The Cypriot Playing Cards Walking Stick Exhibition

The Cypriot Playing Cards Walking Stick - Savvas Papasavvas,
alumnus of the FA Sculpture studio and CSM 3d graduate 2004-2007

at

22 Little Russell Street, Bloomsbury

PV 4th March at 6pm-9pm,
Show continues 5th & 6th March, 11am to 6pm.

"Cyprus is a metaphor to me and I don’t see it as part of my identity, at least not in any traditional sense of the word, where identity refers to the past. Cyprus as a metaphor refers to the future and while the future is not known, not preordained, as a metaphors it is still distinctly recognisable and symbolises more than just sameness. That is more than the sameness between Greek Cypriots and Greece or Turkish Cypriots and Turkey. If my identity were to be Cypriot, it would only be Cypriot, as is this walking stick.

The Cyprus problem is one of many examples of divided communities across the globe but unlike Palestine or Northern Ireland, it is not a religious conflict. I suppose I make a point of this because it is a positive aspect to the problem and it may be a reason why a solution could be found. Religion is deeply rooted in the past and the past can’t change, especially if your identity and your past are the same thing. But when your identity is more like a metaphor then you are rooted in the future.

Maybe I am clutching at straws here but I felt I needed to make these points before another Greek or Greek Cypriot comes and slaps me on the back, shouting, “Ré Malaka! Are you Greek?” Or if no Turkish or Turkish Cypriot decides to come to the show because they see the ‘Papa’ before the ‘savva.’"


Savvas will be will be coming to the Foundation FA Sculpture studio to present his work and experience.

Hopefully see you there on thursday.

More Free Films...

Lots and Lots of film.....
Another option is on friday morning at 10.00 Camberwell do do two film screenings for their foundation students at the Vue in Leister square (for free), You don't know what they are until the day, but I over heard girl last week saying that tomorrows films are meant to be good.
Hope to see one or two of you lovely people there.
ciao x

Experience: I became a famous artist at the age of 94

Hi all

...I'm not encouraging anyone to take this as a role model for being a professional artist...after all, this is three quarters of a century down the line for most of you...even so, quite a touching article and idea of what being an artist is about.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/feb/20/carmen-herrera-artist




Five years ago, some of my canvases were included in an exhibition in New York showcasing female g eometric painters. There was an element of chance involved – a good friend put my name forward when one of the other artists dropped out. A collector bought five of my pieces, the first I had sold. I was 89 years old; I had been painting full-time for more than 60 years.

Over the decades I had occasional exhibitions and good reviews, but never sold a painting. The type of work I was doing simply wasn't fashionable. There were knock-backs, too, such as a gallery owner who loved my work but wouldn't show it, because I was a woman. Benign neglect, I call it – there was never any malice intended. I suppose I was a little bit ahead of my time and paid for it.

Perhaps if I'd been more a ggressive things might have worked out differently, but for me, the work was everything. Recognition and money have never been an issue, painting is simply my vocation.

In 1939, when I met my husband in my native Cuba, I was studying architecture. I had done some sculpting, but after I married Jesse, an English professor, and moved with him to New York, my priorities shifted. I started training at New York's Art Students League, but wasn't satisfied. It was all so academic, and though I felt there was something I needed to express, I wasn't finding a way to do it. It wasn't until we spent some years living in Paris after the war that I made the discovery that was to change the course of my life.

Browsing through some bookstalls on the banks of the Seine, I came across something I simply hadn't known existed. Every two years, Le Salon des Réalités Nouvelles had an e xhibition of practically every geometric or minimalist artist in Europe. I opened a catalogue of one and was floored by some of the images I saw. I i mmediately knew this was the path I wanted to take.

I had to change my way of thinking and feeling about painting, and reject everything I'd been taught. I gave up representational art entirely and started working in the abstract. It was a struggle, but an interesting struggle. I worked very, very hard, and little by little, over many, many years, I came to find my own voice.

Jesse was endlessly supportive and one of the very few people who understood what I was aiming at. Poor man – I inflicted a lot of difficulties in his life. We had to move to neighbourhoods that were cheap but sometimes a little dangerous so I could have a big enough place to paint, and he did this with a lot of grace. I had a secure existence. We had no children, so once Jesse left for work in the morning I'd get any necessary housework out of the way and then paint for hours. Many talented people drop out of art because they can't afford to do it, which is terribly sad. I was a very lucky woman. Even after Jesse died, in 2000, I carried on. I had no choice – my work really needed to come out, it was a necessity, as well as a pleasure.

After those first paintings were bought in 2004, word spread quickly and other pieces were sold. I was in shock for days. Now I have pieces in collections all over the world. Yet perhaps it's been a good thing I was able to work for so many years without recognition. I was left alone to refine and distil my art for decades, paring things down to their essence. I have no regrets, no complaints, and my work is more important to me than ever. I'm not as well as I would like to be, but as soon as I b egin painting all my aches and pains disappear.

