Amelia’s Magazine | Graduate Fashion Show 2007: Manchester Metropolitan

Those of you who’ve seen Fame (you know the one, store information pills “Remember my name (FAME!)/I’m gonna live forever” and all that jazz) may remember the relatively small but significant character called Bruno. He hated playing in the strings section of the orchestra because he could electronically create an orchestra of sound and fury on his own, information pills healing resulting in much dancing in the streets and on taxis…

…The comaprison: Napoleon IIIrd Napoleon IIIrd. Why he hasn’t had more Fame action himself is quite beyond me. Though that said, I had heard on the grapevine that the man was touring with a full band and was hoping to see and hear such a spectacle in the flesh. But alas, whilst hoping that the brass section was hiding out in the toilets working up the saliva to play, the man himself emerged to take his place behind two microphones, that met above a keyboard, nestled between all manner of electronic and musical paraphernalia…and no band.

Never mind though, performing solo, he didn’t disappoint. Unexpectedly formidable, Napoleon is energetic and jerky as his music often is. One thing is that from the start, Napoleon is so believable. Without guile or pretensions, yet vaguely angsty and almost aggressive, not quite desperate but definitely hopeful, he is one man doing his own orchestral manoeuvres in the dark.

Like a proud band leader, pumping his metaphoric baton triumphantly, Napoleon IIIrd conducted his way through the set with a well practiced panache; twiddling with levels, blue-tacking keys, pressing buttons and bristling on his guitar. Completely comfortable but not complacent, Napoleon IIIrd played with abandon. With heavy industrial beats, crunchy glitches, big refrains, random samples and a pre-recorded choir of Napoleons to back him up, Napoleon IIIrd’s music is quite epic live. It’s all the more strange to match the sound to the scene when the guy is all alone on stage amongst his band of merry, electronically recorded selves.

So remember his name, because Napoleon IIIrd is dynamite.
Having studied graphic design, remedy I too had put on a show at my university and then made the journey to London to showcase my talents to industry moguls. My experience was, remedy well, pretty shit – but this was flawless. With over 50 stands showcasing talent, 2 fashion theatres and an orange-carpeted Moët bar for pre-show drinks, GFW supported by River Island (amongst other major players) really packed a punch.

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Amelia’s Magazine | London College of Fashion MA graduate collections

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Monday 26th January

Lucky Dragons
, health store Luminaire, viagra London

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Pretentious blurb going on about birthing fragile networks of digital signals or whatever but don’t be put off as it should be an interesting night of experimental folktronica.

Zombie Zombie, Ruby Lounge, Manchester

French electro with a cool Germanic edge.

Michael Baker, Ida Brown, John Barrow, Slaughtered Lamb, London

Folk rock from Michael Baker with more acoustic sounds in support at this lovely, folk-oriented venue.

Tuesday 27th January

Grace Jones, Roundhouse, London

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Will be nothing less than extraordinary show from this wildly experimental but still accessibly pop singer. Her new album is spectacular as we have raved on previous occasions and she is completely fantastic live.

Let’s Wrestle, Screaming Tea Party, Hoxton Square Bar and Kitchen, London

Fun party indie boys headline with cute bubblegum punk support from Screaming Tea Party.

Luke Haines, FreeDM studio at Roundhouse, London

He of the Auteurs and Black Box Recorder and self-proclaimed Britpop instigator plays his highly regarded solo material.

Wednesday 28th January

Crystal Antlers, Darker My Lover, Loverman, Ark People, Lexington, London

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I will save my thesis on the fact that every single hip new band seems to be called Crystal something at the moment for another time. Instead catch the Antlers’ Long Beach raw punk on their first European tour. Sweaty, bruising fun.

Six Toes, The Mariner’s Children, Share, Slaughtered Lamb, London

Delicate and pretty, the exact antithesis of the Lexington gig. A Wednesday night of contrasts.

Thursday 29th January

George Pringle, Applicants, 4 or 5 Magicians, Buffalo Bar London

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Spoken word to a stark electro backing track from George Pringle. Dead arty.

Glissando, City Screen, York

Gliding atmospheric sounds, perfectly suited to the cinema venue.

Friday 30th January

Afrikan Boy, The Real Heat, Barden’s Boudoir, London

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Signed to M.I.A.’s label, probably best known for his hilarious masterpiece about shoplifting bargain supermarkets.

Luminous Frenzy, Shunt Vaults, London

Where better than an underground dungeon club to see this haunting cinematic live show? Nowhere better.

Saturday 31st January

Stereo Total, Bar Rumba, London

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Like a Franco-German White Stripes (girl singer/drummer, boy guitarist) only about a million times more appealing and with a sense of humour. And nothing in common musically. Playing electro-punk reworkings of French chanson and ye-ye as well as their own charming and wittily insouciant numbers in French, German, English and any other languages they happen to have picked up.

Mike Bones, Oakford Social, Reading

Session guitarist supreme, turned solo singer-songwriter with interestingly lovelorn songs and none of the whingeing usually associated with that damning tag.

Micachu and the Shapes, Macbeth, London

On nearly everyone’s list of ones to watch 2009 (and of course, featured in Issue 10), catch Micachu’s angular and unpredictable show in a small venue while you still can.

Sky Larkin, Brudenell Social Club, Leeds

Homecoming gig for this local band whose sweet and clever indie rock is slightly off-kilter lending shades of Sonic Youth to their jangly guitars.

Sunday 1st February

Emmy the Great, Phoenix, Exeter

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Promoting her debut album despite having been touring material for the past four years, with deceptively sweet-sounding tunes and scarily frank lyrics.

Last week, more about the London College of Fashion held it’s MA show in the beautiful Raphael gallery at the V&A. It’s very fitting that it took place during menswear fashion week, as twelve out of the nineteen collections were clothes for the boys.

It seems that menswear is finally standing up to its competitive and often overpowering opposite. Usually, the occasional dose of menswear in graduate collections – lets face it – never usually quite stands up to its womenswear rivals, this time round however, it was a different story. If the MA graduates set out to change the preconceptions of us voyeurs of fashion, who put the words ‘fashion’ and ‘womenswear’ hand in hand, they did a very good job with these collections.

Nowhere near boring – menswear and gave us gold, sequins, fringing and innovative tailoring fitted to a selection of 80′s looking, nu-romantic boys; flopping curls and eyeliner in check. Not to confuse these looks as steals from womenswear, masculinity was still very much in tact.

Here is a selection of the ones that caught our eye:

Dimitri Stavrou (below left) presented a very masculine interpretation of fringing through a skilled process of hand-frayed carbon fiber. The collection was inspired by the incest breeding of a Greek mythological God and mortal woman, a part human, part-animal crossover was explored through historical body armour and shapes created through movement.

Ji Yun Lapthorn’s ( below right)sophisticated and beautiful display of drapery and tailoring was a delicate and mesmerising affair. Soft folds created new shapes from heavy silk crepe, and cashmere showed a mature sensitivity to both form and fabric.
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A futuristic rainbow of colour shone through with Rohan Kale’s (above) collection, where luxury and sustainability met in a beautiful patchwork of Spanish silk tie off-cuts. Entitled ‘The Two Christians’ his admiration for both Christian Dior and Christian Lacroix was explored in this rich, exuberant take on sharp, quality tailoring.

Sticking to a theme of bright colour, Carly Garwin (below) used neon pink as a metaphor for happiness in her Parisian inspired collection. Proportions were played with and innovative cutting gave a sophisticated feel to this collection, where leg baring tailored shorts matched with cropped capes for a refreshing male silhouette.
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Miyhun Park (above) took us on a mystical journey under the sea, where fluidity merged with structure. Sheer dresses fitted to wire frames mimicked jellyfish like shapes, whilst creating a blurred and distorted vision of the underlying garments to leave an impression of being underwater.

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In a fitting and fair finale the battle between men’s and womenswear ended in a beautiful mixed collection from graduate Manjit Deu, (above) who won the Collection of the Year. Using the ever-popular sequin- in its new and more abstract rectangular shape – Manjit hand-embroidered dresses, hoodies and tops for a truly lavish and dazzling end to the show.

Categories ,80’s, ,Catwalk, ,London, ,London College of Fashion, ,Menswear, ,Student

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Amelia’s Magazine | Fashioning an Ethical Industry Conference 2010

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Last week an email dropped into my inbox announcing that the March 2010 Fashioning an Ethical Industry : Fast Forward conference will be held in London. Fashioning an Ethical Industry -the educational division of Labour behind the Label project- is offering students the opportunity to present ethical and socially responsible research and design projects which address the following key themes at the forum.

• Social responsibility in the garment industry (with an emphasis on garment
workers’ rights)
• Teaching ethics within fashion education
• Approaches to education for sustainable development relevant to fashion
education

Project Abstracts (500-700 words) need to be completed by the 30th October 2009.
Final Papers need to be 5-6000 words long and will be published online under a creative commons license. Each accepted project will have a presentation time of thirty minutes.

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The aim of the project (funded by the EU) and the accompanying book: Sustainable Fashion: A Handbook for Educators book (available online here) is to encourage fashion design lecturers to raise student awareness about their responsibility towards the rights and physical exertion of workers who construct garments for the textile industry.

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Fashion has the ability to capture the imagination, help it subsequently has the possibility to influence and reflect social change. Think of the Land Girls during the 1940′s and the popularity of Dior’s New Look after the war. Chanel continued championing – arguably as a stylish choice- the right for women to wear trousers; the possibility of not being able to, pilule seems alien today. Fashion changed as Women’s rights developed and it reflected this change through the clothes that became available in the shops. There is nothing to stop it changing now, information pills by reflecting a desire to protect the environment. Moreover the fashion industry must enter discussions surrounding sustainability now, because of the impact of fast fashion and ever changing ‘trends’ on landfills. A conversation Amelia’s Magazine welcomes having long supported sustainable living that does not impede on those who work in the garment industry’s physical health.

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The Fashioning an Ethical Industry International conference aims to equip students “with the tools to design the way we make and consume fashion differently… It brings together educators, industry experts, academics and selected students to explore how fashion can be taught to inspire responsibility for the rights of the workers making our clothes.” The site features examples of student’s work exploring the possibilities of ethical fashion from up-cycling to sustainable materials. Earlier this year Amelia’s magazine reported on Fashioning an Ethical Industry’s reassuring research highlighting the increasing interest of fashion students towards using of sustainable materials to create ethical fashion.

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The Fashioning an Ethical Industry conference is a great opportunity to become involved with debates on social responsibility. Students should be encourage to utilise the current explosion in internet fashion reportage to press these topics into the public domain. The popularity of fashion, specifically because of it’s potential to help buck the recession in newspapers and magazines features offers designers and students the chance to express the importance of human rights in all aspects of life, including the places where are clothes are made. Katherine Hamnett wears her thoughts on her chest, is it not time we did too?

