17/11/2011

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I Feel Orange / apartamento #08

East London’s Vyner Street headquarters of The Rebel Dining Society was overtaken last week by orange recipes, orange juice, and orange neon. All the orange festivity ushered in the premier issue of I Feel Orange magazine, a collaboration by apartamento with artist Jody Barton and the food magicians Arabeschi di Latte. All in all, the little journal has warmed us up to the many charms of the oft unappreciated color. And from Dutch flags to pulpy juice, we may never again see orange the same way.

Not incidentally, the soirée was also a roundabout celebration for the birth of the 8th issue of everyone’s favorite “everyday life interiors magazine.” We’ve gotten a great look at it before it’s slated to hit newsstands, and it’s as lovely a read as ever. Inside the pragmatic and jam-packed journal are interviews with Beda Achermann, Marcelo Krasilcic and others, recipes for eggplant and a watercolor guide to 12 great gay books both by Ana Dominguez, a fun Kinder section, a bit of poetry, and brilliant bread still lives by apartamento co-director, 2DM’s Nacho Alegre. Also making a couple cameos in the issue is 2DM’s Roberta Ridolfi, with some cozy imagery of a very cozy home in New York, as well as photos for an interview of Faye Toogood of Studio Toogood fame.

Pat on the back, kids. Bang up job on the new zine, the latest issue, the lovely launch. Much love to our new nifty (orange) totebag takeaway to haul things around in, too. Perhaps even some oranges.

Join apartamento in Paris on the 18th at Librairie Yvon Lambert for the official launch of issue #08 alongside the vernissage “Drawings” of Nathalie du Pasquier.

Tag Christof

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11/11/2011

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Paris Photo 2011

Depuis ses origines, la photographie élargit son champ de vision, faisant dialoguer sans cesse les formes artistiques qu’elle côtoie avec la «réalité» qu’elle perçoit…

Yesterday marked the start of this year’s Paris Photo. The world’s premier event for fine art photography continues its role as the world’s litmus test for influential photography. And in a world more crowded than ever with imagery, Paris Photo is an important reminder that photography at its best can be immensely powerful and important. A selection of many of the world’s best galleries are in attendance, with work from contemporaries such as Marina Abramovic and Vito Acconci to old masters like Brassaï and Ansel Adams.

This year’s place of honour belongs to Africa, with an emphasis throughout on the work of several key African artists. Les Rencontres de Bamako is a dedicated space that showcases the work of a new wave of African photographers, while the Arthur Walther collection will present the works. And, of course, works from the likes of big names such as the seminal, politically charged David Goldblatt will be on display.

If you’re anywhere near Paris this weekend, it is absolutely not to be missed. Re-read some Susan Sontag essays, see some incredible photos and ponder the profound effect photography has had on our lives. At Paris’ Grand Palais until Sunday.

Tag Christof

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16/09/2011

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Luis Gispert / Fake Fashion Fantasy

A stroll down New York’s Canal Street on a weekend afternoon is all it takes to know that counterfeit luxury is big business. Peddlers selling knockoffs on the world’s city streets are impossibly well-organized, and at least in Italy, legend has it that mafia involvement is why the police seem to always look blindly away. Whatever the case, counterfeits make up a massive industry, with all the infrastructure and … that entails. And even a pretty mighty subculture.

While traveling the United States in search of extravagant custom cars to photograph, artist Luis Gispert stumbled upon that mighty subculture: cars upholstered in shiny Fendi and Gucci and Vuitton. All fakes, of course. But sumptuous, meticulously made, and obviously doted over to the point of actually becoming luxury to their owners. And just like any extravagantly cared-for SoCal lowrider, they are tangible symbols of their creators’ strongest desires.


So, the wealth fakes pretend to signify is a powerful symbol of optimism. They are forced access into the lavish dreams espoused by their ripped-off brands, and nowhere has this been more clear than in Gispert’s photographs. They are a look into vast cultural inequality and the power of symbols. These counterfeits are a surrogate for “capitalistic fantasies that may never be attained.”

