steph von reiswitz

Bare Bones 3

2010-03-26T13:24:00.000-07:00

Drawing Room at Tate Britain

2010-03-19T07:04:00.000-07:00

Georgia Jacob and I are up to our old tricks again, this time setting up in the beautiful 'portraiture 1700-1800' room at Tate Britain. There's a whole host of other interesting stuff happening - talks, performances, social experiments, you name it - so drop by if you're around. 2pm-5pm, free.

wah! it's been almost a year...

2010-03-09T09:36:00.000-08:00

...and my online persona's been totally stagnant. Too much to do is the reason, but I'll try to update when I get a minute. (Been illustrating and exhibiting and travelling etc, it's all been good.) more pictures soon...

BB2 in the press

2010-02-23T13:25:00.000-08:00

(dazed & confused 02/10)

Dean Street Townhouse

2009-11-26T11:43:00.000-08:00

There's a new permanent show on at the Dean Street Townhouse (69 Dean Street) in Soho which opens to the public on Wednesday November 25.

The place has got some decent Soho history - initially the Townhouse's 18th Century building was a printing press for publisher Novello. In the 1920s, it housed the notorious Gargoyle club, a haunt for people like Noel Coward, Sigfried Sassoon, Dylan Thomas, Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, John Minton and Graham Greene. Matisse created parts of the red and glass interiors, and his painting 'The Red Studio' hung on its walls. In the 1970s, a goth bar (The Batcave) moved in, earning the space a cult following, yet another following (with overlap) came in its next incarnation as a men's sauna and massage parlour. In the 1980s it hosted the nightclub Gossips.

The collection (themed around the allures of Soho) is on permanent display on the ground floor and includes such eminences of the art world as Andrzej Klimowski, Peter Blake, Tracey Emin, Noble and Webster, Gavin Turk, Fiona Banner, Paul Noble, Damien Hirst, Jamie Hewlett, Jose Parla, Keith Tyson, Mark Titchner as well as lots of younger folk including Neal Fox and myself. Drop by and have a little cocktail or a nibble, I'm told the food is exquisite.

Wilton's Café Poster Exhibition

2009-11-06T11:12:00.000-08:00

Dave McH, chief of the Notting Hill Arts Club and various other ventures (and the man who provided us with the means and opportunity for the infamous LE GUN shoe shop of curiosities), has opened a new café. It's called Wilton's, at 63 Wilton Way in Hackney, serves excellent food and drink and also houses London Fields Radio. To mark the opening Dave invited us to stage a little poster exhibition there.

I'm trying to find better pictures as all the posters were great (featuring Bays, Bianchi, Bragg, Fox, Greene, Heretic, Kariya, Malt, and myself) - here's Heretic & Fox's contributions, and below that my own.

Bare Bones 2

2009-11-01T07:07:00.000-08:00

Bare Bones 2 - launch and exhibition at Maurice Einhardt Neu gallery. Heretic were this issue's cover stars and showed a selection of posters as well as a limited edition screen printed BB book jacket, while other BB members put pen to A5 paper and sold several wallfuls of original drawings at a competitive price just in time for the christmas rush.

messengers of her majesty's cosmic empire

2009-10-10T06:58:00.000-07:00

Messrs Bianchi and Rubbish put up this marvelous show at the Concrete Hermit gallery:

'Robert Rubbish and Chris Bianchi (of Le Gun magazine and Bare Bones tabloid) bring you a unique collaboration. They will be
transforming the Concrete Hermit gallery into an interstellar installation that coincides with the 4o year anniversary of the first
man on the moon. They will be showing their cosmic collections of curiosities. The artists will be exhibiting their own individual
artworks as well as collaborative paintings drawings and assemblages made specifically for the show. The pair take their
inspirations from the time they spent creating and running a modern day curiosity shop in Hackney in 2007 as well as many other
sources including the films of Alejandro Jodorowsky, space rock, dipsomania, the occult, magic, Catholicism, James Ensor,
chemical memories, psychedelic experiences, death and Belgium. The exhibition will also have special events programmed
including a requiem mass on the last day: Halloween.'

Latitude and Port Eliot

2009-07-19T08:38:00.000-07:00

In July the Drawing Room went on tour with the House of Fairy Tales, and spent 5 hectic days in the woods at Latitude with special guests Heretic...

The following week we decamped to lovely Port Eliot festival in Cornwall for some more of the usual, plus copious amounts of sloe gin, some impromptu theatrics and a hell of a lot of uphill dancing.