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Find out more about sweatshop conditions here:

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Categories ,Ethical Fashion Forum, ,Fashion, ,Fashioning an Ethical Industry, ,Labour behind the Label, ,Student, ,Sustainable

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Amelia’s Magazine | Graduate Fashion Show 2007: Central St. Martins

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Five albums in, medications malady and with only mild commercial success to date, it would be a reasonable assessment to describe Rufus Wainwright’s dramatic, theatrical pop as something of an acquired taste. For many, he over eggs the pudding , and then some. But whilst bold ambition may be a deterrent to some, his loyal fans will rejoice at this offering. This is classic Rufus, and whilst it wont be winning him many new fans, this simply doesn’t matter. This is a record to admire, it may even be his most satisfying work to date.

As expected, Wainwright offers up his usual mix of epic and restrained throughout the 13 songs, and there are a number of gems. Striking orchestration and characteristically high in the mix Rufus vocals lead us into opener Do I Dissapoint You. It is a brilliant opening song to set the tone for what is to follow. The diversity of instruments employed here alone is staggering, and like many songs throughout the album the arrangement is gloriously ambitious. The recurring operatic theme, present throughout all his previous work has been thankfully maintained.

First Single Going To A Town (which was B listed by Radio 2) follows. Its mournful tones echoing latter day Beatles balladry (think Fool On The Hill) and it features the albums most engaging lyrics. Amidst numerous misforgivings with his homeland, Wainwright again finds himself lost in the confusion of love and religion (another recurring theme here), “Tell me, do you really think you go to hell for having loved?” he pleads. For all the record’s grandiose, it is these moments of human insecurity that really strike a chord. It is also one of a number of outstanding vocals on the record.

The pace doesn’t let up throughout the opening half – Nobody’s Off The Hook, Between My Legs and Tiergarten sit easily amongst the artists best work. But, it cannot quite be maintained throughout the second half – a better focus on sequencing next time perhaps. But this is a minor gripe. With each listen, hidden depths are revealed, suggesting that this is a record that will endure also. It is a joy.

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Troubles! That’s exactly what the Concretes got into during the last year. One of the three founding members and nonetheless the lead vocalist of the band decided to quit to start her solo project Taken by Trees. If that was not enough the destiny decided to punish them furthermore and as a result they had all their equipment stolen during the U.S. tour. Quite a difficult time for a band, sildenafil isn’t it? However, The Concretes decided to look ahead and continue their career as a seven piece band, giving Maria Erikkson the difficult task to substitute the charismatic and easily recognisable voice of Victoria Bergsman.

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Amelia’s Magazine | Graduate Fashion Show 2007: Kingston University

Those of you who’ve seen Fame (you know the one, store information pills “Remember my name (FAME!)/I’m gonna live forever” and all that jazz) may remember the relatively small but significant character called Bruno. He hated playing in the strings section of the orchestra because he could electronically create an orchestra of sound and fury on his own, information pills healing resulting in much dancing in the streets and on taxis…

…The comaprison: Napoleon IIIrd Napoleon IIIrd. Why he hasn’t had more Fame action himself is quite beyond me. Though that said, I had heard on the grapevine that the man was touring with a full band and was hoping to see and hear such a spectacle in the flesh. But alas, whilst hoping that the brass section was hiding out in the toilets working up the saliva to play, the man himself emerged to take his place behind two microphones, that met above a keyboard, nestled between all manner of electronic and musical paraphernalia…and no band.

Never mind though, performing solo, he didn’t disappoint. Unexpectedly formidable, Napoleon is energetic and jerky as his music often is. One thing is that from the start, Napoleon is so believable. Without guile or pretensions, yet vaguely angsty and almost aggressive, not quite desperate but definitely hopeful, he is one man doing his own orchestral manoeuvres in the dark.

Like a proud band leader, pumping his metaphoric baton triumphantly, Napoleon IIIrd conducted his way through the set with a well practiced panache; twiddling with levels, blue-tacking keys, pressing buttons and bristling on his guitar. Completely comfortable but not complacent, Napoleon IIIrd played with abandon. With heavy industrial beats, crunchy glitches, big refrains, random samples and a pre-recorded choir of Napoleons to back him up, Napoleon IIIrd’s music is quite epic live. It’s all the more strange to match the sound to the scene when the guy is all alone on stage amongst his band of merry, electronically recorded selves.

So remember his name, because Napoleon IIIrd is dynamite.
Having studied graphic design, remedy I too had put on a show at my university and then made the journey to London to showcase my talents to industry moguls. My experience was, remedy well, pretty shit – but this was flawless. With over 50 stands showcasing talent, 2 fashion theatres and an orange-carpeted Moët bar for pre-show drinks, GFW supported by River Island (amongst other major players) really packed a punch.

Read more

Amelia’s Magazine | Ethical Fashion Forum – Global Sourcing The Market Place Event – One to Watch

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I love the Ethical Fashion Forum. For the past year they have been developing the Spotlight on Sourcing series (the last of which happen in August, drug Spotlight On Africa). The culmination of the 2009 series, drug titled The Annual Industry Marketplace for Suppliers of Sustainable Fabrics, Components and Manufacturers to the Fashion Industry will happen on Friday 20th – Saturday 21st November 2009 at Chelsea College of Art and Design.

The two day conference promises to be an exciting informative event continuing the EFF’s excellent work with regards to building links and contacts between designers, suppliers and warehouses who desire to produce sustainable ethical fashion.

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The culmination of the 2009 series is The Global Sourcing Marketplace event. As aforementioned the event aims to build links between designers, businesses and entrepreneurs who want to work in an ethical environment. The initiative started as a result of the numerous emails the EFF receives each month from business representatives and social entrepreneurs requesting advice or recommendation for manufacturers, suppliers and cooperatives who work to high ethical standards.

Therefore, if you are looking to produce ethical sustainable fashion but are unsure how, this is the event for you. Likewise if you want to exhibit and discuss the creation of your sustainable products you can participate as part of the exhibition stands. Find out more and how to apply here

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Dani the event’s organiser spoke to Amelia’s Magazine about the event, explaining there will be “a series of short seminars during the day, when exhibitors are invited to introduce innovative and exemplary fabrics, components, and manufacturing processes.”

The event is not for profit and all the money raised from the entrance fee will be used to continue the development of sustainable ethical fashion. As the website states the ultimate goal is “to reduce the environmental impact of the industry, support fair and equitable trade, and reduce poverty.” It is held in conjunction with Fairtrade and the World Fairtrade Organisation.

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In addition to the aforementioned series and their already well-established EFF Network, a place where like minded people can gather online to discuss ethical fashion initiatives. The EFF have now started a monthly event: The Ethical Fashion Social. The first of which was hosted a few weeks ago in London, Bristol, New Dehli, Narobi and Washington DC.

Joey Instone, the brains behind the meeting spoke to Amelia’s Magazine about her desire to encourage the groundwork established by the online network to move into face to face discussions. The concept for the socials being to pass on individual knowledge regarding the difficulties facing the establishment and development of ethical fashion companies.

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Eventually Joey hopes for the socials to be self sufficient happenings across the globe that build ethical communities through a combination of business and social relationships. From my own inbox I can see one has sprung up in New York and having experienced the welcoming atmosphere where everyone was keen to pass on information and discuss the state of the fashion industry. This is one idea that will run and run across the world.

Whilst at the Social I met a range of people who had been involved in all aspects of fashion – from the positive steps being taken by the High Street to witnessing the negative side of environmental pollution created as a result of the unregulated textile companies. It was a really fantastic event, watch the EFF website for future dates across the globe!

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Let’s all get involved! If you trying to produce sustainable fashion, this is the event for you! Find out more on the EFF Website.

Watch this space for further news on the EFF Socials, Amelia’s Magazine will be in attendance.

Categories ,Chelsea College of Art and Design, ,fairtrade, ,The Ethical Fashion Forum

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Amelia’s Magazine | Go Green Week With The University Of Arts

The eponymous release from New York based The Pains of Being Pure at Heart has everything you could want from a summer album. A certain been-in-the-sun-too-long hazy-headyness without the too-much-ice-cream sugariness of many indie-pop summer albums. No-No! I’m rallying for The Pains of Being Pure at Heart being trail-blazers for a new genre we shall call ‘Sandalgaze” aka Shoegaze for when it’s not raining out.

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From the rip-roaring opener ‘Contender’, buy more about the album manages to be catchy without being twee, shop noise without being dreary, imagine My Bloody Valentine on a beach doo-wopping and you’re halfway there.
Whilst treading this line The Pains of Being Pure at Heart consistently avoid being schmaltzy. The track; Young Adult Friction is danceable, its lyrics of a whimsy worthy of Stuart Murdoch yet reflect on themes like first love with a sort of yearning nostalgia, again souring the sweetness. Here the oft-overdone boy/girl singing duo is slightly off-kilter and the effect is more reminiscent of early Yo La Tengo or Jesus and Mary Chain than Belle & Sebastian.

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The Pains of Being Pure of Heart is definitely tinged with nods towards the 80s and early 90s,yet it is perhaps too easy to criticise the album for this. The band manage to utilise certain stylistic tropes without being too retrospective or shallow.
In fact The Pains of Being Pure at Heart is refreshing in it’s redefinition of certain preconceptions: summer isn’t all about whistling and tambourine jangling anymore and Shoegaze is reinterpreted with a sunny touch rather like enjoying a 99 flake with Kevin Shields!

The album ‘The Pains of Being Pure at Heart’ is available now and the single ‘Young Adult Friction’ is released on 18th May (Fortuna Pop!)
They play The Lexington, London on 15th May

Kitsuné has really got its groove on this time. Left eyebrows are often tilted to a 74-degree angle at the mention of a Parisian fashion boutique that puts out compilation CDs, symptoms amongst other music releases. At first, tadalafil you kind of expect endless Dimitri From Paris types churning out catwalk-flavoured lint, but Kitsuné really knows what it is getting, and won’t be holding onto the receipt. With utter confidence and bravado, you see, it was Kitsuné that released Wolfmother’s ball-busting old-metal limited edition EP. Benetton scratches its head in confusion.
For all that, Compilation 7 is a danceable disc, with lots of European disco-beats, and plenty of fruity basslines in the Frenchified Electro style. But it’s not the kind of thoughtless, juvenile poppy end of it. You won’t hear anything approaching “Lady, give me tonight, cos my feeling is just so right”, since the Maison-people (Maisonettes?) are clued up. They listen to Tangerine Dream and Elvis Costello, and anything they select from the here and now is selected with a certainty that reminds me of the chap who picks the leaves for PG Tips: He just knows where the good stuff’s at.
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Highpoints include Chateau Marmont’s Beagle, filled with synths fresh from Tomorrow’s World demonstrations, sidewinding through arpeggiated chords, with the occasional crash-bang with a wooden spoon by the stove, and Beni’s Fringe Element, which popcorns along with hi-hats before going to a thoroughly spiffing hiatus of slap bass with one of the squidgiest, wiggly-wormiest synth solos since Mr.Scruff’s Shrimp. Probably the most exciting track here is Crystal Fighters’ (above) Xtatic Truth, a journey involving Epic-Ragga-Happy-Hardcore, hints of Chinese Folk, and a choir of the ether.
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But it’s a plentiful CD. There are nineteen songs, in all, and although everything chugs along to the metronomic pulse of cubase, there is pacing and variety to the beast overall. Gentle relief comes best of all in This Sweet Love by James Yuill (above), as remixed by Prins Thomas, a ponderous chillscape based on the warmest fingerpicking, and an embrace of vocals. You will feel truly hugged. And once you’ve digested it all, you can take that lovely warm glow on the Eurostar with you, and buy yourself the bestest clothes (I’m not a fashion writer, actually) in all Pareeee!

