Poor and Privileged

Read about my trip to Maze at the Marriot

Recently I was fortunate enough to enjoy a fine dining experience, of which a destitute student such as myself is rarely granted. For someone trained in silver service, experiencing the luxury personally was a delight. As I walked through the restaurant, doors were swiftly opened for my entrance by enthusiastic Maze staff.  My party and I were seated separately from the main restaurant, behind glass sliding doors at the Chef’s table. Situated besides the bustling kitchen, the table offered us the opportunity to watch our food be prepared by a team of fervent chefs.

The transnational wine list was presented on an iPad, which created a more entertaining experience to browsing the menu. A shared starter of sushi platters instigated the meal, the mackerel pate topped with plantain chips was particularly exquisite, yet at £12 a pop for something so small, my destitute ideals tapped at my back and tugged on my purse strings.

We were then served a board of bread with a deliciously smooth butter dip. For the main I chose the cod in a butter and caper sauce, which was accompanied by a creamy mash. The fish was faultlessly cooked and paired well with the delectable yet not over powering sauce. We shared side dishes of Portobello mushrooms, spinach and chips topped with truffle oil and Parmesan. The mushrooms were cooked to perfection and worked well with the main.

To finish, a chocolate brownie topped with salted caramel ice cream. As somewhat a connoisseur of chocolate brownies, the texture was rich, gooey and crumbly, yet not unlike the many I have tasted in restaurants that didn’t charge almost £10 for the treat. The salted caramel ice cream however, was mouthwateringly scrumptious, I feel utterly desirous just reminiscing.

Our evening was topped off with a visit to the Marriot members club in the basement of the hotel, which accommodated several fridges very handsomely housing an array of complimentary drinks. Don’t look at me like that, I’m a student, can’t say no to free beer now can I? 

Pencil to Pixel

For those with a slightly creepy fetish for typography, like myself, Metropolitan Wharf is currently a place of delight. Housed in the tastefully renovated riverside Victorian warehouse, Monotype UK exhibits its past present and future.

Spanning over a hundred years the typographic institution has manipulated the way in which we read today. The show enthusiastically allows the average Joe the opportunity to observe pieces not usually available to the general public. Original hand drawings by type designers such as Eric Gill and Bruce Rogers demonstrate the hard graft that goes into designing a typeface. This compels you to appreciate the vast array of fonts now available at the click of a button. As it’s name promises, Pencil to Pixel takes you on a journey from the original hand drawn sketches, to the digitalisation of the modern age.

After the memorable appearance of Eric Gill’s experimental typographic pieces at the Beauty in the Making exhibit last spring, Monotype has once again teamed up with GFSmith to create some beautifully high quality printed booklets. The exhibit also displays a really interesting selection of the archives records of typeface development, drawings, artwork, promotional materials and photographs. A visit to the gift shop is definitely recommended; I personally fell in love with a charming book of photographic postcards, but with mugs, booklets and limited edition posters there’s plenty to choose from.

The Camden Arts Centre - It's Ok to be Boring

Simon Raven 

It’s not as often as I’d like it to be that I walk into an art gallery and feel instantly at home. My first visit to the Camden Arts Centre was an enjoyable one; I discovered a place that celebrates artists, educates all ages and allows space to relax and unwind. Upon arrival I was welcomed by an assortment of books spanning the length of the ground floor; a variety of reading material is available to visitors of all ages and creative interests.

The Camden Arts Centre exudes a family friendly atmosphere, with courses for all ages, such as clay sculpting and life drawing, as well as a garden to sit and unwind, which I can only imagine thrives in the summertime. The Centre even runs a garden residency, Taking Root, which allows visitors to explore the thriving ecology that surrounds them.

When exploring the upstairs galleries I discovered that the most exciting thing about the Centre was housed in a playful and unusual studio currently in the residence of Simon Raven. His studio is filled with a variety of interesting and humorous contraptions. In the time that Raven has occupied the space he has transformed the large white room into an artist’s playground to which an open door policy is in place. Raven’s practice is multi-disciplinary involving performance, painting, film and music.

