Design Museum 22 May

Visited the design museum to finnally see the Brit Insurance Designs of the Year 2010, and also the David Adjaye exhibition on Urbanisation in Africa. The Insurance Design exhibition was really interesting. The winning design - the foldable plug by Min-kyu Choi, was impressive. The UK plug is something which is so unescessarily bulky and cumbersome, but also tolerated without question in day to day life, so to create such a simple and user friendly solution, I think, was very clever. Other designs which I was impressed / inspired by include, a product called 'clouds' which is an installation / starage / furniture / partition wall combo creation, by Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec for Kvadrat. Basically a series of cells constructed from felt and connected together with custom fit elastic bands. the beautiful thing about the product is that the form and size of the 'cloud' is entirely down to the individual user. I really enjoyed the creation of something beautiful which can also be unique to everyone. Also the nominees for the interactive award were interesting and often alot of fun! Bloom (by Brian Eno and Peter Chilvers), which is an iphone / ipod touch application design was fun. the idea was to create music compositions by touching the screen in different places, this also created a ripple effect visual and when the application was left idle it would repeat the most recently entered composition on a loop. The BMW concept design was fascinating but with the desciption of its fantastic ergonomic form and unusual material, and also the surreal aesthetic; all you wanted to do was have a touch - and you obviously (but dissapointingly) weren't allowed. The most beautiful intallation I saw during the exhibition was without doubt 'Soma' by Ayala Serfaty. It was a light intallation constructed of light filaments which are woven together and then sprayed with polymer to create a glowing skin-like crust.

(Below: Folding plug design by Min-Kyu Choi, Cloud by Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec for Kvadrat, Soma by Ayala Serfaty)

I was surprisied to see the Highline project as a nominee for the architecture award, only because it feels like its been around longer than it actually has, I think. Where it was maybe under celebrated in the Brity Insurance Design Awards, it has now made it up by winning a D&AD 'black pencil' award in the environmental design category.

LINK to D&AD website

I then went on to see the also long awaited David Adjaye Urban Africa exhibition. The introduction to the project was really interesting. Different characteristics of each African country were shown through mapping the whole continent in different styles. Giving you as the viewer an opportunity to understand each individaul country in the context of the Afican Continent. However when I moved into the exhibition I was slightly dissapointed. Each capital city in the whole continent was represented through a series of photographs, intended to encapture the feel of the whole city and the urban context of each city. I felt a little let down, and I don't really know why - the few Cities in Africa which I have visited and were represented, were represented well by the photographs. I think I was just expecting more analysis, more of a study.

Serpentine Pavillion 2010

French architect Jean Nouvel has been asked to design this years Serpentine Pavillion (a temporary pavillion which is designed by a different architect each year since 2000, often an architect who has not had the opportunity to have anything built in the UK before). The proposal (below) is intended to refer to classic british icons, such as the route master buses / red telephone boxes / post boxes. The materials, glass, steel, fabric and polycarbonate, are also inteded to reflect this concept. The pavillion declares it's presence in Hyde park through it's vibrant colour and a 14m free standing wall next to the building.

below - video about previous Pavillions from different architects over the years.

Dilston Grove Arts Venue

Dilston Church is due to reopen it's doors as a contemporary arts venue at an opening event on the 27 may, after two years and £870 000. The building is a grade two listed church and has hosted exhibits by various artists before, including; Ackroyd & Harvey, Richard Wilson, Mike Nelson and Shauna Illingworth.

Waterperry Gardens 

May 1st 2010

Waterperry house and gardens, in oxfordshire which was originally home to the Horticultural College between 1932 and 1971 the gardens are really beautiful and a lot of the border planting particuarly is reminiscent of the arts and crafts movement / painterly style borders of Gertrude Jekyll. Mary spiller is the design consultant responsible for the majority of the design of the gardens, having herself graduated from the school to become a teacher, horticultural manager and then head gardener before her current design role.

 I really appreciated the gentle painterly approach to the design of the garden, particularly the Mary Rose gardens, (which were planted in 1991 and are now well established and flourishing) and  the canal and surrounding area. the canal is a strip of water (probably better described as a sort of rectangular pond) which joins the herbacious nursery to 'Mirandas border'. It is cleverly designed to allow the clear vista from the top lawn over the countryside to remain, whilt still being a beautiuful and interesting feature in itself. In the centre of the canal stands a statue of Miranda from Shakespeare's 'Tempest' sculpted by Tanya Russel, it is elegant and eautiful and seems to fit the aesthetic of the garden well. The formal gradens were also very interesting, based (loosely) on a Tudor garden, it comprises of plants which might have been found in gardens from multiple eras including Tudor, Stuart, Georgian and Victorian, and also has a sculpture of a girl holding the 'lamp of wisdom'.