I don't know how I would have reacted if I had been more successful when I was young. Now it's nice, and I have more money than I could ever have imagined earlier in my life. Yet I'm not overwhelmed by it at all. I've always been a private person, and my work is my private life – I'd resent it if I felt people were intruding when I was trying to paint. But it is very pleasant to be recognised a little bit – I've made it on to the cover of the New York Times without having to kill anyone. All I had to do was get old. The world came to me eventually – I just had to wait 94 years, that's all.

• As told to Chris Broughton

Consume Peckham

CONSUME PECKHAM
18 FILMS

Screening: Monday 1st March 6.30-8pm
Peckham Multiplex. 95a Rye Lane.
Admission £2
The Screening is part of the I Love Peckham 2009 Development Project.
I Love Peckham 2009-2010 is managed by Southwark Arts Forum

Consume Peckham: 18 films, is a collaborative film project between 18 businesses and 57 students from Chelsea College of Art and Design. The films take a fresh look at the complex relationships between culture and commercialism in Peckham, as seen from the point of view of young people unfamiliar to the area. With guidance and support from mentors the students have been encouraged to integrate themselves into the community and take a deep approach to research in order to gain trust from the businesses they are seeking to understand.

We observe the mundane and the poetic in the day to day routine of Ozzie’s Café; we witness the preparation of a traditional Pakistani goat stew, we seek to understand why Peckham needs a Persian corner shop, Seen together, the 18 films build up a multifaceted documentary portrait of Peckham revealing tangled cultural, social and economic relationships. The films ask if the abundance of diversity in such a confined space can create a utopia; or if divisions and differences create tensions that cannot be bridged.

Poetry and others

hello,

for those who may be interested, there is a nice cafe in convent garden that has regular poetry evenings. It is a quite nice little comfortable place and it belongs to "the poetry society".

this is the link to their events/website
http://more.poetrysociety.org.uk/cafe/calendar.php



also another places that is worth to check out:

http://www.cafeoto.co.uk/cafe.shtm - nice cafe with interesting projects going on, mostly connected to experimental music.

http://www.shunt.co.uk/ - a theater company based in the part of London Bridge tube station that is not being used. It's an impressive place to go out and every night they have lots of performances, installations, music, varied shows happening. A very exciting cultural and huge huge space to go.

http://www.anightlessordinary.org.uk/ - this is a new offer supported by the arts council England, which is free theater tickets for under 26's. Just search the theaters and performances available, some of the most known places don't offer all free tickets, but have good discounts.


yey!

bye,

ana

Artists Films @ The Camden Arts Centre

http://www.camdenartscentre.org/home/?id=100814

I know that you may be busy over this period but there is a little something for everyone in this programme of films curated by Kate Davies.

Best

Pierpaolo

Journeys With No Return

Can Hardly recommend you all to visit A Foundation where twelve turkish artists reflect on turkish migration on contemporary art.

For you who never been there.. Just off Shoreditch high st., besides Arnold Circus. The street is Club Row i think.

have a nice weekend and good luck on tuesday!

//R

Chiharu Shiota: One Place (Haunch of Venison Gallery)

An installation made out of 400 windows from Berlin assembled by Shiota on daily visits to demolition sites in East Berlin.

A metaphor for an opening and a barrier at the same time.

AMAZING!

A show...

another...

and another

Cheap books...

Publications on sale will range from monographs to exhibition catalogues, magazines to auction catalogues with prices starting from £5.

Crash - Gagosian Galler Britania Street

SAATCHI GALLERY

DUKE OF YORK's HQ, KINGS ROAD, LONDON

RICHARD WILSON IN CONVERSATION AT THE SAATCHI GALLERY

To coincide with the new installation of his celebrated oil
installation 20:50, Richard Wilson will be discussing his work with
the critic Ossian Ward at the Saatchi Gallery on Thursday 25 February
at 7.30pm. Tickets are £10 and there are only 300 seats available so
you are advised to book early.

Richard Wilson is one of Britain's most celebrated sculptors, known
for his interventions in architectural space which are characterised
by concerns with size and structural daring. 20:50 was first created
in 1987 and has been described as ‘one of the masterpieces of the
modern age’ by the art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon.

To purchase tickets for this event please book online at
www.saatchigallery.com/oil. You will be issued with a reference number
which you must bring to the gallery to gain admission to the event.

You will also have the chance to see the Saatchi Gallery's current
exhibition The Empire Strikes Back: New Art from India.

chicken skin for robin

I found this artist on the internet and I think you should really look into her work because she does very similar things to your idea of the chicken skin. Using the wall and organic materials. You'll see...

This is her website:

http://www.katemccgwire.com/index.php?pid=40&sid=2009

I hope it helps!

stephanie

Time Project

Hi all

Please find Time Project on Blackboard>Curriculum Areas>FAP>Projects

Sound Symposium at the Tate Modern this Staurday

CRiSAP (Creative Research into Sound Arts Practice) presents:

Speaking Out

The Spoken Word in Artistic Practice

Saturday 6 February 2010, 10.30–17.30

This symposium focuses on the use of the spoken word in artistic practice and its manifestations in sonic and audiovisual art works. Taking the lead from the recently published anthology of works Playing with Words: The Spoken Word in Artistic Practice, this event encompasses performances, talks and conversations by artists and researchers who employ spoken words as their material and inspiration.

