebration of design culture and commerce. From museum-quality exhibitions of furniture, lighting and objets d’art to new commissions, the event not only satisfies the demand for a high-end design fair but also broadens audiences’ awareness of the modern and contemporary as modes of inspiration.
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www.ngv.vic.gov.au The inaugural NGV Triennial showcases art, design and architecture from around the world. Featuring more than 60 artists from over 30 countries, the show reveals cutting edge technologies from 3D printing to robotics, as well as performance, film, painting, drawing, fashion design, tapestry and sculpture. There are 20 new commissions, which include Alexandra Kehayoglou’s monumental 100 square metre carpet landscape.
www.louisiana.dk In Being There, 10 contemporary artists examine the human condition in the digital age, or more accurately, the unique space we occupy in between the physical and technological worlds. Through nine room installations, Bunny Rogers, Louisa Gagliardi, Dora Budor, Pamela Rosenkranz, Cécile B. Evans, Lizzie Fitch, Ryan Trecartin, Ed Atkins, Ian Cheng and Hannah Levy all address the nature of identities in flux.
nederlandsfotomuseum.nl This unique exhibition unites two projects: Unwired Landscapes and iPortrait. The subject of Hassink’s show is how we are affected by the absence of online contact. Each of the lush, colourful and organic compositions sharply contrast multimedia installations of smartphone photographs, offering a mental experience that traverses natural and digitalised worlds – an antitheses between stress and serenity.
www.icp.org British photographer Edmund Clark has spent 10 years exploring the structures of power and control stemming from the post 9/11 global War on Terror. The Day the Music Died presents photographic, video and installation work focusing on the measures used to protect citizens from conflicts. From locations such as Guantanamo Bay to Afghanistan, Clark visualises processes, sites and experiences.
NGV Triennial
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne 15 December - 15 April
Being There
Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark Until 25 February
Jacqueline Hassink
Nederlands Fotomuseum, Rotterdam 20 January - 6 May
Edmund Clark
ICP Museum, New York 26 January - 6 May
6. Derrin Crawford and Demi Leigh Cruickshank in The Liver Birds, LOVE magazine, Liverpool, 2012 © Alice Hawkins. 7. Still from HÍBRIDOS The Spirits of Brazil, Vincent Moon & Priscilla Telmon. 8. Christian Tagliavini, La Moglie dell’Orefice, 2017. © Christian Tagliavini / Courtesy of CAMERA WORK. 9. Monika Sosnowska, ‘Untitled ’ (2015) and ‘Façade’ (2016), © Monika Sosnowska. Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth. 10. Installation View, Gillian Wearing: Rock ’n’ Roll 70, The Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston, 2016–2018. Courtesy the artist; Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York; Maureen Paley, London; and Regen Projects, Los Angeles. Photo by Charles Mayer Photography. © Gillian Wearing.
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North: Fashioning Identity
Somerset House, London Until 4 February
www.somersethouse.org.uk More than 100 photographs, garments and artworks contribute to a portrait of the north of England through the lens of fashion. Work by Jeremy Deller, Mark Leckey, Raf Simons and Gareth Pugh sits alongside social documentary film and photography from the likes of Shirley Baker, John Bulmer and Peter Mitchell. The exhibition unpicks the themes and tropes present in this collective vision of northern England.
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www.barbican.org.uk French filmmakers Vincent Moon and Priscilla Telmon have spent the last three years in Brazil documenting more than 60 different spiritual ceremonies across the country. HÍBRIDOS: The Spirits of Brazil is a compilation of their discoveries in a 24-hour audiovisual loop. The result is a rare glimpse into spiritual observances, from the AfroBrazilian ceremonies of Candomblé to indigenous ancestral rituals in Acre.
www.camerawork.de Alongside images from across his career, Christian Tagliavini’s most recent series 1406, is on display. The artist specialises in portraits that reinterpret the iconography of 15th century painting; he designs and creates all the sets, costumes and ornaments. The new collection references the birth of Italian Renaissance painter Filippo Lippi (1406-1469), aiming to reimagine the grace, pride and power of the period.
www.hauserwirth.com Monika Sosnowska has developed an acclaimed approach to materiality which brings together architectural and sculptural elements in disorientating new configurations. In Structural Exercises at Hauser & Wirth London, she offers an entirely new body of work comprising seven distinct sculptural pieces which together form an immersive exhibition, several of them emerging from the fabric of the gallery space.
Vincent Moon & Priscilla Telmon
Barbican, London Until 11 February
Christian Tagliavini: 1406
Camera Work, Berlin 9 December - 24 February
Monika Sosnowska
Hauser & Wirth, London 1 December - 10 February
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Gillian Wearing
ICA Boston 9-31 December
www.icaboston.org The monumental photographic installation Rock ’n’ Roll 70 (2015) is a site-specific commission for the ICA’s Sandra and Gerald Fineberg Art Wall. Gillian Wearing explores the complexities of identity as mediated through 21st century advancements. Using a self-portrait, Wearing (b. 1963) asked experts in age-progressing technology to show what she might look like at the age of 70. The results show a diversity of possible futures.
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art
Emotive Metropolis Clarissa Bonet
Clarissa Bonet (b. 1986) is a Chicago-based artist whose work explores aspects of urbanness in both a physical and psychological context. City Space revolves around the artist’s perceptions of the environment as a temporal body, highlighting its elements and characters from the angle of a passer-by – a seemingly anonymous yet fixed individual. From an endless sea of concrete to duplicable buildings, the featured locations reflect a new understanding of life in the 21st century, where architecture provokes new sensibilities. The images reconstruct the mundane through memory, using stark lights, deep shadows and muted colours to strengthen a sense of the cinematic. In doing so, they offer a singular view of the city as opposed to a collective experience. Refusing to blend into globalisation, the crowds become puzzle pieces within an isolated, beautiful and undeterred vision. www.clarissabonet.com.
Fortress, 2016 © Clarissa Bonet / Images courtesy Catherine Edelman Gallery, Chicago.
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Mixed Use, 2016 Š Clarissa Bonet / Images courtesy Catherine Edelman Gallery, Chicago.
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The Crossing, 2011 Š Clarissa Bonet / Images courtesy Catherine Edelman Gallery, Chicago.
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Taxi, 2012 Š Clarissa Bonet / Images courtesy Catherine Edelman Gallery, Chicago.
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Removal, 2015 Š Clarissa Bonet / Images courtesy Catherine Edelman Gallery, Chicago.
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Rhythm of the Street, 2017 Š Clarissa Bonet / Images courtesy Catherine Edelman Gallery, Chicago.
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art
Liminal Exploration Destination Architecture Both universal landscapes and personal experiences are represented in a new publication that considers the wider effects of architectural tourism.
In times of increasingly uncertain and tumultuous geopolitics, includes three separate aspects, is triangulated into three difit has never been more important to “think global, act local.” ferent buildings connected by two roof surfaces. Meanwhile, The catchphrase is usually attributed to the pioneering Scot- all the walls and barrel vaults are made up of compressed tish town planner and social activist Patrick Geddes, whose earth, becoming highly suited to the climactic demands 1915 book Cities in Evolution discusses urban planning with of the site, and acting as an efficient temperature regulator. respect to the human condition. In this unique text he argues Further to this, ventilation openings provide a natural flow of the case for working with the environment and its local com- air so that the building conditioning works without mechanic munities, instead of in opposition to them. This impulse – on backing. The overhanging roof acts as a canopy and provides the one hand favouring worldwide significance, whilst on effective outdoor spaces. Whilst Kéré’s example responded functionally and critically the other demanding the immediate localised situation – is evident throughout the commodious Destination Architec- to its organic needs, some of the featured structures literally ture. This compendium offers 1,000 buildings from across reflect their surroundings, one example being the Nanjing the world – many small and medium-sized builds – selected Wanjing Garden Chapel in Jiangsu China, designed in 2014 for both their aesthetic qualities and their inventiveness, as a by AZL. This small chapel, which is used by the Nanjing Union Theological Seminary, is located beside the Nanjing Riverguide to cutting-edge contemporary living. As to be expected in such a voluminous sampling, the build- front. Its shapely, arresting exterior – two muted spires and a ings featured are thrillingly diverse in their approaches. As curve – are mirrored in the water, creating a near-symmetrical Phaidon’s editors note: “The buildings were selected for a host extension of the building’s form. Its exterior is formed of thin of reasons – beauty and purpose are certainly two of these. pillars of wood (like pencil shading on a fine drawing), and We included a lot of fantastic small builds that embody both they allow light to flood the chapel’s luminous white interiors. Further to these thematic connections throughout the book, these values.” These projects include Diébédo Francis Kéré’s (b. 1965) Centre for Earth Architecture in Mali, a structure with the projects are arranged – as the title suggests – by their a cantilevered roof, which is sited on the crest of a dike that location. One of the merits of geographical representation is also encompasses a mosque. Its outline is compliantly sleek that it brings designs into conversation with one another, both and pared back, using a local vocabulary and responding to on a neighbouring level and also more widely – they encourthe texture and fabric of the landscape, without compromis- age patterns of what the theorists Rosa Braidotti and Pierre ing a view of the mosque. As well as its beautiful exterior qual- Joris call “nomadic thought,” reading dynamically across and ities, the centre has been tailored to its function, and to the through different social and political borders, paying attenoutside topographies. For example, the visitor centre, which tion to smaller, more recognisable contexts. The editors think
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Light*House, UNStudio, 2013, Aarhus, Denmark. Picture credit: Mikkel Frost (project 285, page 161, upper).
“The editors conceieve of the book as a kind of field guide ‘primarily a travel guide, so the most user-friendly format is to present the structures by place’, but this decision opens the buildings up into more fruitful dialogues.”
Previous Page: Dogok Maximum, Moon Hoon, 2016, Dogok-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul, South Korea. Picture credit: Namgoong Sun (project 143, page 88, upper). Left: UN City, 3XN, 2013, Copenhagen, Denmark. Picture credit: 3XN/Adam Mørk (project 292, page 164, lower).
of the book as a kind of field guide, “primarily a travel guide, have included a swathe of buildings that respond to their so the most user-friendly format is to present the structures environment in dynamic, engaging ways. The Romsdal Folk by place”, but this decision opens up more fruitful dialogues Museum (2016) by Reiulf Ramstad, is one such design: its from a critical standpoint. What is the significance of similari- spiky, zigzagged roof is produced to mirror Romsdal’s traties and differences within or, indeed, across borders? Des- ditional pitch-roof. Elsewhere, 3XN’s Blue Planet Aquarium tination Architecture draws up conversations about projects features an organic shape that is inspired by waves, and and the landscape – a relationship that is both connective which mimics a whirlpool from above; a swirling path leads and reciprocal. Examples of this include Isbjerget (2013), you into the entrance, creating an almost seamless transition designed by seARCH, CEBRA, JDS architects and Louis from the surrounding water and fields.” In an age where the image is ever more central to expePaillard, and Light*House (2012), which are both in Aarhus, Denmark. These works make use of light and their immedi- rience, part of the collection is likely to be recognisable or ate position on the water, enabling them to reflect the waves familiar to a wide audience because of its visual or even and promote social spaces through the elements. They also “likeable” appeal. As the editors note: “Some of the buildings seem to suggest a particular pairing with the contemporary might feature heavily on Instagram, say, because they have aesthetic prevalent in Aarhus. Isberjget, for example, is real- a fantastical form: Zaha Hadid, Herzog & de Meuron, Frank ised through the dramatic shape of an iceberg, with playful Gehry, OMA and Rem Koolhaas all come to mind. Specificalangles and peaks, but with a sweeping elegance to its form, ly, we love OMA’s MahaNakhon Tower, Hadid’s Port House in hosting diverse housing types in four L-shaped wings which Antwerp, Gehry’s Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris, Herzog & de Meuron’s Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, and FR-EE’s Museo contain more than 200 one- or two-storey apartments. Another example that takes hold of light as an innovative Soumaya — for their eye-popping forms.” Phaidon’s publication promotes attention to the appreciamode of communication is Buckingham Gate (2013), London, which carries the façade of folding planes that reflect differ- tion of architecture, positing the potential for exterior forms ent types of light based on the time of day. This futuristic and to be integrated into everyday life, perhaps as an activity or forward-looking building is also sensitive to its surrounding collective interest. Ultimately the publication asks: how can environs – a historic area of London being extensively rede- an engagement with buildings create wider, philosophical veloped and reconsidered. This indeed looks at the notion of and recreational meaning – to international audiences – by inviting viewers to stop, visit and enjoy the physicality as optemporality, change, and ultimately, progression. Many of the examples also engage in ecologically so- posed to simply reading about the design? This is something phisticated practices that respond to the fabric of the earth that is integral to the editorial approach: “We hope that the as a mediator for its own sustainability. As the editors point book appeals to architectural buffs, but also encourages out: “This wasn’t the primary intention of the text, but we people curious about design and culture more widely to seek
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Finance for Danish Industry, 3XN, 2002, Copenhagen, Denmark. Picture credit: Helene Hoyer Mikkelsen (project 291, page 164, upper).
out standout structures, just as they would a gallery, or store.” nonetheless an example of forward-thinking design. At the With this approach in mind, the book’s structure capitalises other side of the spectrum, in Melbourne, the RMIT Design on emerging audiences for tourism, and an interest in the Hub (2012) by Sean Godsell features an elegant façade, spectacle of architecture. This is a trend that has significantly which is clad in more than 16,000 sand-blasted photovoltaic emerged in recent years, with audiences actively travelling glass discs. This wildly futuristic and visually stunning proto take in structures, has grown into a phenomenon, and a ject might already be familiar to some, as it featured in the kind of awe-inspiring or personally fulfilling activity: “Partic- popular science fiction film Predestination. In this way, the compilation could be seen as creating a ular styles – Brutalism, say – have really captured the wider public’s imagination, particularly through channels such as cultural, intricate network of buildings that highlight and Instagram. Classical / landmark / iconic works have always engage with issues such as sustainability and adaptability, as been on travellers’ hit lists, but it’s a nice swing to see that well as bringing the personal into the public realm. Each of contemporary buildings are being given the same creed – the institutions, chapels, schools, museums and hotels initiate a dialogue around the cultural context of architecture’s particularly those with an element of the spectacle.” A few of the more magnificent buildings include, in Szc- place in global and local communities at large: “A huge zecin, the Philharmonic Hall (2014) by Barozzi Veiga. This number of designs included have sustainable credentials, concert space is clad in a beautiful translucent ribbed and promote interaction. It seemed particularly prescient in glass, and contrasts dramatically with the conditions of its denser urban spaces, to have an element of community or surrounding environment. Its most prominent feature is its shared space. University campuses, for example, included zigzagging roofline, made up of a series of sharply pitched super-wide stairwells, to encourage interaction between stugables. In Los Angeles, The Broad (2015) by Diller Scofidio dents as they moved about the building.” Architectural tourism raises many issues of how local aes+ Renfro created a striking new landmark for the city. It has a bright white, honeycombed, concrete exo-skeleton, and thetics are maintained in an era of uncertain geopolitics. This undeterred, fascinating book – in its investigation of inside an acre of column-free exhibition space. However, the compendium also features examples that are how places are defined by their structures – encourages atsmaller in scale, and in some ways less spectacular. In Cam- tention at both levels of the international and the regional. bridge, Cowan Court, 2016, by 6a is a rather unassuming Whilst Geddes might not have foreseen the extent of our acstructure, but, with a façade of reclaimed oak-board, deftly celerating, digitalised, connective planet, he would perhaps references the masonry cladding and proportions of its have been interested in the extent to which architecture has neighbouring 1960s accommodation. This quieter approach emerged as a social-orientated practice and activity, one that is a project that might not usually receive the same global brings people to countries to marvel, engage and enjoy new attention that Destination Architecture bestows but which is spaces, and indeed, new worlds.