Raven is a welcoming character; it makes an interesting change to talk to an artist directly about their practice than read it from the wall next to their work. He is inspired by the writings of Slavok Zizek and is developing a psychoanalytical space entitled ‘It’s OK to be boring’, which he explains is a comment on the atmosphere generally generated by artists work with a psychoanalytical premise. The space is far from boring and plays host to a ‘Iceberg Lounge’ that Raven created for a Frieze VIP party inspired by the 1960s batman villain Mr Freeze. A giant iceberg sculpture is placed in the centre of the room and surrounded by works involving tinfoil and lights among other materials and found objects to explore.

Raven is also hosting a literary ghost themed party on Halloween (31/10/12 7pm-9pm) in celebration of his residency’s conclusion, to which the best costume will win a painting of Raven’s depicting pugs in space.

The Camden Arts Centre epitomises the character of Camden; a fun, open, family orientated building, housing interesting art work and opportunities, with the odd flamboyant and affable character thrown in for good measure.

Rubbish Duck

Camden Lock has recently been graced with the presence of a less than feathered friend. Two MA students from Central St Martins, created the sculptured duck from over 2000 plastic bottles found in the Thames and Regent’s Canal by the volunteers of the Thames 21 Organisation. The large duck floats peacefully across areas of London as a gentle reminder to the public of plastic pollution worldwide. The sculpture represents the country’s neglect towards the environment and the threat that it poses to all manners of wildlife.

Not only does the aquatic creature remind us of the effect our waste can have on the environment, it’s slow drift across the river adds a tranquil calm to the hussle and bussle of the Camden streets. It’s charming colours paired with the transparency of the bottles create something quite lovely to look at, especially with the addition of the surrounding glow of nightlife and reflection in the water. So make sure you visit before he/she floats away on tour of London!

For more information on the project visit:

http://www.rubbishduck.com/

For information on how you can help the clean up of London’s rivers visit:

http://www.thames21.org.uk/events/

Jenny Saville at Modern Art Oxford Review

Cambridge born artist and graduate of Edinburgh College of Art, Jenny Saville has graced Oxford, with the privilege of hosting her first ever solo exhibition in the UK.  With a beautiful yet unnerving aura, Saville traces back her practice from the early nineties to the present in the well-lit, warm environment of Modern Art Oxford (MAO).

Saville has gained a prosperous reputation in the States following the success of her show at the Saatchi Gallery in 1994 yet due to her keen attraction to a figurative opus, was not necessarily deemed ‘fashionable’ among the painting world. Perhaps this explains the delay for a solo exhibit, yet Saville felt that the time had come to display in the city where she fabricates her work “I feel it is the right time to show in this country and this is a beautiful museum with wonderful daylight."

The exhibition takes a reverse chronological approach to displaying Saville’s pieces with her most recent works in the downstairs entrance of MAO. The layered nude portraits take inspiration from the artist’s experience of motherhood and capture the concept of shifting time and movement.

 With a stimulus of the Renaissance Virgin and Child the gestural pieces demonstrate her incredible skills as a craftsman and artist.

Meanwhile upstairs, Saville’s earlier works, such as the ‘Stare’ series, explore areas such as the boundaries between states of the body, medical and social categorisation, and life and death give a slight unsettling feeling, yet the sheer talent cannot be denied. It’s no surprise that works such as the 16ft-wide ‘Fulcrum’ took two years to accomplish. The upstairs leads onto Saville’s preliminary paintings that rose her to fame in the nineties for demonstrating and implying the marking and restricting of the female form. The colour scheme of the oil paintings and Saville’s brushwork captures the shapes and contours of the female body with beauty and opulence.