You can buy the Maison’s goodies at www.kitsune.fr or at their myspace.
If you are a university student, online what do you make of your schools environmental policies? Do they even have green policies to speak of? This week, the students of the University of Arts London have been bringing environmental issues to the forefront, and discussing the various ways that both themselves, their campuses and the courses themselves can be more environmentally aware.

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The Go Green Week, also known as Green: The New Black has been running for the last few days and culminates in talks and workshops on Friday, that include Fashion Forward: Creating an Ethical Label between 4pm-6pm RHS East Space, LCF, John Princes Street
which asks: “How can you create a label that looks good, but is also good to the environment?” ECCA and the Centre for Sustainable Fashion present fashion design businesses that are sustainable throughout from their manufacturing processes and materials, to marketing methods that aim communicate and promote their ethical processes to their customers.
Also on Friday afternoon at LCC is the meeting “Students Going Green” –top of the agenda are the following points “Fed up with the lack of recycling at your College? … Want sustainability on the curriculum? … Think Arts London should GO GREEN?” Speaking with the Press Officers of the Student Union, I learnt that a large number of students have voiced their concerns over this topic. The recycling issue specifically has been on ongoing and much debated subject. Many students feel that not enough is being done to provide facilities to recycle. The Green Charter laid out by the Student Union demands that “Sufficient recycling facilities should be available at all Arts London Sites and all Halls of Residence, with consideration also given to specialist recycling e.g. textiles, wood at relevant sites.”

Also on the agenda is for the issues of sustainability to feature more heavily in the Universities curriculum, either in the form of specific modules, or integrated as a whole, and for the campuses to switch to a green energy provider. The student union also explained that they are setting up an “Ethical and Environmental assembly” that will set future Go Green Assembly’s. They have also been encouraging students to sign a petition that is campaigning for a greener Arts London. Realising that strong visuals are the best way to get the point across, the students were asked to be photographed with the green charter and upload their pictures to the blog. An example would be these brave folks.

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Learning about the concerted efforts to raise environmental awareness amongst students started me wondering how other universities and student bodies broach this subject. As this is a topic that is dear to our heart, we would love your input on whether your schools and universities are committed to the environmental cause, and if so, do you feel that they are doing enough? . Tell us more at hello@ameliasmagazine.com and maybe we can help to highlight the issue.

Categories ,Climate, ,Ecology, ,Student

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Amelia’s Magazine | Studying Permaculture at the Maya Mountain Research Farm

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On Thursday the bath-time lovelies at Lush supported one of my great loves, case troche by staging Climate Rush themed picnics outside all 89 of their UK stores.

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As was detailed by Cari in a previous post, unhealthy my local Lush store just happens to be in Liverpool Street Station. Chosen as the flagship store for this event the picnic was attended by Lush superstar campaigners Sean and Andrew, here who have together helped us out in a very big way.

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I sent the interns ahead on foot and arrived to find a fetching gingham tablecloth – bearing the timely ‘Climate Change is No Picnic’ slogan – being spread and upon it a yummy selection of vegan cake and cookies laid out for passersby to enjoy.

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A trio of violins led by the Rush’s very own Deborah (her of sticky-fingers-in-parliament fame) struck up a tune as the lovely Lush girls, dressed in full Edwardian garb, handed out Trains Not Planes sashes to business men passing by and even managed to engage some climate change denialists in some productive conversation.

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The police, as ever, were present. In fact I swear I recognised one of them from the “Riot Gate” at Kingsnorth during Climate Camp last year. Unlike then, they were eager to smell the soaps (all packaged in recyclable paper – Lush tries not to use excess packaging, just one of the reasons we love ‘em) and chat to the pretty shop girls. I wonder if they’ll be so nice to us on Monday…

As Tamsin did her best to butter up the passersby in those famous suffragette must-haves, fishnet tights and a miniskirt, we were pounced on by a person dressed up as a giant mobile phone.

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A slightly surreal experience to say the least, as the Lush shop girls tried to dress the ungainly thing in some bright red sashes, whilst Sean did his best to engage the phone in conversation about how many times a year it flies. My interns finally arrived and proceeded to pose marvelously for the camera. We’ve been joking that Jonno and Roisin are evil twins – just check them out!

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Over the weekend there has been a flurry of Climate Rush activity, both promotional and creative – we’ve flyered the South Bank twice, and approached friendly looking cyclists left, right and centre.

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It seems that if you ride a bike you are generally a friendly soul, and all of them were happy to hear about Climate Rush bar a particularly unpleasant yuppie couple with a pair of fold out Bromptons that no doubt only see the light of day when the sun shines at the weekend. Fairweather cyclists, who’d have ‘em?!

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In between accosting cyclists we have managed to print a mammoth amount of sexy sashes and flags to attach to the back of bikes.

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I’ve discovered that I can still sew, and managed to knock up 5 pairs of fetching bloomers in record time (just don’t look too closely at the sewing, I was in a hurry okay?!) Made out of red and white striped fabric with lacey ruffles on the legs they look part clown and more than a little bit burlesque, but then whoever said we take the Edwardian theme too seriously?! I can’t wait to see what everyone else dons for out bike ride tomorrow.

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Bring it on…. let’s show the government and big corporations that we won’t let them get away with business as usual when it comes to Climate Change. Collectively we can stop this beautiful world of ours from being buggered over, so make sure you come along and enjoy a stylish Bike Rush with a purpose. This is one cycle ride you’re sure to remember…

Read a past blog about this event here. What do you think about direct action over Climate Change? Let us know your views.
Rowdy – Never Smile at a Crocodile

Sartorial Contemporary Art
26 Argyle Square
London WC1H 8AP
June 4th – June 27th
Open Tues – Sat 1:30 – 7pm or by appointment

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With work described as ‘Ren & Stimpy meets Goldsworthy’, shop this is the first major solo show for Rowdy in London to date. Mixing the Ancient with the Urban, medical Rowdy juxtaposes his trademark playful crocodile sculptures with the modern cityscape jungle. He also produces street art paintings reminiscent of caveman-esque cartoon monoliths.

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Abstract America: New Painting and Sculpture

Saatchi Gallery
Duke of York’s HQ
King’s Road
London
SW3 4SQ
Until 13th September
10am-6pm, illness 7 days a week
Free

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A new generation of radical American abstract painters and sculptors from the US, 35 of them in total, with work both daring and inventive, fresh and exhilarating.

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Aditya Pande

Alexia Goethe Gallery
7 Dover Street, London W1S 4LD
Until 18th July
Monday – Friday 10-6
Saturday 11-4

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New Dehli artist Aditya Pande’s first solo London show draws on both fine and applied art principles. What start as drawings on computer morph into paper prints or canvas creations, and then become starting points for three-dimensional narratives. Frantic, glossy, grand and descriptive.

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Feel The Force

Cafe Gallery
By the Lake, Southwark Park
London SE16 2UA
Until 28th June
Wednesday – Sunday 12 – 6
Free

Maja Bajevic, Benjamin Beker, Astrid Busch, Kate Gilmore, Immo Klink, Susan MacWilliam, James Pogson, Anina Schenker

Curated by Clare Goodwin and Liz Murray

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Inspired by engagement in power and resistance, Feel the Force is a collaborative show from eight international artists and debates the psychological, the political and the physical. Investigating roles of victim and perpetrator, the artists approach the term Force through avenues diverse as obsessional first love and the military.

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The Social Lives of Objects

Castlefield Gallery
2 Hewitt Street
Knott Mill
Manchester M15 4GB
Until 19th July
1-6pm Wednesday-Sunday
Free

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Hilary Jack, Lisa Penny and Dallas Seitz provide insightful examinations of society’s complex and perplexing relationship with material goods, from their beginnings in production to their inevitable obsolescence and decay. Everyday objects are recovered and represented and reinterpreted for our reevaluation of what role ‘stuff’ has in our lives and in our world.

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The Butterfly Effect

ARCH Gallery
15 Resolution Way
Deptford
London SE8 4NT
Until 20th June
Thurs – Sat 12:00 to 5:00pm

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The well-known theory that subtle actions can and will ultimately alter the paths of world disaster is given a makeover by God’s gift to drawing Paul Marks. Using the system to create intricate line drawings in which each line added by hand effects the next one added. The comparisons are as varied as lunar landscapes, overtly sexual and flows of air, smoke or water.

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ARCHIPELAGO – Gemma Anderson

Whitecross Gallery
122 Whitecross St.
London EC1Y 8PU
Until 6. June
Tues – Sat 11 – 6pm or by appointment
Free

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The final week to catch new work from Gemma Anderson including her signature drawings and newer etching work. Dream-like and fantastical depictions of fairies, land and seascapes drawing on her experiences of researching the Natural History archives in Canada, Japan and France her new work doubles as a personal travelogue.


Monday 1st June
Gang Gang Dance and About at Dingwalls, buy more about London
.

Gang Gang Dance are one of the most exciting bands around at the moment. They take inspiration from all over the world without erring into the Vampire Weekend‘s at times jarring pseudo-exoticism, by mixing everything through a furore of delay pedals and reverbs, to create a cyclical and danceable freaky electronica. With support from Hot Chip‘s Alexis Taylor’s improv side project About.

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Tuesday 2nd June
Fanfarlo and {Stricken City} at ICA, London.

Amelia’s favourites Anglo-Swedish Fanfarlo, bring their grandiose but whimsical pop to the ICA. With support from {Stricken City}

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Wednesday 3rd June
Post War Years, Milke and My Tiger My Timing at The Lexington, London.

The Lexington reminds me of that friend you had when you were 16 who introduced to lots of awesome bands. Tonight they host Post War Years, Milke, My Tiger My Timing. Come and boogie on down.

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Thursday 4th June
Deolinda and Oliver Man at ICA, London

Get that summer vibe with some Portugese music… Deolinda, an excellent four piece inspired by traditional fado music. Australian Oliver Mann offers support at the ICA.?

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Friday 5th June
Dan Deacon, Future Islands, Teeth Mountain, Adventure at ULU, London.

