Amelia’s Magazine | London Fashion Week S/S 2011 Presentation Review: Antipodium

FADAwards-the tightrope walker-Florence Melrose by-Barbara-Ana-G
The Tightrope Walker – an illustration of a dress designed by Florence Melrose, medications illustrated by Barbara Ana Gomez.

I’m a bit rubbish when it actually comes to checking what’s what during fashion week – I will generally go to most things that I’m invited to on the grounds that if someone has bothered to invite me then I should generally return the honour by actually turning up. Not so most magazine editors I might add – many was the time that I would swan into a fashion show under the guise of Katie Grand at The Face. She never went, information pills and yours truly got the golden tickets.

FAD awards SS2011 - abi daker
Dress by Rebecca Glyn-Blanco of Camden School for Girls. Illustration by Abigail Daker.

FADAwards Keep it secret-by-Barbara-Ana-Gomez
Keep it Secret – illustration of a dress by Sinead Cloonan from City & Islington College by Barbara Ana Gomez.

And as I’ve already mentioned I don’t do queues – not in Tescos, buy and certainly not during fashion week. To this end my heart sank as I rounded the corner to Freemasons’ Hall and found a line of people streaming down the street. What was this FAD awards malarkey anyway? Heading to the front of the queue I waggled my ticket at an unknown PR person and hoped for the best, so was somewhat surprised to be informed in hushed tones that I was a VIP and could go straight on through. Upstairs in one of the many architecturally fabulous chambers, Matt and I sipped on sweet fizzy stuff as we tried to figure out what this was all about.

FAD-Awards-sketches-Amelias-Magazine-by-kila_kitu
FAD-Awards 2010-Kila Kitu
Dress by Emily Rogers of Salford City College as illustrated by Kila Kitu.

Apparently we’ve been very supportive of FAD in the past, and once I’d looked up our previous coverage it did suddenly all ring a bell. But I wasn’t quite prepared for the sheer unadulterated upbeat joy of this event. Right in the thick of a hectic fashion week it’s a true testament to the achievement of this organisation that I could sit through yet another long catwalk show and come out the other end beaming with goodwill.

LFW_FAD_Awards_Abigail_Nottingham
The European Fashion Designer award winning dress from Paul Vasileff and Shahira Bakhoum. Illustrated by Abigail Nottingham.

FADAwards Flower-Rebecca Glyn-Blanco by-Barbara-Ana-G
Rebecca Glyn-Blanco by Barbara Ana Gomez.

Just to recap quickly, FAD stands for Fashion Awareness Direct and it is a charity that aims to empower young people – as the brochure says “Fashion is a great way to connect with young people from different backgrounds, to give them confidence and raise their aspirations for the future.”

FAD awards SS2011 - Adam Preece by Abi Daker
Adam Preece by Abigail Daker.

LFW_FAD_awards Chelsey Ward by Abigail-Nottingham
Chelsey Ward by Abigail Nottingham.

Last year we covered the undergraduates awards show, but this year we were in for a much younger treat: the FAD Junior Awards showcased the designs of finalists chosen from 130 teenagers aged 16-19. Yes dear reader, you may well have to keep pinching yourself as you take a look through the images. I know I did, and I was sitting right there when they paraded past. Created over the course of five days at the University of East London with the help of an experienced team of tutors, the outfits put together by these young designers would put many graduates to shame.

LFW_FAD_Awards Karmen-Marie Parker by Abigail_Nottingham
Karmen-Marie Parker by Abigail Nottingham.

FAD-Awards-Natalie Goreham by-kila_kitu
Natalie Goreham by Kila Kitu.

To start off the evening’s events previous winner Prash Muraleetharan took to the stage with a bit of confident advice, endearingly delivered. “It’s what you do with this moment which determines a winner…. so get upstairs and network,” he advised, somewhat sagely. At the end he winked. And I’m sure he winked at me. Blimey… what a charmer… it’s quite hard to countenance that Prash must still be a teenager, and yet he already runs his own fashion label with a website and everything.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
Prash Muraleetharan dispels his words of wisdom at the start of the ceremony. All photography by Amelia Gregory.

After the catwalk show we had speeches from the sleek Susan Aubrey-Cound of M&S and Helen Carter of UEL, followed by the prizegiving by the extremely fabulous Zandra Rhodes, who is *the cutest* when she smiles! The winners and their parents looked so overwhelmed it really did warm the cockles of my jaded fashionista heart.

Zandra-Rhodes-FAD-Awards-2010-Antonia-Parker-Amelias-Magazine-A
Zandra Rhodes by Antonia Parker. I wuv her.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
Paul Vasileff and Shahira Bakhoum of Milan step up first to take the prize for the European Fashion Designer Competition, which was the culmination of a two year project.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
Karmen-Marie Parker with her winning design shortly before she burst into tears… aw, bless.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
Andre Augusto: pattern cutting award winner.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
Research award winner Sarah Kilkenny.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
17 year old David Short – the first boy to become overall winner and a proper little fashionista in the making.

Within this blog you’ll find my favourite pieces to hit the runway – and just remember, they were all designed and made by 16-19 year olds. Quite astonishing I’m sure you’ll agree.

FAD junior awards 2010 Shomari Williams photo by Amelia Gregory
Shomari Williams.

FAD junior awards 2010 Emily Rogers photo by Amelia Gregory
Emily Rogers.

FAD junior awards 2010 Charlie Ibouillie photo by Amelia Gregory
Charlie Ibouillie.

FAD junior awards 2010 Sinead Cloonan photo by Amelia Gregory
Sinead Cloonan.

FAD junior awards 2010 European winners photo by Amelia Gregory
FAD junior awards 2010 European winners photo by Amelia Gregory
The winner of the European competition.

FAD junior awards 2010 Rebecca Glyn-Blanco photo by Amelia Gregory
Rebecca Glyn-Blanco.

FAD junior awards 2010 Natalie Goreham photo by Amelia Gregory
Natalie Goreham.

FAD junior awards 2010 Florence Melrose photo by Amelia Gregory
Florence Melrose.

FAD junior awards 2010 Misbah Siddique photo by Amelia Gregory
Misbah Siddique.

FAD junior awards 2010 Zandra Rhodes photo by Amelia Gregory
And another completely gratuitous shot of Zandra because this post isn’t long enough already. Because I WUV HER.

FADAwards-the tightrope walker-Florence Melrose by-Barbara-Ana-G
The Tightrope Walker – an illustration of a dress designed by Florence Melrose, ed illustrated by Barbara Ana Gomez.

I’m a bit rubbish when it actually comes to checking what’s what during fashion week – I will generally go to most things that I’m invited to on the grounds that if someone has bothered to invite me then I should generally return the honour by actually turning up. Not so most magazine editors I might add – many was the time that I would swan into a fashion show under the guise of Katie Grand at The Face. She never went, information pills and yours truly got the golden tickets.

FAD awards SS2011 - abi daker
Dress by Rebecca Glyn-Blanco of Camden School for Girls. Illustration by Abigail Daker.

FADAwards Keep it secret-by-Barbara-Ana-Gomez
Keep it Secret – illustration of a dress by Sinead Cloonan from City & Islington College by Barbara Ana Gomez.

And as I’ve already mentioned I don’t do queues – not in Tescos, and certainly not during fashion week. To this end my heart sank as I rounded the corner to Freemasons’ Hall and found a line of people streaming down the street. What was this FAD awards malarkey anyway? Heading to the front of the queue I waggled my ticket at an unknown PR person and hoped for the best, so was somewhat surprised to be informed in hushed tones that I was a VIP and could go straight on through. Upstairs in one of the many architecturally fabulous chambers, Matt and I sipped on sweet fizzy stuff as we tried to figure out what this was all about.

FAD-Awards-sketches-Amelias-Magazine-by-kila_kitu
FAD-Awards 2010-Kila Kitu
Dress by Yashodah Rodgers as illustrated by Kila Kitu.

Apparently we’ve been very supportive of FAD in the past, and once I’d looked up our previous coverage it did suddenly all ring a bell. But I wasn’t quite prepared for the sheer unadulterated upbeat joy of this event. Right in the thick of a hectic fashion week it’s a true testament to the achievement of this organisation that I could sit through yet another long catwalk show and come out the other end beaming with goodwill.

LFW_FAD_Awards_Abigail_Nottingham
The European Fashion Designer award winning dress from Paul Vasileff and Shahira Bakhoum. Illustrated by Abigail Nottingham.

FADAwards Flower-Rebecca Glyn-Blanco by-Barbara-Ana-G
Rebecca Glyn-Blanco by Barbara Ana Gomez.

Just to recap quickly, FAD stands for Fashion Awareness Direct and it is a charity that aims to empower young people – as the brochure says “Fashion is a great way to connect with young people from different backgrounds, to give them confidence and raise their aspirations for the future.”

FAD awards SS2011 - Adam Preece by Abi Daker
Adam Preece by Abigail Daker.

LFW_FAD_awards Chelsey Ward by Abigail-Nottingham
Chelsey Ward by Abigail Nottingham.

Last year we covered the undergraduates awards show, but this year we were in for a much younger treat: the FAD Junior Awards showcased the designs of finalists chosen from 130 teenagers aged 16-19. Yes dear reader, you may well have to keep pinching yourself as you take a look through the images. I know I did, and I was sitting right there when they paraded past. Created over the course of five days at the University of East London with the help of an experienced team of tutors, the outfits put together by these young designers would put many graduates to shame.

LFW_FAD_Awards Karmen-Marie Parker by Abigail_Nottingham
Karmen-Marie Parker by Abigail Nottingham.

FAD-Awards-Natalie Goreham by-kila_kitu
Natalie Goreham by Kila Kitu.

To start off the evening’s events previous winner Prash Muraleetharan took to the stage with a bit of confident advice, endearingly delivered. “It’s what you do with this moment which determines a winner…. so get upstairs and network,” he advised, somewhat sagely. At the end he winked. And I’m sure he winked at me. Blimey… what a charmer… it’s quite hard to countenance that Prash must still be a teenager, and yet he already runs his own fashion label with a website and everything.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
Prash Muraleetharan dispels his words of wisdom at the start of the ceremony. All photography by Amelia Gregory.

After the V&A inspired catwalk show we had speeches from the sleek Susan Aubrey-Cound of M&S and Lucy Jones of UEL, followed by the prizegiving by the extremely fabulous Zandra Rhodes, who is *the cutest* when she smiles! The winners and their parents looked so overwhelmed it really did warm the cockles of my jaded fashionista heart.

Zandra-Rhodes-FAD-Awards-2010-Antonia-Parker-Amelias-Magazine-A
Zandra Rhodes by Antonia Parker. I wuv her.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
Paul Vasileff and Shahira Bakhoum of Milan step up first to take the prize for the European Fashion Designer Competition, which was the culmination of a two year project.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
Karmen-Marie Parker with her winning design shortly before she burst into tears… aw, bless.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
Andre Augusto: pattern cutting award winner.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
Research award winner Sarah Kilkenny.

FAD junior awards 2010 photo by Amelia Gregory
17 year old David Short – the first boy to become overall winner and a proper little fashionista in the making.

Within this blog you’ll find my favourite pieces to hit the runway – and just remember, they were all designed and made by 16-19 year olds. Quite astonishing I’m sure you’ll agree.

FAD junior awards 2010 Shomari Williams photo by Amelia Gregory
Shomari Williams.

FAD junior awards 2010 Emily Rogers photo by Amelia Gregory
Yashodah Rodgers.

FAD junior awards 2010 Charlie Ibouillie photo by Amelia Gregory
Charlie Ibouillie.

FAD junior awards 2010 Sinead Cloonan photo by Amelia Gregory
Sinead Cloonan.

FAD junior awards 2010 European winners photo by Amelia Gregory
FAD junior awards 2010 European winners photo by Amelia Gregory
The winner of the European competition.

FAD junior awards 2010 Rebecca Glyn-Blanco photo by Amelia Gregory
Rebecca Glyn-Blanco.

FAD junior awards 2010 Natalie Goreham photo by Amelia Gregory
Natalie Goreham.

FAD junior awards 2010 Florence Melrose photo by Amelia Gregory
Florence Melrose.

FAD junior awards 2010 Misbah Siddique photo by Amelia Gregory
Misbah Siddique.

FAD junior awards 2010 Zandra Rhodes photo by Amelia Gregory
And another completely gratuitous shot of Zandra because this post isn’t long enough already. Because I WUV HER.

LFW-Antipodium-Andrea-Peterson
Antipodium by Andrea Peterson.

Antipodium was a shop that used to stock Amelia’s Magazine many a moon ago… run by Ozzies, stuff it has always championed Ozzie design. and apparently cake. At the Antipodium show at the Portico Rooms, visit Somerset House we were served up some delicious delicacies from down under.

Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Homemade cake: always good. And to think, unhealthy not a cupcake in sight *thank god*

Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
All photography by Amelia Gregory.

LFW-Antipodium by Jo Cheung
Antipodium by Jo Cheung.

Antipodium by Lisa Stannard
Antipodium by Lisa Stannard.

Antipodium the label grew out of the boutique as it found itself home to all sorts of creative types. Owner Ashe Peacock launched the brand in 2006 with former intern Geoffrey J. Finch, and since then it seems they’ve been quietly growing something of a reputation for its easy going style – a result of their down-to-earth Australian background.

Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
LFW-Antipodium-Andrea-Peterson
Antipodium by Andrea Peterson.

For S/S 2011 Antipodium took the “brutalist beauty of the Barbican hothouse as a starting point” – possibly the reason for the backdrop of huge potted plants. Filtered through the steamy social mores of the 1970s all sorts of scurrilous goings-on were imagined in the nooks and crannies of this iconic building.

Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
LFW-Antipodium by Paolo-Caravello
Antipodium by Paolo Caravello.

In reality this meant a cleanly classic collection spiced up with great little details, shown on a range of young models who had obviously been instructed to act louche. This for me is where models fail – they’re too young to be convincing, to act anything other than the most basic of parts. But this didn’t distract from my enjoyment of the hugely successful collection – after all I didn’t read the accompanying bumpf until just now.

Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
LFW-Antipodium by Jo Cheung
Antipodium by Jo Cheung.

Wearing a muted colour palette of mossy greens, khaki, pale blue, aubergine, dusky pink and fawn the models paraded to the music of two DJs hidden in the corner. Stand outs were the clever use of fabrics and detailing; waffly knitwear, silky shirting, the subtle A shape in the back of a man’s beautifully cut coat. But best of all had to be the prints: commissioned from Australian born (of course) New York artist Craig Redman, these featured double-take patterns: oversized limbs, bespectacled butterflies and strange blooms. Can you tell I trained as a printed textile designer? Always the colour and patterns for me… Fabulous stuff.

Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium SS2011 photo by Amelia Gregory
Antipodium-by-Lisa-Stannard
Antipodium by Lisa Stannard.

LFW-Antipodium by Jo Cheung
LFW-Antipodium by Jo Cheung
Antipodium by Jo Cheung.

Categories ,1970s, ,Andrea Peterson, ,Antipodium, ,Ashe Peacock, ,Australian, ,barbican, ,Cake, ,Craig Redman, ,Geoffrey J. Finch, ,Jo Cheung, ,Lisa Stannard, ,Paolo Caravello, ,Portico Rooms, ,Somerset House

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Amelia’s Magazine | Future Beauty: 30 Years of Japanese Fashion at the Barbican

laura callaghan MA show Kingston
Love Amandine Gemma Milly
Illustration by Gemma Milly.

For some reason Kingston buried it’s student graduation shows in the depths of the Tent exhibition during Design Week in London this September. Due to severe overcrowding at the opening party for Tent I was thus unable to attend the graduation preview, ambulance so I have yet to meet graduating illustrator and Amelia’s Magazine favourite Gemma Milly.

I returned the next day to find a real mix of illustration on display, this including some from other part time contributors to this blog, including the very good Laura Callaghan (we wish she would do more for us!) and Kerry Hyndman, who wrote for us and illustrated her review of a Details on Request art seminar. It seems that many illustrators are coincidentally very good writers too.

Kingston illustration MA Gemma Milly
Gemma Milly’s exhibition space.

Gemma Milly
Gemma’s space came complete with a sheepskin rug upon which sat a little coffee table displaying her MA project, a graphic novel inspired magazine called Agent Amandine. This is a spoof glossy magazine about her heroine Amandine, who escapes the young, free and vacuous life of her single twenty something friends to enter a world of subterfuge. Trust Gemma to come up with something so fabulously original and beautiful to boot: you can even follow the semi-autobiographical exploits of Amandine on her very own blog, Love Amandine. Gemma is known for her wonderfully delicate and desirable female figures so of course her work is perfectly suited to fashion illustration – expect to catch up with her in my upcoming Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration.

Gemma Milly Italian straw hat
Gemma Milly Amandine cover

Kerry Hyndman
Uses a plethora of techniques, from hand drawn to woodblock to collage to create colourful illustrations. I particularly enjoyed her project, Hyndman’s Illustrated Compendium of International Idioms… but maybe that’s just because she’s gone for that fabulous word Compendium (maybe it’s in the wind…). Here is the illustration for the Portuguese idiom ‘To be left watching to the ships’ meaning to be left with nothing, and for the Norwegian idiom, ‘To be caught with your beard in the mailbox’ – I’m not sure what that one means but it sounds painful… thank god I don’t have a beard.

Kerry Hyndman sailor
kerry hyndman beardpostbox

Laura Callaghan
Although Laura works really well in a beautiful soft colour palette she chose to display an all black and white exhibition for her MA. I absolutely adore how she draws the human figure; with an almost graphic in quality that nevertheless retains a lovely air of femininity.

New discoveries (click on their names to access websites) were:

Sheena Dempsey
Sheena is a brilliant children’s book illustrator who cunningly uses the scaling of objects to create an exciting narrative. She’ll be creating bespoke watercolours that would be an ideal gift for a child’s bedroom in the run up to Christmas – what a fab idea, hop on over to her website and order one if you want something you’ll appreciate just as much as your offspring (or possibly more…)

Sheena Dempsey detail

Suran Park
Until I discovered the Kingston University illustrator’s web page I was, at this point, about to have my customary gripe about the lack of online presence for some of the showcasing illustrators. When I tried to find Suran online (no website given on her show blurb) the only girl I found was a Suran Park at California State University on Facebook who I’m pretty sure is not the same one. Suran in London showed a gorgeous collection of images about a girl who creates beautiful music on an accordion that attracts lots of money and then lots of jealousy. Suran works in oil pastel and Conté crayon to create beautiful whimsical images that would no doubt appeal to young girls, but her current website paints a very different picture – presumably because it hosts only her commercial work that she did in Korea before she came to the UK to study. It’s a real shame she hasn’t updated it yet.

Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park-2

Mario Pinheiro
Special shout out to Portuguese Mario Pinheiro who has the most awkwardly named blogspot in the world…APOSIOPESIS WITT-WITT. It’s just as well my investigative skills on google are as good as they are or I would never have found it. I mean, why make it so hard on yourself folks?! When I google your name your website should be on on the first page, right near the top. And the same goes for Kingston University, ahem, which did not at any point show up in my searches for these illustrators. Sort out your SEO, please. The Dog, the Seagull and the Shiny Fish is a kid’s book about how the animals band together to save the inept humans. Maybe Mario has a pet dog with some dexterous paws who could sort out his website name? Oh woops, I seem to have changed your url to Mario-Pinheiro.com. Well I never how did that happen? Woof.

Kingston MA Mario Pinheiro

Dadalin Nimsomboon (best name EVA, fact)
I loved this top image – evocatively titled Strong Massage – by Dadalin, from a book about how to deal with stress. Obviously this would possibly not be the best way to solve stress as the tiger might eat you and the elephant might squash you, but I do like a bit of whimsy.

Dadalin Nimsomboon strong massage
Dadalin Nimsomboon paint nails

Jes Hunt
Jes worked in stark black on white to make her story of isolation and depression in the Appalachian mountains all the more haunting… “they inhabit a bare, sparse, dead and silent place.” As the relationships in a family improve colour creeps into her work. Very effective.

Dawn Front Cover- jes Hunt

Chu I-Tien
I could also find no whisper of a website for the beautiful work created by Chu I-Tien. “Lily is always alone. She always wants to have a sister or brother. Lily is always alone. She always checks her phone every five minutes.” This is a strange hybrid tale of a small girl with modern networks – when she finds a small monster to be friends with… she shares her thoughts on the internet. Psst… get onto twitter then Scarlett…

Kingston illustration MA Chu I-Tien

Jinyoung Kim
Another seemingly web free illustrator inspired by fantastical tales, this time of a forbidden love between a human and a dragon, if I have this correctly! Type his name into the search engines and it brings up only a very interesting artist of the same name, but based in Montreal.

Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail2
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail

Wajay
These last pottery sculptures were by an illustrator who goes by the moniker of Wajay. Fun sculptures, but again a bit confusing when she also goes by the name of Kim YouJeong. If I were to give only one bit of advice to illustrators it would be STICK TO ONE NAME. It’s just way too confusing otherwise. Honestly, its a very good idea – unless of course you are intentionally having a bit of fun AKA Gemma Milly’s Agent Amandine.

Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery dont
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery just
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery

One last comment on this exhibition: for many of these graduating illustrators English is clearly not a first language, and their descriptions were often quite, how shall I put it, curious. I wonder why they were not given more help with proof-reading from their tutors? But then, why they haven’t been asked to maintain an immaculate web presence as an absolute prerequisite for graduating is another mystery to me…

Love Amandine Gemma Milly
Illustration by Gemma Milly.

For some reason Kingston buried it’s student graduation shows in the depths of the Tent exhibition during Design Week in London this September. Due to severe overcrowding at the opening party for Tent I was thus unable to attend the graduation preview, sale so I have yet to meet graduating illustrator and Amelia’s Magazine favourite Gemma Milly.

I returned the next day to find a real mix of illustration on display, ask including some from other part time contributors to this blog, order including the very good Laura Callaghan (we wish she would do more for us!) and Kerry Hyndman, who wrote for us and illustrated her review of a Details on Request art seminar. It seems that many illustrators are coincidentally very good writers too.

Kingston illustration MA Gemma Milly
Gemma Milly’s exhibition space.

Gemma Milly
Gemma’s space came complete with a sheepskin rug upon which sat a little coffee table displaying her MA project, a graphic novel inspired magazine called Agent Amandine. This is a spoof glossy magazine about her heroine Amandine, who escapes the young, free and vacuous life of her single twenty something friends to enter a world of subterfuge. Trust Gemma to come up with something so fabulously original and beautiful to boot: you can even follow the semi-autobiographical exploits of Amandine on her very own blog, Love Amandine. Gemma is known for her wonderfully delicate and desirable female figures so of course her work is perfectly suited to fashion illustration – expect to catch up with her in my upcoming Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration.

Gemma Milly Italian straw hat
Gemma Milly Amandine cover

Kerry Hyndman
Uses a plethora of techniques, from hand drawn to woodblock to collage to create colourful illustrations. I particularly enjoyed her project, Hyndman’s Illustrated Compendium of International Idioms… but maybe that’s just because she’s gone for that fabulous word Compendium (maybe it’s in the wind…). Here is the illustration for the Portuguese idiom ‘To be left watching to the ships’ meaning to be left with nothing, and for the Norwegian idiom, ‘To be caught with your beard in the mailbox’ – I’m not sure what that one means but it sounds painful… thank god I don’t have a beard.

Kerry Hyndman sailor
kerry hyndman beardpostbox

Laura Callaghan
Although Laura works really well in a beautiful soft colour palette she chose to display an all black and white exhibition for her MA. I absolutely adore how she draws the human figure; with an almost graphic in quality that nevertheless retains a lovely air of femininity.

laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston

New discoveries (click on their names to access websites) were:

Sheena Dempsey
Sheena is a brilliant children’s book illustrator who cunningly uses the scaling of objects to create an exciting narrative. She’ll be creating bespoke watercolours that would be an ideal gift for a child’s bedroom in the run up to Christmas – what a fab idea, hop on over to her website and order one if you want something you’ll appreciate just as much as your offspring (or possibly more…)

Sheena Dempsey detail

Suran Park
Until I discovered the Kingston University illustrator’s web page I was, at this point, about to have my customary gripe about the lack of online presence for some of the showcasing illustrators. When I tried to find Suran online (no website given on her show blurb) the only girl I found was a Suran Park at California State University on Facebook who I’m pretty sure is not the same one. Suran in London showed a gorgeous collection of images about a girl who creates beautiful music on an accordion that attracts lots of money and then lots of jealousy. Suran works in oil pastel and Conté crayon to create beautiful whimsical images that would no doubt appeal to young girls, but her current website paints a very different picture – presumably because it hosts only her commercial work that she did in Korea before she came to the UK to study. It’s a real shame she hasn’t updated it yet.

Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park-2

Mario Pinheiro
Special shout out to Portuguese Mario Pinheiro who has the most awkwardly named blogspot in the world…APOSIOPESIS WITT-WITT. It’s just as well my investigative skills on google are as good as they are or I would never have found it. I mean, why make it so hard on yourself folks?! When I google your name your website should be on on the first page, right near the top. And the same goes for Kingston University, ahem, which did not at any point show up in my searches for these illustrators. Sort out your SEO, please. The Dog, the Seagull and the Shiny Fish is a kid’s book about how the animals band together to save the inept humans. Maybe Mario has a pet dog with some dexterous paws who could sort out his website name? Oh woops, I seem to have changed your url to Mario-Pinheiro.com. Well I never how did that happen? Woof.

Kingston MA Mario Pinheiro

Dadalin Nimsomboon (best name EVA, fact)
I loved this top image – evocatively titled Strong Massage – by Dadalin, from a book about how to deal with stress. Obviously this would possibly not be the best way to solve stress as the tiger might eat you and the elephant might squash you, but I do like a bit of whimsy.

Dadalin Nimsomboon strong massage
Dadalin Nimsomboon paint nails

Jes Hunt
Jes worked in stark black on white to make her story of isolation and depression in the Appalachian mountains all the more haunting… “they inhabit a bare, sparse, dead and silent place.” As the relationships in a family improve colour creeps into her work. Very effective.

Dawn Front Cover- jes Hunt

Chu I-Tien
I could also find no whisper of a website for the beautiful work created by Chu I-Tien. “Lily is always alone. She always wants to have a sister or brother. Lily is always alone. She always checks her phone every five minutes.” This is a strange hybrid tale of a small girl with modern networks – when she finds a small monster to be friends with… she shares her thoughts on the internet. Psst… get onto twitter then Scarlett…

Kingston illustration MA Chu I-Tien

Jinyoung Kim
Another seemingly web free illustrator inspired by fantastical tales, this time of a forbidden love between a human and a dragon, if I have this correctly! Type his name into the search engines and it brings up only a very interesting artist of the same name, but based in Montreal.

Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail2
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail

Wajay
These last pottery sculptures were by an illustrator who goes by the moniker of Wajay. Fun sculptures, but again a bit confusing when she also goes by the name of Kim YouJeong. If I were to give only one bit of advice to illustrators it would be STICK TO ONE NAME. It’s just way too confusing otherwise. Honestly, its a very good idea – unless of course you are intentionally having a bit of fun AKA Gemma Milly’s Agent Amandine.

Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery dont
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery just
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery

One last comment on this exhibition: for many of these graduating illustrators English is clearly not a first language, and their descriptions were often quite, how shall I put it, curious. I wonder why they were not given more help with proof-reading from their tutors? But then, why they haven’t been asked to maintain an immaculate web presence as an absolute prerequisite for graduating is another mystery to me…

Love Amandine Gemma Milly
Illustration by Gemma Milly.

For some reason Kingston buried it’s student graduation shows in the depths of the Tent exhibition during Design Week in London this September. Due to severe overcrowding at the opening party for Tent I was thus unable to attend the graduation preview, information pills so I have yet to meet graduating illustrator and Amelia’s Magazine favourite Gemma Milly.

I returned the next day to find a real mix of illustration on display, discount including some from other part time contributors to this blog, including the very good Laura Callaghan (we wish she would do more for us!) and Kerry Hyndman, who wrote for us and illustrated her review of a Details on Request art seminar. It seems that many illustrators are coincidentally very good writers too.

Kingston illustration MA Gemma Milly
Gemma Milly’s exhibition space.

Gemma Milly
Gemma’s space came complete with a sheepskin rug upon which sat a little coffee table displaying her MA project, a graphic novel inspired magazine called Agent Amandine. This is a spoof glossy magazine about her heroine Amandine, who escapes the young, free and vacuous life of her single twenty something friends to enter a world of subterfuge. Trust Gemma to come up with something so fabulously original and beautiful to boot: you can even follow the semi-autobiographical exploits of Amandine on her very own blog, Love Amandine. Gemma is known for her wonderfully delicate and desirable female figures so of course her work is perfectly suited to fashion illustration – expect to catch up with her in my upcoming Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration.

Gemma Milly Italian straw hat
Gemma Milly Amandine cover

Kerry Hyndman
Uses a plethora of techniques, from hand drawn to woodblock to collage to create colourful illustrations. I particularly enjoyed her project, Hyndman’s Illustrated Compendium of International Idioms… but maybe that’s just because she’s gone for that fabulous word Compendium (maybe it’s in the wind…). Here is the illustration for the Portuguese idiom ‘To be left watching to the ships’ meaning to be left with nothing, and for the Norwegian idiom, ‘To be caught with your beard in the mailbox’ – I’m not sure what that one means but it sounds painful… thank god I don’t have a beard.

Kerry Hyndman sailor
kerry hyndman beardpostbox

Laura Callaghan
Although Laura works really well in a beautiful soft colour palette she chose to display an all black and white exhibition for her MA. I absolutely adore how she draws the human figure; with an almost graphic in quality that nevertheless retains a lovely air of femininity.

laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston

New discoveries (click on their names to access websites) were:

Sheena Dempsey
Sheena is a brilliant children’s book illustrator who cunningly uses the scaling of objects to create an exciting narrative. She’ll be creating bespoke watercolours that would be an ideal gift for a child’s bedroom in the run up to Christmas – what a fab idea, hop on over to her website and order one if you want something you’ll appreciate just as much as your offspring (or possibly more…)

Sheena Dempsey detail

Suran Park
Until I discovered the Kingston University illustrator’s web page I was, at this point, about to have my customary gripe about the lack of online presence for some of the showcasing illustrators. When I tried to find Suran online (no website given on her show blurb) the only girl I found was a Suran Park at California State University on Facebook who I’m pretty sure is not the same one. Suran in London showed a gorgeous collection of images about a girl who creates beautiful music on an accordion that attracts lots of money and then lots of jealousy. Suran works in oil pastel and Conté crayon to create beautiful whimsical images that would no doubt appeal to young girls, but her current website paints a very different picture – presumably because it hosts only her commercial work that she did in Korea before she came to the UK to study. It’s a real shame she hasn’t updated it yet.

Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park-2

Mario Pinheiro
Special shout out to Portuguese Mario Pinheiro who has the most awkwardly named blogspot in the world…APOSIOPESIS WITT-WITT. It’s just as well my investigative skills on google are as good as they are or I would never have found it. I mean, why make it so hard on yourself folks?! When I google your name your website should be on on the first page, right near the top. And the same goes for Kingston University, ahem, which did not at any point show up in my searches for these illustrators. Sort out your SEO, please. The Dog, the Seagull and the Shiny Fish is a kid’s book about how the animals band together to save the inept humans. Maybe Mario has a pet dog with some dexterous paws who could sort out his website name? Oh woops, I seem to have changed your url to Mario-Pinheiro.com. Well I never how did that happen? Woof.

Kingston MA Mario Pinheiro

Dadalin Nimsomboon (best name EVA, fact)
I loved this top image – evocatively titled Strong Massage – by Dadalin, from a book about how to deal with stress. Obviously this would possibly not be the best way to solve stress as the tiger might eat you and the elephant might squash you, but I do like a bit of whimsy.

Dadalin Nimsomboon strong massage
Dadalin Nimsomboon paint nails

Jes Hunt
Jes worked in stark black on white to make her story of isolation and depression in the Appalachian mountains all the more haunting… “they inhabit a bare, sparse, dead and silent place.” As the relationships in a family improve colour creeps into her work. Very effective.

Dawn Front Cover- jes Hunt

Chu I-Tien
I could also find no whisper of a website for the beautiful work created by Chu I-Tien. “Lily is always alone. She always wants to have a sister or brother. Lily is always alone. She always checks her phone every five minutes.” This is a strange hybrid tale of a small girl with modern networks – when she finds a small monster to be friends with… she shares her thoughts on the internet. Psst… get onto twitter then Scarlett…

Kingston illustration MA Chu I-Tien

Jinyoung Kim
Another seemingly web free illustrator inspired by fantastical tales, this time of a forbidden love between a human and a dragon, if I have this correctly! Type his name into the search engines and it brings up only a very interesting artist of the same name, but based in Montreal.

Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail2
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail

Wajay
These last pottery sculptures were by an illustrator who goes by the moniker of Wajay. Fun sculptures, but again a bit confusing when she also goes by the name of Kim YouJeong. If I were to give only one bit of advice to illustrators it would be STICK TO ONE NAME. It’s just way too confusing otherwise. Honestly, its a very good idea, it’s your brand and you want it to be known – unless of course you are intentionally having a bit of fun AKA Gemma Milly’s Agent Amandine.

Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery dont
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery just
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery

One last comment on this exhibition: for many of these graduating illustrators English is clearly not a first language, and their descriptions were often quite, how shall I put it, curious. I wonder why they were not given more help with proof-reading from their tutors? But then, why they haven’t been asked to maintain an immaculate web presence as an absolute prerequisite for graduating is another mystery to me…

Love Amandine Gemma Milly
Illustration by Gemma Milly.

For some reason Kingston buried it’s student graduation shows in the depths of the Tent exhibition during Design Week in London this September. Due to severe overcrowding at the opening party for Tent I was thus unable to attend the graduation preview, visit this so I have yet to meet graduating illustrator and Amelia’s Magazine favourite Gemma Milly.

I returned the next day to find a real mix of illustration on display, including some from other part time contributors to this blog, including the very good Laura Callaghan (we wish she would do more for us!) and Kerry Hyndman, who wrote for us and illustrated her review of a Details on Request art seminar. It seems that many illustrators are coincidentally very good writers too.

Kingston illustration MA Gemma Milly
Gemma Milly’s exhibition space.

Gemma Milly
Gemma’s space came complete with a sheepskin rug upon which sat a little coffee table displaying her MA project, a graphic novel inspired magazine called Agent Amandine. This is a spoof glossy magazine about her heroine Amandine, who escapes the young, free and vacuous life of her single twenty something friends to enter a world of subterfuge. Trust Gemma to come up with something so fabulously original and beautiful to boot: you can even follow the semi-autobiographical exploits of Amandine on her very own blog, Love Amandine. Gemma is known for her wonderfully delicate and desirable female figures so of course her work is perfectly suited to fashion illustration – expect to catch up with her in my upcoming Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration.

Gemma Milly Italian straw hat
Gemma Milly Amandine cover

Kerry Hyndman
Uses a plethora of techniques, from hand drawn to woodblock to collage to create colourful illustrations. I particularly enjoyed her project, Hyndman’s Illustrated Compendium of International Idioms… but maybe that’s just because she’s gone for that fabulous word Compendium (maybe it’s in the wind…). Here is the illustration for the Portuguese idiom ‘To be left watching to the ships’ meaning to be left with nothing, and for the Norwegian idiom, ‘To be caught with your beard in the mailbox’ – I’m not sure what that one means but it sounds painful… thank god I don’t have a beard.

Kerry Hyndman sailor
kerry hyndman beardpostbox

Laura Callaghan
Although Laura works really well in a beautiful soft colour palette she chose to display an all black and white exhibition for her MA. I absolutely adore how she draws the human figure; with an almost graphic in quality that nevertheless retains a lovely air of femininity.

laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
New discoveries (click on their names to access websites) were:

Sheena Dempsey
Sheena is a brilliant children’s book illustrator who cunningly uses the scaling of objects to create an exciting narrative. She’ll be creating bespoke watercolours that would be an ideal gift for a child’s bedroom in the run up to Christmas – what a fab idea, hop on over to her website and order one if you want something you’ll appreciate just as much as your offspring (or possibly more…)

Sheena Dempsey detail

Suran Park
Until I discovered the Kingston University illustrator’s web page I was, at this point, about to have my customary gripe about the lack of online presence for some of the showcasing illustrators. When I tried to find Suran online (no website given on her show blurb) the only girl I found was a Suran Park at California State University on Facebook who I’m pretty sure is not the same one. Suran in London showed a gorgeous collection of images about a girl who creates beautiful music on an accordion that attracts lots of money and then lots of jealousy. Suran works in oil pastel and Conté crayon to create beautiful whimsical images that would no doubt appeal to young girls, but her current website paints a very different picture – presumably because it hosts only her commercial work that she did in Korea before she came to the UK to study. It’s a real shame she hasn’t updated it yet.

Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park-2

Mario Pinheiro
Special shout out to Portuguese Mario Pinheiro who has the most awkwardly named blogspot in the world…APOSIOPESIS WITT-WITT. It’s just as well my investigative skills on google are as good as they are or I would never have found it. I mean, why make it so hard on yourself folks?! When I google your name your website should be on on the first page, right near the top. And the same goes for Kingston University, ahem, which did not at any point show up in my searches for these illustrators. Sort out your SEO, please. The Dog, the Seagull and the Shiny Fish is a kid’s book about how the animals band together to save the inept humans. Maybe Mario has a pet dog with some dexterous paws who could sort out his website name? Oh woops, I seem to have changed your url to Mario-Pinheiro.com. Well I never how did that happen? Woof.

Kingston MA Mario Pinheiro

Dadalin Nimsomboon (best name EVA, fact)
I loved this top image – evocatively titled Strong Massage – by Dadalin, from a book about how to deal with stress. Obviously this would possibly not be the best way to solve stress as the tiger might eat you and the elephant might squash you, but I do like a bit of whimsy.

Dadalin Nimsomboon strong massage
Dadalin Nimsomboon paint nails

Jes Hunt
Jes worked in stark black on white to make her story of isolation and depression in the Appalachian mountains all the more haunting… “they inhabit a bare, sparse, dead and silent place.” As the relationships in a family improve colour creeps into her work. Very effective.

Dawn Front Cover- jes Hunt

Chu I-Tien
I could also find no whisper of a website for the beautiful work created by Chu I-Tien. “Lily is always alone. She always wants to have a sister or brother. Lily is always alone. She always checks her phone every five minutes.” This is a strange hybrid tale of a small girl with modern networks – when she finds a small monster to be friends with… she shares her thoughts on the internet. Psst… get onto twitter then Scarlett…

Kingston illustration MA Chu I-Tien

Jinyoung Kim
Another seemingly web free illustrator inspired by fantastical tales, this time of a forbidden love between a human and a dragon, if I have this correctly! Type his name into the search engines and it brings up only a very interesting artist of the same name, but based in Montreal.

Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail2
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail

Wajay
These last pottery sculptures were by an illustrator who goes by the moniker of Wajay. Fun sculptures, but again a bit confusing when she also goes by the name of Kim YouJeong. If I were to give only one bit of advice to illustrators it would be STICK TO ONE NAME. It’s just way too confusing otherwise. Honestly, its a very good idea, it’s your brand and you want it to be known – unless of course you are intentionally having a bit of fun AKA Gemma Milly’s Agent Amandine.

Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery dont
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery just
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery

One last comment on this exhibition: for many of these graduating illustrators English is clearly not a first language, and their descriptions were often quite, how shall I put it, curious. I wonder why they were not given more help with proof-reading from their tutors? But then, why they haven’t been asked to maintain an immaculate web presence as an absolute prerequisite for graduating is another mystery to me…

Love Amandine Gemma Milly
Illustration by Gemma Milly.

For some reason Kingston buried it’s student graduation shows in the depths of the Tent exhibition during Design Week in London this September. Due to severe overcrowding at the opening party for Tent I was thus unable to attend the graduation preview, order so I have yet to meet graduating illustrator and Amelia’s Magazine favourite Gemma Milly.

I returned the next day to find a real mix of illustration on display, information pills including some from other part time contributors to this blog, shop including the very good Laura Callaghan (we wish she would do more for us!) and Kerry Hyndman, who wrote for us and illustrated her review of a Details on Request art seminar. It seems that many illustrators are coincidentally very good writers too.

Kingston illustration MA Gemma Milly
Gemma Milly’s exhibition space.

Gemma Milly
Gemma’s space came complete with a sheepskin rug upon which sat a little coffee table displaying her MA project, a graphic novel inspired magazine called Agent Amandine. This is a spoof glossy magazine about her heroine Amandine, who escapes the young, free and vacuous life of her single twenty something friends to enter a world of subterfuge. Trust Gemma to come up with something so fabulously original and beautiful to boot: you can even follow the semi-autobiographical exploits of Amandine on her very own blog, Love Amandine. Gemma is known for her wonderfully delicate and desirable female figures so of course her work is perfectly suited to fashion illustration – expect to catch up with her in my upcoming Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration.

Gemma Milly Italian straw hat
Gemma Milly Amandine cover

Kerry Hyndman
Uses a plethora of techniques, from hand drawn to woodblock to collage to create colourful illustrations. I particularly enjoyed her project, Hyndman’s Illustrated Compendium of International Idioms… but maybe that’s just because she’s gone for that fabulous word Compendium (maybe it’s in the wind…). Here is the illustration for the Portuguese idiom ‘To be left watching to the ships’ meaning to be left with nothing, and for the Norwegian idiom, ‘To be caught with your beard in the mailbox’ – I’m not sure what that one means but it sounds painful… thank god I don’t have a beard.

Kerry Hyndman sailor
kerry hyndman beardpostbox

Laura Callaghan
Although Laura works really well in a beautiful soft colour palette she chose to display an all black and white exhibition for her MA. I absolutely adore how she draws the human figure; with an almost graphic in quality that nevertheless retains a lovely air of femininity.

laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
New discoveries (click on their names to access websites) were:

Sheena Dempsey
Sheena is a brilliant children’s book illustrator who cunningly uses the scaling of objects to create an exciting narrative. She’ll be creating bespoke watercolours that would be an ideal gift for a child’s bedroom in the run up to Christmas – what a fab idea, hop on over to her website and order one if you want something you’ll appreciate just as much as your offspring (or possibly more…)

Sheena Dempsey detail

Suran Park
Until I discovered the Kingston University illustrator’s web page I was, at this point, about to have my customary gripe about the lack of online presence for some of the showcasing illustrators. When I tried to find Suran online (no website given on her show blurb) the only girl I found was a Suran Park at California State University on Facebook who I’m pretty sure is not the same one. Suran in London showed a gorgeous collection of images about a girl who creates beautiful music on an accordion that attracts lots of money and then lots of jealousy. Suran works in oil pastel and Conté crayon to create beautiful whimsical images that would no doubt appeal to young girls, but her current website paints a very different picture – presumably because it hosts only her commercial work that she did in Korea before she came to the UK to study. It’s a real shame she hasn’t updated it yet.

Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park-2

Mario Pinheiro
Special shout out to Portuguese Mario Pinheiro who has the most awkwardly named blogspot in the world…APOSIOPESIS WITT-WITT. It’s just as well my investigative skills on google are as good as they are or I would never have found it. I mean, why make it so hard on yourself folks?! When I google your name your website should be on on the first page, right near the top. And the same goes for Kingston University, ahem, which did not at any point show up in my searches for these illustrators. Sort out your SEO, please. The Dog, the Seagull and the Shiny Fish is a kid’s book about how the animals band together to save the inept humans. Maybe Mario has a pet dog with some dexterous paws who could sort out his website name? Oh woops, I seem to have changed your url to Mario-Pinheiro.com. Well I never how did that happen? Woof.

Kingston MA Mario Pinheiro

Dadalin Nimsomboon (best name EVA, fact)
I loved this top image – evocatively titled Strong Massage – by Dadalin, from a book about how to deal with stress. Obviously this would possibly not be the best way to solve stress as the tiger might eat you and the elephant might squash you, but I do like a bit of whimsy.

Dadalin Nimsomboon strong massage
Dadalin Nimsomboon paint nails

Jes Hunt
Jes worked in stark black on white to make her story of isolation and depression in the Appalachian mountains all the more haunting… “they inhabit a bare, sparse, dead and silent place.” As the relationships in a family improve colour creeps into her work. Very effective.

Dawn Front Cover- jes Hunt

Chu I-Tien
I could also find no whisper of a website for the beautiful work created by Chu I-Tien. “Lily is always alone. She always wants to have a sister or brother. Lily is always alone. She always checks her phone every five minutes.” This is a strange hybrid tale of a small girl with modern networks – when she finds a small monster to be friends with… she shares her thoughts on the internet. Psst… get onto twitter then Scarlett…

Kingston illustration MA Chu I-Tien

Jinyoung Kim
Another seemingly web free illustrator inspired by fantastical tales, this time of a forbidden love between a human and a dragon, if I have this correctly! Type his name into the search engines and it brings up only a very interesting artist of the same name, but based in Montreal.

Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail2
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail

Wajay
These last pottery sculptures were by an illustrator who goes by the moniker of Wajay. Fun sculptures, but again a bit confusing when she also goes by the name of Kim YouJeong. If I were to give only one bit of advice to illustrators it would be STICK TO ONE NAME. It’s just way too confusing otherwise. Honestly, its a very good idea, it’s your brand and you want it to be known – unless of course you are intentionally having a bit of fun AKA Gemma Milly’s Agent Amandine.

Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery dont
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery just
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery

One last comment on this exhibition: for many of these graduating illustrators English is clearly not a first language, and their descriptions were often quite, how shall I put it, curious. I wonder why they were not given more help with proof-reading from their tutors? But then, why they haven’t been asked to maintain an immaculate web presence as an absolute prerequisite for graduating is another mystery to me…


Rei Kawakubo/Comme des Garçons 1997, price illustrated by Faye West

The next few months are an absolute treat for fashion fans – there are exhibitions popping up all over the place. First on my fashionable list was the Barbican‘s offering – a retrospective of the last thirty years of the Japanese avant-garde.

Now anybody who saw the fabulous Viktor & Rolf extravaganza a couple of years ago will know that the Barbican sure knows how to put on a fashion exhibition – the art gallery on the third level of the brutalist ziggurat couldn’t be any better suited: concrete alcoves, information pills pebbled-dashed walls and hard stone floors all add to the atmosphere and with each show you’d be forgiven for thinking the space had been constructed solely for the current exhibition – particularly this one.


Junya Watanabe, dosage illustrated by Baiba Ladiga

To create the feeling of a journey, the gallery has been adorned with translucent drapes that lead you around various examples. We start with magnificent pieces from the grand masters – Yohji Yamamoto, Rei Kawakubo and Issey Miyake feature heavily, as do the newer major players.

The lower level of the exhibition aims to bring together the key ideas and themes that define what we know of the Japanese avant-garde. Ideas like wabi-sabi (beauty in imperfection) and ma (which generally translates as the space between objects) are explained and brought to life with a broad range of examples from the great Japanese masters. Wabi-sabi is explored with examples from Junya Watanabe, Rei Kawakubo et al – fraid hems, unfinished seams and abnormal folds all appear in their collections, and it was this (un)attention to detail and deliberately unfinished aesthetic that first drew attention to the Japanese couturiers.

There are great examples of ma, too; where garments are constructed to work against the female form, they are celebrated. Cue works of wonder like Issey Miyake’s origami numbers, Tao Kurihara’s groundbreaking sculptural pieces and Koji Tatsuno’s ridiculous but wonderful golden brown nylon net dress, which turns the figure into a giant sphere (think pumpkin Hallowe’en costume with Japanese drama.)


Fruits! Illustrated by Gareth A Hopkins

The lower levels also explore broader concepts that have been recurrent in Japanese fashion – shadows, flatness, tradition (and inspiration) and ‘Cool Japan’ (or Fruits as we lovingly refer to this fashion and their wearers). The ‘Cool Japan’ stuff doesn’t float my boat as much as the grand masters and their illustrious heritage. I used to like it, a lot, but I think it’s a little passé these days. Maybe that’s a bit harsh, but when you’ve walked through three decades of expertly cut, uniquley tailored and innovatively crafted Japanese fashion, seeing Hello Kitty pyjamas and Manga t-shirts is a little deflating. Tao Kurihara’s exemplary cable-knit underwear does add some sophistication, though.


Illustration by Lesley Barnes

While I love getting my teeth into a good fashion theme, I often wish that they’d just give us a hand and put things in chronological order. This is a particularly difficult feat to overcome with Japanese fashion – a Junya Watanabe/Comme des Garçons black nylon taffeta coat slash padded puffa jacket with intricate gold chain sits side by side a Rei Kawakubo/Comme des Garçons black gauze skirt and top with interlaced, looped bands from 1983. They could pretty much be from the same collection.

Similarly, a silk 1970s Kenzo blouse is positioned next to a 2005 kimono, which cold be 500 years old, even, but they still fit perfectly together. I guess it is this harmony that has strung Japanese fashion together over the years that makes it so inspiring.


Issey Miyake/A-POC, 1999, illustrated by Naomi Law

Upstairs is a different story and a different designer is celebrated in each of the concrete alcoves. The greats are covered – Yamamoto, Kawakubo, Miyake and Watanabe – along with newer labels like Mintdesigns and Jun Takahashi.

Yohji Yamamoto

Yohji Yamamoto 1999, illustrated by Abby Wright

I do love Mr Yamamoto, who is described as the ‘most poetic’ of the Japanese fashion designers, and it’s easy to see why. But what I love most are his highly charged collections with a hint of cynicism. His juxtaposition of hopelessly romantic silhouettes (drawing inspiration from Western culture and, in particular, Dior’s New Look) and his androgynous forms is, I believe, totally unique even today. Who else combines elements of couture with workwear? Well, maybe Galliano, but that’s besides the point.