The basement of MOA host a film interview with Saville herself, allowing guests the opportunity to get a real understanding of the artist’s mind. In the discussion, Saville talks about individual pieces, such as ‘Torso 2’, that she worked on to ‘channel the feelings of being human into an animal carcass.’  She explains the project captured her inspiration for being ‘a mass of masculinity’, dissimilar to her other works which exude femininity.

While her work is not something you would necessarily want to wake up to in the morning, it cannot be denied that Saville’s practice is executed with great skill and emotion. MOA has accomplished a great task in hosting her first solo exhibition, and I would very much recommend going to see the collection composed as one while you can! And while in Oxford city, two of Saville’s recent works inspired by Leonardo’s The Burlington House Cartoon, can be found a short walk away resting in the Italian Renaissance space of the Ashmolean Museum.

 Jenny Saville at Modern Art Oxford till 16.09.2012 

Waste Not - Song Dong

‘Wu jin qi yong’ is what Chinese artist Song Dong titles his latest edition of work currently carpeting the floor of the curve gallery of the Barbrican. Loosely translated as ‘Waste not’, the categorically curated piece, comprising of over 10,000 everyday possessions, is homage to his mother, Zhao Xiangyuan. With China’s drift away from socialism and toward the ‘restoration of capitalism’ in 1966, at the hands of Chairman Mao, Zhao Xiangyuan saw no other option than to be parsimonious.

Hording has always been an obligatory way of life in hard times and seems to leave the individual with the need to save everything for future use. This is undeniably apparent when viewing the vast collection of items before you, such as empty toothpaste tubes, drinks cans and broken pots and pans, some of which I fail to see as reusable other than by recycling. However, Song Dong was motivated to make his mother’s obsession an art piece due to a family tragedy, the loss of his father in 2002. Zhao Xiangyuan descended into a deep depression and began to attempt to fill the void left in her life with material possessions, regardless of their use. It was then that Song Dong suggested that they used her obsession as an art form and outlet for her grief and states that “It gave my mother a space to put her memories and history in order”.

I had anticipated that many of the Chinese articles would seem unfamiliar to me, which was certainly true upon arriving at the exhibition to be greeted by an array of foreign toys and tools. Yet as I made my way thorough the space, I was surprised by the scale of recognisable packaging, that speaks a lot for the globalisation of the commerical industry.

One thing that Song Dong does very successfully through his piece is compel the viewer to think about the amount they waste. Walking past the multiple objects laid out before me, I am instantly aware of the amount that I toss to the landfill. ‘Waste not’ has a relevance to us all, the exhibit forces you to question your influence on the environment by throwing things away. Perhaps we should question what we do with items that we believe to be done with, and ask ourselves whether they really need replacing.

Why I wish I was a little boy named Bernard

Everyone has an answer to the untimely question of “If you could have a superpower, what would it be?” and although invisibility and the ability to fly have very charming attributes, I’ve decided to take my wishful thinking to a more subordinate level. If you’re an eighties or nineties child I’m sure you will fondly remember the TV show Bernard’s watch, and that is indeed what I would wish for, the ability to pause time. Seriously, 24 hours are not sufficient.

For me, I’m a student, I establish my own personal projects, I hold two jobs, a long distance relationship, attempt to see friends and family from all over, I work out four times a week (on a good week might I add) and there’s always an errand to be ran. I know I’m very lucky to be following my dream, doing something creative with my life and studying in an awesome city, yet I find that sometimes I’m losing the will to live. I’m positive I’m not alone, my peers are under the same pressure, and with the big wide world lurking ahead we’re all keen to be as paramount as possible to show it what we’ve got. Plus we’ve all got to sleep sometime!

There are 24 hours in a day, 168 in a week and 720 in a month, so much can be accomplished, so much can be wasted, but it’s time to stop worrying about it!  I’m beginning to apprehend that I’m not a perfect person, and neither are you! It’s time to chill out a bit and be proud of what can be achieved to the best of your ability.