This Friday, Upset the Rhythm are serving up the finest Baltimore exports since The Wire, with the promise of more bells than Stringer. Dan Deacon headlines at ULU with the Wham CIty Collective, having loved his latest record Bromst with it’s melodic plinky plonky electro noise, I can’t wait to see him live apparently his shows are a sight to behold. He shares the bill with the Baltimore synth-poppers Future Islands, the noisy electro outfit Teeth Mountain, and “game-boy” soul band Adventure.

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Saturday 6th June
Devo at The HMV Forum, London.

Q. Are we not men?
A. No we are Devo.

That’s right! Mega-group Devo play the Forum this Saturday, interestingly and even more awesomely member Mark Mothersbaugh also composes for Wes Anderson. They merge kitschy science fiction and a dark sense of humour- this is truly going be legendary.

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Monday 1st June

BEGIN THE SUMMER OF PROTEST IN STYLE! remember..
1.Meet in St James Square, visit just off The Mall, from 5pm (we set off at 6pm).?
2. Bring bells, banners, Suffragette style, a picnic to share.?
3. If you miss us then you can come and join at any point along the way, or just for the picnic, call 07751 805 275 to find out where we’re at.

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On Monday 1st June the UK Parliament returns from recess for the summer sitting. We want to give them a warm welcome and remind them of the heat they can expect if they continue to ignore climate change.
Ed Miliband (Secretary of State Energy and Climate Change) is in Bonn that evening, discussing with other ‘world leaders’ the agenda for the UN Climate Summit in Copenhagen. Let’s give our ‘leaders’ a taste of the civil disobedience they can expect if real climate justice fails to materialise.
It is also the first evening of a coal conference at the illustrious ‘Chatham House’. Everyone who’s anyone, at least in the coal world, will be there.
We’ll begin our bike-ride outside their conference before winding our way ?through town.
Meet us from 5pm on St James Square, SW1Y 4LE. We’ll then move off at 6pm and take our bikes for a relaxed tour through London. Labour might think that investing in electric cars is the solution to climate change but we know that cars using electricity from coal-fired power stations is yet another red-herring.
Have you ever needed more reason to leave the house, embrace the sunshine and join the pedal-powered as they move about town?
Come along and make your impact felt.

Tuesday 2nd June

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Illustration by Faye Katirai

Entering an Ecological Age,
RIBA, 66 Portland Place, W1.
Peter Head explores how the world can begin to make the transition towards an ecological age of civilisation. focussing on urban areas and inefficient food production methods which consume land and non-renewable resources, 6.30pm, £8/£5
Info: 7580 5533/ info@bb.cc.org.uk

Celebrating World Environment Day – towards a new concept of development,

Francisco Lozano Winterhalder, 6.30pm, Instituto Cervantes, 102 Eaton Square
SW1. Info: 7235 0353

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Wednesday 3rd June
7pm

?‘Meltdown The End of The Age of Greed’?with Paul Mason

?Housmans Bookshop?
5 Caledonian Road?
LONDON,?
England
?N1 9DX,?UK?

Newsnight’s economics editor Paul Mason discusses the financial crash and explains why, love it or loathe it, the neo-liberal era is over. Followed by Q&A and book signing.???’Meltdown‘ tells the story of the financial crash that destroyed the West’s investment banks, brought the global economy to its knees, and began to undermine three decades of neo-liberal orthodoxy. Covering the credit crunch and its aftershocks from the economic front line, BBC journalist Paul Mason explores the roots of the US and UK’s financial hubris, documenting the real-world causes and consequences from the Ford factory, to Wall Street, to the City of London.??In response to the immense challenge now facing the existing economic system, he outlines a new era of hyper-regulated capitalism that could emerge from the wreckage. Paul Mason writes: “The book tells the story of the events of September-October 2008: I’m the economics editor of BBC Newsnight, so I had a ringside seat. It explains how we got here – from the shadow banking system, to subprime, to the commodities speculation that forced a billion people to go without meals in mid-2008. It also explains why, love it or loathe it, the neo-liberal era is over.”?
About the author: ??Paul Mason is the economics editor of BBC Newsnight and has covered globalisation and social justice stories from locations across the world, including Latin America, Africa and China. His previous book ‘Live Working, Die Fighting‘ was longlisted for the Guardian First Book Award.??Paul’s blog on the unfolding financial crisis ‘Idle Scrawl‘ can be found at www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/paulmason/.

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Thursday 4th June

The Gate of Heavenly Peace,
7.30pm
Prince Charles Cinema,
7 Leicester Place, WC2 .

Tickets £6.50 / £5 Students / £4.50 Member – Q&A
Starring: ?This extraordinary three-hour film…is a deep, powerful and rivetingly complex study of Tiananmen… THE GATE OF HEAVENLY PEACE will prove controversial in the West as well, for it shows that the student movement was divided against itself, with some its most influential leaders hoping for carnage. The student leader Chai Ling, shortly before the crackdown, announces in an interview that `only when the square is awash with blood will the people of China open their eyes.’ We have a special Q&A session with Antony Thomas (director of The Tank Man) and Tian Ai Zhang soprano soloist.

Friday 5th June

7.30pm
Food for All?
George Alagiah introduces the first in a series of debates on the big issues of our times, free, St. Peter’s Church, De Beauvoir Rd, Hackney

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Saturday 6 June

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Climate Camp Benefit Night
7pm -1.30am
Cross Kings Pub,
126 York Way,
N1 0AX
Are you interested in doing more to highlight the urgency of climate change? Are you intrigued but feel uncomfortable about going outside the mainstream political process? Would you consider getting involved but don’t know how? Are you nervous about the consequences?
Climate Camp Benefit Night
Poetry, Comedy and Bands


WDM’s London campaigner convention

When: 10am – 5pm, Saturday 6 June 2009 ?
Where: The Resource Centre, 356 Holloway Road, London N7 6PA

Join the World Development Movement in discussing just and sustainable solutions to the financial and climate crises, and learn useful skills for campaigning for a better world.
Speakers include:
Andrew Simms (New Economics Foundation)?, Emily Thornberry MP, ?Nicola Bullard (Focus on the Global South), ?Paul Chatterton (Author, Do It Yourself: A handbook for changing our world)? Plus WDM policy officers and campaigners.
Another world is possible
For 30 years, free market dogma has dominated official politics the world over. Now that dogma has brought us a financial crisis, a climate crisis, and for thousands of the world’s poorest people a crisis of soaring food prices too.
Yet all over the world, people are responding to these crises by challenging vested interests and proposing alternatives. Alternatives which seek to build a just, sustainable and peaceful world, and which put people before profit.
Think Global is about making those alternatives a reality, by helping you to spread the word, understand the issues and learn the skills you need to bring about change.
Sessions include:
What is climate justice? ?Working with diaspora communities?. Stop Europe’s great trade robbery. ?Practical activism: Making change happen in your community. ?How to lobby your MP or MEP. ?The Green New Deal? Economic alternatives from the global south.
Plus bookstalls, lots of free educational and campaigns materials and refreshments.
WDM’s Annual General Meeting will take place during the day, and all WDM members are welcome to attend. There will be a parallel session for non-members during this time.
Email register@wdm.org.uk/ 7820 4900

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Saturday 6th June

Eco-village occupation London

In May 1996, 500 The Land is Ours activists occupied 13 acres of derelict land on the banks of the River Thames in Wandsworth, highlighting the misuse of urban land, the lack of provision of affordable housing and the deterioration of the urban environment. That action grew into far more than just a simple land rights action.
A community grew up on the site called Pure Genius!! over the 5½ months that the occupation lasted for…..
Then and now:
“Only when it is dark enough can you see the stars” Martin Luther King.
In the first three months of 2009, nearly 13,000 Britons lost their home to repossessions. Now, perhaps more than ever, the ideas of peaceful land reclamation and eco-villages are becoming recognized as the solution to problems such as overcrowding in cities and the destruction of the land due to harmful agricultural practices.
Action:
In the spirit of Pure Genius, On June 6th 2009, hundreds of activists will converge on a piece of derelict land close by to Hammersmith in south west London to create an eco-village community based entirely on sustainable technology and construction techniques.
Come and be a part of this eco-village community.
Meet-up:
The exact location of the site will be revealed on the day. The meet up point is at Waterloo Station (under the clock in the middle of the station) at 10AM on Saturday 6th June. Please try to be on time as we don’t want to be hanging around all morning.
If you would like to speak to someone regarding the campaign or the occupation, please contact Carolyn on: 01727 812369 or Gareth on: 07515 166011 or email: diggers360@yahoo.co.uk

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Sunday 7 June

3pm – 7pm
Green Sunday
Arcola Theatre, 27 Arcola Street, E8.
Drop in between 3pm and 7pm for tea and cake on the roof, activities with the Secret Seed Society, a swap shop, market, debate about ethical consumerism with Neil Boorman and Morgan Philips plus music, film and books.
Info: anna@arcolatheatre.com
Find out more here
Mowgli. Ace Ventura. Romulus, buy Remus. Lindsay Lohan in Mean Girls – there’s a number of individuals across the board that have lived their lives shoulder to shoulder with the animal kingdom. Whether these life experiences amounted to much creative cashback for the above is unknown – what we do know is that it certainly did for Dutch jeweller Felieke van der Leest, pharm who grew up next door to a zoo. She has spent years making collections of animal- inspired jewellery that has been exhibited in a whole lot of museums, including the International Museum of Applied Arts in Turn, the Museum of Decorative Arts in Montreal, the Modern Art Museum in Arnhem, and the Dutch Textile Museum in Tilburg.

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Most affronting is the seamlessly funny juxtaposition of ideas – like the rapper penguin with bling around his neck and diamond eyes (a brooch), rubber ducks squeezed into lifeboat rings (a necklace). Her creations are bit like neo-Sylvanian families gone Shoreditch: a testament to a wealth of spangly imagination channelling the uninhibited spirit of the animal world.

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As van der Leest says, “animals are never boring”, and when they’re swinging from hoops, or squatting on their own little aeroplane runways, even less so. I think she accomplishes the same effect as Beatrix Potter, Enid Blyton or Lewis Carroll, tapping into her customer’s childish sense of wonder that might have got replaced by cynicism along the way. It was her own childhood fascination that propelled her into her profession, having spent her family holidays indoors watching National Geographic and knitting clothes for her bears, even crocheting an entire mouse family along with a piece of cheese.

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There’s something so perfect about them they are almost uncanny; you might be left scratching your head and wondering if Jack Russells hadn’t been nonchalantly wearing American football uniforms all along. She has also, amazingly, made much of it multi-functional, including the necklace of strolling lions whose leader can be detached and worn as a brooch.

