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Every street has that crazy old hippy artist guy that’s so far ahead of his time, no-one really understands him. Maybe he collects junk in his front yard to make wacky Rauschenberg-esque sculptures, maybe he carves totem poles out of railway sleepers or weaves beaded necklaces… whatever their medium, they ALWAYS have some cosmically original yet totally convoluted way of looking at the world, and their art is the only non-pharmaceutical way of understanding it. Len Lye was DEFINITELY that guy on his street. Except Lye actually WAS a total visionary. In 1935, he was the first guy to make a film without a camera. Why would he bother trying? Because he couldn’t afford the camera! Amazing! He painted directly on the film, in full colour, treating it like a moving painting.
This was in the 30s, remember, when films were black and white… shit would’ve blown MINDS!!! He scored the films with his own jazz compositions, improvising both elements as he worked. Eventually he got down with Hans Richter, Georgia O’Keefe and Le Corbusier, who supported his experimentation in virtually every art discipline that occurred to him, as long as it furthered his obsession with ‘pure figures in motion.’ He made some of the earliest and significant kinetic sculptures in the early 60s. He wrote poetry and philosophy throughout his entire life. Later on he managed to push the boundaries of film again, with his ‘scratch’ films, such as the incredible Free Radicals from 1958. This is one crazy old art hippy who’s definitely worth figuring out. Pretty much everything is on exhibition at the moment in Melbourne, at ACMI. See more Len Lye videos…
This weekend we suggest going to the beach if you are in Sydney and if you are in Melbourne check the Len Lye An Artist In Perpetual Motion at ACMI Federation Square, open 10am-6pm daily until Sunday October 11.
‘Everyone saw the beauty, no one saw the pain.’ This is the tag-line for 1998 HBO film GIA, based on the life of America’s first Supermodel, Gia Marie Carangi, starring Angelina Jolie.
One you get past some of the cringe-worthy moments that a tele movie does provide, and however you may feel about Angelina, this movie tells an incredibly tragic story of a beautiful woman whose life was sadly cut short at 26 years old. A box of tissues is quite necessary. Here too is a great blog dedicated to the work of Gia Marie Carangi.
Also, if you are around Sydney, Big Fashion Sale at BJB Studios starts tomorrow and features up to 80% of Australian labels including Arnsdorf, Marnie Skillings, Michelle Robinson, Dress Up, Rittenhouse, Toby Jones, Elke Kramer and more!
Friday September 11 – Sunday September 13, 10am-6pm
BJB Studios, 259 Riley St, Surry Hills, (Cnr Reservoir St)
This week Adriana is stepping in for BB. Check back each Thursday for more on the fashion world from Billy Bride
This weekend in Melbourne Late Arvo Sons will be releasing their debut album Letters From Another Alphabet at the Birmingham Hotel in Fitzroy. With an edgy punk, hardcore, garage rock, bluesy sound it’s hard to put these guys into a basket, one thing for sure though is that they bring an electric energy to the stage that has heads nodding and feet tapping. I met with lead singer Mark Lording to share a few words on how they got together, the creative process behind their music and the actualisation of their album.
We are all mutual friends of the Eddy Current boys, I met Stuart and Kent through Brendan ’cause Stuart is a high school mate of his, and I met Frosty ’cause he was Mikey’s best mate and that’s all pretty much how we met each other. Mikey suggested “Oh, hey Frosty, Stu plays drums and Kent plays guitar why don’t you have a jam together?” So they jammed together for a couple of months before I came along when we were all out one night and Stu was drunk and asked “Do you wanna come and have a sing with our band? We’ve got a few songs you know, come along and have a jam.” That was in March of 2007. I had only ever attempted to sing a couple of times when I mucked around in this high school band, but pretty much had never sung. Within four or five jam sessions we had like six songs. Our first ever show was in late November of 2007 at the Cobra Bar in the Tote.