There’s a limited selection from his illustrious career in fashion – but I was pleased to see the quilted polyester dress with a modernist bone structure – totally feminine but innovative at the same time. Some Y-3 pieces appear, but they’re totally lost at the side of his master couturier craftsmanship.

Issey Miyake

Illustration by Joana Faria

At first, I thought presenting only Miyake’s latest project – 132 5 – was a bit of an odd choice. ‘Where are his innovative numbers that toyed with gender and influenced so many in the 1980s?’ I wondered. What a complete wonderer I am these days. Some of his A-POC pieces appear downstairs, in particular the dramatic and iconic red knitted numbers.

However, when I actually stopped wondering and had a look at this 132 5 malarkey, I was breathless. This new line, continuing Miyake’s boundary-breaking experiments in materials, feature intricately folded and steam pressed polygons of material – sustainable material, no less! Hooray for Miyake!

On the floor, they don’t look much – well, they’re beautiful but you don’t look like you get much frock for your buck. That is until they’re placed onto the body and they transform into incredible, geometric, sculptural, architectural wonders. Truly breathtaking stuff and my favourite pieces in the entire exhibition.

Rei Kawakubo

Illustration by Alia Gargum

Described as the ‘most influential living fashion designer’, we owe thanks for decades of innovative but wearable menswear to Kawakubo and her legendary brand, Comme des Garçons. With her army of influenceables (Watanabe, Kurihara and most recently, Chitose Abe), Kawakubo is the matriarch of Japanese fashion.

Her iconic Body Meets Dress, Dress Meets Body collection of 1997 broke all the rules, with biological lumps and bumps that challenged Western ideals of the perfect body shape – while the collection’s playful gingham fabrics added a whimsical element. And, while she can mix it up a bit, she can sure do beauty – the pink knitted sweater dress, embroidered with unrivalled craftsmanship and teamed with a tulle bustle, exudes femininity and sparks a nostalgic look at the past.

Junya Watanabe

Junya Watanabe S/S 2003, illustrated by Maria del Carmen Smith

Watanabe is a bit of a character when it comes to fashion. His most shocking move to date was to show a collection entirely of Jacquard trouser suits, which says a lot about his work before that infamous S/S 2010 collection.

Described as the ‘techno couturier’, Watanabe trained under Rei Kawakubo, whose influence shines through in Watanabe’s collections. Sleeping-bag dresses and outlandish headgear features – but beyond the quirkier elements and performance fabrics, Watanabe’s pieces are infinitely wearable.

Mintdesigns

Mintdesigns, illustrated by Antonia Parker

Mintdesigns bring their own blend of innovation to the mix. A combination of unusual materials (translucent plastics, for example) and graphic patterns, this Tokyo twosome are at the forefront of modern Japanese fashion with a younger feel. And I totally dig the dinosaur hat.

Phew! Well, if you’ve got to the end of this post, well done. That was a long one, no? I hope I’ve convinced you to go… you won’t regret it.

All photography by Matt Bramford

Get all the visitors information in our listings section.

Categories ,Abby Wright, ,Antonia Parker, ,Avant-garde, ,Baiba Ladiga, ,barbican, ,Chitose Abe, ,Comme des Garçons, ,exhibition, ,fashion, ,Faye West, ,Gallery, ,Gareth A Hopkins, ,Hello Kitty, ,Issey Miyake, ,japan, ,Japanese fashion, ,Joana Faria, ,Jun Takahashi, ,Junya Watanabe, ,Kenzo, ,Koji Tatsuno, ,Lesley Barnes, ,ma, ,Manga, ,Maria del Carmen Smith, ,Mintdesigns, ,Naomi Law, ,Rei Kawakubo, ,review, ,Tao Kurihara, ,Wabi-sabi, ,Yohji Yamamoto

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Amelia’s Magazine | Future Beauty: 30 Years of Japanese Fashion at the Barbican

laura callaghan MA show Kingston
Love Amandine Gemma Milly
Illustration by Gemma Milly.

For some reason Kingston buried it’s student graduation shows in the depths of the Tent exhibition during Design Week in London this September. Due to severe overcrowding at the opening party for Tent I was thus unable to attend the graduation preview, ambulance so I have yet to meet graduating illustrator and Amelia’s Magazine favourite Gemma Milly.

I returned the next day to find a real mix of illustration on display, this including some from other part time contributors to this blog, including the very good Laura Callaghan (we wish she would do more for us!) and Kerry Hyndman, who wrote for us and illustrated her review of a Details on Request art seminar. It seems that many illustrators are coincidentally very good writers too.

Kingston illustration MA Gemma Milly
Gemma Milly’s exhibition space.

Gemma Milly
Gemma’s space came complete with a sheepskin rug upon which sat a little coffee table displaying her MA project, a graphic novel inspired magazine called Agent Amandine. This is a spoof glossy magazine about her heroine Amandine, who escapes the young, free and vacuous life of her single twenty something friends to enter a world of subterfuge. Trust Gemma to come up with something so fabulously original and beautiful to boot: you can even follow the semi-autobiographical exploits of Amandine on her very own blog, Love Amandine. Gemma is known for her wonderfully delicate and desirable female figures so of course her work is perfectly suited to fashion illustration – expect to catch up with her in my upcoming Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration.

Gemma Milly Italian straw hat
Gemma Milly Amandine cover

Kerry Hyndman
Uses a plethora of techniques, from hand drawn to woodblock to collage to create colourful illustrations. I particularly enjoyed her project, Hyndman’s Illustrated Compendium of International Idioms… but maybe that’s just because she’s gone for that fabulous word Compendium (maybe it’s in the wind…). Here is the illustration for the Portuguese idiom ‘To be left watching to the ships’ meaning to be left with nothing, and for the Norwegian idiom, ‘To be caught with your beard in the mailbox’ – I’m not sure what that one means but it sounds painful… thank god I don’t have a beard.

Kerry Hyndman sailor
kerry hyndman beardpostbox

Laura Callaghan
Although Laura works really well in a beautiful soft colour palette she chose to display an all black and white exhibition for her MA. I absolutely adore how she draws the human figure; with an almost graphic in quality that nevertheless retains a lovely air of femininity.

New discoveries (click on their names to access websites) were:

Sheena Dempsey
Sheena is a brilliant children’s book illustrator who cunningly uses the scaling of objects to create an exciting narrative. She’ll be creating bespoke watercolours that would be an ideal gift for a child’s bedroom in the run up to Christmas – what a fab idea, hop on over to her website and order one if you want something you’ll appreciate just as much as your offspring (or possibly more…)

Sheena Dempsey detail

Suran Park
Until I discovered the Kingston University illustrator’s web page I was, at this point, about to have my customary gripe about the lack of online presence for some of the showcasing illustrators. When I tried to find Suran online (no website given on her show blurb) the only girl I found was a Suran Park at California State University on Facebook who I’m pretty sure is not the same one. Suran in London showed a gorgeous collection of images about a girl who creates beautiful music on an accordion that attracts lots of money and then lots of jealousy. Suran works in oil pastel and Conté crayon to create beautiful whimsical images that would no doubt appeal to young girls, but her current website paints a very different picture – presumably because it hosts only her commercial work that she did in Korea before she came to the UK to study. It’s a real shame she hasn’t updated it yet.

Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park-2

Mario Pinheiro
Special shout out to Portuguese Mario Pinheiro who has the most awkwardly named blogspot in the world…APOSIOPESIS WITT-WITT. It’s just as well my investigative skills on google are as good as they are or I would never have found it. I mean, why make it so hard on yourself folks?! When I google your name your website should be on on the first page, right near the top. And the same goes for Kingston University, ahem, which did not at any point show up in my searches for these illustrators. Sort out your SEO, please. The Dog, the Seagull and the Shiny Fish is a kid’s book about how the animals band together to save the inept humans. Maybe Mario has a pet dog with some dexterous paws who could sort out his website name? Oh woops, I seem to have changed your url to Mario-Pinheiro.com. Well I never how did that happen? Woof.

Kingston MA Mario Pinheiro

Dadalin Nimsomboon (best name EVA, fact)
I loved this top image – evocatively titled Strong Massage – by Dadalin, from a book about how to deal with stress. Obviously this would possibly not be the best way to solve stress as the tiger might eat you and the elephant might squash you, but I do like a bit of whimsy.

Dadalin Nimsomboon strong massage
Dadalin Nimsomboon paint nails

Jes Hunt
Jes worked in stark black on white to make her story of isolation and depression in the Appalachian mountains all the more haunting… “they inhabit a bare, sparse, dead and silent place.” As the relationships in a family improve colour creeps into her work. Very effective.

Dawn Front Cover- jes Hunt

Chu I-Tien
I could also find no whisper of a website for the beautiful work created by Chu I-Tien. “Lily is always alone. She always wants to have a sister or brother. Lily is always alone. She always checks her phone every five minutes.” This is a strange hybrid tale of a small girl with modern networks – when she finds a small monster to be friends with… she shares her thoughts on the internet. Psst… get onto twitter then Scarlett…

Kingston illustration MA Chu I-Tien

Jinyoung Kim
Another seemingly web free illustrator inspired by fantastical tales, this time of a forbidden love between a human and a dragon, if I have this correctly! Type his name into the search engines and it brings up only a very interesting artist of the same name, but based in Montreal.

Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail2
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail

Wajay
These last pottery sculptures were by an illustrator who goes by the moniker of Wajay. Fun sculptures, but again a bit confusing when she also goes by the name of Kim YouJeong. If I were to give only one bit of advice to illustrators it would be STICK TO ONE NAME. It’s just way too confusing otherwise. Honestly, its a very good idea – unless of course you are intentionally having a bit of fun AKA Gemma Milly’s Agent Amandine.

Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery dont
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery just
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery

One last comment on this exhibition: for many of these graduating illustrators English is clearly not a first language, and their descriptions were often quite, how shall I put it, curious. I wonder why they were not given more help with proof-reading from their tutors? But then, why they haven’t been asked to maintain an immaculate web presence as an absolute prerequisite for graduating is another mystery to me…

Love Amandine Gemma Milly
Illustration by Gemma Milly.

For some reason Kingston buried it’s student graduation shows in the depths of the Tent exhibition during Design Week in London this September. Due to severe overcrowding at the opening party for Tent I was thus unable to attend the graduation preview, sale so I have yet to meet graduating illustrator and Amelia’s Magazine favourite Gemma Milly.

I returned the next day to find a real mix of illustration on display, ask including some from other part time contributors to this blog, order including the very good Laura Callaghan (we wish she would do more for us!) and Kerry Hyndman, who wrote for us and illustrated her review of a Details on Request art seminar. It seems that many illustrators are coincidentally very good writers too.

Kingston illustration MA Gemma Milly
Gemma Milly’s exhibition space.

Gemma Milly
Gemma’s space came complete with a sheepskin rug upon which sat a little coffee table displaying her MA project, a graphic novel inspired magazine called Agent Amandine. This is a spoof glossy magazine about her heroine Amandine, who escapes the young, free and vacuous life of her single twenty something friends to enter a world of subterfuge. Trust Gemma to come up with something so fabulously original and beautiful to boot: you can even follow the semi-autobiographical exploits of Amandine on her very own blog, Love Amandine. Gemma is known for her wonderfully delicate and desirable female figures so of course her work is perfectly suited to fashion illustration – expect to catch up with her in my upcoming Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration.

Gemma Milly Italian straw hat
Gemma Milly Amandine cover

Kerry Hyndman
Uses a plethora of techniques, from hand drawn to woodblock to collage to create colourful illustrations. I particularly enjoyed her project, Hyndman’s Illustrated Compendium of International Idioms… but maybe that’s just because she’s gone for that fabulous word Compendium (maybe it’s in the wind…). Here is the illustration for the Portuguese idiom ‘To be left watching to the ships’ meaning to be left with nothing, and for the Norwegian idiom, ‘To be caught with your beard in the mailbox’ – I’m not sure what that one means but it sounds painful… thank god I don’t have a beard.

Kerry Hyndman sailor
kerry hyndman beardpostbox

Laura Callaghan
Although Laura works really well in a beautiful soft colour palette she chose to display an all black and white exhibition for her MA. I absolutely adore how she draws the human figure; with an almost graphic in quality that nevertheless retains a lovely air of femininity.

laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston

New discoveries (click on their names to access websites) were:

Sheena Dempsey
Sheena is a brilliant children’s book illustrator who cunningly uses the scaling of objects to create an exciting narrative. She’ll be creating bespoke watercolours that would be an ideal gift for a child’s bedroom in the run up to Christmas – what a fab idea, hop on over to her website and order one if you want something you’ll appreciate just as much as your offspring (or possibly more…)

Sheena Dempsey detail

Suran Park
Until I discovered the Kingston University illustrator’s web page I was, at this point, about to have my customary gripe about the lack of online presence for some of the showcasing illustrators. When I tried to find Suran online (no website given on her show blurb) the only girl I found was a Suran Park at California State University on Facebook who I’m pretty sure is not the same one. Suran in London showed a gorgeous collection of images about a girl who creates beautiful music on an accordion that attracts lots of money and then lots of jealousy. Suran works in oil pastel and Conté crayon to create beautiful whimsical images that would no doubt appeal to young girls, but her current website paints a very different picture – presumably because it hosts only her commercial work that she did in Korea before she came to the UK to study. It’s a real shame she hasn’t updated it yet.

Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park-2

Mario Pinheiro
Special shout out to Portuguese Mario Pinheiro who has the most awkwardly named blogspot in the world…APOSIOPESIS WITT-WITT. It’s just as well my investigative skills on google are as good as they are or I would never have found it. I mean, why make it so hard on yourself folks?! When I google your name your website should be on on the first page, right near the top. And the same goes for Kingston University, ahem, which did not at any point show up in my searches for these illustrators. Sort out your SEO, please. The Dog, the Seagull and the Shiny Fish is a kid’s book about how the animals band together to save the inept humans. Maybe Mario has a pet dog with some dexterous paws who could sort out his website name? Oh woops, I seem to have changed your url to Mario-Pinheiro.com. Well I never how did that happen? Woof.

Kingston MA Mario Pinheiro

Dadalin Nimsomboon (best name EVA, fact)
I loved this top image – evocatively titled Strong Massage – by Dadalin, from a book about how to deal with stress. Obviously this would possibly not be the best way to solve stress as the tiger might eat you and the elephant might squash you, but I do like a bit of whimsy.

Dadalin Nimsomboon strong massage
Dadalin Nimsomboon paint nails

Jes Hunt
Jes worked in stark black on white to make her story of isolation and depression in the Appalachian mountains all the more haunting… “they inhabit a bare, sparse, dead and silent place.” As the relationships in a family improve colour creeps into her work. Very effective.

Dawn Front Cover- jes Hunt

Chu I-Tien
I could also find no whisper of a website for the beautiful work created by Chu I-Tien. “Lily is always alone. She always wants to have a sister or brother. Lily is always alone. She always checks her phone every five minutes.” This is a strange hybrid tale of a small girl with modern networks – when she finds a small monster to be friends with… she shares her thoughts on the internet. Psst… get onto twitter then Scarlett…

Kingston illustration MA Chu I-Tien

Jinyoung Kim
Another seemingly web free illustrator inspired by fantastical tales, this time of a forbidden love between a human and a dragon, if I have this correctly! Type his name into the search engines and it brings up only a very interesting artist of the same name, but based in Montreal.

Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail2
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail

Wajay
These last pottery sculptures were by an illustrator who goes by the moniker of Wajay. Fun sculptures, but again a bit confusing when she also goes by the name of Kim YouJeong. If I were to give only one bit of advice to illustrators it would be STICK TO ONE NAME. It’s just way too confusing otherwise. Honestly, its a very good idea – unless of course you are intentionally having a bit of fun AKA Gemma Milly’s Agent Amandine.

Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery dont
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery just
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery

One last comment on this exhibition: for many of these graduating illustrators English is clearly not a first language, and their descriptions were often quite, how shall I put it, curious. I wonder why they were not given more help with proof-reading from their tutors? But then, why they haven’t been asked to maintain an immaculate web presence as an absolute prerequisite for graduating is another mystery to me…

Love Amandine Gemma Milly
Illustration by Gemma Milly.

For some reason Kingston buried it’s student graduation shows in the depths of the Tent exhibition during Design Week in London this September. Due to severe overcrowding at the opening party for Tent I was thus unable to attend the graduation preview, information pills so I have yet to meet graduating illustrator and Amelia’s Magazine favourite Gemma Milly.

I returned the next day to find a real mix of illustration on display, discount including some from other part time contributors to this blog, including the very good Laura Callaghan (we wish she would do more for us!) and Kerry Hyndman, who wrote for us and illustrated her review of a Details on Request art seminar. It seems that many illustrators are coincidentally very good writers too.

Kingston illustration MA Gemma Milly
Gemma Milly’s exhibition space.

Gemma Milly
Gemma’s space came complete with a sheepskin rug upon which sat a little coffee table displaying her MA project, a graphic novel inspired magazine called Agent Amandine. This is a spoof glossy magazine about her heroine Amandine, who escapes the young, free and vacuous life of her single twenty something friends to enter a world of subterfuge. Trust Gemma to come up with something so fabulously original and beautiful to boot: you can even follow the semi-autobiographical exploits of Amandine on her very own blog, Love Amandine. Gemma is known for her wonderfully delicate and desirable female figures so of course her work is perfectly suited to fashion illustration – expect to catch up with her in my upcoming Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration.

Gemma Milly Italian straw hat
Gemma Milly Amandine cover

Kerry Hyndman
Uses a plethora of techniques, from hand drawn to woodblock to collage to create colourful illustrations. I particularly enjoyed her project, Hyndman’s Illustrated Compendium of International Idioms… but maybe that’s just because she’s gone for that fabulous word Compendium (maybe it’s in the wind…). Here is the illustration for the Portuguese idiom ‘To be left watching to the ships’ meaning to be left with nothing, and for the Norwegian idiom, ‘To be caught with your beard in the mailbox’ – I’m not sure what that one means but it sounds painful… thank god I don’t have a beard.

Kerry Hyndman sailor
kerry hyndman beardpostbox

Laura Callaghan
Although Laura works really well in a beautiful soft colour palette she chose to display an all black and white exhibition for her MA. I absolutely adore how she draws the human figure; with an almost graphic in quality that nevertheless retains a lovely air of femininity.

laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston

New discoveries (click on their names to access websites) were:

Sheena Dempsey
Sheena is a brilliant children’s book illustrator who cunningly uses the scaling of objects to create an exciting narrative. She’ll be creating bespoke watercolours that would be an ideal gift for a child’s bedroom in the run up to Christmas – what a fab idea, hop on over to her website and order one if you want something you’ll appreciate just as much as your offspring (or possibly more…)

Sheena Dempsey detail

Suran Park
Until I discovered the Kingston University illustrator’s web page I was, at this point, about to have my customary gripe about the lack of online presence for some of the showcasing illustrators. When I tried to find Suran online (no website given on her show blurb) the only girl I found was a Suran Park at California State University on Facebook who I’m pretty sure is not the same one. Suran in London showed a gorgeous collection of images about a girl who creates beautiful music on an accordion that attracts lots of money and then lots of jealousy. Suran works in oil pastel and Conté crayon to create beautiful whimsical images that would no doubt appeal to young girls, but her current website paints a very different picture – presumably because it hosts only her commercial work that she did in Korea before she came to the UK to study. It’s a real shame she hasn’t updated it yet.

Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park-2

Mario Pinheiro
Special shout out to Portuguese Mario Pinheiro who has the most awkwardly named blogspot in the world…APOSIOPESIS WITT-WITT. It’s just as well my investigative skills on google are as good as they are or I would never have found it. I mean, why make it so hard on yourself folks?! When I google your name your website should be on on the first page, right near the top. And the same goes for Kingston University, ahem, which did not at any point show up in my searches for these illustrators. Sort out your SEO, please. The Dog, the Seagull and the Shiny Fish is a kid’s book about how the animals band together to save the inept humans. Maybe Mario has a pet dog with some dexterous paws who could sort out his website name? Oh woops, I seem to have changed your url to Mario-Pinheiro.com. Well I never how did that happen? Woof.

Kingston MA Mario Pinheiro

Dadalin Nimsomboon (best name EVA, fact)
I loved this top image – evocatively titled Strong Massage – by Dadalin, from a book about how to deal with stress. Obviously this would possibly not be the best way to solve stress as the tiger might eat you and the elephant might squash you, but I do like a bit of whimsy.

Dadalin Nimsomboon strong massage
Dadalin Nimsomboon paint nails

Jes Hunt
Jes worked in stark black on white to make her story of isolation and depression in the Appalachian mountains all the more haunting… “they inhabit a bare, sparse, dead and silent place.” As the relationships in a family improve colour creeps into her work. Very effective.

Dawn Front Cover- jes Hunt

Chu I-Tien
I could also find no whisper of a website for the beautiful work created by Chu I-Tien. “Lily is always alone. She always wants to have a sister or brother. Lily is always alone. She always checks her phone every five minutes.” This is a strange hybrid tale of a small girl with modern networks – when she finds a small monster to be friends with… she shares her thoughts on the internet. Psst… get onto twitter then Scarlett…

Kingston illustration MA Chu I-Tien

Jinyoung Kim
Another seemingly web free illustrator inspired by fantastical tales, this time of a forbidden love between a human and a dragon, if I have this correctly! Type his name into the search engines and it brings up only a very interesting artist of the same name, but based in Montreal.

Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail2
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail

Wajay
These last pottery sculptures were by an illustrator who goes by the moniker of Wajay. Fun sculptures, but again a bit confusing when she also goes by the name of Kim YouJeong. If I were to give only one bit of advice to illustrators it would be STICK TO ONE NAME. It’s just way too confusing otherwise. Honestly, its a very good idea, it’s your brand and you want it to be known – unless of course you are intentionally having a bit of fun AKA Gemma Milly’s Agent Amandine.

Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery dont
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery just
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery

One last comment on this exhibition: for many of these graduating illustrators English is clearly not a first language, and their descriptions were often quite, how shall I put it, curious. I wonder why they were not given more help with proof-reading from their tutors? But then, why they haven’t been asked to maintain an immaculate web presence as an absolute prerequisite for graduating is another mystery to me…

Love Amandine Gemma Milly
Illustration by Gemma Milly.

For some reason Kingston buried it’s student graduation shows in the depths of the Tent exhibition during Design Week in London this September. Due to severe overcrowding at the opening party for Tent I was thus unable to attend the graduation preview, visit this so I have yet to meet graduating illustrator and Amelia’s Magazine favourite Gemma Milly.

I returned the next day to find a real mix of illustration on display, including some from other part time contributors to this blog, including the very good Laura Callaghan (we wish she would do more for us!) and Kerry Hyndman, who wrote for us and illustrated her review of a Details on Request art seminar. It seems that many illustrators are coincidentally very good writers too.

Kingston illustration MA Gemma Milly
Gemma Milly’s exhibition space.

Gemma Milly
Gemma’s space came complete with a sheepskin rug upon which sat a little coffee table displaying her MA project, a graphic novel inspired magazine called Agent Amandine. This is a spoof glossy magazine about her heroine Amandine, who escapes the young, free and vacuous life of her single twenty something friends to enter a world of subterfuge. Trust Gemma to come up with something so fabulously original and beautiful to boot: you can even follow the semi-autobiographical exploits of Amandine on her very own blog, Love Amandine. Gemma is known for her wonderfully delicate and desirable female figures so of course her work is perfectly suited to fashion illustration – expect to catch up with her in my upcoming Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration.

Gemma Milly Italian straw hat
Gemma Milly Amandine cover

Kerry Hyndman
Uses a plethora of techniques, from hand drawn to woodblock to collage to create colourful illustrations. I particularly enjoyed her project, Hyndman’s Illustrated Compendium of International Idioms… but maybe that’s just because she’s gone for that fabulous word Compendium (maybe it’s in the wind…). Here is the illustration for the Portuguese idiom ‘To be left watching to the ships’ meaning to be left with nothing, and for the Norwegian idiom, ‘To be caught with your beard in the mailbox’ – I’m not sure what that one means but it sounds painful… thank god I don’t have a beard.