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This reaction, of course, might have something to do with van der Leest’s crazy good capabilities with her materials. Van der Leest, who originally trained as a goldsmith, combines metals with textile techniques – after studying metalwork in Amsterdam she became reacquainted with knitting and crocheting. She began to introduce metal into her works after she developed RSI as a means of combating the repetitiveness of knitting, although she has said she enjoys working with textiles for their variety and availability. It’s not all kittens and cupcakes though: there’s something masochistic about some of her work, in particular the dismembered animal parts hanging from a chain, or the decapitated giraffe with a nest instead of a head.

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They’re startling pieces that seem to upset you with their disorder, making you wonder about the relationship between the animal world and the human one; how one can shape – and, indeed, destroy – the other.

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Humanising animals is a tradition that goes so far back into children’s stories that it would almost seem unnatural to have van der Leest’s creatures without a narrative. Like the rollerskating diplodocus: since as the diplodocus was a famously slow animal, the next logical step was for van der Leest to allocate it with two pairs of tiny rollerskates). However along with this tradition comes a tendency to infantilise the idea as it happens, but what’s most striking about van der Leest’s pieces are their modernity and their sophistication – in short, it’s subversive humour for grown-ups. In a period of fashion where people are mercilessly bandying around words like ‘austerity’ and ‘practicality’, I think wearing a badge of a goldfish on a giant set of wheels has never been more necessary.

The smoking ban of two long summers ago that plighted many a filthy nicotine habit may be an odd choice for artistic inspiration, viagra 40mg but the marvelous Kate Jenkins took it as an opportunity to switch us from lighting up to lightening up with her quirky knitted collection ‘Soft Smokes’.

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This was the follow up to her debut range ‘Comfort Food’ which launched her as an artist in 2007 and created a name for her, treat paving the way to many a wondrous thing, buy information pills including her ‘Cardigans in Bloom’ show as part of Brighton’s much respected annual Open Door exhibition season.

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From there to being picked up by the Art Group publishing group to produce greeting cards of loveliness and offered a spot to sell her collectable Specimen Cabinets of bugs, butterflies and beauty in Liberty of London, a solo show at the Rebecca Hossack Gallery opens next week and considering her immense talent, is way over due.

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Whilst many of us have ashamedly only become aware of knitting and it’s creative possibilities in the recent-ish upsurge of craft culture renaissance, Jenkins is no newbie to needles. Pre 2003, when her own label Cardigan was launched, she was turning up and casting off for the likes of Missoni, Donna Karan and Marc Jacobs. Her new work entitled ‘Kate’s Café’ will be a feast to behold; knitted breakfasts on knitted plates, knitted cups on knitted saucers, and knitted condiments to go on your.. yep, you guessed it- knitted fish and chips.

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As well as pieces to wear and give, Jenkins produces wall worthy art work that provide instant talking points and mood enhancers as they are simply impossible to not fall in love with. In fact, Kate includes in her philosophy ‘anything can be created from yarn as long as it is made with love’. There is definitely something intrinsic about knitting and a giddy devoted heart.

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Perhaps it’s the fact that art which relies on incredible meticulous skills, as knitting surely does, is bound to enlist blood sweat and tears and a huge helping from the heart. The ones who succeed do so because they love what they do, and in kind reciprocation we love it back.

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Her noteworthy collaborations include Jon Link and Mick Bunnage, the Mr and Mr of Modern Toss fame, who commissioned Jenkins to produce a knitted book for their exhibition ‘Museum of Urban Shitniks’ at London’s Ink’d Gallery. She is now represented by Modern Toss’ agents Agency Rush for her illustrated commissions, who also deal with Ryu Itadani, Emily Forgot and Natsko Seki.

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Kate Jenkins
Rebecca Hossack Art Gallery
28 Charlotte Street,
Fitzrovia,
London W1T 2NA

Monday – Saturday 10 – 6
Sunday – Closed
6th June – 27th June 2009

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What’s for lunch today at Kate’s Cafe?

WEDNESDAY, and APRIL 22, 2009

Back To Reality

Into the Jungle

We are crouched in the dory, a traditional canoe carved from a solid tree trunk, being punted upstream through the darkening jungle. The vine covered rafters reach over us, blackening into the night sky. Jorge struggles valiently but weighed low with passengers we frequently grind to a halt and have to jump out barefoot and push. It starts to drizzle, only adding to the atmosphere.

Eventually we arrive, slipping precariously up the bank with our lumps of luggage, climbing a stepped slope until we arrive at a covered courtyard and calls of welcome from our fellow students. We’ve reached the Maya Mountain Research Farm (MMRF) ready to begin a two week Permaculture Design Course.

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MMRF
MMRF is the life’s work of Christopher Nesbitt, a forty-something New Yorker who in the eighties swapped the furious pace of a Manhatten cycle courier for a seventy acre damaged citrous farm in Southern Belize. From his early days living in a wooden shack, beholden to the sun for wake-up calls and lights-out, he has observed, studied, planted and nurtured his land into a lush and productive agroforestry system. Papaya, pineapple, breadnut, corn, beans, coconuts, eggs, vanilla, cacao, coffee… the list goes on and on. Solar panel by solar panel, stone by stone he has built a comfortable, light-filled home – complete with kitchen, book-lined study and panoramic vista’d bedroom – fit for the cover of glossy magazine.

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Although the dreadlocks went decades ago he’s not shaved since eighteen and Chris could now be credited with creating the ‘Jungle Rabbinic’ look: cropped hair and vast beard, baggy Carhartt pants betraying his urban roots, wellingtons, army surplus rucksack slung over one shoulder and riffle or machete over the other. His face is open and kind but his large, sad eyes hint at the tough graft and personal tragedies that he’s overcome building his home in the jungle of this sparsely populated river valley.

Chris was the perfect host and his farm the perfect location to study something that I hoped desperately could offer a last minute reprieve to a world on life-support.

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‘Permanent Agriculture’
Permaculture is short for ‘permanent agriculture’. It sums up the ambitious hopes of its founders, Bill Mollison and David Holmgren, who in 1978 launched it with the publication of ‘Permaculture One’. In 1988 the hefty ‘Permaculture: A Designers’ Manual’ was published, one percent ethics and ninety percent practical design instruction, where the definition given is “the conscious design and maintenance of agriculturally productive and healthy ecosystems which have the diversity, stability and resilience of natural ecosystems.” Still not clear? I wasn’t either.

Most of my fellow students weren’t entirely sure, but our anticipation grew during the introduction: we were to be learning a whole new vocabulary that included the mysterious ‘swales‘, the principle of ‘stacking functions’ and the crucial tool of ‘needs and yields analysis’. With it we could share ideas with the millions of other permaculturists around the world, in the common language of the ‘permaculture army’.

There were sixteen students, of all ages and backgrounds. Many were from the U.S. but there was a Canadian, some Mexicans, a Trinidadian and some Belizians on scholarship. Three teachers joined Chris – Albert Bates, Maria A Martinez Ros and and Andrew ‘Goodheart’ Brown – making an eclectic and experienced team who each brought their own angle. Initially teaching was theory-heavy as we learnt key principles of ecology and of permaculture design. Later in the week we practiced mapping out an area of the farm, using our bodies as rulers – our result was 2,000 square ‘Erles’ – and learnt how to use a simple A-frame to measure along the contours of a slope to dig a swale – simply a shallow ditch that catches and holds water, but a key tool to build healthy soil.

Piece by piece it started to make sense.

A Deficit of Ducks
There’s a story that one day a student was lamenting to permaculture’s founder, Bill Mollison, about loosing her lettuces to an onslaught of slugs. “You don’t have a surplus of slugs problem.” he replied. “You have a deficit of ducks”. It neatly illustrates the goal of permaculture – to think like an ecosystem and strive always to ‘close the loop’.

The carefully fostered illusion of consumer culture is that things magically appear and disappear to satisfy our needs. Yet every bit of matter passing through our hands comes from and returns to the earth’s ecosystem and is part of its cycles. (A point made brilliantly in The Story of Stuff). Extraction and disposal have consequences and these can only be ignored for so long before they return to bite us. Simply put, our waste is wasting us – most prominently, our waste carbon, which we thought we could walk away from. Surprise, surprise, we can’t. ‘Up in smoke’ should not be a synonym for disappeared.

Nature works in cycles and so permaculture rejects the whole concept of ‘waste’. Waste is a resource that we’ve not been smart enough to put to good use yet. No good use at all – spent nuclear fuel rods, for example – is a warning that whatever system is producing it has no sustainable place in the world. There’s no waste in nature as such.

So one of the key tools we learnt was ‘Needs and Yields Analysis’. Each element of a design has needs and yields and the aim is to match them up – to close the loop. The chickens on Chris’s farm are my favourite example. They need food, water, space to roam, a safe place for the night. They yield products and useful services: kitchen scraps disappear greedily, turned into tasty eggs and nutrient rich droppings. A big problem for tropical farmers are Leafcutter Ants, or ‘Wee Wees’. The fossil fuel solution: put poison in the system, pesticides bought from outside – a complex external industrial product. The permaculture solution: Wee Wees as chicken food. Having been chased from my bed by Soldier Ants I gained a new found respect for the chicken as I watched them gobble up huge-pincered ants streaming from an aggravated nest.

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Nature Resplendent
So we are part of the loop, but everyday life constantly hides this from us. For me the beauty of studying at MMRF was that you couldn’t forget this basic fact: from the bug bites yelling “you’re part of the food chain” to the tasty meals cooked from ingredients plucked straight from nearby trees. For the first week I recoiled: used to a more sterile environment I was faintly flustered by it all, by bugs and bites and slippy pathways. Then I relaxed, the unseasonal showers passed, and I felt wonderfully and peacefully at home.

My favourite moments were stolen between classes: swinging gently on the hammock, cool after a swim in the river, just soaking in the sounds; cheeps, flutters, rustles, whistles, pulsing bug rubbings, the high pitched whine and zoom of passing flies; the jungle community going about its daily business, from soil to canopy top. There was a rhythm and intimacy with nature that brought a deep sense of calm.

“Normal”: Discuss
As the exotic became more familiar what struck me was that this ‘exotic’ was nothing of the sort. This is how it has been, day after day, for millions of years. My normal (our normal) everyday life is a freakish aberration: we drive complex machines over fields of asphalt, stopping at filling stations to pay pittance for fossilised sunlight, and then carelessly burn up this rich energy resource (equivalent to thousands of hours of human labour) on activities that we could often happily do without. All civilisations are temporary, perhaps as temporary as their foundations, and we have thrown in our lot with a dwindling treasure trove of inherited energy, egged on by blind faith in free-market capitalism whose priests insist that the mighty market will provide – “We’ll cross that bridge…”; “Don’t plan ahead (Communist!), believe”; don’t save for a rainy day…

The ‘normal’ has a way of lulling us into a false sense of security and permanence. For hundreds of years life was very ‘normal’ in this now jungle-filled river valley, when it was part of a bustling Mayan metropolis. One evening we climbed the ridge in the gold of the setting sun and through a clearing in the undergrowth looked at a beautifully set Mayan wall, 1200 years old. Chris told us that there are literally hundreds of house mounds dotted around the farm (his house is in fact built on one). At their zenith the Maya ruled an area from Southern Mexico to Northern Honduras for over 600 years before their civilisation declined and came to an end. But we’re smarter than them, right? We have Google and ATM machines. And cars. And toilet paper made from ancient forests. The Mayans might beg to differ and challenge us to last a little longer than the century and a half since industrialisation began.

