Amelia’s Magazine | Happy Birthday Grow Heathrow

Krystof Strozyna A/W 2011 by Gabriel ‘Gaarte’ Ayala.
Krystof Strozyna A/W 2011 by Gabriel ‘Gaarte’ Ayala.

Krystof Strozyna has been on my radar for what seems like forever in fashion… which in practice means a couple of years – ever since we wrote about him in the print version of Amelia’s Magazine, generic visit this shortly after his graduation from Central Saint Martins in 2007. Which makes it all the more annoying that we don’t receive proper tickets to his shows. I hate e-invites, information pills I really do. I always forget to print them out which usually means I forget to attend the show (I need tickets IN MY HANDS during LFW – there’s just too much to juggle otherwise) and they’re invariably no good for anything better than standing. Basically, viagra they just don’t cut it.

Krystof Strozyna A/W 2011 by Gabriel ‘Gaarte’ Ayala.
Krystof Strozyna A/W 2011 by Gabriel ‘Gaarte’ Ayala.

Luckily my face is so well known around Fashion Scout that I can usually slide into any show with no problem. So it was that I got cajoled in to see Krystof Strozyna‘s A/W collection – well, it didn’t take much to be honest. Apparently Kimberly Walsh was there too, flying the flag for Girls Aloud during a rare break for Nicola Roberts. I can imagine her curves would suit his sexy 80s inspired draped tailoring a little better anyhow.

Krystof Strozyna A/W 2011 by Matilde Sazio
Krystof Strozyna A/W 2011 by Matilde Sazio.

For the most part this collection did not disappoint, featuring tailored black and flesh tones combined with undulating shades of ruched blue chiffon. A little more awkward was a one legged dress – maybe a good idea in practice but somewhat inelegant on the catwalk.

Krystof Strozyna A/W 2011 by Gabriel ‘Gaarte’ Ayala.
Krystof Strozyna A/W 2011 by Gabriel ‘Gaarte’ Ayala.

The winning numbers were undoubtedly Krystof Strozyna‘s gorgeous neon fractal prints, which brought a splash of welcome colour to the ubiquitous Little Black Dress… and a devastating punch delivered by the liberal use of acidic orange. Red may have been the favoured highlight of many an A/W collection but on the strength of this I’m voting for vibrant orange. Yum yum.

Krystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia GregoryKrystof Strozyna A/W 2011. Photography by Amelia Gregory
Krystof Strozyna A/W 2011. All photography by Amelia Gregory.
Grow Heathrow by Rebecca Peacock
Grow Heathrow by Rebecca Peacock.

Just over a year ago a group of my friends envisioned a radical new version of the Transition Town model. Activists drawn from groups such as Plane Stupid and Climate Camp decided to squat a rundown old market garden in the village of Sipson that was being used as a dumping ground for car scrap in an area planned for demolition to make way for the third runway at Heathrow. And thus Grow Heathrow was born, link a great big YES in the face of so many NOs.

We Won! Grow Heathrow by Sam Parr
We Won! Grow Heathrow by Sam Parr.

Over the course of the past year they have utterly transformed the area; growing their own food, stomach hosting bike workshops and ensuring a sustainable community has sprung up that fully involves the locals. What was once an eyesore covered in shattered glass has become an inspiring success story, described by one local as “better than prozac”. In this beautiful short video from You and I Films the misty eyed community get together to reminisce about the past year, describing how what they did was “naughty but extremely worthwhile” and a necessary action to enable the creation of their “own piece of paradise.” As is so often the case, gardening has proved the glue that has brought people together.

Later in March Grow Heathrow will host the Reclaim the Fields European gathering, and then a group of people associated with the project will go on an ambitious 100 day cycle ride to Palestine. P.E.D.A.L. will meet with permaculture projects along the way; sharing ideas and stories for a better world.

Inspiring stuff indeed, but I’ll let this lovely video – made to celebrate Grow Heathrow‘s first birthday – do the talking.

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You can read more about Grow Heathrow in this blog, written just after it was set up in early 2010.

Categories ,Climate Camp, ,community, ,Direct Action, ,Firecatcher, ,gardening, ,Grow Heathrow, ,heathrow, ,P.E.D.A.L., ,Palestine, ,Plane Stupid, ,Rebecca Peacock, ,Reclaim the Fields, ,Sam Parr, ,sipson, ,squatting, ,sustainability, ,Third Runway, ,Transition Heathrow, ,transition towns, ,You and I Films

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Amelia’s Magazine | Kew Bridge Eco-Village

Undercover: Lingerie Exhibition at the Fashion and Textiles Museum

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“Welcome to Limehouse.” With those words, about it Jarvis Cocker set off on the latest instalment of his 30 year musical odyssey, visit this site launching into set opener Pilchard from his new solo album, Further Complications. For such a long, often tortuous journey which began at a Sheffield secondary school and the formation of what was originally known as Arabicus Pulp, the Troxy did seem a rather apt stopping point – a former theatre turned bingo-hall in the deepest End End, where Stepney and Limehouse blur into each other, now restored and reborn as an unlikely concert venue.

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In fact, Cocker did remark, in his own inimitable way, that the place reminded him of an ice-rink from his youth, where he went to “cop off” with someone, and you still half expected to hear calls of “clickety click” and “legs eleven”, even as support band the Horrors were going through their Neu! meets Echo and the Bunnymen infused motorik indie.

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There were a few half-hearted requests from parts of the audience, but tonight was most definitely a Pulp-free zone (the presence of longtime sidekick Steve Mackey on bass was as near as we got). The set leant heavily on Cocker’s sophomore solo effort, which has a rockier, heavier edge to it than its’ predecessor (not surprising given the pedigree of producer Steve Albini). That said, old Jarvis still has the wry wit and subtle smut that made albums like Different Class such stand outs back in the day (witness news songs Leftover and I Never Said I Was Deep), and he still has plenty of those weirdly angular dance moves up his sleeves. As if that weren’t enough, he even dusted off his old junior school recorder skills on the introduction to Caucasian Blues.

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A couple of numbers from Cocker’s debut solo album made an appearance towards the end of the set, including a driving Fat Children, whilst the encore opened with Don’t Let Him Waste Your Time. We ended on the closer from Further Complications, You’re In My eyes (Discosong), where Jarvis appears to channel the spirit of Barry White – there was even a glitterball to dazzle the Troxy’s faded glamour.
As Jarvis took the adulation of the massed faithful, it seemed like, after a bit of a wilderness period post-Pulp, old Mr Cocker has most definitely got his mojo back.

12 June – 27 September 2009

The Fashion and Textiles Museum‘s summer exhibition hopes to present the evolution of underwear over the last hundred years. The result is a lacklustre exhibition with a thrown-together-in-minutes appearance.

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The exhibition is organised into areas covering research, more about innovation, seek materials, order celebrity, marketing, print and colour. Despite the ‘evolution’ title, there isn’t any sense of a chronological representation, apart from a small part of the opening corridor of the exhibition where underwear is displayed by year.

It is here where the most interesting pieces are displayed. Beginning with a Charles Bayer corset from the 1900s, we take an (albeit short) walk through the brief history of underwear. There are great examples from Triumph International – then a pioneering underwear brand, now underwear powerhouse governing brands like Sloggi.

We see a sanfor circular conical stretch bra, reminiscent of Madonna’s iconic bra designed by John Paul Gaultier in the 80s (which the placard reveals, to nobody’s surprise, is where JPG sought his inspiration).

In the main arena, there are corsets hanging from the ceiling, of which there are 8 or 9 examples. The corset, as the information details, is one of fashion’s most iconic items. So how can so few examples tell us anything we didn’t already know? Only one of the artefacts is pre 21st century – most are borrowed from burlesque ‘celebrities’ such as Immodesty Blaze and Dita von Teese – hardly representative of underwear’s evolution.

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The bulk of the exhibition centres around print, pattern and colour, and again the exhibition relies too heavily on modern pieces, with a small scattering of interesting M&S items. This area, again, relies too heavily on modern underwear – usual suspects La Perla and Rigby & Peller extensively featured – but other key brands, such as Agent Provocateur, fail to get even a mention.

Pioneer of modern underwear Calvin Klein isn’t covered nearly enough as he should be, save for a couple of iconic 1990s white boxer shirts. In fact, men’s underwear isn’t given any coverage at all, which is a shame considering this exhibition’s bold title.

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This exhibition does hold some key pieces, and regardless of what I think, it’s definitely worth seeing if you are a fashion follower. Its many flaws could have been ironed out with more attention to detail, and it’s a shame that the FTM isn’t more of a major player in London’s fashion scene. If you want to see stacks of salacious, expensive, modern-day underwear, why not just take a trip to Harrods? They have a larger selection and don’t charge an entry fee!

Dear Readers, symptoms

I am writing to share something a little bit special with you. We all know that warm butterflies-in-the-belly feeling when envelopes arrive through the letterbox with your name and address handwritten carefully on the front with a return address of a friend or lover on the reverse, pilule a beacon of personal correspondence among a mundane plethora of bills, more about takeaway menus and bank statements. How much more sincere is a ‘Thank You’ or a ‘Sorry’, how much more romantic is an ‘I Love You’ or ‘Marry Me’ when it comes in pen to paper form rather than digitalised and, heaven forbid, abbreviated via modern technological means.

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Letter writing may be an old fashioned and somewhat dying art, one that we all claim to still do or intend to do, but actually don’t make time for in a world of convenient instant messaging, free text plans and social network sites, but Jamie Atherton and Jeremy Lin refuse to abandon the old worldly ways of communication just yet.

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Finding their stationery was like being invited to a secret society for letter writers, a prize from the postal Gods to congratulate and reward all those who participate in mail exchanges, to inspire us to keep going to strive on and not let the Royal Mail network collapse from lack of traffic. The more I find out about this creative pair of gents the deeper I fall under their spell. Two handsome young men, madly in love with each other, one English one American, live together in London nowadays but in the 12 years that have passed since they fell head over heels they have lived in San Francisco too and co-created Atherton Lin, the name under which they produce, distribute and sell their products.

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Their work, such as the collections of Winter and Summer greeting cards, is as collectable as it is sendable. Each of the four cards in a set tells a tale; funny, sentimental, melancholic and earnest. They strive to avoid clichés or overused formulaic recipes for ‘commercialised cute’, but instead the boys have created a world of butterflies, badgers, bicycles and balloons, using recycled materials and harm-free inks. It is not just their illustrated correspondence materials that Atherton Lin have become known and adored for, that paved the way to being noticed by and sold alongside Marc Jacobs’ wears and tears, as well as being stocked at places such as London’s ICA, LA’s Ooga Booga and San Francisco’s Little Otsu.

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Working on the basis that not all correspondence is text, stationery therefore does not have to be exclusively on paper. With a nod to their burgeoning passion for mix tapes, which featured heavily through their transatlantic courtship, they created artwork for a series of blank CDs. The pair have collaborated with a number of talented outfits such as the musicians Vetiver and Elks, and for a book of poems published by Fithian Press, in addition to eye wateringly lovely calendars.

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They cite their inspirations to include the charmingly unaware wit of Japanese stationary with its mysteriously nonsensical English translations, Peanuts comic strips, the lyrics to strumming shoe gaze bands such as Ride and poet Dylan Thomas. Having conducted the first three years of their blossoming relationship as long distance partners, they perhaps know better than anyone the value and worth of the handwritten word, the virtues of patience while awaiting the postman and the magnified importance of every tiny detail when letters are sustaining your longing heart.

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Now that I’ve been well and truly bitten by the Atherton Lin bug, I have an overbearing urge to dig out my address book and scribe catch up letters to friends in far-flung corners of the globe, and those just around the corner. And for the scented pastel coloured envelopes about to reach the letterboxes of my acquaintances in the next couple of weeks, you have Jeremy and Jamie to thank, for restoring my faith in the romantic, timeless pastime of writing letters.

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Yours ever so faithfully,

Alice Watson
Last Thursday, order I negotiated my bicycle through the customary crush of Trafalgar Square to the RSA, find for a talk by R Beau Lotto in association with the Barbican Radical Nature series. Beau heads up Lotto Lab, whose aim is to explain and explore how and why we see what we do (do check out their website) – mainly through looking at how we see colour, which is one of the simplest things we do.

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All images by R Beau Lotto, courtesy of Lotto Labs

Here’s a quick science bit, which he gets in at the beginning of the talk to a packed full lecture theatre – light and colour are not the same. Light can be represented on a linear scale. It has just wavelength and intensity. Colour has three bits to it. So it’s much more complicated to describe : hue (red-green-blue-or-yellowness), brightness, and saturation (greyness).

The whole talk is full of questions I asked as a six-year-old, and I’m left with a kind of wide-eyed amazement at how clearly everything is explained and presented – I’ll pick out one of the most satisfying.. Why is the sky blue? This is one to try at home. Get the biggest glass bowl or see-through container you can find, and fill it with water. Shine a desk lamp through it – the lamp’s now the sun and the water space. If we had no atmosphere, the sky would be black with a bright sun – as it is from the moon. Now add a little milk at a time to the water, stirring as you go. As it spreads through the water, the milk will scatter the light like the atmosphere does, and at the right level, will scatter blue. Add a bit more, and you’ll make a sunset – the longer-wave red light scatters when it goes through more atmosphere, as sunlight does when it’s low in the sky. Add more again, and it’ll go grey : you made a cloud, where all the light scatters equally.

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The colour of space changes. We never quite see the surface of anything in the world – we see the result of the light shining, the character of the surface, and the space in between. So colours really are brighter in St Ives than Old Street. So the patterns of light that fall onto the eye are strictly meaningless.

We learn to see. We find relationships between things we look at – the context of anything we look at is essential to how we see it. This is what the ‘illusions’ spread through this article show so bogglingly. And context is what links the present to the past – we associate patterns with what we did last time, and learn from it. Beau asked at one point for a volunteer from the audience. I was desperately far back, in the middle of a row – smooth escape from that one. But the demonstration itself was quietly mind-blowing. A target was projected on the screen, and Rob the lucky volunteer was asked to hit it (this as a control – the exciting bit comes next). Next, he put on a pair of glasses which shifted the world 30 degrees to his right. Throwing again, he missed by miles. After a few goes, though, Rob’s whole body movement changed and he hit the target every time. Then he took the glasses off again, and immediately missed the other way – his mind had learnt for that moment to see the world utterly differently.

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We don’t see the world as it is – in fact it doesn’t make much sense to talk about the world ‘as it really is’ – only what’s useful. Colour, for example, is great for not being eaten by orange tigers in a green jungle. We constantly figure out what is ‘normal’ – and what should stick out from this normal. So… there are no absolutes – only perceptions of a world relative to a changing normal. No one is outside of this relativity. We are all defined by our ecology. We all learn to live in the world that’s presented to us – and that in a very relative way.

Beau has four ‘C’s that he leaves as teasing thoughts – Compassion, Creativity, Choice and Community. And this is where, if you’ve been reading along wondering quite why I thought this was a good idea for an ‘Earth’ article, I started thinking about the way we tell stories about the environment, the way we tell stories about what happens in the world around us. Getting your head around different mindsets could be wonderfully informed by these ideas – things like understanding how to persuade business profit-heads that sustainability is the only way to long-term profit, or grassroots activists that FTSE 500 companies have been organising and managing disparate groups of employees for years – there’s surely something to learn there.

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Knowing that everything we do – down to something so simple as seeing colour – is essentially informed by what we did before, and the kinds of context we’ve ever been exposed to – this can only add possibility to whatever buzzes round our brains : more compassionate, as we see where others might have come from; more creative, questioning these reflexes; more conscious in our choices, if we think a little past the instinctive; and more communal, in a broad sense, as we’re each a unique part of a whole, all sharing in individual perceptions and histories.

That was what I took from it, anyway. Do get in touch, or leave a comment, if you saw any other cool patterns here – I’d be intrigued to hear.

Come July 16th, ampoule Amelia’s Magazine will be packing the bikini’s, sunglasses and factor 15 to rock up to one of the biggest highlights of our social calendar. Continuing our Festival season round up, we are going to focus our attention on the Daddy of the European festivals; Benicassim. Building rapidly in status, this cheeky Spanish live wire began its incarnation in 1995, but even then it was reaching for the stars, with heavy hitters such as The Chemical Brothers, The Jesus and Mary Chain, and The Stone Roses headlining. Now firmly established as a major player on the summer festival season, Benicassim is the ultimate go-to when you want your music fest to go easy on the mud, and heavy on the sand, sea and sun.

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Desde Escenario Verde by Oscar L. Tejeda

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Getting back to the music, the organisers have come up trumps for this years festival. Just in case you were unaware of the lineup, allow me to share the treats that will be in store if you’ve got tickets. Top of the bill will be Oasis, Kings of Leon, Franz Ferdinand and The Killers. It is not just about the headliners though, Beni makes sure that there is something for everyone, and while most acts indie rock , the many stages showcase plenty of other genres, such as electronica, experimental and dance. Each night will see a plethora of fantastic and diverse acts and my personal favourites that will make me nudge through the crowds to the front are Telepathe, Glasvegas, Paul Weller, Tom Tom Club, Friendly Fires, The Psychedelic Furs, Lykke Li and my BFF Peaches. With guaranteed sunshine and a beachside backdrop, it promises to be a memorable event. While the 4 day passes have all sold out, there are still one day passes available for Thursday 16th July. You might consider it impractical to get down there for just one day (not that we are going to stand in your way), but if you happen to be passing through the Costa De Azahar around that time, then why not get yourself a wristband, grab a Sol and pitch up?

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You know, the more we think about it, the more we realise that Benicassim is tailor made for Amelia’s Magazine. As our loyal readers know, we are strong supporters of all things sustainable and environmentally friendly and Benicassim is leaps and bounds ahead of many of the other festivals in terms of environmental awareness. Having been awarded the Limpio Y Verde (Clean + Green) Award by The European Festival Association, Beni is serious about taking initiatives which minimise the impact that a festival causes. For example, to offset the Co2 emissions that are generated while the festival is underway, they are creating an authentic Fiber forest, which has come as a result of planting over 2,000 trees during the 2008, 2009 and 2010 festivals. For those attending the festival, the organisers have laid on a number of shared transport facilities to get to and from the site, including frequent shuttle services into town and bicycle hire. Once inside the site, ticket holders will find that there is a strong and active recycling policy, with different bins for glass, plastic and paper and reusable glasses in the bars and restaurants which are made from biodegradable material. Several charities and NGO’s will be on hand – look out for the stands where Greenpeace, Amnesty International, Action Against Hunger and Citizens Association Against AIDS amongst others will be distributing information.

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Bear in mind for future visits to the festival (or if you haven’t yet booked flights to get there), that there are various options for how to get to Benicassim that don’t involve flying. While most people will be boarding planes, the options of rail, or even ferry as transport can turn the holiday into a completely different experience. Spain has a fantastic and well regulated rail system, with all major cities such as Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia operating trains to the town of Benicassim. Full details on how to arrange your rail itinerary are here . If you were interested in beginning the journey by ferry, (information on routes can be found here there are regular services from Plymouth to Santander, or Portsmouth to Bilbao (both cities have rail links that will get you to Benicassim). Otherwise, there are plenty of ferries from Dover to France, if interrailing it through part of Europe was also a consideration. Obviously, these options are considerably longer than flying, but there is something much more civilized about this way of travelling, and you get to see much more of the country which is hosting the festival, and that can only be a good thing.

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Fibers En Zonas De Acampada by Pau Bellido

For more information on Benicassim, go to Festival Internacional De Benicassim
Bless-ed: Superimposing The Thought Of Happiness

Cosa
7 Ledbury Mews North
London W11 2AF

10th July – 31st July

11am – 6pm Tuesday – Friday
12pm – 4pm Saturday

Free

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“Artworks created from smashed vinyl records and recycled packaging. Hot on the heels of their highly successful New York show, no rx Robi Walters & Leanne Wright, side effects aka ‘Bless-ed’, dosage hit London with their unique series of collages and constructed works featuring smashed vinyl and recycled packaging. “

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Robots

The Old Sweet Shop
11 Brookwood Road
London SW18 5BL

10th July 2009 – 25th July

Monday to Saturday 9.30am – 5.30pm
or by appointment

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Image: Doggy Robot (Detail) by Ellie Alexandri

“Do you remember when robots were a futuristic fantasy? The Old Sweet Shop gallery’s latest exhibition takes a warm hearted look at these retro-tinged creations through the eyes of up-and coming artists and illustrators, peeking into the inner world of clunking creatures built to make human lives easier. ‘Robots’ will appeal to all ages, and features a diverse range of talent in many different media.”

Robots exhibition featuring work by: Alec Strang, Emily Evans, Freya Harrison, Moon Keum, Vinish Shah, JMG, Catherine Rudie, Hanne Berkaak, Cristian Ortiz, Elli Alexandri and Serge Jupin.

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Antony Gormley: One & Other

Fourth Plinth
Trafalgar Square
London

6th July – 14th October

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Trafalgar Square’s Fourth Plinth, ordinarily reserved for statues of the bold and brave, is staging one of the most exciting art ventures of the year. Under the direction of Anthony Gormley a steady stream of voluntary contributors will, every hour on the hour for the next 100 days, be occupying the space to create, make, do or perform as they wish. One such selected applicant is Tina Louise, whose slot will be Sunday 12th July, at 11am. She plans to stage “involves a bit of a sing-along where I am inviting various choirs, a Muslim call to prayer man, some whirling Dervishes (fingers crossed)” and invites you all to get down there this week and help celebrate human diversity in all it’s glory.

Find out more about Tina here.

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The Museum of Souvenirs – The Surrealist Photography of Marcel Mariën

Diemar/Noble Photography
66/67 Wells Street
London W1T 3PY

Until 25th July

Tuesday to Saturday 11am – 6pm

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An exciting UK premiere of Belgian Surrealist Marcel Marien’s photographs taken between 1983 and 1990. Marien was a master of many trades, and not all of them art based; as well as being a poet, essayist and filmmaker, he branched out as a publisher, bookseller, journalist and even a sailor.

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The Importance of Beauty – The Art of Ina Rosing

GV Art
49 Chiltern Street
Marylebone
London W1U 6LY

Until 25th July

Tuesday to Friday 11am to 7pm
Saturday 11 am to 4 pm
or by appointment

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Inspired by her interest in inner silence and beauty, Ina Rosing’s work sails through immovable mountains and vibrant red flowers with dignified grace and spirituality. She explores the personal yet universal connections with landscape and culture, asking where and how can we capture the true importance of beauty using graffiti-like political and environmental messages.

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James Unsworth: I Love You Like a Murderer Loves Their Victims

Sartorial Contemporary Art
26 Argyle Square
London WC1H 8AP

8th July – 30th July

Tuesday – Friday 12:30pm – 6pm
or by appointment

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James Unsworth is not a new name for us here at Amelia’s Magazine, having featured him a short while ago in Issue 8 of our publication, but this new collection of work from the controversial outspoken illustrator and filmmaker takes his hyper-unreal visions of all things dark and disturbing to a new level. The movies and photographs use low-budget charm and dangerously close to the bone references to murder, sex and dismemberment to win us over, free our minds and freak us out, not particularly in that order.