I thoroughly enjoyed the gardens and found them very therapeutic and relaxing.

The New Faces: a Photographic Exhibition  

At The Book Club. It was a series of protraits and photographs by Dean Chalkney. I really liked the laid back style of the photos, and the moments which were caught seemed natural and yet well orchistrated.

"All the participants are in their late teens or early twenties, trying hard to be 'faces' on today's mod scene. Dean first encountered them last summer when they dropped into his monthly night club in north London. They would appear, dance and, after a few visits, even DJ. He became fascinated by their moves and by their style and the idea for 'The New Faces' was born"

http://www.modculture.co.uk/culture/culture.php?id=62

An article in the Evening Standard about an art installation opening at the Bargehouse on Southbank from 9th April. It is called Speed of Light and is to celebrate the 10th anniversy of broadband. (By collective United Visual Artists and comissioned by Virgin Media). Looks really interesting; i can't find any further information about it, so i'm looking forward to it - I have in mind Leo Villareal style lighting effects / works. should be good.

The Real Van Gogh - The artist and his letters

20 / 03 / 2010

"They say a picture is worth a thousand words, yet in ‘The Real Van Gogh: The Artist and His Letters’ words redefine our understanding and appreciation of one of the most revered figures in the Post-Impressionist movement. Through the juxtaposition of Van Gogh's letters and his art, we see his life, work and passions illuminated as never before."

The exhibition was at the Royal academy of Arts. It was an amazing exhibition which really gave insight into what Van Gogh was all about. it was fascinating to me to see how he struggled with perspective for so long and it was interesting to see the progression through his work, as you walked through the exhibition. I found the earlier pieces of work sometimes very crude  (mainly the perspective paintings in oil), and often beautiful in an almost romantic way (ink sketches and line drawings on a plain background). the later work where he really embraced colour were fantastic. I was so glad to finally see some. Among my favourites was "sower with setting sun" (below); the colours were almost luminous, the green was so vibrant against the purple fields. Another favourite was the sunflowers, as i used sunflowers among other organic forms in my art at sixth form and on my art foundation at Norwich. The colours were really beautiful which made me realise how badly most of the paintings reproduce - they were all far more beautiful in reality. Some of the colours eg. bright pink have faded over time to almost white (eg. below in "blossoming Almond tree"; the blossom were originally a much brighter pink).

Above: Blossoming Almond Tree, (Feb 1890) Vincent Van Gogh Below: Sowers with Setting Sun, (nov 1888) Vincent Van Gogh

I did enjoy letter aspect of the exhibition; although most were in dutch and french they were often illustrated with rough sketches of whichever painting he was working on at the time. These sketches, which he referred to as 'croquis' or 'scratches', were beautiful, and with a few of his earlier pieces I actually preferred them to the painting itself. Most of the letters were addressed to his younger brother Theo (an art dealer who supported Van Gogh financially and morally throughout his career) other letters were addressed to his younger sister Willemien and artist friends Anthon van Rappard, Paul Gauguin and Emile Bernard. 

Sir John Soanes Museum - 20th march 2010

"Soane was born in 1753, the son of a bricklayer, and died after a long and distinguished career, in 1837.

Soane designed this house to live in, but also as a setting for his antiquities and his works of art. After the death of his wife (1815), he lived here alone, constantly adding to and rearranging his collections. Having been deeply disappointed by the conduct of his two sons, one of whom survived him, he determined to establish the house as a museum to which 'amateurs and students' should have access. "

http://www.soane.org/

The second time i have visited, but i found it just as fascinating as the first time. The amount of things in the house and the architecture of the house itself is staggering. I am always most impressed by the sarcophagus of Seti I. I just find it so bazaar and fascinating that a house can have such precious things in it.

Time lapse similar to the time lapse of japanese knotweed i found on the BBC website. I love the way you can see the days going by, by the shadows. For my final in art foundation I was looking at the way things grow, and I planted beans in a custom made perspex box, so you could see the growth of roots and leaves. In the final exhibition I displayed the perspex box with five canvases and three pint glasses with conkers at different rates of growth. I found the project very interesting.

