As a musician, you know you’ve really made it when someone gives you the chance to curate your own festival. Boutique festival All Tommorrow’s Parties will see a new type of music festival exciting Brisbane audiences. For this festival, organisers invite an artist or band to headline and then handpick its favourite performers to play at the festival. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds have been asked to headline the 2009 event and use its knowledge of the music industry to fill the remainder of the festival’s timetable. From January 12–16, Brisbane Powerhouse will host a series of bands including Fuck Buttons, Afrirampo and Harmonia. In addition to this, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds will play on January 15 at Brisbane Riverstage. There are more bands to be announced for this festival – keep in touch with the Brisbane Powerhouse website.
In most cases, we act on our thoughts about food at least three times a day. What are you going to eat? Where will you buy it or will you make it yourself? Photographer Matthew Carden thinks about food all the time. Married to a chef and working as a commercial photographer, Matthew realised that his daily dreams about food and consumption were in great contrast to the passing thought that most people give their food. So, Matthew set out to encourage people to be more aware of what they eat and encourage people to ‘play with their food’. With his series Small World the photographs juxtapose figures with seemingly mega-sized broccoli, macaroons, chicken wings, apricots and homemade marshmallows. The curator to Matthew’s collection of images says that they “speak of abundance and the ultimate waste produced on our land of plenty”. Despite the pressing issues depicted in these photos, the dreamy quality and comical value of the photos in Small World still allows viewers to enjoy the pleasures of food.
As seen on thecoolhunter.com.au, Ogily Action’s clever public campaign for MTV Switch stirred a lot of attention in Amsterdam. The realistic inflatable arms that come out of the water and hold up signs marked ‘Global Warming. What’s all the fuss about’ and a website address are honestly quite shocking. I checked out mtv.switch.com to see what all the fuss was about. Switch is MTV Networks International’s Global Climate Change Campaign. With the website, MTV hope to encourage young people all over the world to submit ideas on how we can reinvent how we live in ways that are ‘cool for us and the planet’. With the slogan ‘Go Lo-Carb’, MTV’s Switch campaign is obviously directed at its young audience and even though the website is still in its early stages, it does have some valuable content including news feeds from popular green blogs, a carbon calculator and videos profiling young green achievers and their stories. One of these young achievers is Monash University and Australian Young Designer of the Year winner Harsha Ravi. He won this award for his ultra-lightweight, solar-powered plastic car the Globetrotter. Ravi’s car is built for 2017 and is independent of fossil fuels, packed with eco-friendly technologies and cuts back the weight and bulk of today’s petrol guzzlers. There’s more to this car though – it even has a nano-paper battery, airless tires, nanopaints to absorb solar energy while parked to charge its batteries and woven seat material. It’s really assuring to see such vision from young designers such as Harsha. Now, all we need is more designers like him. It’s also good to see an organisation like MTV using its position in the media to influence young people to better the way we live. Here is another impressive campaign raising awareness of the effects of climate change.
Toronto Stories is a new movie comprising of four short stories that a nameless boy witnesses in the course of a single day on the city streets of Toronto - and how, in the end, each of those stories comes to be connected. Described to be in a similar vein to Paris, je t’aime, it is about different types of love and friendships. There’s a story about childhood friends, a story of awkward romance, a story of an escaped ex-con, and a story of a homeless man’s struggle. You certainly don’t actually need to know Toronto to understand the film, but for me it was kind of fun to see the familiar, and try to guess where places were. Continue reading ‘toronto stories’
Amidst the festive whirlwind of decorations, carols, Christmas parties and shopping trolleys groaning with glazed hams, bon bons and plum puddings; I can’t help but feel reflective at this time of the year. It seems that we collectively begin to regroup around now and wonder how 2008 panned out, seek to spend time with those we love and corral milestones to tick off a lifelong to-do list. Continue reading ‘The meaning at Christmas’
This guy has some nice moves.