Monday 6th July
Why? The Garage, buy London

“Why should I go and see Why?” you ask.
Well, cialis 40mg because Why? are probably one of the most innovative exciting bands around at the moment their albums Alopecia and Elephant Eyelash are very high up on my “Most-Listened-To List”. Fronted by the excellently named Yoni Wolf, Why? fuse hip hop and indie rock to create something totally unique. Wolf’s lyrics are strangely intimate and often funny; bar mitzvahs and Puerto Rican porno occassionally pop up- and why not?

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Tuesday 7th July
!!!, The Luminaire, London

Here are two facts about !!!
1. You have probably had the best time dancing to them.
2. According to Wikipedia: !!! is pronounced by repeating thrice any monosyllabic sound. Chk Chk Chk is the most common pronunciation, but they could just as easily be called Pow Pow Pow, Bam Bam Bam, Uh Uh Uh, etc.
So go along to the Luminaire and make strange noises (“thrice”) and dance your socks off.

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Wednesday 8th July
White Denim, Heaven, London

White Denim are the best thing to come out of Texas since ribs and good accents, they have been compared to Os Mutantes and Can which is no mean feat. Expect a healthy dose of psychadelia with a smudge of grubby rock n’roll

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Thursday 9th July
The Twilight Sad, We Were Promised Jetpacks, Kill It Kid, The ICA, London.

What are Fat Cat doing on Thursday?
Oh, you know, just being as awesome as ever at the ICA.
Fat Cat seem to have excellent taste in music, and the three bands playing tonight carry on the high standards of Fat Cat label veterans like Animal Collective. Expect melancholy and sweetness from The Twilight Sad and post-punk from the others. Lashings of fun all round.

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The Weekend
Loop Festival, Brighton.

Let’s go to the sea! Brighton’s Loop Festival; a celebration of music and digital art has the most mouth-watering line-up ever. Fever Ray, Karin from The Knife‘s solo project, play alongside múm, the hot-to-trot Telepathe (pictured) and Tuung to name but a few. If I were going I’d invite them all to make sandcastles with me afterwards…hopefully they would.

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Monday 6 July

Whose landscape is it anyway?

Nicholas Stern and Ramachandra Guha consider the tensions between environmental concerns and industrial and economic development in South Asia today.

£5 including day pass to Royal Botanic Gardens, mind Kew.
6.30pm, cost British Museum, Great Russell Street, WC1.

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Illustration by Joanna Cheung

Tuesday 7th July

Garbage Warrior Film Screening

The epic story of radical Earthship eco architect Michael Reynolds, and his fight to build off-the-grid self-sufficient communities.

7pm (86min), Passing clouds, Dalston (review + directions)

An Alternative Energy Evening?·

Lecture and Panel Discussion?· Professor Vernon Gibson, with Jonathan Leake, ??Chief Chemist of BP, in discussion with key experts in the field of sustainable and renewable energy.
Please join us to hear the latest on this hot topic.

Free to attend. Admission is by guest list only.
??Email events@weizmann.org.uk to reserve your place.
+44 (0)20 7424 6863?  www.weizmann.org.uk

7pm
Royal Geographical Society
1 Kensington Gore
London SW7 2AR

Wednesday 8th July

Renewable Energy, All Party Parliamentary Climate Change Group meeting with WWF

Dr Keith Allott leads the discussion.

4-6pm, House of Commons, Westminster SW1

Thursday 9th July

Conflicting Environmental Goods and the Future of the Countryside

Caroline Lucas MEP talking on possible futures.

Contact – judithr@cpre.org.uk
5-7pm, The Gallery, 77 Cowcross Street, EC1

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Illustration by Faye Katirai

A Climate Mission for Europe: Leadership & Opportunity

Lord Browne, Roger Carr, Lord Giddens, John Gummer MP and Roland Rudd

8–9.30am
Royal Academy of Engineering,
3 Carlton House Terrace, SW1Y

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Illustration by Michaela

Wise Women Speaker Event: John D Liu

John D Liu speaks on integrated poverty eradication and large-scale ecosystem rehabilitation. Since the mid-1990′s he has concentrated on ecological film making and has written, produced and directed films on many aspects of the ecology. In 2003, Liu wrote, produced and directed “Jane Goodall – China Diary” for National Geographic. Hailed as a visionary for the future, Lui is director of the Environmental Education Media Project (EEMP) and will discuss his groundbreaking work.

RSVP: polly@wisewomen.me.uk

7pm, ?£10 on the door
The Hub,Islington,
Candid Arts Trust,
5 Torrens Street, London,
EC1V 1NQ

Friday 10th July

The End of the Line

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Imagine an ocean without fish. Imagine your meals without seafood. Imagine the global consequences. This is the future if we do not stop, think and act. The End of the Line is the first major feature documentary film revealing the impact of overfishing on our oceans. This screening will be followed by a Q&A with director Rupert Murray.

7pm, Frontline Club, 13 Norfolk Place, W2.
Contact – events@frontlineclub.com

Saturday 11th July

The Artic And Us

Lemn Sissay discusses the making of the poem “What If”, inspired by his recent trip to the Arctic to highlight climate change.

£7, 3.30pm, South Bank Centre

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Illustration by Lea Jaffey
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This year I spent a record six days at Glastonbury. On Tuesday we set off from London with a mission to “tat” along the way. Tatting is a favourite occupation of the fictional Wombles and is a process central to Climate Camp – it basically means relieving skips and front gardens of useful discarded objects – such as sofas, pilule chairs, tables and carpeting – for reuse in another situation. En route to Glastonbury we managed to fill the van up with various items including a full set of dining chairs that looked swanky but collapsed as soon as we sat on them and a rather manky looking mouldy mattress. It was pointed out that this would seem the lap of luxury after a couple of days in a field with no soft surfaces to rest upon, so we duly lugged it into the van. In fact we needn’t have worried – the mattress was left out to air as soon as we arrived and stolen almost immediately. Desirable already!

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Our journey had an added frisson of excitement given the rumour that everyone was being locked out of the site at 10pm every night. Fortunately (and thanks to GPS on my poncey new iphone) we made it to Pilton Farm on time, whereupon we were greeted by the cheery sight of our big red and yellow marquee. It seems that making merry in the fields of Somerset has turned into a week long affair for many, so vast quantities of people were already cruising the fields, beers in hand.

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For us there was still much work to be done, so in the morning we dressed our area with significant amounts of bunting and colourful flags that we had screenprinted beforehand, all bearing Mia Marie Overgaard‘s beautiful artwork.

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Climate Camp was given a generous corner of an otherwise predominantly camping field – with a big fire pit in the middle and a yurt (housing Ecolab‘s Future Scenarios exhibition) demarcating one corner. Around the yurt I strung the story of Climate Rush so far – printed upon weather resistant banners that billowed dramatically in the gusty winds.

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By the field boundary a “tripod stage” had been constructed – an inspired bit of naming that made reference to the grand pyramid stage down where the rabble doth hang about.

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As we beavered away to beautify the site some classic festival munters pitched up and decided to erect their box fresh tents directly under our Welcome to Climate Camp banner – thereby easily misleading the public in to believing that they were indeed Climate Camp. Within minutes they were yelling “Ogee-ogee-oy” at each other through a megaphone. I kid you not. They were the perfect festival munter cliche right on our doorstep. Needless to say these same creatures left an absolute disaster zone in their wake when they left the festival – but more on that later…

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Many more Climate Camp kindred spirits arrived as we sorted out our space, and by Thursday many curious festival-goers were stopping by to listen to a bit of music or take a wander around our exhibition. Danny Chivers delivered his usual wonderful poetry to a rapt audience and Billy Bragg’s Jail Guitar Doors (set up in honour of Joe Strummer and named after a Clash song) took a turn on the stage.

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Billy Bragg’s Jail Guitar Doors provides guitars with which to rehabilitate prisoners through music, and the two lads playing for us had since left prison and are trying to build a career in music. After a shy start they were soon regaling the receptive crowd with tales of prison life and left amidst promises that they would return, possibly with the real Billy Bragg in tow – a rumour that quickly gained momentum but was sadly never fulfilled.

Then out of nowhere came possibly our most exciting idea yet; instead of just teaching how to take direct action in workshop form, we would actually do some mock actions right there in Glastonbury. It all seemed too good an opportunity to miss – this year Greenpeace had created a full-on third runway experience, including a miniature Sipson with it’s own international airport which was clearly ripe for the blockading.

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We all donned one of the Climate Camp t-shirts that I’d printed up (I’ve been on a bit of a screenprinting frenzy) and marched noisily down to the Greenpeace field with our tripod and an orangutan in tow. As you do.

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Twenty people blockaded the entrance to the bemusement of passersby, as faux security guards tried to pull them off and the orangutan climbed triumphantly to the top of the tripod. It was a pretty good re-enactment of a real direct action, until actors hired by Greenpeace waded in and stole our thunder with some attention grabbing shouting.

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On Thursday night there was the most spectacular storm, with torrential rain pouring down off our Climate Change is Pants bunting (made from, erm, pants, of course) and into the tent as we sheltered from the monsoon. It stopped just in time for our Mass Night Game, for which I played the part of a security guard (they’re never far away on a direct action)

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As each team arrived at our base in the stone circle they had to climb the tripod as fast as they could before the guards could pull them off. In one surreal moment as the dusk fell some real Glastonbury stewards materialised in pink dayglo waistcoats to my yellow dayglo one, and really confused both themselves and those playing the game.

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As evening fell a group of us went off to discover the new Shangri-La area, where a gaggle of totally drunk pre-pubescent girls fell into us yelling “Michael Jackson’s dead!” Soon the whole festival was ringing with the news – as well as his back catalogue – though we all remained uncertain about the veracity of the rumours and decided to spread a counter rumour that Timmy Mallett was dead. Looking back it was odd that noone seemed particularly sad to hear the news, but then I think most of us have already mourned the cute little black boy who vanished under drastic surgery long ago. It was almost as if Michael Jackson had been one big fat joke for so long that his death was as fantastical and unreal as his life had become, and therefore hard to take seriously.

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The rest of the festival was spent in a whirlwind of outreach and fundraising. I wasn’t so comfortable with the bucket rattling, but luckily others were brilliant at it and we managed to raise loads of much needed cash to help put Climate Camp on this year.

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I spent most of my time chatting to people, both in our field and out around the Green Fields area. And of course taking lots of photos – because that’s where I feel most comfortable of all, recording everything that we do for future posterity.

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We facilitated another few mini direct actions – one day in defiance of the cheap flights on offer in the mock travel agents in Shangri-La, and on another using arm tubes to blockade the mini village of Sipson.

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Friends wandered by to see me but I didn’t really go further than the Green Fields for much of the festival. I have a love hate relationship with Glastonbury and tend to be happiest away from the seething crowds down near the main stages. There were a lot more police on site this year and there were at least two arrests in our field, presumably for drug dealing – thus we found ourselves offering solidarity to the friends that were left behind “we get arrested quite a lot you see…” We got the paddling pool out when it was especially roasting, and I jumped in with all my clothes on before rushing onto the path to offer wet hugs to passersby.

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On my rare trips down to “Babylon” I got in a mild panic – huge crowds of fucked people crashing into me is not my idea of fun. Bruce Springsteen was a major disappointment and I only saw brief bits of Blur from the very back of the field before wandering off to find a friend at the Prodigy, where I got thoroughly freaked out by the gazillions of men and women screaming “smack my bitch up” at the top of their voices, I mean – I like the tune, but there are some totally suspect lyrics going on there. Over by the John Peel stage I was amused to see a huge (high as a skyscraper) board of protest banners bearing one of the Climate Rush picnic blankets from our Heathrow protest.

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It was very surreal to see it high above me, when last it was sitting in a crumpled mess in my hallway. On more than a few occasions we found ourselves at the uber decadent Arcadia area of an evening.

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It was the ultimate irony that the closest stage to Climate Camp featured hugely wasteful gas flares that shot into the night and made a mockery of our frugal ways; any energy savings made by our solar powered camp so obviously swallowed in the dystopian heat of the dramatic flames. Needless to say we were drawn to Arcadia like fossil fuel moths, dancing under the sizzling spectacle with all the other revellers, all part of the same species careering towards self-destruction.

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But back to the beautiful green space of Climate Camp, where our little tripod stage proved to be a real winner. My trusty music editor Roisin had contacted some music prs a mere day or so before I left for Glastonbury and secured performances from the wondrous First Aid Kit and the equally brilliant 6 Day Riot. First Aid Kit arrived fresh from a gig on the Park Stage with their parents in tow, and wowed everyone with a simple acoustic set that highlighted their delicate use of harmonies.

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Unfortunately I missed 6 Day Riot due to outreach with our “aggie animals” whereby a homeless alcoholic orangutan, polar bear and tiger went out to engage with the general public.

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The idea was to subvert the traditional cutesy perception of said animals, a plan which worked really well during the day, but in the evening faltered as the distinction between performance art and actual fucked festival munter blurred to the point of impossibility. Especially when one of our animals spewed into the bushes in a prize bit of method acting (she’d just downed a pint of homebrewed cider)

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On Sunday afternoon we held a random raffle, which was made possible by blagging prizes from various stalls and performers during the course of the festival. A large amount of people were happy to part with cash to purchase a raffle ticket, and a small crowd was persuaded to attend the actual event, compered with aplomb by our resident poet Danny. Prizes included the beer can that Jack Penate had allegedly drunk from (won by a child, woops)

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It was all beautifully ramshackle but seemed to entertain. The girl who has inadvertently become part of this year’s logo (by virtue of an image of her at the Kingsnorth camp that is strewn across the interweb) stopped by and did some dazzling acrobatics on our tripod stage.

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By the evening I still hadn’t managed to figure a way to get out of the festival so I ended up staying on until Monday evening for “tat down” – taking down the tents and sorting stuff to be transported back home. The mattress that we had lovingly cleaned made a sudden return, and small children started to circle our site like hyenas on the look out for valuable abandoned belongings, and undrunk alcohol (festie children eh?! Cheeky buggers!)

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Stories reached us of people leaving their tent for one moment and returning to find it removed within moments by opportunistic “tatters”. I went on a roam of our general area to search for useful stuff, but returned feeling sick to the pit of my stomach and unable to take anything for myself.

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Is it really that much hassle to take your pop-up tent home? What kind of person abandons so many reusable things? Do you really have that much disposable income in the age of the credit crunch? The festival munters camped under our welcome banner departed leaving a wasteland behind. Piles of rubbish streaming across the ground, a stereo, blow up mattresses, perfectly good tents (not pop-up!) – debris of an unaware society.

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I returned home exhausted, but already formulating plans to put forward Green Kite Midnight as the Climate Camp house band next year – a celidh would really have set things off a treat. Until then there’s always the Big Green Gathering, where we’re house band for the Last Chance Saloon. Come see us there!
At Glastonbury when not navigating through guy ropes clutching half drunk bottles of cider with dirty shorts, order haystack hair and generally looking like I’ve emerged from the mountains, medicine I like to ‘do’ things. Last year, store I paid eight pounds to have an astrology reading, where I crouched goggle-eyed in a small tipi opposite a warm, smiling, apple-cheeked evil money-sucker who ethereally told me the biggest pack of lies you’ve ever heard.

Eight pounds! Not going back there, NO WAY JOSÉ! Given the size of Glastonbury, there are, of course, a multitude of ways to enjoy yourself in the most concrete and non-superstitious of manners – in fact, in the spirit of ‘Reclaiming Craft’ making something with my hands seemed the perfect antidote. On the Thursday Amelia’s Magazine floated on over to the Green Craft Fields where we found ourselves in a tent filled with lots of small drawing children. On the other side were some adults milling around a life model like no other. Life-drawing: a sensual sketching of the nude human physique? Less so if it’s an unshaven superhero clad in a spandex bodysuit and purple pants – and that’s Mr Spandex to you and I. So I got involved, producing a multi-angled ‘sketch-book’ of questionable quality that sadly got ruined when my tent turned out not to be waterproof, but while it’s destruction is in fact probably a blessing for the art world, I appreciate that such a catastrophe may have accidentally granted my artistic skills with an unearned aura of mystique.

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Chatting to the mistress of ceremonies Leanne afterwards, she told me a bit about R-ART, their creative collective based in East London. They are fusing ideas of art and fashion in an interactive and educational capacity, providing holiday workshops, after-school clubs and Saturday schools; all with a push towards sustainable making, free-thinking and responsibility that’s locking horns with that image of the pie-eyed child with a peanut-butter sandwich in one hand and a Nintendo controller in the other on a sunny Saturday afternoon.

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Set up by Leanne and her friend Ita and developed with eco-entertainment company BASH Creations, they naturally play the big sister role to the kids, with a sole mandate to lighten the ecological footprint of the British entertainment industry and to teach them the heart behind the making of things with your own two hands. Given my own scribbling skills, I too belong at the children’s table, a bit like Jack out of that Robin Williams film (except not really, I do get ID’d a lot, so I don’t look that old. But I digress.)

One of their projects involved working with Nova Dando, constructing a couture gown out of old copies of the Financial Times, which again, in its trashionista spirit hammered home the process of recycling making and getting everyone involved – children doing couture! Great stuff.

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To get in touch and to find out their workshops and other upcoming projects, visit their website at www.r-art.co.uk, or e-mail Ita and Leanne at us2@r-art.co.uk. Look out for a report on how it all went down at Glastonbury for them too – if you too managed to swing by their tent let us here at Amelia’s Magazine know about it!
Futuresonic is one of the most stellar event’s on Manchester’s musical calender. Not only does it symbolise (to me) the beginning of the summer festival season but it’s one of the most musically challenging and varied events of the year. Unlike so many other festivals it doesn’t concentrate on the commercial or press friendly artists but solely musicians and artists alike who constantly flaut convention, view breaking boundaries and sticking flags in musical territories previously unchartered. Rarther than touting the Guardian‘s Top ten of 2009 it digs a little deeper and promotes some of the more interesting artists from around the globe in a myriad of genres like Electronic, drugs Metal and Bastard Pop!

After 13 years of pushing the envelope the organisers have managed to do it again this year. Beginning with Murcof, information pills they have shown that music can be ever changing and that when seamlessley combined with other mediums of artistic endeavor can create something truly original and mind expanding.

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First on the RNCM main stage is Manchester based (Skelmersdale born) Denis Jones with his bone shaking ryhthm’s and dirge infused shouts and beats looped back through a whole host of pedals and electronic gadgetry. Projected behind this is a sextuplet of Denis’s, or should that be Den-i, layered on toip on one another to compliment the layering of clucks, slaps, plucks and claps. Having seen a few artists these days who do a similar thing it’s great to see someone do it so intricately and beautifully on a large stage to a strong audience. It can be rather sloppy and the point can be lost in the masses of equipment that I don’t know the first thing about. As he meanders his way into a vibrant crescendo it’s easy to see why Denis is being hyped as a musical giant of the future.

To contrast with this high octane solo operation comes Icelandic composer Johan Johansson with the Iskra Quartet, who create sombre laptop and piano accompanied string pieces that I feel comfortable in equating to classical Estonian Raconteur Arvo Part. These pieces are complex but the delicate sounds are all somewhat identifiable to a techno dope like myself. The sounds are highly mellifluous and they toggle between Melancholy and high drama evoking the counterpoint of Moondog at times. With a break before Murcof I had an opportunity to reflect on the beauty of the moment which led me almost to tears, the air was rife with emotion but anxiety of what was to come soon remedied this.

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As the curtain re-opened, behind a sheet of white, is lurking who we can only assume to be Mexican electronic music pioneer Murcof. We know Anti VJ (comprised of Joanie Le Mercier, Simon Geilfus and Nicolas Boritch) must be hiding somewhere but as there is only one other face in the shadows we can’t be sure who it is. As a faint hum begins, a tiny spec of light appears in the centre of the sheet which grows as the music explodes into loud bursts. The dot becomes a sprawling mass of spider webs and creates a haunted house like atmosphere that’s not for the faint hearted. From this we travel through a myriad of imagery such as a multifarious star system and regimentally swirling, shooting stars accompanied by Lygeti-esque composition. The imagery at all times compliments the minmal soundscaping of Murcof fantastically but neither is at any point subdued. For me there couldn’t have been a better way to kick off the 13th Futuresonic and the festival season as a whole.

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All photos by Anne-Laure Franchette
From previous years, viagra this looks set to be the one summer gathering any activist or aspiring campaigner needs to attend. A report of last year’s camp speaks warmly of the ‘lasting sense of genuine kindred spirit and camaraderie’, viagra 100mg between old hands and newcomers alike.

If the Resurgence Reader’s Weekend will provide a few days of quiet reflection, the Earth First! Summer Gathering promises an inspirational week of skill sharing and planning for direct action.

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Illustrations by Adam Bletchley

Earth First! is all about networking and building strength through community and communication. Direct action is what they do – not relying on government or industry to act sufficiently, this network without leaders takes action to them. And whether your campaign takes up the issue of opencast mining, genetic engineering, agrofuels, dam-building, hunt-sabbing, general climate actions, oil pipeline resistance, road stopping, anti-whaling, squatting, or rainforest protection, you’re sure to find something to learn here.

The gathering will be communally run, non-hierarchical, in true anarchist tradition. So far, there are over eighty workshops planned – but everyone coming along will contribute and help run the camp. Get in touch in advance if you’ve an idea for a workshop, or want to help with the setup or takedown of the site.

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Too many workshops on practical skills for direct action are already planned to list here – though to whet your appetite, they include tree climbing, activist medic first aid, and a full day of water based training. This should help to build on the several campaigns already taking to the water – at Rossport against Shell’s pipeline laying, and the Great Rebel Raft Regatta of last summer’s Climate Camp.

There will also be the chance to brush up your practical ‘sustainable’ living skills – grounding that ever-slippery term in real things : field trips, learning to recognise plants and animals, wild food, getting your own power from the sun and wind, squatting and bike maintenance. And vegan cake making, which for me is quite the cherry on top.

Have a collective think, too, about ecology, ecocentric ethics and alternatives to the corporate world of exploitation. Which should come neatly round to an excursion to some of the beautiful vallies of the area, on the Monday (24th August), to visit communities threatened by an expansion of coal mining around the North East.

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Here are the practicalities:

BRING
Bring tent and sleeping bag. You can either cook food for yourself or for £4 per day chip in with collective cooking of delicious vegan organic food – organised by the wonderful Anarchist Teapot collective. There’ll be quiet sleeping areas, toilets and running water, a children’s space and spaces for workshops and info stalls. Veggies will provide vegan cake and snacks. Children and young adults welcome with subsidized meals.

WHEN
19th-24th August 2009 – Arrive Tuesday afternoon. Workshops run from Wednesday morning until Sunday afternoon.

WHERE
The site is in or near the Lake District, Cumbria. The nearest train station is Penrith and there is a bus service to the site, there are car and living vehicle spaces outside the camp.

The exact location will be announced the week before the gathering so that it doesn’t turn into a festival. For travel directions check the website where they will be posted on 12th August.

DOGS : This year well behaved owners with dogs on leads can be accommodated, but think about whether your dog will feel comfortable in workshops. Please call beforehand so we know numbers.

COST : £20 – £30 according to what you can afford. It’s not for profit – all extra cash goes to help fund next year. Under 14′s free.

CONTACT
summergathering@earthfirst.org.uk
www.earthfirstgathering.org.uk
Or ring 01524 383012 – though it might take a while to get back to you.