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Just not seeing it
When I first walked through Chris’s farm I saw trees. Just lots of trees. But walk through with Chris as translator and you start to see complex systems, carefully designed and incredibly productive: coffee and cacao shaded under breadnut trees and coconut palms, pinapple crescents catching water and building soil around sapplings. My illiteracy was shared by the ‘conquerors’ five hundred years ago, who lamented the ignorant slash and burn agriculture while missing the carefully managed agroforestry system of the ‘fallow’ land (see ‘Beyond Wilderness: Seeing the Garden in the Jungle‘).

Yes, we know more than the Mayans. Our scientific method is qualitatively different from what went before. It has given us great power. But perhaps we’re all the more stupid for it.

The fertile middle ground
For me the genius of permaculture is that it recognises this stupidity but refuses to fall into the opposite trap of romanticising past cultures. It respects both the natural systems that ultimately support all life and also the scientific method that has given us so much power to understand and influence them. My interpretation of permaculture as that it is a science-based design system. Ultimately we are completely reliant on nature, but if we approach it with respect we can understand and learn from the systems that keep our world alive. Then we can apply our intelligence and creativity to tweak and mould them to provide generously for human life. It is a middle ground between domination (destined to fail) and subservience (destructive of our humanity), aimed at creating a humane space within the natural world. A garden.

Spades out for the revolution
So that’s what it boils down to: permaculture is gardening. And to think as a boy I saw my Grandfather as such an anachronism, with his rows of raspberries and inability to operate a video recorder. If engineers ruled in the 20th Century then perhaps the 21st belongs to the gardeners: scientifically literate, socially influential and operating in their millions. We hope.

‘Everything gardens’ is a permaculture principle and it was illustrated every night as we carefully stepped over the torch lit highway of Leafcutter Ants, ferrying green chunks in their millions back to their nest. They use the leaves to grow mould that will feed the whole colony. They hardly ever kill a tree, Chris explained, but strip only some branches before moving on. They do not destroy that which they depend upon. The heart of permaculture is learning from nature, and we could take a leaf from their book.

I Will Survive: Permaculture Remix

It was a fun-filled night tinged with sadness, as everyone pitched in for the ‘No Talent’ show that rounded off the two week course. I’ll spare you the full version, but my group had ‘re-designed’ Gloria Gaynor’s classic ‘I will survive’ to include lines such as: “At first I was afraid, I was petrified. Kept thinking I could never live without these pesticides” and “But no, not us, we will survive. For as long as we know how to swale I know we’ll stay alive.” After two weeks we had all become quite fond of each other. I wondered where this group of radical gardeners would get to, and what difference we would make. And why the course was only two thirds full when the ‘normal’ world is so clearly starting to unravel.

Still, we left inspired, determined to plant and compost to a better future.

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Back to Civilisation
The bus was pretty swish – air conditioned, reclining chairs, video screens – but I felt uncomfortable. A growing sense of agitation was making me desperate for the journey to end.

We stopped at Gautemala’s version of a service station. As I looked round at a forest of plastic, tin cylinders behind glass and bulging humans poking at synthetic food on polyester plates, I realised what I was suffering – culture shock. I was trying to place it all in the natural cycles I’d become used to and so little of it would fit.

It showed the change my fortnight at MMRF had brought. In my five years of ‘environmentalism’, first of study then work, I’ve heard lots of theory about living within the earth’s limits. Now for the first time I really felt it, in my guts. Permaculture might not be ‘the answer’ – there’s no such thing – but it taught me to see the fundamental logic of our place in the natural order.

More than this, perhaps it might allow me the audacity of hope for a reconciliation between humanity and the world we’re currently beating the crap out of. Perhaps environmentalism does not equal atavism. Perhaps MMRF hints at a way forward, rather than a retreat, as the interns check their emails under locally grown bananas: the Apple Mac sitting with the permaculture pineapple.

I don’t know yet, but I firmly believe that Bill Mollison was right in 1988 when he wrote that “in the near future we will see the end of wasted energy or the end of civilization as we know it”. I just hope that, over two decades later, another of his assertions still holds true: “What we have done, we can undo.”

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Photo credits: Thanks to Erle Noronha for the second picture (Chris’s house) and Albert Bates for the group photo. All others are my own.

What permaculture can do – the mighty ‘swale’ in action. A great little video:

COMMENTS: interested, bored, indifferent? Write a comment…
This article originally featured on EyesLikeSaucers.

Categories ,Climate, ,Ecology, ,Environment, ,Student

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Amelia’s Magazine | Final Year Show: Slade School Of Fine Art: Private View

Those of you who’ve seen Fame (you know the one, store information pills “Remember my name (FAME!)/I’m gonna live forever” and all that jazz) may remember the relatively small but significant character called Bruno. He hated playing in the strings section of the orchestra because he could electronically create an orchestra of sound and fury on his own, information pills healing resulting in much dancing in the streets and on taxis…

…The comaprison: Napoleon IIIrd Napoleon IIIrd. Why he hasn’t had more Fame action himself is quite beyond me. Though that said, I had heard on the grapevine that the man was touring with a full band and was hoping to see and hear such a spectacle in the flesh. But alas, whilst hoping that the brass section was hiding out in the toilets working up the saliva to play, the man himself emerged to take his place behind two microphones, that met above a keyboard, nestled between all manner of electronic and musical paraphernalia…and no band.

Never mind though, performing solo, he didn’t disappoint. Unexpectedly formidable, Napoleon is energetic and jerky as his music often is. One thing is that from the start, Napoleon is so believable. Without guile or pretensions, yet vaguely angsty and almost aggressive, not quite desperate but definitely hopeful, he is one man doing his own orchestral manoeuvres in the dark.

Like a proud band leader, pumping his metaphoric baton triumphantly, Napoleon IIIrd conducted his way through the set with a well practiced panache; twiddling with levels, blue-tacking keys, pressing buttons and bristling on his guitar. Completely comfortable but not complacent, Napoleon IIIrd played with abandon. With heavy industrial beats, crunchy glitches, big refrains, random samples and a pre-recorded choir of Napoleons to back him up, Napoleon IIIrd’s music is quite epic live. It’s all the more strange to match the sound to the scene when the guy is all alone on stage amongst his band of merry, electronically recorded selves.

So remember his name, because Napoleon IIIrd is dynamite.
Having studied graphic design, remedy I too had put on a show at my university and then made the journey to London to showcase my talents to industry moguls. My experience was, remedy well, pretty shit – but this was flawless. With over 50 stands showcasing talent, 2 fashion theatres and an orange-carpeted Moët bar for pre-show drinks, GFW supported by River Island (amongst other major players) really packed a punch.

Read more

Amelia’s Magazine | Imaginary Friends

Monday 12th Jan
Starting today: The Voice and Nothing More is a week-long festival at the Slade Research Centre that explores the voice as both medium and subject matter in contemporary arts practices. Established artists and emerging talent will work with leading vocal performers in an exploration of the voice outside language. On Wednesday the festival culminates in a presentation of objects, pilule generic performances, order and installations that are open to the public. There will also be performances on Thursday and Friday from 6 pm.

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Wednesday 14th Jan

Now in it’s 21st year, recipe the London Art Fair begins at the Design Centre in Islington. A hundred galleries are selected to show work from the last few hundred years. This immense exhibition will encompass sculpture, photography, prints, video and installation art. It ends on the 18th of January.
There is a talk this evening at the ICA entitled Can Art make us Happy? where artists Zoë Walker and Michael Pinsky explore the notions of art as a social cure-all in times of economic and social gloom.
A new solo show from Josephine Flynn begins today at Limoncello on Hoxton Square. The Mexican was bought off a patient who was in hospital with mental health problems. When the patient talked about The Mexican she described how the process of making him had helped her – ‘healing through making’ was how she put it.

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Thursday 15th Jan
Feierabend is a collaborative installation between artists Francis Upritchard, Martino Gamper, and Karl Fritsche, bringing together a shared aesthetic in their distinctive approaches to jewellery, furniture design, and sculpture. The exhibition plays with the boundaries of art and real life – looking like a workshop abandoned at the end of a day’s work, or a sitting room left in abstracted dissary, it’s only inhabitants a set of sculpted figures who seem lost in their own meditations.
Gimpel Fils opens a new photographic exhbition from Peter Lanyon and Emily-Jo Sargent, 100 Pictures of Coney Island.
The Asphalt World is a new solo show at Studio Voltaire from Simon Bedwell. Drip paintings are made from advertising posters in an ironic twist or corporate seduction.

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Feierabend


Friday 16th

There are two exhibitions starting today at Wilkinson on Vyner Street. In Upper Gallery a, Episode III, Enjoy Poverty, is the second in a series of three films by Renzo Martens in which he raises issues surrounding contemporary image making, challenging ideas about the role of film makers and viewers in the construction of documentaries. In the Lower Gallery, there will be the fourth exhibiton from German artist, Silke Schatz. Through the conjunction of video, sculpture, drawing and found objects, Schahtz composes a personal portrait of the city of Agsburg.

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Saturday 17th Jan

We featured David Cotterrell in issue ten, where in the picturesque surroundings of Tatton Park, he explained how his visit to Afghanistan, where he was invited by the Wellcome Trust, would be likely to have a lasting effect on his future work. Aesthetic Distance is David Cotterrell’s third solo exhibition with Danielle Arnaud, and focuses on the experiences and inevitable aftermath of a flight he took in November 2007 in a RAF C17, from Brize Norton to Kandahar. He was the sole passenger in a plane loaded with half a million rounds of palletised munitions and medical supplies to join Operation Herrick 7, a strange irony not lost on the artist.

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Earth Listings

Monday 12th January, viagra 60mg 7pm

Climate Rush hits Heathrow

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To whomsoever concerned by the biggest threat faced by humanity today-that of climate change,

You are cordially invited to Dinner at Domestic Departures. Join us for an evening of peaceful civil(ised) disobedience ahead of the government’s decision over a third runway at Heathrow. Inspired by the actions of the suffragettes, we will be calling for DEEDS NOT WORDS. The government acknowledges the huge problems we face from Climate Change but they continue with business as usual. This jolly evening is intended to produce much-needed positive change and we do hope that you would join us.

Location: Domestic Departures, Terminal 1, Heathrow Airport.

Time: 7pm (when the string quartet plays their first note).

