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Someone shared this short film with me at the weekend and I think it’s pretty cool. The creation of architect student Kibwe Tavares, there is some serious talent on display here. Check it out.
http://factoryfifteen.prosite.com/7936/152394/home/robots-of-brixton
I checked some of the visual arts delights at the Galway Arts Festival last week-end on a rainy Saturday afternoon. Despite the location (in a large shopping centre on the edge of town) the Hughie O’Donoghue exhibition entitled ‘The Road’ was impressive and included some of his monumental pieces. The show is also the premiere of his new work ‘Road’ a painting in 60 parts. The eye is drawn along what seems like a vast line of canvases, all of which evoke merged memories from snapshots of family portraits, half forgotten book illustrations and historical documents.
What also, surprisinlgy, grabbed my attention in the same location was a collection of contemporary Irish crafts including jewellery, furniture and ceramics. My favourite was a beautiful lunula made from delicate white crepe paper and gold leaf (not sure how this would have survived in the downpour outside).
After a nice cup of tea in my favourite tea shop in Galway (Cupan Tae), I popped into the Galway City Museum and saw a little gem of an exhibition, of the works of Charles Lamb (1893-1964). Lamb actually began his career as a humble house painter in his native Armagh before becoming a fully fledged Royal Hibernian Academician. His landscapes, especially his skies are sublime and his depiction of the toil and labour of the West of Ireland peasants is moving. I really loved his little black chickens in his cottage series – painted as mere suggestions in black and red.
I visited a great little show in London on the weekend. It comprised of artwork and things of interest that had been found in the Transport for London lost property office.
There were family portraits, oils paintings and a prosthetic arm among the finds.
All works were available to claim back by their rightful owners.
We celebrated Lollipop Day today with an internal fund raiser over tea and cake.
There were prizes for best dressed lady and gent. Congratulations to Yvonne O’Toole and Kevin Keenan for their pink combo’s.
We are heading down to the Lollipop launch on Henry Street now – we have Lorraine Keane, The Dublin Gospel Choir, and Sonny Knowles lined up to help out.
See you there!
It’s Friday, it’s snowing, so we thought why not build some snowmen in our car park? Of course it was a competition and it was the boys vs. girls.
The competition was stiff, but in the end the boys came out on top. Unfortunately, their snow art isn’t something we can put up on our blog, so instead here are some lovely pictures of the sweet snowman the girl’s created. As Caitriona said, ‘he’s magical!’
There’s some unusual advertising around the city of London. Colossal black and white portraits of ordinary folk framed by the striking yellow of Aviva on the sides of buildings with simply the web address as headline – youarethebigpicture.com It appears this is a global project taking place simultaneously across 5 cities. Although taking place on a big scale the breaking out of traditional ad sites coupled with the intrigue of the url stayed with me till I went to the site and got the whole story. It’s a pretty nice site too.
Arcade Fire have created an experimental online video for their new single “We Used To Wait”.
It was created by Chris Milk working with Google Maps to create a personalized video using unexpected elements of your childhood.
There’s a great database of street art from around the world at unurth.com
Here are a couple of my favourites from the site, but make sure you bookmark it as there’s heaps of content to browse through.
Walking around Dublin recently I’ve noticed some quite different looking graffiti. Old advertising typography combined with a familiar poetry.
I was soon to discover that it is a brilliant collaboration between street artist Maser and the inimitable Dubliner Damian Dempsey.
Keep an eye out for them around the city and see the full set at theyareus.ie
Saturday night’s opening X-Factor saw massive viewership figures, the highest ever – with 730,000 people tuning into the show. This made TV3 the most watched channel for 15-44 year olds in Ireland for that time period. In Universal McCann, we always pride ourselves on the strength of our client’s programme access. The ‘Coca-Cola with Food’ campaign had prime position in the first centre break with ‘first-in-break’ access.
Certainly one of the highlights of the Saturday’s show was Shirlena Johnson with ‘Mercy’. This year’s X-Factor is set to be bigger and better than ever… tune in this Saturday at 19.30 and 20.45 for the Xtra-Factor!
www.toxel.com have pulled together some cool creative outdoor advertising from around the world, here are some of our favourites:
See the original toxel.com post here.
I visited the BioRhythm exhibition in the Science Gallery on Saturday. A hugely entertaining and interactive show on how the body and the brain react to music. You can see the graph below of how my body subconsciously reacted to different types of music. Journey was obviously doing it for me!
Have a look at www.sciencegallery.com/biorhythm
FUSE Interiors are developing a range of lights that make use of recycled Baked Beans and Soup cans. Mouth-wateringly simple. Check them out at fuseinteriors.ie
There is an argument that the advent of the iPad will make magazines in their traditional format an outdated medium. A visit to Minizine, the new magazine shop which has recently opened at Indigo & Cloth on Dublin’s South William Street, puts paid to that notion. This store within a store celebrates the magazine in all of its weighty and tactile beauty. Stocking a range of titles unavailable anywhere else in Ireland, Garrett Pitcher has put together an unrivalled collection of material for anyone with a passion for photography, art or fashion.
It is a beautifully curated collection of magazines, zines and art books encompassing titles such as Self-Service (a Paris-based fashion and culture biannual), Dossier (a bi-annual arts and culture journal incorporating fashion, photography, creative writing, art, music and culinary pursuits) and Inventory (a curation of ideas in product, craft and culture). I defy anyone who goes in not to lose track of time while browsing through the collection.
Garrett intends to use the space he has created for Minizine for brand collaborations and other collections in the future. It is nice to see someone stepping out of the mainstream and embracing new retail and cultural trends. Dublin needs more choice and inspiration so I hope Minizine will prove to be a success.