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Central St Martin’s graduate Phil Hall draws in the same way that some of us dream; streams of consciousness, information pills themes interspersed with sudden hints and whispers of unrelated recollections. Some of his work contains snippets of dialogue, viagra often witty and astute but again with an undertone of the surreal and reminiscent of muddled hallucinogenic dream talk (yes, sick that is a technical term).

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His commissions to date include the magazines La Bouche, Crafty and Torpedo, as well as for the G2 Guardian supplement and animation company Kanoti. Animals, both actual and fictitious, are nestled between cityscapes and underwater worlds, while everyday objects are comically personified and everyday scenes playfully reinterpreted.

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Figures and portraiture are also common threads throughout Hall’s work, which he has an incredible skill for undertaking. Subtle use of lines and marks, but nonetheless full of expression, the characters are often solemn and appear loss in thought. I wondered whether this was a reflection of Hall’s own state of mind and so challenged him to a quick fire round of questions. Turns out he’s actually a pretty sharp guy.

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So, Phil, what makes you so awesome?

I don’t know about that, but I think people who want to create, try new things, provoke through art are pretty awesome.

Which artists or illustrators do you most admire?

Anybody who is trying new and interesting things, especially people who take risks.

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Who or what is your nemesis?

That darn negative voice in my head

Which band past or present would provide the soundtrack to your life?

New Radiohead stuff, i know, i know…

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I say Modern Art is Rubbish, you say…?

Some of it

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

climbing the walls

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What would your pub quiz specialist subject be?

90′s video games, yes, I’m slightly embarrassed by this but as an 80′s child in was such escapism.

What advice would you give up and coming artists?

Believe in your own ideas, but always question them.

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What piece of modern technology can you not live without?

The Internet and hoverboard

What is your guilty pleasure?

Crap TV

Tell us something about Phil Hall that we didn’t know already.

I’m a triplet, I have two sisters, ones a florist the other a teaching assistant.

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When I fall asleep tonight, when I slip into that state of meditative relaxation and my mind lets go of the reality of my day, I hope my dreams are as vibrant and vivid as Phil Hall’s illustrations.

What do you dream about?

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So. A whole new batch of graduates all with a different vision – and what to do with them? With the music industry completely revolutionised beyond recognition by the internet, sale the world of fashion has also recognised the lucrative possibilities of the online community to spread the word beyond the catwalk and the pages of glossy magazines. Networking sites like Nineteen74.com are making an obsessively international industry international for the earliest of starters, viagra approved connecting stylists, unhealthy designers, editors, make-up artists, press and hairdressers across the waters.

But with fashion as a site where art and commerce (especially when globalised) traditionally sit uneasily alongside one another, individual expression so often has to be tamed and tapered to fit. Yet Stefan Siegel, owner and founder of the website NOT JUST A LABEL believes that “fashion finds its freedom in the art of individuals”, so set up an online store dedicated to embracing such creativity, and crucially taking it to an accessible level but making it a place where “everything goes”. It’s an online base of up and coming designers, giving its members an esteemed platform where they can showcase and sell their clothing without having to compromise. This is 2009, and this is the world showroom. Here, Stefan talks to Amelia’s Magazine about his designers, his successes and his motivations.

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When and why did you start NJAL and what motivated you to open the shop-section of the website?

Young aspiring fashion designers face enormous hurdles at the beginning of their career; we wanted to provide a stage where designers could showcase their collections at no costs. The goal was to formulate and implement a vision; linking designers with the fashion industry.

How long did it take for the shop to materialize?

Only 10 weeks, we decided during Paris Fashion Week in March that it would be a good idea and all our designers supported the idea. We started developing it in April.

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How do you decide which designers to sell?

The recently launched Not Just A Label shop gives birth to a new kind of online shopping experience offering unique, one-off designer garments. Addicts and admirers alike now have the opportunity to purchase special and limited edition pieces from designers recognised as the leaders in avant-garde fashion.

With so many people wanting to get their work out there, how is it possible to keep up?

Selected collaborators like Robin Schulié and Diane Pernet hand-pick designs from the collections. On a monthly basis a new key industry figure will be asked to join us in the selection process, resulting in a different monthly collection. The chosen participants will be launched as a group to the press a month before their launch on the website.

Have you been successful as of yet?

The response has been amazing, we had thousands visitors on our page when we launched and the reactions are all positive so far. We believe it was really something the market was missing.

How do you think attitudes are changing in young designers?

Young designers recognise the responsibility in creating sustainable fashion. By applying artisan craftsmanship they are known to create products that have classic values with longer lasting qualities and we hope that consumers and buyers will soon recognise this opportunity. Every item displayed on THE SHOP is unique or part of a small production, we believe it is more valuable and eco-friendly to buy an item you can keep for more seasons.

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Having a snoop around the website, it’s great to see that designers can create their own free individualised showrooms online with personalised web addresses, with picture and video galleries and contact information. It’s in essence a place where the individual wields the power – what NJAL has called ‘the black sheep’s environment’. Here you’ve got to be the black sheep or else! Now just imagine what this flock would look like – pretty fabulous we bet.

Blundering, sildenafil mistake-making fashion followers believe that style is about fitting in, find but the true sartorial clan know that individuality has always been the on-trend approach to dressing. These days the high street seems to offer little more than weak duplicates of catwalk designs. The same styles circle the streets over and over again. Standing out has become a difficult endeavour: but there is hope. Forget hitting the shops, adiposity stay at home and spend your style pennies via the happy medium of your computer. With online retail expanding every day (check out our article on NOT JUST A LABEL), the web has become a virtual mall, brimming with quirky garments, capable of satisfying the most eccentric of fashionistas. The obstacle is discovering them, but Amelia’s Magazine has picked out some of our favourites that might mean you would never have to get out of your pyjamas to actually wear any of the clothes you might hypothetically buy. C’est la vie, etc.

Modcloth Indie Clothing:
The pitch: Granny in space
FYI: An emporium of funky fashion finds: from more conventional tea-party dresses to crazy PVC high-waisted shorts. It is a fashion cocktail that will quench all styles of thirst: from grunge to gran- glam to more sophisticated tastes: Modcloth embraces it all. Their stock is as diverse as it wearable, with a collection of pendants particularly expansive; from roses to miniature clocks to birds to robots – and all for less than thirty pounds.

Spanish Moss Vintage

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The pitch: It’s a New York state of dress
FYI: If Lady Gaga owned a vintage shop, it would most definitely resemble Spanish Moss Vintage: most of the models sport her iconic platinum bob and the clothes have a bold, eccentric New York appeal. You can choose between either their New or Vintage Stock, with both lines evoking what can only be described as a wild-nocturnal-hippie-bohemian vibe. Designer pieces are jumbled between quirky one-offs. Jumpsuit aficionados will be especially impressed, from shoulder-padded, to floral covered to striped: each number reflects a different era, it’s like buying a piece of fashion history!

PIXIE MARKET

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The pitch: Olsen Twins at a rock concert
FYI: Everything speaks rock with a capital R. Garments at Pixie Market are subdued but sharp at the same time, sometimes merging with a beautiful grunge-inspired sloppy look. Acid-wash , spray-painted tees, hard-ass leather; its Soho chic at its most dirty. Especially covetable are the studded sandals, which are a harsher twist on the elegant Balenciaga numbers.

ABSOLUTE VINTAGE

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The pitch: Schoolgirl chic
FYI: Endless collections of handbags, dresses and shoes straight with the oh-so-stylish Brick Lane twist. This is old-lady chic heaven, 75% of all stock would work wonderfully with knee-socks, wayfarers and a dashing blazer. The website is incredibly easy to navigate, and the interminable rows of product images evoke a genuine market-shopping vibe. Forget Portobello, Absolute Vintage is where it’s at!

ROLLING STONE VINTAGE
The pitch: Acceptable in the 70s, 80s and 90s
FYI: The people over at Rolling Stone Vintage believe that a vintage dress is a “fashion staple”, and they make sure to provide this staple what seems like a gazillion different varieties. From American-Indian motifs to glitzy sequins to prom-styles, there is a frock for every girl (or boy, for that matter, we won’t put people in a box). Other vintage highlights include their sporadically placed bright graphic tees that seem to scream “Viva las 80s!”

So come on people – pick up that virtual shopping basket, it’s ever so light. And readers, do you have any more online vintage sites you’d like to recommend? Don’t be a meanie and keep them to yourselves!

What could be more British than Gilbert and George? They are the perfect symbols of a nation that is as renowned for its stiff upper lip as it is for its football hooliganism, patient for its uptight sexuality as its love of bawdy smut. Mild and mannerly yet anarchic and challenging, this the artistic duo (two men, one artist) have been performing for us, exhibiting their art and showing us their shit for over 40 years now. And we love them for it.

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George Passmore and Gilbert Proesch met, as Jarvis Cocker might say, whilst studying sculpture at St Martin’s college. Taking an unusual approach to their studies, they sacrificed themselves to live out their lives as a performance; the two became one living sculpture. Upon the realisation that singing Flanagan and Allen’s ‘Underneath the Arches’ for eight hours straight can get rather tiring, Gilbert and George branched out into film and photography, settling on their now trademark vividly coloured grid photographs that glow like unholy stained glass windows. It is this familiar technique that allows them to explore modern patriotism in their new show ‘Jack Freak Pictures.’

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What could be more British than Jesus sporting a pair of Union Jack boxer shorts? This is the confusing and confrontational question that Gilbert and George pose to us in the image ‘Christian England’. Are we a patriotic people, a religious people, and what has happened to the ‘Christian England’ of old? Did those feet in ancient time walk upon England’s mountains green? And might the holy Lamb of God have purchased his pants from a tourist shop?

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When previewing ‘Jack Freak pictures’ the Evening Standard hinted that their new works go as far as blasphemy. Gilbert and George would surely be delighted at this, having asserted themselves as anti-religion and always up for shocking people into contemplation. However, not even a spokesperson for the Church of England could be riled; ‘It sounds very mild for them’ the holy one surmised.
Mild may not be the right word, but Gilbert and George do at least seem to manage to keep most of their clothes on for the majority of this series. Instead of naughty body bits, it is rosettes and medals that feature heavily in images such as ‘God Guard Thee’ and ‘Church of England’. The wonderfully titled ‘Ingerland’ appears as a mess of flesh, flailing arms and a hypnotic pattern of red, white and blue.

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The Union Flag has provided much inspiration for the pair, from their image titles (‘Jesus Jack’, ‘Jack Shit’, ‘Jacksie’) right down to their ultra-patriotic suits. Subtly, this is where Gilbert and George’s shock tactics lie. The duo are content to calmly pose us with images of patriotism, ramped up to a level just shy of insanity, and then lie back and think of England as the audience themselves go insane wondering what it all means. The Union Jack is a loaded symbol. War time medals of honour hold connotations of terror and death. Christianity itself is complicated enough. But aren’t we told we’re supposed to be proud of all this?
Gilbert and George aren’t letting on, as they pose passively as the everyman in their images. Passively,yet aggressively. And what could be more British than that?

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Gilbert and George: Jack Freak Pictures

White Cube Gallery
48 Hoxton Square
London N1 6BU

10th July 22nd August
10am – 6pm Tuesday to Saturday
If you don’t know who Deerhoof are, cheapest you might want to check your sources, reprimand your social group, and consider reading better magazines (and blogs, of course). Deerhoof haven’t quite broken out, weirdly. There are a fair few t-shirts on the street, a few nods of approval in beer garden conversations, and a growing swathe of gimmicky-recognition (“aren’t they the one with the bouncy Japanese lady instead of a normal singer?”), but there is no summer anthem, no festival domination, and no MTV2 a-listed iconic-video-of-the-month. So there’s an extra pat on the back for the wise and knowing horde which descended on Scala this wednesday. Well done!

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Needless to say, they have already been rewarded for their astute pulse-taking on-the-ball-ness – this was a fantastic gig in every respect. A bit of a slow start, maybe, but one which created the perfect calm pond into which massive boulders of rock can most joyfully be dropped. And these are beautifully detailed boulders. Guitarist John Dieterich and his sparring buddy, Ed Rodriguez take such joy in melodic interplay, you could imagine this evolving into classical music a decade hence. And Greg Saunier is one of the most charismatic drummers around. He jiggers around on his stool like an orang-utan on mushrooms and clearly has an obsession with slowing things down, creating tension by bringing in his thwack a little late, or birthing an extra half a secong in a crotchet so he can rattle off one of his beloved buddle-de-dah type licks across the kit. Drummers pay attention: most of you can learn from this chap.

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And then, right in your fovea, is the glorious Satomi Matsuzaki. In the vastness of the stage, she’s a fun-sized centre of attention, like Spinal Tap’s Stonehenge. On the bass, she’s all scripted and tight. After all, someone’s got to hold it together. As a singer, she’s a magical bundle of fun. It’s a little girl voice, opening christmas presents of unpredictable melodies and impressions of inanimate objects (beep, ring, etc). And a great showwoman, too. The crowd was thrilled by her dance sequence with a glow-in-the-dark basketball to the brilliant Basketball Get Your Groove Back. And there was a lovely feedback stew in which she, John and Ed all made as much “EEEEEEeeeeeeeep” as possible with their axes behind their heads. On of the encores had everyone on the wrong instrument for a quick country standard. Another was an instrumental which stepped toward Tortoise or King Crimson. Enthrallment was the order of the day, with one of my chums confused about whether it was accessible or not: “I can hear how weird it is, so I how come I’m enjoying it as much as I am?” she mused.

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Energetically, I’m reminded of the Pixies, except there will never be a Here Comes Your Man from Deerhoof, who might suddenly lurch toward Careful With The Axe, Eugene, instead. The whimsy recalls Pavement, but nothing as simple or catchy as Haircut will come out of this lot, while they keep getting deeper into the infinite possibilities that they clearly see in their instruments. It’s not for them to dilute their powers with accessibility. It’s for every man, woman and child to climb on what Satori has called “the dog-faced rollercoaster” of their music.

It’s a ride I suggest you join them on.
At the confluence of the teeming A roads that intersect the eastern edge of Hackney, click crouching in the shadow of an imposing tower block, troche stands the shell of the Clapton Cinematograph Theatre.

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All photos by Kirsty McQuire.

The borough’s oldest surviving picture house overlooks the Lea Bridge Road roundabout, clinic the hotch-potch nucleus of Upper and Lower Clapton. It’s an area which has recently received, among others, the Miquita Oliver seal of approval: ‘The place to be? Clapton.’ The neglected structure, sandwiched between the equally dishevelled White Hart pub, and the robust St. James Church, is a sorry sight. Bearing neither the shiny new face of Mare St. civic pride (so derided by local psycho-geographer Iain Sinclair) nor the artistic shabby-chic of Dalston, it is an anachronism, a ghost on the inner city landscape. The Edwardian picture palace itself is shrouded by a tawdry lilac façade, conjuring all the eeriness of a forgotten fairground.

With the spotlight of regeneration holding East London firmly in its glare as the Olympics edge ever closer, and the tide of cool (or ‘Shoreditch Twat’ syndrome, depending on your perspective) creeping beyond its Hoxton stronghold, this would seem an opportune moment to raise the profile of a forgotten cultural gem. So says Julie Lafferty, Secretary of the Friends of Clapton Cinematograph Theatre (FCCT), an alliance of local residents who are campaigning for the dilapidated building to be restored to its former glory. That is not merely nostalgic hyperbole, given that the erstwhile leafy suburb of country piles, landscaped gardens and prosperous farms formed the backdrop to the theatre, erected in 1910, just as Portobello Road got the Electric and East Finchley the Phoenix. Both of those Grade II listed, art house haunts have fared considerably better than their Clapton contemporary, buoyed by cult followings and more affluent locales. In its heyday the Cinematograph seated 750 local punters who flocked to see shows that fused film screenings and live performance. Features and shorts were accompanied by acts including ‘the famous banjoists: Miss Hilda Barry and Mr Harry Stuart;’ bridging the gap between the Victorian East End’s love affair with Music Hall and the advent of modern cinema. How many of the current avant-garde, frequenting genre-defying venues such as Shunt and the Village Underground, are aware of this quaint antecedent to their adventures in multimedia, I wonder? I certainly wasn’t!

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This invaluable record of cinematic history was all but eclipsed as the decline of the local area manifest itself in the ‘flea pit’ conditions inside the cinema, ultimately leading to its closure in 1979. The premises were to lie dormant until 1983, reopening as Afro-Caribbean nightspot Dougies and later renamed the Palace Pavilion. The original club attracted a vibrant, diverse mix of punters whilst retaining a wholesome atmosphere, Lafferty tells me, having lived in the area with her family for thirty years. Dougies championed black reggae musicians and succeeded in integrating the flourishing multi-cultural community. However, in its 90s hip hop incarnation and under the aegis of proprietor and DJ Admiral Ken, AKA Kenneth Edwards, the Pavilion was blighted by knife and gun crime. After the violence reached its peak in a gangland-style double shooting on New Years Eve 2005, local pressure groups succeeded in having the club’s license revoked. According to Lafferty’s findings through Land Registry, Edwards’ name still appears on the leasehold, though the Bass Holdings’ freehold is now on the market. A victim of the recession as well as its reputation, the club has remained boarded up ever since it closed its doors to the public. Edwards has declined to enter into a dialogue with the FCCT on several occasions. ‘We took his business away,’ she admits.

The Pavilion’s demise inevitably damaged the livelihoods of those who profited from it, both officially and unofficially. Yet it has been key in continuing to eradicate what Tony Blair famously referred to as ‘the society of fear,’ with direct reference to the borough. ‘Crime in Hackney is falling faster than in nearly any other London borough,’ reflected Mayor Jules Pipe recently, following heartening statistics from the Met. In the year 2006-07, crime was found to be down by 7,000 offences, a decrease of 28% compared to 2003-04, meaning that Hackney exceeded the three-year target of a 20% reduction in priority crimes. Locals had the backing of Diane Abbot, MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, who insists that ‘the club had a long and bloody history and the decision to close it was long overdue.’ Abbot’s involvement has not ended there, as she has also lent her support to the FCCT’s vision for the building’s future.

‘Hackney currently only has one cinema serving a population of over 200,000,’ states the FCCT campaign literature. The Rio, a jewel in Hackney’s cultural crown, is a prime example of what local patronage can do to preserve a neighbourhood institution; the venue having been earmarked for various developments since its inception in 1909. But the cosy Art Deco hangout of just 402 seats cannot possibly meet the increasing demand of a predominantly young borough, which grew by 12% compared to the 7.4% of London overall, in the 1990s alone. A rival development has been mooted for Pitfield Street in Shoreditch, but if resident naysayer Jarvis Cocker has anything to do with it, it won’t get the go ahead.

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In an ambitious yet shrewd proposal, the group envisages the Cinematograph’s resurrection paying homage to the late playwright and local hero, Harold Pinter. ‘It’s a little known fact,’ says Lafferty, ‘that alongside his works for the theatre he also wrote 22 screenplays. Pinter was very fond of the area he grew up in- he wrote poetry recounting walks with his teacher from Clapton Pond to Finsbury Park, discussing the literature that inspired him to start writing.’ Ideally, such a tribute would be finalised in time to coincide with the cinema’s centenary in 2010.

In light of this, Abbot requested an Early Day Motion on 15th January which ‘calls on the Government to do all it can to support the campaign by local residents to restore the cinema on Lower Clapton Road in honour of this illustrious Hackney resident.’ Although most EDMs are never debated in the House of Commons, this petition has already garnered the support of Glenda Jackson and at the very least will serve to air the issue around Westminster. That Pinter ended his days in the more salubrious climes of Kensington and Chelsea is beside the point; he was born in Lower Clapton and there is a staggering absence of any visible testament to his humble beginnings. Lafferty: ‘On Broadway they dimmed the lights for him. What have we done?’ Another example of British diffidence in the face of towering achievement, I conclude.

Lest the project be branded purely a heritage piece, Lafferty is quick to point out that this dedication is not the extent of the FCCT’s plans, which also encompass a community centre, gallery space, café and film training facilities. ‘I believe in training, not punishment,’ she says, and cites the fact that ‘Hackney youth are at a considerable disadvantage in the job market.’ With half of all adults not attaining the literacy level expected of a school leaver and the employment rate being some 13% lower than the London average, she has a point. But how might she and her colleagues on the committee counter accusations of gentrification, now almost synonymous with the double-edged sword of regeneration? ‘By involving local people from the start. We want a community cinema, a place to unite polarised generations- not a faceless multiplex but not an art house clique either.’ She is well aware of fears that the Olympic legacy will be a white elephant, and denies that cynics might justifiably say the same of an independent cinema on the Park’s periphery: ‘It should be for the long-term and inclusive, not exclusive. The challenge is to appeal to everyone. I’m advocating a diverse programme world cinema and young documentary talent, alongside mainstream blockbusters.’

In the meantime, it’s a case of means tirelessly raising awareness in every local forum from the church fete to the school hall. Volunteers are canvassing for signatures to provide evidence of community feeling, with which to bolster political interest and attract investment. The FCCT are in the process of commissioning a £30,000 feasibility study, potentially to be financed by the RIBA community fund- the next step towards proving the practical and economic benefits of the enterprise. The campaigners are also armed with a Film Council Report of 2005, containing a glowing case study of the Rio. ‘What’s to stop it happening here?’ is Lafferty’s characteristically sanguine attitude.

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Which is not to say that she and her colleagues haven’t experienced set backs in the past. Although the FCCT have not met with opposition directly, longstanding residents among them are no strangers to controversy and disappointment. They only hope that the fate of nearby Latham’s Yard, a 13-acre site by the River Lea, will not befall the cinema. The greenbelt land had its planning application for a development of 7-storey apartment blocks approved in 2005, despite considerable local and political objection. ‘The Government’s own Planning Inspector said no, but it got the green light anyway. That was a real low-point.’

Resilience and resourcefulness appear to go a long way in the world of grass roots lobbying. Through the edifying neighbourhood grapevine of Dave Hill’s Clapton Pond Blog I learnt not only of the FCCT’s existence, but also of their first cinematic venture, a free screening of The Big Smoke: Films from a Lost London 1896-1945. This event simultaneously formed part of the Open Gardens and Squares Weekend and the BFI Mediatheque on Tour, which takes the South Bank archive on the road. So on the afternoon of Sunday 14th June I trotted along to the unlikely setting of the St. John’s Ambulance Hall, passing bustling homemade cake stands and brick-a-brack stalls dotted round the pond. More Vicar of Dibley than Clapton, really. A make-shift banner proclaimed defiantly (and with more than a hint of irony), ‘Screen on the Pond;’ and a bottle of Recession plonk bearing the PM’s face was being raffled as the tombola prize. Neighbours young and old had turned out to watch black and white silent movies on a sunny summer’s day and despite the lack of popcorn, it was standing room only.

It seems there is still a demand for a cinema-experience on your doorstep that isn’t tantamount to a trip to the supermarket, after all. And this was only the trailer.

The next FCCT public meeting will be held at The Pembury Tavern on Amhurst Road, Hackney on Tuesday 14th July at 7pm.