From there, Gispert explored the wider culture surrounding knockoffs, stemming from 1980s and 1990s hip-hop and LA’s legendary Dapper Dan boutique. In all, an alternate view of fakes emerges. Not of the sweatshop labour and theft that produces them, of course, but a view that seems to legitimize the symbolic access to fantasy they create.

As fashion continues to move beyond logo-emblazoned mainstays, we’d argue that fakes pose little real threat. And if you’re truly in the market for a Hermès bag, you likely won’t cross-shop that glitzy Via Sant’Andrea boutique with a terrifying Chinatown basement, no matter how convincing the ripoff.

And when you carry that “Birkin” with track pants and a pair of Uggs, we all know where you got it, anyway.

Catch Gispert’s excellent works in an exhibition entitled ”Decepción” at Mary Boone Gallery, 745 Fifth Avenue in New York, running through October 2011.

Tag Christof – Images courtesy Mary Boone Gallery

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15/08/2011

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Judd’s Marfa / Chinati Foundation

Smack in the absolute middle of nowhere, along a solitary country road near Big Bend in the extreme west of Texas is the oasis of Marfa: population 1,981. The stuff of myth in artistic circles, the town was just like any other dying agricultural outpost until Donald Judd set up shop in the early 1970’s. He brought with him a singular vision and a cadre of extremely talented artists to create, on an uninterrupted scale that would have been almost impossible elsewhere. Despite its continued isolation, Judd’s vision evolved into a vibrant community (on which his mark is still thankfully conspicuous) that remains quite unlike anywhere else on the planet.


We talked last week about its most recognizable landmark, Prada Marfa (which actually sits several miles northwest of the town itself), but the place is much, much more than merely a gigantic display case for Judd’s art: it is a frontier town, both literally and artistically, with several boundary pushing artist-in-residency programs (we heard someone mention that the French government will begin sponsoring one soon), innovative galleries and an impressive food scene for its minuscule size. The city as a whole has an oddly otherworldly quality to it: well-preserved old signs indicating long-gone buildings purposefully dot its main street, gleaming galleries stand alongside decaying old structures, and shiny classic cars stylishly hum down streets alongside fat-tired bicycles. And among millions of visible stars, the inexplicable Marfa Lights can be seen from an observation point a few miles outside the city drifting across the night skies.


The majority of Judd’s work in Marfa is housed in a sprawling ex-military complex, which is the main outpost of the artist’s Chinati Foundation. It is here that Judd’s most impressive works are housed, including 100 Untitled Works in Mill Aluminum, a stark and sweeping meditation on difference, uniformity, complexity and the tenuousness of outward appearance.


Dan Flavin’s works in fluorescent light, which play brilliantly with colour psychology and their disorienting context, occupy six separate military barracks. In their midst is a Oldenburg & Van Bruggen sculpture, and the foundation also houses large-scale works from the likes of Carl Andre, Roni Horn, John Wesley, and Ingólfur Arnarsson. Chinati’s annex in the city’s centre, additionally, houses a large collection of Chamberlain’s emotionally charged scrap metal sculptures. The place is nothing short of a spiritual experience.

And in addition to the phenomenal collection at Chinati, there is also the Ayn Foundation, which houses a Warhol or two, as well as several other excellent galleries. And Marfa’s population is surprisingly urbane, yet is possessed of an endearing small-town sensibility and size: you can bicycle from end to end of the town in five minutes.


The city’s few restaurants are fantastic, with some notables being Jett’s inside Hotel Paisano, Squeeze, a very Swiss café with great breakfast, The Miniature Rooster which serves a delightful mix of southern USA comfort food and Indian fare alongside a long list of beers, and Cochineal, which has a fantastic ambience and simple, fresh food. The now iconic Food Shark truck makes an appearance at lunch time, and serves up some of the best falafel creations we’ve ever tried. And the town’s Thunderbird Hotel is a nifty, design savvy update on an old American motel, with gorgeous rooms, a typewriter rental service (!!!), phonographs and a big collection of vinyl albums for its guests, a sun-drenched pool and bicycle rental.