Kerry Hyndman sailor
kerry hyndman beardpostbox

Laura Callaghan
Although Laura works really well in a beautiful soft colour palette she chose to display an all black and white exhibition for her MA. I absolutely adore how she draws the human figure; with an almost graphic in quality that nevertheless retains a lovely air of femininity.

laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
New discoveries (click on their names to access websites) were:

Sheena Dempsey
Sheena is a brilliant children’s book illustrator who cunningly uses the scaling of objects to create an exciting narrative. She’ll be creating bespoke watercolours that would be an ideal gift for a child’s bedroom in the run up to Christmas – what a fab idea, hop on over to her website and order one if you want something you’ll appreciate just as much as your offspring (or possibly more…)

Sheena Dempsey detail

Suran Park
Until I discovered the Kingston University illustrator’s web page I was, at this point, about to have my customary gripe about the lack of online presence for some of the showcasing illustrators. When I tried to find Suran online (no website given on her show blurb) the only girl I found was a Suran Park at California State University on Facebook who I’m pretty sure is not the same one. Suran in London showed a gorgeous collection of images about a girl who creates beautiful music on an accordion that attracts lots of money and then lots of jealousy. Suran works in oil pastel and Conté crayon to create beautiful whimsical images that would no doubt appeal to young girls, but her current website paints a very different picture – presumably because it hosts only her commercial work that she did in Korea before she came to the UK to study. It’s a real shame she hasn’t updated it yet.

Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park-2

Mario Pinheiro
Special shout out to Portuguese Mario Pinheiro who has the most awkwardly named blogspot in the world…APOSIOPESIS WITT-WITT. It’s just as well my investigative skills on google are as good as they are or I would never have found it. I mean, why make it so hard on yourself folks?! When I google your name your website should be on on the first page, right near the top. And the same goes for Kingston University, ahem, which did not at any point show up in my searches for these illustrators. Sort out your SEO, please. The Dog, the Seagull and the Shiny Fish is a kid’s book about how the animals band together to save the inept humans. Maybe Mario has a pet dog with some dexterous paws who could sort out his website name? Oh woops, I seem to have changed your url to Mario-Pinheiro.com. Well I never how did that happen? Woof.

Kingston MA Mario Pinheiro

Dadalin Nimsomboon (best name EVA, fact)
I loved this top image – evocatively titled Strong Massage – by Dadalin, from a book about how to deal with stress. Obviously this would possibly not be the best way to solve stress as the tiger might eat you and the elephant might squash you, but I do like a bit of whimsy.

Dadalin Nimsomboon strong massage
Dadalin Nimsomboon paint nails

Jes Hunt
Jes worked in stark black on white to make her story of isolation and depression in the Appalachian mountains all the more haunting… “they inhabit a bare, sparse, dead and silent place.” As the relationships in a family improve colour creeps into her work. Very effective.

Dawn Front Cover- jes Hunt

Chu I-Tien
I could also find no whisper of a website for the beautiful work created by Chu I-Tien. “Lily is always alone. She always wants to have a sister or brother. Lily is always alone. She always checks her phone every five minutes.” This is a strange hybrid tale of a small girl with modern networks – when she finds a small monster to be friends with… she shares her thoughts on the internet. Psst… get onto twitter then Scarlett…

Kingston illustration MA Chu I-Tien

Jinyoung Kim
Another seemingly web free illustrator inspired by fantastical tales, this time of a forbidden love between a human and a dragon, if I have this correctly! Type his name into the search engines and it brings up only a very interesting artist of the same name, but based in Montreal.

Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail2
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail

Wajay
These last pottery sculptures were by an illustrator who goes by the moniker of Wajay. Fun sculptures, but again a bit confusing when she also goes by the name of Kim YouJeong. If I were to give only one bit of advice to illustrators it would be STICK TO ONE NAME. It’s just way too confusing otherwise. Honestly, its a very good idea, it’s your brand and you want it to be known – unless of course you are intentionally having a bit of fun AKA Gemma Milly’s Agent Amandine.

Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery dont
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery just
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery

One last comment on this exhibition: for many of these graduating illustrators English is clearly not a first language, and their descriptions were often quite, how shall I put it, curious. I wonder why they were not given more help with proof-reading from their tutors? But then, why they haven’t been asked to maintain an immaculate web presence as an absolute prerequisite for graduating is another mystery to me…

Love Amandine Gemma Milly
Illustration by Gemma Milly.

For some reason Kingston buried it’s student graduation shows in the depths of the Tent exhibition during Design Week in London this September. Due to severe overcrowding at the opening party for Tent I was thus unable to attend the graduation preview, order so I have yet to meet graduating illustrator and Amelia’s Magazine favourite Gemma Milly.

I returned the next day to find a real mix of illustration on display, information pills including some from other part time contributors to this blog, shop including the very good Laura Callaghan (we wish she would do more for us!) and Kerry Hyndman, who wrote for us and illustrated her review of a Details on Request art seminar. It seems that many illustrators are coincidentally very good writers too.

Kingston illustration MA Gemma Milly
Gemma Milly’s exhibition space.

Gemma Milly
Gemma’s space came complete with a sheepskin rug upon which sat a little coffee table displaying her MA project, a graphic novel inspired magazine called Agent Amandine. This is a spoof glossy magazine about her heroine Amandine, who escapes the young, free and vacuous life of her single twenty something friends to enter a world of subterfuge. Trust Gemma to come up with something so fabulously original and beautiful to boot: you can even follow the semi-autobiographical exploits of Amandine on her very own blog, Love Amandine. Gemma is known for her wonderfully delicate and desirable female figures so of course her work is perfectly suited to fashion illustration – expect to catch up with her in my upcoming Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration.

Gemma Milly Italian straw hat
Gemma Milly Amandine cover

Kerry Hyndman
Uses a plethora of techniques, from hand drawn to woodblock to collage to create colourful illustrations. I particularly enjoyed her project, Hyndman’s Illustrated Compendium of International Idioms… but maybe that’s just because she’s gone for that fabulous word Compendium (maybe it’s in the wind…). Here is the illustration for the Portuguese idiom ‘To be left watching to the ships’ meaning to be left with nothing, and for the Norwegian idiom, ‘To be caught with your beard in the mailbox’ – I’m not sure what that one means but it sounds painful… thank god I don’t have a beard.

Kerry Hyndman sailor
kerry hyndman beardpostbox

Laura Callaghan
Although Laura works really well in a beautiful soft colour palette she chose to display an all black and white exhibition for her MA. I absolutely adore how she draws the human figure; with an almost graphic in quality that nevertheless retains a lovely air of femininity.

laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
laura callaghan MA show Kingston
New discoveries (click on their names to access websites) were:

Sheena Dempsey
Sheena is a brilliant children’s book illustrator who cunningly uses the scaling of objects to create an exciting narrative. She’ll be creating bespoke watercolours that would be an ideal gift for a child’s bedroom in the run up to Christmas – what a fab idea, hop on over to her website and order one if you want something you’ll appreciate just as much as your offspring (or possibly more…)

Sheena Dempsey detail

Suran Park
Until I discovered the Kingston University illustrator’s web page I was, at this point, about to have my customary gripe about the lack of online presence for some of the showcasing illustrators. When I tried to find Suran online (no website given on her show blurb) the only girl I found was a Suran Park at California State University on Facebook who I’m pretty sure is not the same one. Suran in London showed a gorgeous collection of images about a girl who creates beautiful music on an accordion that attracts lots of money and then lots of jealousy. Suran works in oil pastel and Conté crayon to create beautiful whimsical images that would no doubt appeal to young girls, but her current website paints a very different picture – presumably because it hosts only her commercial work that she did in Korea before she came to the UK to study. It’s a real shame she hasn’t updated it yet.

Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park
Kingston illustration MA Suran Park-2

Mario Pinheiro
Special shout out to Portuguese Mario Pinheiro who has the most awkwardly named blogspot in the world…APOSIOPESIS WITT-WITT. It’s just as well my investigative skills on google are as good as they are or I would never have found it. I mean, why make it so hard on yourself folks?! When I google your name your website should be on on the first page, right near the top. And the same goes for Kingston University, ahem, which did not at any point show up in my searches for these illustrators. Sort out your SEO, please. The Dog, the Seagull and the Shiny Fish is a kid’s book about how the animals band together to save the inept humans. Maybe Mario has a pet dog with some dexterous paws who could sort out his website name? Oh woops, I seem to have changed your url to Mario-Pinheiro.com. Well I never how did that happen? Woof.

Kingston MA Mario Pinheiro

Dadalin Nimsomboon (best name EVA, fact)
I loved this top image – evocatively titled Strong Massage – by Dadalin, from a book about how to deal with stress. Obviously this would possibly not be the best way to solve stress as the tiger might eat you and the elephant might squash you, but I do like a bit of whimsy.

Dadalin Nimsomboon strong massage
Dadalin Nimsomboon paint nails

Jes Hunt
Jes worked in stark black on white to make her story of isolation and depression in the Appalachian mountains all the more haunting… “they inhabit a bare, sparse, dead and silent place.” As the relationships in a family improve colour creeps into her work. Very effective.

Dawn Front Cover- jes Hunt

Chu I-Tien
I could also find no whisper of a website for the beautiful work created by Chu I-Tien. “Lily is always alone. She always wants to have a sister or brother. Lily is always alone. She always checks her phone every five minutes.” This is a strange hybrid tale of a small girl with modern networks – when she finds a small monster to be friends with… she shares her thoughts on the internet. Psst… get onto twitter then Scarlett…

Kingston illustration MA Chu I-Tien

Jinyoung Kim
Another seemingly web free illustrator inspired by fantastical tales, this time of a forbidden love between a human and a dragon, if I have this correctly! Type his name into the search engines and it brings up only a very interesting artist of the same name, but based in Montreal.

Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail2
Kingston illustration MA Jinyoung Kim detail

Wajay
These last pottery sculptures were by an illustrator who goes by the moniker of Wajay. Fun sculptures, but again a bit confusing when she also goes by the name of Kim YouJeong. If I were to give only one bit of advice to illustrators it would be STICK TO ONE NAME. It’s just way too confusing otherwise. Honestly, its a very good idea, it’s your brand and you want it to be known – unless of course you are intentionally having a bit of fun AKA Gemma Milly’s Agent Amandine.

Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery dont
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery just
Kingston illustration MA Wajay pottery

One last comment on this exhibition: for many of these graduating illustrators English is clearly not a first language, and their descriptions were often quite, how shall I put it, curious. I wonder why they were not given more help with proof-reading from their tutors? But then, why they haven’t been asked to maintain an immaculate web presence as an absolute prerequisite for graduating is another mystery to me…


Rei Kawakubo/Comme des Garçons 1997, price illustrated by Faye West

The next few months are an absolute treat for fashion fans – there are exhibitions popping up all over the place. First on my fashionable list was the Barbican‘s offering – a retrospective of the last thirty years of the Japanese avant-garde.

Now anybody who saw the fabulous Viktor & Rolf extravaganza a couple of years ago will know that the Barbican sure knows how to put on a fashion exhibition – the art gallery on the third level of the brutalist ziggurat couldn’t be any better suited: concrete alcoves, information pills pebbled-dashed walls and hard stone floors all add to the atmosphere and with each show you’d be forgiven for thinking the space had been constructed solely for the current exhibition – particularly this one.


Junya Watanabe, dosage illustrated by Baiba Ladiga

To create the feeling of a journey, the gallery has been adorned with translucent drapes that lead you around various examples. We start with magnificent pieces from the grand masters – Yohji Yamamoto, Rei Kawakubo and Issey Miyake feature heavily, as do the newer major players.

The lower level of the exhibition aims to bring together the key ideas and themes that define what we know of the Japanese avant-garde. Ideas like wabi-sabi (beauty in imperfection) and ma (which generally translates as the space between objects) are explained and brought to life with a broad range of examples from the great Japanese masters. Wabi-sabi is explored with examples from Junya Watanabe, Rei Kawakubo et al – fraid hems, unfinished seams and abnormal folds all appear in their collections, and it was this (un)attention to detail and deliberately unfinished aesthetic that first drew attention to the Japanese couturiers.

There are great examples of ma, too; where garments are constructed to work against the female form, they are celebrated. Cue works of wonder like Issey Miyake’s origami numbers, Tao Kurihara’s groundbreaking sculptural pieces and Koji Tatsuno’s ridiculous but wonderful golden brown nylon net dress, which turns the figure into a giant sphere (think pumpkin Hallowe’en costume with Japanese drama.)


Fruits! Illustrated by Gareth A Hopkins

The lower levels also explore broader concepts that have been recurrent in Japanese fashion – shadows, flatness, tradition (and inspiration) and ‘Cool Japan’ (or Fruits as we lovingly refer to this fashion and their wearers). The ‘Cool Japan’ stuff doesn’t float my boat as much as the grand masters and their illustrious heritage. I used to like it, a lot, but I think it’s a little passé these days. Maybe that’s a bit harsh, but when you’ve walked through three decades of expertly cut, uniquley tailored and innovatively crafted Japanese fashion, seeing Hello Kitty pyjamas and Manga t-shirts is a little deflating. Tao Kurihara’s exemplary cable-knit underwear does add some sophistication, though.


Illustration by Lesley Barnes

While I love getting my teeth into a good fashion theme, I often wish that they’d just give us a hand and put things in chronological order. This is a particularly difficult feat to overcome with Japanese fashion – a Junya Watanabe/Comme des Garçons black nylon taffeta coat slash padded puffa jacket with intricate gold chain sits side by side a Rei Kawakubo/Comme des Garçons black gauze skirt and top with interlaced, looped bands from 1983. They could pretty much be from the same collection.

Similarly, a silk 1970s Kenzo blouse is positioned next to a 2005 kimono, which cold be 500 years old, even, but they still fit perfectly together. I guess it is this harmony that has strung Japanese fashion together over the years that makes it so inspiring.


Issey Miyake/A-POC, 1999, illustrated by Naomi Law

Upstairs is a different story and a different designer is celebrated in each of the concrete alcoves. The greats are covered – Yamamoto, Kawakubo, Miyake and Watanabe – along with newer labels like Mintdesigns and Jun Takahashi.

Yohji Yamamoto

Yohji Yamamoto 1999, illustrated by Abby Wright

I do love Mr Yamamoto, who is described as the ‘most poetic’ of the Japanese fashion designers, and it’s easy to see why. But what I love most are his highly charged collections with a hint of cynicism. His juxtaposition of hopelessly romantic silhouettes (drawing inspiration from Western culture and, in particular, Dior’s New Look) and his androgynous forms is, I believe, totally unique even today. Who else combines elements of couture with workwear? Well, maybe Galliano, but that’s besides the point.

There’s a limited selection from his illustrious career in fashion – but I was pleased to see the quilted polyester dress with a modernist bone structure – totally feminine but innovative at the same time. Some Y-3 pieces appear, but they’re totally lost at the side of his master couturier craftsmanship.

Issey Miyake

Illustration by Joana Faria

At first, I thought presenting only Miyake’s latest project – 132 5 – was a bit of an odd choice. ‘Where are his innovative numbers that toyed with gender and influenced so many in the 1980s?’ I wondered. What a complete wonderer I am these days. Some of his A-POC pieces appear downstairs, in particular the dramatic and iconic red knitted numbers.

However, when I actually stopped wondering and had a look at this 132 5 malarkey, I was breathless. This new line, continuing Miyake’s boundary-breaking experiments in materials, feature intricately folded and steam pressed polygons of material – sustainable material, no less! Hooray for Miyake!

On the floor, they don’t look much – well, they’re beautiful but you don’t look like you get much frock for your buck. That is until they’re placed onto the body and they transform into incredible, geometric, sculptural, architectural wonders. Truly breathtaking stuff and my favourite pieces in the entire exhibition.

Rei Kawakubo

Illustration by Alia Gargum

Described as the ‘most influential living fashion designer’, we owe thanks for decades of innovative but wearable menswear to Kawakubo and her legendary brand, Comme des Garçons. With her army of influenceables (Watanabe, Kurihara and most recently, Chitose Abe), Kawakubo is the matriarch of Japanese fashion.

Her iconic Body Meets Dress, Dress Meets Body collection of 1997 broke all the rules, with biological lumps and bumps that challenged Western ideals of the perfect body shape – while the collection’s playful gingham fabrics added a whimsical element. And, while she can mix it up a bit, she can sure do beauty – the pink knitted sweater dress, embroidered with unrivalled craftsmanship and teamed with a tulle bustle, exudes femininity and sparks a nostalgic look at the past.

Junya Watanabe

Junya Watanabe S/S 2003, illustrated by Maria del Carmen Smith

Watanabe is a bit of a character when it comes to fashion. His most shocking move to date was to show a collection entirely of Jacquard trouser suits, which says a lot about his work before that infamous S/S 2010 collection.

Described as the ‘techno couturier’, Watanabe trained under Rei Kawakubo, whose influence shines through in Watanabe’s collections. Sleeping-bag dresses and outlandish headgear features – but beyond the quirkier elements and performance fabrics, Watanabe’s pieces are infinitely wearable.

Mintdesigns

Mintdesigns, illustrated by Antonia Parker

Mintdesigns bring their own blend of innovation to the mix. A combination of unusual materials (translucent plastics, for example) and graphic patterns, this Tokyo twosome are at the forefront of modern Japanese fashion with a younger feel. And I totally dig the dinosaur hat.

Phew! Well, if you’ve got to the end of this post, well done. That was a long one, no? I hope I’ve convinced you to go… you won’t regret it.

All photography by Matt Bramford

Get all the visitors information in our listings section.

Categories ,Abby Wright, ,Antonia Parker, ,Avant-garde, ,Baiba Ladiga, ,barbican, ,Chitose Abe, ,Comme des Garçons, ,exhibition, ,fashion, ,Faye West, ,Gallery, ,Gareth A Hopkins, ,Hello Kitty, ,Issey Miyake, ,japan, ,Japanese fashion, ,Joana Faria, ,Jun Takahashi, ,Junya Watanabe, ,Kenzo, ,Koji Tatsuno, ,Lesley Barnes, ,ma, ,Manga, ,Maria del Carmen Smith, ,Mintdesigns, ,Naomi Law, ,Rei Kawakubo, ,review, ,Tao Kurihara, ,Wabi-sabi, ,Yohji Yamamoto

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Amelia’s Magazine | Future Beauty at the Barbican: Beauty Party

Illustration by Lesley Barnes

Illustration by Maria del Carmen Smith

Illustration by Kelly Angood

Illustration by Joana Faria

Illustration by Abby Wright

Illustration by Antonia Parker

Illustration by Lesley Barnes

Justine Picard is a journalist for the Telegraph and an author who produces both fiction and non fiction, look for the last 13 years her side project has been researching Coco Chanel. Picard opened her talk on the publication of her Chanel Biography with the statement that the V&A is the heart of Fashion, this forget Topshop!

Coco Chanel the name synonymous with French fashion, so carefully cultivated by Karl Largerfield, he feels as if a caretaker at the same time as being an innovative fashion designer such is the call of the Chanel Staples. Each catwalk is a reinvention of the tweeds, the stars, the numbers, simplistic beauty is what Chanel conjures and it is what it achieves.

So of course how could I pass up the opportunity to listen to JP who has spent the last 13 years researching the life of perhaps the most well known, but least known fashion designer?

It was the perfect talk – full of teasers about what the book contained alongside interesting insights into Coco’s design aesthetic – the monestry where she grew up the walls were embedded with stars, similar to what would later feature in her designs.

A talented speaker from the start, Justine enraptured the audience with tales of Chanel’s rise from rags to riches polevaulting through French Society’s conventions that those born in a certain place – should stay on the rung of society they were born. Luckily, not only for Haute Couture but for Women everywhere Chanel made ignoring social conventions a habit of a lifetime.

Illustration by Maria del Carmen Smith

Not for Chanel the corsets of early 1900′s France – no, the most striking thing about Chanel was seeing the pictures of her in a style that has inudated our subconscious – from the wearing of trousers to single handily popularising the Breton Stripe. Most importantly Chanel was an avid wearer of the flat show – not for her the gravity defying, walk preventing spindly heels that seem so popular not only on the catwalk but that shop which nestles within the heart of Oxford Street, Topshop.

Illustration by Kelly Angood

“Fashion is very dark, what we wear is what we cover up” Coco Chanel

JP covered the usual ground her relationship with Boy Capell and the Duke of Westminister, revealing a photograph of Coco and Winston Churchill lead her to the ministery of archives… what did she find? Sadly that was left to be revealed in the pages of her boo

Illustration by Joana Faria

Illustration by Abby Wright

Illustration by Antonia Parker

Illustration by Lesley Barnes

Justine Picard is a journalist for the Telegraph and an author who produces both fiction and non fiction, shop for the last 13 years her side project has been researching Coco Chanel. Picard opened her talk on the publication of her Chanel Biography with the statement that the V&A is the heart of Fashion, information pills forget Topshop!

Coco Chanel the name synonymous with French fashion, so carefully cultivated by Karl Largerfield, he feels as if a caretaker at the same time as being an innovative fashion designer such is the call of the Chanel Staples. Each catwalk is a reinvention of the tweeds, the stars, the numbers, simplistic beauty is what Chanel conjures and it is what it achieves.

So of course how could I pass up the opportunity to listen to JP who has spent the last 13 years researching the life of perhaps the most well known, but least known fashion designer?

Illustration by Maria del Carmen Smith – An aside about this image, notice how Chanel sits on the horse in jodphurs, rather than side saddle, a fairly political statement at a time when most women were bound in corsets, forcing them to sit side saddle.

It was the perfect talk – full of teasers about what the book contained alongside interesting insights into Coco’s design aesthetic – the monestry where she grew up the walls were embedded with stars, similar to what would later feature in her designs.

A talented speaker from the start, Justine enraptured the audience with tales of Chanel’s rise from rags to riches polevaulting through French Society’s conventions that those born in a certain place – should stay on the rung of society they were born. Luckily, not only for Haute Couture but for Women everywhere Chanel made ignoring social conventions a habit of a lifetime.

Illustration by Kelly Angood

“Fashion is very dark, what we wear is what we cover up” Coco Chanel

Not for Chanel the corsets of early 1900′s France – no, the most striking thing about Chanel was seeing the pictures of her in a style that has inudated our subconscious – from the wearing of trousers to single handily popularising the Breton Stripe. Most importantly Chanel was an avid wearer of the flat show – not for her the gravity defying, walk preventing spindly heels that seem so popular not only on the catwalk but that shop which nestles within the heart of Oxford Street, Topshop.

Illustration by Joana Faria

JP covered the usual ground her relationship with Boy Capell and the Duke of Westminister, revealing a photograph of Coco and Winston Churchill lead her to the ministery of archives… what did she find? Sadly that was left to be revealed in the pages of her book – but let’s just say her reported relationship with a German Soldier may not have been what it has so far appeared to be the work of a traitor, but a (slightly naive…) plan between Coco and Winston Churchill to bring the war to an early end. This may seem rather glib, but to find out more, we will all have to read the book…

Illustration by Abby Wright

Picard touched upon the inclusions of the number 5 etc and the use of stars… magical numbers were part of Chanel’s magical thinking… Tarot Cards. Chanel was interested in simple beauty. Justine attributes this magical thinking to her time spent as a child growing up in an ancient monastery, suggesting that the epoynmous chanel star was inspired by the mosiac’s made by Medieval Monks…

Illustration by Antonia Parker

Chanel was funded by Boy Capell, the man sitting on the horse in the above illustration, as soon as the Fashion House started to make money, Chanel paid every last penny back. From the start Coco was to be an independent women. Justine Picard described fashion as “a series of Hauntings” and finished the talk with a wish for a book on the continuation of Chanel by Karl Largerfield, to conclude that such a book could only be written once Largerfield had left Chanel and quite possibly this planet…

Illustration by Lesley Barnes

Coco Chanel the name synonymous with French fashion, discount so carefully cultivated by Karl Largerfield, side effects he feels as if a caretaker at the same time as being an innovative fashion designer such is the call of the Chanel Staples. Each catwalk is a reinvention of the tweeds, the stars, the numbers, simplistic beauty is what Chanel conjures and it is what it achieves.

Justine Picard is a journalist for the Telegraph and an author who produces both fiction and non fiction, for the last 13 years her side project has been researching Coco Chanel. Picard opened her talk on the publication of her Chanel Biography with the statement that the V&A is the heart of Fashion, forget Topshop!

How could I pass up the opportunity to find out more about this ever present, but ever distant fashion designer? Especially as I am yet to watch either of the recent films made about her early life…

Illustration by Maria del Carmen Smith – An aside about this image, notice how Chanel sits on the horse in jodphurs, rather than side saddle, a fairly political statement at a time when most women were bound in corsets, forcing them to sit side saddle.

It was the perfect talk – full of teasers about what the book contained alongside interesting insights into Coco’s design aesthetic – the monestry where she grew up the walls were embedded with stars, similar to what would later feature in her designs.

A talented speaker from the start, Justine enraptured the audience with tales of Chanel’s rise from rags to riches polevaulting through French Society’s conventions that those born in a certain place – should stay on the rung of society they were born. Luckily, not only for Haute Couture but for Women everywhere Chanel made ignoring social conventions a habit of a lifetime.

