17.3.12

WANT SO BAD



Alpine Northwest by Charley Harper

OMG! Look what I found this morning while skipping around the web. These amazingly beautiful posters from Charley Harper were commissioned by the U.S Department of the Interior, each showcasing one national park, from Glacier Bay, Alaska to the Atlantic Barrier Islands. And now the U.S Government bookstore is selling off it's stockpile. Obviously then stock is limited but for $20 (and free shipping!!) you'd be a loon not snap one up. Now just to decide which one...... click HERE for the links.

15.3.12

keepin calm



Here is a sweet little video from Barter Books.

It turns out the Keep Calm and Carry On posters have a more interesting story than I thought and that Barter Books is the bookstore of our dreams.

7.2.12

Dalmation Bitch

Laurie's Copenhagen Romp



30.1.12

Die Vögel - Fratzengulasch


Joachim found this video by Katharina Duve & Timo Schierhorn
to a track by Die Vögel (The Birds).
I think it's great, have a look!

29.1.12

A is for Autism and Ace Animations



Just rewatched this gem of a video. The train animation at the end is still completely staggering. Such a sensitive and beautiful way to explain what it can be like having autism.

19.1.12

Bye Bye Kodak?

Today is a sad day. I woke up and turned on the radio and the first thing I hear is that Kodak
is now (finally) bankrupt. I have been working with Kodak film and paper since I started making photographs so this feel very sad..very sad indeed. Strange to realize that the project Im working on now might be the last one where Im using Kodak film and paper. I suppose I should not be surprised, but for example emily and sophia, say just imagine you have been drawing with ink all your life and now you only get to use pencils, boring or? Bloody devastating I think.
I suppose I have to try and feel some kind of love for digital photography, but it is hard to fall
in love with, somehow the smell of the darkroom and the film and the waiting is very essential to me. As long as Fuji doesn't crash down too I suppose I might be fine.
well. time to wake up from the analog sleep, but it has been a really great dream for me so lovely to work with Kodak materials. Anyhow, now I have to finish this project while I can. But maybe it is too early to say bye bye and maybe some pretty big miracle will happen!

4.1.12

christmas and new year



After celebrating a lovely christmas and a dancing new years party with a pheasant, a pig and some other friends I now feel very ready for 2012. Wish you all a good start!

30.12.11

14 parakeets



There were about 14 parakeets flitting around this tree today. It blew my mind.

Tiny Council







These aren't the best pictures, but I love Evol's stenciled estates by Farringdon. Right down to the tiny graffiti and the fact that people have started to use the space between them as a bin.

24.11.11

Read a Poem

Read a poem advising me to practice losing things.


I started with my watch (shoved it good and proper down the back of my bed), moved onto the lighter for the cooker (put that sucker somewhere safe), my black and white scarf (I left in a pub), an umberella (in a shop), a telephone number (was kept in my lost phone left on a bus on the way to a meeting held at the 'Seven Wounds of Jesus') and finally I let some friends drift away.

Now I must go, and this blog will lose me in its own efficient way. I will be superseded by a new thought, a picture, a creative work. My writings will shift down and off the page in a day and into the archive where they will remain buried, everything must change.

22.11.11

Welcome guest blogger Luke Warren



Welcome guest blogger Luke Warren. A few days after he's started... A writer and animator you can see more of his work here and read more here.

20.11.11

ARC and a hippo















To entertain myself in the grey days in Berlin I went to the zoo with Dorothee last weekend, the hippo was not so amuzed, and therefore we got to see his giant teeth! massive. So that was a good day. Apart from that I have been meaning to tell you about the journey I made to Paris two weeks ago, but that has to wait a little bit as I am too tired tonight. But! what I really wanted to share is that Joachim, Timo and Toni finally have their webpage together, hurray, so for a trio of fine Leipzig/Berlin based graphic designers have a look here.
And hello Luke!

Under-the-ground commuter

I'm a commuter.

I move in step with the person in front of me.

