Pop Life

Jann Haworth is a pop artist I stumbled upon at Wolverhampton Art Gallery last year for her large scale, delicious looking fabric bracelets. On a recent visit I was pleased to come across more of her work in the current pop exhibition including the piece pictured above.

Her work is vivid and fun (and I imagine tactile but the 'Do not touch' signs prevented me finding out) and reminds me of the kitsch nature of Claes Oldenburg's work; albeit on a much smaller scale.



On researching Haworth further I also found out she actually co-created the Beatle's Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band cover, pretty neat.

Animals

Currently on at Wolverhampton Art Gallery until 28th May is the exhibition Animals by Robert Davis.

Curly

Featuring large scale pencil drawings of a range of farmyard animals from a sanctuary near Worcester, each animal's name is displayed beside it in a bid to encourage the viewer to consider their own relationship with animals.

Marmite

The pieces are incredibly intricate, and the number of hours each piece took (usually in the region of several hundred) sits beside the names. There is also a video of the artist drawing one of his pieces in fast forward, drinking umpteen cups of tea and periodically joined by his cat; it's an interesting look behind the scenes (and also for some reason funny to see the artist working away in tracky bottoms).

Juxtaposed with Robert Davies own work is also a display of previous artists who inspired him, including George Stubbs and his anatomical drawings of a horse, as shown below. Definitely worth a browse, animal lover or not.

Whose streets?

Photographs from the 'March for the Alternative' protest held on 26th March 2011 against government cuts. Organised by the TUC, an estimated 250,000-500,000 people took part in the march to Hyde Park and the protest was largely peaceful (despite a small number of splinter groups who vandalised/occupied some west end shops) and very enjoyable to take part in. Hopefully it can help make a difference.

Ab Fab

Last week I went to Aberystwyth in Wales for one of my best pal's 21st Birthday, it was great. The relaxing sea breeze was a refreshing change to the London smog, and all the locals were so friendly and chatty (and made excellent welsh cakes). I got these post cards from the town museum, which was so cute and had some excellent taxidermy.



I have no idea why these elephants are in the sea there, but I like the fact the photo's called 'Mixed Bathing at Aberystwyth'. And I love these shoes, so wrong but yet so right. I could eat them they look so good.

Submarine

I just got home from watching this at the cinema, and to be honest wasn't expecting anything too great, but it was brilliant. Following a somewhat challenging pubescent period in 15 year old Oliver Tate's life, it's shot beautifully, and Oliver's narrative is both matter of fact and wryly hilarious. Even the sound track (which was by Alex Turner so I wasn't holding my breath) was wonderful, the film has a lovely overall aesthetic.

TTC

N.B.

It ain't about the b-bling b-bling

Brewster's Millions is a film which I only saw recently but has been around ages, originally based on a novel of the same name published in 1902. Since then there have been seven film versions, the most recent version which I watched from 1985.



Based around that old nugget of wisdom that money can't buy you happiness, the story follows Monty Brewster (Richard Pryor) as he attempts to squander 30 million in 30 days, so that he can inherit his uncle's full fortune of 300 million. The only catch (of course there's a catch) is that he can't tell anyone what he's doing, cannot gain any assets, cannot buy expensive things to just give them away and must receive a worthwhile service from anyone he employs. He's also restricted on how much he can donate to charity/gamble away, and if he fails to meet these stipulations by the end of the 30 day stint will receive nothing.

Somewhat predictably the task is a challenging undertaking, and his pals end up inadvertantly hindering his progress by making him money, but our endearing protagonist earnestly struggles on, resourcefully and comically doing his utmost to get rid of his wads of cash. Outdated in some ways (in a good way, who doesn't love that 80's vibe) but not others, this is a great film to watch any time you want some easy viewing/cheering up.

Turn me up some

I know some amazingly talented people, amongst them is the hip hop dancer in the above video, Omari Carter. His passion and talent is inspiring, I hope one day I'll be as good a dancer, albeit on a pole.

Unfiltered

Here are some (unfortunately lo res - phone cam) snaps of an exhibition recently put on by my good friend and talented ceramacist Elvira Roslund G. Her work is based on the themes of life, death and Zen Buddhism, amongst other things.

The massive pitchfork chilling in the background here is what she uses to extract her pieces from the kiln, once they've been roasted at over 1000 degrees. The process she uses to create her work is raku firing, a practice originating in 16th century Japan.

A video of Elvira in action creating one of her pieces is also on its way, watch this space.

The million dollar question

Wish I knew.