Normally Kent and Frosty will come up with a track, and then we all come into a rehearsal and jam it out. Sometimes I will already have pre-written lyrics written on scraps of paper that I fit over the tracks when we jam, but we always record our rehearsal on a four-track, so from there I can take a CD home and write lyrics to it that way. It’s a joy to go to rehearsal, its something we’re pumped about and we’re always in a rush to get there you know, its where we definitely want to be.
We recorded the album in December 2008 over two days at Revolver in Prahran with Mikey Young. Mikey is the guy that could capture a sound that we wanted, He recorded us on an eight-track reel-to-reel, old analogue style. He is one of the very few guys that I know of who still has that equipment and is actually using it. We all really like the live sound that it has, it captures us as a band and we wouldn’t want anything more polished than that because it wouldn’t do us as a band any favours, cause that’s the way we sound live. Recording the album was fairly relaxed, just drinking beers and trying to get the takes right. It was a fairly quick process really.
Late Arvo Sons is Mark Lording (vocals), Brett Frost (bass), Kent Thomas (guitar) and Stuart Reynolds (drums). Letters From Another Alphabet album launch, this Saturday September 12 at the Birmingham Hotel, 333 Smith St, Fitzroy. Doors open at 8pm, $10.
Okay, so I’ve found this amazing food website, an online cooking school really. It basically has a ‘how to’ video on all those little culinary secrets you’ve always wanted to know right before you need to do it, or right after you’ve messed it up.
There’s everything from how to skin an almond, how to pit an olive, how to poach an egg to how to test salmon for done-ness, how to butcher a chicken or how to clean squid!
There are only a few out there who could front a band like, say, Eddy Current Suppression Ring, in their spare time. Brendan Huntley does just that because the rest of the time he’s in his studio painting and sculpting, in fact there are certain influential people who reckon his art is that good he shouldn’t even bother playing music. Fortunately the man himself doesn’t see it that way and so he continues both practices. His latest offering Looking Forward, an exploration of the human psyche, opens this Thursday in Melbourne with his trademark array of inanimate, yet personified vessels. His ability to render the complexities of human life so simply is refreshingly honest.
I like my work to be able to stand up on its own. Eventually the whole show will be separated, so most importantly the work needs to be able to stand on its own, as a singular sculpture and secondly as an intstallation. Unless they’re being presented as a couple or a group, in which case they go off as a couple or a group and stay that way. I guess, without over analysing things, it has to be that way. It’s like a set of cups or a group of people. It’s that certain feeling you get from a group, a certain energy is coming at you. Are you going to be able to walk past with no hassles, or do you need to cross the street? It’s a different situation, but its the power of the group that I want to capture in those certain pieces. It comes across as a set of jugs, or as a group of people. It’s a feeling. Sometimes it’s different depending on what time of the day you approach them. When they are walking down the street, whether it’s a safe time, at a certain point they have a certain feeling.
This Thursday night Sydney’s Songs play the Hopetoun in Surry Hills accompanied by locals bands The Laurels and Danimals. Out of curiosity, I asked Song’s drummer Steve Uren why Songs are called Songs and what to expect from show…
I have no idea about the name really. The other geniuses in the band came up with the name before I joined. I didn’t really like it to be honest – so looked beyond it, knowing that inevitably I would meet tonnes of attractive people through knowing Max Doyle (singer and guitar player in Songs). For the show, it’s a pretty safe bet that we will play about 45 minutes of music, politely ask the sound guy to fix the monitors and be ignored… all that high profile rock’n'roll stuff really. No doubt a certain employee at the Hopetoun will probably treat you like dog-shit too. That’s better than watching television at home though right?
Songs perform Thursday September 10 at the Hopetoun. Show starts at 8pm.
Here’s a classic clip from Shaun Micallef, the one and only saviour of Australian popular television. Back on prime time recently with Talkin Bout Your Generation, Micallef played some classic comedy roles back in the day like Milo Kerrigan and Italian Male Model Fabio on Full Frontal and was responsible for the brilliant Micallef Program in the late nineties. Thanks DJ Biscuit for the link! Click here for more videos!