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Right: 62 Buckingham Gate, 2013. Pelli Clarke Pelli and Swanke Hayden Connell. Hufton + Crow/VIEW.
Words Colin Herd
www.phaidon.com
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art
Modes of Communication Kevin Cooley
At Light’s Edge provides desolate views of American landscapes illuminated by eerie distress signals – messages coming from above or vice-versa. Lightning that shoots or seemingly falls through the sky highlights the notion of endangered beauty, whilst correlating with beliefs in divine or extra-terrestrial phenomenon. The project was shot in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming – one of the least populated regions in the country – states selected for their scenic qualities. Ultimately, these environments maintain a historical significance; many are important to local Native American tribes, or provided paths for early western pioneers, giving rise to ideas about exploration and identity. The organic forces foregrounded in Kevin Cooley’s (b. 1975) images are used to question systems of knowledge. Cooley creates frameworks through which to observe gestures and decipher complex relationships with nature, technology and each other. www.kevincooley.net.
Kevin Cooley, Badlands I South Pass, Wyoming, 2009. Chromogenic print, singular edition of 7+1ap. 30x38.5 & 48.5x60”.
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Kevin Cooley, Badlands II Lyman, Wyoming, 2009. Chromogenic print, singular edition of 7+1ap, 30x38.5 & 48.5x60�. Courtesy of the artist and Kopeikin Gallery, Los Angeles.
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Kevin Cooley, Wind River Canyon Wyoming, 2009. Chromogenic print, singular edition of 7+1ap, 30x38.5 & 48.5x60�. Courtesy of the artist and Kopeikin Gallery, Los Angeles.
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Kevin Cooley, Badlands III, Lonetree, Wyoming, 2009. Chromogenic print, singular edition of 7+1ap, 30x38.5 & 48.5x60�. Courtesy of the artist and Kopeikin Gallery, Los Angeles.
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Kevin Cooley, Madison River, Montana, 2009. Chromogenic print singular edition of 7+1ap, 30x38.5 & 48.5x60�. Courtesy of the artist and Kopeikin Gallery, Los Angeles.
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Kevin Cooley, Driggs, Montana, 2009. Chromogenic print, singular edition of 7+1ap, 30x38.5 & 48.5x60�. Courtesy of the artist and Kopeikin Gallery, Los Angeles.
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art
United Progression Digital Handmade Combining unprecedented technologies with traditional techniques, Lucy Johnston navigates the future of design through compromise and innovation.
French poet and critic Remy de Gourmont (1858-1915) once guise of a dining room table. The table measures 14.5 × 7.3 said: “Industry has operated against the artisan in favour of m and is able to sit 80 guests; each person is perched delithe idler, and in favour of capital and against labour. Any cately on the ocean’s shelf, eating off the coastline, “candlemechanical invention whatsoever has been more harmful lit” by the cities (represented by pockmarks drilled through to humanity than a century of war.” This statement remains the wood, each sized according to their amount of light pollution as measured by NASA satellite images at night). This to be disputed within today’s cultural sphere. Technological industries are allowing society to push to is a feat of engineering and imagination – firmly supporting the extremes of design and product; and indeed, the fear Johnston’s assertion that humans will always be integral to that humans will be replaced is as rife a fear as it was during design, no matter how far practices advance. The author views the digital revolution as “an enabler in the 18th and 20th centuries. However, Lucy Johnston’s Digital Handmade: Craftsmanship and the New Industrial Revo- a positive way”, allowing artisans to push the boundaries lution explores the realities of these new avenues as mod- of form and structure, and to make things that physically ern-day practices at the forefront of our imagination – and may not have been possible before. Integral to this is the all the positives and negatives that they entail – through a opportunity for further experimentation; previously young comprehensive publication released by Thames & Hudson. designers would have been limited by funds, unable to Featuring 80 designers, the book starts with Assa acquire commercial machinery or gain access to industrial Ashuach’s early experiments with three-dimensional workshops. They can now work with a wide range of tools, printing (the sintered titanium Lemon Squeezer) through through initiatives in shared ownership and programming, as to his sleek Venturi chair collection inspired by the Venturi well as having studio access. It used to be expensive to fail; fluidflow effect. Johnston immediately thrusts the reader now people are willing to try new things. As Johnston notes: into the thick of the 21st century condition. For design “Everything is so much more accessible, enabling designers aficionados the terminology will be nothing new, but for to be both hands-on and work in a cost-effective way.” New manufacturing technologies can provide huge savthe everyday reader, descriptions like “five-axis CNCmilled mould” will be a steep learning curve. Johnston’s ings; the machines can be swiftly reprogrammed to make a advice? Learn it. These are the words of the future as much completely difference object or shape. This combination of adaptability and affordability means that the consumer has as “carving” and “lathing” have been in the past. Johnston does not limit the book to pure functional design, the option to make slight customisations without major costbut incorporates everything from UK studio Atmoss’ World- implication or investment. Such developments also herald a scape (2012), a three-dimensional map of the planet in the return to a more sustainable method of local-production,
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Jan Wertell and Gernot Oberfell, Atomic Light (2016). Material: Nylon. Technique: Selective Laser Sintering. Courtesy WertelOberfell.
“We live in the ‘experience economy’; everyone wants their own take on things, but we need some kind of parameter or guidelines otherwise everything would fall through.”
Previous Page: Jan Wertell and Gernot Oberfell, Atomic Light (2016). Material: Nylon. Technique: Selective Laser Sintering. Courtesy WertelOberfell. Left: Jan Wertell and Gernot Oberfell, Aurelia (2011), Pendant light for Yamagiwa, Japan. Materials: Mouthblown Glass, Aluminium. Photo credit: Nacasa & Partners Inc. Courtesy WertelOberfell.
Johnston places post-modern designers of Dean’s ilk away from the assembly lines of the past. Johnston notes: “We live in the ‘experience economy’; everyone wants their against the modern: artists like Beatwoven (founded by own take on things, but we need some kind of parameter Nadia-Anne Ricketts) use audio software to convert a digior guidelines otherwise everything would fall through. The tal pattern to be woven on a Jacquard loom; Tord Boontje’s concept of mass-customisation revolves around the crea- Garland Light (2002) – a computer designed pendant light tion of fewer, really good quality products as opposed to an uses photochemical etching to cut thin sheets of copper, endless stream of different versions that just sit on shelves. brass, or silver into a garland shape; jewellery designer Emily Cobb’s fantastical headpieces, rings and necklaces These things don’t exist until they’re needed.” A return to more localised production is also seen in the modelled in CAD and using printed with three-dimensional assorted designs, with many referencing antiquities. These technology. Without a doubt, Cobb’s The Elk with Antlers include Barry X Ball’s Envy (2008-present), a Belgian rep- That Never Stopped Growing (2010), an exquisitely intricate lica of the 17th century sculpture Invidia by Giusto Le Court; headpiece made of over 50 separate elements printed in Michael Eden’s reimagining of iconic porcelain forms by nylon, would not have been possible 50 years ago. By Wedgewood; and Jorge Ayala’s Cabinet of Post-Digital Curi- using digital techniques, each of these artists is changing the way products can, and are being made. osities (2013), a platform to explore new skins and textures. Interestingly, one of the key trends represented in the Ayala’s reference point – cabinets housing private collections of objects – became the rage during the 18th and 19th publication is the new interest in incorporating handmade centuries. Small selections (often referred to as Wunderkam- craftsmanship. Jorge Ayala, Beatwoven, Lia Cook and mers, “wonder rooms”) took the odd, the curious, and the won- Louise Lemieux Bérubé use software to create new visual derful and placed them as though in narrative or interaction. effects with thread and fabric; Valissa Butterworth, Michael Skeletons, exotic taxidermy, seashells, preserved organs – all Eden and design group Front are using cutting edge techno haphazard and eclectic – were often the point of pride for new digital tools give her a new dynamism in her designs: collectors. Famously, Danish physician Ole Worm’s museum “[they] force me to be more creative, to perfect the result, to of sorts, the Wormanium, was filled with stuffed tribal weap- experiment with the yarns. There is no excuse to feel limited.” This is best epitomised by Exposure (2010) – a behemoth ons and dried animals taken from his travels. Ayala fully explores the mythic status of these collections through an adept work of Antony Gormley. Measuring 25 metres high, it occuhandling of biology and form. Arranging rapid-prototyped pies a desolate stretch of the Dutch provinces of Friesland and moulds and latex-cast resin organisms as though pinned to Flevoland. Modelled as Gormley’s crouching figure, the work Worm’s walls, he forces experimental shapes to take on a new took over 18 months to fabricate and install. Based on an inilife, and a new structure. He takes this further through his fash- tial plaster outline of the artist, the cast was then scanned and subjected to unique algorithms to define the exact arrangeion label, Jorge Ayala Paris, inspired by the natural world.
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Bram Geenen, Gaudi Chair.
ment and placements of the struts. With no defined load path, it was only by using bespoke software that the design team could create this sculpture. Each piece of material has been honed so that only a minimal amount is needed, making the sculpture an extreme feat of engineering. As with Australian artist Louis Pratt’s sculptures of the human figure, Gormley’s interest in the human form is distinctly tied to technology. Whereas Pratt uses the mathematical sine wave to play on the viewer’s perception of her sculptures – when viewed from a certain angle the bent and twisted sculptures are viewed in full, correct proportion – Gormley plays with his audiences through the possibilities allowed by careful and precise mathematics. Johnston argues that this is a positive: “Through digital technology we can actually analyse, rather than just make an approximate judgement about, the dimensions and the structure [of objects in nature]. We can now measure and recreate them perfectly.” This capability has changed the way objects are made and designed, and will continue to do so. Gernot Oberfell and Jan Wertel have managed to do this through simulation software, perhaps best epitomised by their Fractal Table. Taking as their source the growth patterns seen in organic forms, and using mathematical algorithms, they construct a tree-like structure which seems to grow from the floor, literally branching out to form a table-top. The duo is wholly reliant on new technologies to both conceive and produce the table. Its size and complexity means they have had to use rapid-prototyping technologies (stereolithography) to manufacture it. They have pioneered the capabilities of “new” design, taking the “the cleverness of nature” and adapting it to their own uses. The combination of nature and industry raises the ques-
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tions of evolution and revolution, for Johnston two ideas closely intertwined. They are visually articulated through the work of Bram Geenen, whose technically advanced furniture designs, (famously the Gaudí chair) take as their source the parabolic curve. He suspends chains across two supports, naturally creating the curve which he then replicates in his furniture designs. This technique was used by Antoni Gaudí to create organic, curvilinear buildings, but Geenen utilises it alongside modern technology. Using the laser-sintering technique and carbon fibre he creates a sleek high-quality product that uses the minimal amount of material required for maximum strength. Visually, the chair is the antithesis of that made by Chinese Industrial designer Zhang Zhoujie, but both have one important thing in common: the client. Geenen and Zhoujie take as the first step the human body, measuring the way in which a person sits and where the weight is placed. Zhoujie’s designs are particularly specific: using a “digitised fabrication system”, producing personalised chairs, each made to fit an individual’s specific seated pose. The series, Endless Forms, pushes the idea of comfort to the next level – perfectly moulded to the client’s body it is high-end customisation at its finest. Despite how advanced and “futuristic” the chair looks, it is ultimately based in nature. Whether looking at the translation of complex organic forms into aesthetically considered tables or a reconsideration of budgeting, we are continually looking for new tools to speed up our ability to “reinvent the wheel.” But Johnston’s text does not infer that humans will be made redundant – if anything she argues that we will be required more than ever to embrace digital methods as part of a new, minimalist world of innovation – with people at the helm of originality and creativity.
Right: Jan Wertell and Gernot Oberfell, Atomic Light (2016). Material: Nylon. Technique: Selective Laser Sintering. Courtesy WertelOberfell.
Words Niamh Coghlan www.thamesandhudson.com
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art
Living Detachment Tania Franco Klein
Tania Franco Klein (b. 1990) began taking pictures whilst studying for a BA in Architecture in Mexico City, before moving to the UK to pursue a Masters at the University of the Arts London. Highly influenced by social behaviour, her poignant works uncover the darker elements of culture, from over-consumption and media over-stimulation to emotional disconnection. This becomes clear in Our Life In The Shadows, a series built upon the American dream gone wrong. Open windows and gas burners glare into rooms lit only by a dystopian sun down, whilst figures look outwards, silently, for solace. Franco Klein notes: “Philosopher Byung-Chul Han once said that we live in an era of exhaustion, caused by an incessant compulsion to perform. We now experience the neuronal era characterised by depression, attention deficit and bipolar disorder. My characters find themselves melting into places – constantly looking for any possibility of escape.� www.taniafrancoklein.com.
Tania Franco Klein, Border Line, 2016.
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Left: Tania Franco Klein, Dining Room (Self-Portrait), 2017. Right: Tania Franco Klein, Midnight Recipe, 2016.
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Tania Franco Klein, Empty Rooms, 2016.
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Left: Tania Franco Klein, The Door (Self-Portrait), 2016. Right: Tania Franco Klein, Miss Communication , 2016.
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Tania Franco Klein, The Window (Self-Portrait), 2017.
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Left: Tania Franco Klein, Silk Memories (Self-Portrait), 2017. Right: Tania Franco Klein, Border Line II, 2016.
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Left: Tania Franco Klein, The Waiting, 2016. Right: Tania Franco Klein, Pipe Dream (Self-Portrait), 2017.
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art
Timeless Minimalism Charlie May the ever-changing face of fashion is exemplified through a unique label that combines digital origins and clean styling with an ethical commitment.