Dress Code: Edwardian Suffragette: high collars, long skirts, fitted jackets, puffed sleeves, think Mary Poppins. Sashes will be provided. * Although advisable, it is not compulsory to arrive in Edwardian dress, the most important thing is that you your friends and family join us for dinner. To add the element of surprise, it is suggested that you arrive in a large coat to conceal your costume until the stroke of 7.

Bring: Jam tarts, scones, cucumber sandwiches, hard-boiled eggs, tea cakes. Picnic blankets and table cloths. Tea and elderflower cordial. No alcohol please.

Entertainment: String quartet, art tricks from ArtPort, polite conversation.

We look forward to seeing you,

The Misbehaved Ladies from Climate Rush x

Tuesday 13th January, 6pm

Art, Activism and the legacy of Chico Mendes
RSA
8 John Adam Street
London
WC2N 6EZ

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Tonight will explore the ways in which the arts can help shift society’s attitudes in the face of unprecedented climate change. Elenira Mendes, daughter of environmental activist Chico Mendes, will talk alongside panelists Jonathan Dove (award-winning composer), Greenpeace’s senior climate adviser, Charlie Kronick and fasion designer and activist Dame Vivienne Westwood.

Wednesday 14th January

Wednesdays Do Matter
InSpiral Lounge, 250 Camden High Street NW1 8QS

A night of music, comedy, poetry and film (and really good vegan smoothies!) in aid of global justice campaigners, the World Development Movement. Remind yourselves why everyday matters, even Wednesdays.

Trouble the Water
ICA
The Mall
London
SW1Y 5AH

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Winner of this year’s Grand Jury prize at Sundance and announced as a finalist in 2009 Accademy Awards for Best Documentary. This is one New Orleans’ resident’s depiction of the catastrophic tragedy of Hurricaine Katrina. Shot with a (shakily) handheld camera, Kimberely Roberts’ footage starts from the weekend before the hurricaine and covers a period of a year. Michael Moore collaborators Tia Lessin and Carl Deal edit and append the tapes with their own film of the post-Katrina clean-up effort.An astounding portrayal of resilience and bravery.

Showing at the ICA 12th-15th January

Turning The Season
at The Wapping Project
Wapping Hydraulic Power Station
Wapping Wall
London
E1W 3SG

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Recent crisp bright skies have been a welcome respite from the usual drab January weather. But who knows what tomorrow may bring. Turning the Season explores the social and cultural phenomenon of the British Season. It would be fair to say that the increasingly visible effects of Climate Change have further fuelled our national fascination with the weather.
Expect 100 bird houses, a roof-top lily pond and a photo story showing the break-up of a relationship against the backdrop of seasonal events shot by fashion photographer Thomas Zanon-Larcher.

Until 28th Febuary

Amazonia at the Young Vic

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Although aimed at swarms of roaring key stage 3 schoolchildren as an educational piece on the issue of deforestation, this production from Palace People’s Projects is a true delight. Set in a traditional village in the Amazon that is eventually swayed by the ghost of Chico Mendes to not fall under the developers’ bulldozers. But not until some devastation has been wreaked first. A socio-political depiction of destruction of the Amazon with a mythical slant. All set to the music and dancing of Forro. An inventive stage (a mammoth man-made tree rather resembling an electrical pole, and pools of water seperating the audience) and brilliantly gaudy costumes by Gringo Cardia.

Until 24th January
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Monday 12th January

Dead Kids, cost O Children, erectile The Lexington, London

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Seriously energetic post-punk, sequinned and LOUD live act Dead Kids headline. No matter what you think of them on record, they’re sure to grab you live. Continuing the infant name-theme, as well as the intense post-punk sounds are support O Children.

Comanechi, Durrr at The End, London

With the ever-winning combo of Japanese girl singing drummer (also to be found as frontwoman for London band Pre) and jangular guitars, this is your best bet for a trendy sceney night out in London.

Tuesday 13th January


Banjo or Freakout
single launch party, White Heat @ Madame JoJos, London

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Part of the new-wave of ultra-hip, genre-smashing music sweeping the artier corners of the globe at the moment. Should be a celebratory atmosphere as it is his single launch party.

Wednesday 14th January

Goldie Lookin Chain, Metro, London

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Ho ho ho, GLC are sooooo funny. Free entry is promised to the gig but don’t leave your purse at home as you’ll have to pay to leave.

The Virgins, Rough Trade East, London

American New Wave tinged indie-rock.

Thursday 15th January

Wet Paint, Rough Trade East, London

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Playing this gig in anticipation of the release of their new album, they’ll be supporting Bloc Party later in the year.

Emmy the Great, 12 Bar Club, London

Intimate solo acoustic performance of debut album First Love in full, ahead of its release in February.

Push, Astoria 2, London

A massive farewell party for the Astoria 2 which will be finally demolished on Friday. Catch Cajun Dance Party live as well as DJ sets from Mystery Jets, Lightspeed Champion, Good Shoes and Neon Gold among many others and mourn the demise of the sticky-floored dingy music venue in central London.

Friday 16th January

Cats in Paris, Brassica, Braindead Improv Ensemble, The Woe Betides, George Tavern, London

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Massively hyped, bonkers 70s-ish glam-electro from Manchester.

The Golden Silvers, The Macbeth, London

Dreamy indie-pop from these regulars of the London gig circuit.

Saturday 17th January

The Bookhouse Boys, Empire, Middlesborough

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Catch this 9 piece mini-orchestra, complete with mariachi brass, duelling drummers and girl-boy vocals, for their Ennio Morricone-style soundscapes.

I Love Boxie: a web-based business in London that tailors a t-shirt especially for you based on the story you tell them. The most astute of the fashion-conscious clan know that style should reflect your spirit and not merely robotic trends. In light of this; don’t wear your heart on your sleeve– instead wear it on a t-shirt; a Boxie t-shirt.
Here, cure founder of Boxie, troche Moxie shares her views on what fashion is truly about, how her brand works and what she hopes to achieve through her t-shirts:

Tell us the story of I Love Boxie.?

Each t-shirt tells a piece of the way – a place we have been, a person we have seen. We have many lines that fit many situations and could tell a piece of your story too. If not, we offer t-spoke. You call us, tell us a story and we turn it into a line on a t-shirt. We believe everyone in the world should have an unbranded, authentic tee that sings a line of where they have been and what they have seen. We are the opposite of any company who just put a logo on a t-shirt.

?Where does the inspiration for your t-shirts come from?

?From the people who write and call in everyday with their stories. The stories are wild, heartfelt, quiet, poignant and are better than anything we could make up.

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What’s the idea behind the “half a conversation” concept?

If you think about branding for the last 30 years it’s been about distillation, reducing everything to a line eg: ‘just do it’ or ‘impossible is nothing’.
Our lines are about provoking expansion. It’s just the first line of the story, or the chapter heading. We want people to come up to someone wearing a Boxie tee – and go ‘wow, what the hell happened to you??’
?
Why do you make it purposefully hard for people to purchase your t-shirts, without contacting you directly first??

The tees are written about stupid, funny, weird, deep moments in people’s lives. All of them from the heart. They feel like they need more exchange than a credit card transaction. T-spoke especially. This is a creative collaboration that begins with the customer telling us their story. It is a strange and wonderful one off encounter between them and us. The t-shirt is their battle scar of that personal story.

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Is all your business Internet based? ?

As far as being web based goes, our tees are obviously a form of self expression and there is no greater arena for that than the web. This taps into what a tee originally was – a piece of underwear, something that wasn’t supposed to be seen but kept close to the chest and hidden like a secret.

These days, the web is a place where secrets can step out of the shade, where people can talk about things they wouldn’t usually talk about in real life. Most times, you can learn more about someone from reading their status report than talking to them for an hour in reality, because the web has taught us the language of openness and sharing.

Boxie exists in the ether as part of that fluency. More importantly those web values – openness, sharing, community – are overflowing back into real life now. So, yes, soon we’ll be on the streets in some form, although the tees will never ever be in a retail space, hanging limply on a rack.

Your favourite Boxie T-Shirt to date??

So High and Solo

How would you describe Boxie in one word??
Gonzo

Any advice for the penniless fashionista?
Everything great creatively comes from being up against it and with no cash. You can’t ever see it when you’re in it but, as far as imagination goes, you are in an infinitely better position than someone with a million dollars. Do something great with this time. And then call us to get the t-shirt. ?

Advice for those wanting to purchase something Boxie??

Write to us directly at moxie@iloveboxie.com
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New York is spawning many a catchy-tuned electro based band at the moment – meet The Discoghosts, more about firstly they have a brilliant name, look secondly, approved they do what they say on the tin, this is a disco fest. Their ethos is nicely summed up in their lyrics, “We love ladies and they love us, cos we’re cool and disco plus.”

Otherwise known as M-Boy and Tracky, they meant their album title – BAD – literally it seems, rather than a tribute to the King of 80′s pop, as they are apparently, “trying to break the taboos of “good” music, while playing with clichés of club sound like repetition, climax, stupidity, autofilter, and sound fetishism.” I see.

This album could be the OST to many an 80′s movie – it’s true, it may be the decade that taste forgot but it produced some pretty good tunes – there are obvious Ghostbusters references ie: track 2 being called Ghostbusters Busters and there’s also hints of the Beverley Hills Cop riffs in there, along with and slinky soul beats, electro voices, rubbish rapping and a guy that sounds suspiciously like the chef from South Park

That’s not to say they’re stuck in the past, their mellower synthetic beats, such as Jellyfish, track 9, have a Hot Chip vibe and that’s not a bad thing at all.

If their aim was to produce an awful album – they failed, maybe it’s just that I have a soft spot/great love for the 80′s but I very much enjoyed this, catchy, listenable songs that don’t take themselves seriously. My favourite line, from Straight but Gayish (sung by a high electro voice), “your boyfriend’s hetro but he looks homo.”

And they dress like this to perform:

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How could you not love them?
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It was legitimate for us to feel nervous. With indiscreet bullying from BAA and no knowledge as to how the police were planning to receive us, sick we tucked our dresses beneath our over-coats and shuffled through the throngs of intimidating fluorescent jackets at Heathrow Departures, illness passports at the ready and an impromptu conversation about flight times – very subtle. I wish I could have seen the briefing, look out for pretty girls in dresses and large jackets.

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Once in, all subtleties were abandoned, a charming sight when the order of the day was Edwardian dress and dinner, an evening of very civil (ised) disobedience. Instruments, top hats, high collars and puffy sleeves – all were revealed as the clock struck seven, the string quartet took to its first note and picnic blankets were unfurled for the beginning of the Climate Rush organized party, Dinner at Domestic Departures.

Music played, food passed cordially from plate to plate, and sashes were handed out. It was not long before currents rippled through the crowd into cheers, claps, and chants, “Deeds Not Words”, “Trains not Planes” and, “No Third Runway”, with a contingency singing to the tune of 90′s classic There’s no Limit. The complete transformation of Zone C was helped along by Artport, a collective of artists working in collaboration with Cilimate Rush to redefine the space as we know it. Green all-in-one clad waiters weaved through the crowd with a planet for a cake and planes for spoons, whilst a parachute game bounced a blow-up earth from edge to edge.

