There was some very strong work from Digital Arts and Visual Communication at the UEL graduate exhibition. Naturally I was drawn to the photographers, viagra 40mg illustrators and print makers.
Gosia Kaczmarczyk showed Calavera Lapidarium, this a series of four cast printed photo etchings. Her exhibition played on the idea of the Mexican relationship to death in a modern society obsessed with the impermanence of beauty and youth.
Luke Gray showed two very different bodies of work. His photographs explored the reality of cross dressing in a series of evocative images featuring different male ideals.
Details from Calamity.
Bold black and white print work for his upcoming graphic novel Calamity showed the trials and tribulations of a teenage couple who have survived the apocalypse with only each other for company.
Sarah-Jane Evans is a printmaker and illustrator. Her Pretty Killers featured the deadliest of diseases under the microscope – rendered beautiful as photo etchings in ‘diamond dust’. Sarah-Jane Evans‘s beautiful Untitled series is described as ‘Gray’s Anatomy for Idiots’. Instead of being labelled with the correct medical terms intricately described body parts are layered with relevant puns and sayings. Deceptive and lovely.
Written by Amelia Gregory on Tuesday June 14th, 2011 8:30 am
What do you get if you cross a tubby voodoo stick-waving Indian man with some of the finest soul-tastic sounds of the 70s? The answer is Canada’s answer to Har Mar Superstar. (Whatever happened to him?) It’s about time we met another man of questionable aesthetic qualities, more aboutthis but with enough vim and vigour to carry off his own self-invented sex god status.
We arrived at the Hoxton Bar and Grill, that odd black box of a venue that once boasted a small independent cinema (how I still mourn it’s loss), in time to catch the end of local London band Let’s Wrestle. They had trouble moving anyone even remotely close to the stage except me (never one to be put off by being the sole nutter on the dancefloor), despite the danceable mix of scuzzy guitars and bouncy melodies backed by frenetic drumming.
The geeky bespectacled singer retaliated to the general ennui of the room by pouring himself wine on stage as the seated boys and girls perched self-consciously like wallflowers on the benches.
There was no sign of any imminent life in these Sunday night gig-goers yet… but that was all about to change.
Announced by a three strong all-dancing brass section of men in matching black shirts and brash tooth necklaces, King Khan himself arrived in a swish of white suit and over-sized plastic prawn adornments, waggling his big skull on a stick.
Launching into an enthusiastic pastiche of psychedelic soul he was soon leaping into the ecstatic audience, leaving me laughing amusedly to myself as I snapped him weaving his way through the crowd; which was an odd mix of self-conscious faux-50s gals and flat-cap wearing Hoxton boys.
This I was not expecting! In between tunes the King regaled us with some nonsense about Indian men sticking their feet up vaginas, cackling against tootling trumpets like a maniacal voodoo priest, before once again launching into some side-stepping foot-stompin’ choreographed dance moves against a backdrop of suitably cheesy organ.
The entire set was without doubt a hammy send up of a whole genre of crotch waving lover-man antics but King Khan and The Shrines have somehow managed to attract a trendy crowd who reacted with unashamed abandon to such joie de vivre.
That this concept works is testament not only to the love that King Khan and his merry band have so obviously put into creating their over-the-top show, but also to the tight musicianship that this crew of indeterminate age have clearly learnt over many years on the gigging circuit, evident in all their puff-chested glory.
A highly recommended live show – make sure you catch them next time they are back in town. Thankyou for dragging me along Tom!
Feeling uninspired, approved cold, order and emotionally vacant? Banish those January blues and grasp a hold of some motivation by heading along to a workshop at The Temporary School of Thought. A week of talks, film-screenings, and practical and creative fun starts today. There’s lots on offer but here are a few that took my fancy…
Tree House Training and Building (Wednesday 7th at 3pm and Thursday 8th in Green Park at 3pm).
Finally fulfil that new years resolution circa 1990 and learn to build your own tree house.
Courier Talk: No Fixed Ideas (Tuesday 6th at 6pm)
Thinking of changing your career path? Learn more about the realities of bicycle couriering, you may be tempted to become one yourself.
Bicycle Maintaince (Tuesday 6th at 2pm and Friday 9th at 12pm)
Save money and keep safe by learning to take care of your wheels.
Make sure you’re in the know by attending these discussions on climate change.
Biofuels: Exacerbating Climate Change (Tuesday 6th at 6pm)
Peak Oil/ Economic Collapse (Saturday 10th at 3pm)
This Week at the Alan Cristea Gallery we are looking back. Both 31 and 34 Cork Street will be devoted to presenting the work of artists whom they have represented over the course of the past twelve months. The range of media is vast, viagra sale including sculptures from Rachel Whiteread, cost etchings from Joe Tilson, and computer animations from Michael Craig-Martin. It ends on January the 24th.
Tuesday 6th
Explosure, a new exhibit from Tierney Gearon, begins today at the Phillips de Pury Company on Howick Place, SW1P. The photographic project began with a series of photographs that track family visits to her mother at her home over the last ten years. Persuaded to experiment with double exposure, Gearon says this new form is a diary of her soul. The images are dream-like and surreal, and they can be viewed up to the 27th of January.
Wednesday 7th
There is not much time left to catch Claire Morgan’s installations at the James Hockey & Foyers Galleries in Farnham. Natural organisms and manmade materials are used in these large hanging structures in a creation that is both spectacular and that emulates fragility, bearing the mysterious correlation between death, decay and the persistence of life. This exhibition is free, it ends on January the 10th.
Thursday 8th
The Dolls’ Day is a new exhibition from Alice Anderson at Artprojx Space featuring films, constructions, and drawings. Alice turns her gaze to the mirror to question her own past and identity. “What I try to do with my work is say something about my past. To do that I construct narratives based on memories and objects that awaken certain feelings in me, sentiments that are often violent.” The Dolls’ Day leads to the transformation of the body’s flesh and blood into puppets. It runs until the 31st of this month.
Friday 9th
From today until the 17th of January, Rich and Chris Fairhead are in residence at The Gift Shop with a series of work entitled God’s Sketchbook. They assume the role of fictional creators at the dawn of time, their work thereafter evolving over the ten days and drawing influence from the area around the whitechapel gift shop. We can expect to see elements of local characters, locations, landmarks, and animals, and they intend to involve the
Local community creating images and a sketchbook with a life of its own.
Saturday 10th
One of our favourite Hackney gallery’s opens its doors again this Saturday for the new exhibition Too Much is not Enough. The folks at Transition explore the delirium of fame and fandom along with the darker underbelly of the worn out and depraved celebrity – “Fandom”, writes Jessica Voorsanger, one of the five artists featured in the exhibition, “is one of the purest forms of unrequited love, it is both euphoric and destroying. You love them and they don’t want to be anywhere near you”. We’ve all had fleeting obsessions with stage abiding strummers haven’t we? We’ve all written never-to-be-sent letters of devotion haven’t we? No? Hmph.
