amica lane

Amelia’s Magazine | Spotlight: Camila Soares

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All images courtesy of Camila Soares

There are a lot of amazing artists coming out of Brazil at the moment, clinic which can be attested to by our previous interview with Rodrigo Souto. My latest favourite to fly out from under the equator is illustrator, tadalafil Camila Soares, site who majored in advertising and then moved onto graphic design before turning to illustration. For which those who have eyes should be grateful for.

The very first thing that popped into my head when visiting her online portfolio was a slack jawed, ‘whoooa’. Probably not the most intellectual response, especially from an Art Editor, but there you have it, and from her illustrations included here, I think you can see why.

I especially love her portrait of Alice Dellal. I love Alice Dellal related things anyway, for way back in 2005 before a meteoric rise to success, I bumped into Alice in an east end bathroom and she randomly told me I was beautiful. I mean, she was probably on pills at the time and it was dark, but I’m a sucker for flattery. It stuck in my ‘compliments’ of fame book. Right next to the dude who played Berko in Empire Records, who will always be number one. Berko! Not so interesting narcissitic anecdotes aside, I love the how the girlish pastel tones contrast with the ‘edgy’ (I hate that word) look of the subject.

‘Skull’ is also amazing; with a hyper realistic quality that rivals Escher. I particularly dig the errant braid of hair. Perhaps a social comment on models being bones with hair?

The photograph above nicely incorporates burning as a material strategy, which again takes fashion illustration out of its fluffy shell and gives it a little backbone. Personally, I love when illustration brings a little grit into the mix. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not talking Harmony Korine level grit, just something a little harder than the very common ‘tweecentric’ quality of work that I see all the time. Stop with the rainbows, yo.

The watercolour blotches really contribute to Camila’s individual style, which again establishes her as a really fantastic illustrator. She clearly has her own stylistic aesthetic that is reflected in her work. It’s one thing to draw well, but to express your own flair and personality in illustration is very different, and here is a case that exemplifies such a quality.

Camila’s website can be found here

Written by Amica Lane on Wednesday March 17th, 2010 10:53 pm

Categories ,Alice Dellal, ,amica lane, ,burn, ,camila soares, ,Harmony Korine, ,illustration, ,Kate Moss, ,kinda awesome, ,watercolour

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Amelia’s Magazine | Spotlight: Cat Sims

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All illustrations courtesy of the artist

My favourite thing about this job is scouting for new illustrators to feature in this section. There’s always the mix of the good, information pills the bad and the ugly. And just sometimes, order there’s a one who makes me sit up straight and exclaim ‘Hot damn, website that’s a big can of talent.’ In a dodgy Texas accent, because that’s how I like to entertain my companion, and myself Phelps the cat.

Swiftly moving on, this is South London based illustrator graduated from Graphic/Media design at the London College of Communication in 2004 and has since gone on to design artwork for Illustrated People, whose t-shirts have gone on sale in Topshop and Japan.

Using a high stylised black and white technique, Sims creates illustrations that explode in a feast of bones, owls, butterflies and other such things to create a finished artwork that one can stare at for quite a long time. I’m loving the theme of owls that I’ve seen in a lot of artwork lately. I wonder if it has anything to do with Twin Peaks finally being released on DVD?

One of my favourite illustrations by Cat Sims, entitled ‘High Barnet’. It reminds me of what might have happened if Marie Antoinette had decided to throw A Midsummer’s Night Dream themed party.

Three songs you like to draw to: I usually draw to Radio 4 (oh wow, that rhymes!) but anything from “Vespertine“, Bjork, “We Are Love” Hot Chip, “What’s He Building in There?“, Tom Waits.

Three destinations you’d love to travel to: Japan, Mexico, and New York

Three artists that inspire you: Supermundane, Lucien Freud, David Lynch. Editor’s note: Ha! Knew that Twin Peaks theory was bang on!


Three words to describe your work: black, white, and intricate.

Cat Sims blog can be found here.

Written by Amica Lane on Tuesday March 30th, 2010 9:46 am

Categories ,amica lane, ,bjork, ,cat sims, ,David Lynch, ,illustrated people, ,owls, ,topshop, ,twin peaks

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Amelia’s Magazine | Spotlight: Matteo Patocchi

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All photography by Matteo Patocchi

After studying Graphic Design in Switzerland, what is ed Matteo Patocchi relocated to London to graduate in photography. This collection, order entitled ‘Houston I Have a Dream’ is an exclusive for Amelia’s Magazine.


His dreamy style is reminiscent of Corinne Day (her bohemian phase, sickness not the heroin one) with the essence of Lance Acord’s cinematography thrown in the mix, and like any good creative, the strong elements of storytelling flow through his work. ‘Houston, We Have a Dream’ was Patocchi’s concept, centred around the idea of a young fan of the Astronaut, Neil Armstrong whose reality she visits in her dreams.


Matteo Patocchi: “These photographs depict a girl who’s transported from reality into a dream. She’s the girl next door, passionate about Neil Armstrong’s expeditions. One day she falls asleep, finding herself mesmerized and nostalgic; dreaming about some of her imaginary places. Eventually she wake up at home, but we are not sure if the dream has ended yet.”


Whilst retaining an aesthetic that would easily fit into a fashion editorial spread, there’s a low-fi creative spark to this series of photographs, especially considering they are taken in Patocchi’s apartment using mostly natural light to evoke a dreamlike reality, playing with texture and colour to create a simple but effective narrative structure. What I especially like about this collection is the juxtaposition of subjects. When I think about space travel and NASA, several things come into my head. Steel, phallic looking spacecrafts, chunky bubblesuits and inexplicably, Bruce Willis. Aside from clearly being a scientific luddite, my connatations with Astronautics are not feminine, soft and feminine, which is exactly what these photographs are.




Matteo Patocchi is currently working on a series of photographs and visual installations based on playgrounds captured at night, to reveal strange alternative landscapes. Hopefully we’ll be seeing a lot more of this photographer, but in the meantime, more images can be found on his website.

Written by Amica Lane on Tuesday March 16th, 2010 11:31 am

Categories ,amica lane, ,corinne day, ,lance acord, ,Matteo Patocchi, ,moon, ,neil armstrong, ,photography, ,stars, ,tinfoil

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Amelia’s Magazine | Spotlight: Sophie Webb

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Interesting facts about Sophie Webb.
– After graduating from Byam Shaw, buy information pills more about she went on to work with Damien Hirst amongst others before becoming a freelance illustrator.
– She is a semi professional Kristin Stewart lookalike
– She likes breaking into abandoned mental hospitals with her equally insane best friend.


And she makes amazing artwork. Juxtaposing subjects, Bill Hicks and Robert Pattinson per example, advice her work is crafted in a multi-media fashion, incorporating retro black labels, rizlas, hand illustration and mix tapes. Her collection which she has named ‘care packages’ consists of customised matchboxes, with tiny scroll within, reading quotes from authors such as Sylvia Plath and Paul Auster.