Illustration by Kelly Angood

“Fashion is very dark, what we wear is what we cover up” Coco Chanel

Not for Chanel the corsets of early 1900′s France – no, the most striking thing about Chanel was seeing the pictures of her in a style that has inudated our subconscious – from the wearing of trousers to single handily popularising the Breton Stripe. Most importantly Chanel was an avid wearer of the flat show – not for her the gravity defying, walk preventing spindly heels that seem so popular not only on the catwalk but that shop which nestles within the heart of Oxford Street, Topshop.

Illustration by Joana Faria

JP covered the usual ground her relationship with Boy Capell and the Duke of Westminister, revealing a photograph of Coco and Winston Churchill lead her to the ministery of archives… what did she find? Sadly that was left to be revealed in the pages of her book – but let’s just say her reported relationship with a German Soldier may not have been what it has so far appeared to be the work of a traitor, but a (slightly naive…) plan between Coco and Winston Churchill to bring the war to an early end. This may seem rather glib, but to find out more, we will all have to read the book…

Illustration by Abby Wright

Picard touched upon the inclusions of the number 5 etc and the use of stars… magical numbers were part of Chanel’s magical thinking… Tarot Cards. Chanel was interested in simple beauty. Justine attributes this magical thinking to her time spent as a child growing up in an ancient monastery, suggesting that the epoynmous chanel star was inspired by the mosiac’s made by Medieval Monks…

Illustration by Antonia Parker

Chanel was funded by Boy Capell, the man sitting on the horse in the above illustration, as soon as the Fashion House started to make money, Chanel paid every last penny back. From the start Coco was to be an independent women. Justine Picard described fashion as “a series of Hauntings” and finished the talk with a wish for a book on the continuation of Chanel by Karl Largerfield, to conclude that such a book could only be written once Largerfield had left Chanel and quite possibly this planet…

Illustration by Lesley Barnes

Coco Chanel the name synonymous with French fashion, order so carefully cultivated by Karl Largerfield, this he feels as if a caretaker at the same time as being an innovative fashion designer such is the call of the Chanel Staples. Each catwalk is a reinvention of the tweeds, the stars, the numbers, simplistic beauty is what Chanel conjures and it is what it achieves.

Justine Picard is a journalist for the Telegraph and an author who produces both fiction and non fiction, for the last 13 years her side project has been researching Coco Chanel. Picard opened her talk on the publication of her Chanel Biography with the statement that the V&A is the heart of Fashion, forget Topshop!

How could I pass up the opportunity to find out more about this ever present, but ever distant fashion designer? Especially as I am yet to watch either of the recent films made about her early life…

Illustration by Maria del Carmen SmithAn aside, notice how Chanel sits on the horse in jodphurs, rather than side saddle, a fairly political statement at a time when most women were bound in corsets, forcing them to sit side saddle.

It was the perfect talk – full of teasers about what the book contained alongside interesting insights into Coco’s design aesthetic – the monestry where she grew up the walls were embedded with stars, similar to what would later feature in her designs.

A talented speaker from the start, Justine enraptured the audience with tales of Chanel’s rise from rags to riches polevaulting through French Society’s conventions that those born in a certain place – should stay on the rung of society they were born. Luckily, not only for Haute Couture but for Women everywhere Chanel made ignoring social conventions a habit of a lifetime.

Illustration by Kelly Angood

“Fashion is very dark, what we wear is what we cover up” Coco Chanel

Not for Chanel the corsets of early 1900′s France – no, the most striking thing about Chanel was seeing the pictures of her in a style that has inudated our subconscious – from the wearing of trousers to single handily popularising the Breton Stripe. Most importantly Chanel was an avid wearer of the flat show – not for her the gravity defying, walk preventing spindly heels that seem so popular not only on the catwalk but that shop which nestles within the heart of Oxford Street, Topshop.

Illustration by Joana Faria

JP covered the usual ground her relationship with Boy Capell and the Duke of Westminister, revealing a photograph of Coco and Winston Churchill lead her to the ministery of archives… what did she find? Sadly that was left to be revealed in the pages of her book – but let’s just say her reported relationship with a German Soldier may not have been what it has so far appeared to be the work of a traitor, but a (slightly naive…) plan between Coco and Winston Churchill to bring the war to an early end. This may seem rather glib, but to find out more, we will all have to read the book…

Illustration by Abby Wright

Picard touched upon the inclusions of the number 5 etc and the use of stars… magical numbers were part of Chanel’s magical thinking… Tarot Cards. Chanel was interested in simple beauty. Justine attributes this magical thinking to her time spent as a child growing up in an ancient monastery, suggesting that the epoynmous chanel star was inspired by the mosiac’s made by Medieval Monks…

Illustration by Antonia Parker

Chanel was funded by Boy Capell, the man sitting on the horse in the above illustration, as soon as the Fashion House started to make money, Chanel paid every last penny back. From the start Coco was to be an independent women. Justine Picard described fashion as “a series of Hauntings” and finished the talk with a wish for a book on the continuation of Chanel by Karl Largerfield, to conclude that such a book could only be written once Largerfield had left Chanel and quite possibly this planet…

Illustration by Lesley Barnes

Coco Chanel the name synonymous with French fashion, order so carefully cultivated by Karl Largerfield, what is ed he feels as if a caretaker at the same time as being an innovative fashion designer such is the call of the Chanel Staples. Each catwalk is a reinvention of the tweeds, patient the stars, the numbers, simplistic beauty is what Chanel conjures and it is what it achieves.

Justine Picard is a journalist for the Telegraph and an author who produces both fiction and non fiction, for the last 13 years her side project has been researching Coco Chanel. Picard opened her talk on the publication of her Chanel Biography with the statement that the V&A is the heart of Fashion, forget Topshop!

Illustration by Joana Faria

How could I pass up the opportunity to find out more about this ever present, but ever distant fashion designer? Especially as I am yet to watch either of the recent films made about her early life…

It was the perfect talk – full of teasers about what the book contained alongside interesting insights into Coco’s design aesthetic – the monestry where she grew up the walls were embedded with stars, similar to what would later feature in her designs.

A talented speaker, Justine enraptured the audience with tales of Chanel’s rise from rags to riches polevaulting through French Society’s conventions that those born in a certain place – should stay on the rung of society they were born. Luckily, not only for Haute Couture but for women everywhere who wanted to wear trousers, Chanel made ignoring social conventions a habit of a lifetime.

Illustration by Kelly Angood

“Fashion is very dark, what we wear is what we cover up” Coco Chanel

Not for Chanel the corsets of early 1900′s France – no, the most striking thing about Chanel was seeing the pictures of her in a style that has inudated our subconscious – from the wearing of trousers to single handily popularising the Breton Stripe. Most importantly Chanel was an avid wearer of the flat show – not for her the gravity defying, walk preventing spindly heels that seem so popular not only on the catwalk but that shop which nestles within the heart of Oxford Street, Topshop.

Illustration by Maria del Carmen SmithAn aside, notice how Chanel sits on the horse in jodphurs, rather than side saddle, a fairly political statement at a time when most women were bound in corsets.

Chanel was funded by Boy Capell, the man in the above illustration, as soon as the Fashion House produced revenue, Chanel paid every last penny back. From the start Coco was to be an independent women.

Justine Picard covered the usual ground of Chanel’s relationship with men, starting with Boy Capell and touching upon her life spent fishing in Scotland with the Duke of Westminister. Through whom Coco met Winston Churchill in the early 1920′s. The discovery of a picture of the two together lead Picard to the ministery of war archives, specifically the archives on Winston Churchill to explore Chanel’s reported relationship with a German Soldier may not have been what has so far been reported, the work of a traitor, but a (slightly naive…) plan -devised perhaps by Coco and regaled to Winston Churchill- to bring the war to an early end. This may seem rather glib, but to find out more and the outcome of Picards trip to the archives? Sadly the author left this announcement within the pages of her book.

Illustration by Abby Wright

Picard touched upon the inclusions of the number 5 etc and the use of stars… magical numbers were part of Chanel’s magical thinking… Tarot Cards. Chanel was interested in simple beauty. Justine attributes this magical thinking to her time spent as a child growing up in an ancient monastery, suggesting that the epoynmous chanel star was inspired by the mosiac’s made by Medieval Monks…

Illustration by Antonia Parker

Justine Picard described fashion as “a series of Hauntings” and finished the talk with a wish for a book on the continuation of Chanel by Karl Largerfield, to conclude that such a book could only be written once Largerfield had left Chanel and quite possibly this planet…


WAH Nails, pills illustrated by Yelena Bryksenkova

Unless you’ve been under a rock, view you’ll have seen me banging on about Future Beauty: 30 Years of Japanese Fashion at the Barbican. I did a mammoth post about the exhibition last week; it’s one of my favourite fashion exhibitions ever, store and I couldn’t wait to go back for a second look.

So I was delighted to attend the Beauty Party last Thursday. The name flooded my mind with images of middle-aged women guzzling Lambrini and exchanging salacious stories while passing underwear around a living room on a cul-de-sac somewhere in Huddersfield. The roster of participants was pretty alluring, though – Alex Box, Charlie le Mindu and WAH Nails to name a few.


All photography by Matt Bramford

I went to a Viktor & Rolf event like this a couple of years back and it isn’t the easiest thing to navigate – you have to seek out the various special events – they’re usually tucked away. In tiny rooms behind the exhibition itself, each of the aficionados of beauty had set up their wares. Nails, make-up and hair were covered. What exactly was I going to get out of this? I have very little hair, I bite my nails, and I rarely wear make-up. ‘This is for girls,’ I thought to myself. Well, here’s a little round-up of the night’s events:

Charlie le Mindu

Illustration by Gemma Sheldrake

I’d subconsciously blocked Charlie le Mindu out of my mind after fashion week’s debacle. I feel lucky to be alive after that display, and I thought I had at least six months to recover before braving his (what will undoubtedly be fabulous) show for A/W 2011. Thankfully there wasn’t an arse or tit (or, er, y’know – the other bit) insight this time.

Charlie had created, especially for the occasion, a sculptural creation from human hair that descended from the roof and featured a rider’s helmet with a huge, yellow horse tail that dropped to the ground. On its own, it was beautiful; hanging motionless from the ceiling, it looked like magic. Attendees were able to slip underneath the creation and have their photograph taken, with hilarious results… Some were too short, some were too tall, some just couldn’t make it balance on their heads, but oh, what fun!


Look, it’s Amelia’s Magazine illustrator Naomi Law!


It’s Jenny, who isn’t an illustrator, but a friend nonetheless.

WAH Nails

I love how WAH Nails have single-handedly made nail art cool again. Their incredible designs have had so much press and attention since their debut in 2009. Most recently, they were part of the Eley Kishimoto Flash-On Week pop-up at the Shoreditch Studios, transforming nails with the iconic Flash pattern. Sadly, between the two of them, no matter how quickly the duo revamped nails it was clear the girls I’d gone with weren’t going to get a look in. The list to put your name on was full after fifteen minutes!

Still, it was fascinating to watch the designs come to life.

Alex Box

Illustration by Emmeline Pidgen

I’ve been a fan of Alex’s for a while but I wasn’t sure what to make of a make-up demonstration. A world-famous make-up artist demonstrating her skills in make-up at the front of a cinema, for an hour and a half? Oh, go on then I thought – what’s the worst that can happen? It turns out it was one of the most mesmerising things I (and my pals) had ever seen. Resplendent in a vintage floor-sweeping red frock and fashion glasses that would make half of Shoreditch envious, Alex began creating the first look to the sound of haunting classical music.

To see how quickly she works and how naturally it seems to flow was utterly hypnotising, and surprisingly relaxing. The first look was a Marie-Antoinette inspired ghostly creation, complete with a headpiece and fabrics that were added at the end – absolutely beautiful.

The same poor model then had her face wiped before Look Two began – a more playful look with vibrant colours and jazzy fabrics. ‘Sometimes you have to go against the rules,’ relayed Alex, to a room full of gripped onlookers. A truly wonderful experience.

Illamasqua

Illamasqua‘s team of make-up artists were on hand to provide makeovers. I couldn’t see much of what was going on here because a gaggle of excited teenage girls surrounded them in the hope of a dab of powder from one of these ‘world-famous’ experts. Nothing to see, here.

Of course amongst all this was a chance to see the incredible exhibition again, and it was equally as wonderful as the first time. I’d definitely recommend these evenings, and ooh look – there’s one tonight, starring Fred Butler amongst others!

See all the details here.

Categories ,A/W 2011, ,Alex Box, ,barbican, ,Beauty Party, ,Charlie le Mindu, ,Eley Kishimoto, ,Emmeline Pidgen, ,fashion, ,Flash, ,Fred Butler, ,Future Beauty, ,Gemma Sheldrake, ,Hair, ,japanese, ,Make-up, ,Marie Antoinette, ,Nails, ,Viktor & Rolf, ,WAH Nails, ,Yelena Bryksenkova

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Amelia’s Magazine | Fashion in Film Festival: Dreams of Darkness and Colour

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

How did you folks all meet up? Can you describe a bit more about the formation of the band?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, viagra approved order haha.




Amelia’s Magazine | Fashion in Film Festival: Dreams of Darkness and Colour























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Top 25 Art Blog - Creative Tourist




Fashion in Film Festival: Dreams of Darkness and Colour

In the last of our reviews from the Fashion in Film Festival, here’s the lavish Rapsodia Satanica – a classic from the Italian silent movie era, accompanied by live music…

Written by Matt Bramford

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

How did you folks all meet up? Can you describe a bit more about the formation of the band?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, viagra approved order haha. I (Peter) had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, stuff but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, capsule relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
dry the river by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

YouTube Preview Image
And on youtube using one of my photos from Glastonbury… without permission of course! In fact my pictures of Dry the River are crawling all over the web without credits…

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your recent youtube video gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here.

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

How did you folks all meet up? Can you describe a bit more about the formation of the band?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, capsule haha. I (Peter) had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, order but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

YouTube Preview Image
And on youtube using one of my photos from Glastonbury… without permission of course! In fact my pictures of Dry the River are crawling all over the web without credits…

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

dry-the-river-gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your recent youtube video gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here.

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

I first encountered Dry the River when they offered to do a gig for the Climate Camp stage at Glastonbury (read my write up here). As soon as I heard them I was absolutely blown away by this talented five some, link and seeing them live only cemented my feelings. On the eve of their sold out headline gig at The Nest in Dalston, viagra order I caught up with singer Peter Liddle.

How did the band get together?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, haha. I had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
Peter Liddle by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

dry-the-river-gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your YouTube video for Bible Belt has gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here.

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

I first encountered Dry the River when they offered to do a gig for the Climate Camp stage at Glastonbury (read my write up here). As soon as I heard them I was absolutely blown away by this talented five some, buy and seeing them live only cemented my feelings. On the eve of their sold out headline gig at The Nest in Dalston, I caught up with singer Peter Liddle.

How did the band get together?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, haha. I (Peter) had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

YouTube Preview Image
And on youtube using one of my photos from Glastonbury… without permission of course! In fact my pictures of Dry the River are crawling all over the web without credits…

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

dry-the-river-gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your recent youtube video gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here.

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

I first encountered Dry the River when they offered to do a gig for the Climate Camp stage at Glastonbury (read my write up here). As soon as I heard them I was absolutely blown away by this talented five some, mind and seeing them live only cemented my feelings. On the eve of their sold out headline gig at The Nest in Dalston, cheap I caught up with singer Peter Liddle.

How did the band get together?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, haha. I had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
Peter Liddle by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

YouTube Preview Image
And on youtube using one of my photos from Glastonbury… without permission of course! In fact my pictures of Dry the River are crawling all over the web without credits…

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

dry-the-river-gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your recent youtube video gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here.

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

I first encountered Dry the River when they offered to do a gig for the Climate Camp stage at Glastonbury. I was absolutely blown away by this talented five some, page who have since been on tour up and down the country over the past six weeks. On the eve of their final sold out headline gig at The Nest in Dalston, more about I caught up with singer Peter Liddle.

How did the band get together?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, haha. I had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
Peter Liddle by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

dry-the-river-gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive Records – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your YouTube video for Bible Belt has gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here. Read my review of their gig at Glastonbury here.

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

I first encountered Dry the River when they offered to do a gig for the Climate Camp stage at Glastonbury. On record they are fabulous, pilule but live I was absolutely blown away by this talented five some. They have since been on tour up and down the country over the past six weeks. On the eve of their final sold out headline gig at The Nest in Dalston, order I caught up with Norwegian singer Peter Liddle.

How did the band get together?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, purchase haha. I had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
Peter Liddle by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

dry-the-river-gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive Records – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your YouTube video for Bible Belt has gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here. Read my review of their gig at Glastonbury here.

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

I first encountered Dry the River when they offered to do a gig for the Climate Camp stage at Glastonbury. On record they are fabulous, dosage but live I was absolutely blown away by this talented five some. They have since been on tour up and down the country over the past six weeks, side effects and on the eve of their final sold out headline gig at The Nest in Dalston, I caught up with Norwegian singer Peter Liddle.

How did the band get together?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, haha. I had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
Peter Liddle by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

dry-the-river-gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive Records – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your YouTube video for Bible Belt has gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here. Read my review of their gig at Glastonbury here.

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

I first encountered Dry the River when they offered to do a gig for the Climate Camp stage at Glastonbury. On record they are fabulous, health but live I was absolutely blown away by this talented five some. Over the past six weeks they have been on tour up and down the country. I find out how life is treating them in my intimate interview with Norwegian lead singer and chief songwriter Peter Liddle.

How did the band get together?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, information pills haha. I had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, mind but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
Peter Liddle by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

dry-the-river-gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive Records – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your YouTube video for Bible Belt has gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here. Read my review of their gig at Glastonbury here.

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

I first encountered Dry the River when they offered to do a gig for the Climate Camp stage at Glastonbury. On record they are fabulous, physician but live I was absolutely blown away by this talented five some. They have since been on tour up and down the country over the past six weeks, visit this site and on the eve of their final sold out headline gig at The Nest in Dalston I present my interview with their Norwegian singer songwriter Peter Liddle.

How did the band get together?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, viagra order haha. I had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
Peter Liddle by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

dry-the-river-gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive Records – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your YouTube video for Bible Belt has gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here. Read my review of their gig at Glastonbury here.

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

I first encountered Dry the River when they offered to do a gig for the Climate Camp stage at Glastonbury. On record they are fabulous, hospital but live I was absolutely blown away by this talented five some. Over the past six weeks they have been on tour up and down the country: I find out how life has been treating them in my intimate interview with Norwegian lead singer and chief songwriter Peter Liddle.

How did the band get together?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, viagra 60mg haha. I had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
Peter Liddle by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

dry-the-river-gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive Records – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your YouTube video for Bible Belt has gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here. Read my review of their gig at Glastonbury here.

Dry the River by Avril Kelly
Dry the River by Avril Kelly.

I first encountered Dry the River when they offered to do a gig for the Climate Camp stage at Glastonbury this summer. On record they are fabulous, advice but live I was absolutely blown away by this talented five some. Over the past six weeks they have been on tour up and down the country: I find out how life has been treating them in my intimate interview with Norwegian lead singer and chief songwriter Peter Liddle.

How did the band get together?
I’d like to say it was an epic tale of overcoming obstacles and triumph in the face of adversity but it was actually a pretty run-of-the-mill thing, haha. I had taken some time out of music to do some other stuff but before I knew it I’d kind of unconsciously started writing a record. One weekend I recruited some musicians I knew from old bands etc. and we spent a weekend recording. The day after we finished recording I went off on an acoustic UK tour and the band was kind of built out of that.

Dry The River by Karina Yarv
Dry The River by Karina Yarv.

How do you describe your music to people who have never heard it?
Actually it’s changed a lot – at the start it was very lo-fi folky stuff because the songs grew out some acoustic bedroom recordings, but now that we all live together and are all involved in the writing process we’ve opened the door to a lot of different influences. I think the songs still resemble folk music thematically – I write a lot about family, relationships, the things that a lot of us deal with day to day – but in the practice room we all get the chance to pull the arrangements in different directions. I guess the short answer is that it’s folky gospel music played by a post-punk band.

Dry The River by Mags James
Dry The River by Mags James.

You share a home in Stratford – is this ever hard work? Who does the most washing up (and the least)?
I think living in a confined space with other people is always a tricky business. At least in our case we have a mutual understanding of each other’s situation. That said, some days are obviously harder than others. We’ve been on tour for six weeks now, mostly cooped up in a van – I think after our Nest show on Wednesday we’ll all go back to our respective family homes for some time apart. Jon (drums) does the most washing up, he likes to keep things tidy. I think I probably do the least, or Scott (bass)…

YouTube Preview Image

You are known for utterly lush harmonies… is it hard to get these right and how do they come about?
It’s funny, it was never our intention to be a band that feature prominent harmonies. We were in the studio working on a new recording and I asked Scott whether he could sing. He had a go at singing a third or a fifth on top of what Matt and I were singing and it seemed to work. It really was that haphazard – we rarely spend time crafting harmony parts, Matt and Scott just sing where it seems to make sense. Sometimes we get to recording a song and realise what we’ve been singing doesn’t even work, and have to sit at a piano working out what the lines should be!

dry the river by Gaarte
Peter Liddle by Gaarte.

Were you all musical children? Did you learn to play instruments from a young age?
Aside from Will, we’re all first generation musicians. None of us come from particularly musical families. I think we actually all grew up at a time when being in rock bands was just what kids did. Certainly in Newbury where I took up music in earnest, almost everyone tried their hand at it. That said, I’m at the other extreme to Will – I never studied music formally at all and one day I’d like to. The other guys all have at least a pretty solid (if rudimentary) understanding of music theory.

Stephanie Thieullent-dry the river
Dry the River by Stephanie Thieullent.

Does Peter write all the lyrics, and where do you draw inspiration from?
Writing lyrics is a separate endeavour to writing songs, for me. I write chord progressions and vocal melodies and have a pretty formed idea of where a song is going, then I go away and spend a long time writing lyrics. I think experience informs the way everybody behaves – it’s the lens that everybody views the world through and music is no different. In my case the songs are rarely based on a specific event or a candid message that I desperately want to deliver. They’re more a collection of responses to environments I’ve found myself in – periods of time, people, places… So I guess in that respect they include images of my childhood in Norway and the UK, reflections on my time at University, and a whole load of other stuff that influences my worldview on any given day.

YouTube Preview Image

Your songs are very intense emotionally – is this intentional and why do you think they come across like this?
I think there are probably two reasons for that. Firstly, whether it’s an event or a feeling or a situation, something has to motivate an artist enough to write a song or paint or whatever. I think the vast majority of artworks are created as an emotional response, so the subject matter is always going to be emotional in nature. Secondly, though, we are grew up listening to post-punk and metal and so on, which is traditionally played in a very intense way. I think the way we play probably magnifies the emotional content in the lyrics.

We first met at Glastonbury when you played for Climate Camp this year… what was your highlight of this year’s festival?
Snooooooooooop!

You will be playing a lot more festivals next summer, can you tell us which ones they will be, and are there any in particular that you are looking forward to?
I think we’ve confirmed quite a few now but I’m not sure which we’re meant to reveal! The other day we were announced alongside Midlake and Wild Beasts in the first batch of names for End of the Road, which we’re super stoked about!

dry-the-river-gaarte
Dry the River by Gaarte.

You’ve decided to release your debut single on Transgressive Records – what made you decide to go with this label and what will the single be?
Tim and Toby at Transgressive really put their faith in the music at an early stage when everything was uncertain. A lot of people see a band with potential and sit in the wings, waiting to see how they’ll fare. Transgressive were the opposite – they met us straight away, told us they loved the music and believed in it, and set about moving mountains to help us become a full time band. Aside from all that, they’re a great label and we’re really proud to be adding to the discography. As for the song, you’ll have to wait and see!

YouTube Preview Image

Your YouTube video for Bible Belt has gained more than 100,000 hits – why do you think it has proved so popular?
There are a variety of a reasons I suppose – firstly it was on the YouTube front page as part of a YouTube Music Tuesdays promotion, which I think put it in front of a lot of people who wouldn’t normally have seen it. Also Watch Listen Tell, who filmed that session, have a really loyal following, and maybe there was a word of mouth element too – I guess it’s quite memorable with Matt’s broken arm and so on!

You’ve just played the Forum, what was the highlight of the gig? What can the audience expect at your headline gig at the Nest in Dalston?
The Forum was our biggest show ever – there’s no substitute for experience on big stages in front of lots of people! That said, we love the more intimate settings where we can see familiar faces and talk to people. I hope The Nest will be a really special event – for us it’s our homecoming show after six weeks on the road, as well as our 100th show and a celebration of all that’s come about in the past year.

You can find the wonderful Dry the River on Myspace here, and at home on their website here where you can download three songs for free. You can also follow them on twitter here, and of course do not forget their headline show, which is on Wednesday 15th December at The Nest. Full listing info here. Read my review of their gig at Glastonbury here.


Illustration by Gareth A Hopkins

So the next stop on my fashion film list (after almost having a seizure at the Pink Narcissus screening) was Dreams of Darkness and Colour.

