Let’s make something inspiring…

I have just been sent this lovely video by a collegue at work. Really want to get on with ‘Ladytrouble’ now.

What was your secret?

Shooting pictures – material cultures in a material existence

This week has been a strange week. Work wise, I have accomplished so much and am enjoying my placement immensely – I went on location for a film shoot for the first time which was pretty exciting!

Emotionally though, I think London is getting me down. I’m finding the people here hard work, particularly when I feel like the only one smiling. Everyone is one mission to get to where they want to be, either on the tube or on the career ladder. I miss the sense of community and randomness that Brighton had. Upon reflection I realise my squirmy London emotions stem from the combination of working/trying to get into the cut-throat media industry, impending graduation and a full moon.

While I’m convinced my outlook will change next week, I wanted to write a post that hinted at the complexities that I am currently facing. On a magazine hunt this afternoon I wandered over to the Tate Modern, where I decided that for once, I wasn’t going to rant like a pubescent panda-eyed girl struck down with ladytrouble. Instead, I was going to wander around the gallery and pick a work that summed up this week’s feelings, without pretentiously ranting about myself.

The work I chose was ‘Shooting picture’ by Niki de Saint Phalle.

At the first glance it looks like paint thrown at papier mache – a predictable and uninspiring combiation. But on a closer inspection of the gritty yet pourus bedrock, you realise that the paint is dribbling from the crevices from within the frame, like multicoloured blood dribbling out of an open wound.

The artist’s technique? She enclosed paint parcels inside these papier-mache domes – but the paintings soul could only be released when someone shot at it – hence the title Shooting picture. Shooting something – be it a photograph, a film, or with a gun – is seen as a masculine job. It is aggressive and violent, but immensely satisfying when executed correctly. This particular work was shot by artists Robert Raushenberg and Jasper Johns, so the added element of the celebrity that gracing it’s presence will undoubtedly make the work more popular. Saint Phalle made many of these pictures but stopped making them after a few years, saying: “I had become addicted to shooting, like one becomes addicted to a drug.”

The more I think about this painting the more I find it as a resolution to the comatose state I’m trying to resist. It’s playful, methodical in is construction and harmless at first, yet the deeper you delve into it the more you realise the horror and brutality behind it’s beauty. Yet once you look at it, you will find yourself impossible to turn away.

The Creators project – London

On paper, it sounds like a cultural commercial dream. Vice, one of the hippest free magazines on the planet, partnered with a with the forward thinking computer chip giant, Intel, for a creative fiesta and one hell of a free piss-up. Comparing itself to 1920’s Paris, when modernism was in full flow from a fascination with the futurist machine, The Creators Project is collaboration between artists, musicians, programmers, thinkers; anyone fascinated and empowered by all that is electric. The event should have been an extravaganza of entertainment and enlightenment and by day the artistic merits of the show succeeded this promise. But by night, when an array of over-blogged bands and DJ’s descended onto Victoria house, the event turned into a nightmarish episode of Nathan Barley.

The Creators Project was born as an online community in 2008, conceived around the idea that the advancement of technology in the 21^st century has allowed anyone to log in and upload their content to share with the world, anywhere in the world. Enter Vice and Intel, looking to snag fasionistas craving apples like Eve. A year later and the group celebrated their efforts with two parties in Leon and Paris. Today, the project has grown to five parties with the first in New York last month, last weekend’s event in London, before descending on Seoul, Sau Paulo and Beijing.

Visually the show confirmed that we are still living nostalgically in the 80’s, as the re-programmed NES games were nostalgically 8-bit, the VJ loops loud and garish, with the boys rocking quiffs like extras from the Lost Boys and the girls looking more crack whore than Madonna post sex. Musically London got the bum deal, New York got MIA and we got Tinchy Stryder. Yuck were good but unappreciated by the too-savvy-to-smile audience, yet went ecstatic when Mark Ronson arselickingly exclaimed for the millionth time that they were the ‘best audience ever’. Either the free bar had hit them, or I really don’t understand the formula of cool.

The main issue with the event was the misleading nature of the line-up. The website boasted everyone involved with the whole project including musical museos like Diplo, James Lavelle, Matthew Herbert, CSS, Animal Collective and many more, but it wasn’t clear only certain artists would be featured in each individual city, or which ones. Similarly the magazine available at the featured interviews artists and musicians that didn’t appear at the show. The event was proportionally smaller and shitter than I had previously imagined.

However, the highlight of the London show was the art, particularly during the day when the viewers had more room to breathe. Much of the hipstamatic amazement came from the interchanging light installations, which you should expect to soon see appropriated in a nightclub near you. Many loved the triptych by United Visual Artists, three motion sensitive panels of hypnotic light that turned the most diplomatic individuals into fireflies. Similarly the Royal Appointment by Moritz Waldemeyer allowed participants to sit on the chair and change its glowing colour like a mood ring. On a personal note, it was a delight to see again one of Brighton based Felix Thorn’s beautiful machines. On the hour this kinetic sculpture strikes and plays an automated piece of ambient experimental music like a grandfather clock on acid, complete with a flashing LED display. Such a shame this beautiful work was placed in the noisy and well lit reception, rather than a dark and unsuspecting corner where it would have been appreciated for the beauty that it is. The real crowd puller was the triple screening of Spike Jonze’s short film I’m here. Featuring his magical yet bizarre imagination seen in previous filmsBeing John Malcovich and Where The Wild Things Are, this ½ hour film showcased the tender and moving love story of two androids leading an fragile existence.