‘Portraits’, which is available for commissions, focuses rather on the subject’s taste rather than the subject themselves. ‘Lemmy Kilmister’ for a Kilmister fan is a psychedelic combination of sign language, illustration, handcrafted paper and a rizla, which fits together to encapsulate far more about the man than the run of a mill illustration. Collage seems to becoming to re-emerge in young artist’s portfolios, and I find the use of relevant materials, the rizla for example which I love the use of in context with the artwork, to be very fresh and relevant.


Sophie has abandoned a traditional art career path in favour of the freedom of working independently and focusing on the art that she wants to create, which has also taken place all over her body is a series of self designed tattoos. So what inspires Sophie Webb? ‘B.Dolan. Twilight. Bill Hicks. Twin Peaks. Cigarette boxes.’
Excellent choice.

For more information, contact simivalleysherri@hotmail.com for pricing.

Written by Amica Lane on Monday March 29th, 2010 1:50 pm

Categories ,amica lane, ,b dolan, ,bill hicks, ,collage, ,lemmy kilmister, ,robert pattinson, ,sophie webb, ,sylvia plath, ,twilight

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Amelia’s Magazine | Through the Lens: An Interview with Dean Chalkley

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Courtesy of The Book Club

Dean Chalkley has shot everyone. Not with a gun, obviously, although that would be quite an interesting story in itself. As one of the most respected photographers in Britain, Dean Chalkley has snapped a platter of well known faces from Scarlett Johansson to Simon Cowell.
In his new exhibition, The New Faces, which is currently exhibiting at The Book Club, Dean Chalkley returns the exploring mod culture. Having been at the forefront of the Mod explosion in 2006, when The Horrors burst onto the scene from Southend, I sit down with Dean Chalkley to discuss life, death and what makes a good photographer…

I know you started out with Dazed and Confused, but prior to that, how did you get involved with photography?
It depends how far you want to go back really! When I was a kid my dad had a big old Russian Zenith, which was a bit like a tank. Really solid. I don’t think he knew how to use it properly, and I certainly didn’t. But we played around with, experimenting with all kinds of filters; so I got into it from that context. As I got older I got much more into it. At school I was really into clothes and wanted to be a fashion designer, so photography took a backseat as I thought I was going to be the next Savile Row tailor to the stars! Then I got in car racing funnily enough. Only minis, but I raced at Brands Hatch and places like that. But before I did the racing, I went to Brands Hatch and ended up taking pictures of the cars. After that I decided I wanted to find out more about photography, so I did some evening classes at a local college, which was a bit of an odd experience. They’d get a model in, and you’d have to queue up to take a photo of her, a bit odd really. Then I decided to give up on motor racing and get into photography full time.

It’s interesting that you wanted to be a fashion designer when you were younger as a lot of your photographs, like the ones currently on display at The Book Club have a very strong fashion aesthetic.
When I was in school, I was a real strict mod character. Probably quite annoying, but I didn’t care! I grew up in Southend on Sea, and at that time there was a real strong hold on youth culture, it was very tribal. I was a mod and I loved the music, the clothes, the scooters, I was immersed in it. Conversely you got characters such as the skinheads, who were doing the same thing but they hated you. These were the times where if you wore a pink shirt and walked down South End High Street, you’d definitely get your head kicked in. No question of a doubt. Today it’s a lot more liberal. Back then it was very divided. You had a passion and a pride for your tribe.

All images Courtesy of PYMCA and copywrited by the artist

You returned to the Southend Scene later when you did a lot of photographs for Junk Club and The Horrors, who embraced that Mod Culture.
The Horrors weren’t The Horrors back then. I went back home and went to Junk Club one night, and it was amazing. Instantaneously you could tell there was something there that had been missing for a long time. The town had been homogenised, it was very dissatisfying with the bland all encompassing blanket of Smooth RnB and that kind of thing. It steamrollered out everything else, and then this group of kids started doing something different for no other reason than they felt a magnetism for it. It was an organic process. Rhys and some of those guys would come up to London and were quite big on the mod scene, but it would go back to Southend and transmogrify into something else and then influence other people. I found it fascinating. And if you find something fascinating, you’ve got to capture it then and there otherwise you might miss it. The last day of my exhibition ‘Southend’s Underground’ was the last day of Junk Club. A lot of characters moved on, some moved up to London. But the ripple effect of that scene can be found everywhere, from Dior to other bands. You could tell so many of those people were going to become something, they had the spark; they just needed something to ignite. And they did it because they loved it, not for any commercial interest.

You’ve shot a variety of people from a range of backgrounds and tribes. Is there a particular group you feel a particular bond with or have a preference to shoot?
Not really. One of the fascinating things about photography is that it enables you to look into the lives of others. It’s fabulous, I mean, like you. You’ve got heroes, I’ve got heroes, but with our jobs you can go into peoples lives and touch them…but not in a sexual way, for the record! For me, I idolised The Jam when I was younger, but recently I’ve been working with Paul Weller and it’s like ‘Jesus! This is amazing! Paul Weller!’ I believe in heroes, which sounds lame, but I want to have heroes. But at the same time, I want to celebrate real people. And Junk Club was exactly that. But sometimes you get a phone call asking if you want to photograph Scarlett Johansson, and that’s pretty amazing.

As a photographer do you consciously watch out for movements that happen like Junk club, or is it something that transpires naturally?
I don’t actively pursue things. I have no idea what’s happening on the metal scene because I have no interest in that. I’m a bit idealistic, but I do what I want to do, and what interests me. You have to be careful what you wish for, for example if you took a real interest in teapots, and spent your life photographing teapots then people are going to know you as the teapot photographer and there may not be a chance to expand from that niche. I like to move around. I had an interest in body builders, and I actually did a photography project for Amelia’s Magazine. Amelia came up with the title, which was brilliant, called ‘Physical culturists’. What inspired me to do that was a bodybuilder I knew. He was coming up for a competition and put so much energy into it, but people tend to mock bodybuilders a lot, but it takes real dedication to do that. So I wanted to portray them in a heroic kind of way. I showed the pictures to Amelia, and she liked them, so I took the project further for the magazine. It wasn’t ridiculing them; it was about showing that they are also really dedicated.
It’s a bit like this chap I know from Southend, and they call him the Bagpipe Man. He used to drive around on a massive tricycle motorbike, which had a car engine in it, playing bagpipe music. He had a Mohican and a kilt on. It turned out that he had his penis and tentacles pierced eighteen times. Whenever he went into a bar, he’d lift his kilt up and smash a beer glass. I thought to myself ‘that’s quite unusual’ for the same reason. He’s an outsider, but also kind of a hero. I entered a photograph of him into a competition with the same sentiment and some editor put a comment next to the entry ‘from some pea brained optimist’!
Well, I think it’s quite good to be a pea-brained optimist as a photographer. A lot of photography has become very sterile. What with how much we can manipulate photographs with computers, a lot of the beauty is gone. The dirt, the mistakes – that can make a great photograph.

Some artists I’ve spoken to lately talk about the loss of personality in art with the digital age. Do you work digitally or tend to use film?
I embrace digital culture, most of what I do is digital. But it should be viewed as a tool, it should enhance what you’re doing but not be the heart of it. However the notion of error is frowned upon in a digital context, whereas in film error is a part of photography.