This town of makers, aesthetes, craftspeople and adventurers is assuredly unlike anywhere you’ve ever been. And it is, unequivocally, a place you must add to your must-visit list.

Tag Christof – Photos by Tag Christof and Jamie Ho for The Blogazine

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08/08/2011

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Prada Marfa / A Half-Decade Later

In a sideways nod to consumerism’s sprawl, globalisation, and the epic power of branding, Scandinavian artists Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset (Galleri Nicolai Wallner) conceived and erected Prada Marfa in the middle of nowhere a bit more than a half-decade ago. Its almost surreal location on a desolate farm road some 40 miles (60km) outside the tiny art mecca of Marfa (more on that tomorrow) is key to its symbolic power: it seems to say that consumerism, like cockroaches, could survive absolutely anything.


Today, a bit more than a half-decade after its inception, the sculpture has become positively iconic. It’s travelled through every realm of the blogosphere, been vandalized several times, and has become instantly recognizable in the vain of Watts Tower and Oldenburg & Van Bruggen‘s Spoonbridge and Cherry. And while the artists had originally intended to let the work weather, decompose and eventually go back to nature, its iconic place in culture seems to have guaranteed it a place in the physical world. As its myth has grown, it has become a veritable landmark unto itself, to which hipsters with artsy pretensions make sacred pilgrimages – five years later, it’s maintained, free of graffiti, well-lit and glimmering not unlike any real Prada boutique. All this while every building in the adjacent town of Valentine, Texas is sagging, smashed or deserted.

The sculpture’s appropriateness seems to be growing with time, its meaning towed forward not only by Prada’s vigorous attention to its own sterling brand, but also by a cultural context in which our relationship to ostentation and conspicuous consumption is becoming more complex. The Blogazine visited the sculpture last week in the American summer sun, and we’re very happy to have found it alive and well.

Tag Christof – Photos by Jamie Ho & Tag Christof for The Blogazine

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01/08/2011

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The Editorial: Summer Is Counterculture

Today is August. Oh, summer!

There are a million ways to spend yours. As long as it’s not behind a desk, of course. And as we all set off – cameras and sketchpads in hand – on the road, into nature or on faraway flights to new places, open your senses, stretch your arms and breathe in the fresh air.

This is the time of year for reflection, rejuvenation, redefinition. It is the glorious counterpoint to our yearlong toils, a time to crush workaday into a million tiny pieces and to be unconstrained by deadlines and meetings and stress. It is, above all, a time to nurture the creative spirit.

We at 2DM live through the image. We talk Avedon’s legacy and photographic processes over coffee. We size up models and work with world-class image makers from around the world. We make videos, watch avidly for new talents and devour magazines, with keen eyes on art direction. And through it, we’ve come to share a very particular vision of summer, seen of course, through the image: like Skye Parrott’s brilliant exhibition, You Were Here, in Wonder Room last year, we see unbounded freedom. Like a lifelong road trip. Sunshine. Impulsiveness. New scenery.


Roberta Price’s photographs of the communes of counterculture in the untamed western USA in the late 1960s and early 1970s distill our vision of summer brilliantly: her subjects were quixotic idealists who lived simply and harmoniously on their own terms, in a space outside the reach of a comparatively rigid society. They’re grainy and evocative and unpretentious. Her photographs are summer. Summer is counterculture. And some of our most fruitful ideas and inspirations spring from this most fertile of seasons. It is with this in mind that we begin ours.


Throughout the month, the editors of The Blogazine, together with 2DM’s talents, will share snapshots and words, stories and sketches of our own summers. We hope you’ll come along for the ride.

So get out and enjoy the hell out of your summer. See, make, think beautiful things.

Price’s photos are being shown in an excellent exhibition entitled Counterculture, which runs through 27 August at 516 Arts, not far from where most of them were taken.