Bare Bones in the press

2009-07-01T07:03:00.000-07:00

Dazed & Confused report on the launch of Bare Bones 1 at the D&C gallery...

bare bones show

2009-06-01T11:03:00.000-07:00

setting up the bare bones exhibition at the dazed & confused gallery.

this is what a small part of it looked like -

BARE BONES!

2009-05-26T15:40:00.000-07:00

The Drawing Room micro-festival outside Tate Modern

2009-05-26T09:58:00.000-07:00

The Drawing Room represented as part of the House of Fairy Tales festival outside Tate Modern on 23-24-25 May. We had our own very spacious marquee (see picture) into which we'd invited artists, collectives, performers and bands, and it all went remarkably well.
There was a hell of a lot of drawing, some drinking (mainly afterwards), and generally hanging out by the river over a the so far hottest and most gorgeous weekend this year.

Apart from the Drawing Room gang we first had Amelia Johnstone cutting paper drawings and being harassed by a reactionary mother, Material of Ludlow being over-run in a badge-making frenzy, the Mighty Low rocking out the day.
On Sunday we started with a banquet, followed by a 10m-drawing of the Thames as imagined by LE GUN and the great unwashed, the amazing printed drawing games produced by heretic, and the Bohemianauts for some gypsy klezmer pop classics at the end.
And on Monday we followed two hours of dress-up&draw with Strangeworks' hilarious 'blackboard drama' and Lina B Frank's crazy performance machine and finished the sticky day with Victorian punk revivalists the Rubbishmen of Soho.

In retrospect I think it was a supremely successful event, we did get loads of people drawing and enjoying themselves. The children-to-adult ratio grew over the three days, which was ok, but unfortunately this meant the parent-to-normal people ratio also increased dramatically, and while on Saturday I did feel like smacking a few of the pushy, narrow minded, overbearing parents, on Sunday I would have liked to punch them and by Monday evening I was ready to shoot them. Refusing to get involved themselves as in their minds 'drawing is just for kids' - but constantly 'correcting' their children's drawings, some literally taking their pens and intruding them with their 'ideas'. Thankfully there were others who were just fabulous and got right into the spirit.

musings

2009-05-25T02:48:00.000-07:00

I've been wondering why I find doing the Drawing Room so rewarding, apart from the fact it's silly and playful and fun... and I've come to realise I do feel very strongly about getting people to think of any art (be it their own drawing or art in a museum) as accessible to anyone.
The notion that there is such a thing as 'high art' that must take itself very seriously and needs a certain kind of person or a certain level of study to be appreciated really annoys me, and people who cite their background/class/occupation/education as reasons why it's 'not for them' or why they 'won't understand it' even more so.
And the same goes for doing a bit of drawing - no-one thinks twice about jotting down a note, but most people above the age of 11 start stressing out if they're asked to draw anything. Otherwise perfectly articulate adults will panic, mumble about 'not being any good' and revert back to the classics (hearts, flowers, smiley faces, penises).
When there is so much hilarity and enjoyment to be had with just a cheap pen and some paper, and a little imagination!
I think I was very lucky to be brought up to think of drawing as entertainment, as something that takes you on excursions, that can be sociable or solitary but is almost always fun and interesting. And it's such a brilliant conductor for ideas, people should just realise they're perfectly able and should be doing more of it.

rumpole

2009-05-22T01:51:00.000-07:00

Grab this bullshit by the horns!

2009-05-12T09:49:00.000-07:00

BARE BONES launch exhibition at the Dazed & Confused gallery next thursday!
( 112-6 Old Street - time tbc but usual private view time)

BARE BONES,
Fourteen people providing fourteen bespoke written/ranted/drawn/cut/carved/copied works.
Profile, interview and portrait of a featured artist.
Curated, funded and distributed quarterly by it's contributors.
We are not in this for the greater good, this is a coin-op co-op.
There are no flies on us.

