Blatent Boasting

Just thought I'd let you know,  I've recently been given my first paid commission as an art writer. Fabulous.

Also, I found this nice little bit of writing about blogs which some of you might enjoy reading.

Michael

Companions, Magazines and Idea(l)s

Just spotted this being advertised on the weekly mailing listing for Volcanic Tongue, an experimental music boutique based on Argyle Street (not far from Jim Lambie's studio to use a familiar reference point) - it's an insider's guide and map to Glasgow's interesting buildings, attractions and curiosities published by Herb Lester Associates. Selling for about £3, A Glasgow Companion includes parks, pubs, restaurants, record shops, galleries, architecture and places to hangout amongst its 50 entries and is presented as a folded A3 poster lithoprinted on recycled paper. I've not got a copy of it myself, just thought I'd share it as a curious product...

Speaking of independent publications and kind of in contrast to the above, an artist friend I know called Jasia Little recently put together within the space of a couple of months an online blog and quarterly magazine called Anti-Body. The first issue, spanning over 200 pages (!), includes a number of interviews with creative friends specialising in painting, photography and fashion alongside accompanying photos of their work, plus some reviews of other exhibitions around West Yorkshire. It's free to read here. In addition she's also started producing a photocopied zine called Point Art Zine between herself and another artist called Eleanor - already they've produced two issues within the space of a month which they've handed out for free at local music festivals. Back issues are being posted online once their limited run of physical copies run out. She's currently been doing all this between working on her dissertation as she starts her final year studying Fine Art at Bradford College too - inspiring company and not dissimilar to where some of us were around the same time in our education...

As for us? Well, I'm glad that a new Manifesto is about to come together and that there's also plans for a video project, but I'm thinking (rather than actually doing, of course!) that we should have a bit more going on, both as a collective and as individuals. So far we've only had the loose-form project Manifesto keeping us together - a one person project that other people contribute to. The changing editor/curator role keeps it fresh but the zine has never been a serious part of what we can do, merely an occasional by-product (in a way, much like the idea of a collective). We're all completely different to each other and working together is difficult at times - we can critique, encourage and motivate each other's individual projects and ideas, but we can't always rely on others to assist or be involved in our own projects (after all it only takes one slightly resistant contributor to a project to hold it back indefinitely). We're driven by our own preoccupations and obsessions, yet still immaturely in constant need of reassurance and acceptance - do you agree with me?

So how should the collective exist then? Are we very simply a group of names listed on the left hand side of a website, or a team working together? Are we autocratic? Democratic? Laissez-faire? Paternalistic? Do we assign group projects together that are led individually, or individual projects led by groups? Are projects open-invite only or curated? Do we even have to decide anything at all?

Which brings me onto future Black Swan publications - even if it's just a sole online publication with texts/interviews from us all and a few pictures (like Anti-Body) rather than a physical object (like A Glasgow Companion), I think we need to get back onto doing this. But how to do it? Would you prefer there to be a sole editor of a project who receive submissions from others who then decides the final presentation? Should we each work together in some way or another throughout all the processes, or each assign ourselves a role (one person layouts, another person binds/prints the publication)? Should we just do our own thing as individuals, and then maybe stick all the entries together in a [figurative] box at a set time in the year?

Right now - and I'm feeling selfish when I say this, although in a way I'm only being realistic from past experience - I'm thinking the latter. I'll just get on with my own Black Swan project and do it myself. Set my own rules, projects and deadlines and just share the end result. When will that happen? Oh, whenever I feel like it...

John

NOWNESS

Hi Folks,

Found this site recently and am rather taken by it. Its called Nowness and apparently is the digital leader in luxury storytelling. Each day, NOWNESS showcases an exclusive premiere of the most inspiring stories influencing contemporary culture and global lifestyle, previewing the latest in fashion, gastronomy, art, film, music, design, travel and sport.

NOWNESS also collaborates with the world’s foremost designers, creatives and thinkers in the luxury industry. NOWNESS is an innovative space where ideas, both timeless and timely, are first and foremost.

Kit

Manifesto

The deadline for Manifesto 7 submissions is fast approaching, as yet I have not received work from the majority of you. What are you waiting for? Please send your entries now! Lets get this bastard made! Lets get the show on the fucking ball rolling, done! Shagged out! Fin! It would be a shame to have a Manifesto without you.

If you need to talk anything through last minute, you can reach me on my new number 07506050762 or send me an email.

Love you long time,
Michael

Website Redesign

I've had a bit of a redesign of my website, it was getting a bit complex! I'd appreciate a bit of feedback (bearing in mind the limitations of iWeb & my abilities)

sam-smith.org.uk  in case you've forgotten since my last bit of self promotion


Sam

Michael and the Artist Factory

When I came to Grizedale, being a working class boy from suburban Glasgow, I couldn't have been farther from home, in these rural Lake District surroundings of the staggeringly beautiful and impeccable Lawson Park. Thankfully I was met with a genuine acceptance and quiet assistance by the residents, the degree of which has surprised me somewhat. 

I came here without particular proclivity for, well, anything useful. Fresh from art school, your eyes can still be a little dewy - because art schools aren't really schools are they? And what you learn in them can so easily, and often, amount to nothing at all. In fact it seems an absurd misuse of the word art, or artist, if one thinks it can be proscribed or created through a meagre three - four years in a non-school. What they do achieve though, in general, through provision of their nurturing time, space, framework, is capacity for critical outlook and thought, which is a powerful, vastly under valued skill, and quite ominously rare. But this capacity must be applied with rigour and insight to far more than just insular gallery exhibits.