Charlie May, a Young British Designer with a strong minimalist aesthetic, began an eponymous label in 2011, building on a profile that had emerged from the popular blog Girl A La Mode. Since then, her designs have featured on London Fashion Week runways, become a favourite of style editors across Europe, and are now on offer in cities across the world. With a focus that is firmly placed on “silhouette, fabrication and colour,” the directional pieces revere simplicity and represent a decisive step away from fast, disposable fashion. An acute awareness of the role of digital promotion and commerce has helped the label to reach a global audience fast. This was not initially deliberate: when the blog was started in 2008, May never imagined it would help when she started the company three years later. Nonetheless, over the years it has contributed to a large online following and a wealth of significant industry contacts. “Being at the forefront of digital in the early years, whilst watching other big fashion houses at the time trying to get a grip on social media, was very interesting”, she says, explaining that “developing organically is key and I feel so lucky to have grown an audience over the last nine years that has seen me go from a student, to an intern, to a designer with her own label.” This level of business acumen does not, however, come at the expense of traditional design skills. May is quick to point out that the two aspects have always gone together: “I began teaching myself how to sew and sell products I’d made online even before I studied Fashion Design and pattern making in the traditional sense.” University provided the opportunity to hone the craft, before turning to the practicalities of running
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a business. But those early days of selling online had clearly helped. Creativity alone is no longer sufficient for success in this competitive field, and this is an approach that is extended to the developing business, suggesting that “it’s not enough to just be a very creative individual if you don’t know how to market that and to reach your potential. I don’t think anyone has a traditional job anymore; we all have multiple roles within the fashion industry and I expect my team to be able to be hands-on with any project that comes up day to day.” This involves being adaptable, as the fashion world responds to advances in technology, and also constantly learning new skills. May’s experiences with Japanese collaborators, who are “always at the forefront with digital support,” have been especially helpful in this regard. “They were shocked when we first started working together and I was still drawing my patterns by hand!” Although the label has garnered significant press attention over the years, May believes the rise of social networks such as Instagram mean the role of the traditional media is no longer as critical for young designers: “It’s enabled practitioners to take their audience into their own hands. You don’t need to rely on being on the covers of magazines to get your brand out there. A unique perspective and a fresh idea is all you need to propel you to a customer base in any corner of the world.” These digital platforms are allowing young British designers to stake their place in the competitive, fast-changing fashion industry, and reach global audiences through their own volition, no longer waiting for publicity in print. Nonetheless, some constants
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Styled by Basma Khalifa, Photographed by Christopher Fenner, Hair by Terri Capon and Make Up by Kenny Leung.
“I wear men’s pieces personally and I have a lot of male clients who wear the women’s also. I think androgyny is beautiful and I want to start building the website so that men and women are wearing the same garment in their own style.”
Previous Page: Styled by Basma Khalifa, Photographed by Christopher Fenner, Hair by Terri Capon and Make Up by Kenny Leung. Left: Styled by Basma Khalifa, Photographed by Christopher Fenner, Hair by Terri Capon and Make Up by Kenny Leung.
remain. As with so many pre-digital predecessors, May’s first collection after graduating “was created part-time in my living room and took a year to perfect.” At university, she had been fascinated by organic forms, and focused on “rusting silks and decomposing suede leathers.” This interest evolved in combination with “all the inspirations that had been building up.” The designer acknowledges that the work became “a lot more grown up and experimental” as 10 key looks were put together, which were then showcased with a short film that intended to share inspiration and emotions with other creatives. These looks are still a major feature of May’s practice today. Her favourite piece was an asymmetric white silk georgette shirt dress, which is “still very much Charlie May DNA.” The fact that six years later items from her first collection continue to represent a key part of her design vocabulary highlights the timelessness of these minimal pieces. May “loves a muted palette” and is excited by putting together “unusual colour combinations, such as a soft dusty grey compared to a bright Sakura pink,” as featured in the last Autumn / Winter collection. The company’s aesthetic reflects a core belief that clothes should be cherished forever. The notion of fast fashion and its environmental impact is something that wholly scares May, and it is a global concept that the label continues to rally against: “We all need to consider what it means to be a part of the industry and think about what we can do to make a change.” She calls on the whole industry to “wake up and realise what it’s doing to the Earth.” This is reflected in the work of the company, which is establishing more sustainable methods of manufacturing garments, particularly when it comes to knitwear. Having recently spent time in Peru, the
designer met “Andean alpaca farmers who weave and knit their own yarn. They live two hours outside of Cusco in the heart of the mountains and they live very hardy lives. I find working with these diverse communities so rewarding; the women I met are all incredibly inspiring and dedicated to their craft, which has been handed down throughout the generations.” For May, this ongoing commitment to sustainability also means producing simple and considered designs, with every detail thought through. The strong, digital presence also means that a dialogue is able to be created with customers, so that they are a part of this movement. However, minimalist design is not just about the clothes. It’s a way of avoiding over-consumption and mass production, a “lifestyle of being comfortable with less clutter surrounding yourself and your life. I love to meditate and work out every morning, eating well; it’s self-love.” This helps to navigate and cope with the accelerating speed of technology. A world where “we consume Instagram feeds at a nanosecond per picture” is exciting, she says, but she is also aware that “it can be easy to lose yourself.” Keeping a close eye on her strong brand message and remembering who the customer is crucial. This means that a core mantra of “silhouette, fabrication and colour” has become something of a mission statement; May considers these to be fundamentals, always focusing on these three elements throughout a garment’s design. In this way, they are linked to the emotions customers feel when wearing the clothes: “The overall design of the silhouette is important to create confidence, the colour relates to mood and the fabrication to comfort.” May focuses on creating excitement and empowerment. “I don’t like how the industry creates fear of not being good enough. I want my pieces to
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Styled by Basma Khalifa, Photographed by Christopher Fenner, Hair by Terri Capon and Make Up by Kenny Leung.
create happiness instead.” Ultimately, the goal is to create an intimate connection and even attachment between the wearer and the garment, one which is far-flung from any notion of disposability or carelessness. Simple shapes intended to instill confidence are becoming a major feature of modern womenswear, and indeed go beyond it, with androgynous pieces becoming more and more prevalent in contemporary fashion. May incorporates this thinking: “I have always been inspired by menswear and I am drawn inspirationally to a more tailored oversized silhouette.” Although the production of menswear was only introduced to the label last year, May is embracing a more gender-fluid approach and takes this to its logical conclusion: unisex pieces that defy boundaries. “I always wear men’s pieces personally and I have a lot of male clients who wear the women’s also. I am quite inspired by Japanese style and how different it is from the traditional western idea of dressing for your body type. I think androgyny is beautiful and I want to start building the website so that men and women are wearing the same garment in their own style.” In recent knitwear designs, the focus has been upon mixing “streetwear and hip hop style with luxury.” This translates into items such as “a ribbed merino tracksuit” in a “really thick beautiful yarn with the perfect slouch.” In these pieces, the design offers “elongating silhouettes,” working with “long sleeves that can be rucked up” and “a longer, more flattering length in the torso,” with a side-split worked in for that allimportant movement and comfort. May relishes the challenge of creating simple, stripped-back clothing, which, despite its clean-cut nature might actually be “the most difficult thing you can do.” These creative garments are given the
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distinctive Charlie May touch through small key differences in design and only using the best natural fibre available. As always, the dialogue with customers and individuals is of utmost importance: “It’s important for a woman to be free to move throughout her day in complete comfort and confidence whilst not having to sacrifice what she’s wearing in any way. When a woman feels confident I think it radiates out.” However, the athletic influence is not limited to the featured shapes and cuts. Despite demonstrating a passion for natural fibres, the label will continue exploring technical yarns in sportswear for example, which “has been a huge inspiration on the industry with the active way we all live our lives now. I’ve always used natural fibres but I’d be very excited to experiment with new methods.” This progressive approach to the business of fashion also has an impact on the nature of retailing itself, with the distinction between buyers and partners often becoming more blurred than in the past. May describes the company as being represented by a “curated landscape of retail partners”; relationships are built consciously and outlets for distribution chosen very carefully. “I think when you have a strong vision of a design aesthetic it makes sense that you want to partner with the stores that have that same brand ethos as yourself. I love to work with boutiques and stores that share my views and have something unique to say with their buying and retail offering.” The whole lifecycle of May’s designs then, is thoroughly contemporary. From the brand’s digital beginnings, to its careful dialogue with customers, this thread runs all the way to the means by which she sells her pieces. Reflected in her minimalist style and philosophy, this ethos is truly forward-looking and inspiring.
Right: Styled by Basma Khalifa, Photographed by Christopher Fenner, Hair by Terri Capon and Make Up by Kenny Leung.
Words Anna Feintuck
www.charlie-may.co.uk
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art
Sensory Disconnect Jeanette Hägglund
Jeanette Hägglund is a Swedish photographer based in Uppsala who has worked in the industry for 12 years across advertising and portraiture. A consistently bright and bold aesthetic can be found in various commercial and personal series, which collectively free viewers from a measurable, recognisable reality. Alienation is at the very centre of the artist’s practice: images from Temptations – shot in Copenhagen and Malmö – revel in flourishing forms and hyperreal colours. Meanwhile, Beyond the Beach offers a closer look into a small tourist village where older hotels will soon be superseded by tall resort complexes. Similarities can be seen in both series; whether negative or positive, the end result is an altered perspective. Although pop minimalism is a concept widely used in digital photography, Hägglund utilises the format not to comment upon a universal existence – one that is increasingly reductive in its anonymity – but to open minds to new possibilities. www.jeanettehagglund.se.
Jeanette Hägglund, “Bitter Sweet Symphony”, Temptations, Cph 2015.
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Jeanette Hägglund, “Flutes in the Air”, Temptations, Cph 2015.
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Jeanette Hägglund, “Blue Velvet”, Dreams Away - abstract reflections, 2016, Seoul.
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Jeanette Hägglund, “Too Close to Comfort”, Too Close to Comfort, Cph 2015.
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Jeanette Hägglund, “Falling from the Sun”, Hamburg, 2015.
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Jeanette Hägglund, “The Air Near My Fingers”, Beyond the Beach, Calpe 2016.
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Jeanette Hägglund, “Echoes of Silence”, Temptations. Cph 2015.
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art
Seeking Transience Cig Harvey
Cig Harvey (b. 1973) returns to Aesthetica for the third time with images from You an Orchestra You a Bomb, a new photobook that pays attention to the fragile present. Each vignette captures moments of awe, resting in the threshold between bewitchment and disaster. Each image nestles within split seconds where beauty mingles alongside an arresting sense of danger – dripping with sensory information and visceral consideration. There are moments of enlightenment to be found in a tangled web of emotion: characters are brought to the surface as harbingers for events that are yet to play out. Harvey is included in the permanent collections of major museums including The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Solo shows for this latest monograph open simultaneously at Robert Mann Gallery, New York, and at Robert Klein Gallery, Boston, in December, running until January. Harvey is represented in the UK by Beetles + Huxley, London. www.cigharvey.com.
Cig Harvey, The Sky Lantern, You an Orchestra You a Bomb, 2017.
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Left: Cig Harvey, Surf Trip, Gardening at Night, 2012. Right: Cig Harvey, The Twirled Locket (cut), You an Orchestra You a Bomb, 2015.
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Left: Cig Harvey, Lady Slipper, You an Orchestra You a Bomb, 2017. Right: Cig Harvey, Ariel Waiting, You an Orchestra You a Bomb, 2016.
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Left: Cig Harvey, Magnolia Tree, You an Orchestra You a Bomb, 2017. Right: Cig Harvey, Goldfinch, Gardening at Night, 2014.
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Left: Cig Harvey, Juneberry Tree, You an Orchestra You a Bomb, 2017. Right: Cig Harvey, Hannah in the Black Truck, You an Orchestra You a Bomb, 2017.
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art
Cultural Dimensions Stephen Shore A major retrospective offers audiences an unprecedented understanding of an artist whose vision has been shaped by contemporary, accelerating worlds.
At the age of six, American photographer Stephen Shore (b. 1947) started developing his parents’ negatives. He was given a camera at nine, and by the time he was 14 he was on the phone to MoMA’s Director of the Department of Photography, Edward Steichen, proposing his work for the collection. Steichen bought three images. However, it didn’t end there: a regular at Andy Warhol’s Factory by the age of 17, Shore documented the various characters who frequented the studio, quickly setting himself up as one of the most infamous young photographers working in New York City. This early success could have left him in a precarious situation, but the magic of his practice lies in the continual quest to interrogate new ways of looking. This desire to personally and professionally evolve provides the basis for the most comprehensive exhibition to date. Curated by Quentin Bajac and Kristen Gaylord, the show spans everything from the early Americana, right through to print-on-demand books, and finally, to an engagement with the latest social media platforms. It’s also not a coincidence that Bajac is part of this unique and awe-inspiring show, having been appointed The Joel and Anne Ehrenkranz Chief Curator of the Department of Photography at The Museum of Modern Art in January 2013, after spending nine years at the Centre Pompidou, Musée National d’Art Moderne, where he curated numerous shows on modern and contemporary photography. Bajac is unequivocally an avid believer in the place of the image as a method for renewal, for expansion, and for regeneration, something held at the core of this mammoth
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retrospective: “Shore keeps re-inventing himself. He’s always been intrigued by new, popular, democratic ways of producing images. In the past this meant working with snapshots, but today, this includes engaging with Instagram. I’m especially interested in this; he never tries to stick to one style. Given all the artists of his generation, this is the reason he is one of the most interesting.” Such thirst for innovation can be seen across the entirety of his oeuvre. Shore revolutionised many things, but it is for using colour photography at a time when no-one else was that he is best known. Black and white was de rigeur in the 1970s, because at the time using full colour was viewed as vulgar and commonplace. Shore, revelling in modernity, adopted the new genre as his own, using it in all its vivacious capabilities. His endeavours were recognised by academia at the time, with a retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art, New York, in 1971. This exhibition was far from a resounding critical success, but it did set the stage for further explorations into the medium; he set off on a cross-country trip across the USA the next year. The resulting snapshots of a glass of milk alongside a plate of pancakes and bacon seen in Grand Canyon, New Mexico, (1972) reframed the landscape famously presented through the eyes of Walker Evans and Paul Strand, artists that Shore both identifies with and is inspired by. It’s important to note that even in these groundbreaking works – which have often been deemed timeless for their tonal and compositional complexities – offer a lens into the world as it was then. Similarly, devoid of a juxtaposition be-
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Stephen Shore, Macon, Georgia, June 1972. From American Surfaces. © Stephen Shore. Courtesy 303 Gallery, New York.
“Such thirst for innovation can be seen across the entirety of his oeuvre. Shore revolutionised many things, but it is for using colour photography at a time when no-one else was that he is best known.”