Returning just for a moment to the R-Art collective collaboration with Nova Dando to make a dress entirely from everyone’s favourite page-turner The Financial Times, it’s funny to see examples of trashion pop up in different guises, treat and wondering whether it’s all really part of the same thing. Back in the 1940s, a shoemaker called Salvatore Ferragamo started to braid sweet wrappers in the upper parts of his shoes during the Second World War. He discovered their strength and wear in a difficult period to obtain expensive materials.

Fast-forward to 2009, and you’ve got entire ranges of kitsch accessories being woven out of sweet wrappers. You’ve got students constructing trousers from Royal Mail postbags, Martin Margiela making shirts appliquéd with old football parts.

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And look! Alexander McQueen is even recycling old collections, and using umbrellas and hub- caps as hats.

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In the unlikely pairing of Ferragamo and McQueen, we are witnessing an artistic response fuelled by the unglamorous concept of necessity generated by an economic downturn. For Margiela it has long been a practice to ‘upcycle’ his own garments with his Artisanal range, looking to grant them with a ‘higher status’. It’s intellectualising something that you see also in the most lowbrow of arenas, like Project Runway, where designers are challenged to create futuristic outfits out of vintage clothes, or rip up the interiors of apartments to make into something avant-garde. It’s easy to see how trashion treads the fine line between a belief system and a gimmick (completely ruining several perfectly decent apartments seemed somewhat regressive to me). There was even the Channel 4 programmed ‘Dumped’ where a group of strangers were forced to live together and filmed around the clock. In a dump. Undoubtedly a gimmick, but these people actually managed to survive by reusing what people had thought to throw away.

So the idea of repurposing is nothing new, and it’s obvious why we regularly look to cover here it at Amelia’s Magazine. More interesting than why it’s produced is how, I began reading about Chilean designer Alexandra Guerrero, who genuinely views the wastage in her city as an opportunity to be resourceful, and has gone so far as to make wearable pieces out of a fabric constructed from cigarette butts. Yes, that’s CIGARETTE BUTTS. Before the murmurs start about overstepping the mark, Guerrero pre-empted all the haters out there by checking with an environmental engineer to check that cleaning them would make them hygienically sound. Given the thumbs up – you can get ‘em at 95% purified apparently – she then put them through something called an autoclave, then washed them in something else called a polar solvent, put them back into the trusty autoclave, to go and then rinse, dry, shred, dye, separate the butts, and finally spin with natural sheep wool. Ta-dah! Imagine the horrifyingly elongated episode of Blue Peter: here’s one I autoclaved earlier.

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Shows like Project Runway delineate a certain fascination with the process of it all, and specifically the difficulty involved in doing it. If turning some old coffee cups into a cheeky little playsuit was easily done, maybe it would just be the common practice. The fact remains, that, with Guerrera’s project in mind, it’s an exhausting process that of course isn’t more trouble than it’s worth environmentally (not at a whopping 4.5 trillion butts dropped a day) but artistically, it could definitely be a bit laborious. And, let’s face it, not to everybody’s taste.

McQueen himself said his AW09 collection was indeed a response to the gross wastage of the fashion industry in an economic climate where it could not be commercially viable any more. Guerrero ironically enough needs more funding to pursue her investigations into the world of cigarette butts. But the shared excitement in possibilities in repurposing materials seems the important result, and the creative potential out there is without a doubt enormous. So next time you chuck something in the bin, take a second look – maybe it could make a brilliant overcoat.

If your memory stretches back a few weeks, link you may remember we wrote about an eco-village about to be set up. Well, a couple of Amelia’s Magazine reporters ventured along to help out with the get in. Alice Watson and Roisin Conway met the gathering at Waterloo station, before getting on to the site itself. All the internet noise about a location near Hammersmith turned out to be fuzz to throw off the fuzz – they took up an abandoned area near Kew Bridge. And four police did turn up, in very reasonable manner, simply to hear an idea of the plans and get some contact details.

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After getting access to the site, which had been left well locked up despite being left untouched for so long, first up was a meeting. Future eco-villlagers and interested people sat down together, and started to realise just how from-scratch this project was. Activist consensus decision making apparently proceeds by raising both hands and wobbling them slightly – a bit like a two-handed royal wave. The day was then mostly spent (as agreed) in clearing up rubbish, and starting to reach out to the local communities – handing out flyers and chatting to people.

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The Kew Eco-villagers recently sent out a week-two update : “we have cleared the site of most of the rubbish, put our tents up, built a compost toilet and a kitchen, and have built a half roundhouse as a communal structure!”

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The neighbours and people in local communities and local businesses have helped out with many donations. They’ve given plants, wood, tents and building materials to the project. There’s a long way to go, still, before the eco-village gets on towards its potential – if you’re feeling generous, there’s a wish list up on their facebook group – go to the discussions and find ‘How you can all help!’.

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The other big thing to do is to send post to the site – an important part in the process of getting squatters’ rights. Postcards, messages of support, envelopes of seeds, or anything else you’re inspired to post will be greatly appreciated. The beginnings of a wider community of interested people is the best for the further development of the eco-village movement. This space in Kew Bridge is growing into a place to learn and to get to know people – building everything on the principles of sustainable land use, the people living there think of themselves as looking after this land for, well, everyone. Their gates are open every day. Essentially, it’s a community garden. Everyone from the local area can – is encouraged to – pay a visit and share their ideas about what to do with the land, as well as having the chance to plant vegetables and also just to chill out and get to know everyone there.

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They have had a fair few visitors from all over the world recently, and all over London. Absolutely everyone is welcome to come and stay. There are a few site rules which include no drugs and alcohol, as well as being considerate to others and actively participating as a member of the community. Sundays are open days – this Sunday, 12th July, there’s a local Irish band booked to be playing, and last weekend they held a Solstice Open Weekend with activities including face painting, music, picnic area and children’s workshops. Anyone with ‘useful or interesting skills or knowledge’ is most welcome to get along and hold a workshop to share them. Whether common law and herbal remedies are your bag, or making didgeridoos and repairing bicycles is more your thing, there’s a space there for you. And if you just want to listen and learn, you’ll be more than welcome too.

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Photos by (1,2 and 7) Alice Watson and Roisin Conway, and (3, 4, 5 and 6) Peter Marshall,

You can find KewEcoVillage on twitter, if you like your updates to-the-minute.

Visitors are welcome – come along between 11 am and 8 pm, to 2 Kew Bridge Rd, Brentford. The nearest station is ‘Kew Bridge’ and the nearest tube is ‘Gunnersbury’.

There’s a public meeting every Thursday at 7pm on site, and every Sunday is an open day. Do get in touch if you’d like to propose a workshop.

The on-site contact number is 07967 864 370

Post seeds, postcards, or anything you like, to:
The Eco Village
2 Kew Bridge Rd
Brentford
TW8 0JF

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Categories ,community, ,ecovillage, ,garden, ,kew bridge, ,squatting, ,the land is ours

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Amelia’s Magazine | Squatting in the Community: Bristol’s Factory Reoccupied

I have to honestly admit that I don’t really THINK about sustainability in my everyday life. I even recycle without thinking because it is such a natural process to me. You don’t consciously think about why you drink tea from a cup and not from a bowl or why you pee into the toilet and not into the basin.  
I think you’re only truly sustainable when it’s a part of your way of life, healing just like a diet is pointless unless you actually change your lifestyle and habits. In keeping with this, shop I came across a test with a perfectly relevant name: “My Habbit“. You can check out your own carbon footprint and you might be surprised at how easy it is to change really small habits. 

Whilst taking the test it visualises your carbon footprint in the form of a strange and creepy semi-alien computer-generated human body. Proportionally distorting a human’s body parts in order to visualise your disproportionate use, you work your way through the different stages of sustainability. For instance, if you use a lot of electricity, you head starts to look more and more like a skeleton. The more meat you eat, the fatter your belly gets. Electricity and gas expands your hands, travel expands your feet until it looks like an almost bursting balloon. Mine looked pretty normal at the end, but it still had suggestions for me to better myself. But how did I even come across this test? 

“So, a guy came into the office today to borrow some of our paper, which was recycled and said ‘So are you trying to save the world or summin?’ (sic) to which I wanted to start replying but by the time I said ‘Um..’ he said ‘Then stop driving!’ I obviously replied ‘I don’t drive’ and he said ‘Oh’ and walked off. What’s the dude hassling me for?” 
This is a snippet of a conversation I had during dinner today, where it transpired that me being a vegetarian and not having a car actually makes me “pretty green” according to a test my partner had taken during the workshop he held at the “Sustainable Future” exhibition at the Design Museum. I was immediately intrigued. This may have been mainly due to the fact that I was fairly certain I was going to come out of the other end of the tunnel with a result to be proud of (aka something to show off about).  

I already knew some of the reasons that were going to be to my advantage. I work from home, which means that in average, I use the underground only once a week in for meetings or events in town. I have only travelled by plane once in the past year (last November, in fact), which is highly unusual and mainly down to the fact that work has happily consumed all my time. Either way, I knew it was going to make me look good in the test. I walk to the shops, and buy most of my food and fabric (I am a fashion designer) in the local market where things are mainly locally sourced. I’m very lazy when it comes to anything that is essential to life such as sleep, eating and washing. That’s only of advantage because I own a lot of clothes, which means I very rarely have to actually wash any of them. My washing machine is extremely underused.  

Furthermore, since we’re on the subject of big white goods, I don’t own a dishwasher or tumble dryer or any such machinery. I recycle everything from paper snippets to plastic to glass to fabric. I would say “tins” but I don’t really use them. As I mentioned before, most my food moves directly form the bowl of vegetables of the farmer’s table into my Longchamp shopping bag into my vegetable drawer. Another point that I knew was going to help me look good in this test was the fact that I’m a vegetarian. Apparently, that makes a difference although I’m still not quite sure why. Surely any food needs to be transported, worked on? Do feel free to enlighten me if you know. 

Returning to the subject of technical items, I don’t watch TV. I have a TV set for watching a DVD every now and then, but I usually prefer to work, and the TV is of course unplugged when I don’t use it because otherwise it makes a very annoying humming noise when it’s on standby. I unplug my printers, sewing machines, hair straighteners etc when I’m not using them.

People who don’t live with me would never believe it, but I’d rather look like a couch potato wearing three jackets (I’m at home, right?) than turn on the heating unnecessarily. In fact, the heating is completely switched off until the temperature drops below 10 degrees Celsius for more than a week, which doesn’t make me very popular with my housemates.  

We were given some free sustainable light bulbs when we last switched gas and electricity companies, which we use throughout the house and half of the fluorescent light bulbs we have in our office have burned out and we are too lazy to replace them.

This one is a big deal, but not a topic that gave me any extra credit during the test. About 80% of my wardrobe (including my shoes) is either second hand, vintage or passed on in some form or another through eBay, TK Maxx, in the form of presents from family and friends, inherited pieces, charity shops etc. This does not, however, mean that I don’t indulge my fashion sense, as a quick peek into the style section of my website will confirm. 

I don’t listen to the radio, I don’t have a CD player or stereo because I have all my music on my Mac and iPhone – who knew being this non-nostalgic about music, could turn into a blessing? 

We have an agreement with our landlord who sends round a gardener every two months. Officially, any carbon footprint they amass during their work is technically not mine, so I am not counting it. The grass is yellow from the few days of “heat” this lame English summer had, but I don’t really see that as my responsibility and as far as I can tell, I don’t think the gardeners ever water the grass – they simpy cut it even shorter and dryer and pick up the leaves. 

Some of the questions in the test were difficult. For instance, I had to look up which type of light bulbs we actually use. They cleverly adjust the optimum “habit” you could have at the end and suggest ways in which you can better yourself, even if your carbon emission is as low as one could realistically imagine. 

However, there were aspects of importance that were not quite taken into consideration. A big issue, which could tip someone’s carbon print (especially among us fashionistas and fahsionistos, eh?)  is our shopping and consumption habits beyond mere primary necessity (food). Do you buy online? Are your purchase shipped or flown from overseas or do you make sure buy locally? Do you shop in chain supermarkets or local markets? How much stuff do you own? Do you buy from Primark or second hand? Do you buy per trend and season or do you invest in pieces that you have worn for decades? Do you tend to consume actual objects such electric equipment, decorative items, clothing or something altogether different? 

There are also questions relating to your profession that are not taken into consideration at all. For instance, the test asks you whether you use a printer at home, but not whether you use a printer at work. How much paper do you use and waste, knowing you’re not paying for it? I’ll forgive them for not asking office-related questions, though, as this could get very detailed and complex. But what about mobile phones? No sign of their impact.

Having an iPhone, which I use for work, means I charge my phone up a lot more often than, say, someone who works in a shop and turns theirs off for most of the day. As anybody who owns an iPhone knows, as much as we love them – the battery of the iPhone is abysmal. It needs charging ALL the time. Surely the test should be asking about the different phones one has, the same way they asked about what type of TV I own? On the other hand, I charge my iPhone via my laptop – this means less electricity is used. You can see, the questions can be quite endless, but an essential acknowledgement of such basics would have improved the test. 
Many of my friends and colleagues are writers or need to write in some form or another. When you do your writing, do you do it online or offline? That sounds like it would make no difference, but it does. Here’s a good illustrating example, which has astounded quite a lot of people when I’ve mentioned it. 

One of the questions in the questionnaire is how often you boil the kettle. Did you know that every time you do a search on google it uses as much electricity and power from the mighty google servers as it does to boil a full kettle? A question in the test, if I have had any say, should have been “Do you look up the tiniest question on google rather than trying to think that second longer in case you remember?” Do you maybe have a real life dictionary (oh wonder and glory), which can help you just as much? Yes, one should consider the production cost of making said book, but for the sake of the argument, let’s assume it’s a vintage book, which still holds perfectly updated descriptions of most words we know. If it doesn’t, you can STILL use Google, Wikipedia or an online dictionary. But not doing so immediately would reduce your carbon footprint more than you think… 

I am a great believer in the fact that until something is accepted as normal, it has not really been overcome. Until it is, the obstacle of integration is not complete. I feel this is the way with sustainability. I grew up with it, so it was quite strange for me to see what fuss people made about being sustainable – it was new to me. Once people embrace it as part of their lives, it will be a lot easier. You hear campaigns telling you to “be aware” and “do your part” as if most of these acts weren’t perfectly logical. I disagree. Sure, some people just don’t admit to perfectly basic knowledge being obvious, and need those hints and tips, and none of us are perfect and continue to be educated. However, the obsession of making recycling something to be conscious about is not going to help. Only once it’s truly and easily integrated into our lives in a manner that is natural to participate in will sustainability really be standard practice.


All photography by Maria Domican

I was nervous upon arriving at Vintage at Goodwood… Nervous because I had called in sick to work, order nervous because I had been hearing bad press about the event and mainly nervous because I had no idea what to expect.

I have to admit, abortion no matter how fashionable, arty and eco driven a festival is, a major emphasis has always been on being drunk and having a great, if somewhat crazy time… I couldn’t imagine myself getting wasted on ‘classic cocktails’ or ‘gin and tonics’, parading around campsites in my beloved vintage treasures and sleeping through bands in a dusty heap at Goodwood. Apparently that was exactly the crowd that organiser Wayne Hemingway was eager to discourage, not wanting those “out on the lash that leave a load of empty tins at their ripped tent”.

Goodwood was billed as ‘the first of what will be an annual music and fashion led celebration of creative British cool’ ‘The new festival of Britain’. But what was it? A vintage Fashion Fair? An exhibition? Or a festival? Featuring music, art, fashion, film and design I was puzzled as to how it would all come together.

None the less I was excited… I had packed a few of my 2nd favourite dresses (the dirt was still a worry!) far too many hats (and yes I carried them in a vintage hat box) and even two matching vintage parasols, for my friend and I to parade around with; in short, more than I would usually take on a week long holiday.

Upon arrival we were greeted by a red carpet and the famous British High Street. Made up like a spaghetti western, all wooden fronted shops, I felt like I had wandered onto a film set. The high street catered for the big brands: John Lewis, The Body Shop and Dr. Martins all had large stores with all the facilities of any other high street shop. It also was the home for the vintage cinema, a traditional British pub and even an Indian take away! The draw of the festival to many though – the vintage stalls – were down the two side streets in tents. These were much more bazaar-like in style; small cramped lines of tents exploding with clothes, accessories, and when it rained (which it did a lot) crammed in people unable to move.


Vintage shopping at Goodwood.

Bands such as The Faces, Buzzcocks, Heaven 17 and the Noisettes entertained the crowds but it was the fashion that was the main draw of the festival. Workshops taught sewing and knitting while Hardy Amies and Pearl and Daisy Lowe were among those with runway shows.


The Noisettes on the main stage.


Pearl and Daisy Lowe at their runway show.

Divided into eras, the festival celebrated five decades of British cool, with each area having a different ‘curator’ (supposed experts in that field).


The 1970s and 1980s zone curated by Greg Wilson featured a warehouse with interactive graffiti wall and a roller disco.

Also in the 1970s era was Eddie Miller’s Soul Casino nightclub – replicating a mid 70s ballroom and reminiscent of many a bad wedding reception, complete with 1970s swirly carpet, sprung dance floor, pool tables and low lighting – it was here that Wayne Hemingway performed his own DJ set on the Sunday.


Wayne Hemingway

The emphasis of the festival was definitely the 1940s and 1950s, however, with the majority of outfits being so themed and with one of the highlights being leading percussionist, producer and 1940s enthusiast Snowboy’s Tanqueray sponsored ‘Torch Club’: a 1940’s style supper club which served 3 course meals over the weekend, with waiter service and a full orchestra playing while you eat. Behind the club forties allotments and land girls held guess-the-weight-of-the-pumpkin competitions and the guys from The Chap held an Olympian event with cucumber sandwich tossing and tug-o-moustache.


Cucumber sandwich tossing at The Chap Olympiad


Moustache tug-o-war

Still in its first year, the festival organisers have room for improvement before next year’s. The website promised ‘an unparalleled attention to design and organisational detail’ which is a little optimistic considering the press pass debacle. Still, this was upheld in areas such as the attention to period detail in all shops and stages and that all events were first come first served and not fully booked up beforehand.
It’s possible the press pass debacle was a result of the PR company giving all 150 staff free weekend and camping tickets… of which apparently only 8 were used!

One stall holder also complained that they felt the festival had been miss-sold as they thought that the vintage stalls were going to be on the main high street not crammed into the side tents.

Whilst a lot of events over the weekend such as dance classes and the cinema were free, the main grumbles were still about the commercial emphasis of the festival, Bonham’s high profile auction, chain stores and a huge emphasis on shopping and spending money left a lot of people disgruntled, but apparently still willing to spend; Oxfam reportedly made £1000 in the first half hour of opening! Lily Allen‘s no-show to launch ‘Lucy in Disguise’ was probably a blessing in disguise as it prevented the focus of the weekend from being celebrity.

The ‘Glamping’ was on all accounts also seen to be a big disappointment. Situated at the bottom of the hill in the woods this area quickly became a muddy bog with the torrential rain and at £1200 for a tent with an airbed was seen as a complete rip off by many who didn’t even have hot showers. The same was true of the pods which had to move some people to tents due to complaints about size and not being able to stand up.


Glamorous campers.

For the regular campers, though, there were no problems. Many vintage tents, bunting strewn camps and campervans were on a chalk based slope which quickly drained and dressing rooms with full length mirrors and power points enabled everyone to dress up.


Dressing up rooms. Photography by Madeleine Lowry

…And dress up they did! Whilst the day trippers favoured fancy dress over true vintage and stuck to the high street, the weekend crowd were the highlight of the festival. A huge ego-boosting weekend, everyone went out of their way to compliment each other on their outfits and a general blitz spirit coupled with the friendly campsite and interactive nature of events ensured that everyone was quick to make new friends.

Overall the weekend offered an overwhelming range of activities to take part in or witness, and hopefully with the kinks ironed out before next year, things can only get better for Goodwood.



Fashion at Goodwood.

You can read our insightful preview of Vintage at Goodwood here, and Amelia’s experience of the festival here.

Who really owns land? This is a question I find myself asking more and more, thumb recently. How can anyone own land? We’ve all seen Pocahontas (and if you haven’t, prostate then hop to. It is a scathing social commentary about the colonial instinct, and also, greed) wherein the eponymous heroine calls on John Smith to address his privilege through the politically incisive medium of song: ‘you think you own whatever land you land on/ the world is just a dead thing you can claim’ and those lyrics mean just as much today as they did when the English wandered over to the New World, disembarked and thought ‘Looks nice, we’ll take it. Giftwrap, please.’
In the Amazon, indigenous tribes who just happen to have lived and hunted the land for generations are getting turfed out by farmers who want to grow their soya crops in the sweeping clearings, full of smouldering stumps and fertile soil, which occur naturally throughout South America. (If you go by the idea that man is natural, and therefore any actions are also ‘natural). Money exchanged hands! Legally (probably), the farmers own the land! But…who did they pay? Who wrote them the deeds to this land? Who owned the land prior to the farmers? Who could possibly have been said to own the land prior to the farmers, except the tribes who lived on the land, knew the land, needed the land to support themselves…and are now increasingly finding themselves in concentrations camps along roadsides? How do you even own land? I think Pocahontas would agree with me that whoever works land, owns land. Whoever lives on land, understands the land and uses the land to benefit themselves and others, without fucking anyone else over, then they might be the people who own that land.

This attitude once led to the premature demolishing of a beautiful piece of art-deco architecture, on my part. The pride of my old hometown was a dilapidated old cinema, dating back to the 1940s. On the basis of ‘you’re not using it, and we want a youth centre’, a friend of mine and I ran all over the place finding people to support us, applying for funding and getting in the newspapers. The owner realised that he, oh noes!, might be called upon to do something NICE for the community, something BENEFICIAL to others! That couldn’t be! No longer being able to ignore the problem, what with our stern and business-like faces staring him out from the pages of the local Gazette, he had it torn down and built shiny, shiny expensive flats on the land instead. Can you spell f-a-i-l?

Luckily, others do better at reclaiming land for community usage than we, and one such group has taken over the Factory in the St. Pauls area of Bristol. An old boot manufacturers, then paper factory (they found a shit-ton of corrugated card in one of the rooms), it is now home to between ten and fourteen residents, and plenty of interested friends and strangers, who have cleared the place of rubble, painted over the old graffiti (from previous squatters, not the paper makers [“Wot, no ring-binders?’]), built a kitchen, and are doing their best to set up and host a pleasant, rent-free space for the use of the community.
The act of squatting to claim land is the oldest mode of tenure in the world according to Colin Ward (anarchist and squatting expert), and we are all descended from squatters, even the Queen. So, just like institutionalised homophobia and racism, it’s traditional! We’re allowed. There are a variety of reasons for squatting, but many based around the fact that people are homeless and houses are empty. Jim Radford, a long-time organiser with the Advisory Service for Squatters, points out that squatting can seen as political, but most people are just doing what they can to a get a roof over their heads. The personal, however, is always political and the fact that one person can ‘own’ property they don’t use while others are moved along nightly for the perceived crime of not having anywhere else to go is, frankly, illogical. And fucking nuts.