Wednesday 24th February 

Antony Gormley Sculpture - St. Pauls

Flare II is the new sculpture which has been unveiled today in St. Pauls cathedral. the sculpture by Antony Gormley is a mesh of wire in a cloud form with a falling figure hanging in the cloud. The staircase is not usually open to the public, although it has featured in a few films, including Harry Potter and Sherlock Holmes, so it will be a unique chance to see the geometric stair case. The staircase itself looks so beautiful I would love to go purely to see Christophers Wren's inspiring architecture, although the sculpture looks very interesting aswell. Photographs I have seen of it are not so clear so really need to see it in reality! Flare II is part of the cathedrals programme of artworks designed "to explore the encounter between art and faith".

Canon Giles Fraser (the cathedral's chancellor):  "Gormley's work on the human form was an apt art for a Christian church which believes in incarnation — where God becomes human: “We're just really excited at being the place where people are asking questions — about the nature of the body and about physicality and vulnerability.”"

 Antony Gormley: “Wren understood proportion, space and gravitational dynamics as no other British architect of his time, and the Geometric Staircase is a supreme and elegant outcome of this understanding,”

“Flare II is my attempt to use applied geometry to construct an energy field describing a human space in space.”  

"Stratford goes for gold with £3m Olympic metal leaves that sway in breeze"

Evening Standard- thursday 18 february

I read an article in the standard today about drawings for a string of tree sculptures designed to give a sense of arrival to Stratford (for the olympics), the sculptures are up to 16 metres tall and have large plates of titanium as leaves which are designed to sway in the wind. The height and scale of the sculptures would make them the largest kinetic sculptures in Britain. I personally really like the idea of sculptural landscapes. I think the sculptures will give Stratford a distinctive identity. I proposed for a project in Paddington Basin a tree sculpture with wide glass plates as leaves, which is a similar design, which I made a model for. I guess that is what really caught my imagination is the combination of art and landscape architecture in such a direct way, up until this degree (in landscape architecture) my focus was always fine art, i chose to specialise in fine art for the majority of the Foundation in art and design in Norwich, and have always relied on that fine art background to influence my own designs.  

"A report on the project warns that at present the streets trapped within the traffic-logged Newham gyratory system — dubbed “the island” — are scruffy and depressing, yet they will also provide the first impression for millions of visitors to the area in 2012.

“In its current condition, Stratford town centre runs the risk of being overshadowed by adjacent new developments,” warns the report. “The island needs to be more exciting to attract new businesses, residents and visitors.”"

Sri Carmichael, Consumer Affairs Reporter, London Evening Standard.

A model I made for a project in my first year at uni. It was proposed to be a shelter made from steel with  glass leaves in Paddington basin. 

The Photographers' Gallery
17th February 2010
Deutsche Borse Photography Prize 2010

http://deutsche-boerse.com/dbag/dispatch/en/kir/gdb_navigation/about_us/30_Art_Collection/25_photography_prize

The Deutsche Börse Photography Prize rewards a living photographer, of any nationality, who has made the most significant contribution, in exhibition or publication format, to the medium of photography over the previous year.'

I went to the photographers gallery to see the work of the four finalists; Zoe Leonard, Anna Fox, Sophie Ristelheuber and Donovan Wylie. I found looking at the work really interesting, i decided to look through the whole exhibition without reading any of the accompanying explanation/ commentary, so as to interpret the photographs as they are, with no preconceptions or expectations. And it was really refreshing. They were depressing, impending, bizarre, and very different from artist to artist. All seemed to demand attention and evoke a strong feeling. After having read the accompanying notes about the photographers and their chosen subject matter, i just felt the same reactions in a more comprehensible context.

The photographs which had the most dramatic effect, for me, were by Donovan Wylie. He exhibited a series of photographs of the Maze prison, which once housed both loyalist and republican prisoners in Ireland. I think he really conveyed a sense of weight with the photographs, I felt that the series was photographed in reflection to his own personal experience of the building and feelings about the building. There was a wall display of clippings and artefacts from a scrap book on the opposite wall to the photographs, which visually gave the exhibition more context and a vague explanation. It was clear from the scrap book clippings what the show was about, but the photographs had an eery mystery about them. I can clearly picture now the strong lines and use of perspective to direct the viewer to through the photograph, there was something very blunt about the images.

(http://blog.magnumphotos.com/images/wylie_LON83745_Comp.jpg)

V&A    Decode    8.2.10

I went to the V&A to see the Decode exhibition, i'd heard a lot about it before going, so my expectations were high. I was not disappointed, I thought it was awesome. The exhibition was based digital and interactive design, works featured were mostly existing although a few were created especially for the exhibition. One thing that I really liked about the exhibition was that it was fun for everyone, you don't have to be into art or design specifically to enjoy the exhibition.  