BARE BONES
Barely another bright eyed example of the present trend for non-electronic human communication,
this is a modern day Jack London loitering about in the rough heat of the self promotional art ego wasteland.
The scaffold on which were are hung, temporarily it supports us but will inevitably crumble like nonagenarian bones and end up a pile of spidery dust.
Grab this bullshit by the horns and hop onto our tabloid eye junket.
Consider this timely opportunity for you to loaf and invite inspiration straight into your hands.
Put BARE BONES in your pipe and smoke it.

welcome to the real world

2009-05-12T09:42:00.000-07:00

been too busy to update anything - this was an exhibition at the Coningsby gallery organised by Dominik Klimowski to coincide with the launch of his illustrated book of short stories 'Welcome to the Real World'. The book and exhibition featured illustrations by Ali Mobasser, Tom McShane, Graeme Stuart, Neal Fox, Bill Bragg, Robert Greene, Steph von Reiswitz, Andrzej Klimowski, Danusia Schejbal, Swava Harasymowicz, Chris Bianchi and Dominik Klimowski.

(at the private view I was recognised as the creator of my picture by another exhibitor whom I didn't know, which he said demonstrated his theory that people always look like their own drawings. I do know what he means, but considering that particular picture was of a band of bearded gypsies with fur hats and evil stares I'm not too sure if I'm flattered...)

House of Fairy Tales exhibition

2009-03-12T02:05:00.000-07:00

everything is for sale! proceeds go to the House of Fairy Tales, which is an arts-based education project by Deborah Curtis & Gavin Turk. Candlelit Matinée (see below) is one of their ventures promoting arts-based entertainment for youngsters...

drawing room outing

2009-03-03T11:52:00.000-08:00

we'll be representing in our own morbidly decadent section of this extravaganza - come and check out what the youth are up to and of course hang out with us and do a bit of drawing... entry fee up to you (donations only)

party in Berlin!

2009-03-03T11:49:00.000-08:00

should you find yourself in Berlin on these dates why not party like there's no tomorrow?

all being well I'll also be doing some visuals at this 48-hour bash in a Berlin brewery...

Pentti & Deathgirl! a quick review!

2009-02-16T09:25:00.000-08:00

been extremely busy, and dashing abroad a little bit etc etc but having just read this book I had to take a minute to mention it: Pentti & Deathgirl, a brilliant book comprising of two graphic stories written and drawn by the excellent Emma Rendel. Emma's been publishing stuff for ages - self-publishing zines and slimline books, contributing short graphic stories to Le Gun magazine etc - until Jonathan Cape recognised a great opportunity, and Pentti & Deathgirl is the result (she's actually also about to publish another book in Sweden).
I was slightly worried about reading it because as a friend and fan I knew my expectations would be high and was afraid I might not like it, or even 'not like it that much' - but as it turned out I enjoyed it so much I keep picking it up to have another look all the time...

Pentti is a story about this brutal Finnish farmer who lives with his brother and can only act on his desire to be physically close to other men by picking fights with them at the local bar and beating them up. Deathgirl is an outsider at school who records her violent thoughts and hopes and day-to-day activities in her diary.
With her particular sense for satire, Emma combines the naïve and seemingly innocent with despair and ultraviolence, and the result actually makes a strong comment on the issues at hand but delivers it in such a subtle and funny way it seems hard to argue.
The artwork is beautiful and the visual storytelling brilliant, especially in Pentti, and I really love the use of colour, and the unpredictability of the narrative. And of course Emma's deadpan sense of humor is very present throughout (both in the pictures and the words) and had me laughing out loud again and again.
I can kind of see why people might be divided over this book, simply because it doesn't immediately fit into an obvious niche. It's not a pretty looking 'alternative' comic about being bored in the suburbs, the style probably doesn't adhere to the five generic styles (Marvel etc/BDs/Burns/Hergé/even the 'wilder' L'Association) people seem to expect from a graphic novel, and the feel-good factor isn't immediately apparent with both stories dealing with such awkward subjects and characters. But I think that if you're looking for engaging graphic stories skillfully told that will make you laugh and think and want to revisit their strange little world, this book is a wise investment.

Austin Underground Film

2008-12-14T07:15:00.000-08:00

Here's a little poster I did for the Austin Underground Film Festival. The program sounds really good so check it out should you find yourself in the Texan vicinity!

nine ladies dancing

2008-12-14T05:22:00.000-08:00

this was my contribution to studio 8's charity christmas exhibition and sale on december 3rd. Each poster was a line from the twelve days of christmas, and I'd picked "nine ladies dancing".
For the whole 12 days - some of the posters are still up for grabs, as are Christmas card sets of all 12 - look here, and definitely check out the excellent (left to right) Chris Bianchi's "ten lords a-leaping", Bill Bragg's "eleven pipers piping" and Robert Greene's "twelve drummers drumming" (we'd picked these randomly and only realised on the night they'd obviously all be next to each other).

more BBC fun

2008-12-14T05:18:00.000-08:00

haven't updated anything in ages - been very busy and then ill... This was up on the BBC website in early december and still up on the iplayer now.