I walk up the stairs bending my leg when I see the person in front of me bend theirs. I take their cue to lift my trousered leg up. I am a commuter. The people I touch I will never see again, women in all their beauty stand within a hair's breadth and I look through them, they are ghosts like me. We are not here but stowed away somewhere in our thoughts.

Reality does not help here under the ground.

I have a mask that fits the bill and does the job of covering my scream. It is flat and its polythene expression has a flat seam that rubs on the inside of my emotions like a badly made shoe.

I am searching for distraction, filled with the need to consume, like a gumball machine I have been twisted and I spit out treats to those who love me and I love.

I have a soul but it is within four walls in croydon kept there by crayfish guards that will not let you pass unless you have my permission or they are bribed by gold fish food. Can muslims eat crayfish? the chat rooms are full of rumor and I cant find a definitive answer. Well these crayfish are ten foot tall and have golden claws. They are a national treasure and eating them would be a crime because they are a national treasure and will not let me down.

So why do I hide my soul? Because of the danger of exposure to the world of course, because of the last time.

She didn't doubt I loved her it was not about love it was about compatibility it was about: cornish pasties and corned beef, salad cream and tomato sauce, socks and iceburg lettuces, fantasy novels and TV; verses: skin, smell, looks, sweat, the way I gripped the sheets, the hand, the hair, the eyes, the eye, the humor, the warmth the company the laughter and the forgetting.

Pulled in different directions at equal force and in the end … well I am a commuter now parting ways with everyone at every stop.

I like this world it is close but has no meaning the contact with others is unmeant and unmet. A biological father gets on with his biological son, going to private school, his back is straight and his son is to young to realize but he mimics his dad, long live the sharp elbowed middle class. Slowly moving towards their death in an orderly fashion, moving in step with the person in front.

19.11.11

What would happen if saving the planet from environmental disaster replaced football?

All those crowds cheering for solutions, the airplay and debates about strategies and mistakes.

The Wags all being papped as their men build self sustaining environments, get drunk, have tattoos and sleep with other women.

The difficult conversations in pubs about; penalties and fouls, sending offs, the type of shoes their team should have used to create an ergonomic cityscape which would decrease traffic congestion.

And on the national stage who would the manager choose to be worthy to play against the greats like brazil with their strong reforestation play, or china with its notoriously weak defense when it comes to coal emissions.

18.11.11

misunderstood physiotherapist


Proselytizing, she was proselytizing about my knees.

She stood there her hair athunder, her glasses crooked with passion.

I was taken aback to hear such words spoken about my knees. The disciple bent and admitted her mistakes begging for forgiveness.

I rose in fear and obeyed her instructions. Answered questions honestly. Gave secret information freely.

She stripped my knees down to their bone, muscle and sinew, reaching their very soul, their very being.

Then she asked me to stand with my heel on the edge of a tiny piece of paper and the pain vanished.

I left with just one question. Could Jesus, Moses and all the Hindu gods have been misunderstood physiotherapists?

13.11.11

The Giving Tree



Just rediscovered this story and the original animation. here.

11.11.11

Echolalia



I saw this series and was really awestruck. I had to share. Timothy Archibald collaborated on these photos with his son who has autism spectrum disorder.

They are so ethereal and quiet... they seem to prick the surface of the feel of autism and childhood. Have a look at the rest of the series.

9.11.11

Guerilla Gardening





















Check out Becca's lovely mural for the gardeners that are taking over the Heygate Estate gardens and using them in a brilliant DIY community project. This week a full feature of the project and the future of the estate can be seen in London's TimeOut. When something so positive can be born out of a near derelict estate, it is a wonder that Southwark council is trying to ban the 'illegal gardening' and claims that the site is too dangerous for the public to be in ( - and they did not mean the safety of buildings structure). I once met two councillors from Southwark and their views on how they see the Elephant and Castle development going were frighteningly sterile, with Starbucks and high end flats, turning the Elephant into just another boring, homogenous part of the city. Jeez. So it is great to see creativity and common sense giving the council two (green) fingers. Visit the Elephant and Castle Urban Forest website to see how you can get involved.