Tag Christof – Images courtesy Roberta Price

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28/07/2011

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MAXXI / Verso Est. Chinese Architectural Landscapes

As the west’s infrastructures crumble and desperate attempts at “renewal” remain the main concern of planners inside our badly outdated cities, China’s have forged ahead phenomenally over the past decade. The country has spared almost no expense in its economic boom time building, and its cities have become gleaming, towering beacons of modernity. And within the context of a country with grandiose notions of itself, it has become the hotbed for grandiose, experimental architecture today.

Beyond the hoopla of Beijing’s transformations just before the landmark 2008 Olympic games, the entire country has been swept up and even cities in the most remote provinces have undergone tangible change. They now bear virtually no resemblance to their selves of even a decade ago, and as China continues to invest around one trillion dollars a year in infrastructure and construction, the changes show no sign of relenting.

Opening tomorrow at Rome’s MAXXI (itself an awkward shard of modernity in that most anti-modern of western cities) is Verso Est. Chinese Architectural Landscapes, organised in collaboration with the National Museum of Art China and curated by Fang Zhenning. It is to be a transversal look at the country’s feverish progress, and the new typologies China’s vanguard is nurturing in architecture. Buildings by Rem Koolhaas, Massimiliano and Doriana Fuksas, Steven Holl and even MAXXI’s own designer Zaha Hadid will be on display, and several lectures will seek to actively dissect the interesting problems and progress China has made over the last decade.

As Italy, even more than most countries faces massive problems of urban decay and degrading public space, it is indeed an opportune time to open a dialogue between the old and new. Especially as several prominent Italian architects are now doing their most important works in China. The exhibition’s title, “Verso Est” (“Towards the East”) even concomitantly seems to suggest a paradigm shift in architectural ingenuity is, well… going towards the east. And it seems that this shift is already well underway. With its heroic population numbers and a considerable amount of green thinking going into the massive projects the country’s cities have undertaken, China will inevitably begin to teach the west a thing or two about living well in the years ahead.

Catch the exhibition opening tomorrow at Fondazione MAXXI and running through 23 October.

Tag Christof – Images courtesy Fondazione MAXXI 

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28/07/2011

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Long Live Lucian Freud

Lucian Freud, one of the most influential painters of our time, passed away last week at his London home. The artist was well known not only for his artistic genius and his famous grandfather, Sigmund (same last name), but also for his eccentric personality, contempt for society’s conventions and his rather, shall we say… prolific sex life.

His Austrian Jewish family moved to London during the racial persecutions, where he would eventually become, together with his friend Francis Bacon, art’s greatest and sharpest observer of the human body’s break-up. He described the decadence of consumer society through the representation of (mainly nude) people with a merciless and ironic attitude. In Phaidon’s Painting Today, Tony Godfrey asserts “There is a distinction between figure and body: the figure is what we see – often idealised, as in fashion magazines – the body is how we feel our own body and that of others,” and Freud’s work was, if nothing, a tireless exploration into that subtle yet profound distinction.


The artist depicted, with raw realism, people from all social classes, but his choices sprang from personal impulse rather then political beliefs. What really affected him was exposing of the condition of the flesh, our shared sense of mortality and the disturbing decomposition of bodies. He focused on collapsed and pitted skin, adipose tissues, scars, rashes and other blemishes with a certain taste for people who looked unusual or had anomalous proportions, as in the case of Sue Tilley, an obese woman depicted in some of his more famous works.

But Lucian Freud will also be remembered for his life as a bon viveur – he hit the bottle hard throughout his adult life, gambled excessively and had many love affairs leading to an indefinite number of legitimate and illegitimate children. Guesstimates run as high as 40. Having moved in fashionable circles, he also had access to upper class London and painted it without sentiment, plainly, almost mockingly. In this way he subverted the traditional compulsion towards festooning portraits of wealthy sitters with jewels and other tokens of wealth to escape the uneasiness of bodily decay and the human condition. In this vain, the artist made a portrait of ‘a heavily-pregnant and naked’ Kate Moss, neither striving for formal beauty nor aesthetic, and he painted Queen Elizabeth II without hiding – and instead emphasising – her flabby muscles and empty stare.