Casablanca!

2008-11-28T10:01:00.000-08:00

this time The Drawing Room has become slightly more glam as we've been invited by the excellent Josh to drink'n'draw at this fabulous night - just dress to impress (see dress code) and bring your drawing supplies. Yes it's on a saturday evening, but the good news is you'll be brilliantly attired for the rest of saturday night, flatteringly flushed with excitement and slight inebriation, plus those ink stains and paint smudges will make you look mysterious and interesting and attract handsome strangers like flies to cream cakes.

BTW - although billed as "stoke newington airport" the Drawing Room still is a georgiaJ/stephvr production.

(dress code small print says: Fez's, white tuxedos, bow ties, patent leather shoes, MuMus, Daishikis, zig zags, sequins, Dutch batiks, Cossak pants, fedoras, boleros, turkish slippers, ballet shoes, bangles, beads, smoking jackets, wedge espadrilles, satin playsuits, silk pyjamas, or your own effortless style as long as it's très chic!)

Opium Magazine

2008-11-19T05:20:00.000-08:00

page (left) in issue 7 of opium magazine, part of the McSweeney stable - image on the right is by Art Spiegelman

sweet charity! 3rd december

2008-11-18T15:56:00.001-08:00

PoCom at the ICA

2008-11-18T15:47:00.001-08:00

Bill Bragg organised this year's 'PoCom' (potential comics) at comICA, the annual comic extravaganza at the Institute of Contemporary Art. He wrote a complete graphic story, then handed single panels of it to a whole variety of graphic artists who spun their own stories using the panels as staring points. You can admire the web of stories in a long corridor at the ICA till November 26 - it makes for fascinating reading and the bar is at the end of it!

artists involved: Bill Bragg, Hiroshi Kariya, Emma Rendel and Matt, Russell Weekes, Walter Newton, Tobi Tak, Becky Barnicoat, Les Coleman, Chris Bianchi, Matilda Tristram, Mark Ciavola, Neal Fox, Rachel Gannon, Fumie Kamijo, Chloe Regan, Mireille Fauchon, Astrid Chesney, Tom Idon'tactuallyknowhislastname, Daniel Merlin Goodbrey, (at least) two other people whose name I unfortunately don't recall at all, and myself... here's two of my panels

Drawing islands at Parasol Unit on 30 Oct

2008-11-18T15:45:00.000-08:00

LE GUN did a night of drawing at Parasol Unit, as part of Charles Avery's exhibition 'The Islanders'. He has created his own imaginary island, a strange hybrid of Scotland and Egypt, and made drawings and sculptures of its inhabitants. We had a go at drawing our own island next door. Members of the great unwashed came and joined in with the drawing to a soundtrack of sea shanties, whale music and Chris Rea.

(Luc Barbute in action!)

studio shuffle

2008-11-18T08:19:00.000-08:00

Harry Malt was the latest addition to our studio after Hiroshi Kariya moved on to new pastures (just up the road) to pursue a carreer in large paintings. Harry is captain of Bare Bones as well as a prolific thinker-drawer who outputs (often hilarious) verbal/visual delights. This is how he treats the place.

March of the Dead

2008-10-27T15:56:00.000-07:00

it's time for some ghoulishness again! This year Hallowe'en is on a moonless night, so for Strangeworks' March of the Dead the moon (well, a large glowing replica) will be travelling within a sea of dead souls from Stoke Newington cemetery via Gillett Square in Dalston down to Passing Cloud's new larger venue for an evil afterparty. As usual, there'll be live bands during the march and after. Why not throw on something ghastly (black and/or white is good) and join us:

some impressions of last year:

BBC fun

2008-10-15T10:01:00.000-07:00

Pop Culture in Holland!

2008-10-15T09:25:00.000-07:00

Neal Fox, Chris Bianchi and Steph von Reiswitz went over to the Netherlands for a few days to do a workshop with the students at the Academy of Pop Culture in Groningen. In between beer drinking and bicycle rides a strange exhibition was knocked together involving a mysterious secret society, and good times were had by all. The show included a mad naked Georgian with an apple in his mouth and was attended by such local celebrities as Holland's only ever astronaut.
Thanks to Natasha Taylor aka Madam Zafira, Mieke the gypsy and famous nightclub Vera for their hospitality and all the students for their effort, keep on keepin on.