Previous Page: Stephen Shore, La Brea Avenue and De Longpre Avenue, Los Angeles, California, June 11, 1975. From Uncommon Places. © Stephen Shore. Courtesy 303 Gallery, New York. Left: Stephen Shore, Washington Avenue, North Adams, Massachusetts, July 14, 1974. From Uncommon Places. © Stephen Shore. Courtesy 303 Gallery, New York.
tween idealisation and reality, the images captured streets and sidewalks through maintaining an unbiased stance, instead preferring the subjectivity of the flâneur. This insight into the quotidian continues through to the iconic Uncommon Places (1982), a series which looks at geography as a hinge point for human interaction. Bajac states: “Uncommon Places is about urban landscapes; the representation of architecture expresses certain forces – political, social and aesthetic – those that are at play within our culture.” It’s easy to see how this series developed into widespread iconography. For example, Aperture Foundation recently republished a number of them in Stephen Shore: Selected Works 1973-1981, calling upon introductions from a variety of well-known cultural figures including Wes Anderson and David Campany. However, images from this era are often viewed with a sense of nostalgia (as opposed to innovation), a term that the curation is keen to reflect. “I didn’t want the exhibition to only focus on the 1970s – though there will be a major part of the show that will be devoted to that era – but I also wanted to show some recent works. There are approximately 50 pieces from Uncommon Places, but it was also my goal to include series that are indirectly connected to it. For example, I’m showing some stereoscopic pieces from 1974 and 1975. I’m also introducing some editorial and commissions that Shore did at the same time that also relate to the vernacular sense of America.” Bajac, as both a curator and avid aficionado, clearly resists a simplified and perhaps unfair reading purely regarding sentimentality and a longing to glamourise the past. This becomes clear in the choices made to display lesser-known compositions, as well as offering a large space to new pieces
posted publicly through Instagram. Whilst recognising the merit in earlier photographs, the exhibition includes a sense of urgency to be responsive to audiences, and to engage in the practice as an ever-changing format: “New generations give you new readings, illuminating things that you have not found. You must be open to these. Shore is not all nostalgic.” However, whilst the emergence of touch screens, “liking” cultures and immediate gratification are elements that are wholly embraced in this retrospective, the images taken from the artist’s main page (@stephen.shore) shouldn’t be disregarded, or even seen to be separate from the 20th century series, where empty streets, suburban houses and classic cars surface. Even though the lens may have changed, the theme and subject matter are similar. Bajac expands: “If you have a look at his account, I think the posts are quite consistent with what he used to do. They deal with architecture – close-ups of structures – and it’s true that they still have the distance that you can feel right from the start of the 1960s and 1970s. In a way, they have the indirect, autobiographical aspect that his work carries.” What’s evident in the curation is an interest in the same everyday phenomena, but a recognition that the places in which we live out our daily existence are in a state of flux. Shop windows from the 1970s are no longer representative of today’s America. Nor are analogue cameras. As an individual, a traveller and a documenter, the artist is wholly intrigued by contemporary lands, and all that they encompass. His desire to see, to observe, to experiment and to capture has not changed, but the ways in which we process information – through spontaneous screens and virtual realities – have. So what does this mean for the
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Stephen Shore, Kanab, Utah, June 1972. From American Surfaces. © Stephen Shore. Courtesy 303 Gallery, New York.
future? Bajac offers: “What I think is different with Instagram is the international scope – Shore can post and have this dialogue with people. There’s a possibility of disseminating images immediately, and he can have new followers and be able to establish a visual dialogue as an exchange with his audiences. It’s really more like a visual language, one that is also real with written communication. This is something that we both find fascinating, and indeed refreshing.” Whilst this will undeniably be a blockbuster event, MoMA has created the perfect arena to reflect upon the work as it was intended, considering the temporal nature of topographies in a completely radical way. Taking a chronological journey from gelatin silver prints to the rise of large-scale digital compositions, and then, finally, to a room of screens, the gallery presents the opportunity to experience an uncompromising pursuit of photography’s possibilities – both conceptually and physically. Audiences are taken from the white-walled houses in Backyard off U.S. 98, Apalachicola, Florida, (1976) right up to unforeseen, unnamed captions on apps. Ending with the opportunity to swipe, scroll, like and comment, individuals are essentially looking into a mirror, responding to the current climate, and engaging with the present. It is, of course, only fitting that the Instagram feed be displayed through its virtual dimension. As Bajac asserts: “I didn’t want to print them. They are meant to be seen on an iPhone, or on a screen, so they will be shown that way.” And indeed, why shouldn’t they? The way that humanity processes information has now changed, and the iconography that fills the gallery’s walls has only come to fruition through trying out new methods, and by treading
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new ground. There is something to be respected in this, and also a fundamental lesson about contemporary art within the wider historical and cultural sphere. Memory is not something that Shore ultimately avoids, but moves past in search of invention. Bajac notes: “I think if I could define his approach, I would use the term ‘anthropologist.’ In an interview in 2005, he was asked the question: ‘what would you do if you weren’t a photographer?’ And he answered: ‘archaeology.’ It’s true that his images have this dimension; they’re about traces of the everyday, and about the archaeology of the contemporary in the making.” MoMA has touched on something truly special here, and asks poignant questions about why visionaries like Shore resonate in our minds as original, acclaimed, and to be “followed.” He is a keen observer of the contemporary condition, one that recognises his place within the “now”, and one that is simultaneously detached. Through inserting the camera as a barrier between the frame and reality, whether that’s looking out at vast forestry in Merced River, Yosemite National Park, California, August 13, 1979 or to recognisable streets in Beverly Boulevard and La Brea Avenue, Los Angeles, California, June 21, 1975, he offers a plane of existence and remembrance that only artists can do. Bajac’s closing words linger in the mind: “Shore is always passing through countries, not as an insider or indeed an outsider – a tourist. He is a traveller within his own country, and in others.” Much like the floods of people entering the gallery, we, as consumers, editors and digital natives, are glancing through the aperture – one narrative at a time – to reach an understanding of the world around us, one that is currently playing out before our eyes.
Right: Stephen Shore, Backyard off U.S. 98, Apalachicola, Florida, February 4, 1976. From Uncommon Places. © Stephen Shore. Courtesy 303 Gallery, New York.
Words Niamh Coghlan Kate Simpson
Stephen Shore Until 28 May MoMA, New York www.moma.org
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Simulated Environment Tekla Evelina Severin
Tekla Evelina Severin (b. 1981) is a Stockholm-based interior architect who since 2010, has been working in the multidisciplinary fields of art direction, set design and photography. Featured in the following pages are images from the Bright Volumes series, a unique, whimsical collection that marries subtle choreography with complimentary colours. Faceless figures grapple with stairs, hallways and concrete grooves, playing with the space as if it holds the answer to a question, or is a provocateur for the human condition. Paired with these are compositions from Muralla Roja and Sunny, structurally resonant photographs that, draped in the light of a high sun, nod to a summer day in decline. Also featured is an image from Daniel’s Apt, shot for Note Design Studio for Sight Unseen, offering a keyhole view into an intimate interior – one that celebrates minimalism. Pastel doorways give way to deep blue walls, blending contemporary design with visual flair. www.teklaevelinaseverin.com.
Assignment for Bright Volumes, 2016. Photography, Art Direction and Creative Direction: Tekla Evelina Severin. Styling and Model: Sarah Baker. Location: DTLA. Public Architecture/Landscape: Ricardo Lagoretta, Architect.
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Outake from home portrait-series of Daniel Heckscher (Designer at Note Design Studio), 2016. Photography, Art Direction and Styling: Tekla Evelina Severin. Interior Design: Daniel Heckscher/Note Design.
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Assignment for Bright Volumes, 2016. Photography, Art Direction and Creative Direction: Tekla Evelina Severin. Styling and Model: Sarah Baker. Location: Palm Springs.
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Outtake from Muralla Roja, architecture series, 2016-2017. Photography, Art Direction and Creative Direction: Tekla Evelina Severin. Location: Calpe, Spain.
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Assignment for Bright Volumes, 2016. Photography, Art Direction and Creative Direction: Tekla Evelina Severin. Styling and Model: Sarah Baker. Location: Palm Springs.
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Outtake from Muralla Roja, architecture series, 2016-2017. Photography, Art Direction and Creative Direction: Tekla Evelina Severin. Location: Calpe, Spain.
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Outtake from Million Programme, architecture series in Alby for Subtopia Magazine, 2017. Photography, Art Direction and Creative Direction: Tekla Evelina Severin. Location; Alby, Stockholm, Sweden.
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Assignment for Bright Volumes, 2016. Photography, Art Direction and Creative Direction: Tekla Evelina Severin. Styling and Model: Sarah Baker. Location: Palm Springs.
art
Opulent Scenarios Dean Bradshaw
Dean Bradshaw is a photographer and director interested in the elements that sit below the surface. Conceptually engaging, each composition focuses on the finer details that define the exterior. The featured images – taken from Hyper Color – are led by uninhibited narratives that immerse viewers in peculiar, extraordinary microcosms. Lush backdrops are prevalent; rich, indulgent colours provide arresting settings for performative characters. Whilst the settings are static – windowless, exit-less and all-consuming – uninhibited models revel in the simplicity of their props and the frames within which they fully express themselves. Chequered floors, still clocks and un-hooked phones provide pop-coloured relief that is at once alienating and whimsical. With no reference to time or context, Bradshaw creates multi-layered realities which truly reflect the desire to balance intrigue with attraction. The ordinary is transformed into an illusory playground. www.deanbradshaw.com.
Photographer: Dean Bradshaw, Production: Jess Herman, Styling & Model: Ann-Marie Hoang (Instagram: @mstr_of_disguise). www.deanbradshaw.com.
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Photographer: Dean Bradshaw, Production: Jess Herman, Styling & Model: Ann-Marie Hoang (Instagram: @mstr_of_disguise). www.deanbradshaw.com.
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Photographer: Dean Bradshaw, Production: Jess Herman, Styling & Model: Ann-Marie Hoang (Instagram: @mstr_of_disguise). www.deanbradshaw.com.
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Photographer: Dean Bradshaw, Production: Jess Herman, Styling & Model: Ann-Marie Hoang (Instagram: @mstr_of_disguise). www.deanbradshaw.com.
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Photographer: Dean Bradshaw, Production: Jess Herman, Styling & Model: Ann-Marie Hoang (Instagram: @mstr_of_disguise). www.deanbradshaw.com.
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Photographer: Dean Bradshaw, Production: Jess Herman, Styling & Model: Ann-Marie Hoang (Instagram: @mstr_of_disguise). www.deanbradshaw.com.
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exhibition reviews
1 Hyundai Commission: One Two Three Swing! Superflex
Collective action and social purpose inspire the Danish art trio Superflex, whose new work once again transforms Tate’s Turbine Hall into a playground, in a similar way to Carsten Höller’s 2006 commission, Test Site, which famously brought a series of slides to the space for viewers to experience. This time, the artists invite visitors to populate one of the many three-person swings that pepper the hall and its surrounding areas, all interconnected by an orange line that flows out of Tate Modern’s south entrance. Carpeted in graphic stripes the colours of British banknotes, the imposing downward slope covering half of the Turbine Hall represents “apathy” as a giant pendulum swings hypnotically overhead. The lower level, with its multiple swings, represents “movement”, whilst buried in the far north-eastern corner is “production”, where the swings are assembled and stamped (though presumably
not actually produced) before their installation. Observers are told that if enough people swing together then the course of the pendulum will shift and change accordingly. The purpose of the space is to “challenge society’s apathy towards the political, environmental and economic crises of our age”, and indeed, the experience does offer a sense of connectivity that is perhaps much needed in today’s existential and geographical spheres. However, a sense of novelty also prevails above these more politicised undertones, where the theme gives way to physicality, and the importance of the immediate bodily experience outweighs the broader conceptual dimensions. Just as Tate’s previous commissions, the project proves to be overwhelmingly popular from both angles, offering a platform for collective reception and enjoyment; something to be truly celebrated within the artistic world.
Words Ruby Beesley
Tate Modern, London 3 October - 2 April www.tate.org.uk
2 Archive
Felicity Mccabe
Juxtaposed with East London’s street art, Felicity McCabe’s site-specific installation is glossy, bold and ethereal. The four images on view have been selected from her series Archive, which explores the creation of new works through a technique of abstracting from archival photographs. Fragments of the original source can be traced, with key links between them that are found in the images’ titles. McCabe has taken this opportunity of showing at the Great Eastern Wall Gallery to produce a project inspired by the surrounding area and its history, particularly the era after the Blitz. Twisted barbed wire punctuates a modern, minimalistic backdrop in East End, March 1946, referencing a post-war photograph which was taken nearby. In Christmas Street, December 1946, the open door mirrors the original Charles Hewitt image, with the light casting an eerie glow despite the use of a rosy-hued filter. Milky blues are depicted in Leman Street Club, July 1949,
a bleached interpretation of a Jamaican snooker club and a nod to the greater issues of integration and race in the area and in wider post-war society. The fourth photograph on display here, Work as Usual, September 1940, portrays jagged shards of broken glass, reflecting an enchanting spectrum whilst drawing on the significance of its source, a Bill Hardy image of a woman working in a tailoring shop that has had its window smashed during an air raid. The fluidity of the movement from archival to present in an abstract sense conveys issues which are both apt and timely. The fear of war, racial and gender inequality, and everyday challenges are, unfortunately, still relevant today. McCabe uses memory, with its own subjectivity and falsehoods, as a key element to form and inform her works. Displayed on the street, each measuring four metres by four metres, her photographs offer a dynamic perspective on our minds as well as on matters of place and time.
Words Ashton Chandler Guyatt
Great Eastern Wall Gallery, London 14 September - 15 January www.greateasternwall gallery.com
3 Infinity Mirrors Yayoi Kusama
Wit and wonder draw audiences into the existential realm of Yayoi Kusama (b. 1929), a visual, installation and performance artist whose move from her native Japan to New York saw her become a leading figure in the Western avant-garde and 1960s counter-culture of political activism. The latest edition of Infinity Mirrors presents six reflective rooms, large-scale installations, drawings, paintings and sculptures that define the 60-year plus career of the artist. The exhibition presents a mind-altering journey through the concepts of fantasy and self-discovery, which are inherent in Kusama’s oeuvre, as she explores the themes of the individual’s relationship with infinity and with “radical connectivity – creating power through networks of people.” The interactive spaces of the exhibition offer a liminal experience in reflexivity that captures the phenomenology of existence and the creative imagination. In the process, the viewer becomes a participant in media, mirror and message
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amidst a virtual, generated landscape of dots and delights. The audience enters and exits each mirrored room or viewing chamber in 30-second intervals to be faced with a mise-en-scène of mirrors, lights, soft sculpture and mixed media elements that are then reflected exponentially to transform the room into an expanded field of continuum. Some key installations from the artist’s career on view here include Infinity Mirrored Rooms: Phalli’s Field, (Kusama’s first, originally shown in Floor Show, Castellane Gallery, New York, 1965); Love Forever, 1966; Dots Obsession – Love Transformed into Dots, 2007; Aftermath of Obliteration of Eternity, 2009; The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away, 2013; and All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins, 2016. The latter is the only site where cameras are not allowed, a small sacrifice, given the free-flowing imagery from this immersive show, can be captured by the public and shared enthusiastically on global media platforms.