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In amidst this electric and elevating atmosphere, it was a spectacular delivery of a serious message. Climate Change is a very real threat and many people feel let down by the powers that be to address this threat.

We don’t want a third runway and call for cheaper train fares and better transport hubs instead of domestic short-haul flights. It is of course just part of a bigger picture: the greater threat of Climate Change of which aviation expansion is just a part, and the wider feelings of concern and dissatisfaction amongst citizens for whom civil disobedience is also, just a part.

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Describing herself as an ex-Camden townie, link the self-taught illustrator, Zarina Liew, has thrown her arms up at the big smoke and a career in marketing; and has chosen instead the serenity of the Cambridgeshire countryside, pencils, watercolours, and strange lonely creatures ridden by lust and self-ruin.
Her Hunter Series, eight inked paintings which exhibited at the Shoreditch Shuffle Festival, started life as a 24-page graphic novel. It tells the story of a gramaphone and a lonely creature, who forms an unlikely friendship with three musicians. She is driven by a need for company and music, they are captured by her beauty and seduced by her authority. The musicians fall into her charm and into her gramophone where they are trapped and eventually perish, singing songs of solidarity and love.

Over a virtual cup if Green Tea, we ask Liew a bit more about her curious creatures of emotional turmoil, her illustrative inspiration and whether or not she misses Camden.

Tell us about the Hunter Series.

I wanted The Hunter Series to be an extension of the original story both visually and metaphorically – a story within a story. You get a sense of the narrative from the different pieces, but as a whole, you see the Hunter for who she is – a hungry, lonely and melancholic being. It’s an illustration of lust and self-ruin; both the musicians and the Hunter are acting on impulse, blind to their terrible fates. Even though she is the one to end the men’s lives, the Hunter does not get what she wants. With no one to listen or play with, she’s alone again.

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Where do you draw information for your characters from?

I draw most of my information from observing the people around me. I never assume that what you see in someone is what you get – everyone has a hidden interior of ambition and desire. Music plays a large part as well. I found the musicians for The Hunter listening to an unsigned band playing at the Dublin Castle in Camden – the Parallel Animals. After falling in love with them – and the front man! – I offered to sketch them during rehearsals and help out at their gigs. Seeing how hard local bands work at this music business, and how ruthless the whole industry is, gave me a sense of direction in depicting the musician’s fate in my artwork.

The emotional context of the characters is strong; the nature of lust and self-ruin… is this an expression of your own emotional turmoil?

I suppose yes – in a sense that all of my work is an expression of myself, my feelings and thoughts. I wouldn’t say that I am strongly affected by the nature of lust and self-ruin though, let’s just say that I am extremely aware of it in myself, and all too conscious of letting myself go, or losing control of who I am. As I mentioned earlier we all have a hidden interior of ambition and desire – acting on lust however (whatever the desire – money, sex, fame) can only lead to self-ruin. Sometimes I wonder if I’m making the right choices, I question why I did certain things and what is behind my motivations. It’s a constant cycle of self-reflection.

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And finally, Camden vs Cambridge countryside… who wins?

This is a real toughie. Can I be wayward and say that weekdays are for Camden and weekends are for Cambridge?
During the week I get a lot of inspiration from the Camden kids, lovely hidden-away galleries and sweaty underpriced indie nights. By the weekend though it’s full of puffy tourists and very long queues for nothing.
That’s when I retreat to the gentle Cambridge countryside. It’s perfect for lethargic country strolls and relaxing afternoon teas; this is also where I get a lot of my inspiration down onto paper and start to paint. All the week’s bustle leaves my mind ready to draw in peace and quiet!

You can see more of her work here, or catch her at the Alternative Press Fair on Sunday 1st February where she will be featuring the Hunter Storybook alongside other homemade creations, and apparently, lots of Green Tea.

.
Why is it no-one tells you that when you leave uni, approved your life will have a huge vacuum and those 3 years you spent studying illustration suddenly seem wasted when all the available jobs are in call centres? What to do? Give up the creative dream? Not if you’re Brighton girl Anna Wenger. She decided that if there was no jobs out there, adiposity she’d start her own business, viagra dosage and Sacred Stitches was born. Her idea of stitching classic tattoo designs onto clothes and homewares has really taken off in recent months, and she’s kindly chatted to us about it:

How did your business come about?
I needed to give my family and friends Christmas presents but without spending much money, so made everyone cushions. I got a lot of attention from these cushions and created more and more and now embroider onto everything I can lay my hands on!

Who are your favourite designers?
I love Angelique Houtkamp, her work mixes classic tattoo imagery with Hollywood romance and her eye for style is very inspirational.
Others include Inka Tattooist James Robinson, Alex Binnie, Jon Burgerman, Tara McPherson and Crush Design Studio.

How would you describe your personal style?

A very modern graphic twist on an old school tattoo style. I like to think that with my designs everyone can appreciate the art form of tattoos without having to get one.

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Do you wear your own designs?
Oh yes, and so does my boyfriend, his friends, my flatmates. My flat is completely covered in sacred stitches cushions!

Who or what inspires you? (i know the obvious answer here is tattoos –
but if there’s anything else!)

I live with a tattooist who influences my work; magazines and art exhibitions are good for getting new ideas. My boyfriend and friends are covered in tattoos and will come home with a new piece of art on their skin, so its hard not to be inspired when your surrounded by moving artwork.


Have you got any tattoos?

No, the design is still in progress.

Do you have a favourite tattoo design / what’s the best you’ve seen so
far?

My favourite so far is by Judd Ripley of an amazingly haunting pirate ship. (pictured below)

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Do you still love Brighton/can you see yourself living anywhere else?
I am originally from Brighton and moved back here after University, as it’s a creative city. I do love Brighton as it’s a very receptive place for my designs because people here like to buy from small businesses.

Can I have a t-shirt please?
Yes, what size are you, xxl?!?

How very dare you. A medium at the very most!
Thanks for your time Anna. Talent and ambition, the best combination.
Contact Anna about getting hold of your own personalised tattoo(ed piece of clothing) here.

So it may have looked like I was deserting my post last week, cheap swanning off to Paris to slide down hills on the ice and hibernate in nice restaurants. However, whilst my trip may have involved quite a lot of that sort of fun, I was not just being a bone-idle holiday-monger. Au contraire. I also had my ears opened to some great new music and had this excellent first EP by Hold Your Horses! thrust into my sweaty and eager palms (fine it was in a nice restaurant that this transaction took place but we were just following the model of most international business).

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Most recent French bands seem either to do an excellent line in electronica or a terrible one in punk rock – you just can’t do attitude if your beige converse match your cashmere v-neck and your hair is cleaner and shinier than a Pantene advert. Hold Your Horses! have most in common with the second school, essentially a guitar band augmented with some strings and wind. However, perhaps the fact that they are a motley crew of diplobrats and true Frenchies contributes to the broader and more interesting range of influences discernible in their music. Sure, The Strokes are probably in every single member of the band’s record collection and at moments on this record, if you were to replace singer Flo’s Chrissie Hinde delivery with a Casablancas drawl, you would be forgiven for thinking you’d stepped back to Strokes-fever 2003, but this is really just what provides the catchy backbone of these songs. There’s a pleasantly shambolic tone – perhaps a little too shambolic at times due to the slightly rough-around-the-edges self-done mix – and when the boy vocals kick in partway through track two, a vaguely Celtic edge emerges.

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Opener Cigarettes and Lies, the strongest song on the record, fanfares its arrival with a blast of trumpets before launching into a danceable meditation on youthful lust and confusion. After that, the titles get longer and the violins more prominent as they have a bit of an Irish-ska moment (fine that’s not like, an official genre but listen and you’ll know what I mean) before ending on the sultry Argue and the sweet Flo’s Folk. Although not perfect or polished, this EP is really promising and tips HYH! as a band it’s definitely worth catching live when they hopefully make it to this side of the Channel.

Click hereto get hold of a copy.

Now you see him now you…hang on, search is that? Yep a giant bunny in a smoking jacket who is theatrically drawing my portrait and grimacing at the fur collar of the girl standing next to me. ‘It’s mink!’ she frantically mimes through Wieden & Kennedy’s shop window on Hanbury Street. ‘Minks are bastards’ he mouths back.

I’m witnessing some of the day-to-day activity taking place outside Imaginary Friends, medicine a rather bizarre shop front exhibition that takes me back to long days spent in the airing cupboard as an only child. Back then, store my imaginary friend was a replica of the devilish dog that encouraged Tintin’s canine companion Snowy to do naughty things (don’t worry, no one else understood that either).

From now until Sunday your imagination takes the form of a wine glugging, abusive life size bunny rabbit (aka recent Central St. Martin’s graduate Jack Bishop).

I managed to catch him on a carrot break.

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LJ: I say ‘carrot’ you say?

IF: Parrot? Ok it is the main component of one’s diet but I much prefer Beef Wellington. I shall not be marginalised.

L.J. Can you be taken for walks?

I.F. Of course I can darling. I’m imaginary after all, I can go anywhere you chose. Usually down the local.

L.J. Do you get along with cats?

I.F. So-so. We have a mutual respect for one another.

L.J. Do you breed well with Holland Lops?

I.F. Most definitely. Although my ideal breeding partner would have to be Jessica Rabbit.

L.J. Of course what a babe, got any celebrity bunny mates or rabbits in high hutches?

I.F. Well Harvey is a dear friend as we’re very alike. I used to be drinking buddies with Bugs but…(he drifts) he said a few things about me…said I drank too much. Lightweight.

L.J. Oh dear, well hopefully you’ll settle your differences over a good carrot or a nice seed selection. What are your thoughts on the following high-profile bunnies?

L.J. Peter Rabbit?

I.F. Wet lad.

L.J. Easter Bunny?

I.F. Fatty boy (all that chocolate).

L.J. Energizer Bunny?

I.F. Nympho.

L.J. Thumper?

I.F. Good Kid.

L.J. Nesquick Bunny?

I.F. He’s sold out. Such a shame. Corporate bastard now.

L.J. Got any plans for Easter?

I.F. (He humphs dismissively) I’m not the religious type. I’ll most probably be alone listening to Smokey Robinson and Sam Cook, drinking fine wines.

L.J. That sounds fun, I’ll be your friend if you want.

I.F. You fool! I can’t chose to be someone’s friend, I’m imaginary, they decide what I am to them, it’s annoying. Sometimes I feel degraded. I’d much rather be on my own.

With that he lolloped back down Brick Lane.

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Categories ,Imaginary Friends, ,Jack Bishop, ,London, ,Q&A, ,Student, ,Wieden & Kennedy

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