Anyway, when I read the great modernists talking about the merging of art and life, as they do, it always seemed to me to veer tragically and slightly solipsistically back toward art. At Lawson Park, life really is an art, with even it's own type of autonomy in the form of six hundred feet of altitude and an exceedingly long driveway (much to the fury of certain members of the village people.) Indeed, if I could belligerently key a phrase: There is no art but life. That is to say, art here is an integral part of life, not that it doesn’t happen - it just isn’t as precious. In terms of use value though, besides growing much of it’s own foodstuffs, Lawson Park as a site has as strong a cathartic and revelatory spiritual affect as any of the conventional art-forms can claim. At the same time, as locus or matrix, it is able to export these values to make real social head way, creating interesting connections between disparate cultural nerve-endings - even if this is entirely lost on it’s most frequent visitor; the lesser Lake District Mountain-Biker.

I see Lawson Park as a yardstick, a benchmark, a tan line, err... it's like white bed linen that shows up all the dirt, hair and nasty bits that we all leave behind and makes them so obvious that we really can't ignore them any longer, in fact they become to clear that we can examine them in comfort and wonder at how they came to be, and perhaps devise ways of not getting so dirty in the future. The shit streaks and sweat patches that as a society we've grown so used to hiding under dark colours and deodorant that only once you see them you realise how easily they can be washed away. Perhaps I’m being a little think with simile, but simply put, they have a good life here, and eminently worth striving for. There are so many things that are lost to habituation of city life and work - most significantly the manual work of making or growing - which has dislocated so many lives with the reality of our existence.  This disjunction grows greater by the day, observable through the sense of suspicion and uncertainty on the part of the ‘offcomer’ people from cities, at anything that is not qualified by the framing mechanics of consumer packaging, sell-by-dates and GDAs - an odd reversal of the stereotypical country folk’s distrust of everything technological.

I've spent my three months here a bit like a sponge, quietly absorbing and reticently retaining as much as I could. I've even washed Andy Warhol’s collection of cups, and wiped down surfaces used by some great minds. But alas, my summer not-a-holiday at Grizedale is at an end and now I must go off into the night and squeeze myself of all this juice.

So long, and thanks for all those Sophistocakes (copyright Benjamin, M. Z. 2011)

Here are some photos of things what I made, grew and saw:

Michael Davis

The Death of a Working Man

The Death of a Working Man (2011) M. Davis

IRIONBRRATZ

Just seen this place advertising studio spaces which are currently available for immediate use. Theres a map which you can download off their site which shows a variety of spaces and prices. Might go and check them out sometime this coming week. They seem like a happy bunch and they are still quite a young creation at just over a year old so they seem to be quite enthusiastic at pushing the promotion of themselves and finding/giving opportunities to exhibit and more with the artists there. Its located slap bang in the middle of the city as well a short walk from GOMA.

Kit

The age of social media

Some days it really hits home how far the world has come in the digital age. For a long time now I have been working on a piece of writing concerning the rise of social media and the impact this has had on the arts and on social interaction in general. The main reason this hasn't come into fruition yet is time constraints, it is a huge subject which needs much research, and juggling this with paying work and other commitments means I haven't had the time to devote to it that I would like. However, I cannot let today pass without comment.

Today I have been humbled by Twitter and the kindness and generosity towards others shown by it's users.  Like many others I spent a sleepless night watching the 24 hour news channels and trying to keep up with the #londonriots news feed. Watching parts of the city you grew up in burn to the ground is not comfortable viewing. Particularly, the images of the fires in Croydon and Ealing were haunting. The Twitter feed was crazy, there were so many updates it was impossible to keep up with. The news reports were blaming Twitter for being the tool used to coordinate the riots, but in reality it was full of people posting pictures and reports of what they could see, warnings of where gangs were gathering and, overwhelmingly, people reaching out to loved ones in affected areas to make sure they were unharmed. This week, social media has taken over from regular news reporting, the video cameras of the bigger companies could not make it into the crowds without getting their equipment damages, or assaulted themselves, so amateur videos, photographs and reports took over.  Many news stations had to use these as all they had otherwise were ariel shots of the destruction.

Then, today, the power of social media really comes into it's own, organising people to clean the streets and donations for people who have lost their homes and possessions, all of which has been organised via Twitter or Facebook. It is a simple display of people utilising social media to help others, and it's beautiful. Please, if you can, help out #riotcleanup

Jen M

Something (will) happen

Since finishing uni a couple of months ago (though it seems like an age) I'm getting restless having not made anything. Plenty ideas; little room, little time and with my practice of video -  little of other people's time. So, I'm proposing some sort of video group. I have many loose ideas (most I've yet to properly develop past the planning stage) but very little ways to share or create them. Kit? Craig? John? Anyone else interested? Richard Wainman would have to be included cos he's the man...

Obviously the difficulty is having to live; which means much work and so colliding time schedules. I've been trying to collaborate with Richard locally though I've since met with him once since finishing uni. Though this can be held to lack of enthusiasm, being in the "what to do now?" phase. I don't feel I need a studio to make work - more so people.

So I propose anyone interested in video work - be they films, shorts, experimental, anything obscure - especially if it's for sake of learning how to do certain things (effects, genres, methods etc). I shall be up in Glasgow for a few days from August 15th so perhaps we could meet up and sort something then? My idea for this is exchanging ideas, scripts, artists, film makers, even imdb trivia- all this can be done via internet - but hopefully when time and ideas meet, let's get together and make something. I'm sure between us we can conjure up equipment, beg, borrow, steal. I managed to make all my films in year3 without Uni equipment - so it can be done easily enough.

The French New Wave began with a zine and David Lynch's Eraserhead took 5years to complete (with Jack Nance keeping that stupid hairdo for whenever schedules cleared and money came together).

So anyone interested?

I am also looking for a good excuse to perform again...

Nathan