Amelia’s Magazine | In Conversation at the V&A: Peter Blake

http://qik.com/video/9048914

A while back I happened to catch a performance by Lissie at the Old Queens Head in Angel. I hadn’t planned on watching her – truth be told, dosage I was there to check out the band before her; but my curiosity was piqued as I watched the room fill up with an expectant and excited audience, cialis 40mg all craning their necks and standing on their tippy toes to get a better view of the girl serenading us. It’s been a while since I saw someone so captivating. Golden haired, freckled and just a slip of a thing, Lissie entranced the room who in turn treated her to a hushed and reverential silence, punctuated only by bursts of spirited applause and cheers. I watched the audience watching her. Everyone seemed transported out of their location; away from the top room of a pub on grimy old Essex Road and into the world that Mid-Western native come Californian girl Lissie inhabits, laced with the scent of orange blossom, filled with wide open skies, winding rivers and smokey mountains, and night-times spent on porches with nothing but a guitar, a couple of beers and a pack of Marlboro Reds . No wonder we were all enchanted.

A couple of weeks later, I got to meet the busy Lissie. In the time between, Lissie had appeared on Jools Holland, toured around Europe, duetted with Ellie Goulding at The Great Escape, and graced the airwaves, all in the name of the hectic promotion of her debut album, Catching a Tiger (hot on the heels of the release of last years Why You Runnin’ EP). The phrase ‘riding a juggernaut’ comes to mind with Lissie; bursting into our consciousness with the brightest of starts. The day we met was a rare moment of down time; her touring schedule is in a constant state of flux – stretching to accommodate gigs that are being added on a daily basis, and Lissie had only just made it back from the previous nights gigs in Manchester and Newcastle. Curled up wearing her newest ac
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Peter Blake, remedy illustrated by Gareth A Hopkins

Peter Blake is, sickness for the majority, most famous for THAT cover. The one still spawning imitators – frequently seen walking the streets, they can be identified through the wearing of what is now the eponymous band jacket. Blake groaned every time the cover was mentioned. For those, like me familiar with Blake’s influence in graphic design, the talk at the V&A was an eye opener. For all the famous album covers (if you would like the aforementioned album signed, Blake charges a tenner and the proceeds are donated to charity) there were numerous drawing projects showcasing the depth of Blake’s talent that is all to often associated solely with an idea of Pop Art.


Illustration by Gareth A Hopkins

Blake received an incredible introduction to a range of technical skills whilst studying at college prior to the Royal College of Art. Fairly recently Blake reintroduced himself to wood engraving, producing prints based on old carnival illustrations. The outcome was a series titled “Side Show,” which with their dark humour and sense of craft could easily have been made in the 19th century.

The series Under Milk Wood appears to be a labour of love. Blake has produced a watercolour for every character, collages of the 28 different dreams experienced by the characters alongside 60 anecdotes. The words of Dylan Thomas appear within the work.

Whilst the talk was organised to champion the release of Blake’s new book: Design, it was full of fascinating anecdotes and tangents as Blake explained the minute reasoning for the appearance of this figure here or that figure there (specifically in relation to the album covers). What came across was the importance of the ability to collect to his work, the treasure trove of his studio and Blake’s ability to embrace the new, demonstrated through his clear admiration for the powers of the computer.

This was a fascinating insight into a polymath of an artist.

Categories ,Album Covers, ,art, ,Dark Humour, ,Dylan Thomas, ,Gareth A Hopkins, ,Graphic Design, ,In Conversation, ,Peter Blake, ,Peter Blake Design, ,Pop Art, ,Royal College of Art, ,Sally Mumby-Croft, ,Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, ,Side Show, ,the beatles, ,Under Milk Wood, ,va

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Amelia’s Magazine | Museum of Everything: A Review of Exhibition #3

Design Museum fashion talk by Leeay
Design Museum fashion talks Marc Jacobs A/W 2010, approved illustration by Leeay
Abi Daker The Museum of Everything
The Museum of Everything by Abigail Daker