Looking back at the works of Lucian Freud, it is striking to examine the way he used colours, linking masterly technique to ungainly and thick brushes, which seem to be due to a sort of personal urge. Using a traditional media Freud played a prominent part in the history of Art, changing the ways of thinking about figuration and influencing many contemporary artists.

Monica Lombardi – Images courtesy Artchive

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26/07/2011

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Segalega / Zero + Giò Marconi

June and July are usually not the best months to see exhibitions in Milan. The artistic season has essentially drawn to a close and, except for some blockbuster institutional events, most of the time, people can only find slack summer shows proposed by art dealers who are planning to leave the city until September.

But Segalega, the unusual group exhibition split between two of the most important galleries in Italy, Gio Marconi and Zero, doesn’t fall within either of these categories.

It seems that the show has been thought to hold the interest of the small ‘community’ of art lovers, who keep on going to visit galleries, in spite of tropical heat of Milan.

The project, running until last week in the two venues contemporaneously, came out under the pretext of overlooking the same street (via Tadino near Porta Venezia) and features some rather remarkable works. The exhibition opened with a weird and amusing performance by Marcello Maloberti untitled Doppietta, in which two people – one black and one white – wearing alpine uniform, crawled side by side from the first gallery to the other one and roamed around the visitors, who were watching the shows.

Among the works presented in both the art spaces, Kerstin Bratsch, the German artist, based in New York, draws the attention with his colourful pieces where subjects give the impression of being trapped between two boards of Plexiglas and make fun of painting. Rosa BarbaRosa Barba’s installation entitled Invisible act, on display at Zero gallery is characterised by the usual elegance through which the Italian artist, who lives in Berlin, is able to create sculptures that seem to be made of light. But a special note goes to the Andrea Kvas (b. 1985), who makes his debut among the already known international artists John Bock, Massimo Grimaldi and Markus Schinwald. Courageously, Zero dedicated one room of the gallery – in a sort of solo show – to the young artist that shows small works on canvas, which privilege the gesture.

With many ups and just a few downs, Segalega gave the opportunity to see a satisfying number of works, which truly spoke about painting, colour stratification, afterthoughts and some interesting effects. It was, happily, a good reason to challenge the hot weather of these past few days and see the show within tomorrow.

Monica Lombardi
  
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21/07/2011

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Protein / Animate Everything

Animated GIFs spread like wildfire in the early days of the net. As we away on the blazing fast 56K modem speeds of the day, the junky little motion clips – each containing a series of frames running in running in a continuous loop – stood in for our inability to download real video. They were in every creepy religious chain email your aunt sent, on Myspace pages, and they even dotted the e-porn landscape like devious 1990s kinetoscopes. Then high-speed internet hit, and they mostly faded into the sunset – save their obnoxious flashing banner ad cousins – replaced by high quality images and real video.

But it turns out they have a longer shelf life than just their technical simplicity. They’re somewhere between films and photos, and as such offer a typological bridge between the two. Over the past several years, especially with the advent of Tumblr, designers and all sorts of other people one the web have brought them back, someitmes to pretty spectacular effect. And several artists are even working in the medium (can I really call it that?).

Opening tonight, the endlessly clever UK creative firm Protein has curated the first exhibition of some of the most notable work being done in the format. The time seems right, after all. Artists include Parra, Jiro Bevis, Mimi Leung, Nous Vous Collective, DDF, Will Robson Scott, Tyrone Le Bon, as well as several others.

Opening tonight, 21 July at Protein’s gallery space on 18 Hewett street in Shoreditch, London, just off Curtain Road. Vernissage starts at 7pm, and the show will run until the 15th of August.

Tag Christof – Animated .GIF courtesy Protein

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