Mare Street Biennale

2008-10-15T09:19:00.000-07:00

LE GUN is exhibiting a new drawing at the first Mare Street Biennale,
Private view 9thOct 2008 runs until the 30th Oct
143 Mare Street, London, E8 3RH.

The drawing - "The Card Players", Indian ink on canvas, 200 x 150 cm - is by Bianchi, Bragg, Fox and myself.
More about the show:
"The fantastic ARTISTSPACE double-fronted gallery spills out into the vibrant heart of Hackney connecting with the themes focused on in the Biennale, providing an ideal place to see the work of the ten London-based, national and international artists. The exhibition promises new work from Mark Caviola, Anne Colvin, Alexandra Flood, Jonathan Goslan, LE GUN, David Lindberg, Theresia Lynch, Rod Maclachlan, Mark Ross and Bob & Roberta Smith."

jersey evening post

2008-10-01T07:19:00.000-07:00

from the Jersey Evening Post, sept 26...

our stint in prison

2008-09-18T15:08:00.000-07:00

...starting tomorow... private view on monday, see below:

LE GUN - THE FAMILY

2008-09-17T04:00:00.000-07:00

Here's some pictures (at last!) of the LE GUN - The Family exhibition at the Rochelle School. Thanks to Michele Panzeri, photographer extraordinaire ...

entrance area... featuring the work of many Le Gun contributors

and of course a giant cat

more salon walls... featuring more work

vista of some of our gigantic canvases (we did 4 of them, 30m in total)

a 10m stretch (the family leaving LeGundon and crossing the sea)

another 10m stretch - the interzone

the Cardboard Room, brainchild of Bill Bragg, assembled with the help of a bunch of Chelsea students on summer break. They did a sterling job with the construction following Bill's plans, we then painted everything. (The sofas, arm chairs and piano stool were fully functional btw!)

my personal pride & joy - the grand piano, aptly named 'Schlampenpupsen' (Whore's Fart)

Inside the piano - an elegantly wasted lady surrounded by various musical demons (Tobi Tak & J M F Casey helped me paint those)

some FAQs -

how many people did the giant canvases? Mainly Bianchi, Fox, Greene, and myself, and Bragg. Also as usual lots of friends and contributors dropped by and painted the odd thing...

how long did they take? all told probably something like 4 weeks. We did them on and off over a number of months.

Is the cardboard room really all cardboard? yes, no furniture inside a cardboard shell or anything, all 100% sturdy cardboard (well with the odd bolt to secure the inside of the sofas & chairs etc)

How long did it take? a week to build, thanks to the help of a 7-strong team of super-efficient students.

what happened to the furniture after the exhibition? In storage at Le Gun HQ. I'm using the armchair I painted as my studio desk chair, yes it really is that comfortable...

John M F Casey – Swindler of the Abyss

2008-09-03T03:57:00.000-07:00

this young man makes some beautiful images, and will have a show at nog on brick lane starting September 14.
I initially got to know him through some obscure channels and had a postcard of his on my desk for a while - the image incidentally is now a spread in LE GUN 4 - and then got to know him properly when he helped tremendously in putting up the 'The Family' show. Go and check out his handywork -

his myspace is http://www.myspace.com/jmfcasey
14 September – 8 October 2008
Nog Gallery, 182 Brick Lane, London E1 6SA, +44 (0)2077394134
Opening on Sunday 14 September 2008, 6 – 9 pm

Mothers In Law

2008-08-21T07:49:00.000-07:00

Faber have just sent me this hot off the press, to be released on 16th October - here's the cover (it also has 50 inside illustrations)... Apart from two minor mistakes that no-one else will probably notice I'm very pleased. Loving the electric violet...

exhibition alert! 27th august

2008-08-18T18:04:00.000-07:00

wow what a show it'll be! LE GUN issue 4 will be launched. other features: a display of gigantic ink drawings detailing the progress of 'The Family' from LeGundon via various depraved locations all the way to a jungle funeral. a life size-cardboard room. embalming fluid cocktails. Caliper Boy's death march. a salon d'artistes. a shop stocking all sorts of delights. and if previous after parties are anything to go by I'm slightly scared of this one already... come!

exhibition alert! 21 august

2008-08-18T17:58:00.000-07:00

this week - the mysterious mystery spot exhibition. apart from rob rubbish and anna mcclelland i have never met any of them and no idea who they are (except for a vague knowledge of ceri amphlett/craig atkinson/daryl waller's work) so i'm still mystified, but then maybe that's the point, who knows... swing by:

quality x3

2008-08-10T05:43:00.000-07:00

this is totally irrelevant, but I couldn't resist: here is a picture of my sister with DJ Vadim, who is trying his first ever 'hanuta' hazelnut chocolate wafer snack... (all three are firm favourites of mine)

cargo

2008-07-26T02:31:00.001-07:00

as mentioned in an earlier post, when we painted the cargo murals they time-lapse filmed our progress on the dj booth bit, and this is the result. for the rest of the murals see below somewhere... in action: bianchi, bragg, fox, frost, greene, rendel & myself.