On a very cold Saturday afternoon, abortion I headed to the Barbican where an eclectic line up was to be shown alongside Rapsodia Satanica – a glorious black/white movie from 1915. It was so cold outside that, at first, it was a huge relief to step inside the Barbican with its roaring heating, but this (alongside the huge, comfy seats in Cinema 1) was soon to prove to be a recipe for a snooze…

Running a little late, the series was first introduced by the lovely Marketa Uhlirova, director of the Fashion in Film Festival, who gave a litte background to each of the films. Next up, Anna Battista – fashion journalist and lecturer – gave an hilarious introduction to each in the series. A gorgeous Italian woman wearing what looked like a post-bag, she leaped around the stage with such vigour that it was hard not to get excited about the forthcoming flicks.

This wasn’t any ordinary screening, mind. The five films we were about to watch were all of the silent era – and they were to be accompanied Lily Henley, tinkling the ivories in dramatic fashion. I’ve heard great things about these kind of screenings – where films from the silent era are accompanied by live music – but I’m embarrassed to say I’d never experienced one until now. I wasn’t disappointed.


Illustration by Avril Kelly

The first screenings were the shorts, which included Méliès’ La Danse du feu (The Pillar of Fire) – an extraordinary hand-coloured film where a demon conjures a woman wearing a voluminous white dress, who then dances; Le Farfalle (The Butterflies) by a unknown director, where Geishas dance and play with a butterfly-like creature who they have imprisoned in a cage; and my favourite, Le Spectre Rouge (The Red Spectre), where in a dark cavern a very creepy devil performs incredible tricks to conjure up women and then make them disappear.

The beauty of these shorts is that, while there isn’t much of a narrative, visually they are stunning. There are only so many times you can watch a woman in a white sheet flap around, I have to say, but at the time the effect of committing these illusions to film must have been magical. They’re still extremely powerful today – even the effetti speciali were enchanting when I expected them to be a little bogus.

Henley, on the piano, never faulted once as she accompanied each of the films. The music matched every dramatic scene perfectly, and I had to continually remind myself that it was actually live music I could hear as every note seamlessly married the film footage.


Illustration by Rukmunal Hakim

So, on to the main event. Rapsodia Satanica was the last film directed by Nino Oxilia, and is generally regarded as one of the finest achievements of Italian cinema during the silent era. A variation of the Faustian plot, our protagonist Alba d’Oltrevita (Lyda Borelli) signs a deal with the devil to regain her youth and beauty – minus the ability to fall in love. The film itself combines elements of horror, expressionism and, of course, the glitz, glamour and extravagance we’d expect from such an epic – Alba’s costumes were created by the Spanish couturier Mariano Fortuny, no less. Battista discussed the topic of the cloth that covers Borelli’s face in the most iconic scenes and the symbolism of the effect it creates – obscuring imperfections and bringing a ghost-like image with it. A flick through recent fashion magazines would reveal that the image of a woman with her face obscured by cloth/net or any translucent material is a reoccurring concept in fashion.

The clothes, typical of the aspirations of the early century, where about as lavish as you get. Set amongst the decadent backdrops of aristocratic mansions, our lead character goes from scene to scene wearing more embellishments than you can shake a stick at.

Huge thanks go to the Fashion in Film Festival for bringing these forgotten wonders to the screens of London. In a world where every visual effect is possible and unique costume design is rare, thank heavens for these enduring works with magic that never fades.

See our reviews of Pink Narcissus and Moulin Rouge (1928) from the Fashion in Film Festival.

Categories ,1915, ,Anna Battista, ,barbican, ,cinema, ,Dreams of Darkness and Colour, ,fashion, ,Fashion in Film Festival, ,film, ,Italian, ,La Danse du feu, ,Le Farfalle, ,Le Spectre Rouge, ,Lily Henley, ,Lyda Borelli, ,Mariano Fortuny, ,Marketa Uhlirova, ,Nino Oxilia, ,piano, ,Rapsodia Satanica, ,Silent era

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Amelia’s Magazine | Frans Lanting and Philip Glass: LIFE: A Journey Through Time performed at the Barbican by the LSO

Frans Lanting Joanne Young
Frans Lanting. Illustration by Joanne Young.

Way back in the depths of February I went for a very different night out in the middle of London Fashion Week. This was for the London premiere, at the Barbican, of an unusual multimedia collaboration between composer Philip Glass and Frans Lanting – a wildlife photographer much beloved of the National Geographic. LIFE: A Journey Through Time comprised an orchestral performance by the London Symphony Orchestra played beneath a huge three screen projection of photographs depicting the evolution of life on earth: not a big task at all then. The images have also been turned into a beautiful (and heavy) coffee table tome produced by Taschen, which is available here.

Life: A Journey Through Time
You wouldn’t want to drop this on your toes.

When I was I child my parents seemed hopeful that I’d become a serious violinist, so at the weekends I was dragged on numerous trips to watch classical music performed at the Royal Festival Hall and ever since then the idea of doing the same under my own steam brings back memories of mind-numbing boredom. What a great idea though – create something for those of us more visually inclined to look so that our minds don’t wander too far. I was hoping that the combination of imagery with music would produce something so much more engaging than your usual orchestral performance.

Barbican gallery

I was not disappointed: from the upper gallery we had a great view of the screens onto which were projected a mixture of stunning images from Lanting’s back catalogue together with many that were specifically taken for this project, one which clearly necessitated many further trips into pristine wildernesses to capture the world as it might have been many years before man arrived on the scene. The music and the images were expertly ‘choreographed’ by Alexander Nichols for the first ever performance, held in 2006 in Santa Cruz, and have been altered and adapted at each ensuing one. LIFE: A Journey Through Time has now been performed all over the world, including at the official inauguration ceremony of the CERN Hadron Collider. You can watch an excerpt of the show here.

After the performance we stayed on for a Q&A session, which was unexpectedly interesting – possibly due to the high calibre of the audience questions – a rarity! Together, Franz Lanting (the man with the idea), conductor Marin Alsop and Cameron Hepburn, an environmental economist and representative of Julie’s Bicycle (on organisation that seeks to reduce the carbon emissions of the music industry) talked about the processes and ethics behind the performance.

frans lanting turtles
Image courtesy of Frans Lanting.

The extreme luminosity of the projections were perfect for showcasing the impressive images, which somehow took on an otherworldly feel despite being very much about our own amazing earth. Lanting did his best to find images that look hyper real in the first place, which of course has been abetted by the move to digital photography. “All the most recent images were taken on digital cameras and the colour of earlier ones were synchronised with them.” No longer do we need to worry about the quality of “crummy prints.” The project was only supposed to take a few years to do, but unsurprisingly Lanting kept finding new and interesting things to photograph. How does he locate and then shoot his subject matter? “It takes a lot of patience and research; finding out where and when to go to a place. You can’t just sit behind a tree and hope for the best – you have to engage and then get out of the way quickly.” He offered as an example the yawning jaws of a hippo. No, you wouldn’t want to stay too close to that particular vision!

frans lanting ferns
Image courtesy of Frans Lanting.

The biggest issue for Lanting was how to weave the human story into such a beautiful project without really, erm, sullying the imagery with shots of actual humans. Seems I’m not the only one who regards us as a blight on the planet. He decided that the best way to do this was to subtly represent the vulnerability of humanity with an image of an embryo, a curiously delicate pair of human feet, and cross sections of brain and hands to highlight the universal branching patterns that can are found everywhere in nature, from landscapes to music. Setting the imagery to music made perfect sense because everyone can relate to music in the same way that they can relate to the natural world. “Resonance is indigenous to life, so the same patterns repeat themselves at different scales in whatever form.”

Frans Lanting croc
Image courtesy of Frans Lanting.

And this is where the choice of Glass came in. “Selecting the composer for this work was a logical decision,” explained Lanting. “I’d had his music in my ears for decades because it has the same organic focus on pattern as you find in the natural world.” And anyway Steve Reich won’t work with an orchestra, so that put paid to his inclusion in the project.

Marin Alsop Joanne Young
Marin Alsop. Ilustration by Joanne Young.

As for the conductor, Marin Alsop. Well, I and most of the audience were most surprised to discover that there was no automatic synching of the music to the imagery – she does it all done totally live. “It’s quite a tricky thing to keep in time with the images,” she admitted. No shit! I was seriously impressed. Added difficulties arise when the images are changed around from performance to performance. “Sometimes I’m looking for an iguana and it’s become a bird.” She tries to keep in time by doodling eyeballs in the correct places on her score, although she admitted that “it’s mostly just luck when everything lines up.”

Cameron Hepburn Joanne Young
Cameron Hepburn. Illustration by Joanne Young.

So why do this? Why put together this piece and then tout it all over the globe? “It’s all about humanity being in the same place experiencing something together at the same time” was the best that the panelists could come up with. This is where I struggle. It’s a beautiful piece of work and one that I would highly recommend anyone to go and see – it’s evocative, engaging, mournful, emotional. But the creators are also being flown all over the world to promote the piece, which in itself is a carbon intensive production. Because I feel so very conflicted about projects like this I was really interested to hear the thoughts of Hepburn, who admitted that although he cycled to the Barbican he also flies around the world to attend conferences on climate change. He was also disarmingly honest in questioning how successful this performance could be in raising awareness of climate change and the attendant huge loss of biodiversity that we currently face.

frans lanting jellyfish
Image courtesy of Frans Lanting.

Yes the performance was incredibly moving, and the accompanying book is very beautiful and I’d really like a copy, yes please, as did many of the punters queueing around the shop to buy it – but what exactly will its purchase do, apart from provide a bit of wow factor for the coffee table? Having enjoyed this performance, will the audience go away and change anything deeper about their lifestyles? Am I a cynic to doubt they will? The main demographic were assuredly middle class cultured types of the sort who think nothing of flying half way across the world on holiday and then assuage their conscience by staying in an eco-lodge. Does this really help preserve the glory of our natural world? I am sure that the production of this work alone has justified Lanting’s global jaunts to fragile places of beauty many times over. Therein lies the conundrum: it’s important to document and tell people about what we risk losing and Lanting is particularly good at capturing the raw primeval beauty of the natural world – but when the very production of those photos contributes to global warming, where does that leave us?

frans lanting cheetah
Image courtesy of Frans Lanting.

Humans are programmed to rejoice in the wonder of the natural world; it’s why we love to travel abroad and experience the landscapes of beautiful unspoilt places. I love being in wild places so much that it was one of the reasons I decided to pursue fashion photography for a while – it allowed me to seek out amazing locations that I would never otherwise have been able to justify visiting. But we’ve become so greedy to see all the beautiful places of the world that we bury our heads and do our best not to consider the heavy carbon costs of air travel. How many people actually think about what that holiday to a pristine wilderness now costs us on a planetary wide scale? And how do we balance having a global view not only of the beauty we risk losing, but the multitudes of cultures and peoples, whilst taking into account the costs of travel?

Frans Lanting volcano
Image courtesy of Frans Lanting.

I don’t know what the answer is. If I’m honest I’m jealous that Lanting has a reason to justify his visits to the Galapagos and I don’t. But would I fly there repeatedly if I had the opportunity to do the same? Probably not. My conscience just weighs too heavy. Although maybe I can justify just that one trip for myself in my lifetime… Now how long does it take to get there by boat?

Categories ,barbican, ,Cameron Hepburn, ,CERN, ,Classical Music, ,Frans Lanting, ,Galapagos, ,Hippo, ,Joanne Young, ,Julie’s Bicycle, ,London Fashion Week, ,London Symphony Orchestra, ,LSO, ,Marin Alsop, ,Minimalist music, ,Philip Glass, ,photography, ,Royal Festival Hall, ,Santa Cruz, ,wildlife

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Amelia’s Magazine | Radical Nature – The exhibition challenging our perceptions in a changing planet.

75dpi legs

Charlotte Daffern’s playful statement jewellery borders on the completely eccentric, cheap whilst tackling ideas of gender and national stereotype. The work re-visits the 1950’s as a result of the surge in a return to the ideals of the housewife from baking and sowing to the current increase in upcycling. Daffern’s work re-invents what are considered to be traditionally upper crust British Fabrics into something fresh and vitalic for today’s youth.

From looking at your designs, the humour and whimsicality often associated with the idea Britishness is incredibly evident, especially in the manipulation of tartan. What other material stereotypes did you find to be eponymous with British Culture?

Whilst I was studying for my MA we had a seminar discussion about what imagery you see when you think of British fashion or British people. It was basically fairly twee: twin sets and pearls for women, shooting jackets for men, flat caps etc. Pearls have run through all of my collections so far, I suppose its one element that nods towards the stereotype and the historical fashion of Britain. I try to create an updated version of the pearl necklace. I think most people imagine pearls on royalty, wealthy ladies or the light lipped librarian. However I didn’t want people to dismiss wearing them because of stereotypes they might have.

75dpi escape apron

Subsequently, how has the exploration of what it is to be British affected your designs?

Whilst my work is based on stereotypes it aims to subvert whilst making reference to them at the same time. In the red tartan work, everyone comments on the connection to Vivienne Westwood. If you change the fabric to something that isn’t tartan I’m not sure you would necessarily make that link with her. I suppose I learned the power changing one element such as a print or colour can have on the perception of the work. Having studied with international students and networked with some American artists and galleries I realised how interested they were in British culture and style, perhaps more so than British people themselves. Really it was a natural progression from observing other cultures perception of ‘Britishness’. The result was a want to present my idea on British lifestyle and stereotypes through design.

charlottedaffernteapot spout bangles

Continuing from the discussion on stereotypes, how do ideas of gender and sociology feature in your work? – I particularly enjoyed the ‘hoody’ body adornment and the one armed necklace.

I like to challenge ideas of gender by putting pearls on a man or by giving a woman a pretty polka dot penis necklace. I love humour, irony and contradictions and I think this corresponds with my ideas of what it is to be British as well. I like knowing what’s going on with social and fashion trends. There are things you can take from the pieces that maybe reference different aspects of past or present culture/ lifestyle.

My more recent work is a combination of two stereotypes – the 1990’s acid house rave character combined with the 1950’s housewife. I represent the raver stereotype through the acidic fluorescent colours and the chaotic nature of some of the pieces and the fabrics are all typical to the 1950’s style – polka dots, stripes, gingham checks, florals.

charlottedaffern

Favourite designers?

I’ve done some work experience at Paul Smith which really influenced my love of all things British! Vivienne Westwood is obviously a huge inspiration and proof you can achieve anything if you go for it and believe in yourself. I suppose that’s the ultimate dream to work for Vivienne Westwood! Comme des Garcons, Viktor and Rolf – love their style and how they challenge rhythm and tradition within their designs. I like to see what other people are doing as well, other jewellers, illustrators, graphic designers, furniture makers! The list is endless.

charlottedaffern

From reading previous answers, would you say your choice of fabric evolves from their involvement in the stereotypes your are subverting?

Yes I think they do. I begin with fabrics that people associate with the stereotype and try to deconstruct and develop new sometimes mutated forms from the initial subjects forms and materials. I think a lot of people associate tartan with ‘Britishness’ and gingham checks with tablecloths but they don’t usually see these made into other things and then transformed into something wearable.

What fabric are you using in the new collection?

In my latest collection I have used the things that I associate with the imagery of the 1950’s housewives. Polka dots, checks, ginhams, florals. I imagined the polka dots on a housewifes dress, the stripey shirts of her husband, the checks on her tablecloth, the flowers sitting in a vase on her table. The fabrics I use are a combination of new, vintage and second hand.

charlottedaffern8

As Amelia’s Magazine focuses frequently on sustainable fashion – I wondered if I could could enquire about your thoughts on the following? Would you consider yourself environmentally aware? If so does being aware of the environment impact your work?

I would definitely like to think I am environmentally aware. My fashion degree dissertation was based on what it is to make a company ethical and profitable. Through all the research I learned a lot about how much gets wasted and which companies are taking steps towards improving their methods and sourcing. I love recycling and upcycling. There’s something exciting about spotting something in a charity shop that others have overlooked. There is also the challenge of trying to make it into something even better! The only downside to this way of working is storage space. My mum has endured my hoarding ways for years and now my poor boyfriend is going to be subject to it.

Charlotte_Daffern_6

Are there ways that you think our society can be improved and are you as a designer or as an individual engaged in doing anything about this?

I think the ‘fast fashion’ of today is really damaging. Most customers who pop into town won’t know what goes into their £2.50 t-shirt. I think there have been programmes on television which have tried to highlight this but I can appreciate those on low incomes will completely overlook that when they’re at the till. I don’t think it is going to do much good by trying to educate people and leave it solely in their hands. I think it’s the responsibility of the designers and manufacturers to only offer sustainable options (or as sustainable as possible). As a designer there’s the argument of where do you draw the line at calling something ‘sustainable’ or ‘ethical’? I don’t usually bring up where my materials come from unless people ask. However I do like to use recycled beads, haberdashery, fabrics etc and combine these with new. I would like to use more and more recycled materials in the future. Sometimes the problem lies in getting good quality second hand materials and I would rather create something combining new and old so that the aesthetic of the work is not compromised.

Charlotte_Daffern_3

Where did you study and how did you find the design ethos of the teachers on the MA?

I studied at Birmingham School of Jewellery In the Jewellery Quarter. I found that the course supported ideas, concepts and material investigation. It isn’t about trying to fit into any boxes as far as style or design is concerned. You are really encouraged to develop your own creative handwriting and I learned to be confident in making work that some people might not understand. The work I make is a hybrid of fashion and jewellery; I’ve always struggled to explain it to people when they ask what I do! I’ve found that most people like to be able to explain exactly what something is and they get confused when they see some of my pieces. I think it adds to the fascination but people sometimes reject what they don’t recognise. I think they are happy for you to do anything here, just justify why and that there is a market for it and you can do anything!

What aspects of design make you happy?

So many aspects of designing make me happy! I like to find creative solutions to problems such as how to use the last scrap of vintage fabric effectively; How I can incorporate and combine various colours, fabrics and findings etc. I love creating something that makes other people smile. I think fashion should be fun and daring! It’s a shame that as we get older we sometimes lose that playfulness that we had with our dressing up box. I worked in retail for a couple of years and met such a wide range of interesting people. I was really inspired by peoples reaction to colours, trends etc. One lady told me that despite the credit crunch she wanted the bright orange dress and not the safe black cardigan, That really got me thinking – of course if you only have so much to spend you want to spend it on something that’s got the wow factor! This made me happy!

Find Charlotte Daffern here:

75dpi legs

Charlotte Daffern’s playful statement jewellery borders on the completely eccentric, malady whilst tackling ideas of gender and national stereotype. The work re-visits the 1950’s as a result of the surge in a return to the ideals of the housewife from baking and sowing to the current increase in upcycling. Daffern’s work re-invents what are considered to be traditionally upper crust British Fabrics into something fresh and vitalic for today’s youth.

From looking at your designs, the humour and whimsicality often associated with the idea Britishness is incredibly evident, especially in the manipulation of tartan. What other material stereotypes did you find to be eponymous with British Culture?

Whilst I was studying for my MA we had a seminar discussion about what imagery you see when you think of British fashion or British people. It was basically fairly twee: twin sets and pearls for women, shooting jackets for men, flat caps etc. Pearls have run through all of my collections so far, I suppose its one element that nods towards the stereotype and the historical fashion of Britain. I try to create an updated version of the pearl necklace. I think most people imagine pearls on royalty, wealthy ladies or the light lipped librarian. However I didn’t want people to dismiss wearing them because of stereotypes they might have.

75dpi escape apron

Subsequently, how has the exploration of what it is to be British affected your designs?

Whilst my work is based on stereotypes it aims to subvert whilst making reference to them at the same time. In the red tartan work, everyone comments on the connection to Vivienne Westwood. If you change the fabric to something that isn’t tartan I’m not sure you would necessarily make that link with her. I suppose I learned the power changing one element such as a print or colour can have on the perception of the work. Having studied with international students and networked with some American artists and galleries I realised how interested they were in British culture and style, perhaps more so than British people themselves. Really it was a natural progression from observing other cultures perception of ‘Britishness’. The result was a want to present my idea on British lifestyle and stereotypes through design.

charlottedaffernteapot spout bangles

Continuing from the discussion on stereotypes, how do ideas of gender and sociology feature in your work? – I particularly enjoyed the ‘hoody’ body adornment and the one armed necklace.

I like to challenge ideas of gender by putting pearls on a man or by giving a woman a pretty polka dot penis necklace. I love humour, irony and contradictions and I think this corresponds with my ideas of what it is to be British as well. I like knowing what’s going on with social and fashion trends. There are things you can take from the pieces that maybe reference different aspects of past or present culture/ lifestyle.

My more recent work is a combination of two stereotypes – the 1990’s acid house rave character combined with the 1950’s housewife. I represent the raver stereotype through the acidic fluorescent colours and the chaotic nature of some of the pieces and the fabrics are all typical to the 1950’s style – polka dots, stripes, gingham checks, florals.

charlottedaffern

Favourite designers?

I’ve done some work experience at Paul Smith which really influenced my love of all things British! Vivienne Westwood is obviously a huge inspiration and proof you can achieve anything if you go for it and believe in yourself. I suppose that’s the ultimate dream to work for Vivienne Westwood! Comme des Garcons, Viktor and Rolf – love their style and how they challenge rhythm and tradition within their designs. I like to see what other people are doing as well, other jewellers, illustrators, graphic designers, furniture makers! The list is endless.

charlottedaffern

From reading previous answers, would you say your choice of fabric evolves from their involvement in the stereotypes your are subverting?

Yes I think they do. I begin with fabrics that people associate with the stereotype and try to deconstruct and develop new sometimes mutated forms from the initial subjects forms and materials. I think a lot of people associate tartan with ‘Britishness’ and gingham checks with tablecloths but they don’t usually see these made into other things and then transformed into something wearable.

What fabric are you using in the new collection?

In my latest collection I have used the things that I associate with the imagery of the 1950’s housewives. Polka dots, checks, ginhams, florals. I imagined the polka dots on a housewifes dress, the stripey shirts of her husband, the checks on her tablecloth, the flowers sitting in a vase on her table. The fabrics I use are a combination of new, vintage and second hand.

charlottedaffern8

As Amelia’s Magazine focuses frequently on sustainable fashion – I wondered if I could could enquire about your thoughts on the following? Would you consider yourself environmentally aware? If so does being aware of the environment impact your work?

I would definitely like to think I am environmentally aware. My fashion degree dissertation was based on what it is to make a company ethical and profitable. Through all the research I learned a lot about how much gets wasted and which companies are taking steps towards improving their methods and sourcing. I love recycling and upcycling. There’s something exciting about spotting something in a charity shop that others have overlooked. There is also the challenge of trying to make it into something even better! The only downside to this way of working is storage space. My mum has endured my hoarding ways for years and now my poor boyfriend is going to be subject to it.

Charlotte_Daffern_6

Are there ways that you think our society can be improved and are you as a designer or as an individual engaged in doing anything about this?

I think the ‘fast fashion’ of today is really damaging. Most customers who pop into town won’t know what goes into their £2.50 t-shirt. I think there have been programmes on television which have tried to highlight this but I can appreciate those on low incomes will completely overlook that when they’re at the till. I don’t think it is going to do much good by trying to educate people and leave it solely in their hands. I think it’s the responsibility of the designers and manufacturers to only offer sustainable options (or as sustainable as possible). As a designer there’s the argument of where do you draw the line at calling something ‘sustainable’ or ‘ethical’? I don’t usually bring up where my materials come from unless people ask. However I do like to use recycled beads, haberdashery, fabrics etc and combine these with new. I would like to use more and more recycled materials in the future. Sometimes the problem lies in getting good quality second hand materials and I would rather create something combining new and old so that the aesthetic of the work is not compromised.

Charlotte_Daffern_3

Where did you study and how did you find the design ethos of the teachers on the MA?

I studied at Birmingham School of Jewellery In the Jewellery Quarter. I found that the course supported ideas, concepts and material investigation. It isn’t about trying to fit into any boxes as far as style or design is concerned. You are really encouraged to develop your own creative handwriting and I learned to be confident in making work that some people might not understand. The work I make is a hybrid of fashion and jewellery; I’ve always struggled to explain it to people when they ask what I do! I’ve found that most people like to be able to explain exactly what something is and they get confused when they see some of my pieces. I think it adds to the fascination but people sometimes reject what they don’t recognise. I think they are happy for you to do anything here, just justify why and that there is a market for it and you can do anything!

What aspects of design make you happy?

So many aspects of designing make me happy! I like to find creative solutions to problems such as how to use the last scrap of vintage fabric effectively; How I can incorporate and combine various colours, fabrics and findings etc. I love creating something that makes other people smile. I think fashion should be fun and daring! It’s a shame that as we get older we sometimes lose that playfulness that we had with our dressing up box. I worked in retail for a couple of years and met such a wide range of interesting people. I was really inspired by peoples reaction to colours, trends etc. One lady told me that despite the credit crunch she wanted the bright orange dress and not the safe black cardigan, That really got me thinking – of course if you only have so much to spend you want to spend it on something that’s got the wow factor! This made me happy!