There was a quote recently that I read that said ‘A camera does not make a photographer and Photoshop doesn’t make a designer.’ If you had to sum up what makes a good photographer, how would you define that?
Someone who likes what they do. The camera and Photoshop is the peripheral, it’s the thing inside that drives it. It’s your heart, your soul and your viewpoint. It’s like a meat mincer; you take all your life and your influences, bung it in the top – the cupcake you had from when you four, the music that changed your life – all that stuff. You take it all, put it in, crank it through and then out of it comes your art, and your outlook. That’s the most vital thing. And if you lose your sanity through it, that’s the most devastating thing. You can get another camera, another computer, but if you lose your mind then that’s a big problem. I guess being a good photographer is having a vision inside that you have to communicate.

For someone who has been so successful as photographer, do you ever think about the legacy you would like to leave behind?
That’s an interesting question that I’ve actually been thinking about. I’ve made a will and everything! I thoroughly recommend it too, great fun. You think about it as an artist, after you die, what happens to your work? I think everyone wants to leave behind something, which is a resonance to themselves. I’ve captured moments in time, for other people to look at in the future. And I think that’s enough.

With all the different work you’ve done, and the artists you’ve worked with, you must have some good stories. What’s the weirdest encounter you’ve had?
One time I was doing a photoshoot in Iceland with The Propellerheads, and after the shoot we’re going to this party. So we go around to someone’s house, knock on the door and this woman opens the door shouting ‘Come in!’, and it’s Bjork! It’s not particularly weird, but it’s one of those great strange things when you go to Iceland and find yourself in Bjork’s house. It’s a very weird life, but I tend to live in the now and not think ahead, aside from planning out my funeral. I stay grounded, I’m never going to run off and buy four houses.

Was there ever a point when you were pursuing photography where you felt like you wanted to pack it in and get a stable job?
Well, when I started I was living in a cheap house in Golder’s Green whilst doing internships. I had no money, signed on to the dole whilst I tried to make it as a photographer. But after a short period of time, they were like ‘Well, unless you get a job at Tesco’s, we’re going to take away your money’ which was horrible because I had worked so hard to get the point where I’d nearly made it to be told to work in Tesco’s! Thankfully soon after that, I became a full time assistant and began making enough money to live. A lot of it comes down to timing; you need to know when to push and when to pull. You never want to be blindly ambitious either, you don’t want to steamroll through anybody. You meet people like that, and it’s just not a good way of conducting yourself. It’s a long game, it’s not about getting to the top quickly, and it’s about making it but having longevity. Doing a job like this is like going up a ladder, if you knew how high it was you probably wouldn’t start in the first place! The trick is to only look two rungs ahead, and keep going.

My final question, is what advice would you give to young creative’s starting out?
Do what you want to do, and follow your instincts. Follow your heart and don’t compromise yourself.

Written by Amica Lane on Monday March 15th, 2010 4:41 pm

Categories ,amica lane, ,bjork, ,Dean Chalkley, ,Junk Club, ,Mod Culture, ,Paul Weller, ,photography, ,Scarlett Johansson, ,Sixties, ,Southend, ,The Book Club, ,the horrors, ,The Jam, ,The Propellerheads

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Amelia’s Magazine | Visual Music

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This work may not be reproduced without the permission of Matteo Patocchi, viagra order try info@matteopatocchi.com
All photography by Matteo Patocchi

When coming to chose a degree upon my emancipation from the grim steely hell that I refer to as ‘high school’ I had had intended to pursue Fine Art. But whilst browsing courses in the UCAS guide, pill I came across a course entitled ‘Live Art’ that struck my fancy, diagnosis due to it’s proclivity towards video art and installation, which I considered to be a very interesting and an undervalued aspect of art that was mostly overlooked in favour of more traditional art. Never one to turn away from the chance to do something weird and different, I launched into Live Art with all the necessary zest and fauna that such an establishment which heralds self mutilation as the curriculum can be given. It probably was an error in judgement. The course was a sham, filled up with luddites who had flunked getting into proper art courses and had been sectioned away onto this course for the financial gain of the university. Regardless of this, I enjoyed it, as it exposed me to the underbelly of the art world. Marina Abramovi?, Gina Pane, Vito Acconci – we studied them intently and they were my fast favourites. Although those names have been recognised and given a place in the ‘academy’ of modern art, most of the video artists, composers and performers that I dug up from the bowels of the library had been marginalised into nothingness.

Oskar Fischinger ‘Studie No. 7′

HST can sum up the majority of video art quite succinctly. ‘Too weird to live, too rare to die.’ They’re kicking about, in the crevices of galleries – quite literally in Acconci’s case, but in general, the media furore and deification is usually reserved for those artists who still can fit it with the status quo of the art community. Yet still, after graduation, moving image in art has always been close to my heart. There is something incredibly fresh and alternative about it, yet it’s never quite hit the same success, as it’s static predecessors. Which is precisely how ‘Visual Music’ at The Book Club came about. Alex Marshall has collected footage from avant-garde film-makers who have been pushed into anomie by not quite fitting the mould, then playing live original music to recontextualise the work. So I make the necessary steps to organise an interview with Alex Marshall at The Book Club, where Visual Music takes place. “Everything I say could well be bullshit.” He warns me prior to the interview. “Excellent. In that case, I’ll order a drink.” I reply, deciding that if one is going to be shrugging off the pompous ‘we are artistes’ shtick so early on, I may as well check my ‘I am ze journalist’ routine at the door and get drunk.

So maybe start off by telling me what you’re doing with Visual Music at The Book Club? I was asked to do something to do with film in a very arbitrary way. This freedom encouraged me to experiment with some ideas I’d been wrestling with for a while. I had become  very interested in the contiguity between text and image, but this phrase doesn’t mean very much to anyone, it didn’t mean very much to me at the time I came across it, but they mean a lot to me now.  Oskar Fischinger was the first person who sprung to mind when I began to conceptualise the night. I came across him by chance, as my flatmate had an old documentary about him. What I found fascinating about Fischinger was his background as a musician and how his work was an attempt to visualise what music is, what it feels like. And that fascinated me as it wasn’t a contrived analysis of musical form, or filmic form, it was more an attempt to show people what he felt about music, something that could be shared, but only through abstraction. And in order to show someone something, he wanted them to feel it, through this abstraction, rather than see it. I don’t think people see music, we don’t even see the words we say to each other, what we’re doing when we’re talking is exchanging visual references. This table is only a table because I tell you it’s a table.

Like Saussure? It’s not Saussure.

Lacan? It’s not Lacan! It’s not Wittgenstein either, it’s not labels; it’s that consciousness comes to us through a fictional fashioning. Our understanding of the world is created by the stories that we tell through our relationship to things. It’s a table because I’ve been told that this noise “table” signifies this thing that means all tables everywhere, their table-ness, which is a massive abstraction. The word abstraction is itself a massive abstraction from the meaning of abstraction.

Like Saussure. Fuck Saussure! I mean, this is all bullshit obviously…to anyone  with a real job, this is all bullshit, but it’s something we’re involved with all the time.

