Lost in Glimmering Shadows

It's been a while since I posted an update so here's one now.

I went along to see the Faile exhibition in Lambeth a couple of weeks ago and it didn't disappoint. The exhibition itself was set in Lilian Bayliss Old School, which took me ages to find as it's in the middle of a bunch of local authority buildings, but when I (eventually) got there it was worth the trek.

I was greeted by an eastern european security guard who was much more friendly than he appeared at first look and as the exhibit was nearly over I had the whole building to myself. The room downstairs was dominated by amarble Bunny Boy sculpture which I think was the same one that sat outside the Tate Modern earlier this summer and was surrounded by a series of painted palettes. In the corner by the stairs was a mountain of wooden boxes, each one individually painted with various Faile designs.

I then ventured upstairs where the sounds of A Tribe Called Quest and Jurassic 5 made the large open area of the dark auditorium seem smaller and less lonely. The centre of the room hosted a series of carved Prayer Wheels and the walls were covered with Faile's trademark large canvases. Below are some of the pictures I took while I was there.

In other news, the vinyl collection is coming along nicely. I'm working on one or two Mini Munny's at the moment and a small Teddy Trooper DIY. I'll get some pics of these up soon, once I'm happy with the way they look!

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Vinyl

I've recently decided that I'm going to try and get more hands on with my work again. I used to love stencilling before I went to uni, until everytime I did one someone would say “have you heard of Banksy?” or “is that based on Banksy?” or (...the killer...) “do you base your work on Banksy?”. I didn't even know if that guy existed when I did my first stencil! So I started trying new things and have recently become more and more dependent on my trusty Mac.

I've come to the conclusion that this needs to change again, so it's time to go back to the drawing board. I stopped following Graffiti a couple of years ago, when I decided it would be more worthwhile to find my inspiration from Designers, Typographers and Photographers. However, I did come across a couple of Graffiti artists I liked while researching more established and credit worthy (in the educational sense) practitioners.

One of my favourite photographers is Ricky Powell, and in his book 'Public Access' he has a collection of his photos doctored and manipulated by some impressive illustrators. One of these was KAWS, who now has his own label (original fake) in Japan. I love his simple and brightly coloured illustrations and he has an impressive range of Vinyl figures to his name now too (and an issue of iD based around his world)!

I recently bought some blank vinyl figures. They won't turn out anything like the ones above but it'll be a good way to get back into doing some hands on stuff.

Nam-June Paik

On Sunday I eventually got myself out of bed and headed into Central London. I thought it was about time for another culture injection from one of the many museums and galleries on offer. A quick search online told me it was the last day of The American Scene: Prints from Hopper to Pollock at the British Museum.

The stuff on show was "awesome kit" (the phrase of the day), but I was expecting more large scale efforts. If you missed it, or didn't know about it, the exhibit is touring the country from the beginning of next year. For more info click here.

After finishing the tour around the American prints we had a bit of time before the Museum closed so decided to have a look around some more areas. Which is when I stumbled across Nam-June Paik's work. Paik was a South-Korean video artist based in the States, but there wasn't an installation there (I was in a museum, not a gallery), but there was some great screen-prints that he had done on show.

As I'm a huge fan of robots and screen-printed posters, this image is right up my alley! The next time you find yourself at the British Museum go to the South-Korea room just to see these images in all their glory (along with all the other great stuff on show there too).