Words Jill Thayer
The Broad, Los Angeles 21 October - 1 January www.thebroad.org
1. One Two Three Swing! installation view. Photo: © Tate. 2a. Felicity McCabe: Work as Usual, September 1940. Archive Project, 2017. Courtesy of Wren Artists. Location: Great Eastern Wall Gallery @ Village Underground, Great Eastern Street, Shoreditch, London, EC2A 3PQ. www.wrenartists.com 2b. Felicity McCabe: Christmas Street, December 1946. Archive Project, 2017. Courtesy of Wren Artists. Location: Great Eastern Wall Gallery @ Village Underground, Great Eastern Street, Shoreditch, London, EC2A 3PQ. www. wrenartists.com 3. Yayoi Kusama, All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins, 2016. Wood, mirror, plastic, black glass, LED. Collection of the artist. Courtesy of Ota Fine Arts, Tokyo / Singapore and Victoria Miro, London. © Yayoi Kusama. Photo by Cathy Carver.
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4. Hiroshi Sugimoto, Villa Mazzacorrati, Bologna, 2015. Gelatin silver print, Neg. #34.011. Image: 58 3/4 x 47 in. (149.2 x 119.4 cm). Frame: 72 7/8 x 61 1/8 in. (185.1 x 155.3 cm) (19855) 5a. Christian Nyampeta, Words after the World (film still), 2017. HD Video. Courtesy the artist. 5b. Christian Nyampeta, Words after the World (film still), 2017. HD Video. Courtesy the artist. 6. ALBERT RENGER-PATZSCH – Kauper, Hochofenwerk Herrenwyk, Lübeck. Cowper stove, Herrenwyk blast furnaces, Lübeck], 1927. Albert Renger-Patzsch Archiv / Stiftung Ann und Jürgen Wilde, Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich. © Albert Renger-Patzsch / Archiv Ann und Jürgen Wilde, Zülpich / ADAGP, Paris 2017.
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Hiroshi Sugimoto
Marian Goodman Gallery stages a double exhibition of Hiroshi Sugimoto’s (b. 1948) iconic monochrome photography. Whilst the Paris gallery presents the Seascapes series (1980-present), London showcases Theaters (1976-present). According to the Japanese artist, the latter body of work began with the question “Suppose you shoot a whole movie in a single frame?” Sugimoto opens the camera’s aperture for the entire running time of a movie and the tens of thousands of images that leave the projector combine on the cinema screen, producing a bright white light, emphasising the frame-by-frame basis on which film, photography and the human eye all work. Moving through the exhibition, visitors can see how the artist’s subject matter has changed over 40 years. Early work features redundant drive-in cinemas and crumbling music and film halls in America and Europe, marking theatre’s decline and the rise of TV in the 1950s and movie streaming
today. More recent additions picture ornate Italian opera houses, some of which date back to the Renaissance. The gallery is dim except for spotlights above the works, conjuring the mystique of the moment before a movie begins, when the cinema is half-lit. Curators have tried to place viewers inside Suigmoto’s imagination, where the theatre is a space of collective excitement, experience and recognition. However, contained within the downstairs Square Gallery are two anomalies within his oeuvre: photographs of Bologna’s Villa Mazzacorrati (2015), one taken of the screen (as usual), and the other (unusually) taken from the back of the room, placing the audience’s perspective in the centre of the theatre. Through these differing angles, it’s not just that viewers find themselves embodying the space passing through Sugimoto’s lens, but that the cavernous, black theatre interiors themselves become like an eye through which the world’s light pours.
Words Henry Broome
Marian Goodman Gallery, London 26 October - 22 December www.mariangoodman.com
5 Words after the World Christian Nyampeta
Having returned to Rwanda after emigrating to the Netherlands in 1999, Christian Nyampeta (b. 1981) became interested in problems regarding African language and translation. In Words After the World, the artist explores these issues and, unusually, also hints at solutions. During a residency at the centre, Nyampeta formed a scriptorium – a place to read, translate and write – and invited participants to consider several key African Francophone texts, some of which were translated into English for the first time. Significantly, these translations were considered not as a conversion from one language to another, but as a generative conversation taking place between the two, reframing such linguistic exploration as a living process. Notes from the scriptorium – for which simple furniture was built to be able to host visitors and additional meetings throughout the show’s run – inspired the single-channel
video projection that is central to this new exhibition. The film operates at two narrative levels: it follows a solitary writer as she crafts a novella, and depicts scenes from her world and her developing work. Perhaps unintentionally, both of these levels recall texts by the French Oulipo writer Georges Perec. The author’s novella follows life at a school in Nyanza, where the mistreatment of an elite group of athletic students leads to an unresolved revolt. It recalls Perec’s harrowing allegorical novel W, or a Memory from Childhood (1975). As she writes, the lone author must contend with a licensing system that charges extortionate fees for the use of certain words, hinting at the constraints Perec used in The Void (1969), a 300-page novel that completely omits the letter “E.” Such literary allusions are appropriate to an exhibition that, although visually simplistic, made much of the conceptual and dynamic power of texts.
Words Ned Carter Miles
Camden Arts Centre 29 September -14 January www.camdenartscentre.org
6 Les Choses
Albert Renger-Patzsch
Albert Renger-Patzsch (1897-1966) is one of the seminal figures in the history of photography. Like others of his generation, he broke away from Pictorialism, the aesthetic philosophy that committed photography to aspire to imitate painting and engraving. Renger-Patzsch eschewed the use of soft-focus and any intervention in the development process, preferring to record objects exactly as they looked. This hard-edged quality brought him into contact with the school of New Objectivity, which in turn sought to distance itself from the romantic idealism of Expressionism, the painterly trend popular in Germany in the 1910s. His photographs were not purely documentary, however, as he did intervene occasionally to isolate the objects he wanted to valorise, using dark backgrounds to make the essence of flowers, hands and other humble objects stand out more dramatically. His Foxglove (1922-1923) is the most mesmerising case in point. The photograph lends
the medicinal flower a particularly mysterious dimension. Renger-Patzsch’s love of texture sometimes drove him to foreground ugliness as a thing of beauty in its own right. His depiction of a purulent calloused foot explores the boundary between beauty and deformity. For the most part though, there is a clean, smooth, unmessy quality to his subjects. After exploring the natural world, he turned his attention to industrial products, not reneging on commissions from the Nazi regime. There’s something almost disquieting about works like Jena Beakers (1934) and Buchenwald (1936) when you consider that they were taken at the height of Nazi power. The absence of people and all traces of the political symbols of the period can make the viewer uneasy. It’s hard to appreciate fully the beauty of Buchenwald (Birch forest) when you consider that so many people were slaughtered at Buchenwald, the concentration camp of the same name, the following year.
Words Erik Martiny
Jeu de Paume, Concorde, Paris 17 October - 21 January www.jeudepaume.org
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Still from TRANSITIONS, 2017. Director: Aurele Ferrier.
film
Inspired by Ideas AESTHETICA SHORT FILM FESTIVAL 2017
“Accompanying a series of Guest Programmes from Iris Prize, Krakow Film Festival and British Urban Film Festival, 300 films from the Official Selection were nominated for their innovative depiction of personal and universal narratives.”
Words Kate Simpson
ASFF 2017 ran 8-12 November. See the winning films: www.asff. co.uk/asff-winners-2017 Password: asff2017
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As a destination for experiencing the power and craft of inde- of design, the Best Advertising prize went to Luca Finotti’s allpendent cinema, the seventh edition of the BAFTA-Recognised encompassing and socially inclusive #WeBelieveInThePowAesthetica Short Film Festival was the largest to date, trans- erOfLove, whilst the Best Fashion film went to That Jam for forming York into a cultural landscape over an unprecedented The Sleeping Field. As one of the most visceral and innovative five-day period. Running from 8 to 12 November, the 2017 strands of the festival, the Experimental Award was presented event offered a record number of industry-led masterclasses, to Noémi Varga for The Happiest Barrack, a moment of times panels and networking sessions involving delegates from BFI, past in Communist Hungary. Similarly engaged with politics, BBC, i-D, Nowness and more. Accompanying a series of Guest the Best Documentary went to Sam Peeters’s resonant short Programmes from Iris Prize, Krakow Film Festival, British Urban Homeland, a unique portrayal of life in the Flemish suburbs. Best Music Video went to Metaxas-Sirens, directed by Film Festival and Imperial War Museum, 300 films from the Official Selection were nominated for their innovative depiction Savvas Stavrou, featuring an elderly man as he reminisces over time passed. Celebrating the art of performance, Best of both personal and universal narratives. Amongst 14 accolades, the prestigious Best of Fest Award Dance was awarded to Andrew Margetson for Lil Buck with went to ASFF alumni Benjamin Cleary and TJ O’Grady Peyton Icons of Modern Art, a stunning mix of movement and culfor Wave, the story of a man who wakes from a coma speaking ture in perfect harmony. Revelling in the liberation of creaan unrecognisable language. The film also took home the Best tivity, the Animation Award went to Johnno’s Dead by Chris Drama award, chosen for its deep resonance with the human Shepherd and the Best Comedy went to Teemu Niukkanen’s experience. Cleary was awarded the Best Drama in 2015 for satirically nuanced Fucking Bunnies. Meanwhile, plunging Stutterer, which later went on to receive an Oscar for Best Live into darker phenomenon, Ian Hunt Duffy’s Gridlock won Best Thriller, the tale of a girl gone missing and an unlikely perAction Short Film at the 88th Academy Awards. Another combined win went to the creative and deeply origi- petrator. Finally, this year’s York Youth Award, chosen by stunal For Real Tho by Baptist Penetticobra. Taking the Artists’ Film dents aged 11-14, went to Chris Overton’s The Silent Child, Award and the Northern Film School Award for Best Screen- the story of a deaf four-year-old girl, whose social worker play, the short follows a group of teenagers as they decon- teaches her the gift of communication. The short also took struct the very nature of film. Reaching past the possibilities home the highly coveted and reflective People’s Choice.
Psychological Landscapes MOUNTAIN
the film’s appeal, was with the Australian Chamber Orches- “From the natural tra, whose score breathes such life into the mountains that cycles that the they transform into Hitchcockian villains, mourning loners or mountains endure forces of destruction without moving an inch. With the crisp to the personal cinematography it’s almost all too much at times – fortunate, journeys that then, that the film’s subjects can do nothing but stand still. adventurers make, The film has been played as a live concert across multiple there is a great venues, meaning that it had to work as both a partner piece sense of understanding to the orchestra’s performance and a standalone film. “We that comes listened to pretty much everything the Australian Chamber from watching Orchestra had ever recorded and that was our starting point,” the feature.” says Peedom. “Sometimes the music would drive the editing, and other times, the images would be driving the melodies.” The aspects of the film that are orientated towards the live performance are definitely noticeable; the score reaches a big crescendo as a montage of destruction plays out, and it simmers and swells with the intention of filling a room. Through a thoroughly impressive sequence in the final chapters, however, the standalone film shines through. Words Hypnotic scenes of the rise and fall of water levels at the Beth Webb mountain’s base give it a human quality, as do the vein-like patterns in the frozen water and the bristling of the trees as the ice sets and thaws. It’s a truly unique documentary, full of Mountain is released in UK uncharted and unearthed delights that benefit from the well- cinemas from 15 December. selected collaborations and an experienced directorial eye. www.dogwoof.com
Still from Mountain. Courtesy of Dogwoof Global.
To say that Jennifer Peedom leaves no stone unturned in her new documentary Mountain, a breathtaking feature made with extraordinary skill, may sound like a play on words. However, it instead complements the relationship between the filmmaker and the process of creating a multidimensional documentary. From the natural cycles that the mountains endure to the personal journeys that adventurers make, there is a great sense of understanding that comes from watching the piece, and a real sense of immersion. “We worked with some of the best mountain cinematographers in the world,” says Peedom. “These were real climbers, capturing real moments from real expeditions. Often, they turned the camera on themselves, which why it feels so intimate.” These prized moments of climbers sharing a cigarette, punching the air, falling to the ground, are the result of a truly collaborative effort and it pays off, with each filmmaker sharing ideas of what the landscape represents. “The mountains we climb are of the mind,” reads Willem Dafoe as a few specks on the landscape inch a little closer to their goal. Dafoe is a smart choice for narrator, with his deep and slow tones. Peedom happily agrees: “I could imagine him in front of a raging fire in some log cabin in the mountains somewhere. I also see him as a bold and fearless risk taker in his work, and that was important given the themes.” Peedom’s key collaboration, however, and a large part of
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Image: © Shahir Iqbal, 2017.
music
Representation and Reinvention Nabihah Iqbal
“I feel like something of a trailblazer, and there’s a sense of responsibility that comes with that. I want people to realise that it doesn’t matter who you are, what you look like or if you have a ‘foreign’-sounding name; if I’m able to do what I’m doing, other people can too.”
Words Charlotte R-A www.ninjatune.net/ artist/nabihah-iqbal
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What’s in a name? Plenty, says Nabihah Iqbal, the Asian-Brit- herself in her west London studio. “I also used all my own ish DJ/artist who – up until now – has recorded as Throwing vocals on the album. It’s the first time I’ve tried to sing propShade. Under that moniker, Iqbal has established herself as erly, so that was a new experience for me.” In terms of toucha force – on record (with EPs House of Silk and 19 Jewels), on stones, Iqbal pulled from diverse corners: the poetry of Wilstage and on radio (via her jazz and world-centric radio show liam Blake and Matthew Arnold; the art of Henri Rousseau; on NTS). But with the release of her debut full-length album, random, real life experiences; the subject of honour killings. Weighing Of My Heart, on UK label Ninja Tune, the former The overarching themes are questions she often finds herself human rights lawyer has now decided to embrace her given meditating upon: “Why do people want to live? Do we ever name. Why? “It’s something that I’ve been thinking about for really truly know anyone else? What do people really feel like most of the time? How much of what we experience is quite a while; there a few different reasons,” she explains. Throwing Shade was too “specific to a time and place” long real? What do people want? How can we feel happiest?” With weighty questions like these informing the record, it past, picked out of the air during her university years, when music and DJing was a side-project rather than the full-time makes sense that Iqbal would chose Ma’at, the ancient Egypcareer that it is now. “I also didn’t realise that the term has tian goddess of balance, truth and justice, as her album cover such negative connotations in America and I don’t want to icon. “Its my interpretation of Ma’at,” Iqbal explains. “I’m very be associated with that. More importantly, I’ve been think- interested in ancient Egyptian beliefs, and those from other ing about culture, representation and identity. There aren’t a ancient cultures. I feel like there’s a lot we can learn from lot of ethnic minority people doing what I’m doing in the UK them, especially since they seem to put male and female electronic music/DJ scene – and particularly Asian-British fe- forces on an equal pedestal, unlike most of our modern-day males – so I feel like something of a trailblazer. I want people religions.” The first 150 vinyl copies will include a packet of to realise that it doesn’t matter who you are, or what you look incense – a blend Iqbal burned whilst writing and recording. “I’m trying to make it a multi-sensory experience. Music triglike or whether you have a ‘foreign‘-sounding name.” Weighing Of My Heart is a Can and Bauhaus-inspired gers so many responses within us, mentally and physically. affair, a dreamy new-wave wash of guitars, keys and live / Sound and smell are big triggers, especially when combined. programmed percussion, all played and recorded by Iqbal I want the listening experience to be a meaningful one.”