Find Charlotte Daffern here:

Radical Nature is an exhibition at the Barbican that explores art and architecture for a changing planet, page it was held over summer but is now coming to a close with next week as the last chance to go and see the exhibits.

Rad1

The gallery has brought together an array of artists, viagra 60mg designers and architects across different generations to collaborate in the space. The ideas are drawn from environmental activism, generic experimental architecture and utopianism and make for an interesting whirlwind tour of how we can look to live in the changing global climate.
With over 20 artists presenting their work there is plenty to take in and lots to learn, I’ve picked out my top 6 most inspiring installations.

1. Air-Port-City
Tomas Saraceno

rad3

One of the first things you come across, the bubble cell joined up plastic blobs that relate to Tomas’s concept of Air-Port City. He wants it to challenge the political structure and look for people and nations to communicate and join in synergy with a no borders approach. The conjoined cells, and black rope make up an interesting visual and you can instantly relate it to some far off futuristic utopia.

2. Geodesic Dome
Richard Buckminster Fuller

rad6

Taking one of the centre places is the Geodesic dome, pioneered by Richard Fuller over sixty years ago. The revolutionary structure built up of triangular elements is now replicated all over the world. A film, Modelling Universe, where Fuller explains how universal and natural elements can be simplified down to triangles is defiantly worth a watch.

3. The survival Series
Newton and Helen Harrison

rad5

A collaboration in the seventies where the two began to work on projects that would benefit the ecosystem. It culminated in Full Farm, which is restaged at the Barbican. Cleverly constructed raised beds and vegetable plots are used to grow a range of crops. Tomatoes in a gallery are certainly a first for me, although not too sure about the huge watt bulbs powering the photosynthesis.

4. Wheatfield
Agnes Denes

rad4

An inspiring take on environmental art that can’t help to challenge peoples perceptions. Wheatfield – A Confrontation where two acres of wheat were planted in a landfill right next to New York created amazing images. The project was created at Dalston Mill for the Radical Nature exhibition. The fields and towers give an apocalyptic and futuristic feel and the idea of crops bordering towns and cities seem like an attractive idea to me.

5. Fallen Forest
Henrik Hakansson

Rad2

Another installation to challenge perceptions, a 16metre squared piece of rainforest is flipped on its side. The massive lights create an artificial environment that Hakansson aims to point out the unbalanced relationship between man and nature, although I’m not sure if the huge electricity power needed is meant to be part of the analysis.

6. Waste Flow
Mierle Laderman Ukeles

rad10

Involving all of New York’s districts Mierle met every bin man in the area and personally thanked all 8,500 of them. What I found most interesting was the rubbish flow film that came out of the project, which follows the household rubbish through the streets to landfill. The amount of waste and the fact that we all distance ourselves from the process means that it is a fascinating and eye-opening documentary on our waste and throw away culture.

rad7

The exhibition is defiantly worth a visit and with plenty of other intricacies and projects to look at and learn from on the two floors. Urban Harvest Festival will also be taking place next Thursday the 15th where a DIY disco invite people to bring their own music to season the evening alongside a food and end-of-season harvest Swapshop, as well as chefs from Searcy’s cooking up a treat.

Categories ,Air-Port-City, ,architecture, ,barbican, ,climate, ,Dalston Mill, ,environment, ,exhibit, ,Fallen Forset, ,geodesic, ,harvest, ,Henrik Hakansson, ,Richard Buckminster Fuller, ,utopia, ,Waste Flow, ,wheat-field

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Amelia’s Magazine | An interview with Tim Plester, director of Way of the Morris

(Alt) Way of the Morris by Rosemary Cunningham
Way of the Morris by Rosemary Cunningham.

Actor and film director Tim Plester has produced a beautiful documentary film inspired by his childhood antagonism towards the reignited Adderbury village cult of Morris Dancing. Modern footage is interspersed with old recordings as Way of the Morris follows the lives of current Adderbury Village Morris Men: the film is a touching look at the current renaissance of Morris Dancing in modern lives, adiposity put together with wonderful camera work that catches the Morris Men mid motion like brightly costumed village warriors.

WOTM-Tim Plester dressed as a Morris Dancer
Tim Plester dressed as a Morris Dancer.

What inspired you to make this film? Was there one particular thing that finally kick started the idea into action, pills and if so what was it?
There’s a single Polaroid photograph that has haunted me for most of my life. Taken in April 1976, price it shows me (aged just 5-and-a-half years old), stood outside the family home in Oxfordshire, dressed-up as a Morrisman. There’s a corn-dolly pinned to my breast and there are coloured ribbons tied about my knees. The photo shows me looking towards the camera’s lens with a smile stretched across my unblemished face. But looking at that instant image now, the smile I see displayed there betrays itself as something else entirely. For looking at that photograph now, the captured smile is clearly more of a grimace. It’s a simian smile born only of fear. The rictus grin of a scared and hairless ape. The look of someone who’s unable to turn and face his own destiny. I’ve been running away from my Morris dancing roots ever since the day that photograph was first taken.

Morris Dancers by Faye West
Morris Dancers by Faye West.

What finally stopped me in my tracks and forced me to confront my birthright, was the decision I took to travel to Northern France in the summer of 2008. I’d been invited to visit The Somme as a guest of the Adderbury Village Morris Men (a revival side which my Father and Uncle helped found in the self-same year that the Polaroid image of me was taken); there to commemorate the lives of those village dancers who lost their lives in the stinking trenches of World War One. Of the young fresh-faced team that volunteered to fight for King & Country, only one was to ever return home again. Finding out about that Lost Generation of Morrismen provided me with all the kick-start I ever needed.

WOTM-brothers

How long did it take to make, and how did you manage your other career as an actor around it?
I lost 2-and-a-half years of my life making WAY OF THE MORRIS, and had to juggle any acting work around the filming and lengthy post-production period. On-screen, my hair changes colour 2 or 3 times over the course of the documentary’s 64 minute running-time; the result of a couple of roles elsewhere, that had required a significant change of appearance. I can only recall one instance when the documentary and my acting “day-job” came into direct conflict with each other. Luckily, I have a very understanding agent. And luckily the documentary won out.

Morris Dancer by Erica Sharp
Morris Dancer by Erica Sharp.

What inspired the look of the film, which features lots of old photos and videos interspersed with some new imagery that has also been given an old patina? What feeling were you hoping to achieve?
All of the vintage super-8 used in the film was shot by my late grandfather Harold Jeffrey Plester, who I was very close to. As a child, growing up in Adderbury, I spent almost as much time with him and my paternal Grandmother as I did with my own parents. There’s something potent and magical about the flicker-flicker of 8-millimetre footage. It carries with it an in-built nostalgia. A nostalgia underpinned by melancholy. A homesickness if you like. A lament for lost lands. WAY OF THE MORRIS also features contemporary super-8 footage shot by me, my Father and my Uncle James. The idea here was to keep things in the family whilst helping echo and enforce recurring motifs of circles and cycles and death and rebirth. And finally, in a bid to counteract all of that whilst also acknowledging the reckoning of time, there is some digital HD Flip camera footage to be found right at the very tail-end of the film. This being the modern home-movie equivalent of the footage my grandfather shot. If President John Fitzgerald Kennedy were to be assassinated in public today, then I’d like to think he’d be assassinated on a HD Flip camera.

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How easy was it to research everything? Any tales of woe?
The research was the easy part of the process really. Coming from the village, and having known all the major-players my entire life gave me an unquestioned access-all-areas pass. I am extremely grateful to Barry Davis (an old school-friend of my Father’s) for allowing me to trawl though his extensive collection of archival photographs, and also to Bryan Sheppard, the long-standing Fool of the Adderbury Village Morris Men, who kept a meticulous log-book during the team’s fledgling years, and who also (along with his sister), helped unearth all of the information we have regarding that young team that went to war. One poignant aspect of the filmmaking process that I remember clearly, (though not technically a part of the research or a tale of woe) is my initial response to visiting the WW1 memorials in Northern France.

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Way of the Morris by Karla Pérez Manrique.

I was expecting to be moved by those great towering monoliths and the far-too-many names painstakingly carved upon their stone white walls. But what actually grabbed me by the gut, was the gently rolling countryside that surrounds them on all sides. Scalped, sodomized, and maimed beyond all recognition, those farmer’s fields were left in tatters by the 4 years of abject misery rained down upon them (1914-18). And yet today, the topsoil and the wildlife have long since returned, whilst the nearby villages of Pozières and Albert have been rebuilt brick-by-brick. The old landscape was lost beneath the blood and the clay. Only to be reborn anew. Much like the Morris dancing itself.

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Did you find it hard to direct and feature in the film together?
For this I have to give thanks to my co-director Rob Curry of Fifth Column Films. Rob was always on hand whenever I was needed on the flip-side of the camera, and therefore in danger of neglecting any directorial duties. Amongst other things, Rob must also take a lot of the credit for the way in which we ended-up shooting the raw footage of the Adderbury dancers. Rob has long held this belief that The Morris is, in some strange way, a kind of arcane English martial art. For that reason we shot the dancing mainly in close-up, and tried to capture the kinetic energy of what it’s like to be caught-up within the maelstrom of oscillating willow-sticks and flying pocket-hankies, rather than being on the outside simply looking in.

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??What’s the best thing about coming from a small village in England? What do you have that others can only dream of or aspire to?
I left The Shire many years ago, and have lived in North London for longer than I ever lived amidst the wheatfields. But Adderbury is still the place I go to when I daydream. She’s my own private Avalon. A place where landscape and melody entwine. The locally-brewed Hook Norton beer takes some beating that’s for sure. Sweet, full-bodied and devilishly fruity, Old Hooky is a hallowed ale, brewed-up by a benevolent Malt Giant and his 9 steam-powered billow maidens. So God speed the ploughshare and drink of it deep good people. And give thanks to birthplace and to rural brotherhood. If that in any way shape or form answers your question?

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What’s the best way to encourage community, if Morris Dancing is not an option?
In an age of interactive widescreen 3D television screens, Morris dancing is definitely one way of encouraging community spirit whilst helping maintain a strong connection with one’s cultural identity. But there are certainly others. There’s egg-yarping for one. And cheese-rolling for another. Hastings has its Jack-In-The Green sacrifice, whilst Hallaton and Medbourne have their once-yearly Hare Pie scramble and bottle-kicking fixture. And then of course there’s traditional tar-barrel racing, Tutti-kissing and various seasonal Mumming activities to consider.

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How’s the Morris Dancing these days?
It’s enjoying something of a renaissance, truth be told. There are a number of younger teams springing-up around the country, and in Adderbury itself there are currently more people dancing the old ancestral dances than there were during the glory days of the longhaired 1970’s. Dances to make the crops grow tall. Dances to honour the resurrection. For Herne The Hunter and spritely Robin Goodfellow. Dances to hold up the very sky. Or, in the words of the English composer Gustav Holst; Ye who dance not, know not what we are knowing. Here endeth the lesson.

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Tim Plester’s short film ENGLISH LANGUAGE (With English Subtitles) premiered at the 2007 Los Angeles Film Festival, and has gone on to screen at over 45 film festivals worldwide, picking-up 5 awards along the way. The world premiere of Way of the Morris took place at SXSW. You can catch him at the UK premiere of Way of the Morris this Sunday 15th May at 2pm as part of the London International Documentary Festival at the Barbican, where he will also be answering a Q&A. All the details of the Way of the Morris premiere can be found in this listing here.

Watch the trailers here:

Visit the Way of the Morris website for more information on further screenings.
Keep up with the Adderbury Village Morris Men on Facebook.

Way of the Morris by Karla Pérez Manrique
Way of the Morris by Karla Pérez Manrique.

Categories ,Actor, ,Adderbury, ,Adderbury Village Morris Men, ,barbican, ,Bryan Sheppard, ,cheese-rolling, ,community, ,director, ,egg-yarping, ,ENGLISH LANGUAGE [With English Subtitles], ,Erica Sharp, ,Faye West, ,Fifth Column Films, ,film, ,Gustav Holst, ,Hallaton, ,Harold Jeffrey Plester, ,HD Flip, ,Herne The Hunter, ,Hook Norton, ,interview, ,Karla Pérez Manrique, ,London International Documentary Festival, ,Los Angeles Film Festival, ,Medbourne, ,Morris Dancing, ,Morrisman, ,Mumming, ,Old Hooky, ,Oxfordshire, ,Premiere, ,Rob Curry, ,Robin Goodfellow, ,Rosemary Cunningham, ,Super 8, ,sxsw, ,Tim Plester, ,Way of the Morris, ,Wolf Marloh, ,World War One

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Amelia’s Magazine | Earth Listings 29th June – 5th July

In the festival preview vein, no rx malady here’s one that promises stimulating discussion, patient music, viagra order dance, crafts and walks with fellow readers and contributors to the spiritual and ecologically aware Resurgence Magazine. A more enchanting and vibrant mix is barely to be found outside the Resurgence Reader’s Weekend and Camp.

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The camp will be hosted in Europe’s only tented conference centre, Green and Away, situated on an idyllic site near Malvern, Worcestershire. They’ll feed us ‘mostly local, mostly organic’ food, there’ll be wood-burning hot showers to bathe away sleep-shod morning eyes, solar and wind-sourced electricity, and saunas too, as if this camp didn’t sound chilled out enough already.

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Entertainment and conversation stimulation will come from a host of speakers : Jenny Jones, Green party member of the London Assembly; Miriam Kennet, founder of the Green Economics Institute; Satish Kumar, Earth pilgrim and current editor of Resurgence magazine; Peter Lang, an environmental consultant and researcher, John Naish, author of Enough and initiator of The Landfill Prize, Brigit Strawbridge, of the BBC’s ‘It’s Not Easy Being Green’ fame and founder of The Big Green Idea.

There’s to be a glut of creative workshops – on poetry, Deep Ecology, Tai Chi, finding your voice, and one that should see us sitting comfortably for a round of storytelling.

Music’s coming from the UK, Europe and beyond : bands like Dragonsfly, a wonderfully energetic live band, rocking a pretty unique Celtic-Eastern-Folk Fusion sound, and Bardo Muse – an improvisational acoustic trio, who say they play music simply inspired by life and love.

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Do get booking, as previous events have tended to sell out. For a gently spiritual, artistic weekend a little off the the beat of the usual track, have a listen to the Resurgence Weekend.

Contact – Peter Lang,
Events Director for Resurgence Magazine,
Tel: 0208 809 2391
Email: peterlang(at)resurgence.org
As with a lot of art, order what is taken out or omitted is as important, online if not more so, malady than what is put in. Kako Ueda, a Japanese artist working and living in the US, applies this principle to paper with intricately beautiful results. There is something haunting yet delicate about these shadow like cut-outs; the skulls, spiders, jellyfish, butterflies, feathers, insects and serpents all intertwined in designs in which one may gladly lose hours visually disentangling.

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Her choice of medium was inspired by the cut patterns used for producing kimonos, and Ueda’s appreciation for the history, flexibility and simplicity that using paper entails. The everyday throwaway relationship our society has with materials such as paper makes me evermore excited and sympathetic to artists using these seemingly basic mediums for creating innovative and aesthetically wonderful pieces of work. It was a true honour to pick Kako’s brain about her work, as well as her likes, hates and aspirations.

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How long does it take you to create the average sized piece?
It used to take me a couple of months to make one mid-size work but lately my works are getting bigger and more complicated that sometimes it takes 6 months or longer to finish an installation or bigger work with
separate parts with paint and 3-D objects.

What equipment do you use for cutting paper?
It is called in the US, an Xacto knife (with no. 11 blade), I suppose in Europe or Japan they have a similar knife with different names.

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Who is your art for? What space does your art work best?
I don’t limit/choose my audience; anybody who would look at my work and have a reaction positive or negative. So far my artworks need a wall/walls. So they don’t work so well in the outer space.

Do you have a different reaction here in the UK and in Europe compared to in Japan?
Honestly I have no idea. I would love to have a show in the UK, any European countries or Japan to find out. The only European country I exhibited so far was Finland. Although I was born in Japan I moved to the States as a teenager and my active/public artistic life began here in the US.

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Which artists do you most admire?
There are too many to mention and the list gets longer every day. So today and at this moment I say Salomon Trismosin.

Who or what is your nemesis?
My biggest nemesis is my brain; obsesses too much on energy sucking thoughts and is critical of everything.

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If you could time travel back or forward to any era, where would you go?
It is too difficult to choose but at this moment I would say Edo period in Japan (mid. to late 18th century). I want to experience the urban life/culture in Edo (present Tokyo).

Which band past or present would provide the soundtrack to your life?
Jackie Mittoo’s “Summer Breeze” or “Oboe”. I have a CD called “Cambodian Rock”, which is a collection of various rock bands from Cambodia playing and singing in Cambodian; really cool sound.

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If you weren’t an artist, what would you be doing?
Gold digger.

What would your pub quiz specialist subject be?
Tolstoy novels.

Who would your top five dream dinner guests be? Who would do the washing up?
Duchamp, one of the cave dwellers who made those awesome animal drawings, Hildegard of Bingen, Utamaro, Buddha. I guess we cannot ask a cave dweller to wash up, can we?

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What piece of modern technology can you not live without?
My electric mind-reader.

What is your guilty pleasure?
Doing nothing.

Tell us something about Kako Ueda that we didn’t know already.
My eyelashes are naturally curly so I never have to use a lash curler in my entire life.

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Kako Ueda is definitely one to cut out and keep.
It was a peaceful Sunday morning in the City like any other, drug when:

‘Slowly it reared like a ridge of golden rocks… from which the sea fled away in clouds of smoke; and now we saw it was the head of the Leviathan… advancing towards us with all the fury of a spiritual existence.’

So wrote poet and prophet William Blake in his iconoclastic work ‘The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.’ Over two centuries and a plethora of literary Leviathan motifs later, symptoms musician and composer John Harle has unleashed his own re-imagining of the monster from the deep on London’s Square Mile. Taking a leaf out of weighty tomes from The Book of Job to Hobbes, pilule from Milton to Melville, Harle has conceived a work in which the clamour of 800 saxophonists evokes the satanic spirit of chaos itself. Crikey. When I strolled out of Liverpool Street Station at 11:30am and followed the strains of an al fresco band practice I was, admittedly, greeted with a rather benign pyjama-clad presence in monochrome. So much for the demonic display of Old Testament torment, I thought.

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The City of London Festival, an independent arts organisation which is none the less jointly supported by the City of London Corporation and the business community, commissioned Harle to compose an Ode to the City of London. But a straightforward gala tribute this isn’t; Harle boldly intends both homage and criticism, in light of the economic havoc of recent months. Notably, the event is not for profit. His aim in orchestrating a saxophone procession on an unprecedented scale is to ‘purge the City of its crisis of confidence.’ We’re in for a sort of musical exorcism, then? Well, of the humanist variety. Although biblical references to the Walls of Jericho are made in the promotional material, by way of metaphor, you understand. Through the medium of MP3, audio recordings and commentary are available for download on the Sustain! website. Accessibility is all; the score itself was written with a range of musical abilities in mind. Harle’s voice-over informs voluntary participants that through music, they will be ‘taming the forces of chaos by concerted, unanimous effort.’ No mean feat for a Sunday morning, then! But it is no coincidence that the event is scheduled to coincide with the Summer Solstice, and also commemorates the 800th anniversary of the first stone bridge across the Thames. Organisers envisage a renaissance of optimism and inspiration as music pours from the City’s four historic gates on to those same streets which just three months ago were the scene of violent discontent.

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In spite of these lofty sentiments, passers by on their way to potter round Spitalfields might have been forgiven for mistaking the motley crew assembled outside Starbucks for a Morris Dancer outreach group, or perhaps an avant-garde yoga collective- is this really what city workers get up to on their day off? However, those that found themselves in earshot when the clock struck noon could not fail to be arrested by the pandemonium that simultaneously wended its way from Bishopsgate, Aldgate, Moorgate and Ludgate to descend on London Bridge.

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Snaking through the winding historic streets past countless architectural landmarks and disgraced monuments to capitalism, the gleaming white and gold troop cuts quite a dash in the midday sun. Less of a march, more of a meander, but the ungodly din they generate en masse quite literally stops traffic. Bemused bystanders are both attracted and repelled, from an amused rickshaw driver given a rude awakening from his nap to a disgruntled OAP with his fingers defiantly shoved in his ears. Each saxophonist has been instructed to repeat a set phrase ad infinitum, but with rhythmic independence and free reign to improvise on the theme (and take a breather) when they please. Only when all four groups converge on the Monument can the true discord of four different keys played uproariously be heard in all its dissonant glory. An unlikely assortment of soulful characters, hippie types, consummate professionals and Brassed Off-esque blokes rub shoulders in eccentric solos, father and daughter duos, jazzy trios of mates and whole family bands. Never have I seen such an array of instruments going by the name of saxophone- alto, tenor, soprano and baritone of all shapes and sizes, even one spectacular specimen in pillar-box red! On reaching the foot of the Bridge the various strands begin to unite on one key before the pivotal moment of transition, as all fall under the aegis of Harle himself, conducting in a pinstripe blazer atop a makeshift podium. Order and harmony is restored as the collective serenely parades across the water towards Southwark, before settling on a final, triumphant ‘concert C,’ fading to silence.

And relax. Or, alternatively, begin impromptu jam session. These are saxophonists after all. In between riffs I managed to snatch a moment with three minstrels of the Aldgate crew, congregated in the shadow of a towering office block. ‘We had no rehearsal whatsoever, just downloaded the music off the web and turned up,’ said Denver of South London. ‘It’s the first time we’ve ever done anything like this,’ he explains. ‘We usually play gigs at the Vortex or at Effra. This was mad chaos, but it worked!’

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‘He got me into it,’ chimed in band mate Len who travelled up from Brixton to take part. ‘It was tiring- I’m used to playing sitting down or standing up, not on the go! It’s tough.’ When asked about the logistics of playing on the move and in so big a group, Len admitted that despite the fetching pinstripe, ‘I couldn’t even see the conductor! I just had to listen for the change, that was the biggest challenge.’ Fellow Brixton sax player Dave was similarly enthused: ‘I’ve got a day job so I just play when I can, but this was absolutely brilliant. I just heard about it at the last minute- on Front Row on Friday night. I’d definitely do it again.’
‘Never in the rain though!’ Len added before they were lost to another round of spontaneous play.

Amid the swirling, laid back notes I catch the eye of the affable maestro himself who tells me that the event has ‘surpassed all my expectations.’ But generously he insists that its success is ‘all down to the participants- I did the least work of anyone here today. The work took on a life of its own.’ This will be key to the future of the piece, the recording of which will be recycled via the Sustain! website until it is revisited for the Festival’s 50th anniversary in 2012. A momentous year in more ways than one it seems, but surely even London can only cope with one Leviathan at a time?

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C.R.A.S.H. Contingency is a useful urban survival manual that points at the target seriously whilst disguised as a funny game.

What I enjoyed the most about this experience was my complete ignorance of the whole thing. I would feel a little bit guilty if this had been the preview of the performance, treatment but since the show is now over, I will just describe how it went.

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Photos by Marta Puigdemasa

After checking Two Degrees festival’s website, a week-long programme of work by radical and politically engaged artists about climate change, I decided to bet on a theatre play: C.R.A.S.H. Contingency. At the beginning of the play I felt like I did watching the shows of the wild Spanish theatre company La Fura dels Baus (well-known for their opening show in the 1992 Barcelona Olympics) : that is, excited about the unexpected, but this time without the fear of getting naked or soaked to the skin.

We were led in pairs, in complete darkness, to our seats – which were actually placed on the stage. “We are not actors, we’ll need your help, and this is not a theatre play.” And it was not. Defining themselves as an experiment in three acts in which to imagine a post-capitalist future, the performance was run by a mixture of artists, activists and permaculturists (permaculture being the design of sustainable human environments based on the relationships found in natural ecologies) and performed along with the audience. It was something in between resistance and creativity, culture and politics, art and life. We started with a game that made us laugh and forget the fact that we were on a theatre stage.

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The second part was more or less like a workshop. We split into small groups and the supposed actors fed us with little doses of urban self-sufficiency. They taught us how to make a home-made radio station, a vegetable garden and an origami flower; always taking into account some of permaculture’s core values : earth care and people care. When our tasks finished, they gave us another challenge, the final performance. At that point, we used a new old technique for taking group decisions : consensus. They explained to us how to show agreement and disagreement just with the use of our hands, and how to measure the “temperature” of a decision with our arms.

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When we all finally agreed about how and where to make our intervention (all, except a woman who said she was starving and wouldn’t have time for it, and a girl who didn’t understand the purpose of the action), we put on our lifejackets, took our tools (a wheelbarrow for each pair) and started walking towards Bishopsgate. Once there, in the middle of the financial district, we built our own patch of paradise : a shelter made of wheelbarrows, canvas, vegetables, an umbrella, and piles of imagination. We warmed up some water for the tea, ate some lettuce leaves and chilled out for a while. We reclaimed the streets. I felt like a child ringing on a doorbell and running away. But this time we didn’t run. We stood up and waited for the slap or, as was the case, the smile of those that ran into our tiny harmless outside-of-the-law act.

