Pompedou Centre, Paris

Just been to Paris and whilst i was there i visited the Pompidou Centre. The Centre was designed by the Italian architect Renzo Piano, the British architect couple Richard Rogers and Sue Rogers, and the British structual engineer Edmund Happold. The project was awarded to this team of relative unknowns in a design competition, whose results were announced in 1971. The Pompidou revolutionized museums and in fact how buildings were created. It turned the rules of architecture on it's head. What is normally hidden within the walls of a building is externally presented in a muddle of pipes and external elevators. The characteristic piping is colour-coded according to the contents: yellow for electricity, red for heating, blue for air, and green for water.
I wouldn't go quite so far as to say the building is aesthetically pleasing but it is a great feat of engineering and certainly eye-catching. It's had people talking since it was built and no-one seems to be able to decide on whether it's good piece of architecture or not.
The way the interior has been laid out means that this is totally different museum experience to any other. The whole building combines fine art, film and design in one and uses huge floeurescent typography to guide you through the different levels. A ride on one of the outside elevators is breathtaking as you see right over the city.
Some say it's ugly but if you're looking at it from a design perspective it's innovative and unique.

Ashkan Sahihi

Ashkan Sahihi is an Iranian photographer known for his unique photographic projects. At first glance at his pictures reveal simple portraiture photography, however it's the story behind the pictures that make them really interesting.
His photography is usually divided into different series. Amongst the series he has created, there is the scream series (volunteers screaming), the hypnotised series, the cum series (hilarious pictures of quite conservative people with semen splashed on their face) and my favourite, the drug series.
Sahihi gave illegal drugs to a number of volunteers who had not used drugs before. They had to sit in his studio until the drugs wore off. The photographs he presents in this series are the pictures he felt best summed up the experience of the volunteer. Apparently the photoshoot, at one point, turned nasty when the female volunteer who was given crack got agitated and almost violent when she was told she could not have any more!
Visit the website www.ashkansahihi.com to see his full portfolio of work.
(the woman in the picture above is on ecstasy)

Album artwork by Love Police.

I've had the album above for quite some time and if i remember correctly the reason i bought wasn't for the music but because i fell in love with the artwork on it's cover. The bright colours and psychedelic patterns are delicious! This band obviously wanted to present and package their music in a visually stimulating way. The artwork is by a design group called Love Police. They are also major band and event merchandisers and tour promoters. Formed in 1996 by a designer, a music industry worker and a psychic dog handler(?!) they wanted to bring colour and vibrancy back to the music industry in the post grunge era. Their website is pretty impressive, good use of animation and navigation through visual props makes a really fun website to look through.
www.lovepolice.com.au/

Sam Scorer

This building is near Newark, about 10 miles from where my parents live, and it has caught the attention of many drivers on the A1 i'm sure! It was built in the 1950's by the architect Sam Scorer who incidentally was one of my parents neighbours until he died a few years ago. It was originally a petrol station, but is now, horror of all horrors a Little Chef! A innovative, remarkable piece of architecture that is being wasted somewhat!

JR - Taking art to the street

As an undercover photographer, JR transforms his pictures into posters and makes open space photo galleries out of our streets. An acute observer of our time, as comfortable in cozy neighborhoods as in urban ghettos, he questions pedestrians with the exhibitions he mounts on their everyday commutes.

He has exhbited artwork on the walls of the European Center for Photography and the square of the Hotel de Ville in Paris. He is always thinking of new ways of exhibiting his work, keeping in urban areas where the streets help reveal the meaning of the pictures themselves.

Where art is exhibited is hugely important in terms of how it is viewed and understood. JR is still creating after he has produced the artwork by cleverly placing his work in an outside environment. It's what stands him apart from other artists. He is questioning the boundaries of the public and private realms and changing how we perceive art. It also means people that would otherwise not visit a gallery get to view his art.

Maybe we should look at different ways of displaying our work this coming year giving more people the chance to view it. It would be break from the norm if our final year show was placed outside around the uni campus rather than in the school of design.

Bodysong - Jonny Greenwood (Radiohead)

The trailer for 'Bodysong' - Director-Simon Pumnel, Music-Jonny Greenwood
Year- 2002
Length- 83 mins


This movie tells the story of the archetypal human life using images taken from the last 100 years of cinema and from all around the world. Images span from those inside the body - moment of conception - charting the beginnings of the individual - the first cry of the newborn baby - then starts to capture humanity as a collective and certain aspects it, shown through acculumated footage of ritual celebration and the carnage of war.
The editing, music, and the narrative arc of the material is designed to take the viewer on a roller coaster tour of the human body and life cycle. Every possible depiction of the human life from microscopic medical to portraits and newsreels, from births to deaths, are cut to a powerful music track by Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead to create a powerful and highly emotional film, with peaks of ecstasy and troughs of despair.
The power of this film comes from the huge number of different faces, people, each body and each glimpse at anatomy. All are dignified and placed together in such a way that they are part of a flowing motion - a wave of humanity that makes us realise how big and important it really is.

The film is supported by a highly innovative website www.bodysong.com (click on the bodysong link on the c4 page). It uses a 3D interface to create an interactive website that allows users to truely engage with it and in turn the film. It allows the user to explore each and evry one of the images used in the film and discover the story behind. It's actually a clever piece of marketing for the film as it would generate much interest.

Banksy at Glastonbury

Once again Banksy's presence was felt at the Glastonbury Festival. The guerrilla artist has become a regular fixture at the festival leaving his mark through amusing little tags. However this year he really made a splash by erecting a replica of stone henge using portaloo's. The structure was placed right next glastonburys own stone circle and within the sacred space. It was a humourous take on these mysterious ancient structures using something that's synonymous with the festival, plastic portaloos. The 'stone henge', as the festival progressed was 'decorated' by festival-goers and certainly lost some of it's appeal. Nevertheless Banksy successfully managed to get into the public eye once again with this quirky piece. Whether you could call it art though is another matter. Banksy's 'Stone Henge'.... art or just a pile of s**t?