Theatrical Meditation Soho Rezanejad
Soho Rezanejad is at an undisclosed location in Topanga, Los Angeles. “There are tarantulas and scorpions and this wild, botanical colour palette encircling the house, along with the palm trees,” she reports. “You don’t know when you might step on something that’s going to sting.” It’s certainly a world away from the American-Iranian artist’s adopted home, in Copenhagen, where she’s celebrated as both one third of the group Lust For Youth and as a promising solo artist. It’s in the latter capacity that Aesthetica finds Rezanejad currently engaged, with the release of her debut full-length, Six Archetypes, fast approaching. It is a dark, twinkling thing, a record that sits somewhere between synth-pop and darkwave, and is inspired, like her last release, by influential Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung. “I can identify with all of his archetypes, which goes to show how terribly limiting it is to grip a hardened image of oneself.” Nat Marcus, poet and co-founder of Berlin-based Tabloid publications, has described the record as being “psychic theatre.” Is that an accurate description? “I appreciate theatre, but I don’t think it’s in my hands to answer whether my work is this or that. I think whatever is noticeable is to some extent performative. As soon as something builds a currency of its own, then it lives on in a state of theatrics. I don’t know how much of this life is real. I can only put my hands together and make-believe.” There’s a very distinct sound to the record, and yet so much
of it was collaborative, from the songs – worked on “intense- “Six Archetypes is ly” with Rezanejad’s trusty collaborator, Miccel Mohr – to the a dark, twinkling crowd-sourced lyrics. Rezanejad would demo the words she thing, a record had written, and then invite friends, colleagues and anyone that sits somewhere who happened to pass through the studio to guess at the between synth-pop words. “I’d just play them the demos and ask them to write and darkwave, and down what they thought I was singing. In ancient Greece, is inspired, like when someone engaged in an art form, it was sometimes her last release, by thought to be a spirit or ‘daemon’ using a human’s body to influential Swiss conceive. So my friends and I called it the ‘daemon method psychoanalyst of writing’, because it is like a spirit that possesses you.” Carl Jung.” As underpinning themes goes, it is love that Six Archetypes rests on. “I asked my community what love meant to them after a friend suggested I should write something about love. Not in a romantic sense, but love on the larger scale of human relations.” With fascism on the rise, love might just be the antidote – and who better to meditate on that than a second-generation immigrant artist? “Having immigrant parents residing in Denmark, I grew into both Eastern and Western cultures. I am always looking in from the outside. And I truly appreciate this, because it has given me an opportunity to Words absorb the things that matter to me. My parents fled Iran be- Charlotte R-A cause the regime threatened their freedom, and I’m grateful for the freedom I enjoy. I bet I’ve written more songs about www.sohorezanejad. this than love. Maybe they come down to the same thing.” bigcartel.com
Image: Polina Vinogradova.
music 4
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Oller & Pejic, Black Desert House. Yucca Valley, California, USA, 2014.
books
Colour as Multiplicity Black: Architecture in Monochrome.
“The book cites black as being at the centre of human thought. ‘It can evoke thoughts and mood – conjuring parallels and resonances in all sorts of realms,’ Paul explains. Here, black is the symbol of both high culture and refined taste.”
Words Gunseli Yalcinkaya Phaidon www.phaidon.com
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The colour black as a protean concept is the central theme at tury architect Mies van der Rohe’s S.R. Crown Hall (1956) in the heart of Phaidon’s latest book, Black: Architecture in Mon- Chicago, USA. Intended as a place of learning, the building is ochrome. Featuring more than 150 structures from the last a National Historic Landmark that is typical of the modernist thousand years, the publication charts black’s role as both dictum “less is more.” Constructed from only steel and glass, functional and aesthetic, through striking photographs of the glass panels that surround the structure give a sense of houses, churches, libraries, and other buildings from some of openness – the black structure serves only as an outline of the world’s most influential architects, including Ludwig Mies the transparent exterior. This gives the hall an expansive feel van der Rohe, Philip Johnson, David Adjaye and Jean Nouvel. that blurs the divide between the interior and exterior. In contrast, the black exterior of London’s Dirty House by With an insightful introduction by Stella Paul, the author of Chromaphilia: The Story of Color in Art, the book cites British-Ghanaian architect David Adjaye visually separates it black as being at the centre of human thinking. “It can evoke from the surrounding red brick buildings. Made from conthoughts and mood – conjuring parallels and resonances in crete and brick, the colour black serves a functional purpose, all sorts of realms,” Paul explains. Here, black is the symbol providing a practical way to mitigate against graffiti. Equally, of both high culture and refined taste – Paul cites Chanel’s it makes a visceral aesthetic statement that promotes privacy “little black dress”. But it is also a negation of light – some- and seclusion from the outside. “The two practical and aesthing that is expressed in Greek mythology, and in the Bible thetic standards are enmeshed,” Paul agrees. By stressing the diverse role of the colour black in the perwith metaphors around darkness emblematic of the Devil. When this kind of multiplicity is expressed through the lens ception of a space in a domestic or cultural setting, Black: of architecture, Paul highlights black’s cultural and personal Architecture in Monochrome confirms colour is crucial to our uses. “Colour placement can direct a path of motion through understanding of a built environment. By doing so, it cona structure or reinforce a zone of privacy and ward off on- tradicts any universal notions of colour as “good” or “bad”. lookers – effectively stopping the action,” she says. “It can As Paul notes: “there are innumerable ways in which people serve the public, community drive for gathering together or have theorised about how colours work together or what constitutes harmony or disharmony. Thinking about it is univerit can support an individual’s solitary, internal needs.” Taking a minimalist approach to space is central to 20th cen- sal, yet the field defies any notion of universal truths.”
Gaze Reinvented Fashion Photography: The Story in 180 Pictures
Shinkle notes: “Women were freed of many of the social con- “In manipulating straints that tied them to home and family in Bluemenfeld’s the human form day, but at the expense of being seen as sex objects”. through components In contrast, Viviane Sassen portrays the female form as an of modelling and abstract painting or collage. “With Sassen’s work – much of structure, the which treats the body as a kind of living sculpture – physi- photographs are cality is no longer quite so explicitly subject to a sexualised an example of how gaze and is rather more reduced into elements of formal the introduction of composition.” In manipulating human shapes through com- the female gaze in ponents of modelling and structure, the photographs are an photography can example of how the introduction of the female gaze in pho- alter the portrayal tography can alter the portrayal of women. of ‘feminine’.” The evolution of this vision, as demonstrated through the chronological format, reveals a back-and-forth contention between the ideal and real life. Counterculture and movements like “youthquake” are cited as direct rejections of high fashion’s unattainable notions of beauty and femininity, which is conveyed through an era of reportage images featured in magazines such as The Face, i-D and Interview. As the book closes, however, it reflects on the medium at Words present. With platforms like Instagram democratising fashion, Gunseli Yalcinkaya it seems reasonable to assume photography today is more is rooted in reality. Nevertheless, as these new “influencers” gain a different form of social capital, the lines between the Thames & Hudson ideal and reality once again become blurred. www.thamesandhudson.com
Viviane Sassen, De La Mar Theatre, 2010. From Fashion Photography: The Story in 180 Pictures (Aperture, 2017) © Viviane Sassen.
The relationship between fashion and the cultural landscape is explored in Eugénie Shinkle’s latest book, Fashion Photography: The Story in 180 Pictures. Providing a carefully curated overview of some of the most important figures in fashion photography of the past eight decades, Shinkle shows the evolution of the genre via a chronological account of key practitioners, alongside those shaping contemporary taste today – including Richard Avedon, William Klein, Helmut Newton, Guy Bourdin and Viviane Sassen. Shinkle presents mainstream fashion photography as representative of society’s desires and fantasies. Early images by Erwin Blumenfeld, for example, portray women as objects akin to sculptures, where the female form is treated as an ideal. “Blumenfeld was working at the tail end of fashion photographer’s period of ‘classicism’, when the body was treated as a kind of sculptural object – both in the way it was photographed, and in the way women were expected to comport themselves in a broader social context,” explains Shinkle. Seen through the male gaze, the subject is revealed as an object of vision: a sight, whose image is a product of the zeitgeist of its era. A shift in cultural attitudes towards femininity is reflected in the shifting photographic styles and themes observed in the book. For instance, the social and sexual emancipation of women in the 1970s is characterised in Guy Bourdin’s overtly sexual and fetishist narratives. But as
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film reviews
1
Beach Rats Eliza Hittman
A journey into the secret sexuality of Frankie, Beach Rats lays bare the risks, the thrills and the sensations experienced by a curious teenager as he lurches through an aimless life. The backdrop is Brooklyn, where Frankie (newcomer Harris Dickinson) is drawn equally to pretty, forceful Simone (Madeline Weinstein), a young lass who knows what she wants, and an online chat room where lonely gay men seek partners for no-commitment sex. Ricocheting between the machismo of his dope-smoking pals and his part-time girlfriend, Frankie slips ever deeper into a murky world of throwaway intimacy and claustrophobic physicality. Yearning to find something, he drifts further away from a genuine sense of self. Boasting a strong central performance from Dickinson as the damaged lad who finds himself subconsciously severing roots with his mother and sister (his father having
succumbed to cancer in the first third of the film), Beach Rats (perhaps deliberately) leaves Frankie unfulfilled. Is he seeking a father figure in order to replace the dying man past whom he steers his girlfriend to bed? Are the anonymous pick-ups that he finds on the Brooklyn Boys sex site a pointer to the life that he wants, or that he will have? Can he manage his many conflicts of personal identity, or will they ultimately consume him? Writer/director Eliza Hittman offers her audience no answers here, just as Frankie’s problems (and sundry identities) are not neatly resolved. Instead, journey’s end is a frayed mess of lies, deceit, and barely suppressed homophobia that, it is suggested, culminates in murder. Combining aspects of Looking for Mr. Goodbar, Cruising and Shortbus, Beach Rats is both languid and edgily brittle. It is a film which augurs well for Hittman’s future.
Words Tony Earnshaw
Peccadillo Pictures www.peccapics.com
2
Dina Antonio Santini and Dan Sickles
The winner of the documentary Grand Jury Prize at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, Dina, is a touching portrait of love and marriage against the odds. The subject is Dina Buno, a 49-year-old Philadelphia resident who – like her groom-to-be – is on the autistic spectrum. She’s also suffered from some profound past personal traumas, having lost her first husband to cancer and then experienced a horrifying knife attack at the hands of a deranged former boyfriend. So when she meets Scott, a good-hearted Wal-Mart employee who is still living with his parents, it finally seems that fate is smiling on her. Directed by Antonio Santini and Dan Sickles, who is a family-friend of Buno’s, the film closely follows the couple as they prepare for their impending nuptials (including Dina’s hen night – stripper included). Yet, this is no Bridezilla-style reality television saga. Real hurdles face Dina and Scott, not least his difficulty with sexual
contact. He bashfully admits to pleasuring himself on occasion, but when Dina presents him with a copy of The Joy of Sex, it’s clear that she wants their relationship and their future marriage to be a fully physical one. Santini and Sickles, who previously made Mala Mala, a documentary which was set in the Puerto Rico transgender community, capture some truly candid moments between the couple with the help of their cinematographer Adam Uhl – a testament to their skill at making their subjects feel at ease with the camera. Never patronising the pair, the film doesn’t come across as being about the condition of autism itself, but rather a story of two individual people trying to overcome the many obstacles of their hilly emotional terrain in order to create a future together. Soft, sweet and tender – right down to the use of The Flying Pickets’ ballad Only You – the resulting film is a touchingly real romance.
Words James Mottram
Dogwoof Global www.dogwoof.com
3 Good Time
Josh and Benny Safdie
Thematic undercurrents resurface in Josh and Benny Safdie’s Good Time, as Connie Nikas (Robert Pattinson) spends a frenzied night trying to prevent his brother being sent to Rikers Island jail. Characters driven by love is the connection with 2014’s Heaven Knows What, which saw a woman asked to prove her love for her boyfriend through the act of suicide. And indeed vices do translate into antagonistic forces. To infer the film resembles the botched escapade of its story would be an exaggeration, yet sadly it has an air of a superficial and stylised potboiler, one which is seemingly a little reliant on writing, direction and, ultimately, star power. Lacking soul or charisma, it commands little devotion, leading to a laborious experience that fails to convince of its reason for existence beyond the desire or ambition of its filmmakers. Existing in part as a vehicle for Pattinson, Good Time affords him further separation
from his early vampiric persona, illuminating his continued growth and emergence as one of the most intriguing onscreen actors of his generation. Meanwhile, the pervasive presence of the slick direction, alongside the sharply written script by Josh Safdie and co-writer Ronald Bronstein, fittingly intertwines with Connie’s entrapment in the organised chaos that is unfolding. The film succeeds in teasing the prospective destiny of its character, even as fate seemingly works against him, and it is here that the Safdies and Bronstein echo the gods of fate. Good Time is, however, disconnected from the spiritual essence of masterclasses such as Point Blank, which orchestrated a unity of star and filmmaking aesthetic to make a bold impression where the narrative was merely a wire frame structure. Closing on an emotionally exploitative note, the film instead reaches an underwhelming and frustrating crescendo.
Words Paul Risker
Curzon Artificial Eye www.curzonartificialeye.com
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music reviews
1
Amani The Earth Evolved
The Earth Evolved, the debut EP from singer Amani, is intense from the off. Opening to the 43-second Transform, an off-kilter lullaby that climbs like a Bon Iver reverie only to shudder to a glitchy halt, Amani’s sound feels heavier and more soulful than many others making post-internet electronica, her synthesised vocal harmonies swelling with pathos and world-weariness. This rawness increases on second track and titular song The Earth Evolved – unfurling like cigarette smoke in a darkened bar, every beat heavy and slow. Amani’s delicate vocals open up here to a fuller, bigger sound that evokes a range of 1990s soul artists underneath the urgent bursts of twitching industrial-style beats. Here, it is clear the South London songstress is drawing from her personal experience following the death of her sibling and, more recently, her own health
battles. As she notes: “No one told me this part was so damn hard/ Waking up to an empty room.” The result is a restrained yet caustic meditation that draws upon direct experiences of loss and emotional endurance. Elsewhere, the industrial elements of Amani’s sound become more forceful. On lead single Feathers Falling, the listener enters a disquieting limbo state that is punctuated with white noise. This, added to the layers of sweeping synth, gives the effect of a liminal space – lying prone between channels on a radio. And yet, the singer’s too-sweet vocal tones provide that human, yet somehow unsettling, jolt of energy. Whilst this EP is, as you’d expect, short, it’s a revealing glimpse into the inner life of an artist: one who is possessed of a singular personal vision and equipped with a knack for music that isn’t afraid to express the uncomfortable.