Did your paid work as a projectionist and cameraman influence your choices? Well, I’ve worked as a projectionist, and I’ve worked as a cameraman, I graduated in film, so I felt I was in a good position to try and understand why people come to the cinema. People tend to talk about films in term of their meanings and their symbols. It’s the age of psychoanalysis really, just reading into everything. But on a deeper level we’re constantly in the process of exchanging complete abstractions. I wouldn’t say we’re deluding each other, but we’re never truly questioning, or maybe we’re incapable of questioning, what it is that our consciousness is processing, what that process is. I chose Fischinger and I chose Norman McLaren for these reasons.

Neighbours by Norman McLaren

Tell me about Norman McLaren? He was a Scottish born Canadian art student with no money and no camera, all he had was film. So not only was he scribbling on the actual frame of a 35mm film, but he was also drawing the soundtrack. As a projectionist, this meant a lot to me; this physical touch that takes place. Which takes me back to contiguity, the physical inscription of the idea of language.

I take it that you have a real love of film. The 35mm type. I find its conservativism fascinating. From the moment we could, we’ve tried to ‘fix’ something and make it this permanent thing. However, all the substance of 35mm convinces you of, is that it isn’t a perfect material. The nature of it, is that it damages itself through it’s own reading. I find that really interesting.

Why did you chose Fischinger and Norman McLaren? I chose Fischinger because he was making music visual, and Norman McLaren for the second night because he saw Fischinger’s shorts in Glasgow. McLaren understood what Fischinger was doing and saw it as the perfect way to express visually how he felt about music. I think music is very important. It’s the one art form that can’t be explained away. People don’t know how to watch films in the way that we all listen to music. We all listen to music and don’t ask questions about it, we just accept its abstraction. A film should be viewed as a classical piece of music. How does it move you and why should be an afterthought. If you’re moved by something and you don’t understand it, that’s fine.

When doing these nights is there a particular theme that you want to convey to the audience, or is it very much inviting them into a creative process and allowing them to take from it what they will? Certainly both. I certainly have my viewpoint when I put something in front of someone. The next night is going to be very different and I hope people remain open. The Fischinger shorts were totally abstract and the music is abstract and I feel that it shouldn’t be a difficult thing to tap into. That’s my main drive, that you should be able to sit and experience these things. By watching it you should be asking questions to do with consciousness, and if you’re not then you should. That’s the only dogmatic point of view that I have, if you’re not questioning yourself as an audience you’re susceptible to real dangers.

Elaborate on real dangers. In the world of 24-hour news and the excess of information; you’re going to absorb it. Not necessarily as fact, people can differentiate between propaganda and fact. I mean, I’m fine with propaganda, I find it very honest – but to think of propaganda as negative spiel is very naïve. Anything anyone ever says to you is propaganda, as they’re reflecting their viewpoint onto you. It can be honest and true, but it’s still propaganda. The more we can expose it, the better. I think art should be asking questions to question people’s mode of questioning. Art should be the most powerful mirror in the world.

So you don’t try and create a singular message with any particular night? No. I try to keep it loose, so people can make from it what they will. And most of the audience isn’t even aware of these films and their creators. There’s a film maker that I would love to work with called Peter Watkins, I’d love to get him down but then it would be a Q and A type of thing and I’d fucking hate it, but I did three years of film studies and then years as a cameraman and I’d never heard of Peter Watkins, and I find that terrifying. I’m going to do a show with some of his work at some point. He’s the most marginalized filmmaker I’ve ever come across and his films are extraordinary. The point I’m trying to make is that with this night I wanted to expose filmmakers who had been marginalized by the popular media. Oskar Fischinger, for example. Everyone knows Fantasia. It wouldn’t have been made without him and Disney stole his ideas and shunned him. The work outside of that was vastly superior to anything that Disney ever made; although there are some great Disney movies.

What’s your favorite Disney movie? Fantasia by Oskar Fischinger.

I know you’re a creator yourself, as a filmmaker and photographer. Are you going to showcase your own work in the future? I have thought about that a lot, I did the first night and when I did the second night I talked to people who wanted me to showcase more of my work. It’s something in my mind but I’m quite self-effacing and it would also have to be the right piece of work. If I did it, it would be a surprise. I’m awful at promotion. I find the idea of showing my own work uncomfortable. It would no longer be subjective.

How did you find the musicians to work with you on this? For the first one it was totally by chance. I knew a guy called Jacob who was a friend of mine and plays in a band called Victoria and Jacob and they’re wonderful. So I asked him to contribute a live score. I can’t give a job over to someone if I don’t trust in what they’re doing. With Jacob, it was so easy and obvious. And we have very different viewpoints, which is great. I’m a pretentious academic, and he’s not. We got together to discuss it over a few beers, and I left it to him. I didn’t even know what he would play until the night. There was a two-minute rehearsal before the event, but I left to have a cigarette. So the first time I heard it was with everyone else.

(At this point, to conclude the interview I decide to switch tack probably based upon my blood alcohol levels.)

What is your favourite word? Skopos or Contiguity, I suppose. I don’t really have favourites. But I do like words.

What is your least favourite word? “Like, random”

What turns you on creatively, spiritually or emotionally? Contact

What turns you off? Self-importance.

What is your favourite curse word? Fuck

What sound or noise do you love? The HBO tag these days – excellence generally follows.

What sound or noise do you hate? The buzzer to my front door, especially when unexpected.

What profession other than your own would you like to attempt? Er, what’s my profession?

What profession would you not like to do? Insurance salesman, because I’d have to kill myself in a painful and humiliating way.

If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates? Told you so.

And there you have it. Check out The Book Club’s website for details of the next ‘Visual Music’ night.

Written by Amica Lane on Thursday March 25th, 2010 1:20 am

Categories ,alex marshall, ,amica lane, ,animation, ,art bollocks, ,Disney, ,East London, ,fantasia, ,gina pane, ,Hunter S. Thompson, ,installation, ,marina abramovic, ,oskar fischinger, ,peter watkins, ,The Book Club, ,victoria and jacob, ,Video Art, ,visual music

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Amelia’s Magazine | An Interview with Rodrigo Souto

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CIMG3319

All Images Courtesy of Rodrigo Souto

One of my favourite things about collages, shop is the incorporation of materials from a wealth of different sources to create a finished project; rather than relying on one source. With this in mind, viagra it’s no surprise that Rodrigo Souto chooses to primarily work on collages based on his background. From street art in Brazil to working as a tattoo artist; Souto is an adroit creative, pharm whose work has been featured in The Brick Lane Gallery and been snapped up by art collectors. Poised to be a great success in the art world, his portfolio of work continues to strengthen. This is great news for me, who has two Souto originals inked on my body. I can skin myself for cash if hard up in the future. And they laughed when I said tattoos were an investment…but I digress. We’ve had a penchant for Brazillian artists, since Amelia’s Magazine Issue 09 which focused heavily on artists from Brazil, which can be bought from our shop. In this spirit, I sat down with Rodrigo Souto to talk about his work.

CIMG3316

So how did you get into Art? I know you’re from Brazil, so how did that route unfold?