Returning for the third time the Museum of Everything’s simply named Exhibition #3 has been put together with the help of British pop artist Sir Peter Blake. It only opened on the 13th October to coincide with the Frieze art fair and is due to close again at Christmas so get down there quick before it’s gone, page I promise you’d be sorry to miss it. A strange little place, the Museum of Everything can be found tucked away down a back street in Primose Hill next to the local library. However, although small in stature this curious museum will still require a good portion of your morning or afternoon to get round because every little space, spot, and shelf is covered with intriguing things to peer at.

themuseumofeverything by Emmeline Pidgen
Illustration by Emmeline Pidgen

Entering through the colourful striped doorway and paying a voluntary donation to a lady in a small kitsch ticket booth and you may be well on your way to guessing that the circus is the theme this time round. Indeed circus mirrors greet you, transforming you into a giant, a dwarf and…God forbid! Someone wider than they are tall! Apt then that round the corner is the ‘gallery of unusual people’ and the beginning of an interesting peek into the world of the carnival and the freak show. The gallery is a selection of historic sideshow memorabilia depicting everyone from bearded ladies and dwarves to a man with the completely smooth appearance (yes! including ‘downstairs’) and webbed feet of a frog. This vast collection of posters and postcards are a “celebration of difference” because “nobody’s perfect”, or at least that’s the idea as Sir Peter Blake himself explains in a video later on.

museumofeverything by emmeline pidgen
Snake Charmer by Emmeline Pidgen

Giant banners advertising, among other things, “strange little people”, and “the world’s most grotesque creature” are strewn all over the walls in the main hall. Painted by the so-called ‘king of the sideshow banner’, Fred Johnson, his is just one among the many all but defunct crafts that are revered at the Museum of Everything. There’s even a wardrobe door emblazoned with a leopard painted by sign painter Joe Ephgrave, who also painted the iconic drum skin on the award-winning cover of the Beatles’ Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album that Sir Peter Blake designed.

museum of everything
Girl by Ted Willcox

In fact that’s the really lovely thing about the Museum of Everything, iconic artworks are mixed in without fanfare among work from less known, brilliant, and usually eccentric artists’ – like the embroidery of Ted Willcox. Ted was taught to sew in hospital while recovering from injuries incurred in WW2. He then went on to spend the rest of his life indoors finding inspiration in everything from Alice in Wonderland to pictures of reclining bare-chested beauties, recreating them all in needle and thread.

Natasha-Thompson-Museum-of-Everything-Boxing-Squirrels
Squirrels Boxing by Natasha Thompson

In many ways the Museum can be viewed as a potted history of Great Britain, though told from a thoroughly left field point of view. Nothing sums this up better than the Walter Potter section, an example of Victoriana at its most bizarre if ever there was one. Cleary no relation to animal lover Beatrix, Walter Potter’s tableaux are made up of stuffed rabbits, a variety of birds, squirrels, rats, frogs, puppies and kittens – all in a surprising range of poses. They are completely grotesque but also fascinating, and of course, today taxidermy is very much back in vogue with artists like Polly Morgan picking up and popularising the ancient craft once again.

Walter Potter Rabbit School by Holly Trill
Walter Potter Rabbit School by Holly Trill

The Museum of Everything managed to impart on me the same kinds of feelings that I imagine may have flashed through the minds of the archaic freak show audience. A mix of morbid curiosity, delight in viewing the strange, and a childish excitement over being reminded what a beautiful and odd world we live in. Catch it while the circus is still in town!

Open Wednesday – Sunday, 10.30 am – 6.30 pm until Christmas. More information on the Museum of Everything website here, and don’t forget to check in with our review from their last show in 2009, which was just as wonderful.

Categories ,Abigail Daker, ,art, ,Banners, ,Carnival, ,Circus, ,Collections, ,embroidery, ,Emmeline Pidgen, ,Freak show, ,Fred Johnson, ,frieze, ,Holly Trill, ,Icon, ,Joe Ephgrave, ,Memorabilia, ,Museum of Everything, ,Natasha Thompson, ,Polly Morgan, ,Primrose Hill, ,Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, ,Side Show, ,Sign painting, ,Sir Peter Blake, ,Taxidermy, ,Ted Willcox, ,the beatles, ,Walter Potter

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