The Factory aims to be a social centre for the use of anybody who has a project or a plan or a pair of hands to help with, and while the occupiers may not be overtly political, the place definitely makes a statement about the self-interested, self-aggrandising attitude we are presented with daily in ‘mainstream’ society. I dropped by prior to one of their open days, had a tour and spent the best part of twenty minutes attacking a Venetian blind with a Stanley knife to help fix it in time for the film showing the next day. The place is huge and a hive of activity as residents and fellow droppers-in painted walls, put up shelves, cooked and made delicious vegan cakes for the next day. The first two floors are used for social gatherings, comprising the trapeze teaching area, film screening room, kiddie area (where some big kids were playing with drills and putting wooden animals up around the walls) the soon-to-be community kitchen, bike enclosure, zine library and function room, with apothecary! The top two floors are residential from which the delicious smell of carrot cake spills out of the enormous and gorgeous handmade kitchen, and the roof is where the herb garden lives and gives an amazing view of the rooftop world of Bristol. It is better than any house I know that people have paid to live in.

Squatting itself is not illegal since it is considered a civil matter. (Also, trespassers cannot be prosecuted! The things you learn…) Most squats have a copy of Section 6 of the Criminal Law act 1977 up at the front door, and so long as squatters have secure access to the building and at least one person is always on-site the owner and/or police cannot break in to ‘regain’ access. Many landlords discourage squatting by gutting their unused residences, destroying the stairs and dismantling the plumbing. Better an empty and destroyed house than people live in it without monetary profit to someone who claims ownership! Some people are not put off by such petty indulgences however. As I was led around the cavernous and intricate building (there are ladders, everywhere) I was told about the rubble filling some of the rooms and the graffiti left by the previous squatters…both long gone.

Every month the Factory hosts an open day, providing vegan cake (I really, really liked the cake) and informal guided tours with historical facts (“Here’s where we had the rubble party…a Brazilian football team stayed in this room…”), a fruit and veg stall (skipped!) and films shown in the cinema. On Thursdays, meetings are held to discuss ways of utilising the space which people want to put into practice, as well as just getting to know who’s who and what they do. The website encourages anyone to drop in for a cup of tea and a chat if they happen to wander by, although Mondays through Wednesdays are designated work days if you fancy getting your hands dirty.

Prior to the open day I had dropped in for a talk on Men Against Patriarchy but nobody I asked seemed to know there was a meeting going on. Such are non-hierarchical organisations, I find. Not disorganised, but few with a complete knowledge of what goes on! Having been used to Brownies and Guides and showing up, sitting down and getting told what the agenda is for the day, to show up, wander round and be expected to create my own agenda is a little disconcerting. On the open day itself, after snaffling some dark chocolate and apricot refrigerator cake, I sat upstairs in the function room reading a zine about sexism in anarchist organisations, feeling cosy, if not involved. The gent there to give the talk on guerilla gardening wandered in and we bonded with over vegan cake and Veggies burgers. Later I ventured out and chatted to Theo, who advised me to talk to Darren if I was interested in one day running my own community café since the next big in-Factory project is getting the downstairs kitchen set up for just that reason and Darren was the guy who did most of the fruit and veg skipping. So! I did not find Darren that day but hopefully the Factory will continue to be occupied by these people who want to turn it into a safe and comfortable place for all and any sorts of people, who may or may have anywhere else to go, but who share a common interest in, well, each other and the community in which they live.

Categories ,anarchist, ,bristol, ,Colin Ward, ,factory, ,squat, ,squatting, ,St Pauls, ,vegan

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Amelia’s Magazine | Squatting in the Community: Bristol’s Factory Reoccupied

I have to honestly admit that I don’t really THINK about sustainability in my everyday life. I even recycle without thinking because it is such a natural process to me. You don’t consciously think about why you drink tea from a cup and not from a bowl or why you pee into the toilet and not into the basin.  
I think you’re only truly sustainable when it’s a part of your way of life, healing just like a diet is pointless unless you actually change your lifestyle and habits. In keeping with this, shop I came across a test with a perfectly relevant name: “My Habbit“. You can check out your own carbon footprint and you might be surprised at how easy it is to change really small habits. 

Whilst taking the test it visualises your carbon footprint in the form of a strange and creepy semi-alien computer-generated human body. Proportionally distorting a human’s body parts in order to visualise your disproportionate use, you work your way through the different stages of sustainability. For instance, if you use a lot of electricity, you head starts to look more and more like a skeleton. The more meat you eat, the fatter your belly gets. Electricity and gas expands your hands, travel expands your feet until it looks like an almost bursting balloon. Mine looked pretty normal at the end, but it still had suggestions for me to better myself. But how did I even come across this test? 

“So, a guy came into the office today to borrow some of our paper, which was recycled and said ‘So are you trying to save the world or summin?’ (sic) to which I wanted to start replying but by the time I said ‘Um..’ he said ‘Then stop driving!’ I obviously replied ‘I don’t drive’ and he said ‘Oh’ and walked off. What’s the dude hassling me for?” 
This is a snippet of a conversation I had during dinner today, where it transpired that me being a vegetarian and not having a car actually makes me “pretty green” according to a test my partner had taken during the workshop he held at the “Sustainable Future” exhibition at the Design Museum. I was immediately intrigued. This may have been mainly due to the fact that I was fairly certain I was going to come out of the other end of the tunnel with a result to be proud of (aka something to show off about).  

I already knew some of the reasons that were going to be to my advantage. I work from home, which means that in average, I use the underground only once a week in for meetings or events in town. I have only travelled by plane once in the past year (last November, in fact), which is highly unusual and mainly down to the fact that work has happily consumed all my time. Either way, I knew it was going to make me look good in the test. I walk to the shops, and buy most of my food and fabric (I am a fashion designer) in the local market where things are mainly locally sourced. I’m very lazy when it comes to anything that is essential to life such as sleep, eating and washing. That’s only of advantage because I own a lot of clothes, which means I very rarely have to actually wash any of them. My washing machine is extremely underused.  

Furthermore, since we’re on the subject of big white goods, I don’t own a dishwasher or tumble dryer or any such machinery. I recycle everything from paper snippets to plastic to glass to fabric. I would say “tins” but I don’t really use them. As I mentioned before, most my food moves directly form the bowl of vegetables of the farmer’s table into my Longchamp shopping bag into my vegetable drawer. Another point that I knew was going to help me look good in this test was the fact that I’m a vegetarian. Apparently, that makes a difference although I’m still not quite sure why. Surely any food needs to be transported, worked on? Do feel free to enlighten me if you know. 

Returning to the subject of technical items, I don’t watch TV. I have a TV set for watching a DVD every now and then, but I usually prefer to work, and the TV is of course unplugged when I don’t use it because otherwise it makes a very annoying humming noise when it’s on standby. I unplug my printers, sewing machines, hair straighteners etc when I’m not using them.

People who don’t live with me would never believe it, but I’d rather look like a couch potato wearing three jackets (I’m at home, right?) than turn on the heating unnecessarily. In fact, the heating is completely switched off until the temperature drops below 10 degrees Celsius for more than a week, which doesn’t make me very popular with my housemates.  

We were given some free sustainable light bulbs when we last switched gas and electricity companies, which we use throughout the house and half of the fluorescent light bulbs we have in our office have burned out and we are too lazy to replace them.

This one is a big deal, but not a topic that gave me any extra credit during the test. About 80% of my wardrobe (including my shoes) is either second hand, vintage or passed on in some form or another through eBay, TK Maxx, in the form of presents from family and friends, inherited pieces, charity shops etc. This does not, however, mean that I don’t indulge my fashion sense, as a quick peek into the style section of my website will confirm. 

I don’t listen to the radio, I don’t have a CD player or stereo because I have all my music on my Mac and iPhone – who knew being this non-nostalgic about music, could turn into a blessing? 

We have an agreement with our landlord who sends round a gardener every two months. Officially, any carbon footprint they amass during their work is technically not mine, so I am not counting it. The grass is yellow from the few days of “heat” this lame English summer had, but I don’t really see that as my responsibility and as far as I can tell, I don’t think the gardeners ever water the grass – they simpy cut it even shorter and dryer and pick up the leaves. 

Some of the questions in the test were difficult. For instance, I had to look up which type of light bulbs we actually use. They cleverly adjust the optimum “habit” you could have at the end and suggest ways in which you can better yourself, even if your carbon emission is as low as one could realistically imagine. 

However, there were aspects of importance that were not quite taken into consideration. A big issue, which could tip someone’s carbon print (especially among us fashionistas and fahsionistos, eh?)  is our shopping and consumption habits beyond mere primary necessity (food). Do you buy online? Are your purchase shipped or flown from overseas or do you make sure buy locally? Do you shop in chain supermarkets or local markets? How much stuff do you own? Do you buy from Primark or second hand? Do you buy per trend and season or do you invest in pieces that you have worn for decades? Do you tend to consume actual objects such electric equipment, decorative items, clothing or something altogether different? 

There are also questions relating to your profession that are not taken into consideration at all. For instance, the test asks you whether you use a printer at home, but not whether you use a printer at work. How much paper do you use and waste, knowing you’re not paying for it? I’ll forgive them for not asking office-related questions, though, as this could get very detailed and complex. But what about mobile phones? No sign of their impact.

Having an iPhone, which I use for work, means I charge my phone up a lot more often than, say, someone who works in a shop and turns theirs off for most of the day. As anybody who owns an iPhone knows, as much as we love them – the battery of the iPhone is abysmal. It needs charging ALL the time. Surely the test should be asking about the different phones one has, the same way they asked about what type of TV I own? On the other hand, I charge my iPhone via my laptop – this means less electricity is used. You can see, the questions can be quite endless, but an essential acknowledgement of such basics would have improved the test. 
Many of my friends and colleagues are writers or need to write in some form or another. When you do your writing, do you do it online or offline? That sounds like it would make no difference, but it does. Here’s a good illustrating example, which has astounded quite a lot of people when I’ve mentioned it. 

One of the questions in the questionnaire is how often you boil the kettle. Did you know that every time you do a search on google it uses as much electricity and power from the mighty google servers as it does to boil a full kettle? A question in the test, if I have had any say, should have been “Do you look up the tiniest question on google rather than trying to think that second longer in case you remember?” Do you maybe have a real life dictionary (oh wonder and glory), which can help you just as much? Yes, one should consider the production cost of making said book, but for the sake of the argument, let’s assume it’s a vintage book, which still holds perfectly updated descriptions of most words we know. If it doesn’t, you can STILL use Google, Wikipedia or an online dictionary. But not doing so immediately would reduce your carbon footprint more than you think… 

I am a great believer in the fact that until something is accepted as normal, it has not really been overcome. Until it is, the obstacle of integration is not complete. I feel this is the way with sustainability. I grew up with it, so it was quite strange for me to see what fuss people made about being sustainable – it was new to me. Once people embrace it as part of their lives, it will be a lot easier. You hear campaigns telling you to “be aware” and “do your part” as if most of these acts weren’t perfectly logical. I disagree. Sure, some people just don’t admit to perfectly basic knowledge being obvious, and need those hints and tips, and none of us are perfect and continue to be educated. However, the obsession of making recycling something to be conscious about is not going to help. Only once it’s truly and easily integrated into our lives in a manner that is natural to participate in will sustainability really be standard practice.


All photography by Maria Domican

I was nervous upon arriving at Vintage at Goodwood… Nervous because I had called in sick to work, order nervous because I had been hearing bad press about the event and mainly nervous because I had no idea what to expect.

I have to admit, abortion no matter how fashionable, arty and eco driven a festival is, a major emphasis has always been on being drunk and having a great, if somewhat crazy time… I couldn’t imagine myself getting wasted on ‘classic cocktails’ or ‘gin and tonics’, parading around campsites in my beloved vintage treasures and sleeping through bands in a dusty heap at Goodwood. Apparently that was exactly the crowd that organiser Wayne Hemingway was eager to discourage, not wanting those “out on the lash that leave a load of empty tins at their ripped tent”.

Goodwood was billed as ‘the first of what will be an annual music and fashion led celebration of creative British cool’ ‘The new festival of Britain’. But what was it? A vintage Fashion Fair? An exhibition? Or a festival? Featuring music, art, fashion, film and design I was puzzled as to how it would all come together.

None the less I was excited… I had packed a few of my 2nd favourite dresses (the dirt was still a worry!) far too many hats (and yes I carried them in a vintage hat box) and even two matching vintage parasols, for my friend and I to parade around with; in short, more than I would usually take on a week long holiday.

Upon arrival we were greeted by a red carpet and the famous British High Street. Made up like a spaghetti western, all wooden fronted shops, I felt like I had wandered onto a film set. The high street catered for the big brands: John Lewis, The Body Shop and Dr. Martins all had large stores with all the facilities of any other high street shop. It also was the home for the vintage cinema, a traditional British pub and even an Indian take away! The draw of the festival to many though – the vintage stalls – were down the two side streets in tents. These were much more bazaar-like in style; small cramped lines of tents exploding with clothes, accessories, and when it rained (which it did a lot) crammed in people unable to move.


Vintage shopping at Goodwood.

Bands such as The Faces, Buzzcocks, Heaven 17 and the Noisettes entertained the crowds but it was the fashion that was the main draw of the festival. Workshops taught sewing and knitting while Hardy Amies and Pearl and Daisy Lowe were among those with runway shows.


The Noisettes on the main stage.


Pearl and Daisy Lowe at their runway show.

Divided into eras, the festival celebrated five decades of British cool, with each area having a different ‘curator’ (supposed experts in that field).


The 1970s and 1980s zone curated by Greg Wilson featured a warehouse with interactive graffiti wall and a roller disco.

Also in the 1970s era was Eddie Miller’s Soul Casino nightclub – replicating a mid 70s ballroom and reminiscent of many a bad wedding reception, complete with 1970s swirly carpet, sprung dance floor, pool tables and low lighting – it was here that Wayne Hemingway performed his own DJ set on the Sunday.


Wayne Hemingway

The emphasis of the festival was definitely the 1940s and 1950s, however, with the majority of outfits being so themed and with one of the highlights being leading percussionist, producer and 1940s enthusiast Snowboy’s Tanqueray sponsored ‘Torch Club’: a 1940’s style supper club which served 3 course meals over the weekend, with waiter service and a full orchestra playing while you eat. Behind the club forties allotments and land girls held guess-the-weight-of-the-pumpkin competitions and the guys from The Chap held an Olympian event with cucumber sandwich tossing and tug-o-moustache.


Cucumber sandwich tossing at The Chap Olympiad


Moustache tug-o-war

Still in its first year, the festival organisers have room for improvement before next year’s. The website promised ‘an unparalleled attention to design and organisational detail’ which is a little optimistic considering the press pass debacle. Still, this was upheld in areas such as the attention to period detail in all shops and stages and that all events were first come first served and not fully booked up beforehand.
It’s possible the press pass debacle was a result of the PR company giving all 150 staff free weekend and camping tickets… of which apparently only 8 were used!

One stall holder also complained that they felt the festival had been miss-sold as they thought that the vintage stalls were going to be on the main high street not crammed into the side tents.

Whilst a lot of events over the weekend such as dance classes and the cinema were free, the main grumbles were still about the commercial emphasis of the festival, Bonham’s high profile auction, chain stores and a huge emphasis on shopping and spending money left a lot of people disgruntled, but apparently still willing to spend; Oxfam reportedly made £1000 in the first half hour of opening! Lily Allen‘s no-show to launch ‘Lucy in Disguise’ was probably a blessing in disguise as it prevented the focus of the weekend from being celebrity.

The ‘Glamping’ was on all accounts also seen to be a big disappointment. Situated at the bottom of the hill in the woods this area quickly became a muddy bog with the torrential rain and at £1200 for a tent with an airbed was seen as a complete rip off by many who didn’t even have hot showers. The same was true of the pods which had to move some people to tents due to complaints about size and not being able to stand up.


Glamorous campers.

For the regular campers, though, there were no problems. Many vintage tents, bunting strewn camps and campervans were on a chalk based slope which quickly drained and dressing rooms with full length mirrors and power points enabled everyone to dress up.


Dressing up rooms. Photography by Madeleine Lowry

…And dress up they did! Whilst the day trippers favoured fancy dress over true vintage and stuck to the high street, the weekend crowd were the highlight of the festival. A huge ego-boosting weekend, everyone went out of their way to compliment each other on their outfits and a general blitz spirit coupled with the friendly campsite and interactive nature of events ensured that everyone was quick to make new friends.

Overall the weekend offered an overwhelming range of activities to take part in or witness, and hopefully with the kinks ironed out before next year, things can only get better for Goodwood.



Fashion at Goodwood.

You can read our insightful preview of Vintage at Goodwood here, and Amelia’s experience of the festival here.

Who really owns land? This is a question I find myself asking more and more, thumb recently. How can anyone own land? We’ve all seen Pocahontas (and if you haven’t, prostate then hop to. It is a scathing social commentary about the colonial instinct, and also, greed) wherein the eponymous heroine calls on John Smith to address his privilege through the politically incisive medium of song: ‘you think you own whatever land you land on/ the world is just a dead thing you can claim’ and those lyrics mean just as much today as they did when the English wandered over to the New World, disembarked and thought ‘Looks nice, we’ll take it. Giftwrap, please.’
In the Amazon, indigenous tribes who just happen to have lived and hunted the land for generations are getting turfed out by farmers who want to grow their soya crops in the sweeping clearings, full of smouldering stumps and fertile soil, which occur naturally throughout South America. (If you go by the idea that man is natural, and therefore any actions are also ‘natural). Money exchanged hands! Legally (probably), the farmers own the land! But…who did they pay? Who wrote them the deeds to this land? Who owned the land prior to the farmers? Who could possibly have been said to own the land prior to the farmers, except the tribes who lived on the land, knew the land, needed the land to support themselves…and are now increasingly finding themselves in concentrations camps along roadsides? How do you even own land? I think Pocahontas would agree with me that whoever works land, owns land. Whoever lives on land, understands the land and uses the land to benefit themselves and others, without fucking anyone else over, then they might be the people who own that land.

This attitude once led to the premature demolishing of a beautiful piece of art-deco architecture, on my part. The pride of my old hometown was a dilapidated old cinema, dating back to the 1940s. On the basis of ‘you’re not using it, and we want a youth centre’, a friend of mine and I ran all over the place finding people to support us, applying for funding and getting in the newspapers. The owner realised that he, oh noes!, might be called upon to do something NICE for the community, something BENEFICIAL to others! That couldn’t be! No longer being able to ignore the problem, what with our stern and business-like faces staring him out from the pages of the local Gazette, he had it torn down and built shiny, shiny expensive flats on the land instead. Can you spell f-a-i-l?

Luckily, others do better at reclaiming land for community usage than we, and one such group has taken over the Factory in the St. Pauls area of Bristol. An old boot manufacturers, then paper factory (they found a shit-ton of corrugated card in one of the rooms), it is now home to between ten and fourteen residents, and plenty of interested friends and strangers, who have cleared the place of rubble, painted over the old graffiti (from previous squatters, not the paper makers [“Wot, no ring-binders?’]), built a kitchen, and are doing their best to set up and host a pleasant, rent-free space for the use of the community.
The act of squatting to claim land is the oldest mode of tenure in the world according to Colin Ward (anarchist and squatting expert), and we are all descended from squatters, even the Queen. So, just like institutionalised homophobia and racism, it’s traditional! We’re allowed. There are a variety of reasons for squatting, but many based around the fact that people are homeless and houses are empty. Jim Radford, a long-time organiser with the Advisory Service for Squatters, points out that squatting can seen as political, but most people are just doing what they can to a get a roof over their heads. The personal, however, is always political and the fact that one person can ‘own’ property they don’t use while others are moved along nightly for the perceived crime of not having anywhere else to go is, frankly, illogical. And fucking nuts.

The Factory aims to be a social centre for the use of anybody who has a project or a plan or a pair of hands to help with, and while the occupiers may not be overtly political, the place definitely makes a statement about the self-interested, self-aggrandising attitude we are presented with daily in ‘mainstream’ society. I dropped by prior to one of their open days, had a tour and spent the best part of twenty minutes attacking a Venetian blind with a Stanley knife to help fix it in time for the film showing the next day. The place is huge and a hive of activity as residents and fellow droppers-in painted walls, put up shelves, cooked and made delicious vegan cakes for the next day. The first two floors are used for social gatherings, comprising the trapeze teaching area, film screening room, kiddie area (where some big kids were playing with drills and putting wooden animals up around the walls) the soon-to-be community kitchen, bike enclosure, zine library and function room, with apothecary! The top two floors are residential from which the delicious smell of carrot cake spills out of the enormous and gorgeous handmade kitchen, and the roof is where the herb garden lives and gives an amazing view of the rooftop world of Bristol. It is better than any house I know that people have paid to live in.

Squatting itself is not illegal since it is considered a civil matter. (Also, trespassers cannot be prosecuted! The things you learn…) Most squats have a copy of Section 6 of the Criminal Law act 1977 up at the front door, and so long as squatters have secure access to the building and at least one person is always on-site the owner and/or police cannot break in to ‘regain’ access. Many landlords discourage squatting by gutting their unused residences, destroying the stairs and dismantling the plumbing. Better an empty and destroyed house than people live in it without monetary profit to someone who claims ownership! Some people are not put off by such petty indulgences however. As I was led around the cavernous and intricate building (there are ladders, everywhere) I was told about the rubble filling some of the rooms and the graffiti left by the previous squatters…both long gone.

Every month the Factory hosts an open day, providing vegan cake (I really, really liked the cake) and informal guided tours with historical facts (“Here’s where we had the rubble party…a Brazilian football team stayed in this room…”), a fruit and veg stall (skipped!) and films shown in the cinema. On Thursdays, meetings are held to discuss ways of utilising the space which people want to put into practice, as well as just getting to know who’s who and what they do. The website encourages anyone to drop in for a cup of tea and a chat if they happen to wander by, although Mondays through Wednesdays are designated work days if you fancy getting your hands dirty.

Prior to the open day I had dropped in for a talk on Men Against Patriarchy but nobody I asked seemed to know there was a meeting going on. Such are non-hierarchical organisations, I find. Not disorganised, but few with a complete knowledge of what goes on! Having been used to Brownies and Guides and showing up, sitting down and getting told what the agenda is for the day, to show up, wander round and be expected to create my own agenda is a little disconcerting. On the open day itself, after snaffling some dark chocolate and apricot refrigerator cake, I sat upstairs in the function room reading a zine about sexism in anarchist organisations, feeling cosy, if not involved. The gent there to give the talk on guerilla gardening wandered in and we bonded with over vegan cake and Veggies burgers. Later I ventured out and chatted to Theo, who advised me to talk to Darren if I was interested in one day running my own community café since the next big in-Factory project is getting the downstairs kitchen set up for just that reason and Darren was the guy who did most of the fruit and veg skipping. So! I did not find Darren that day but hopefully the Factory will continue to be occupied by these people who want to turn it into a safe and comfortable place for all and any sorts of people, who may or may have anywhere else to go, but who share a common interest in, well, each other and the community in which they live.