I started when I was very young; I started studying art at the art college where I did two or three years. I then studied Fine Art at University where I started exploring it more, the same professor from my college was also at my university. I started learning a lot about painting, design, drawings but I got really into collage more than anything; that’s when I started doing this. I got really into mail art as well, where you start something and send it off to someone else, then they add to it.

Now you’re working as a tattoo artist in London, was that a natural transition from an art background?

The thing is, I try to do two things. I have my life as an artist, which is different from tattooing, and then working in a tattoo shop. I like doing both, but I want to apply myself 50/50.  But I work 6 or 7 days a week, long hours with a lot of big designs where I have to be really focused. But now I’m trying to keep the balance by only working on tattoos when I’m in the shop, and then when I go home I work on my art.

It’s pretty good that you can earn your living whilst being creative.

Yeah, I like it. My technical skills improve because I do it every day; working with drawing and colour, composition, so I’m still working on myself as an artist at my job.

Being from Brazil, a lot of your work has a very strong aesthetic with colour and style; do you feel the environment changes the work produced…going from the sunny streets of Sao Paulo to the rank grey of London…is their a correlation between what you produce and where you are?

I don’t know if it changes it…but it’s different. I can’t do over here what I would do in Brazil. You can’t sit down on the street and paint; in Brazil it’s really easy. On Sunday, you call your friends and say ‘let’s go for a paint’ and you just get your paints and go, it’s really free. You can be much more creative. I’ve been here for four or five years and rarely have ever painted on the streets. I work mostly from a studio. But on the other hand, the collages get stronger now because I focus on that.

CIMG3326

And to do my collages, I go to street markets and places to find things, like rare paper, whereas in Brazil I couldn’t really do that. So I could more painting, but less collage.

I’d like to do more work with canvas over here, but you need to find the space because I work with spray cans, so you don’t want to –

Asphyxiate yourself?

Exactly. But now, I really want to get into my collages more. With collages you can go out and get different materials to work with, and with paint, well its just paint. I could use a hundred thousand things to make a collage; I have to work for it. Go out; find things that will work together. You bring the material to you. This is why I like it, everything has a story. The materials have a narrative. The other day I bought this paper from 1930. I paid like £70 for paper, but it had writing on it, it had a story in it! You can see where the guy made a mistake and rubbed it out, you can see the history in it. Everything has a story. Then I make it into a collage, and tell another one.

Do you have a narrative for each piece before you make it, or do you let it tell its own story?

I have an idea of what message I want to express. Then I pick up the images and bring them together for what I want to say. But sometimes they tell their own story; I put them together and realise that it’s telling me another story. I really like it when I get one image and it tells me what to do; a guy reclining for example and then I start thinking about it, and put things together from that. I can create something from just one image, it grows.

What other artists inspire you? Are there any contemporary artists you draw inspiration from?

My tutors inspired me a lot, Valdo Rechelo and Antonio Valentin Lino. There is a guy from Brazil, I love his work, Eduardo Recife. He’s a designer, he works for big companies; and I love his stuff. He works with computers a lot, but I don’t use computers well, I do everything by hand.

CIMG3317

That’s nice in a way, in modern art so many people use computers and Photoshop there’s a loss of really handcrafted work.

I think I’m old school, I want to do everything myself. If I could do the frames, I would do them too. I want to create everything myself, not just have the idea. I like to work; cut it, glue it, make it. I love the whole process.

How long does it usually take to create a collage?

Sometimes it can be really easy, if I have everything together; a few nights maybe. Other times it can be much longer.

Your work is changing; in the collages you’ve gone from more 2D projects to 3D. How do you see the work developing and growing in the future?

I want to make them bigger, I’m also interested in installation, which I’d like to do. I have ideas, but I’ll see where it goes.

How many collages are you working on at the moment?

I’ve been on pause for a while, but I’m about to get back into again and produce a lot. I’ve just moved, so I’m setting up my studio again. I have to have my space organised. I went and got my table yesterday, got my things, so I’m ready now.

CIMG3322

A lot of artists are very particular about their studio space, either live in chaos or everything has to be perfect. How do you customise your working studio?

It has to be perfect. I need shelves, I label everything. I have boxes and boxes, paper from London, paper from Brazil, paper from the street…so now my space is organised I’m ready to create! I get so frustrated when I don’t create; I can still express myself through tattoos, but it’s still only fifty percent. The other fifty percent is in my heart, and it needs to come out, so now I’m ready to be very serious about producing again.

In some of the paintings, there’s a real draw of religious iconography. Where did that come from, were you raised religiously?

I had an experience with religion. My family are very relaxed about religion, but I had a girlfriend who was very fanatical about religion. Her family were very religious, and I had to go to Church every Sunday, six to midnight. It killed me. It really got me, and I was at uni, about 18 or 19, discovering new things. My tutor was working with religious iconography at the time, so I started doing my own interpretations, so I started working with it from then.

Do you identify with a particular London art scene? Is there an area you relate to artistically?

Not particularly, but I used to live in Old Street, so I guess I identify with that area and the galleries around there.

Do you get to visit a lot of galleries and exhibitions?

On my days off, definitely. I like to go to Stolen Space in Brick Lane, they always have great things on. And Pure Evil Gallery, they have some of my work there actually. I try to go big exhibitions to see the older things, I want to see Van Gogh ‘letters’ exhibit. I love letters. I used to send my tutor, Valdo Rechelo, collages that I had started, and then he would add to them and finish them. He would send me collages he started, and then I would finish them. There’s a big collection of them.

It’s great to have that artistic collaboration when so far away…

Yes, and not by email! I love paper, when you have a letter you have something. An email is just nothing.

CIMG3320

Your artwork is based in intimacy, from writing letters, to making the artwork very small so people really have to look at it closely, bringing them physically closer to the artwork.

When you do an exhibition, they are so small that they have to get close and really stare at it, and take it in. A lot of people don’t look at artwork at exhibitions, they drift passed it. If you make someone look at your work for two minutes, then you’ve done well.

+

Keep your eyes peeled for upcoming exhibitions. Not literally though, because that would be gross.

Rodrigo Souto’s blog – is here and his myspace –  is here

Written by Amica Lane on Thursday March 4th, 2010 2:48 am

Categories ,amica lane, ,brazil, ,brazillian street art, ,collage, ,Eduardo Recife, ,rodrigo souto, ,self sacrifice, ,tattoo artist, ,Tattoos

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Amelia’s Magazine | An Interview with Rodrigo Souto

by

CIMG3319

All Images Courtesy of Rodrigo Souto

One of my favourite things about collages, is the incorporation of materials from a wealth of different sources to create a finished project; rather than relying on one source. With this in mind, it’s no surprise that Rodrigo Souto chooses to primarily work on collages based on his background. From street art in Brazil to working as a tattoo artist; Souto is an adroit creative, whose work has been featured in The Brick Lane Gallery and been snapped up by art collectors. Poised to be a great success in the art world, his portfolio of work continues to strengthen. This is great news for me, who has two Souto originals inked on my body. I can skin myself for cash if hard up in the future. And they laughed when I said tattoos were an investment…but I digress. We’ve had a penchant for Brazillian artists, since Amelia’s Magazine Issue 09 which focused heavily on artists from Brazil, which can be bought from our shop. In this spirit, I sat down with Rodrigo Souto to talk about his work.