If you’re in Sydney tonight, Gay Bash – Spring Fling is on at The Bourbon in Kings Cross and for the people of Melbourne, 2pm Saturday afternoon sees the opening of TS2, a collaborative waste installation project by Slow Art Collective (Tony Adams, Chaco Kato, Ash Keating & Dylan Martorell) at the Incinerator Arts Complex, 180 Holmes Road, Moonee Ponds, Victoria. It’s the weekend!
Also, DJ Biscuit has given us a pile of hand packaged and numbered of copies of his exclusive Drowning Drums mix from a few Fridays ago. To win a copy, email prize@theblackmail.com.au
As we bid adieu to the last dying days of winter this week, far away on the other side of the planet, our topsy-turvy Northern Hemisphere friends are rolling out the in-store welcome mat for the new fall/winter collections. Yes, for anyone too hopelessly disorganised to get it together during pre-order season, it’s time to hit up that little black book and holla at your favourite online stores, ’cause stock in these nifty numbers won’t last long…
As I possess what borders on a fanatical zeal for fall footwear, let me share with you some of the most mouthwatering new releases of the week – indulge me! First off, the gravity-defying ‘Atacoma’ platform boot has dropped at Acne online in a breathtaking shade of ‘Cloud Blue’ suede. Shod in these celestial numbers (with an 8cm platform sole), you’re sure be the toast of the upper atmosphere! Who ever said a platform desert boot was a silly idea?
Next off the bat we have the pervasive new crop of creeper-esque hybrids that were ubiquitous on winter runways. Phi’s applauded double buckle ankle boot made its hallowed debut earlier in the month, pre-empting round two of the highly anticipated Emma Cook for Topshop injection. Cook’s outlandish wedges hit TS online yesterday afternoon, with a creeper-on-acid vibe incorporating contrasting suede and pony skin paneling and the standout feature crepe rubber wedge sole. Burberry Prorsum nailed the craze with their super-fresh take on a neo hiking boot, featuring a similar textured crepe 5 inch triple platform (what!?!).
Ok, ok, I see your tiny minds are about to crumple under the weight of all this “cool”, so I’ll wind it up with a last look at Falls final frontier – the sky-high thigh high. Check out these perforated boots-slash-leggings from Stella McCartney. The enviro-guru probably shudders at the thought of all the trees that were felled to feed the print press coverage of these show stoppers. And, to polish it all off, I’ll leave you with a little teaser… these Nicholas Kirkwood for Rodarte calf skin bandage boots are rumored for release at Browns later this month – but dates are at this time “undisclosed”. How’s that for a cliffhanger…
Check back each Thursday for more on the fashion world from Billy Bride
This Thursday evening Melbourne fashion store Fat present their limited edition t-shirt party and exhibition Survival of the Fittest. The night features designs from a wide spread of young Australian individuals and fashion labels including PAM, Friedrich Gray, Dress Up (who we covered in our premiere issue), TV, Therese Rawsthorne, Dylan Martorell and Tim Hillier amongst others. Head along to nab yourself some drinks and an eye full of one off t-shirt designs!
Show starts 6pm, Thursday September 3 at No Vacancy, 34-40 Jane Bell Ln, Melbourne
Yesterday I was in a fancy foodery and picked up the most affordable item I could find. It was anchovies, in a tube – it cost $2.50.
The thing that most appealed to be about this, is that fish can be contained and sold to people in a tube. It feels strange and weird to me, but fascinating. Really, the only thing that feels normal to come out of a tube and put in your mouth is toothpaste.
Anyway, the great thing about anchovy paste in a tube is that you don’t have to open a whole jar of anchovies every time you want to use them. You can just squirt a little blob from the tube and you’re away. Delicious salty, fishy goodness, and you don’t get fish fingers either. Another great thing is it keeps really well, as it is tightly packed into the airtight tube. Also, it’s cheap.
On second glance, the packaging is not so far different from that tube of toothpaste in your bathroom, expect for the little fish swimming down the side of the tube. But beware, this is certainly not something you want to brush your teeth with.
Another delicious taste of what comes every Wednesday from CC Bakes