"The exhibition explores three themes: Code presents pieces that use computer code to create new works and looks at how code can be programmed to create constantly fluid and ever-changing works.Interactivity looks at works that are directly influenced by the viewer. Visitors will be invited to interact with and contribute to the development of the exhibits. Network focuses on works that comment on and utilise the digital traces left behind by everyday communications and looks at how advanced technologies and the internet have enabled new types of social interaction and mediums of self-expression."

http://www.vam.ac.uk/microsites/decode/

Outside in the John Madejski garden there were a series of small screens in the water as you approach the screens you see yourself digitally reflected on the various screens, the reflections are then reflected again into the water, it's strangely calming and sombre feeling.   

I followed two little girls around the exhibition and they loved it, it was good for  me to see how responsive the interactive peices were, because they got really in to it. very good, loved it.

V&A Decode generative identity from postspectacular on Vimeo.

The Unilever Series: How It Is

Miroslaw Balka

6.2.10

"The latest commission in The Unilever Series How It Is by Polish artist Miroslaw Balka is a giant grey steel structure with a vast dark chamber, which in construction reflects the surrounding architecture - almost as if the interior space of the Turbine Hall has been turned inside out. Hovering somewhere between sculpture and architecture, on 2 metre stilts, it stands 13 metres high and 30 metres long. Visitors can walk underneath it, listening to the echoing sound of footsteps on steel, or enter via a ramp into a pitch black interior, creating a sense of unease.

Underlying this chamber is a number of allusions to recent Polish history – the ramp at the entrance to the Ghetto in Warsaw, or the trucks which took Jews away to the camps of Treblinka or Auschwitz, for example. By entering the dark space, visitors place considerable trust in the organisation, something that could also be seen in relation to the recent risks often taken by immigrants travelling. Balka intends to provide an experience for visitors which is both personal and collective, creating a range of sensory and emotional experiences through sound, contrasting light and shade, individual experience and awareness of others, perhaps provoking feelings of apprehension, excitement or intrigue."

http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/unilevermiroslawbalka/default.shtm

VAN DOESBURG & the international avant garde

Constructing a new world

Tate modern 6th February 2010

I went to the tate modern today to check out the new Van Doesburg exhibition, which is running until May. It was fantastic. The range of design genre he dipped into during his career was phenomonal and cutting edge for the era. he originally trained briefly as a singer/ actor until he decided to be a painter and then gradually through his career became interested in typography, design and architecture. Theo van Doesburg was born as Christian Emil Marie Küpper in 1883 in Uttrecht, and his early paintings were reminiscent in style and subject matter to the Amsterdam Impressionists. In 1913 Van Doesburg was heavily influenced by Wassily Kandinsky, after reading his book 'Rückblicke', and began to experiment with abstraction.

"Like kandinsky, he saw abstraction as directly embodying the spiritual qualities that he believed to be fundamental to all works of art. It could be means of expressing the artists inner emotions, or of representing the mystical forces underlying the visible world, reflecting the doctrine known as theosophy."

(Gladys Fabre)

During Van Doesburgs two year service to the army in 1915, he came into contact with the work of Piet Mondrian. The complete abstraction of reality portrayed in Mondrian's work appealed to van Doesburg and he contacted Mondrian. Together with other artists Bart van der Leck, Anthony Kok, Vilmos Huszar and J J P Oud, he and Mondrian founded the magazine De Stijl. De Stijl, as a magazine and a movement, was a major element in Van Doesburgs life and featured broadly in this exhibition. The paintings were predominantly large canvases of vertical and horizontal grids with blocks of solid primary colour, although Mondrian often strayed from the restricted palette of primary colours. The paintings originally were based on a physical object or form, but evolved eventually into independent compositions of geometric grid and colour. I found the paintings bizarrely enchanting.

Theo van Doesburg: Counter composition VI 1925

In 1919 Van Doesburg created a new type face which i recognised instantly; It is created in line with the De Stijl movement of straight lines with no curves in squares and blocks, with capitals used where necessary, to keep the uniform shape. It was fascinating to see how this was developed and to understand the reasoning behind it. Van Doesburg felt a unity between his De Stijl movement and the Dada movement in the early 20's, there was a whole room dedicated to this during the exhibition, which i found really interesting. I was introduced to the ideals of Dadaism in my foundation year in Norwich where I had a fantastic lecture on it, however I have never properly looked into it, so it was interesting to see a portion of the exhibition focused on Dada.