CIMG3316

So how did you get into Art? I know you’re from Brazil, so how did that route unfold?

I started when I was very young; I started studying art at the art college where I did two or three years. I then studied Fine Art at University where I started exploring it more, the same professor from my college was also at my university. I started learning a lot about painting, design, drawings but I got really into collage more than anything; that’s when I started doing this. I got really into mail art as well, where you start something and send it off to someone else, then they add to it.

Now you’re working as a tattoo artist in London, was that a natural transition from an art background?

The thing is, I try to do two things. I have my life as an artist, which is different from tattooing, and then working in a tattoo shop. I like doing both, but I want to apply myself 50/50.  But I work 6 or 7 days a week, long hours with a lot of big designs where I have to be really focused. But now I’m trying to keep the balance by only working on tattoos when I’m in the shop, and then when I go home I work on my art.

It’s pretty good that you can earn your living whilst being creative.

Yeah, I like it. My technical skills improve because I do it every day; working with drawing and colour, composition, so I’m still working on myself as an artist at my job.

Being from Brazil, a lot of your work has a very strong aesthetic with colour and style; do you feel the environment changes the work produced…going from the sunny streets of Sao Paulo to the rank grey of London…is their a correlation between what you produce and where you are?

I don’t know if it changes it…but it’s different. I can’t do over here what I would do in Brazil. You can’t sit down on the street and paint; in Brazil it’s really easy. On Sunday, you call your friends and say ‘let’s go for a paint’ and you just get your paints and go, it’s really free. You can be much more creative. I’ve been here for four or five years and rarely have ever painted on the streets. I work mostly from a studio. But on the other hand, the collages get stronger now because I focus on that.

CIMG3326

And to do my collages, I go to street markets and places to find things, like rare paper, whereas in Brazil I couldn’t really do that. So I could more painting, but less collage.

I’d like to do more work with canvas over here, but you need to find the space because I work with spray cans, so you don’t want to –

Asphyxiate yourself?

Exactly. But now, I really want to get into my collages more. With collages you can go out and get different materials to work with, and with paint, well its just paint. I could use a hundred thousand things to make a collage; I have to work for it. Go out; find things that will work together. You bring the material to you. This is why I like it, everything has a story. The materials have a narrative. The other day I bought this paper from 1930. I paid like £70 for paper, but it had writing on it, it had a story in it! You can see where the guy made a mistake and rubbed it out, you can see the history in it. Everything has a story. Then I make it into a collage, and tell another one.

Do you have a narrative for each piece before you make it, or do you let it tell its own story?

I have an idea of what message I want to express. Then I pick up the images and bring them together for what I want to say. But sometimes they tell their own story; I put them together and realise that it’s telling me another story. I really like it when I get one image and it tells me what to do; a guy reclining for example and then I start thinking about it, and put things together from that. I can create something from just one image, it grows.

What other artists inspire you? Are there any contemporary artists you draw inspiration from?

My tutors inspired me a lot, Valdo Rechelo and Antonio Valentin Lino. There is a guy from Brazil, I love his work, Eduardo Recife. He’s a designer, he works for big companies; and I love his stuff. He works with computers a lot, but I don’t use computers well, I do everything by hand.

CIMG3317

That’s nice in a way, in modern art so many people use computers and Photoshop there’s a loss of really handcrafted work.

I think I’m old school, I want to do everything myself. If I could do the frames, I would do them too. I want to create everything myself, not just have the idea. I like to work; cut it, glue it, make it. I love the whole process.

How long does it usually take to create a collage?

Sometimes it can be really easy, if I have everything together; a few nights maybe. Other times it can be much longer.

Your work is changing; in the collages you’ve gone from more 2D projects to 3D. How do you see the work developing and growing in the future?

I want to make them bigger, I’m also interested in installation, which I’d like to do. I have ideas, but I’ll see where it goes.

How many collages are you working on at the moment?

I’ve been on pause for a while, but I’m about to get back into again and produce a lot. I’ve just moved, so I’m setting up my studio again. I have to have my space organised. I went and got my table yesterday, got my things, so I’m ready now.

CIMG3322

A lot of artists are very particular about their studio space, either live in chaos or everything has to be perfect. How do you customise your working studio?

It has to be perfect. I need shelves, I label everything. I have boxes and boxes, paper from London, paper from Brazil, paper from the street…so now my space is organised I’m ready to create! I get so frustrated when I don’t create; I can still express myself through tattoos, but it’s still only fifty percent. The other fifty percent is in my heart, and it needs to come out, so now I’m ready to be very serious about producing again.

In some of the paintings, there’s a real draw of religious iconography. Where did that come from, were you raised religiously?

I had an experience with religion. My family are very relaxed about religion, but I had a girlfriend who was very fanatical about religion. Her family were very religious, and I had to go to Church every Sunday, six to midnight. It killed me. It really got me, and I was at uni, about 18 or 19, discovering new things. My tutor was working with religious iconography at the time, so I started doing my own interpretations, so I started working with it from then.

Do you identify with a particular London art scene? Is there an area you relate to artistically?

Not particularly, but I used to live in Old Street, so I guess I identify with that area and the galleries around there.

Do you get to visit a lot of galleries and exhibitions?

On my days off, definitely. I like to go to Stolen Space in Brick Lane, they always have great things on. And Pure Evil Gallery, they have some of my work there actually. I try to go big exhibitions to see the older things, I want to see Van Gogh ‘letters’ exhibit. I love letters. I used to send my tutor, Valdo Rechelo, collages that I had started, and then he would add to them and finish them. He would send me collages he started, and then I would finish them. There’s a big collection of them.

It’s great to have that artistic collaboration when so far away…

Yes, and not by email! I love paper, when you have a letter you have something. An email is just nothing.

CIMG3320

Your artwork is based in intimacy, from writing letters, to making the artwork very small so people really have to look at it closely, bringing them physically closer to the artwork.

When you do an exhibition, they are so small that they have to get close and really stare at it, and take it in. A lot of people don’t look at artwork at exhibitions, they drift passed it. If you make someone look at your work for two minutes, then you’ve done well.

+

Keep your eyes peeled for upcoming exhibitions. Not literally though, because that would be gross.

Rodrigo Souto’s blog – is here and his myspace –  is here

Written by Amica Lane on Thursday March 4th, 2010 2:48 am

Categories ,amica lane, ,brazil, ,brazillian street art, ,collage, ,Eduardo Recife, ,rodrigo souto, ,self sacrifice, ,tattoo artist, ,Tattoos

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Amelia’s Magazine | Five things you might not know about Chris Ofili

by

Sparky Deathcap is a twenty-something musician and artist from Cheshire, sildenafil whose wry tales of love and loss are in turns hilarious and heartwrenching. You may have caught him recently supporting the likes of Los Campesinos! and Hot Club de Paris.

