CAN I BE AN ARTIST?

After visiting the London Art Fair yesterday (I'll promise to write about my impressions some other time) and with the memory of Francesca Woodman's pictures following me everywhere I go, I decide to use the inspiration to take some pictures with the idea to create interesting visuals that you want to look at.

This idea is as well, in some way, connected to my latest project. A publication in which, while promoting the course that I'm doing at the moment, I have to answer the question: What a designer needs to learn to function successfully in the constant changing 21st Century? After doing some research I started to think in the new designer as the TOTAL Designer in the same way that people like LeonardoDa Vinci or Michelangelo were TOTAL Artists. From there I started to see both disciplines much closer as I have ever seen them before (I broke one of my own mental barriers).

So I'm starting to practice a bit of self-expression through photography. I'm not completely sure about the results but I had loots of fun and I enjoyed experimenting, don't be to hard on me.

Ole!

OK Go - End Love - Rocks!!

THE SHADOW CATHERS

Following one of my multiple New Year's resolutions, making the most of London and its cultural offer, today I went to an exhibition at the Victoria & Albert Museum in South Kensington. The V&A, who's logo was designed by Alan Fletcher, is one of my favorites places in London. Its spaces, collections and exhibitions are relevant and interesting, and the visit it's always a good experience due the relaxed atmosphere(the tourists don't cue at its doors like art junkies possessed by the urgency to overdose on 16 century painting. 

This morning I headed to THE SHADOW CATCHERS not knowing what I was gonna see. Photography without camera?( I didn't quite know what they meant by that). What I have found has been the work of five artist, that master the creation of image. By using light and dark, while manipulating photographic or light sensitive paper, Floris Neususs, Pierre Cordier, Garry Fabian Miller, Susan Derges and Adam Fuss create unexpected visuals, textures and patterns. I specially liked the arches by Susan Derges and the human silhouettes by Neususs and I will experiment with their techniques when looking for an abstract or surrealistic feel in a personal project.

Ole!

 

Floris Neususs

Floris Neususs

 

Garry Fabian Miller

Garry Fabian Miller

Pierre Cordier

Pierre Cordier

Susan Derges

FRANCESCA WOODMAN AT THE VICTORIA MIRO GALLERY

Yesterday I went to a photography exhibition that it's being held at the VICTORIA MIRO GALLERY until the 22nd of January by American artist FRANCESCA WOODMAN. I'm finding quite difficult to describe with words the impact that her work have had on me. Her incredible technique, the beauty of the shoots, her self-obsession, the narrative, the darkness, the absence, the sadness... It was just amazing and inspiring.

A selection of a 100 small format photographs (most of them in black and white), taken between the early 1970's to 1981 that, I think, are completely relevant right now. An artwork by a talented young artist that sadly kill herself in 1981, aged just 22.

Her life and death has been the object of a film which won Best New York Documentary at the ninth Tribeca Film Festival, called THE WOODMANS.

It may be not everybody taste but still, I think that is worth it to go and have a look before it finishes.

Ole!!!!!

JUDGE THEM BY THE COVER

I have a love-hate relationship with fashion magazines, since my teenager years I have been an occasional consumer. Occasional because I'm interested in fashion, and their covers trick me into buy them, but when I start to go through their pages I realize that, most of the times, the content doesn't quite suits my personality. I like the pictures, layout, and the glossy feel of the paper, but I don't appreciate their effort to push you to believe that if you like fashion you have to be prepared to pay for it. I do think that fashion designers deserve to be paid for their art and I'm aware that the choice of materials has an impact on the item price, but a £1000 scarf it's just a bit to frivolous for me.

Still, to work in the art department of one of this magazines, would be a dream come true, because you can see the amount of creativity put into them month after month.

I have chosen a few covers that I find interesting because they seem quite original, away from the smiling pretty face that it's common place.

Ole!

I WAS THERE!!!

Creative Review - Theartschool at the Houses of Parliament

SATURDAY NOTTING HILL

I work always Saturday but yesterday they forgot about me and I enjoyed a Notting Hill morning walk, it was a bit gray, and cold, cold, cold, but I managed to take a few pictures...

COLLAGES COLLAGES COLLAGES

JUANJO SAEZ

Hello everyone, I have been away spending Christmas in Barcelona with my family and this is my excuse to have abandoned my blog for a little bit too long, I know, I know, it sounds as a bad excuse but you don't know them. Nevertheless I had some time to discover interesting things that I can share with you all. My brother introduce me to a new animated series that is being very successful at the moment, ARROS COVAT, a Catalan expresion that translates as Arroz pasado in Spanish, means that you getting old for certain things (probably the most extended use is to speak about a woman in her late thirties that is not a mother yet).

The illustrator of this series is a guy from Barcelona (that I happen to met long time ago) with a really personal and recognizable style in both his drawings and sense of humor. JUANJO SAEZ have worked for the most important Spanish newspapers and tendency magazines and have published already five books. I like his basic but highly expressive drawing and his witty jokes, it's a shame that I could not find the series with English subtitles but I think that you are gonna be able to appreciate it anyway.

Ole!