I’m certainly not declaring that we should all just give up. Especially when my friends and I are at the beginning of our potential careers, it’s exceptionally important that we work hard to be the best that we can be. We should intern, shadow and experience, learn, study and review, write, create and establish. Most importantly we should relish in what we do and look forward to entering the real world with what we have to offer. Nevertheless, superpowers are unobtainable and have you ever heard of a hero selecting his proficiency?

Enjoy what you do, and allow yourself some down time. Work hard, play hard. The finest advice I know, perhaps though, we could add: Relax hard?

British Design 1948-2012

With the imminent Olympics and Diamond jubilee, it seems that Britain has a lot to be proud of this summer. The growing patriotism of the country makes it no surprise that galleries are taking up the opportunity to flaunt our creativity and the V&A is no exception. Christopher Breward and Ghislaine Wood, the curators of the current exhibit, have focused the showcase between British hosting of the prestigious Olympic games; from the hard graft of the ‘austerity games’ in 1948 to what promises to be a more glamorous event in 2012. British Design 1948-2012 follows the ever-changing culture in Britain from post war renovation to the flourishing technology of modern day, and marks the ways in which creatives overcome and embrace change to the British lifestyle.

Upon entering the exhibit you are welcomed with a romantic celebration of Britain’s architectural history in the form of a section of John Piper’s mural ‘The Englishman’s home’.  Sitting majestically beneath the homage of British construction sits three elegantly designed chairs of the 1950’s, including Ernst Grace’s marvellous Kangaroo rocking chair, featured greatly in the Festival of Britain, made from a long single length of steel.

British Design is separated into three main expanses, each space giving off a very different ambiance. Initially, we are engrossed in Tradition and Modernity an area that focuses on the devastating impact of the Second World War and the reconstruction of British culture. The Festival of Britain in 1951 takes a strong rostrum in this section, this event, and others such as the coronation of Elizabeth II were clearly a beacon towards progressive design and lifestyle. This portion of the exhibit enthusiastically displays the growing concern, in the 50s, of successful and healthy lifestyle, including sections on the design of innovative urban planning to ethical living. There’s much to take in Tradition and Modernity and every spectator is guaranteed to find something of interest, whether it be in the Harris tweed revival through designers such as Vivienne Westwood, or the development of the Routemaster bus that stayed functional until 2005.

Succeeding this, we move into the Subversion space, focusing on the insurgence of British art school students into the creative domain. With the faint sound of David Bowie overhead, I for one am instantly more settled upon entering this part of the exhibit. From the influence of artists such as Hockney, Paolozzi and Hamilton in the Pop era of the 60s to the anarchism of Punk in the 70s this elating section of the exhibit demonstrates the irreverent and innovative approaches that sculpted Britain’s cultural landscape. The influence of the designer on music, fashion and youth culture is displayed distinctly throughout this section, which truly emphasises how much power creativity can attain.

With a warm farewell from a gathering of CSM (Central St Martins) graduate garments, we enter the third and final aspect of the show, Innovation and Creativity. At first I am enthused that the first thing I lay my eyes on is a rather gorgeous Jaguar E-Type, yet as I make my way through the final part of the exhibition it is clear that the world we live in today is very far from the world in which I entered the exhibition. Innovation and Creativity moves away from traditional manufacturing towards the more recognisable technological design to which we have become accustomed, as is ultimately a reminder that the social media and gaming are taking over our lives.

Overall, I would consider the British Design to be a success; the curators have successfully engaged me into understanding an impressive overview of 60 years of hardship, revolution and design. Whether it be theatre design, aeronautical engineering or video games, there will be something you enjoy displayed in the exhibition. Finding it on the other hand is a different matter. If anything, I would consider the show to be overwhelming of information, and really a good afternoon is required to appreciate the multitudes of work on display. This exhibition is more than design, it is a homage to the strength and pride of the British in overcoming cultural, economical an physical strains on our society, and ultimately achieving great creative solutions to whatever the problem may be. 

Tickets