WHO_Me (Suz). Again.

WHAT_Art date with Gracie

WHEN_August 2010

WHERE_Exposed: Voyeurism, Surveilance and the Camera, Tate Modern

WHY_I’ve been interested in how the camera and photography has maniupulated our concept of reality for a long time. Susan Sontag’s ‘On Photography’ & ‘Regarding the pain of others’ as well as  Roland Barthes ‘Camera Lucida’ definitley educated and incuraged my curiosity for the subject.

Privacy  and Publicity / Reality and Fantasy

Being bombarded with a vast array of voyeuristic imagery turned my thoughts to just have little power we have over what we see and what information we digest. Voyeuristic sensibilities are ingrained in our society. A deterrent to actually live your live. An escape from reality with no creative gain. The ‘Celebrity & the Public Gaze’ room expresses that the “notion of celebrity as we know it today is inseparable from the invention of photography”. Feeling familiar with celebrities due to the influx of imagery in our everyday life, despite never meeting them in person. I can’t bare gossip magazines filled with such imagery but I’m most definitely partial to looking at photographs of glamorous couple Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton (featured in the show). I’m always more interested in looking at the past.

In the ‘Voyeurism & Desire’ room there are a selection of photographs with couples kissing. I can’t tell you why i like them, but i really do. It isn’t a sexual thing, and funnily enough in reality if I see people kissing too much it makes me want to scream ‘get a fucking room’ at them. Despite the invasive element, when embodied in a well composed photograph it expresses a genuine closeness that everyone desires. That just shows the power of photography. Something I genuinely dislike in reality is captured in photography and translated to be viewed as beautiful. Or maybe I like them because I don’t kiss half as much as I should…

Highlights of the show: Merry Alpern’s ‘Dirty Windows’ secretly taken photographs through an air shaft of a brothel near Wall Street, NYC. A collection of Sophie Calle’s work including a text image piece of when she hired a unknowing private investigator to follow her and take pictures of her movements. A photograph with text by an unknown photographer entitled ‘Bank Bandit Exits after Haul’ I laughed for a while, it’s worth going to the show just to see that.

Lee Friedlander ‘New York City’ 1966

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WHO_Me (Suz)

WHAT_Seeking inspiration in all the right places

WHEN_August 2010

WHERE_The Surreal House at the Barbican

WHY_I’m currently working on three briefs. They focus on different aspects of my thinking, all of which explore the seductive and ephemeral nature of modern existence through the themes of love, loss, death and desire. I needed inspiration, so I found some.

‘Art imagines the house, film ‘performs the house and architecture builds the house.’

The Surreal house was full of film, art, sculpture and architectural references. The more I learn about Surrealism and it’s influence/influences it becomes more relevant to my artistic interests. It highlights the importance of the house to surrealism and explores the relevance of surrealism to architecture. A piece of writing in the show about Surrealist Godfather Andre Brenton’s home in France describes it as the ‘..archetypal surrealist home and the embodiment of surrealism’s longing for marvellous encounters between people, things, images and environments…’. Marvellous encounters are what I live for.

Highlights of the exhibition – Avant-garde film entitled ‘Steamboat Bill JR’ (1928) directed, starred and produced by Buster Keaton. A WHOLE section dedicated to Joseph Cornell including a couple of his magnificent box constructions and a collection of his ephemera. A equally disturbing and beautiful film ‘Jabberwocky’ (1971) which was written and directed by Jan Švankmajer, the film is loosely based on the poem ‘Jabberwocky’ by Lewis Carroll.

Claude Cahun ’self portrait (in wardrobe)’ c.1928

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WHO_Peter Blake

WHAT_A print retrospective at Christie’s

WHEN_23rd July – 12th august 2010

WHERE_Christie’s, 85 Old Brompton Road, London

WHY_Peter Blake is a legend. He was a pioneer in early British pop art. He has created some historic album covers for the Beatles, Paul Weller and Oasis. As well as making some of the most interesting contemporary art I’ve had the pleasure to see. I went to the private view with my friend Jamal and enjoyed it throughly. Christie’s is worth visiting anyway but this show is really not one to sleep on.

WHO_Deth Kills (death spelt like meth)

WHAT_Art collective from L.A

WHEN_I found out about ‘em from my dear friend Skinny last night and proceeded to roll to their art jam in culver city later that evening…

WHERE_Culver City, CA

WHY_I trust Skinny’s opinion on everything, I was like, totally into their work, see for yourself right here

WHO_Clare Pestaille

WHAT_A collage of Milada Mladova

WHEN_1939

WHERE_New York

WHY_It features in an upcoming show entitled ‘Reality’ at the Paul Stolper Gallery, London. I think it is incredibly beautiful.

WHO_Jen-ism aka The Jennist Empire aka Jennifer Crouch in a group show

WHAT_A group show called ‘The Whole Universe in a Glass of Wine’

WHEN_Friday 4th June – Saturday 5th June

WHERE_The Gallery on Redchurch Street, Redchurch Street, London, E2.

WHY_Jen is a badass. Her drawing skills are untouchable.

WHO_ Haunch of Venison, London

WHAT_ The first comprehensive survey of Soviet non-conformist art from the 1980s and early 1990s ever to be mounted in London, in collaboration with Galerie Volker Diehl (Berlin) and Diehl + Gallery One (Moscow)

WHEN_ til 26th June

WHERE_ www.haunchofvenison.com

WHY_ Glasnost liberated Soviet society and brought an end to the Cold War and enabled freedom of speech. This exhibition shows a radical change in aesthetics, an eclectic fusion of media and approach to soviet art than had ever been seen before. I’d really recommend checking this out, its a heady mix of beautifully crafted work with heavily charged meaning. Something I feel is missing from a lot of modern art these days.

Defile

WHO_Mister Batlow X Amar Stewart

WHAT_A collaborative show entitled ‘Eden’s garden’

WHEN_23rd April – 5th May

WHERE_EASTGALLERY, 214 Brick Lane, London

WHY_Mister Batlow is not only my homeboy, but one of the biggest talents London has to offer, plus Over It & Co collaborate with Mister Batlow on the regular

WHO_Suzannah Pettigrew

WHAT_ A solo show

WHEN_ Dec 12th – Jan 12th

WHERE_ Wah Nails, 420 Kingsland Road, London

WHY_I lost my heart and I’m trying to find it again…oh there it is. Found it.

WHO_Tim Burton

WHAT_exhibition

WHEN_Nov 09 – April 10

WHERE_MOMA NYC

WHY_because Nightmare before Christmas is one of the greatest films of all time – no messin’