Words Grace Caffyn
Point Blank Recordings www.soundcloud.com/amani-band
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Keinemusik You Are Safe
A combined brigade of two producers, a DJ and a visual artist come together as Keinemusik, a Berlin collective who are dedicated to a very German-sounding, dancefloorfilling, stomping brand of electronic music. The members have put out five releases every year on their own label since the inception of this creative collective in 2009. Early on in You Are Safe, the captivating Civilist brings a crunching bassline and adds computer game colour to the drilling, house music inspired, military-influenced drum pounding that the album’s opening tracks all offer. The almost unhinged and unwavering repetitive nature of Cafe Des Schickals is trance-inducing, whilst title track You Are Safe is notable in the irony of its title for the sense of profound unease that the dancing synthesisers summon. Placed squarely in the middle of the album is the wonderfully different Up and Down – providing a much-needed complete change of pace and aesthetic,
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featuring the sultry vocals of singer Chiara Noriko. Sounding like something by 2017 neo soul contemporaries Jorja Smith and Nao, the song sticks out and is unfortunately the only one of its type on the record, stranded in a sea of unrelenting dance music. Love, featuring the ethereal tones of Jennifer Touch would also be a brilliant, contrasting soft song, if it weren’t for the constant four-to-the-floor pulse of the kick drums, whilst MBH is swathed in the kind of gritty darkness that could ideally be matched with a movie sequence of some kind of cat-and-mouse police chase in the pouring rain. Given that this record might be entirely about its context – designed primarily to be played and experienced in a sweaty rave and not necessarily listened to for pleasure in the house – getting lost in the gallimaufry of abrasive sounds on offer is most likely the exact intention of this brutally marching album.
Words Kyle Bryony
Playground Music www.keinemusik.com
WYOMI Control
Having garnered attention doing remixes for other artists, forward thinking alternative Swedish electronic music trio WYOMI launches its debut EP entitled Control. Consisting of producers Adin Ehnsiö, Andreas Jonasson and Viktor Rizk, the trio initially studied music together in Stockholm between 2013 and 2015 during which time they discovered a shared passion for electronic music and artists such as Flume, Louis The Child, Mura Masa and ODESZA. In the summer of 2015, they built a studio to experiment with sounds and develop their own identity. Buoyed by over a million streams on Soundcloud and YouTube with remixes for Jackie Tech, Above & Beyond, Whethan vs Oliver Tree, Azad and a collaboration with Krane, WYOMI set about revealing its distinctive and eclectic musical style to the world. en masse. Not wishing to be confined by genre or expectation, WYOMI has created an EP that ultimately feels new and
exciting due in no small part to recording their own vocals, sounds and instruments which gives the overall sound a distinctly organic feel. Distortion and delays are interwoven with layers of atmosphere providing a real sense of elegance and mystique. Flare opens quietly and proceeds to unfold with spiky, procession-like synth stabs and resonant bass. That same propulsive future bass sound pervades Control and on Go Slow, which features soulful vocals meandering across a percussive beat. The dance-friendly Wait for You shines with filtered vocals that pop in and out of reach joyously, a powerful contrast to the addictively heavy, resonating, stuttering synths and sweet, uplifting melodies. It is this authentically unique blend of cascading synths and dominant bass that has given WYOMI space to create a landscape of tonal complexity, frequently combining glistening intensity with sonic reflection.
Words Matt Swain
Playground Music www.wyomimusic.bandcamp.com
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book reviews
1
Androgyne: Fashion and Gender Patrick Mauriès
With Androgyne, Patrick Mauriès conforms to the archetype of the writer weaving a textile of words. The narrative is fabricated from past material – art history, literature, philosophy – to spin the tale of androgyny as a cultural phenomenon that does not only concern fashion. Mauriès retraces the evolution leading up to January 2011, when the graceful bride walking the ramp for Jean Paul Gaultier was unveiled as a man. The boundaries between male and female collapsed under the spotlight, in a live performance before a global audience; yet this was not the first time they were tested. The history of androgyny dates back over 2,000 years: the ancestors of today’s unisexual beauties are the half male and half female spherical creatures featured in Plato’s Symposium. Ever since, androgynous beings have been represented and analysed in novels, debates, canvases. By shedding light
on their journey, Mauriès does not downplay the impact of Gaultier’s gesture: it was trendsetting, inspiring haute couture houses that changed their key aesthetic criteria. However, here androgyny is explained as a historical reality, rather than a modern world curiosity. The very fact that the sweeping overview tackles works as complex as Simone de Beauvoir’s, as hermetic as Charles Baudelaire’s, and as controversial as Joséphin Péladan’s, makes readers doubt the straightforwardness of gender fluidity. Within its exhaustive cultural research, Androgyne gives a limited role to scientific enquiry. Considering the function of androgyny in the animal realm might be yet another looking glass into the topic, but as far as this unique publication goes in terms of humanity, it offers multi-faceted perspectives into the drive to escape defined categories – and all that this entails.
Words Carolina Mostert
Thames & Hudson www.thamesandhudson.com
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Never Ending Stories Ralf Beil
Never Ending Stories, a research project and exhibition at Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, Germany, examines the notion of the endless loop and its prevalence in art and society from antiquity to the present-day. Connecting the ancient Egyptian ouroboros to contemporary multimedia installations, the publication is never limited in its scope. A wide-reaching lens takes an interdisciplinary approach, investigating the self-contained system in film, architecture, music, literature, religion and cultural history. This research method disrupts traditional notions of linear chronology, providing instead the model of a cyclical temporality that challenges conventional history. The publication offers a series of essays, interjected by seminal historical, scientific and theoretical texts that are each illustrated by a selection of cultural artefacts from multiple epochs. Creating new visual and conceptual links, the volume intelligently delves into each subject
area, inviting the reader to intuitively draw spatial and thematic parallels. For example, Niklas Maak’s contribution is accompanied by imagery as diverse as Étienne-Louis Boullée’s 1784 Cenotaph for Isaac Newton and stills from Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 2001: A Space Odyssey. Focusing on the loop in architecture and its potential to break with the ascension-centric model of the highrise Maak uses OMA’s utopian CCTV Towers in Beijing as a case study. Simultaneously forming the shape of an arc whilst symbolising the ceaseless cycle of daily news, the design of the towers is intrinsically bound to the democratic rhythm of the quotidian. Never Ending Stories posits the tendency towards infinite repetition as a reflection of the psyche and of both dream and trauma, presenting this phenomenon as the symptom of an eternally shared human experience.
Words Eleanor Sutherland
Hatje Cantz www.hatjecantz.de
3
Robert Storr: Interviews Robert Storr
“Art has great emancipatory power. Viewers are confronted with their own fear,” Jeff Koons says, shortly after waxing lyrical on the latent sexuality of vacuum cleaners. It is one of many instances in this collated volume of interviews by Robert Storr, the impresario American curator and critic, where heavyweights of the art world reveal thought-provoking glimpses into the wider motivations behind their art practice – as well as their sometimes strange, always highly unique ways of seeing the world. Storr is an informed and critical interviewer, at home professionally – but also personally – with many of his interviewees. His questions have a conversational ease that yields several flowing discussions on art technique, theory, context, and market. In some cases, editor Francesca Pietropaolo has included multiple interviews with an artist held over the years, as in the case of Louise Bourgeois and Gerhard Richter; this, much like the overarching feel of the project, prioritises creative
process over result and growth over accomplishments. These interviews offer a cross-section of the landscape of contemporary art, alternating between a narrow and a wide lens. Sometimes, the intention and approach behind a specific work is discussed – as with Richard Serra, on his installation for Monumenta at the Grand Palais in 2008. More often, the dialogue scopes the interviewee’s past influences and artistic becoming. Intimate and unexpected details still emerge from these latter, broad-ranging conversations, however: Californian artist Kara Walker, for instance, shares that her silhouette collages – depicting racial-historical narratives – were difficult not to discard after display. Letting the authentic voices of its artists and curators shine, Storr’s Interviews take us into the minds of Gabriel Orozco, Adrian Piper, Mike Kelley, Sophie Calle and many others, revealing interviews which are all guided by the hand of a discerning and appreciative interlocutor.
Words Sarah Jilani HENI Publishing www.henipublishing.com Aesthetica 147
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artists’ directory
Charlotte Pann
Who in the www am I? Acrylic colour painting on digital printed canvas, 100cm x 100cm x 3.8cm.
Dongeun Lee
Born and raised in South Korea and based in London, Dongeun Lee graduated from UAL Chelsea College of Arts, BA (Hons) Fine Art. In her series Who in the www am I? Lee explores questions of identity in the digital age, through an avatar called Alice. She has exhibited work in numerous solo and group exhibitions in South Korea, New York and the UK.
www.leedongeun.com
Arnaud Lacoste Arnaud Lacoste’s imagination sits between the worlds of art and science. Many of his multidimensional compositions reflect upon these hybrid languages where visual arts combine with digital experiences. Current and future exhibitions include the Venice Biennale and New York Fashion Week, as well as Art Basel and Frieze New York.
www.antisense.xyz
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In the Wood. Walk-in installation.
Charlotte Pann is an Austrian artist who focuses on the phenomenon of relation as a base for and as a result of spatial constellation, and creates conceptual positions that question the quality and the variability of the surrounding space – the “space in between” – as a source of information as well as a medium of information. www.charlottepann.com
Amy Hughes Amy Hughes is a contemporary British painter. Her work deals with themes surrounding the female body, typically her own. Hughes manipulates and renders her flesh in oil paint; the compositions consider relationships between body and mind, as well as society’s fascination with the physical form.
www.amyvhughes.com
Olaniyi R. Akindiya aka AKIRASH
Between Two Cities, 2016. Mixed media tapestry painting, 50in x 55in x 6in.
Steve Woodbury
Steve Woodbury creates contemporary calligraphy by using the ancient material of gunpowder on modern substrates. www.stevewoodbury.com | www.gunpowderartist.com
Olaniyi R. Akindiya’s practice investigates systems of power that govern everyday existence. Living between Lagos and Texas, the artist translates materials into contemporary sculptures and installations that offer conceptual and temporal perspectives on contrasting social infrastructures.
www.artwithakirash.com
Marie Åkerlund | www.akerlundkonst.se Marie Åkerlund is a Swedish artist who focuses on painting, drawing and portraiture. Her subtle compositions revolve around the fragile, ethereal and essential notion of inspiration, whether that comes in the guise of despair, desire, happiness or hope. Åkerlund’s work has been shown in numerous exhibitions in Europe and the USA, and is held in the European Art Museum’s private collection in Denmark.
LINDA KOSCIEWICZ | www.lindakosciewicz.com Linda Kosciewicz’s work explores female identity, emotion and transience through constructed worlds, self-representation and performance.
For submission enquiries regarding the Artists’ Directory, contact Katherine Smira on (0044) (0)844 568 2001 or directory@aestheticamagazine.com
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Left: 64. 19cm x 19cm. Right: Byzantine Bling. 12cm x 12cm.
allan punton
Bo Kyung Kim
Allan Punton is a glass and ceramic artist who creates contemporary abstract pieces. He takes inspiration from life in general although he enjoys composing work that celebrates the play of light and its ability to change the mood of a piece during the day. Punton has exhibited in Venice, Paris, Chicago, Miami, London and around the UK. www.artopunto.co
Bo Kyung Kim’s work embodies placidity through a process of adding and subtracting from surface and materials. This acts as a physical manifestation of impermanence in Buddhism and the beauty of imperfection – values that come from the aesthetics of traditional Korean culture, and which lead to the pursuit of meditation through creating both relaxing and serious moments. www.bokyungkim-art.com
Brian Tozer
domino pyttel
Brian Tozer originally trained as a ceramicist and moved over to painting, drawing and photography in the 1990s in order to reflect the visual and textural details of multiple subjects. His explorations of subjects include depictions of landscapes, portraits and moments from daily life. www.studiotozer.com | brian@studiotozer.com
German performance artist Domino Pyttel is best-known for her spectacular stagings which transform entire spaces through sound, light and objects. Her performance-installations are poignant and forceful, working to stimulate all the senses, making use of animalistic costumes and theatricality at a high artistic level. www.dominopyttel.com
Doris Duschelbauer
Gene Chih-Yang Chen
German artist Doris Duschelbauer paints via a method of discovery, which allows a story to emerge. She says: “In a world where we hardly find time to rest, I try to offer what many people long for – visual places where time appears to run slower. ” Duschelbauer’s work is held in private and in public collections in the US, Canada, the UK, Sweden, Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Spain. www.duschelbauer.com | Instagram: @dorisduschelbauer
Gene Chih-Yang Chen is a recent graduate of Royal College of Art, and is based in London. He works between art and design, adjusting symbols to communicate speculative concepts. Chen creates platforms to explore the possibilities of subtle relationships that occur between individuals. The work shown here is from the series What if Tools Have Consciousness? www.chihyangchen.com | Instagram: @chihyang.chen
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Lee Panizza Lee Panizza’s latest series Jigsaw Puddles widens her painterly enquiry into the nature of abstraction: an ongoing exercise in the possibilities of paradox and metaphor. The process involves a conceptual mix of controlled splashes and dribbles within a fragmented framework. As well as referencing Abstract Expressionism, the works are “serious fun.” www.leepanizza.com
Odysseia – I’ve Seen it All, from the Odysseia-Cycle series.
Jill Desborough Jill Desborough is a sculptor, printmaker and also a creator of rod puppets, as shown here. The characters take shape in her imagination, or are inspired by mythology, carnival, dark fairytales or writers such as Mervyn Peake and Chaucer. Desborough’s puppets can be commissioned or colour customised. www.JillDesborough.com | Instagram: @Jill Desborough
maria luigia gioffrè
Objects of Matter
Maria Luigia Gioffrè is an Italian artist based in London. Her multidisciplinary practice focuses on narration, time and absence, which she explores through repetition, gesture and duration. She was an award winner of the Celeste Prize in 2017. Her works have been recently part of Tate Exchange at Tate Modern, Art Night Associate at Art Night London and Zürich meets London – A Festival of Two Cities. www.marialuigiagioffre.com
Objects of Matter is a textile design studio based in Milan, which specialises in exclusive, bespoke fabrics for the fashion and interior industries. Head designer Ailara combines her well-researched and creative selection of yarns with a clean, modern aesthetic. The studio offers handwoven as well as industrially-produced collections realised in partnership with highly-esteemed Italian mills. www.objectsofmatter.com
Per Bentley
Sara Chyan
Per Bentley is a self-taught impressionist artist. He experiments with the strong, intense colours found in nature to depict the reality he perceives in his native Sweden. Whilst painting he experiences “freedom, independence and the colours of life that give me a wonderful sense of well-being.” Bentley has recently begun working with digital technology and collage. www.konstgalleri.se/bentley | Instagram: @perbentley
London-based Sara Chyan recently graduated from Royal College of Art, where she trained to become an artist and jeweller with a minimalist, conceptual approach. Chyan’s pieces respond to the human body, using physicality as the basis for multilayered designs. To view a video of a gallium bangle being created, visit: www.vimeo.com/228459382. www.sarachyan.com | Instagram: @sarachyanjewellery
For submission enquiries regarding the Artists’ Directory, contact Katherine Smira on (0044) (0)844 568 2001 or directory@aestheticamagazine.com
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Left: Painter’s Tapes on Blackish Green. Oil, acrylic on Belgium linen, 116.3cm x 80cm x 2 pieces. Right: The Verge. Mixed materials, 85cm x 128cm.