(i should probably add that cargo shot this and added the music - had we had anything to do with the soundtrack it would have been a weird hybrid of/a fight between obscure world music, energetic jazz, power ballads, punk rock, Hawkwind, and italo disco...)

wow!

2008-07-21T03:38:00.000-07:00

check out Hiroshi modelling this sexy new T-shirt - a limited edition of 100 produced by LE GUN in collaboration with Duffer of St George. The shirts are of excellent quality, go with everything and somehow seem to attract a lot of attention - whenever I wear mine people demand what it is and where it came from, a common reaction apparently according to fellow wearers (even on the streets of New York).

The t-shirts will be available for £25 pounds at the LE GUN exhibition and on the website from August 27th. Email this address to pre-order your shirt from the shop.

If you hate the shirt but want to know more about Hiroshi, he's a fellow illustrator and fellow fan of italo disco, an enthusiastic DJ, and joint winner of a recent Tom-Cruise-Off between him, Bill Bragg and myself.

exhibition

2008-07-21T03:32:00.000-07:00

Issue #4 of the narrative art annual LE GUN will be distributed worldwide from September 2008. The launch will coincide with an exhibition and temporary arts club taking place at the Rochelle School in Arnold Circus, Shoreditch titled LE GUN ‘The Family’

In the exhibition, the warped collective imagination of LE GUN presents a dysfunctional family of many generations, including a man with a crab on his head, the leopard walking heiress Marchesa Casati, and the original fat boy actor Joe Cobb. Raised on the the streets of parallel metropolis Legundon, an eccentrically Anglo-Saxon place of loose women, gin and cream cakes, and Francis Bacon’s butchers shop, they are an unusual dynasty. LE GUN’s gigantic black and white ink drawings record the families journey from their home cities murky streets and dens of vice, across a wild unchartered ocean to an outlandish Interzone of mind bending intoxicants and bordellos, and the jungle funeral of unloved street urchin Caliper Boy.

Private View and Launch Party at the Rochelle School  Wednesday 27 August from 5pm 
Extended launch party at Cargo till late.

in the meantime...

2008-07-20T07:55:00.000-07:00

...new magazine Susology published six drawings by LE GUN artistes in their new/current issue, the theme was 'collaboration'. We drew some exquisite corpses, the originals are on display at the Trolley Gallery (Life Beyond Death, there's a post about it below somewhere).

Spread1: Emma Rendel, myself. Spread 2: Chris Bianchi, Robert Greene. Spread 3: Leigh Fox, Neal Fox.
Thanks to Rob Rubbish for the pics.

roasting

2008-07-20T07:36:00.000-07:00

the view from a big rock on one of my favourite Maltese beaches, photographed yesterday. I'm here for a month this time, technology allowing me to take heaps of work with me, but somehow a book in a shady garden, lazy afternoon naps, playing with crabs and sea urchins, and the Mediterranean cuisine seem infinitely more appealing than melting in a room with hand-sweat smudging your lines, and your drawing paper flying from the fan... oh well back to work...

new international shorts

2008-07-20T06:46:00.000-07:00

Kinemastik invited Chris Bianchi and myself to their 4th International Film Festival in early July. Although we've been involved with a good few Kinemastik activities before (Chris being responsible for most of their artwork with me throwing in the odd poster, flyer, T-shirt, and bit of graphic design) we'd somehow always managed to miss the actual festival, so this year was a first.
This time they'd put on a whole week of events - exhibitions, film screenings, talks and workshops, with a weekend of international short films and parties to finish it off. The result was entertaining, thought-provoking, and some heavy drinking.
Here's Bianchi's poster for the festival (I graphic-designed the program on the back):

pineapples

2008-07-20T06:05:00.000-07:00

this is a small sample from 'In the Shadow of the Pineapple', a graphic story I wrote & drew for Australian fiction quarterly Torpedo. It spans 18 pages and is sort of a murder mystery love story. I'm making a small bound edition of it which will be for sale at the LE GUN 'The Family' exhibition in September - I believe the relevant issue of Torpedo will be available in September too.

studio fun!