Categories ,anarchist, ,bristol, ,Colin Ward, ,factory, ,squat, ,squatting, ,St Pauls, ,vegan

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Amelia’s Magazine | Invisible Circus: No Dress Rehearsal – A Documentary by Naomi Smyth

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Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W 2011 Collection, find buy information pills illustration by Abby Wright

The BFC Tent is massive. Or a lot bigger than the other show spaces. But the benches are the same; white and hard. I went to where I was supposed to be seated and realised it was smack bang in the middle of an already super full bench. I went to the end of the bench; “Any…? No, no, ok then. Thanks.” Luckily a man on the bench behind saved me by shifting up a bit and motioning towards the space he’d made. “Ah wonderful, thanks!” I sort of wanted to chat with him, but found the non-moving up people – now before me- much more interesting. Yabbering and air kissing their faces off with some other people in another row. They went from exceptionally animated and friendly to bored and motionless in second. They reminded me of whippets. The BFC was packed, rammed, up to the brim. Before long, it went dark. The wall of photographers were in their pyramid, like hyeneas, eyes blazing, they were poised…some of them taking shots for no apparent reason. Or, just in case something ridiculous happens.

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Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W 2011 Collection, illustration by Jenny Robins

Big shoulders, high necklines, victoriana, huge circle skirts, sashes over shoulders, trouser suits with extra long legs and short jackets, balooning at the middle slightly, and beautiful midi length skirt suits with puffed shoulders. The shoes were angular or strappy, and the hair either blown up, or short and sharply pointed. But as the show continued, the more dramatic it became. The start featured outfits you could happily wear to a whole host of occasions, all fitted, 60s shapes with Victorian influences, in reds, black, grey and teal, but then it went MAD.

CorrieNielsen_LFW_MattBramford_020CorrieNielsen_LFW_MattBramford_019CorrieNielsen_LFW_MattBramford_016CorrieNielsen_LFW_MattBramford_014 Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W 2011 Collection: Photography by Matt Bramford

It was fantastic. Everything got extremely vulumnious. Enormous jackets, enveloping the models in shells of silky, padded looking fabrics. Deep purples, teals and bold reds came streaming out. Waist and neck detailing included ruffles, pleats and knots. Skirts were bubbled and swathing. Some were paired with sheer, ruffling tops, others; tight corsets. Many of the models also wore wide headbands, which added to the historic, modern twist charm, mixing modern design with 60s and the late 1800s. And making it work surprising well.

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Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W 2011 Collection: Photography by Amelia Gregory

Then two show stopper dresses came out. One nearly pure, off white with a hooped top skirt, corseted top, long train and beautiful headpiece, wrapped around the model’s blonde hair. With ballet satin encased feet, this was ghostly, heavenly and adventurous in one. It appealed to me through its theatre, gracefulness and just off purity. The dress had character, frivolity and fantasy wrapped up. Spiced up innocence, a thrown out of her castle, princess. What did she do to be ejected? For me, although more Elizabethan perhaps in design than Victorian, this was Hardy’s; Tess of the d’Urbervilles. Walking over the hills, her boots worn through, her daze; a story.

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Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W 2011 Collection: Photography by Matt Bramford

In contrast, the next dress was BLACK. It reminded me of Queen Victoria herself, mixed with Queen Elizabeth I. Then with the addition of Helena Bonham-Carter and Tilda Swinton. Exploded hair, Elnett insanity, all rough, a bit haphazard and COOL. Together with the most over-ruffled, incredible dress, fit for a QUEEN, it was an explosion. Black as the darkest night, but with a slight shine, like the moon reflecting, the material was reminiscent of a glassy ocean at night. The neck was high, ruffled, starched and stretched down to the waist. The sleeves puffed at the top, then tightened to the wrists. Then the skirt was full and glorious, with a train behind. It was like watching the night fairy, or a stunning, black widow spider move along the catwalk. Deadly. She would have destroyed the off white, semi angel in seconds. It was the ‘other’ side of our heroine, Tess of the d’Urbervilles, downbeat on the moors. Or indeed, 19th century’s; Emily Brontë’s, Wuthering Heights. With Cathy, depressed at the Wuthering Heights estate, angered and serious, yet of course, utterly beautiful. I wish the show had been on the Yorkshire Moors (I don’t), as the dress would have looked sensational, with the wind whipping about and the layers of fabric billowing. The semi angel would have been on a deserted beach in Scotland, or a corn field. I wonder where Corrie would have placed them.

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Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W Collection, illustration by Jenny Robins

Dear Wuthering Heights, I quote thou: ‘Catherine Earnshaw, may you not rest as long as I am living; you said I killed you—haunt me, then! The murdered do haunt their murderers, I believe. I know that ghosts have wandered on earth. Be with me always—take any form—drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh, God! it is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!’

I hope you see what I mean.

Jenny Robins’ and Abby Wright’s illustrations can also be found in Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration, available here.

Illustrations by Ankolie

Even the invitation to this show had me excited; detail of a vintage toile print on a fabric corset lined with vintage style brass buttons and the byline ‘inspired by the court of Louis XV when art became frivolous’ grabbed my attention.Because all of this is frivolous, for sale isn’t it?We’re in the middle of a recession and yet here we are, still feeding are obsession with fashion and art because it has become such an integral part of our lives.Combining fashion and music is a big part of my job as a stylist to musicians, so opening the show with Analize Ching on the violin was a big hit with me, followed by wonderful orchestral music that evoked the atmosphere of a French royal court.


I’d been a little underwhelmed by a lot of very drab Autumn/Winter collections, where hues vary only from black,to greys, some cream and back to black. The colours Prophetik used are all natural, with plum shades blended from madder root, rumex, logwood and indigo, and burgundy mixed from madder root, curled dock and gallnut. Adding yet more splashes of colour and prints were the quilted pieces, handed down from Jeff’s grandmother Lola from Tennesse. Hemp, cactus silk and ostrich feathers provided stunning texture and shape to the pieces. Accessories label ‘Dotted Loop’ provided reworked vintage accessories and even the shoes were made from vegetable-tanned leather.


Its rare that I can get at all excited by menswear, but the pieces in this collection spoke to the avid period-drama fan inside me. Military inspired jackets and riding boots?Phwoar.Yes please. Jeff himself appeared at the end showing how the look can be worked, though I’m sure he could probably get a way with wearing pretty much anything and still look like he just finished writing poetry/surfing/horse-riding; all listed as his hobbies.Only someone this comfortable with his masculinity could design coats for men made out of pastel pink quilts.


Corsets, tailored jackets and voluminous skirts; Jeff is very good at designing clothes for real women’s bodies.He recently dressed the lovely Livia Firth for the 2011 Golden Globes, and I can only imagine that his celebrity following will continue to increase.The final dress, ‘Mrs Moulton’ features ostrich feathers that shed naturally twice a year (from the ostrich, not the dress-that would be a high maintenance frock indeed) hand sewn on white silk and organza- I can totally picture this as a celebrity wedding dress.Watch this space.


I’ll leave you with Jeff’s take on Renaissance Art.I think it’s very interesting considering our current pre-occupation with all things vintage.
‘Renaissance art is not a rebirth as one implies, but freedom from the past. Unconcerned with what has been said or done, living in the present with an immediate relation to all things…achievement does not birth beauty but raw effort confessing its own failures and in the confession is the beauty of Art.’



Illustrations by Alexandra Rolfe

It was a mighty long trek from the main fashion activity at Somerset House to 33 Portland Place for my first show of the A/W 2011 season. As it was bStore, for sale and as 33 Portland Place is stunning (the location for much of the recent filming of The King’s Speech), and I thought it much worth the effort. Amazingly, about it arriving at 6:23 for a 6:30 show I still managed to be first in the queue. Which luckily meant I was first to get a cocktail when the doors finally opened.

bStore were obviously out to put on an intimate and relaxed show for ‘friends’. The cocktails were stunning (well done – best Mojito I have had in ages) and the drawing room we were all ushered into to settle into the evening definitely set the tone. As the room filled it also became obvious that the gathered audience were bang right-on bStore target; urban gentlemen and ladies in the up-to-date yet classically English look that bStore helps to promote. I especially favoured the lovely American woman who had had a little too much to drink, tottered on me and my bags and then had to prop herself against the wall as her ‘heels were far too high’ (if you are reading this, you know who you are!).

Cocktail downed and people watching over, we made our way into the show area. Tightly packed and with live band playing (as with the cocktails, very good) we all took places throughout the two rooms that made the runway circuit. bStore got this location just right, the slightly disused English club room feel suited the brand to a T.

Unfortunately, this is about where the amazing parts of the show came to an end. In dim lighting the first model came out, but he was halfway around the circuit before most of the audience realised the show had actually started. I believe there were two reasons for this: (1) as the lighting was so dim, the model was literally walking in shadows, and (2) the model didn’t look any different to the assembled crowd, it was hard to tell audience and model apart. The parade of models followed as we squinted in the dark to see what was on offer. Muted ochres, burgundies and black on clothes kept to the signature bStore look. Slightly tailored English, slightly American grungy, with the same proportions bStore has been following for a number of seasons now. Don’t get me wrong, I’m usually a big bStore fan and there was nothing here that was awful. Most of it was immensely wearable and if it was my first bStore encounter I would have been more ecstatic (but still squinting, why were there no lights? It’s a fundamental part of this process, surely?). But knowing what bStore offers, this show didn’t really bring anything new to the brand and left me feeling a bit meh. Competent? Yes. Enjoyable? Yes. Groundbreaking? Nope.

Illustrations by Alexandra Rolfe

It was a mighty long trek from the main fashion activity at Somerset House to 33 Portland Place for my first show of the A/W 2011 season. As it was bStore, capsule and as 33 Portland Place is stunning (the location for much of the recent filming of The King’s Speech), I thought it much worth the effort. Amazingly, arriving at 6:23 for a 6:30 show I still managed to be first in the queue. Which luckily meant I was first to get a cocktail when the doors finally opened.

bStore were obviously out to put on an intimate and relaxed show for ‘friends’. The cocktails were stunning (well done – best Mojito I have had in ages) and the drawing room we were all ushered into to settle into the evening definitely set the tone. As the room filled it also became obvious that the gathered audience were bang right-on bStore target; urban gentlemen and ladies in the up-to-date yet classically English look that bStore helps to promote. I especially favoured the lovely American woman who had had a little too much to drink, tottered on me and my bags and then had to prop herself against the wall as her ‘heels were far too high’ (if you are reading this, you know who you are!).

Cocktail downed and people watching over, we made our way into the show area. Tightly packed and with live band playing (as with the cocktails, very good) we all took places throughout the two rooms that made the runway circuit. bStore got this location just right, the slightly disused English club room feel suited the brand to a T.

Unfortunately, this is about where the amazing parts of the show came to an end. In dim lighting the first model came out, but he was halfway around the circuit before most of the audience realised the show had actually started. I believe there were two reasons for this: (1) as the lighting was so dim, the model was literally walking in shadows, and (2) the model didn’t look any different to the assembled crowd, it was hard to tell audience and model apart. The parade of models followed as we squinted in the dark to see what was on offer. Muted ochres, burgundies and black on clothes kept to the signature bStore look. Slightly tailored English, slightly American grungy, with the same proportions bStore has been following for a number of seasons now. Don’t get me wrong, I’m usually a big bStore fan and there was nothing here that was awful. Most of it was immensely wearable and if it was my first bStore encounter I would have been more ecstatic (but still squinting, why were there no lights? It’s a fundamental part of this process, surely?). But knowing what bStore offers, this show didn’t really bring anything new to the brand and left me feeling a bit meh. Competent? Yes. Enjoyable? Yes. Groundbreaking? Nope.


Illustrations by Alexandra Rolfe

It was a mighty long trek from the main fashion activity at Somerset House to 33 Portland Place for my first show of the A/W 2011 season. As it was bStore, price and as 33 Portland Place is stunning (the location for much of the recent filming of The King’s Speech), generic I thought it much worth the effort. Amazingly, site arriving at 6:23 for a 6:30 show I still managed to be first in the queue. Which luckily meant I was first to get a cocktail when the doors finally opened.

bStore were obviously out to put on an intimate and relaxed show for ‘friends’. The cocktails were stunning (well done – best Mojito I have had in ages) and the drawing room we were all ushered into to settle into the evening definitely set the tone. As the room filled it also became obvious that the gathered audience were bang right-on bStore target; urban gentlemen and ladies in the up-to-date yet classically English look that bStore helps to promote. I especially favoured the lovely American woman who had had a little too much to drink, tottered on me and my bags and then had to prop herself against the wall as her ‘heels were far too high’ (if you are reading this, you know who you are!).

Cocktail downed and people watching over, we made our way into the show area. Tightly packed and with live band playing (as with the cocktails, very good) we all took places throughout the two rooms that made the runway circuit. bStore got this location just right, the slightly disused English club room feel suited the brand to a T.

Unfortunately, this is about where the amazing parts of the show came to an end. In dim lighting the first model came out, but he was halfway around the circuit before most of the audience realised the show had actually started. I believe there were two reasons for this: (1) as the lighting was so dim, the model was literally walking in shadows, and (2) the model didn’t look any different to the assembled crowd, it was hard to tell audience and model apart. The parade of models followed as we squinted in the dark to see what was on offer. Muted ochres, burgundies and black on clothes kept to the signature bStore look. Slightly tailored English, slightly American grungy, with the same proportions bStore has been following for a number of seasons now. Don’t get me wrong, I’m usually a big bStore fan and there was nothing here that was awful. Most of it was immensely wearable and if it was my first bStore encounter I would have been more ecstatic (but still squinting, why were there no lights? It’s a fundamental part of this process, surely?). But knowing what bStore offers, this show didn’t really bring anything new to the brand and left me feeling a bit meh. Competent? Yes. Enjoyable? Yes. Groundbreaking? Nope.
Gemma Milly-Invisible Circus
Illustration by Gemma Milly

I’m reading Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen at the moment. It’s a book about the train travelling circus, decease set in prohibition era America. The story flits from the 1930s to the present day. Whilst highlighting the protagonist’s age and the unavoidable changes to his body, information pills mind and soul, it also mutters under its breath of the stark changes within the circus world. The book depicts the ‘old’ circus as full of hardship – pure blood, sweat and tears stuff. The modern circuses are seen as refined pieces of machinery, in a factory made of satin. Is the magic lost within this? A touch of the romanticism? The circus’s underground beginnings would never have seen itself hovering pleasantly next to the Sherif’s house, yet now they are as above board as the Queen… aren’t they? I digress, the circus is glorious! Of course it is! BUT, there within the drama, a snatch of a risk, a missed heartbeat, a creative explosion, that’s the kind of circus I want to see.

There is one circus, The Invisible Circus, who hold all and more of the magic that comes with the old and new; from the hard graft and creativity, to the luxury/despairs of liberation. I’ve been fascinated with them since I moved to Bristol, where they’re based. The group squat in various disused buildings, clean them up and use the spaces for creative expression; for The Invisible Circus. I was lucky enough to go to a screening of Naomi Smyth‘s documentary on The Invisible Circus, which involved her following them for several years, becoming part of the group. She saw them change, inspire, shrink and grow – from squatters to ‘legit’ workers. Ultimately becoming something huge and recognised as beautiful and vital for a city’s inner beating, expression. It’s truly inspiring from a whole host of angles; those that influence our daily lives and the future of truly free art. And free people. DO try and watch the film if you can. Here follows the trailer to the film and a fascinating interview with Naomi Smyth.

Could you introduce yourself please?
I’m Naomi Smyth, I’m a filmmaker, performer and theatre writer/deviser.
How long have you been a film maker?
I’ve been freelancing as a director, camera op and editor on shorts, corporates, showreels, community films and some TV for 8 years. ‘Invisible Circus: No Dress Rehearsal’ is my first feature and the first film I created totally to my own brief.
How did you get into film making?
After my Theatre degree I did a Film and TV Production MA at Bristol Uni, more in order to get the technical skills to make my ideas happen than to get a job in TV. After that I did lots of free showreel building stuff in Bristol and became good enough to be paid.
Are you Bristol born yourself?
I was born in Portsmouth, a great place for an offbeat arty teenager to stare out to sea or in at the concrete and moan that nobody understands. Thankfully that isn’t true! My partner Sam was born in Bristol and wanted to come back here, so I came with him after my degree.
And who are The Invisible Circus?
They make groundbreaking, mindbending shows that combine site-specific, promenade, circus, spectacle and interactive theatre. They’re a large knot of very close, very creative people with a massive range of skills. Over the past four years they have emerged from the squat scene in Bristol and become professionals- both at being a circus and at managing huge derelict buildings as sister co-op Artspace Lifepace. Some crew members had lived outside the system for years , so there were lots of challenges along the way.
What initially interested you about them?
They were squatting a derelict 4-storey garage round the corner from my house. It was pretty manky but they had transformed parts of it with red draping and lighting and created this dark Victoriana aesthetic around the shows there. There was such creative energy about them and a real determination to create beauty out of waste and nothingness with their bare hands.
What made you want to film a documentary such as this; and over such a long period?
If I had known it would take four years I would never have begun! I just felt that this was an intriguing assortment of people who were going somewhere together, and they didn’t all feel the same way about where that was or should be. I thought that was interesting and there must be a story in it! It took about a year to really be sure what the thread was. I did a lot of sitting around with the camera running, wondering why I was there. When I did find the thread it took four years before I really felt the story had developed enough to be finished. CarnyVille is the Masterpiece of the circus so far, and the show that has involved the biggest part of Bristol’s creative community so I’m very glad I ended it with that. People still tell me there is more to film. They’re right, but I’m not doing it!

invisible circus by rebecca lewis
Illustration by Rebecca Lewis

Is it a social, economic and political statement/commentary?
The circus in the film is a group of very passionate creative people who start out underground, slightly flaky and disorganised and get successful, professional and popular. That process is socially interesting, and also political. It is tied into the way our economy and the power structures in our society work, but also the ones in our heads. Tough choices come up as they move further into dealing with the hierarchies of capitalism. They have a leader in Doug too, which is obvious from the outside- but for self proclaimed anarchists which many of them are, that’s a very uncomfortable idea. At the same time they are doing it all for no money, just for the love of making art together, for the sake of beauty and inspiration. That underpins the whole mission and really saves it from the traps along the way.
How did you end up getting involved in the circus yourself? What is your own act?
I don’t have a circus act- but The Invisible Circus has always been about blending theatre, circus and spectacle. It took me a while to get up the courage but now I’ve been in nearly every IC show since November 2007, so I’m pretty used to it! I work on the character and story aspects of the shows. On the night I either act and sing in stage shows, or improvise in character with audience members in our weird imaginary worlds. I’ve helped create Jobcentres, Zoos, Haunted Houses, weddings, reality TV shows, family Christmases… all with a ‘wrong’ twist.
How did you feel performing? What did you wear? How nervous were you?
The first time I performed with the circus was in a cabaret in a squatted pub in 2006. There were 200 odd people there and I sang a Tori Amos song and A Paul Simon song a capella. I was incredibly nervous- even then I was fairly confident with acting but I’d never sung in public before in my life. I had written this monologue and created a whole 20′s Southern Belle character- Tallulah La Moolah- basically as a ruse to convince myself it wasn’t ‘me’ singing.
Were you received well?
I got a great round of applause from a very generous audience. The monologue was definitely too long though!

Ringmaster by Madi
Illustration by Madi Illustration

What do you think about the ethics behind the group?
I think it is very hard to live ethically in our society. It’s much easier to accuse others of hypocrisy for falling short of perfection than it is to make whatever effort possible in your own life to act on your deep-down beliefs. The ethics and beliefs in the circus vary massively. I do feel everyone there is in some way critical of our wasteful consumer culture and is trying in whatever way they can to act on that feeling. Some avoid, some confront, some imagine other ways and some create them for themselves and others.
Did you ever live in one of the buildings the collective were residing in?
I’ve never lived with the circus. I think that made the film possible. Getting the distance to ask questions and edit footage of people I genuinely care about was hard enough. If I’d been waking up in that community every morning with all the internal politics and closeness and mix of work and friendship, then having to translate that into a film, I might have gone nuts.
How did you feel about the legality of what they were doing?
Squatting is legal and I hope it remains so, though the Tories are trying to change that. It’s a loophole that provides housing for people who need it and who take the initiative to sort a building out. Most of these places have lain derelict for ages and can be really nasty inside. It’s not for everyone but the squatters I know are responsible, self-reliant people who hate waste. It can take a lot of hard work to squat- and if they don’t trash the place they’re not costing anyone a penny. Most will do some renovations in order to make a property habitable for themselves so they can actually add value. As Nick says in the film, most squatters in the UK will move on when evicted. The stereotype of the squatters who nick an old lady’s flat while she’s on holiday is based on tabloid tales of a few isolated cases.

There are some pretty rampantly greedy property owners out there who think nothing of the effects a derelict property can have on the community around it. Look at Westmoreland House- it’s full of asbestos, a big rotted hole in Stokes Croft for the last few decades and when the council try to compulsory purchase it, the owners hike the price to way above its value. That’s perfectly legal because they own it. I think that’s a real crime.

The game changes when it comes to running events out of a squat because you can fall foul of licensing laws, health and safety etc. Personally I would like to see people having more freedom to use space and make things happen without all these costly hoops to jump through. I like to see people just doing stuff without asking for permission, and that was what attracted me to the circus in the first place. But the choice Doug and the circus made over the years was to learn what the hoops are and how to jump through them, and rise to that challenge of ‘going legit’. I respect that too because it means they now reach a wider audience and they’ve flown the flag for similar projects and showed the Council and local developers that grassroots arts organisations can be trusted with huge buildings and large scale projects.

INVISIBLE CIRCUS
Photography by Paul Blakemore of Neat Studios

It must have been tiring to make the film! How did you manage your days/workload?
It was pretty hard to balance my life and sanity with the hours I had to put in on the film. At first the money side was OK because I had a well paid part-time job- something I’d recommend for any struggling artist! But about halfway through when they got the huge Police Station building, the crew offered me a free space to edit in and I got possessed by enthusiasm and quit my job to go full time freelance. That was quite tough because although I was getting work, it was harder to make time for the unpaid work on my film. At one point I ‘microfunded’ a 2-month period off all other work for me to crack the edit. I raised about £1400 from friends, family and internet supporters- about 80 people chipped in. I basically lived in my studio on flapjacks and energy drink. I stopped sleeping and life got very strange for a while there.
How was your partner affected – he helped I saw on the film…?
One of the ways my partner Sam was affected was that he learned how to be a damn fine camera operator! I couldn’t always make shoots because of my job, so I trained him up on my camera and sent him out if there was something important happening. Obviously it wasn’t all roses- when I was doing my hardest stints of editing he was the one to pick up the pieces when I stumbled in all sleep deprived and teary-eyed and lay twitching on the sofa. He was also the first person to feed back on my edit, and he always said if he didn’t like something. I did go a bit mad around that time so I wasn’t always grateful for his advice shall we say! But I always made the changes in the end so I guess he was usually right.
Did your own opinion of The Invisible Circus change as the years passed?
The circus itself changed, and my friendships with them did too, so yes- but in too many ways to go into!