Sheau Ming Song
Shino Takizawa
Sheau Ming Song has a PhD from LICA at Lancaster University. His artwork demonstrates the essential issues of two-dimensional representation and documents the visual possibilities of painting materials. He has shown at Art Taipei 2015, Gwangju Biennale 2015 in South Korea, Art15 London, ART.FAIR Cologne 2014 and the-solo-project 2013 in Basel. www.sms1967.com
Shino Takizawa’s paintings make use of strong, vivid colours, exploring the endless possibilities of multi-chromatic palettes as reflections of complex forms and feelings that connote our daily existence. www.shino-takizawa.com Left: Parent and Child. Oil on canvas, 61cm x 73cm. Right: The World. Oil on canvas, 91cm x 73cm.
siniša prvanov
Sirlei Hansen
Siniša Prvanov was born in Serbia and is currently a lecturer in Interior Architecture and Design at Bilkent University in Ankara. In conjunction with internationally acclaimed architecture firms, his professional work has received several design awards. Prvanov’s artwork has been exhibited internationally in Berlin, Milan, Athens, Monaco, Montevideo and Montreal. www.sinisaprvanov.wixsite.com/artmatters
Born and based in Brazil, Sirlei Hansen graduated with a degree in Visual Arts at UFRGS in Porto Alegre. Although she works in various mediums, painting remains her greatest passion. She explains: “The need to preserve nature, as well as the importance of environmental awareness, harmony and contact with nature itself, is my motivation.” Hansen has participated in solo and group exhibitions in Brazil, Argentina and France. Instagram: @sirlei_hansen
Yasushi Koyama
zoe beaudry
Helsinki-based Japanese Yasushi Koyama’s ceramic sculptures marry his native popular culture with Scandinavian design methods. The gentle expression of the ceramic surface is fired at 1240°C without glaze. Simplicity and whimsical figures are prevalent – a contemporary juxtaposition is found in sculptures that are light-hearted and original. https://plus.google.com/+YasushiKoyama | Instagram: @yasushikoyama
Zoe Beaudry is an internationally-exhibited American oil painter currently based in Glasgow. Her work is largely informed by experiences with illness and recovery, and her time spent working abroad. Her painting practice deals with the politics of bodily and spiritual trauma, examining the often politicised border between life and non-life. www.zoebeaudry.com I Instagram: @zoebeaudry_art
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Alysia Davis
Anca Stefanescu
San Francisco-based Alysia Davis romanticises an apocalyptic future. Her work is imbued with escapism, play and tumultuous colour harmonies. Focusing on digital drawings and soft sculpture, the compositions are reminiscent of dreamscapes. Recurring themes include identity and self-gratification. Davis considers her practice to be a combination of styles, resulting in Pop-Povera. www.alysiadavis.com
Bucharest-born Anca Stefanescu was raised in Vădastra, where traces of the Neolithic – found on painted ceramics – reminded her that time is a constructed concept. Painting is a practice through which she finds a universal connection of life, devoid of context. She has exhibited at World Art Dubai, Artexpo New York and Spectrum Miami. www.ancastefanescu.com Digital Love Note, 2017. Digital vector drawing.
Anja Reponen
Ben Dobson
Anja Reponen is a Helsinki-based illustrator specialising in portraits. She is interested in the face as an interface between a person’s surface and their inner world. Reponen explores the ways the face reflects psychology, as she captures the details and unique features of the individual portrayed.
Ben Dobson explores texture, colour, perspective, light and shade using mineral, vegetable and animal matter prepared with skill for the microscope and camera. He is based in Cambridge where he is co-organising the SciArt Exhibition at the Cavendish, the world-renowned physics laboratories, in March 2018.
www.anjareponen.com Instagram: @anjareponen
www.themicroscopeman.com Twitter: @microscopeman74
camilla dowse
chan hong yui clement
Camilla Dowse uses a refined palette of soft colours to create quiet and contemplative urban landscapes. In 2014 she won Artist of the Year in Artists & Illustrators magazine. Dowse has been shortlisted twice for The Sunday Times Watercolour Competition, and in 2017 won the Chairman’s Purchase Prize at the ING Discerning Eye Exhibition. www.camilladowse.co.uk
Chan Hong Yui Clement is a Hong Kong-based visual artist. Through various means of image-making, Chan’s intention is to reveal both the limitations and potential that are inherent in photographic language, resulting in image-based works that tend to be both mediumspecific and process-driven. www.holditorloseit.com
Chavdar Petrov
dale m reid
Chavdar Petrov is a Bulgarian artist who lives and works in Vidin, a town on the Danube. The river is a source of inspiration, becoming the center of his artistic focus and of his life. For Petrov it is a boundary between the visible and the imagination: an entrance to his dreams.
Photographer Dale M Reid uses darkroom techniques to imbue her botanical subjects with personality and emotion, evoking their unique voices and stories. Her studies utilise different elements to produce sensual and whimsical portraits in high contrast, with a keen eye for texture, form and framing.
Facebook: Chavdar Petrov www.dalemreidphotography.com
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Eleanor Bartlett
Eleni Foundoukis
Eleanor Bartlett is a UK-based visual artist who specialises in the use of tar and metal paint. Tar Paintings, curated by Michael Simpson, will be at Tintype Gallery, London, from 19 January until 17 February, a series that utilises block textures and colours in solid forms.
Of dual UK / Greek nationality, Eleni Foundoukis studied at Central Saint Martins and Camberwell College of Arts. In her collages, absurdity and humour combine in an obtuse narrative to create a universe populated with lost, deluded or infantilised characters, in a nonsensical, sometimes psychotic, sometimes comic environment. www.efoundoukis.wordpress.com Instagram: @eleni.foundoukis1
www.eleanorbartlett.com
Elinora Schwartz
evaldas gulbinas
Elinora Schwartz is a Jerusalembased artist whose practice includes experimental short videos, photography, sculpture and installation. Her work investigates female identity with a desire to give expression to the feminine experience of repression, silencing and loss of identity. Two of her works were performed at Femfest 2017 in London. Facebook: Laloosh Baruch Schvartz
The work of Evaldas Gulbinas falls within the discipline of fine art and strives to engage the viewer’s imagination. The ambiguous, mysterious and colourful shapes created from wood and acrylic invite individual interpretation and personal approaches. www.efka.co.uk Instagram: @evaldas_gu
Franziska Stolzenau
german fernandez
Repetition is the foundational theme in the work of Berlin-based artist Franziska Stolzenau. Rather than reproducing reality or creating an illusion, her drawings make the process itself visible – the repetition of a movement that changes the material in its form. Through reiteration, this action becomes an artefact: movement becomes drawing, which becomes sculpture. www.franziskastolzenau.com
German Fernandez is a Peruvian artist and designer based in Dubai. He explores the nature (and struggle) of communication, technology and self-knowledge through drawings, collages and paintings populated with pseudo-fantastical figures. Block (11610272).
Ibrahim Azab London-based Ibrahim Azab explores the subject of language within photography. Focusing on the photograph itself, he considers it as an object which communicates through a visceral process. Linking the act of “looking” or “seeing” with the unconscious process, Azab’s work highlights the failures within realism, surfacing a phenomenological understanding of perspective. www.ibrahimazab.com
Don’t Look Where I’m Pointing, 2017. Silver gelatin print.
gilles Gilles is a designer of humanoids. He published the foundational work Positionism, 15 years in the making, in 2017. His prototype female is based on research and analysis of ancient and modern sources, thus she has a look that can be seen as both classical and fresh. www.positionism.com Instagram: @positionism
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www.german-fernandez.com
www.ioanavrabie.com
K1 ROUND MIRROR, 2016. Multi-panelled (11 panels); wooden construction, canvas, acrylic colour and wax, 210cm x 198cm x 5cm.
janis cornelius
Roots Of Humanity. Ubud, Bali 2015. Analogue double exposure.
Ioana Vrabie Through her romantic and conceptual analogue photographs, Transylvanian artist Ioana Vrabie invites the viewer to slow down, question, contemplate and accept the calm restlessness of life and achieve a heightened state of awareness. She believes that the inherent beauty of the reality we live in does not need retouching.
A graduate of Chelsea College of Art and Design, Janis Cornelius paints landscapes and seascapes of the UK and Antigua. Her practice includes portraiture of Londoners in their workplaces as well as self-portraiture. She has exhibited in New York, Amsterdam, London, Venice and Paris. www.janiscornelius.com Riccardo Vitello, Contemporary Ballet Dancer, 2016. Oil on canvas.
oto rimele
Peter Palfi
In the piece shown here, Oto Rimele notes that he has created an “immaterial manifestation of coloured light.” He achieved this by dividing the whole into individual three-dimensional elements. Then, by using specific techniques in applying the paints, he illuminated the edges of each trapezoidal panel. This illumination is hidden when viewing the painting directly, but is reflected onto the wall, creating a magical effect. www.otorimele.com
Peter Palfi’s provocative practice deals with wider ethics, considering human consumption and animal mistreatment. His unusual, and at times, unnerving sculptures question perceptions and in doing so, pose moral dilemmas within aesthetically challenging compositions. The piece shown here tackles both the Yulin Dog Meat Festival and the common perception of Pit Bull dogs. www.peterpalfi.com
No MSG, 2017. Plywood, oak, cast aluminum, cast bronze, silkscreen print and enamel paint.
Sam Lander
simon ker-fox taylor
Manchester-based maker Sam Lander researches different processes and materials underused in furniture design. He then reconstructs these processes by repurposing machinery and objects. Different materials are used, leading to new approaches in bespoke furniture design.
Simon Ker-Fox Taylor works playfully between what is real and what is constructed. Story and character narratives, whether true or imaginary, are at the centre of his work. The style is raw, close and real, often drawing upon encounters with natural elements. www.simonkerfox.co.za Instagram: @simonkerfox
Instagram: @samlander.maker
Tracks.
THION Intimacy is a simple gesture: a hand cupping a receiving face, an arm draped over a welcoming back. It is these moments that artist and curator Thion investigates. Bold simplicity and vibrant forms provide new avenues to uncover human nuances.
Loving hands, 2017. Giclee print on fine art paper.
sophia pauley Sophia Pauley is currently studying painting at the University of Edinburgh and focuses on recreating movement through certain spaces. The shapes, lines and composition of her acrylic abstracts stem from architectural environments associated with water, such as those around the swimming pool or sea. www.sophiapauley.com Instagram: @sophia_pauley_art
For submission enquiries regarding the Artists’ Directory, contact Katherine Smira on (0044) (0)844 568 2001 or directory@aestheticamagazine.com
www.creathion.com Instagram: @thion_artist hello@creathion.com
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Tony Caunce
volo bevza
Tony Caunce is an English painter and video artist based in Sheffield. In his current work he uses computer software in the development of images, which he then executes on large canvases using traditional or invented painting techniques. Through this process he investigates the relationship between traditional painting and digital media. www.tonycaunce.co.uk
Volo Bevza is a Berlin-based artist who concentrates on digital nature. He works with a digitally generated subject matter: visual information is first processed by software, then translated into an oil painting. In recent works, Bevza converts three-dimensional scanned scenes into two-dimensional compositions. www.volobevza.com
WHO art and design
YARLI ALLISON, LAM
WHO Art and Design uses Perspex, rubber, steel wire, as well as gold and silver metals to create threedimensional art, from wearable pieces to large objects. The work is often influenced by human senses, such as Freud’s theory on colours. Currently in development is a range of light sculptures that captures a sense of movement.
Yarli is a Hong Kong-Canadian born, London-based artist. She says: “I feel like a piece of driftwood, questioning the meaning of survival, whether physically or emotionally, with a fictitious approach.” She is interested in solving crises with an understanding of oriental and Chinese philosophy, inventing coping strategies based on childhood play. www.yarliallison.com Instagram: @yarliallison
www.whoartanddesign.com
YASMEEN MELIUS
ye-ye tsang
Yasmeen Melius’ practice is focused on photography and writing, through which she explores personal experiences, thoughts and questions. With the influence of philosophy and narrative, her work increases the dynamic between artist and audience, whilst investigating the duality that develops through interpretation. www.yasmeenmelius.com Instagram: @yasmeenmelius
Ye-Ye Tsang is a painter based in Hong Kong. She aims to capture the subjective images in her mind that result from viewing visible objects. The composition of colours and shapes under the effects of light changes, leading her to a world that reflects her inner feelings.
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www.yeyetsang.wixsite.com/yeye Instagram: @yeyetsang
Yorkson Yimin Chen
young sam kim
London-based, Chinese-born Yorkson Yimin Chen recently completed her MA in Fine Art at the Slade. Working primarily in installation, she incorporates a range of mediums such as performance, poetry and songwriting, exploring the subjugation of human bodies under the rule of nation states. She is currently preparing a performance project curated by Agnes Gryczkowska at the Serpentine Gallery. www.yorkson.club
Hearing-impaired photographer and visual artist Young Sam Kim lives in New York. Though the lack of hearing hinders life in many ways, it clarifies the artist’s vision. This results in an unusual sensitivity and way of seeing the urban environment. Kim is showing works from the series Concrete Jungle at Emmanuel Fremin Gallery until 31 December. www.youngsamkim.com
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Nathan Coley, The Same For Everyone, 2017. Aarhus2017, ŠstudioNathanColey.
last words
Nathan Coley Artist
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THE SAME FOR EVERYONE has been placed in over 10 locations in central Denmark; the light pieces are identical but the sites differ greatly. Whilst researching potential locations for Aarhus2017, I visited the Friland community, which sits 35km outside of Aarhus. It is an eco-village built around principles of zero waste. One particular plot of land caught my eye: it featured an empty concrete circle, something I saw as an area of architectural proposition. The precision of the sans serif text is juxtaposed with the distinctly temporary aesthetic of the structure. It recalls the signage of the fairground: here today, gone tomorrow. The voice behind the text is authoritative, accusatory, demanding – yet anonymous. Nathan Coley: THE SAME FOR EVERYONE runs as part of Aarhus2017 European Capital of Culture. www.aarhus2017.dk.
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