On songs like “Berlin Syndrome”, case guitars and handclaps loop and whirl around lyrics like, recipe “Since then you just make cameos when I’m asleep/you’re the William Shatner of this elite genre of women that I have loved and lost,” creating a lo-fi landscape one that is simultaneously bleak and full of warmth. At times the songs are reminiscent of early Smog, when Bill Callahan wrote songs like he had a sense of humour and sometimes felt a bit awkward. As well as the recent Tear Jerky EP (available here) he maintains a brilliant cartoon blog at his website.

It’s a busy year for Sparky, off on a European tour as we speak, but I managed to send a few emails back and forth about comic books, rock operas and the Wonder Years.

So, you’re on tour with Los Campesinos! right now, how’s that going?

It has been really fun, it’s an absolute privilege to tour with my friends Los Campesinos! and the supports, Islet and Swanton Bombs, are two outrageously good bands. It was my birthday the other day coinciding with our Aberdeen date and the crowd sang happy birthday to me which was a really touching moment.

Sparky Deathcap presumably isn’t your real name – is it a sort of onstage personal that allows you to unleash your inner diva, like Beyonce Knowles’ Sasha Fierce?

I originally chose it something like 5 years ago when I started doing the one man and a guitar thing live because I felt like it would be easier to play if I could invent a persona. Now, however, there isn’t really a great separation between Sparky Deathcap and me, except for when I remember some of the crap, depressing gigs I used to do and I think about younger Sparky as this sort of beleaguered little brother or something and how excited he’d be by the exciting things I’m getting to do at the moment. Crikey, my mind is like Fellini directing The Wonder Years. Edited by Lassie.

When you play live you have drawings projected behind you, do you think you might ever make a whole comic book, is that something you’d be interested in?

Oh I have grand, grand plans for comic books. I’m working on a little comics booklet for my album and an illustrated valentines rock opera for next year. I’m also trying to resurrect my weekly comic strip for my new blog. The trouble is that comics are incredibly labour intensive. Chris Ware pointed out once that unlike writing a novel, comics don’t allow any sort of natural flow to occur as every page has to be planned out as a whole and so the panels within in it are predestined. I’d love to create a big Clowesian comic book one day, but for now I have to concentrate upon producing small, gimmicky things to “build my profile”… urggggghhhh, the modern world… adulthood…

You mentioned your rock opera there, what does that involve?

That was something I wrote for a ukulele festival in Manchester last year on Valentine’s Day. I was wrongly under the impression that we had to perform the whole thing on ukulele and didn’t really have any ukulele songs so I set about writing a sort of musical/rock opera about an organ transplant van driver finding love whilst snowbound in a rural town. I drew some illustrations for my old overhead projector as well. I hope to turn it into a special edition record and book for next year’s Valentine’s Day.

Musically, who would you call your biggest influences? You get compared to Jeffrey Lewis a lot, right? But that seems like a pretty easy comparison for anyone who sings and draws…

I have an awful lot of respect, naturally, for Jeffrey Lewis, and he has obviously influenced some aspects of my live show, even if it is in trying to steer away from his territory as much as I possibly can. I suppose the bands I have revered the most over the years are The Beach Boys, Pavement, Smog, Silver Jews, Magnetic Fields and Why?, but increasingly I’m becoming very interested in Steve Reich and Bill Evans. In terms of my artwork I’m very heavily influenced by Archer Prewitt, Daniel Clowes, Chris Ware, Adrian Tomine and Marcel Dzama. Archer Prewitt is another artist/musician; he plays in the The Sea And Cake and under his own name whilst also drawing the incomparable Sof’ Boy comics.

So, after this tour, what’s next for Sparky Deathcap?

Next up: more touring with Los Camp. I’m trying to perfect my world-weary, “oh, touring is such a drag,” but in truth it’s the most fun I’ve ever had. We have European and US tours to come which will be really amazing. In between I’m working hard on writing and recording my album, which is really very exciting.

Sparky Deathcap is a twenty-something musician and artist from Cheshire, viagra dosage whose wry tales of love and loss are in turns hilarious and heartwrenching. You may have caught him recently supporting the likes of Los Campesinos! and Hot Club de Paris.

On songs like “Berlin Syndrome”, generic guitars and handclaps loop and whirl around lyrics like, “Since then you just make cameos when I’m asleep/you’re the William Shatner of this elite genre of women that I have loved and lost,” creating a lo-fi landscape one that is simultaneously bleak and full of warmth. At times the songs are reminiscent of early Smog, when Bill Callahan wrote songs like he had a sense of humour and sometimes felt a bit awkward. As well as the recent Tear Jerky EP (available here) he maintains a brilliant cartoon blog at his website.

It’s a busy year for Sparky, off on a European tour as we speak, but I managed to send a few emails back and forth about comic books, rock operas and the Wonder Years.

So, you’re on tour with Los Campesinos! right now, how’s that going?

It has been really fun, it’s an absolute privilege to tour with my friends Los Campesinos! and the supports, Islet and Swanton Bombs, are two outrageously good bands. It was my birthday the other day coinciding with our Aberdeen date and the crowd sang happy birthday to me which was a really touching moment.

Sparky Deathcap presumably isn’t your real name – is it a sort of onstage personal that allows you to unleash your inner diva, like Beyonce Knowles’ Sasha Fierce?

I originally chose it something like 5 years ago when I started doing the one man and a guitar thing live because I felt like it would be easier to play if I could invent a persona. Now, however, there isn’t really a great separation between Sparky Deathcap and me, except for when I remember some of the crap, depressing gigs I used to do and I think about younger Sparky as this sort of beleaguered little brother or something and how excited he’d be by the exciting things I’m getting to do at the moment. Crikey, my mind is like Fellini directing The Wonder Years. Edited by Lassie.

When you play live you have drawings projected behind you, do you think you might ever make a whole comic book, is that something you’d be interested in?

Oh I have grand, grand plans for comic books. I’m working on a little comics booklet for my album and an illustrated valentines rock opera for next year. I’m also trying to resurrect my weekly comic strip for my new blog. The trouble is that comics are incredibly labour intensive. Chris Ware pointed out once that unlike writing a novel, comics don’t allow any sort of natural flow to occur as every page has to be planned out as a whole and so the panels within in it are predestined. I’d love to create a big Clowesian comic book one day, but for now I have to concentrate upon producing small, gimmicky things to “build my profile”… urggggghhhh, the modern world… adulthood…

You mentioned your rock opera there, what does that involve?

That was something I wrote for a ukulele festival in Manchester last year on Valentine’s Day. I was wrongly under the impression that we had to perform the whole thing on ukulele and didn’t really have any ukulele songs so I set about writing a sort of musical/rock opera about an organ transplant van driver finding love whilst snowbound in a rural town. I drew some illustrations for my old overhead projector as well. I hope to turn it into a special edition record and book for next year’s Valentine’s Day.

Musically, who would you call your biggest influences? You get compared to Jeffrey Lewis a lot, right? But that seems like a pretty easy comparison for anyone who sings and draws…

I have an awful lot of respect, naturally, for Jeffrey Lewis, and he has obviously influenced some aspects of my live show, even if it is in trying to steer away from his territory as much as I possibly can. I suppose the bands I have revered the most over the years are The Beach Boys, Pavement, Smog, Silver Jews, Magnetic Fields and Why?, but increasingly I’m becoming very interested in Steve Reich and Bill Evans. In terms of my artwork I’m very heavily influenced by Archer Prewitt, Daniel Clowes, Chris Ware, Adrian Tomine and Marcel Dzama. Archer Prewitt is another artist/musician; he plays in the The Sea And Cake and under his own name whilst also drawing the incomparable Sof’ Boy comics.