On reflection it was a bittersweet evening, but it wasn’t until I walked away from the crime scene that I felt the punch of the lack of women featuring the line-up; namely Peaches, a special secret guest complete with broken leg; Rose Dougall, formally of the Pippettes performing with Mark Ronson and Business Intl, and Mira Calix, a visual artist whose work was relegated to smaller screens opposite Karl Sadler’s pining Corridor. But now I am just being picky. Because girls don’t get technology or use it creatively, right girls?

The life and times of a BBC creative trainee…

I have put off writing this post for a while so I can double-check with the powers that be exactly what I can and can’t say on this blog about my internship. I have a round-about idea, I just can’t go into too much detail about the content I am producing until it is out into the public sphere… if that makes sense.

So it makes sense for you to start with the blog post on the BBC Blast message boards introducing myself and briefly explaining my first week, which you can read here.

Read it? Right. Now I shall continue in more detail.

I am living in a sick location in central London. Shoreditch reminds me so much of the best bits of Brighton. I feel so at home here, but the 100’s of curry houses at the bottom of Brick Lane are going to do my lactose intolerant stomach no favours. Ironically I am living in student halls, which considering I never got in them in my first year, are practically empty, and that I’m being put up by the beeb is all a blessing.

The icing on the cake is that I am also living with two other lovely creative trainees; Louise, who is a petite diamond from the emerald isle working for Blast TV, and Anna, who is jammily working on Nick Grimshaw’s mid-week late night show. I seriously recommend her blog for entertaining stories of her traineeship, she a vivacious girl with a fantastic taste in music, she is going to have the best placement ever. Other blogging trainees include Richard who is also interning at Radio 1. I arranged a little night out with some of the trainees that have already started last weekend and as you can imagine… its was a blast (ahem).

What about me at Blast Online? Well, my first week was a little crazy. Monday morning the news hit the press the BBC trust review. While some were extactic that 6Music would be staying open for the foreseeable future, the department that I had just started working for would be closing by early 2011. Just the kind of things you would want to hear on your first day!

Regardless of the news, the team have done everything to help me to settle in, including being especially lovely. Anthony, another creative trainee, and Dolly have shown me the ropes webwise, while my mentor Hannah is letting me get very involved in a Dr Who/Sarah Jane Adventures competition. I have researched and written my first film script and will even be going on location for the first time next week. It’s very exciting stuff; when I got the placement I didn’t dream I would be doing such a diverse array of practical things that are helpful to the production of a content reliant website – it’s all fantastic experience. And I have been too busy to get my grubby mits on the social media yet… 😛

I am also going to be documenting my experience and work to complete the Silver Arts Award, which will hopefully add another dimension to my CV. Part of it will mean I will also be attending a Blast tour date and (hopefully) taking part in some of the fantastic workshops that Blast offer and seeing the confidence boosting for creative 13-19 year olds first hand.

The whole thing is cementing my thoughts on working in online media – this is defiantly a career I want to pursue and would really enjoy.  If I want to stay in the BBC or not I have yet to decide, but I am going to enjoy every minute of it while I am here. 2 weeks down, 6 to go…

Living the London life – The Royal Academy summer show and the Serpentine Pavilion

I have lived in London nearly a week now – and I am loving it. Life is fast paced and always on the go. One has to keep their wits about them, so it’s a good thing that I have been sharpening mine for some time now.

One of things I am most excited about is being able to visit all the museums and galleries that I have told myself to go to over the years. Today I finally succumbed to the charms of the Royal Academy near Piccadilly Circus and the Serpentine Gallery in Hyde Park.

David Mach - Silver Streak

As expected, the Royal Academy’s summer show is a Pandora’s box of visual spectacles. Some you will love, some you will hate, but there is always something for everyone. What I really like about the show is that there are no name tags next to the works, so while there works that you instantly recognise by style, the anonymous others force you to judge the work on its aesthetic merits before you the celebrity status of the artist clouds your view. The fantastic David Mach (pictured) has got a lot of coverage this year, his works are always as big as his personality, using unusual mass-produced materials to show familiar ideas and emblems from popular culture. This 2 metre high CG-esque gorilla was created with coat-hangers and was by far the best work in the show, which runs until 22nd August.

Then we took a little detour over to the Serpentine Gallery showcasing the recent work of Wolfgang Tilmans and the newly opened pavilion designed by Jean Nouvel. Admittedly the blood-red is a harsh contrast against the green (read yellow) grounds of the park, but inside the space was playful and welcoming. Visitors can play ping-pong and chess or simply take confines in the shade. It was a popular destination this weekend with the fabulous weather, the poor cafe staff were run off their feet but still smiling.

P.S:I’ m holding off talk about my BBC traineeship for a little while as I want to find out exactly what I can and can’t say about my work. Wouldn’t want to get in trouble now would I? A post about it will be up soon 🙂