minimalgothistimetravel

On Thursday spent the day at the study centre at the V&A to handle some of their vast Pugin archive http://www.flickr.com/photos/southofbloor/4799676752/. Its always exciting to be confronted by archival boxes and the anticipation was worth it as there was some wonderful items to look at. It was all part of the support structure offered by Caroline of Camac Design around the wallpaper competition that year 2 Norwich University of the Arts (nuca) textile students are undertaking. I became specially engaged in a small book of designs for furniture after looking at an ecclesiastical catalogue in the British Galleries before i went in the study centre. I think that I am interested in creating designs for a box-like structure that could not be made – gothic tardis – and then thought about the idea of minimal gothic. But most of the time I became really aware of the idea of heritage and felt really manipulated in that if I thought what does the monarchy look like? or englishness created in the technicolor films mainly with Stewart Granger or Richard todd in them – it would look a bit like the boxes of Pugin material – all those bold designs of roses and entwined rope.  

http://lesbicknell.blogspot.co.uk/

The start of on-going stuff about Pugin

This year Camac are organising a Design Competition for students from various selected art / design degrees around the country.

The 2012 brief is based around the work of Pugin as he would have been 200 this year. Part of the aim of this blog is to let the students from those courses know about things that might inspire their design submissions

He created most of the surface design in the Palace of Westminster so we went there for an evening with the Pugin Society.

Here is a taster of some of his amazing wallpaper – these pictures don't do it justice - the colour is so vibrant. Apparently when Pugins' house in Ramsgate was re-decorated in reproduced Pugin wallpaper, the colour was dulled slightly as it was felt that a modern audience almost wouldn't believe that the original bright colours were truly victorian.

More info about the evening & other Pugin related stuff to follow.

The work of the finalists, as well as pieces by invited artists and designers will be on show to the public at various venues later in the year. We’ll keep you up to date via this Blog as the competition progresses.

Pattern & Tidiness in Holland

Just been on a trip to Delft in Holland. We cycled from the Hoek van Holland, and whilst cycling along their amazingly civillised cycle paths it struck us how neatly ‘patterned’ everything is. 

It’s all tidied up, not a thing out of place, but with a real enjoyment in creating pattern & structure from the everyday things that surround us.

From the trees:

To the gardens:

To the pavements:

To the forks on a café wall in Delft:

To the egg cups in an Easter Window:

Fine Art & the Decorative: current shows at Tate Modern

Yayoi Kusama is showing at Tate modern at the moment. She’s an obsessive artist who plays around with lots of things that we often associate with ‘decoration’. Things like repeat, polka dots, surface ‘design’, creating environments, fashion and so on. It’s such an enjoyable show, and the infinity space is magical. It’s much better seeing it in real life than imagining it from a picture in a book. So go if you can before it shuts on June 5^th 2012.

And while you’re there look at (and buy!) some of the products they have made to go with the show - fantastic plates, tea towels, hankies etc.  She fits into that space between fine art & surface design & her work translates so well into ‘mass production’. She was the first artist to make an installation with her images used as 'wallpaper'.

Although she started off well before the 80s so much of the Tate product that goes with the show has a fantastic 80s feel. And they look great with those lovely black & white Marimekko plates

Damien Hirst is showing at Tate Modern until the 9^th September. Lots of people dismiss him because he makes nice things that make money for him. But he is a product of Thatcherism and central to his artistic practice is the canny business attitude that was at the core of the Thatcher era.

And he makes (or has made for him) beautiful crafted ‘art objects’, especially as his career has progressed and his work has become more ‘decorative’. The work has meaning; it’s not just about being aesthetically pleasing.

He’s not alone. Think of artists like Jeff Koons, Andy Warhol or even Alighiero Boetti (who is at Tate Modern too until 27^th May 2012). 

Their art was backed up with philosophy, with thinking, with ‘meaning’ if you like – not least about the artist being a commercial (or even anti-commercial’ creature). But it’s also fairly easy to grasp because it deals with the stuff we all care most about: life, death, love, sex and so on – in a way that looks nice.

That doesn’t make the work worse – or denigrate them as artists at all in our eyes. We’re just pointing out that the craft involved in the making of it, & the fact that it is pleasing to the eye is really important. It gives us as an audience an ‘in’ to the ideas behind the work, which we can deal with or not, depending on how we feel that day. We spend so much of our lives surrounding ourselves with things that make us feel good when we look at them, or try them on or whatever. 

It’s central to all of our existences, even in the ‘Fine Arts’, even if we don’t all like to admit it.