Contributors include Tomomi Adachi, Caroline Bergvall, David Toop, Imogen Stidworthy, Brandon LaBelle, Oswaldo Macià, Dani Gal, Nye Parry, Inua 'Phaze' Ellams, Cathy Lane and Trevor Wishart.

http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/eventseducation/symposia/20795.htm

Tate Modern, Starr Auditorium

£25 (£15 concessions), booking recommended

For tickets book online

or call 020 7887 8888.

CRISAP, Creative Research into Sound Art Practice, London College of Communication, University of the Arts London in collaboration with Tate.

Funded by the AHRC.

Room Project -parasitical space engagement

Initial Idea
:coming from the spatial class where bunch of students usually sit in group like some sort of magnet, sculpture class was quite a change. At first it was bit weird to see people having individual space, some sticking to the wall like a gum.... (no offence!)
Another thing which I was keep observing, even before I joined the sculpture class, was the way
people sit inside the bus. I always take bus on the way to school and the way back home. It was quite a nice enclosed area to notice how humans engage each other. I strongly notice how everyone wants and likes to sit next to the window, again sticking like a gum. 90% of the people will always choose to sit in an empty area rather than sitting next to some strangers.
so I sort of designed a bus called " Everyone wants to sit next to Window" Bus, covering almost all the surfaces with glass, and realized people will now feel rather insecure, having too much transparancy. like human having a bone without skin.
Then I came to sculpture room and noticed how there are so many windows, and initially thought I could use it to create a bus like structure.. However, after lot of sketching, I thought it would be too literal, and wanted to convey the idea of "individualism" in less direct and more interesting way.

Process
After seeing sculpture students work and talking to couple of them, I was surprised to see the contrast of the way people work in Fine art from design. Especially I would say Charlie seemed to be a classic fine art student- having his own phase of working. creating his own working environment(he was making a working board for his own desk)
I was impressed by his deep engagement with one medium- concrete. So I thought it would be more interesting to engage with a sculpture student,(they are the ones who make up the atmosphere of the room) rather than just having my work hanging on the wall. So I thought of making a sort of a room for him and his desk,. in a room(sculpture room), sort of caging him with bars - with designs which I had in mind for making a bus. anyway I picked him cuz he was kind enough to allow such annoyance as well.!

Final outcome..?

Another idea which was going through my mind was the spatial design project which I was meant to do if I didn't swap to fine art. -called "Parasite". creating a parasitical design and bla bla bla.... you know , grass is always greener in the other side. so suddenly got this desire of creating something parasitical... you know (temporarily regreting of my change...? only for a while!:p)
so I thought...why can't I incorporate two ideas?
why can't Charlie be my 'host' and I be the 'Parasite'. So I decided to create something which is some sort of an extention,, continuation of idea, so I start to knit,, -saw my hallmate knitting , seemed interesting,, and you know as you knit, you are sort of reproducing the same shape.. something biological I thought.. It could be sort of connecting to the cages as again, a growing parasite.

so I made this wooden cage, after testing with my model( a wooden bar, wired and roped around, and plaster poured- mere experimentation). So I made a void rectangular solid with wood , exactly measure to fit into Charlie. Half way of creating it, I quite like the way it was just obstructing the area within the classroom and just wanted to leave inside void. So I left it ... and though, should I complete it by drilling 2 more wooden bars.. but wouldn't like it as it would turn into an object..
so I left the 2 bars away from the semi-cage... and I researched into more of type of parasite, and some of them did not stay in one host but moved around.. so I thought,
Charlie can be my first host while, the cage become parasite as it is meant and made to be fit into his space, then, that semi cage becomes the host and the other 2 wooden bars become the parasite, as those two were made and meant to fit into its structure..

and yeah.. I like the way people were struggling ...to move... and to add to the annoyance, I connected the thread from knitting around the classroom so draw attention to the personal space students use...

and I bet tomorrow people will have quite trouble moving around!

Here is an interesting range of work to look at and potentailly reference if appropriate.

http://www.eai.org/eai/artistIndex.htm

Nick Cave's soundsuits

I found this today,
sculpture? suit? live sculpture when being worn? do they work equally when not in the body?

the artist:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PwupTQt9zxY

and a bad bad video, but showing a lot of examples and stages of production of the work:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdmMM6iAt8E

1st thursday of the month!

As you might know this coming thursday is the first thu of the month which means all the galleries on Red Church street has previews between 6-9. As usual there will be another few drinks at the Owl and Pussycat at the same street till the sunrise!
See you there!

XXXr

Blu Blu muot video

have a look at some of these videos, they are amazing, and although illustrations the use of "space" and the 'location" of the work seemed relevant to the way we are working WITH the building.

Hope you like

xxx

http://vimeo.com/993998?pg=embed&sec=993998