2008-06-24T13:51:00.000-07:00

yes, it's this coming weekend. possibly also featuring pink gin floats.

Don't stop me now

2008-06-24T13:43:00.000-07:00

DON'T STOP ME NOW
- the body beyond death – GROUP SHOW, May 29 – Jul 05, 2008

Trolley Gallery is pleased to present a group show examining the human body beyond death. The artists chosen here work with diverse interpretations of the physical, the spiritual, the artefact, and the ritual.

VIEW VIRTUAL TOUR OF THE EXHIBITION

Work included coffin drawings by Bianchi, L.Fox, N.Fox, Greene, Rendel, and myself, as well as a 3D coffin hand crafted by Bianchi & Bragg which created quite a stir and was reported in The Guardian.

"Hardly any risks are acceptable these days. We shield ourselves from peril. That's just sensible. But whatever happened to buyer beware? At the Trolley Gallery in the East End of London, artists have come together for the show Don't stop me now - the body beyond death, among them the renowned collective LE GUN. Their installation Died Happy consists of a boxed clay figure in a hole in the floor, and there is no doubt that he indeed died happy. A protrusion rising to floor level is testament to that. All was well until one woman stood on this proof of his happiness. It snapped and she was banned, but she exacted her revenge. "We got a visit from Tower Hamlets health and safety," explains director Gigi Giannuzzi. "Apparently someone had reported our exhibit as a danger to society! No prizes for guessing who." The sculpture endures but it is surrounded by a fence and hazard tape. Itself a comment on modern life, you might think."

here is the offending article (you might remember him from the Shoe Shop of Curiosities):

LE GUN at D&AD awards on 26 May, 2008

2008-06-24T13:36:00.000-07:00

D&AD and Studio 8 Design asked us to do up the Royal Festival for the D&AD Awards 2008.
We designed many hundreds of life size cardboard cutouts which were then wrecked and stolen at the end of the night by drunken advertising executives. Many of them can now be seen through the windows of tastefully lit loft apartments and at cocaine parties throughout Hoxton.

Party pics here on Flickr and more installation shots here - you just need to go past all the admen in black suits...

(drawings by Bianchi, Bragg, Fox, Greene, and myself)

shh! top secret

2008-05-08T14:27:00.000-07:00

here's a sneak preview of our current job in progress, to be officially unveiled next week...

snake dance

2008-05-05T15:07:00.000-07:00

something new

2008-05-01T09:33:00.000-07:00

we're currently in the process of working on a pretty hefty (yet fun) job that needs to be done by next wednesday, so I'd rather say no more until then... but here's a little peek:

more walls

2008-05-01T08:35:00.000-07:00

another mural-for-money, this time at cargo (the nightclub). This took 1 1/2 days, inside, and there's 2 parts to it (the other part I don't have a picture of yet but Cargo made a time-lapse film of its creation which should be up to view somewhere soon).

Painted by artists from LE GUN: Bianchi, Bragg, Fox, Frost (of heretic), Greene, Rendel and myself.

corporate job

2008-05-01T08:34:00.000-07:00

This mural-for-money was painstakingly painted over 7 whole days by 6 of us 'artists from LE GUN' for metro newspapers. It covers a wall 19m wide x 3m high and is completely exposed to the elements, which made this year's april showers/hail storms/occasional ray of sunshine particularly memorable (our hands were repeatedly frozen into brush-holding shapes)...

Painted by artists from LE GUN: Bianchi, Bragg, Fox, Frost (of heretic), Greene, and myself.

back pages

2008-05-01T08:30:00.000-07:00

a first outing in the Guardian's weekend magazine - it's a bad photo but you get the idea. the article is about adultery.

maps

2008-05-01T00:16:00.000-07:00

did a little 3 week stint of teaching at Norwich School of Art & Design where the 2nd year Illustration were doing a map project. I enjoyed it and I think learned quite a lot, although I was surprised that some of the students didn't seem incredibly keen on making the thing their own by drawing and exploring very much. I always found that the joy of drawing lies in the fact that in your drawings you're God and 'you can chop your own arm off', as Bianchi once famously put it, and especially in students any polite restraint seems unnecessary if not counterproductive somehow. (But of course I only vaguely remember the happy, stressful confusion that can be student life.)