Theo van Doesburg/ Cornelus van Eesteren: Perspective with final colour design, shopping arcade with bar restaurant, Laan van Meerdervoort, The hague 1924.

Van Doesburg's major inputs into the design and architecture world where during the period between 1923 - 1930. He met architect Cornelis Van Eesteren in 1922 and collaberated with him in creating a series of architectural models based on the idea of planes floating in space using black and white and the primary colours. The ideas behing De Stijl architecture and design influenced, Rietveld, Oud, De Marle, Gorin and Eileen Gray. the major project displayed in the exhibition was the Aubette building in Strasbourg. This was redeveloped in partnership with Hans Arp and Sophie Taeuber-Arp into a Cafe, restaurant, Ballroom and Cinema complex. the new aethetic he created with this design he termed Elementarism. Displayed along with the ork in this room was a fantastic quote from van Doesburg:

"The point is to situate man within painting, rather than in front of it . . . Man does not live in the construction but in the atmosphere generated by the surfaces."

The National Portrait Gallery

31st January 2010 

Had a wonder around the National Portrait Gallery, through the gallery displays. One of the displays I found interesting was the "Twiggy: A life in photographs". It was interesting to see the style changing with Twiggy's age. She was so iconic as a model and the images in the show were iconic  in representing the times as well as the person. Other gallery displays at the time i visited included; John Gibbons: Portraits, Chasing mirrors, Jane Bown, Format Photography Agency 1983-2002, Salome: Oscar Wilde and Maud Allan.

NLA

15th January 2010

"Our programme of exhibitions, events and publications brings together leading professionals in the public and private sector, politicians and the general public, to share knowledge and identify the challenges and opportunities of the capital's built environment."

I went to the NLA for a morning talk and a wonder around the exhibits which are there, amongst which is the fantastic model of central London by Pipers- 'International leaders in architectural model making'. It is a beautiful model and I always find it fascinating to see London from that perspective, on my flight to japan in the summer i noticed the city from above. It is so huge and such an iconic landscape. 

LINK to Pipers Architectural Models website

LINK to NLA website

14/01/10

"The Co-op, UK

•  
•  

BrightFarm Systems is part of the winning team chosen to develop a master plan for the redevelopment of an eight-hectare site in central Manchester, United Kingdom. Our design team was chosen by global engineering firm Arup to develop carbon neutral, local food production systems."

http://brightfarmsystems.com/projects/the-co-op-uk

Brightfarm systems are involved in several interesting projects based around urban agriculture and other design solutions to environmental and sustainability issues. One project that they have built, which interests me particularly is The  Science Barge, located on the Hudson river New York. It is a barge which demonstrates systems which can be used to create an entirely sustainable food production using renewable energy, to the public. The designer of the barge itself was Ted Caplow, who is the executive director of New York Sun Works Centre for Sustainable Engineering.

http://brightfarmsystems.com/projects/nysw-usa

9th January 2010

I found this video earlier, it's a clip showing the opening of the new flagship store for Nike in Tokyo, with clips from the architect explaining his design decisions etc. I found it really interesting,having been to Harajuku (where the store is opening) on my trip to Japan last summer. The way in which the feel of the place is captured and also a tiny portion of Japanese modern culture is portrayed. I also found the architect speaking about the design interesting; and of course the design itself. there seemed to be so many different aspect to the design, the way the clip is shot, each camera shot you see, feels like a new building.

Leo Villareal

Tuesday 5th January 2010

Leo Villareal (1967, Albuquerque, New Mexico) is an American artist living and working in New York City. His work combines LED lights and encoded computer programming to create illuminated displays. They are very cool and very beautiful, but worryingly transfixing. Especially 'multiverse' displayed at the  National Gallery of Art, washington, DC. :

"Multiverse, the largest and most complex light sculpture created by American artist Leo Villareal, may be seen and experienced by visitors as they pass through the Concourse walkway between the East and West Buildings of the National Gallery of Art.Commissioned by the Gallery and on view until November 2009, the work features approximately 41,000 computer-programmed LED (light-emitting diode) nodes that run through channels along the entire 200-foot-long space. The development of this LED project began in 2005, and the installation created by Villareal specifically for this location began in September 2008."

(http://www.artknowledgenews.com/2009-10-10-01-04-24-national-gallery-of-art-acquires-leo-villareals-major-installation-multiverse.html)

Link to Leo Villareal's website with a video of 'Multiverse'