Invisible C
Photography by Paul Blakemore of Neat Studios

What about your opinions on Bristol? What do you think about Bristol, how it has developed and how it supports creative communities?
I absolutely love Bristol. In terms of its creative output and variety of stuff happening here, it is world class. The issue it has is that it’s sometimes a bit introverted- we all just bimble about enjoying each other’s talent and not spreading the word beyond the city. So much of the best stuff happens on the level of the grassroots, where people aren’t as good at putting themselves out there or don’t have access to a world stage. There is probably stuff that the Council or arts agencies could have done better in years past but now that there is no funding, we artists have to put ourselves out there in DIY fashion! Which should mean we’re on the turf we know best.
Did the group alter your own opinions on life, art, Bristol, consumerism etc?
The biggest way the circus has changed me is to introduce me to literally hundreds of people, each with a different set of skills to bring, and thrown me into making exciting, exhausting shows with them. I’ve gained a whole new understanding of collaboration, friendship, art and my own priorities.
After that the biggest change has been the discipline required to create the whole film without anybody but me pushing me to do it. I always said that even if nobody ever wanted to see it, it was still worth making. Now to show it to people and have them respond to it, is incredible. I can’t wait to release it properly.
As filming progressed did you become, and are you still part of the group?
I am definitely part of the group now. That happened as I was making the film, and is partially documented in the story. Loads of new people have got involved over the past four years, so I’m kind of an old hand now. Though the real old hands are Dougie and Wim, who founded it 16 years ago when they were busking in Europe.
Do you still perform now?
I did theatre throughout my childhood and being in a company making new work was my big dream. I love documentary too, but yes I still perform and will continue for the rest of my life now. I get something from it that I can’t get anywhere else. I let my demons and dreams out for a run onstage. Bliss.

iCircus
Photography by Paul Blakemore of Neat Studios

How important do you think collectives like The Invisible Circus are for Bristol/the country?
Over a thousand people have worked on Invisible Circus shows in the past few years, and many thousands have been to them. And I’ve seen that nearly all those people have at some point been delighted, transported , or pushed to somewhere they’ve never seen or thought they could be. And I think people need that and I like being a part of it. So I think there should be more of it.
In their case the breadth of the imaginative worlds created is borne on the back of a very solid community who support each other in ways most people don’t with their workmates. I think that’s really positive too and I think it’s necessary to have a close community you can rely on- especially in tough economic times.
Do you have another project lined up?
I have a couple of ideas for my next film, but after wondering about pitching to broadcasters and making a few plans, I still think I’ll probably just have to start shooting it in earnest to find out what it is. I want a bit more time with it before I give it to anybody else to play with.
What do you see for the future of The Invisible Circus?
The Invisible Circus are going to be big. We’ve already had some exciting offers for this year. It’s still the old struggle of trying to financially sustain a large crew who like making elaborate sets and huge spectacles- but we are unstoppable! As the past few years have shown.
What do you hope to do with the film? Travel around the country/world with it?
I’ve had a great offer from transmedia co-op Future Artists to distribute the film. They are working on new ways of releasing films that are fairer for the artist and less expensive for everybody, and they are great people so I’m sure with them it will go far. Hopefully to some festivals first and then to screenings throughout the UK. We are talking about screening in unusual venues and ‘recycled’ spaces like the ones in the film, as well as normal cinemas. Tomorrow, the world!
And how would you like people to leave feeling?
I’d like people to leave uplifted, and inspired to do something about the idea at the back of their mind.
When and where can we next see the FILM?!
I’m not sure at the moment as I’ve just started working with Future Artists, but it shouldn’t be too long. You can keep up to date by following me on twitter: @InvisibleCFilm or visiting the website and subscribing to the mailing list.

Categories ,bristol, ,council, ,documentary, ,ethical, ,film, ,Gemma Milly, ,Helen Martin, ,Madi Illustration, ,Naomi Smyth, ,Neat Studios, ,Paul Blakemore, ,Rebecca Lewis, ,Sara Gruen, ,squatting, ,The Invisible Circus, ,Water For Elephants

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Amelia’s Magazine | Invisible Circus: No Dress Rehearsal – A Documentary by Naomi Smyth

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Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W 2011 Collection, find buy information pills illustration by Abby Wright

The BFC Tent is massive. Or a lot bigger than the other show spaces. But the benches are the same; white and hard. I went to where I was supposed to be seated and realised it was smack bang in the middle of an already super full bench. I went to the end of the bench; “Any…? No, no, ok then. Thanks.” Luckily a man on the bench behind saved me by shifting up a bit and motioning towards the space he’d made. “Ah wonderful, thanks!” I sort of wanted to chat with him, but found the non-moving up people – now before me- much more interesting. Yabbering and air kissing their faces off with some other people in another row. They went from exceptionally animated and friendly to bored and motionless in second. They reminded me of whippets. The BFC was packed, rammed, up to the brim. Before long, it went dark. The wall of photographers were in their pyramid, like hyeneas, eyes blazing, they were poised…some of them taking shots for no apparent reason. Or, just in case something ridiculous happens.

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Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W 2011 Collection, illustration by Jenny Robins

Big shoulders, high necklines, victoriana, huge circle skirts, sashes over shoulders, trouser suits with extra long legs and short jackets, balooning at the middle slightly, and beautiful midi length skirt suits with puffed shoulders. The shoes were angular or strappy, and the hair either blown up, or short and sharply pointed. But as the show continued, the more dramatic it became. The start featured outfits you could happily wear to a whole host of occasions, all fitted, 60s shapes with Victorian influences, in reds, black, grey and teal, but then it went MAD.

CorrieNielsen_LFW_MattBramford_020CorrieNielsen_LFW_MattBramford_019CorrieNielsen_LFW_MattBramford_016CorrieNielsen_LFW_MattBramford_014 Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W 2011 Collection: Photography by Matt Bramford

It was fantastic. Everything got extremely vulumnious. Enormous jackets, enveloping the models in shells of silky, padded looking fabrics. Deep purples, teals and bold reds came streaming out. Waist and neck detailing included ruffles, pleats and knots. Skirts were bubbled and swathing. Some were paired with sheer, ruffling tops, others; tight corsets. Many of the models also wore wide headbands, which added to the historic, modern twist charm, mixing modern design with 60s and the late 1800s. And making it work surprising well.

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Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W 2011 Collection: Photography by Amelia Gregory

Then two show stopper dresses came out. One nearly pure, off white with a hooped top skirt, corseted top, long train and beautiful headpiece, wrapped around the model’s blonde hair. With ballet satin encased feet, this was ghostly, heavenly and adventurous in one. It appealed to me through its theatre, gracefulness and just off purity. The dress had character, frivolity and fantasy wrapped up. Spiced up innocence, a thrown out of her castle, princess. What did she do to be ejected? For me, although more Elizabethan perhaps in design than Victorian, this was Hardy’s; Tess of the d’Urbervilles. Walking over the hills, her boots worn through, her daze; a story.

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Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W 2011 Collection: Photography by Matt Bramford

In contrast, the next dress was BLACK. It reminded me of Queen Victoria herself, mixed with Queen Elizabeth I. Then with the addition of Helena Bonham-Carter and Tilda Swinton. Exploded hair, Elnett insanity, all rough, a bit haphazard and COOL. Together with the most over-ruffled, incredible dress, fit for a QUEEN, it was an explosion. Black as the darkest night, but with a slight shine, like the moon reflecting, the material was reminiscent of a glassy ocean at night. The neck was high, ruffled, starched and stretched down to the waist. The sleeves puffed at the top, then tightened to the wrists. Then the skirt was full and glorious, with a train behind. It was like watching the night fairy, or a stunning, black widow spider move along the catwalk. Deadly. She would have destroyed the off white, semi angel in seconds. It was the ‘other’ side of our heroine, Tess of the d’Urbervilles, downbeat on the moors. Or indeed, 19th century’s; Emily Brontë’s, Wuthering Heights. With Cathy, depressed at the Wuthering Heights estate, angered and serious, yet of course, utterly beautiful. I wish the show had been on the Yorkshire Moors (I don’t), as the dress would have looked sensational, with the wind whipping about and the layers of fabric billowing. The semi angel would have been on a deserted beach in Scotland, or a corn field. I wonder where Corrie would have placed them.

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Corrie Nielsen LFW A/W Collection, illustration by Jenny Robins

Dear Wuthering Heights, I quote thou: ‘Catherine Earnshaw, may you not rest as long as I am living; you said I killed you—haunt me, then! The murdered do haunt their murderers, I believe. I know that ghosts have wandered on earth. Be with me always—take any form—drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh, God! it is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!’

I hope you see what I mean.

Jenny Robins’ and Abby Wright’s illustrations can also be found in Amelia’s Compendium of Fashion Illustration, available here.

Illustrations by Ankolie

Even the invitation to this show had me excited; detail of a vintage toile print on a fabric corset lined with vintage style brass buttons and the byline ‘inspired by the court of Louis XV when art became frivolous’ grabbed my attention.Because all of this is frivolous, for sale isn’t it?We’re in the middle of a recession and yet here we are, still feeding are obsession with fashion and art because it has become such an integral part of our lives.Combining fashion and music is a big part of my job as a stylist to musicians, so opening the show with Analize Ching on the violin was a big hit with me, followed by wonderful orchestral music that evoked the atmosphere of a French royal court.


I’d been a little underwhelmed by a lot of very drab Autumn/Winter collections, where hues vary only from black,to greys, some cream and back to black. The colours Prophetik used are all natural, with plum shades blended from madder root, rumex, logwood and indigo, and burgundy mixed from madder root, curled dock and gallnut. Adding yet more splashes of colour and prints were the quilted pieces, handed down from Jeff’s grandmother Lola from Tennesse. Hemp, cactus silk and ostrich feathers provided stunning texture and shape to the pieces. Accessories label ‘Dotted Loop’ provided reworked vintage accessories and even the shoes were made from vegetable-tanned leather.


Its rare that I can get at all excited by menswear, but the pieces in this collection spoke to the avid period-drama fan inside me. Military inspired jackets and riding boots?Phwoar.Yes please. Jeff himself appeared at the end showing how the look can be worked, though I’m sure he could probably get a way with wearing pretty much anything and still look like he just finished writing poetry/surfing/horse-riding; all listed as his hobbies.Only someone this comfortable with his masculinity could design coats for men made out of pastel pink quilts.


Corsets, tailored jackets and voluminous skirts; Jeff is very good at designing clothes for real women’s bodies.He recently dressed the lovely Livia Firth for the 2011 Golden Globes, and I can only imagine that his celebrity following will continue to increase.The final dress, ‘Mrs Moulton’ features ostrich feathers that shed naturally twice a year (from the ostrich, not the dress-that would be a high maintenance frock indeed) hand sewn on white silk and organza- I can totally picture this as a celebrity wedding dress.Watch this space.


I’ll leave you with Jeff’s take on Renaissance Art.I think it’s very interesting considering our current pre-occupation with all things vintage.
‘Renaissance art is not a rebirth as one implies, but freedom from the past. Unconcerned with what has been said or done, living in the present with an immediate relation to all things…achievement does not birth beauty but raw effort confessing its own failures and in the confession is the beauty of Art.’



Illustrations by Alexandra Rolfe

It was a mighty long trek from the main fashion activity at Somerset House to 33 Portland Place for my first show of the A/W 2011 season. As it was bStore, for sale and as 33 Portland Place is stunning (the location for much of the recent filming of The King’s Speech), and I thought it much worth the effort. Amazingly, about it arriving at 6:23 for a 6:30 show I still managed to be first in the queue. Which luckily meant I was first to get a cocktail when the doors finally opened.

bStore were obviously out to put on an intimate and relaxed show for ‘friends’. The cocktails were stunning (well done – best Mojito I have had in ages) and the drawing room we were all ushered into to settle into the evening definitely set the tone. As the room filled it also became obvious that the gathered audience were bang right-on bStore target; urban gentlemen and ladies in the up-to-date yet classically English look that bStore helps to promote. I especially favoured the lovely American woman who had had a little too much to drink, tottered on me and my bags and then had to prop herself against the wall as her ‘heels were far too high’ (if you are reading this, you know who you are!).

Cocktail downed and people watching over, we made our way into the show area. Tightly packed and with live band playing (as with the cocktails, very good) we all took places throughout the two rooms that made the runway circuit. bStore got this location just right, the slightly disused English club room feel suited the brand to a T.

Unfortunately, this is about where the amazing parts of the show came to an end. In dim lighting the first model came out, but he was halfway around the circuit before most of the audience realised the show had actually started. I believe there were two reasons for this: (1) as the lighting was so dim, the model was literally walking in shadows, and (2) the model didn’t look any different to the assembled crowd, it was hard to tell audience and model apart. The parade of models followed as we squinted in the dark to see what was on offer. Muted ochres, burgundies and black on clothes kept to the signature bStore look. Slightly tailored English, slightly American grungy, with the same proportions bStore has been following for a number of seasons now. Don’t get me wrong, I’m usually a big bStore fan and there was nothing here that was awful. Most of it was immensely wearable and if it was my first bStore encounter I would have been more ecstatic (but still squinting, why were there no lights? It’s a fundamental part of this process, surely?). But knowing what bStore offers, this show didn’t really bring anything new to the brand and left me feeling a bit meh. Competent? Yes. Enjoyable? Yes. Groundbreaking? Nope.

Illustrations by Alexandra Rolfe

It was a mighty long trek from the main fashion activity at Somerset House to 33 Portland Place for my first show of the A/W 2011 season. As it was bStore, capsule and as 33 Portland Place is stunning (the location for much of the recent filming of The King’s Speech), I thought it much worth the effort. Amazingly, arriving at 6:23 for a 6:30 show I still managed to be first in the queue. Which luckily meant I was first to get a cocktail when the doors finally opened.

bStore were obviously out to put on an intimate and relaxed show for ‘friends’. The cocktails were stunning (well done – best Mojito I have had in ages) and the drawing room we were all ushered into to settle into the evening definitely set the tone. As the room filled it also became obvious that the gathered audience were bang right-on bStore target; urban gentlemen and ladies in the up-to-date yet classically English look that bStore helps to promote. I especially favoured the lovely American woman who had had a little too much to drink, tottered on me and my bags and then had to prop herself against the wall as her ‘heels were far too high’ (if you are reading this, you know who you are!).

Cocktail downed and people watching over, we made our way into the show area. Tightly packed and with live band playing (as with the cocktails, very good) we all took places throughout the two rooms that made the runway circuit. bStore got this location just right, the slightly disused English club room feel suited the brand to a T.

Unfortunately, this is about where the amazing parts of the show came to an end. In dim lighting the first model came out, but he was halfway around the circuit before most of the audience realised the show had actually started. I believe there were two reasons for this: (1) as the lighting was so dim, the model was literally walking in shadows, and (2) the model didn’t look any different to the assembled crowd, it was hard to tell audience and model apart. The parade of models followed as we squinted in the dark to see what was on offer. Muted ochres, burgundies and black on clothes kept to the signature bStore look. Slightly tailored English, slightly American grungy, with the same proportions bStore has been following for a number of seasons now. Don’t get me wrong, I’m usually a big bStore fan and there was nothing here that was awful. Most of it was immensely wearable and if it was my first bStore encounter I would have been more ecstatic (but still squinting, why were there no lights? It’s a fundamental part of this process, surely?). But knowing what bStore offers, this show didn’t really bring anything new to the brand and left me feeling a bit meh. Competent? Yes. Enjoyable? Yes. Groundbreaking? Nope.


Illustrations by Alexandra Rolfe

It was a mighty long trek from the main fashion activity at Somerset House to 33 Portland Place for my first show of the A/W 2011 season. As it was bStore, price and as 33 Portland Place is stunning (the location for much of the recent filming of The King’s Speech), generic I thought it much worth the effort. Amazingly, site arriving at 6:23 for a 6:30 show I still managed to be first in the queue. Which luckily meant I was first to get a cocktail when the doors finally opened.

bStore were obviously out to put on an intimate and relaxed show for ‘friends’. The cocktails were stunning (well done – best Mojito I have had in ages) and the drawing room we were all ushered into to settle into the evening definitely set the tone. As the room filled it also became obvious that the gathered audience were bang right-on bStore target; urban gentlemen and ladies in the up-to-date yet classically English look that bStore helps to promote. I especially favoured the lovely American woman who had had a little too much to drink, tottered on me and my bags and then had to prop herself against the wall as her ‘heels were far too high’ (if you are reading this, you know who you are!).

Cocktail downed and people watching over, we made our way into the show area. Tightly packed and with live band playing (as with the cocktails, very good) we all took places throughout the two rooms that made the runway circuit. bStore got this location just right, the slightly disused English club room feel suited the brand to a T.

Unfortunately, this is about where the amazing parts of the show came to an end. In dim lighting the first model came out, but he was halfway around the circuit before most of the audience realised the show had actually started. I believe there were two reasons for this: (1) as the lighting was so dim, the model was literally walking in shadows, and (2) the model didn’t look any different to the assembled crowd, it was hard to tell audience and model apart. The parade of models followed as we squinted in the dark to see what was on offer. Muted ochres, burgundies and black on clothes kept to the signature bStore look. Slightly tailored English, slightly American grungy, with the same proportions bStore has been following for a number of seasons now. Don’t get me wrong, I’m usually a big bStore fan and there was nothing here that was awful. Most of it was immensely wearable and if it was my first bStore encounter I would have been more ecstatic (but still squinting, why were there no lights? It’s a fundamental part of this process, surely?). But knowing what bStore offers, this show didn’t really bring anything new to the brand and left me feeling a bit meh. Competent? Yes. Enjoyable? Yes. Groundbreaking? Nope.
Gemma Milly-Invisible Circus
Illustration by Gemma Milly

I’m reading Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen at the moment. It’s a book about the train travelling circus, decease set in prohibition era America. The story flits from the 1930s to the present day. Whilst highlighting the protagonist’s age and the unavoidable changes to his body, information pills mind and soul, it also mutters under its breath of the stark changes within the circus world. The book depicts the ‘old’ circus as full of hardship – pure blood, sweat and tears stuff. The modern circuses are seen as refined pieces of machinery, in a factory made of satin. Is the magic lost within this? A touch of the romanticism? The circus’s underground beginnings would never have seen itself hovering pleasantly next to the Sherif’s house, yet now they are as above board as the Queen… aren’t they? I digress, the circus is glorious! Of course it is! BUT, there within the drama, a snatch of a risk, a missed heartbeat, a creative explosion, that’s the kind of circus I want to see.

There is one circus, The Invisible Circus, who hold all and more of the magic that comes with the old and new; from the hard graft and creativity, to the luxury/despairs of liberation. I’ve been fascinated with them since I moved to Bristol, where they’re based. The group squat in various disused buildings, clean them up and use the spaces for creative expression; for The Invisible Circus. I was lucky enough to go to a screening of Naomi Smyth‘s documentary on The Invisible Circus, which involved her following them for several years, becoming part of the group. She saw them change, inspire, shrink and grow – from squatters to ‘legit’ workers. Ultimately becoming something huge and recognised as beautiful and vital for a city’s inner beating, expression. It’s truly inspiring from a whole host of angles; those that influence our daily lives and the future of truly free art. And free people. DO try and watch the film if you can. Here follows the trailer to the film and a fascinating interview with Naomi Smyth.

Could you introduce yourself please?
I’m Naomi Smyth, I’m a filmmaker, performer and theatre writer/deviser.
How long have you been a film maker?
I’ve been freelancing as a director, camera op and editor on shorts, corporates, showreels, community films and some TV for 8 years. ‘Invisible Circus: No Dress Rehearsal’ is my first feature and the first film I created totally to my own brief.
How did you get into film making?
After my Theatre degree I did a Film and TV Production MA at Bristol Uni, more in order to get the technical skills to make my ideas happen than to get a job in TV. After that I did lots of free showreel building stuff in Bristol and became good enough to be paid.
Are you Bristol born yourself?
I was born in Portsmouth, a great place for an offbeat arty teenager to stare out to sea or in at the concrete and moan that nobody understands. Thankfully that isn’t true! My partner Sam was born in Bristol and wanted to come back here, so I came with him after my degree.
And who are The Invisible Circus?
They make groundbreaking, mindbending shows that combine site-specific, promenade, circus, spectacle and interactive theatre. They’re a large knot of very close, very creative people with a massive range of skills. Over the past four years they have emerged from the squat scene in Bristol and become professionals- both at being a circus and at managing huge derelict buildings as sister co-op Artspace Lifepace. Some crew members had lived outside the system for years , so there were lots of challenges along the way.
What initially interested you about them?
They were squatting a derelict 4-storey garage round the corner from my house. It was pretty manky but they had transformed parts of it with red draping and lighting and created this dark Victoriana aesthetic around the shows there. There was such creative energy about them and a real determination to create beauty out of waste and nothingness with their bare hands.
What made you want to film a documentary such as this; and over such a long period?
If I had known it would take four years I would never have begun! I just felt that this was an intriguing assortment of people who were going somewhere together, and they didn’t all feel the same way about where that was or should be. I thought that was interesting and there must be a story in it! It took about a year to really be sure what the thread was. I did a lot of sitting around with the camera running, wondering why I was there. When I did find the thread it took four years before I really felt the story had developed enough to be finished. CarnyVille is the Masterpiece of the circus so far, and the show that has involved the biggest part of Bristol’s creative community so I’m very glad I ended it with that. People still tell me there is more to film. They’re right, but I’m not doing it!

invisible circus by rebecca lewis
Illustration by Rebecca Lewis

Is it a social, economic and political statement/commentary?
The circus in the film is a group of very passionate creative people who start out underground, slightly flaky and disorganised and get successful, professional and popular. That process is socially interesting, and also political. It is tied into the way our economy and the power structures in our society work, but also the ones in our heads. Tough choices come up as they move further into dealing with the hierarchies of capitalism. They have a leader in Doug too, which is obvious from the outside- but for self proclaimed anarchists which many of them are, that’s a very uncomfortable idea. At the same time they are doing it all for no money, just for the love of making art together, for the sake of beauty and inspiration. That underpins the whole mission and really saves it from the traps along the way.
How did you end up getting involved in the circus yourself? What is your own act?
I don’t have a circus act- but The Invisible Circus has always been about blending theatre, circus and spectacle. It took me a while to get up the courage but now I’ve been in nearly every IC show since November 2007, so I’m pretty used to it! I work on the character and story aspects of the shows. On the night I either act and sing in stage shows, or improvise in character with audience members in our weird imaginary worlds. I’ve helped create Jobcentres, Zoos, Haunted Houses, weddings, reality TV shows, family Christmases… all with a ‘wrong’ twist.
How did you feel performing? What did you wear? How nervous were you?
The first time I performed with the circus was in a cabaret in a squatted pub in 2006. There were 200 odd people there and I sang a Tori Amos song and A Paul Simon song a capella. I was incredibly nervous- even then I was fairly confident with acting but I’d never sung in public before in my life. I had written this monologue and created a whole 20′s Southern Belle character- Tallulah La Moolah- basically as a ruse to convince myself it wasn’t ‘me’ singing.
Were you received well?
I got a great round of applause from a very generous audience. The monologue was definitely too long though!