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Unfortunately (for my adrenaline’s childish need), the police didn’t come. But in less than three hours we had learnt many things, too many in fact to explain in six hundred words. It was a condensed degree in Life. It also made me understand that another kind of education, non-academic, humble and free (all the meanings of this word included), was possible. I admit that possibly some of their suggested proposals were just utopian. This may be. But it is far better to live dreaming of utopia than sleeping or wandering aimlessly in a rotten world, isn’t it? Good work, guys.

An ear shattering shriek comes down the line, treat the noise of a passing child’s tantrum. As I tentatively return the phone back to my ear Jan Williams, side effects one half of The Caravan Gallery, illness chirps amusedly “Oooh, Greetings from Portsmouth!” and adds, almost by some way of explanation; “We’re just approaching Asda now.” It may not set a perfect picture postcard scene, but that’s not what The Caravan Gallery are about.

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The Caravan Gallery are Portsmouth based artists Jan Williams and Chris Teasdale. You may already be aware of their work from the postcards they produce. If you’ve ever rifled through a spinning stand of postcards at a tourist attraction and chanced upon a card that portrays the grittier, gaudier and, let’s be honest, more realistic side of Britain then chances are The Caravan Gallery duo are behind it. Their best selling postcard is entitled ‘Bank Holiday Britain’, which brings together familiar images of Britons ‘enjoying’ the British sea side in the pouring rain.

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Although Williams and Teasdale have created 170 postcards in total, these are an offshoot of a much larger artistic endeavour. The pair have been travelling the length and breadth of Britain since 2000, capturing unusual and unexpected scenes of its leisure, landscape and lifestyle. The photographs are displayed at each location for the local community to see. Their rather unique, portable gallery allows them to do this; a mustard-coloured, egg-shaped 1969 caravan that is white walled and wooden floored inside. “We don’t really treat it as a caravan,” Williams tells me during our initial phone conversation, “We just think of it as a gallery that happens to be in a caravan.”

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This little gallery on wheels came along to Spitalfields market on Sunday the 14th of June, as part of a promotion with The White Stuff clothing company. After having chatted with Williams on the phone a few days before, I couldn’t wait to go along and see this unique art space for myself.

Plonked on the side of Spitalfields, the little caravan was a charming sight from the outside, but held plenty more charming sights awaiting within. With over 60,000 photographs in their archive, Williams and Teasdale had plenty to choose from to exhibit on their new tour. In their previously released book ‘Welcome to Britain’ their images were separated into chapters such as ‘Concrete’, ‘Smut’, ‘Conifers (thriving)’ and ‘Conifers (dead)’. “We cover all sorts of stuff.” Williams tells me, “A lot of it’s about the built environment and regeneration, how Britain is and how it’s changing.”

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Whilst many of the images throw light on dilapidated areas or the more tasteless aspects of Britain (shut up shops and naughty gnomes), The Caravan Gallery’s work never feels snobbish or patronising. Good humour shines through with every image.

“I think a lot of what we do is a celebration,” Williams admits “and even though places get tarted up there are quite a lot of little bits that refuse to give up the ghost. We really like this juxtaposition of things, it gives places character.”

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Whilst the caravan has travelled the whole of the UK, from Glasgow to Cornwall, North Shields to the Isle of Wight, one unexpected recent jaunt saw the artists taking their work all the way to Japan for an event with Paul Smith.

“Quite a lot of our photos are to do with language and signs so we weren’t quite sure if it would work. But Paul Smith’s staff said that the people there would love anything colourful, anything rude and anything a bit cheeky.”

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And the reaction? “They absolutely loved it!” Williams laughs. “They were saying how it’s just really refreshing to see how Britain really is, instead of just all the same old clichés of Big Ben and the Queen.”

So with us Britons already aware that a bowler hat is not obligatory day wear, and that cucumber sandwiches are actually quite rubbish, what can The Caravan Gallery’s more accurate portrayal of our nation tell us that we don’t already know?

“I suppose the idea is to provoke people and say ‘There’s all this stuff going on around you, have you noticed? What do you think?’” Williams muses. “We’re not saying it’s good or bad but just; ‘Look at it!’”

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But never mind the intricacies of social commentary and the seriousness of urban reflection; at heart The Caravan Gallery is a great laugh. When confronted by the absurdity of a man mowing the pavement outside his home, or a sign advertising ‘Have your photo with a ferret and certificate – £2.60′, there’s nothing you can do but laugh about this crazy place we call home.

And humour, The Caravan Gallery artists have found, is a brilliant social lubricant; “It ends up as like a little social club on wheels,” Williams says. “If we get invited to some kind of prestigious art event, we get the art loving audience, but then maybe we’ll also get a Big Issue seller and someone walking the dog. Shoppers, tourists and passers-by will come in and take a look. We end up with a whole mixture of people in the caravan who never normally have much to do with each other and they end up talking, which is really good.”

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This is certainly true, as I witness the caravan become filled with Spitalfields shoppers. Soon everyone, strangers and friends, are pointing out the most humorous and shocking pictures to one another and the caravan is filled with laughter. If it’s true that us Brits are a reserved bunch then The Caravan Gallery certainly loosens our collective stiff upper lips!

If you’d like to have your upper lip un-stiffened, go see The Caravan Gallery visit the White Stuff stores of Chichester on the 28th June (that’s this Sunday, folks!) and Battersea on the 11th of July.

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We are giving The Caravan Gallery our stamp of approval.
It was a night of contrasts. A contrast between a halcyon past and the here-and-now. It was also a contrast in the ages of the audience, viagra dosage from the veteran disciples to the new believers. Brought together, pill under some nebulous Mojo Magazine honour, generic on the same bill for probably the first time since the opening night of the long defunct Vortex on Wardour Street in July 1977, the evening opened with the original punk poet, John Cooper Clarke. Looking exactly the same as he did over 30 years ago, with wild Robert Smith-style hair, black, skinny drainpipe jeans and black shades, sardonic Salford drawl still intact, this one time partner in crime with the doomed former model, Fellini starlet and Velvet Underground chanteuse Nico (after she fetched up in the unlikely surroundings of early 80′s Manchester) entertained the crowd with a series of gags that literally creaked with age. He finished his brief set with a rendition of one of his most famous poems, Evidently Chickentown, a quick fire dissection of the grim everyday mundanities of life in a no hope town (which also appeared in the recent Joy Division movie, Control, with John Cooper Clarke bizarrely playing himself).

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The friend I was with had never seen the Fall before. I just told them that it’s never a dull moment. Never a truer word spoken. The Fall are only predictable in their (or rather Mark E Smith’s) unpredictability. Even so, it must have proved a novelty (if an unwelcome one) for Mark E Smith to play second fiddle to someone, regardless of their pedigree. Coming on stage typically late, with yet another band line-up (save for keyboardist and current Mrs Smith, Elena Polou), Mark E Smith launched into his trademark stream of consciousness delivery. Movement hindered by a recent broken hip, Smith nevertheless wandered around (and occasionally off) the stage, switching microphones and fiddling with assorted amps, even nonchalantly borrowing Buzzcocks’ snare drum for some impromptu bashing (much to their roadies’ undoubted annoyance), whilst the rest of the Fall thundered ominously around him. The Fall are uncompromising live, rarely given to such trifling matters as pleasing the audience. Their set lists resolutely stick to whatever their current or forthcoming material may be, rarely playing anything more than even a couple of years old (though that may be as much to do with Smith not remembering the songs as much as artistic integrity). True to form, tonight’s set consisted heavily of new songs and tracks from last year’s rather patchy effort, Imperial Wax Solvent. That said, Wolf Kidult Man and 50 Year Old Man did go down a storm. Unusually, there was a rare display of nostalgia with the inclusion of Psykick Dancehall and Rebellious Jukebox, from the Fall’s first two albums. Smith must have been feeling particularly charitable, as not only did we get an encore, but he actually ambled out to join it!

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As for Buzzcocks, well, what is there left to be said? The band that defined the term “indie” with their self-released debut EP, Spiral Scratch, which set the template for the likes of Factory, Rough Trade and Creation? The band that brought the Sex Pistols to the provinces and, with two shows at Manchester’s Lesser Free Trade Hall, inspired the likes of Messrs Morrissey, Curtis, Sumner, Hook, Wilson et al? The band that toured with Joy Division as support? Well, that was then, what about now? After their initial reformation over a decade ago, Buzzcocks are now a core of Pete Shelley and Steve Diggle, and basically what they gave us (in contrast to the Fall) was a greatest hits package. But who are we to complain, when you have a back catalogue such as theirs? After a sardonic “thanks to the support band” from Diggle, Buzzcocks launched into Boredom, from the aforementioned Spiral Scratch.

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Even after all these years, that two note guitar solo still sounds ludicrously glorious. Shelley may now look like a middle-aged geography teacher and Diggle was in danger of going all Pete Townshend with his guitar, but they can still rock a joint – a fact proved by the amount of moshing going on by a lot of people who were old enough to know better. The set did flag a little in the middle with the lesser known tracks, and the sound quality from the balcony (particularly the quality of the vocals) was a bit ropey, but Buzzcocks ramped it up for the not-quite-encore (due to the Fall’s tardiness, much to Steve Diggle’s obvious annoyance). After a rousing What Do I Get?, we headed inexorably towards that evergreen classic of pop-punk, Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve), which raised the Forum’s roof off. The set climaxed (as it were) with Orgasm Addict, Buzzcocks’s first post-Howard Devoto single, a song that still sounds so cheekily enjoyable.

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And so the sweat (and beer) soaked masses headed out into the Kentish town night, and our ears were left ringing with a little slice of musical history, one that proved so influential and can still be heard in venues like the Old Blue Last, Water Rats, the Macbeth and the Windmill almost every night of every week.
If you are a London resident, more about then head over to the East End this weekend for a fashion show with a difference. First of all, information pills there will be no door bitches or clipboard Nazi’s on hand to block your entry. You will be surrounded by friendly folk; ethical folk in fact. And that is the premise of the festivities, this a collaborative between Eco -Design Fair and Fashion-Conscience.com to highlight up and coming ethical designers in the fields of fashion, accessories, home furnishings, health and beauty, and stationary and cards.

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To mark the occasion, Friday night will see part of the Truman Brewery transformed into the location for the aformentioned fashion show complete with a recyling party. On hard will be design stalls, DJ’s and organic food and drinks. Kicking off at 7pm, there will be free entry for those bringing old mobile phones that they want recycling, otherwise an optional donation will be requested.

With sustainability in fashion being a key message of the event, those attending who are clearly – and cleverly garbed in vintage and charity shop outfits will be in with a change of being picked by the roving fashion spies to go into the draw for the Style Competition with prizes galore promised. Elsewhere, there will be makeovers, discussions and advice on how to “dress ethically for your shape.”

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Illustration by Sachiko

Saturday and Sunday sees the Design Fair on from 10 am – 6 pm in the same location. All the exhibitors will be showcasing their work in stalls around the building. An example of designers at the event include Believe You Can, Childstar Samantha, Hemp Garden, It’s Reclaimed, and Reestore Ltd. Also taking place will be weaving workshops courtesy of Catherine Daniel, who will be demonstrating how to make pouches, trays and boxes out of reclaimed cardboard, greeting cards and juice cartons – or anything else that you choose to bring along! These sessions will be held in the mornings and afternoons and booking is required. Email info@ecodesignfair.co.uk to reserve your place, stating your name and age. A donation of £3.00 is also requested.

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I spoke with the founder of Eco Design Fair, Louise Kamara to find out more about her work. Founded six years ago, when the concept of ethical and sustainable fashion and design was simply not an issue for both the high street shopper and the supplier, Louise had a lot of explaining to do to a bemused audience. Bringing new awareness to the general public was paramount to her. Having been brought up on a co-operative community, where creative workshops would be run, and food was collectively grown and shared, Louise was shocked by what she saw when she became an adult and entered the ‘real’ world. Thus the twice yearly design fair was sprung from the desire to feature and promote those who lived and worked closer to nature and to showcase work that had not sprung from a sweatshop. It also encourages the public to step away from the large brands who are claiming that their products are environmentally friendly to lure us back into their shops. “When somewhere like Primark says that they have an ‘ethical’ range, they are just using a trendy word” Louise tells me, “Whereas the Eco Design Fair is from the heart, for us it is a fundamental concern; and that is the huge difference. ”

So see you there then. Don’t forget to come in your charity shop finest!

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Illustration by Sachiko
If you thought that graduate fashion week had passed and you’d seen it all, viagra think again. In a small studio on Charring Cross Rd this week, viagra stood the works of a small, perhaps lesser known group of graduates…yet another gifted brood to emerge from the fertile loins of Central St.Martins. In something of a bridge between an MA and a BA, students of the the Graduate Fashion Diploma course spend a lightning 9 months or so working on various self directed projects under the tutelage of David Kappo.
Although open to all, the names listed showed a decidedly Pacific contingent, perhaps due to the school’s overseas reputation. And in part to the program’s fees which are democratically the same no matter where you’re from. Sorry EUers, no discounts here. Also notable was the fact that many of these fledgling designers signed onto the course when the ink was barely dry on their BA’s, which accounts for the elevated quality and a few research sketchbooks of biblical proportion. Which brings us to the first stop on our tour…

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Bevan Avery

New Zealander Bevan Avery who took his first swing at womenswear…and hit it right out of the park with a collection “based on antique medical photographs and Victorian deformities recorded in the Mutter Mueseum.” As an art student on the East Coast myself, many an hour was spent drawing in the creepy catacombs of that museum. Fun for the whole family! Back to Bevan… “I wanted to create a dark collection which focused on shaping an unusual silhouette through the shoulder and tilting the hems forward and focused on the black and gold colouring of the stained photographs.” This creator of bloated and beautiful sketchbooks says of previous collections he has “…used Voodoo, East London working men and Mongolian queens and wrestlers as inspiration.” Now THAT I would love to see.

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Nancy Stella-Soto

Next to bat is Nancy Stella-Soto’s brilliantly styled, loose and transparent blushed silk dress over a nude crotched slip. WIth vintage colored cottons (dyed using yesterday’s coffee) 1920′s steamer trunks and Charlie Chaplin canes, this writer would love to be a stowaway on Stella-Sotos’ next voyage.

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Sol Ahn

Seoul born Sol Ahn is on her way to an MA at RCA. Barely taking a breath between degrees this designer has got momentum a plenty. Fantastic textures and a balance of exaggerated proportions this menswear collection, with its DIY bleach splatter jeans and mammoth pompom (it IS a trend, believe it!) sweaters is so very London. Sol Ahn cites skinheads’ obsessive meticulousness about how they dress and the mixed up dressing of Diane Arbus’ mental subjects in ‘Untitled’ as her influences.

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Marian Toledo-Candelaria

Marian Toledo-Candelaria has a modern-day Boudicca in mind when he designs. For his final collection he drew ideas from the Roman Invasion of Britain, focusing on the cultural clash between the invading Romans and the native Celts. Heavy on adornment the dark silk dresses are topped with a snakepit of golden jewels, oversized beads and gold suede. The deep blue of the silks being inspired by the woad plant, “a European plant used for the extraction of a indigo pigment that the Celts used for painting their bodies when summoned to war. ”

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bouza

Bouza displayed an elegant tomato colored mini dress with a draping shoulder. An asymmetry mimicked by a single stone colored legging. Lucky for us there is also a website full of their previous works. But It was the display of dip dyed rubber bands and shocking red hairy wool samples that really got my motor running. Let us know when we can see the manifestation of those terrific textiles!

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Kim Kwang

Beijing born Kim Kwang who is already working alongside Jimmy Choo on his couture shoe collection, presented an amazing felted wool jacket complete with contrast lacing. The fibrous wads of wool formed a mystery of moulding whose shapes were victorian corsetry and medieval armor all at once.

These designers have high expectations, industry experience and another diploma shoved into their back pockets. We’ll be sure to let you know their latest and greatest as they hack their own paths through the fashion jungle.
Monday 29th June
Regina Spektor, remedy Serpentine Sessions, and Hyde Park, London.

I love London summers, blessed as we are with plenty of lush green space. Hyde Park are putting on a good show this year with their gasp-inspiringly good line-up for the Serpentine Session, tonight everyone’s favourite singing devushka; Regina Spektor takes to the stage, having made the transition from anti-folk to a more mainstream pop during her illustrious career, Ms Spektor has managed to keep her vocal intensity and gift for story-telling in tact; her balmy tales of the strange and the familiar in a voice not quite like any other, will be perfect for an evening in the park.

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Tuesday 30th June
M. Ward, Shepherd’s Bush Empire, London.

M. Ward has one of the most heart-breakingly lovely voices I’ve heard in a while, quietly strumming and whispering away in a green and leafy Oregon, entrenched in a rich tradition of simple story- telling and with a predilection for musical simplicity and music of yore; M.Ward is the king of understated brilliance. A must for fans of Smog and other good stuff.

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Wednesday 1st July
Deerhoof, Scala, London.

The first time I heard Deerhoof, I was driving around San Francisco on my 19th Birthday and they seemed like a birthday gift from the gods of music. Their inspired sound is as fun as it is unique, like if Sonic Youth were hyper on lemonade at someone’s 7th birthday party; this is surely a live experience that is not to be missed.

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Thursday 2nd July
The Virgins, Scala, London.

The Virgins have whipped up quite the furore on the other side of the Atlantic, danceable new wave-y good vibes to be had.

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Friday 3rd July
Blur, Hyde Park, London.

Do you remember having to pick between Blur and Oasis at school? I do! I was 11 and I am proud to say I chose Blur every time, then this boy in my class bought me Definitely Maybe on cassette for my birthday- what a schmuck! Blur were the most seminal British band of the 90s from their fun Britpop through to the later dalliances with art-rock circa Thirteen. Expect a heady mix of singles and album tracks, and of course lots of fun. With support from Foals and Crystal Castles among others.

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Saturday 4th July
Internet Forever, Brixton Windmill, London.

I’m a big fan of fantastically- named Internet Forever and their exciting mix of reverb, keyboards and sweet vocals, like falling in love with a robot that was created by My Bloody Valentine and the Gameboy music people. Over-extended metaphors aside, Internet Forever get two big thumbs up from me, and if I had more thumbs they’d get them too! Head down to the Windmill I promise you won’t be disappointed.

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Monday 29th June

The Domestic Carbon Time Bomb

A discussion with Peter Thom, order Kelly Butler, more about Roger Webb and Nigel Rees. Held in conjunction with the Carbon Neutral Company, Energy Efficiency industries are coming together on an invitation from Lord Rupert Redesdale, who is the Vice Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Climate Change Group. They will be presenting information to highlight the need for much stronger policy in order to achieve the government’s Climate Change targets. Carbon from the built environment is responsible for approximately a third of carbon emitted in Britain. A website, G2 Action, will be launched for information.

2-4pm, House of Commons, SW1.
Info: catherine.martin(at)carbonneutral.com

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Tuesday 30th June

Musical Morals and Moral Music – The Artist and the Environment – a public lecture by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies

What can we expect from our artists, and what should we demand of them? The independence of artists from society has become an effectively archaic notion, but what stance can an artist hope to take up on issues such as the environment where there are so many better-informed voices already clamouring to be heard? Why should we care what an artist says, and why should the artists bother? Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, Master of the Queen’s Music, is perfectly situated to consider these questions and will pay particular attention to the environmental issues which lie close to his own heart.

Time: 18:00
Gresham College
Free Event

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Wednesday 1st July

Shappi Khorsandi: ‘A Beginner’s Guide to Acting English’ – Book Launch

In 1976, three-year-old Shappi Khorsandi, her brother Peyvand and their parents left Tehran for London. Without a word of English between them, they found themselves thrust into an incomprehensible culture – all cold weather, strange food and odd customs. If adapting to Britain wasn’t enough, it soon became clear that due to her journalist father’s criticism of the new Iranian regime, the Ayatollah’s henchmen were in pursuit.

Well known to British audiences for her warm and witty stand up, Shappi Khorsandi has now written a book about her experience of growing up in England. She will be talking about her new book and reading extracts. The event will be followed by a book signing and drinks reception.

7pm
The Human Rights Action Centre, 17-25 New Inn Yard, EC2

Thursday 2nd July

Marxism festival

The Marxism festival starts today, with over two hundred events – the opening rally is at the Friends’ Meeting House in Euston, entitled ‘Capitalism Isn’t Changing the World’.

Matthew Fort : Green Talk

Guardian Food writer, Matthew Fort chews over the nature of food and art in this talk at the Barbican, part of their Radical Nature season.

6.30pm, Barbican Art Gallery

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Friday 3rd July

Do the poor have to choose between sustainability & development?

Suzanne Jeffery asks the pressing question of the world’s poor – to conflate buzzwordy terms : how might the credit crunch affect our responses to the climate crisis?

7-8.30pm
Part of the Marxism festival
Royal National Hotel, Bloomsbury
Room: Alexandra B

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Saturday 4th July

Seed Saving

Join an all-day course on seed saving, taught by organic gardeners. In association with Transition Town Hackney.

(£21/£5)
Friday Hill House Learning centre, Chingford E4
Contact: 020 8523 9355/ or 07947 983347
Organisers: Waltham Forest

Sunday 5th July

First Sunday of the month, if you’re not up to speed yet, means Green Sunday at the Arcola theatre. Hop along to Arcola’s eco-cafe and roof garden where you can relax, learn something new, eat some sustainable brownies, meet new people and enjoy some music and film. There will also be a swap shop again, following its huge success at June’s event, so bring along any unwanted clothes, plants, DVDs, CDs and books to swap with others.

Categories ,barbican, ,housing, ,marxism, ,music, ,nature, ,radical

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Amelia’s Magazine | A Review of the Crafternoon Tea Club Christmash Spesh with Etsy 2011

Crafternoon Tea Club Rebecca Strickson
Illustration by Rebecca Strickson

On the evening of 8th December, close to 50 people of all ages came together for something resembling a drop-in DIY craft party – the Crafternoon Tea Club Christmas Spesh with Etsy!

Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Taking place at Etsy’s Bevenden Street headquarters (aka The Trampery, or the Christmas Grotto), it was a chance to mingle, drink, dance and be merry, and learn a thing or two about sustainable gift-giving over the holiday period. Everyone attending was asked to bring along gifts they no longer wanted or needed, including homemade items, which could be repackaged and distributed to those who could make use of or enjoy them. A selection of ready-made gifts were to hand for those less organised, and incredibly, everything was free – I’m not sure it would have been possible to make this a more friendly, accessible event.

Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
At the start of the night, Crafternoon Tea Club co-founder Beccy McCray explained a bit about the concept. Using the wonderful materials laid out on a table at the centre of the room, we were to wrap our gifts up using all the creativity we could muster. Once decorated, our presents would require a tag with a ‘gift story’ to explain where they came from. Then, they were to go under the Christmas tree, ready for re-distribution at the evening’s end.

Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
The centre table was a place of crafty glee, and it was hard not to rifle through the glorious French magazines, colourful yarns and sparkly ribbons available. I spied retro jewellery, secondhand books and delicious preserves in the gifting mix, and was so impressed at the artistic techniques on display, including weaving, collage and some intricate hole-punching.

Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Strangers discussed their approaches to gift-wrapping, the Gaggle DJs played some festive tunes, and the wine and mince pies only added to the happy atmosphere. In a year of so much social and environmental upheaval, this gathering seemed to refute any notion of antisocialism taking its grip, or a consumerist society which ignores its environmental impact. Instead, we discussed just how much landfill space we occupy, why it is that we insist on buying all-new presents each year, and how we might use existing materials to recreate beautiful gifts with a conscience.

Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Crafternoon Tea Club was informally started by Beccy McCray and Hannah Elbourne as a bit of post-break-up art therapy in 2001, and began more officially in 2007. Since then it’s grown rapidly, first in parks and pubs, and now spreading to larger spaces. The Club is run by a collective of close to a dozen craft-lovers who work across different industries. They’ve previously held similar events at venues such as the Barbican and the National Theatre, and this was their fourth this year.

Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Beccy told me, ‘We wanted to get away from having workshops and just have a party: a positive, inclusive event.’ They’ve certainly achieved this and more – a spring event is close on the horizon, and there are murmurs of overseas happenings in Brazil and Japan. Watch this crafty space!

Crafternoon tea club photo Caitlin Sinclair
Crafternoon tea club. All photography by Caitlin Sinclair.

Categories ,barbican, ,Beccy McCray, ,Bevenden Street, ,Christmas, ,Christmas Grotto, ,craft, ,Crafternoon Tea Club, ,etsy, ,gaggle, ,Hannah Elbourne, ,National Theatre, ,Tea Party, ,The Trampery

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