So, after this tour, what’s next for Sparky Deathcap?

Next up: more touring with Los Camp. I’m trying to perfect my world-weary, “oh, touring is such a drag,” but in truth it’s the most fun I’ve ever had. We have European and US tours to come which will be really amazing. In between I’m working hard on writing and recording my album, which is really very exciting.

‘The Holy Virgin Mary’ All Images Courtesy Tate Britain, order London © Chris Ofili

1)   Alongside his other works of art, dosage currently being showcased at The Tate Britain, decease one canvas has elicited more controversy than others. The Holy Virgin Mary, portrays an African Virgin Mary surrounded by clippings of genitalia taken from blaxploitation and porn films.

Hang on a minute, could he be making a cultural criticism on the fact that the media has a tendency to deify white idols (Vogue has been in monthly syndication since 1973, to date publishing 446 issues since then, 14 of the covers have featured black women) whereas black women are at best, overlooked and at worst, reduced to faceless sexual objects? Of course he’s not! He’s screwing up America! Bernard Goldman’s right wing book chronicling those who are most to blame for the current predicament of ‘screwed up America’ – the not too creatively titled ‘100 People Who Are Screwing Up America’ listed Ofili at Number 86 for his contributions to the decline of United States. Whether he is directly responsible for environmental decline, the War on Iraq or the 35.9 million citizens living below the poverty line in the US is not made clear. Quite a feat considering he’s actually British. Regardless, Mayor Giuliani was appalled enough by Ofili’s artwork, that in 1999 he threatened to withdraw The Brooklyn Museum of Art’s $7million grant because, as he said “There’s nothing in the First Amendment that supports horrible and disgusting projects!” Well good sir, in which, can we ban Fox News? Or at the very least, Rush Limbaugh. No? Guess the pendulum doesn’t swing both ways. Digressing, I can’t help but wonder whether it’s the depiction of The Holy Virgin Mary as a black woman, the genitalia or the use of elephant dung as an art material that has caused so much outrage?

‘No Woman, No Cry’

2) Continuing from point Number 1; The Holy Virgin Mary had to be placed behind a plexiglass shield when on display in New York. However, crafty little old Christian pensioner, Dennis Heiner, 72, jumped behind the plexiglass shield and smeared white paint over the artwork until the Virgin Mary was obscured from view.  He was charged with second-degree criminal mischief and a $250 fine. That wasn’t a typo. $250. Who wants to place bets on what would happen to me if I threw paint around inside the Vatican?

‘Painting with Shit on it.’

3) Chris Ofili refuses to be molded by his own success. His more recent paintings that are displayed in this exhibition have shrugged off the bright glittery tones of their predecessors. Black on black-blue, the new canvases tell a story, but a story you have to dance around to see. Standing in front of dark canvas, adjusting your eyes to make out the images, like looking for sharks in a dark sea, you can make out a few images; a deer carcass, men making music – but being practically invisible, the mind is forced to project it’s own ideas on what Ofili is both displaying and commenting on.

‘Blue Riders’

4) After winning a scholarship to study in Zimbabwe, Ofili studied African cave paintings, which he has cited as a source of inspiration for much of his work.

5) Chris Ofili is one of the few black artists to be included in the artistically elite group ‘Young British Artists’ which also included Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin.  Any young artists, or anyone young (under 26) can visit Chris Ofili at The Tate Britain for only £5. Pretty good, eh?

Click for our event listing for this exhibtion

Written by Amica Lane on Wednesday March 10th, 2010 9:27 pm

Categories ,africa, ,african art, ,amica lane, ,art vandalism, ,cave paintings, ,Chris Ofili, ,controversy, ,discounts, ,equal rights, ,left wing, ,politics, ,right wing, ,sensations, ,Tate, ,Tate Britain, ,young british artists

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Amelia’s Magazine | Art is Proof Presents: All My Best Friends Are…

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All images courtesy of ‘Art is Proof’

My sense of direction is legendary. Legendary for being almost impressively abysmal. So when I go to Superette’s ‘All my best friend are’ exhibition on Thursday, sildenafil it didn’t take me long to get horribly lost. Despite my well crafted, order yet flawed map, I ended up pacing up and down Brick Lane like a fool before I spotted a gaggle of well dressed art student types strolling down a side street, that had somehow rendered itself invisible a few moments earlier. ‘A ha’ I thought ‘This looks promising.’ In retrospect it was pure luck that upon following them, I ended up at Superette, given that everyone in Brick Lane looks like a well dressed art student. Admittedly, after walking past a large car park, I did doubt as to whether I’d made the right judgement call, but then out the mists of East London, the low rumble of music and lights drew me to my destination, complete with the obligatory large crowd of smokers hovering outside. You come to learn after going to a few opening nights, that anywhere can be found by following the right looking people and looking for the smoking crowd. Tip: the right looking people can often mistake you for a mugger or a sex pest, so pretending to talk on the phone loudly about visiting an exhibition can usually put such doubts at ease. This invaluable advice aside, I happily wondered into the freshly decorated gallery to take in the sights and sounds.

One of my favourite artworks of the evening came courtesy of Francesca Williams, entitled ‘Corpsepaint’. Francesca is the brain behind ‘Wonder League’, which will be opening a pop up shop at Superette on the 28th of March for one day only. I love Corpsepaint because I’m very partial to pen and ink based illustration. That, and I’ve never quite moved beyond my obsession with The Crow, that lead to much of my teenage years being spent kicking around Cranford wearing a trench coat and pretending to be dead. So it’s refreshing to see it referenced in cool art work, as it vindicates said actions. ‘And they used to call me a demented weirdo! Whose laughing now?’

Leah Stewart’s illustrations are magical and stylish. There is something about the above polar bear illustration that reminds me of the atmosphere of ‘His Dark Materials’ before Chris Weitz came along and fucked it all up. Leah Stewart has previously displayed her collection of enchanted forests and owls at Topshop in Oxford Street.

William Exley, above, is another member of the ‘Art is Proof’ collective, displaying a collection of playful illustrations that have almost a graphic novel sentimentality to them.

By Mark Pavey

Transitioning from graphic novel references into Zines, Superette features a whole bunch of cool low-fi Zines from a collection of artists. I love Zine culture, and it’s always exciting to find new ones to add to my collection. Well priced, I’d definitely recommend a shopping spree whilst visiting Superette.

Superette is located at 66a Sclater Street (beyond the car park) just off Brick Lane (the Bethnal Green end) and for your googlemap lovin’, the postcode is E1 6HR.

Written by Amica Lane on Monday March 22nd, 2010 3:51 pm

Categories ,amica lane, ,art is proof, ,francesca williams, ,his dark materials, ,leah stewart, ,mark pavey, ,polar bears, ,superette, ,the crow, ,weirdopower, ,william exley, ,wonder league, ,zines

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