Ringmaster by Madi
Illustration by Madi Illustration

What do you think about the ethics behind the group?
I think it is very hard to live ethically in our society. It’s much easier to accuse others of hypocrisy for falling short of perfection than it is to make whatever effort possible in your own life to act on your deep-down beliefs. The ethics and beliefs in the circus vary massively. I do feel everyone there is in some way critical of our wasteful consumer culture and is trying in whatever way they can to act on that feeling. Some avoid, some confront, some imagine other ways and some create them for themselves and others.
Did you ever live in one of the buildings the collective were residing in?
I’ve never lived with the circus. I think that made the film possible. Getting the distance to ask questions and edit footage of people I genuinely care about was hard enough. If I’d been waking up in that community every morning with all the internal politics and closeness and mix of work and friendship, then having to translate that into a film, I might have gone nuts.
How did you feel about the legality of what they were doing?
Squatting is legal and I hope it remains so, though the Tories are trying to change that. It’s a loophole that provides housing for people who need it and who take the initiative to sort a building out. Most of these places have lain derelict for ages and can be really nasty inside. It’s not for everyone but the squatters I know are responsible, self-reliant people who hate waste. It can take a lot of hard work to squat- and if they don’t trash the place they’re not costing anyone a penny. Most will do some renovations in order to make a property habitable for themselves so they can actually add value. As Nick says in the film, most squatters in the UK will move on when evicted. The stereotype of the squatters who nick an old lady’s flat while she’s on holiday is based on tabloid tales of a few isolated cases.

There are some pretty rampantly greedy property owners out there who think nothing of the effects a derelict property can have on the community around it. Look at Westmoreland House- it’s full of asbestos, a big rotted hole in Stokes Croft for the last few decades and when the council try to compulsory purchase it, the owners hike the price to way above its value. That’s perfectly legal because they own it. I think that’s a real crime.

The game changes when it comes to running events out of a squat because you can fall foul of licensing laws, health and safety etc. Personally I would like to see people having more freedom to use space and make things happen without all these costly hoops to jump through. I like to see people just doing stuff without asking for permission, and that was what attracted me to the circus in the first place. But the choice Doug and the circus made over the years was to learn what the hoops are and how to jump through them, and rise to that challenge of ‘going legit’. I respect that too because it means they now reach a wider audience and they’ve flown the flag for similar projects and showed the Council and local developers that grassroots arts organisations can be trusted with huge buildings and large scale projects.

INVISIBLE CIRCUS
Photography by Paul Blakemore of Neat Studios

It must have been tiring to make the film! How did you manage your days/workload?
It was pretty hard to balance my life and sanity with the hours I had to put in on the film. At first the money side was OK because I had a well paid part-time job- something I’d recommend for any struggling artist! But about halfway through when they got the huge Police Station building, the crew offered me a free space to edit in and I got possessed by enthusiasm and quit my job to go full time freelance. That was quite tough because although I was getting work, it was harder to make time for the unpaid work on my film. At one point I ‘microfunded’ a 2-month period off all other work for me to crack the edit. I raised about £1400 from friends, family and internet supporters- about 80 people chipped in. I basically lived in my studio on flapjacks and energy drink. I stopped sleeping and life got very strange for a while there.
How was your partner affected – he helped I saw on the film…?
One of the ways my partner Sam was affected was that he learned how to be a damn fine camera operator! I couldn’t always make shoots because of my job, so I trained him up on my camera and sent him out if there was something important happening. Obviously it wasn’t all roses- when I was doing my hardest stints of editing he was the one to pick up the pieces when I stumbled in all sleep deprived and teary-eyed and lay twitching on the sofa. He was also the first person to feed back on my edit, and he always said if he didn’t like something. I did go a bit mad around that time so I wasn’t always grateful for his advice shall we say! But I always made the changes in the end so I guess he was usually right.
Did your own opinion of The Invisible Circus change as the years passed?
The circus itself changed, and my friendships with them did too, so yes- but in too many ways to go into!

Invisible C
Photography by Paul Blakemore of Neat Studios

What about your opinions on Bristol? What do you think about Bristol, how it has developed and how it supports creative communities?
I absolutely love Bristol. In terms of its creative output and variety of stuff happening here, it is world class. The issue it has is that it’s sometimes a bit introverted- we all just bimble about enjoying each other’s talent and not spreading the word beyond the city. So much of the best stuff happens on the level of the grassroots, where people aren’t as good at putting themselves out there or don’t have access to a world stage. There is probably stuff that the Council or arts agencies could have done better in years past but now that there is no funding, we artists have to put ourselves out there in DIY fashion! Which should mean we’re on the turf we know best.
Did the group alter your own opinions on life, art, Bristol, consumerism etc?
The biggest way the circus has changed me is to introduce me to literally hundreds of people, each with a different set of skills to bring, and thrown me into making exciting, exhausting shows with them. I’ve gained a whole new understanding of collaboration, friendship, art and my own priorities.
After that the biggest change has been the discipline required to create the whole film without anybody but me pushing me to do it. I always said that even if nobody ever wanted to see it, it was still worth making. Now to show it to people and have them respond to it, is incredible. I can’t wait to release it properly.
As filming progressed did you become, and are you still part of the group?
I am definitely part of the group now. That happened as I was making the film, and is partially documented in the story. Loads of new people have got involved over the past four years, so I’m kind of an old hand now. Though the real old hands are Dougie and Wim, who founded it 16 years ago when they were busking in Europe.
Do you still perform now?
I did theatre throughout my childhood and being in a company making new work was my big dream. I love documentary too, but yes I still perform and will continue for the rest of my life now. I get something from it that I can’t get anywhere else. I let my demons and dreams out for a run onstage. Bliss.

iCircus
Photography by Paul Blakemore of Neat Studios

How important do you think collectives like The Invisible Circus are for Bristol/the country?
Over a thousand people have worked on Invisible Circus shows in the past few years, and many thousands have been to them. And I’ve seen that nearly all those people have at some point been delighted, transported , or pushed to somewhere they’ve never seen or thought they could be. And I think people need that and I like being a part of it. So I think there should be more of it.
In their case the breadth of the imaginative worlds created is borne on the back of a very solid community who support each other in ways most people don’t with their workmates. I think that’s really positive too and I think it’s necessary to have a close community you can rely on- especially in tough economic times.
Do you have another project lined up?
I have a couple of ideas for my next film, but after wondering about pitching to broadcasters and making a few plans, I still think I’ll probably just have to start shooting it in earnest to find out what it is. I want a bit more time with it before I give it to anybody else to play with.
What do you see for the future of The Invisible Circus?
The Invisible Circus are going to be big. We’ve already had some exciting offers for this year. It’s still the old struggle of trying to financially sustain a large crew who like making elaborate sets and huge spectacles- but we are unstoppable! As the past few years have shown.
What do you hope to do with the film? Travel around the country/world with it?
I’ve had a great offer from transmedia co-op Future Artists to distribute the film. They are working on new ways of releasing films that are fairer for the artist and less expensive for everybody, and they are great people so I’m sure with them it will go far. Hopefully to some festivals first and then to screenings throughout the UK. We are talking about screening in unusual venues and ‘recycled’ spaces like the ones in the film, as well as normal cinemas. Tomorrow, the world!
And how would you like people to leave feeling?
I’d like people to leave uplifted, and inspired to do something about the idea at the back of their mind.
When and where can we next see the FILM?!
I’m not sure at the moment as I’ve just started working with Future Artists, but it shouldn’t be too long. You can keep up to date by following me on twitter: @InvisibleCFilm or visiting the website and subscribing to the mailing list.

Categories ,bristol, ,council, ,documentary, ,ethical, ,film, ,Gemma Milly, ,Helen Martin, ,Madi Illustration, ,Naomi Smyth, ,Neat Studios, ,Paul Blakemore, ,Rebecca Lewis, ,Sara Gruen, ,squatting, ,The Invisible Circus, ,Water For Elephants

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Amelia’s Magazine | An interview with Edd Baldry of London Zine Symposium

aniela-murphy-zinesymposium
Illustration by Aniela Murphy/Neltonmandelton.

The Rag Factory, this Brick Lane, page will be playing host to The London Zine Symposium on the 29th of May, capsule an event celebrating DIY culture, promoting communal idea sharing and, naturally, selling a few zines. Inspired by the Portland Zine Symposium, it’s been running since 2005 and just keeps getting bigger. This year there are over 70 stalls dedicated to zines, small presses and comics, with crafty bits to see and do round every corner, as well as discussions, readings and workshops.

The Symposium runs from 12pm, kicking off with the kids’ comic workshop, making things nice, and monstrous, (pretend to be my guardian? Anyone?) and all through the day you can make your own artist trading cards! They’ll be providing all the ingredients you need, though you’re welcome to take along your own cutouts and magazine bits. These excite me more than necessary, probably because I always wanted to be a Pokémon…

The first discussion of the afternoon will focus on the DIY ethos of zine-making and its applications in the wider world – a must for anyone interested in subverting mainstream media and working their socks off to get heard. It’s not limited to the world of paper either, they’ll also be talking about forming bands and organising spoken word tours. Charlotte Cooper, a queer fat researcher and activist, and Josie Long, that stand- up comedian, are among those reading from selections and the event will be nicely rounded off by Tea Hvala and a collaborative writing working, taking the surrealist drawing game the exquisite corpse and translating it to writing, so that each story becomes everybody’s story.

aniela-murphy-zinesymposium
Illustration by Aniela Murphy/Neltonmandelton.

I asked Edd Baldry, one of the organisers, about the superiority of zines to blogs, the importance of DIY culture, and whether they’ve ever been overwhelmed by care bears…

Could you tell us a bit about the beginnings of the London Zine ? Symposium? What inspired you to start it up? Was it very popular at ?first? How has it grown?
Edd Baldry : I was part of a collective squatting a cool building in central ? London, which we’d called the Institute for Autonomy. I was helping to? run an infoshop in the space as well as producing a large collective ? zine – Rancid News – which we distributed across the UK and Europe. So ?I was interested in getting more zine kids involved in radical spaces and radical spaces having zines that weren’t necessarily explicitly ? political. I’ve got to acknowledge though that the name, and the ? inspiration, was taken wholesale from the Portland Zine Symposium who ? do an awesome event in the US north-west every year.? From our point of view it was really popular straight away. I wish ?all the projects I’m involved with were this easy to organise. We had ? about 400 people come, with 12 stalls, at the first event and it’s ?grown steadily each year. Last year we had about 1,400 people come along, with 64 stalls selling their wares.? ? ?

What, exactly, is a zine and what part does it play in DIY culture? ? What makes a good zine? In this techno-focused age, what’s their ?attraction? Isn’t it easier and quicker to start/read a blog?
?EB: A zine is really whatever you want it to be. The only caveat is that ?it’s something that you produce yourself for yourself – at least? that’s what I think of when I think of zines. I think that zines have ? been a vital part of DIY culture since they became prevalent in the ? punk and radical scenes in the late 70s. Riot Grrrl’s a pretty good ?example where the ideas and culture of that scene were communicated ?through zines just as much as they were through the music.? ?It’s difficult to say what makes a ‘good’ zine – there’s such a variety that there’s no magic bullet. There are zines that are amazing ?because they’re beautifully illustrated, others because the ?illustrations look like a three year-old drew them. I guess anything ?that has passion for something in them is interesting and zines are no ?exception.? ?I think the attraction of zines has grown as the internet has. Having ?something that is tangible and final is quite attractive in a world of ?24 hour rolling news and ever changing churn of the internet. Also, ?zines can be read when you’re having a bath, a definite advantage over computers!? ? ?

Does the zine scene go through fads and phases like every other scene? ?Have you ever been overwhelmed by frogophiles, or carebear ?afficionados, for instance?
?EB: No, the symposium’s yet to be overrun by carebear or frog zines. But ?yeah the zine scene does tend to go through waves every few years. A ?few years ago it felt like it was totally dominated by punk zines, in ?2007/8 it felt like a lot of people who made comics started consciously ?making them as zines. More recently it seems like a lot of ? illustration students have been really taken by making zines. Those? trends tend to be reflected in the people who apply for stalls at the? London Zine Symposium – this year we’ve had loads of applications from ? various groups of students around the country.? ? ?

What is the zine scene like in London? Do you think there’s a good ? level of community? What kind of people get into it? ? What are a few of your favourite zines? Is there anyone you’re excited about meeting ?at the symposium?
?EB: I think there’s a pretty vibrant zine scene in London. A lot of that ?has to do with the group of people running the Alternative Press ?project that’s done a bunch of small scale events at places like the ? Foundry, as well as a couple of larger ones at the St Aloysius centre ?near Euston. It’s meant that there’s now zine events happening throughout the year in London, which can only be a good thing. And yeah, there’s certainly a supportive scene amongst zinesters, there’s ?not much machismo or competiveness that you get in other scenes that ?I’ve been heavily involved with.? ?I’m not sure there’s one type of person that makes zines; it takes all sorts. I guess it’s people who feel they have something to say but ?don’t want to go through the traditional channels to express ?themselves. And I’ve discovered so many great people and great zines ?whilst being involved that that’s a pretty impossible question to ?answer. Though Maximum Rock N Roll, Punk Planet, My Evil Twin Sister, ?Inside Front, 12o5 and Scanner will always have a place close to my ? heart!? ? At the symposium I’m looking forward to meeting Matthew Murray – who’s ?running the artist trading card exchange – and Geoff – who’s running ?the kids comix workshop. And of course in general I’m just looking? forward to seeing old friends from across the continent!? ? ?

Zine symposium

How important do you think DIY culture is? What are your views on DIY as a form of resistance to mainstream media and their messages?
?EB: I think DIY’s vital. I think it gives resources and space for radical thought to grow and exist and hopefully gives an alternative to the ?hegemony of mainstream culture. You need a radical culture to exist for any radical change to happen. DIY is, obviously, way bigger than ?just zines though. I think zines can be used by radicals as a way to quickly communicate with people, but I’m not sure that making a zine ?is necessarily inherently radical. But DIY, in general, is certainly ? a corner stone in any anti-authoritarian organising be it squatting ?social centres, taking over the streets or organising a really? awesome gig!? ? ?

I like the idea of artist trading cards! Will there be other crafty ? things to see and do around the symposium? And why is the comic ?workshop only for kids?
?EB: Yeah, the artist trading cards should be cool. And I know it’s a shame ? that the comic workshop is only for kids, but then again kids tend to ?get left out of zine culture sometimes, so it’s cool that they’re going to have their own space at this year’s Symposium.

Do you organise any events based around DIY? culture other than the LSZ? If so, what are they and how can people ? get involved?
EB: There’ll be another zine in a day project at this year’s symposium, which hopefully will be printed on the day itself if all goes according to? plan. I’m afraid LZS is enough of an event to last us all a full year. ?We all put on DIY gigs, organise protests, work in social centres and ? what have you, but nothing on the scale of the Zine Symposium!? ? ?

The Individual Zine Rocks table encourages people with just one zine? to get involved, first-timers or small scale creators; do you have any? tips for people interested in getting into the zine scene on getting ?heard about?
?EB: It’s tricky to give specific pointers, though it’s worth reading Alex ?Wrekk’s ‘Stolen Sharpie Revolution’, which does a really good job of ?explaining the zine scene and all it’s myriad quirks. If you’re interested in making a zine you should just make one. Better to have tried and failed than not have tried at all! If you wanna get heard about come along to zine events, trade zines with other people and ?make sure you get copies into any shop that will have them!? ?

You heard what the man said! Come along to the London Zine Symposium, The Rag Factory, Henage Street, just off Brick Lane, Saturday 29th May 12-6pm. Our original listing is posted here.

Categories ,Aniela Murphy, ,Charlotte Cooper, ,diy, ,Edd Baldry, ,London Zine Symposium, ,Neltonmandelton, ,Portland Zine Symposium, ,squatting, ,Tea Hvala, ,zines

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Amelia’s Magazine | An interview with Edd Baldry of London Zine Symposium

aniela-murphy-zinesymposium
Illustration by Aniela Murphy/Neltonmandelton.

The Rag Factory, Brick Lane, will be playing host to The London Zine Symposium on the 29th of May, an event celebrating DIY culture, promoting communal idea sharing and, naturally, selling a few zines. Inspired by the Portland Zine Symposium, it’s been running since 2005 and just keeps getting bigger. This year there are over 70 stalls dedicated to zines, small presses and comics, with crafty bits to see and do round every corner, as well as discussions, readings and workshops.

The Symposium runs from 12pm, kicking off with the kids’ comic workshop, making things nice, and monstrous, (pretend to be my guardian? Anyone?) and all through the day you can make your own artist trading cards! They’ll be providing all the ingredients you need, though you’re welcome to take along your own cutouts and magazine bits. These excite me more than necessary, probably because I always wanted to be a Pokémon…

The first discussion of the afternoon will focus on the DIY ethos of zine-making and its applications in the wider world – a must for anyone interested in subverting mainstream media and working their socks off to get heard. It’s not limited to the world of paper either, they’ll also be talking about forming bands and organising spoken word tours. Charlotte Cooper, a queer fat researcher and activist, and Josie Long, that stand- up comedian, are among those reading from selections and the event will be nicely rounded off by Tea Hvala and a collaborative writing working, taking the surrealist drawing game the exquisite corpse and translating it to writing, so that each story becomes everybody’s story.

aniela-murphy-zinesymposium
Illustration by Aniela Murphy/Neltonmandelton.

I asked Edd Baldry, one of the organisers, about the superiority of zines to blogs, the importance of DIY culture, and whether they’ve ever been overwhelmed by care bears…

Could you tell us a bit about the beginnings of the London Zine 
 Symposium? What inspired you to start it up? Was it very popular at 
first? How has it grown?
Edd Baldry : I was part of a collective squatting a cool building in central 
 London, which we’d called the Institute for Autonomy. I was helping to
 run an infoshop in the space as well as producing a large collective 
 zine – Rancid News – which we distributed across the UK and Europe. So 
I was interested in getting more zine kids involved in radical spaces and radical spaces having zines that weren’t necessarily explicitly 
 political. I’ve got to acknowledge though that the name, and the 
 inspiration, was taken wholesale from the Portland Zine Symposium who 
 do an awesome event in the US north-west every year.
 From our point of view it was really popular straight away. I wish 
all the projects I’m involved with were this easy to organise. We had 
 about 400 people come, with 12 stalls, at the first event and it’s 
grown steadily each year. Last year we had about 1,400 people come along, with 64 stalls selling their wares.
 
 


What, exactly, is a zine and what part does it play in DIY culture? 
 What makes a good zine? In this techno-focused age, what’s their 
attraction? Isn’t it easier and quicker to start/read a blog?
EB: A zine is really whatever you want it to be. The only caveat is that 
it’s something that you produce yourself for yourself – at least
 that’s what I think of when I think of zines. I think that zines have 
 been a vital part of DIY culture since they became prevalent in the 
 punk and radical scenes in the late 70s. Riot Grrrl’s a pretty good 
example where the ideas and culture of that scene were communicated 
through zines just as much as they were through the music.
 
It’s difficult to say what makes a ‘good’ zine – there’s such a variety that there’s no magic bullet. There are zines that are amazing 
because they’re beautifully illustrated, others because the 
illustrations look like a three year-old drew them. I guess anything 
that has passion for something in them is interesting and zines are no 
exception.
 
I think the attraction of zines has grown as the internet has. Having 
something that is tangible and final is quite attractive in a world of 
24 hour rolling news and ever changing churn of the internet. Also, 
zines can be read when you’re having a bath, a definite advantage over computers!
 
 


Does the zine scene go through fads and phases like every other scene? 
Have you ever been overwhelmed by frogophiles, or carebear 
afficionados, for instance?
EB: No, the symposium’s yet to be overrun by carebear or frog zines. But 
yeah the zine scene does tend to go through waves every few years. A 
few years ago it felt like it was totally dominated by punk zines, in 
2007/8 it felt like a lot of people who made comics started consciously 
making them as zines. More recently it seems like a lot of 
 illustration students have been really taken by making zines. Those
 trends tend to be reflected in the people who apply for stalls at the
 London Zine Symposium – this year we’ve had loads of applications from 
 various groups of students around the country.
 
 


What is the zine scene like in London? Do you think there’s a good 
 level of community? What kind of people get into it? 
 What are a few of your favourite zines? Is there anyone you’re excited about meeting 
at the symposium?
EB: I think there’s a pretty vibrant zine scene in London. A lot of that 
has to do with the group of people running the Alternative Press 
project that’s done a bunch of small scale events at places like the 
 Foundry, as well as a couple of larger ones at the St Aloysius centre 
near Euston. It’s meant that there’s now zine events happening throughout the year in London, which can only be a good thing. And yeah, there’s certainly a supportive scene amongst zinesters, there’s 
not much machismo or competiveness that you get in other scenes that 
I’ve been heavily involved with.
 
I’m not sure there’s one type of person that makes zines; it takes all sorts. I guess it’s people who feel they have something to say but 
don’t want to go through the traditional channels to express 
themselves. And I’ve discovered so many great people and great zines 
whilst being involved that that’s a pretty impossible question to 
answer. Though Maximum Rock N Roll, Punk Planet, My Evil Twin Sister, 
Inside Front, 12o5 and Scanner will always have a place close to my 
 heart!
 
 At the symposium I’m looking forward to meeting Matthew Murray – who’s 
running the artist trading card exchange – and Geoff – who’s running 
the kids comix workshop. And of course in general I’m just looking
 forward to seeing old friends from across the continent!
 
 


Zine symposium

How important do you think DIY culture is? What are your views on DIY as a form of resistance to mainstream media and their messages?
EB: I think DIY’s vital. I think it gives resources and space for radical thought to grow and exist and hopefully gives an alternative to the 
hegemony of mainstream culture. You need a radical culture to exist for any radical change to happen. DIY is, obviously, way bigger than 
just zines though. I think zines can be used by radicals as a way to quickly communicate with people, but I’m not sure that making a zine 
is necessarily inherently radical. But DIY, in general, is certainly 
 a corner stone in any anti-authoritarian organising be it squatting 
social centres, taking over the streets or organising a really
 awesome gig!
 
 


I like the idea of artist trading cards! Will there be other crafty 
 things to see and do around the symposium? And why is the comic 
workshop only for kids?
EB: Yeah, the artist trading cards should be cool. And I know it’s a shame 
 that the comic workshop is only for kids, but then again kids tend to 
get left out of zine culture sometimes, so it’s cool that they’re going to have their own space at this year’s Symposium.

Do you organise any events based around DIY
 culture other than the LSZ? If so, what are they and how can people 
 get involved?
EB: There’ll be another zine in a day project at this year’s symposium, which hopefully will be printed on the day itself if all goes according to
 plan. I’m afraid LZS is enough of an event to last us all a full year. 
We all put on DIY gigs, organise protests, work in social centres and 
 what have you, but nothing on the scale of the Zine Symposium!
 
 


The Individual Zine Rocks table encourages people with just one zine
 to get involved, first-timers or small scale creators; do you have any
 tips for people interested in getting into the zine scene on getting 
heard about?
EB: It’s tricky to give specific pointers, though it’s worth reading Alex 
Wrekk’s ‘Stolen Sharpie Revolution’, which does a really good job of 
explaining the zine scene and all it’s myriad quirks. If you’re interested in making a zine you should just make one. Better to have tried and failed than not have tried at all! If you wanna get heard about come along to zine events, trade zines with other people and 
make sure you get copies into any shop that will have them!
 


You heard what the man said! Come along to the London Zine Symposium, The Rag Factory, Henage Street, just off Brick Lane, Saturday 29th May 12-6pm. Our original listing is posted here.



Categories ,Aniela Murphy, ,Charlotte Cooper, ,diy, ,Edd Baldry, ,London Zine Symposium, ,Neltonmandelton, ,Portland Zine Symposium, ,squatting, ,Tea Hvala, ,zines

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