what's new

2008-04-30T22:53:00.000-07:00

I've added nothing to this or any other online environment for a very long time, leaving my 'online persona' stagnant (god forbid!), so I've decided to go with the times and update a little bit...

curious shoes

2008-04-08T02:22:00.000-07:00

a picture of Brown's Shoe Shop of Curiosities, opened last August and closed this March by the merry men of LE GUN. It hosted many a wild weekend and much debauchery, exhibited a haunted house in the cellar, and provided a great hangout for locals and visitors alike. Many new friendships and acquaintances with nutters were forged at its demure Hackney address. It'll be recreated in Shoreditch for the exhibition in June however so swing by if you can (more info then)!

tella idejk jew nasparra!

2008-03-05T05:32:00.000-08:00

hm

2008-03-05T05:28:00.000-08:00

handbag

2008-03-05T05:27:00.001-08:00

diogenes

2008-03-05T05:26:00.000-08:00

bathtub

2008-03-05T05:21:00.000-08:00

spilled it

2008-02-21T03:14:00.001-08:00

been playing around with ink prints. also preparing some etchings... and working on an epic 30m drawing with le gun gang

another tryout

2008-02-21T03:13:00.001-08:00

ink print tryout1

2008-02-21T03:12:00.000-08:00

little red riding hood

2008-01-27T08:35:00.001-08:00

tattoo anniversary!

2008-01-25T04:31:00.000-08:00

sirruf 's tattoo was exactly one year old yesterday, so he took this happy photo of it... (I still haven't seen it 'in the flesh' quite literally as he lives en Suisse, I live à Londres, and the original drawing was transmitted via electric mail. A second one is in the pipeline.)

fat and tiny

2008-01-23T07:18:00.000-08:00

Ganymede

2008-01-23T07:05:00.000-08:00

...was a prince, I found out yesterday. Somehow I always had him down as a lady...

sex sex sex

2008-01-23T06:40:00.000-08:00

visited the 'sex through the ages' exhibition at the barbican yesterday - a great selection of erotic sculpture, painting, film & photography from antiquity till today, and featuring the great and the good: rodin, warhol, araki, turner, louise bourgeois, hokusai, marlene dumas, bacon, koons, mapplethorpe, picasso, thomas ruff, tracy emin, rembrandt, etc etc etc.

the sex is graphic & the variety breathtaking (explicit ancient murals, an 18th century Arabic manuscript illustrating 10 men having group sex, a photo of a transsexual with a leek up her behind, gorgeous etchings of gods indulging, ...) and the exhibition does make you wonder why we never get to see much sexual imagery of such quality, why there still is such a taboo about sex when at the same time we're flooded with boring, warped and ugly porny images.
I also enjoyed how the show illustrates that the concept of erotica existing purely for the delectation of a heterosexual male audience seems to have been a western/christian idea, and once you move away from western/christian societies you find pornography made to be enjoyed by everyone. (which in my opinion is much more logical and should be common practice everywhere...)

If you go, I recommend you take along your lover - mine was away so I went with friends, but I must say I was glad I wasn't there alone as we went during the day and the place was mainly populated by late-middle-aged men studying the art closely and breathing heavily.

highlights:
Carracci etchings
Warhol's Blowjob vs. k r buxey's Requiem
japanese pop-up shunga woodcuts
an antique photo of two dressed men in the bathhouse in the most elaborate frame-book (gold, glass, velvet, everything)
that nan goldin slideshow portraying couples in love in everyday (including sexual) situations - I'd seen the piece at her solo show at the whitechapel a couple of years ago and the photos were still beautiful and very moving, while the specially created björk soundtrack was even more irritating than I remembered.

masque of the red death

2008-01-19T03:18:00.001-08:00

finished a big mural in the café at Battersea Arts Centre in collaboration with 2/3 of Strangeworks. In return we received free tickets to Punchdrunk's Masque of the Red Death, a Poe fan's wet dream - absolutely beautiful. Will post pics of mural when I get them... (pic above is totally unrelated)

2008-01-19T03:09:00.000-08:00

lie-ins & tigers have mounted an exhibition at the Coningsby gallery! I managed to miss the private view (had just finished & sent off a bunch of roughs for a book and lounged at home) but I hear the show is brilliant...

let's get this party started...

2008-01-15T04:24:00.000-08:00

I'm brand new to this blogging business, so here's a celebratory picture!