In the digital world we live in copyright law, is somewhat, a thing of the past. Movies are easily downloadable, as are songs and television series. Counterfeit luxury brands are available for a small percentage of their cost in some countries and ideas are thrown around and grabbed by the next ‘entrepreneur’ claiming it as his or her own. RiP: A remix manifesto is an open-source documentary about copyright and remix culture that creatively explores the effect of digital technology on copyright law, as well as its contribution to an increasing global economy of ideas. Founded by Brett Gaylor, who has been working on this project for six years, RiP discovers the tycoons and unknown revolutionaries taking advantage of this new frontier as the film journeys from college dorms to the streets of Manila. Continue reading ‘rip: a remix manifesto’
For Christmas, I would like some speakers made out of recycled and sustainable materials with bonsai trees growing out of them. Is that too much to ask? JVC’s Kirikabu Speakers prove that no request is too difficult for Santa. These modular, multi-directional speakers are made of sustainable materials and double as plant holders. They can be connected to make a long line of speakers and they don’t have to bonsai’s growing from them. Imagine having these speakers out on the back deck with some herbs sprouting from them. Apparently, plants like to listen to classical music and rock music hinders their growth – so keep this in mind!
… This is the tagline for the Queensland Theatre Company’s (QTC) 2009 season, which has been crafted to celebrate the joy of facing life in all its wondrous extremes. The 2009 season features nine international and national works and kicks off in February with Ben Jonson and Bell Shakespeare’s production of The Alchemist, described as a satirical masterpiece and parade of wildly extravagant characters called Subtle and Face. These two have sets their sights on fleecing the gullible folk of London with extravagant claims of discovering the Philsopher’s Stone. With the help of Dol Common and her dubious charms, the duo are forced into even more convoluted scams as they struggle to stay one step ahead of greedy patrons, hypocritical clergymen, lovesick youth and the law. But just who is conning whom? Check the QTC website to see the full list of the 2009 QTC season. QTC will be offering a new three and five play season-ticket option for under 30s starting from $87, and for all under 30s, tickets for any session are only $30.
In a perfect world everybody would have something to eat, somewhere to sleep at night and an education. Unfortunately, for a indefinite number of reasons, this is not the case. Some people are just unlucky. Makers of the Yellow Bird Project think that it’s really important that these people be given more opportunity than they have. So if you consider yourself pretty lucky, fortunate or blessed, here’s something you can do to help. Using the power of music, and the art form’s biggest names, Yellow Bird Project has collaborated with musicians/bands to design a t-shirt. The organisers then print them and sell the t-shirts on the Yellow Bird Project website. All the money made goes to a charity of the artists’ choice. The project has three definite aims: to make money through charity organisations through the artists’ endorsement, to raise awareness for charity organisations through artists’ endorsement and to raise the profile of the artist Yellow Bird Project likes. This includes The Shins, The Magic Numbers, Holly Throsby, Wolfmother and Broken Social Scene. My personal favourite is K-OS’ t-shirt in support of ONEXONE. A close second would Clap Your Hands Say Yeah’s t-shirt designed for Art For Change.
Akira’s soft floating nostalgic kimono pattern, layered on Toshi’s contradictory timber grid-work of clean, strong open lines. “Dress Code” is a new piece of functional furniture being released into Brisbane this month. It is an exciting collaboration between two Australian designers, Akira Isogawa a world-renowned fashion designer and Toshi Ueno a Brisbane based furniture designer, which signifies their Japanese heritage and strong bond of friendship. The immaculate joinery of intersecting lines has many functions; it is a side table, shelving system, stool or simply a beautiful piece of art. Made from antique recycled woods like rosewood, silver ash or Tasmanian oak, Toshi says “they were designed to create a memorable and distinctive impression, reinventing and transforming themselves on many levels”. Providing insight into traditional Japanese Culture, Toshi drew his inspiration from Japanese folklore; an 11th Century nobleman IIikaru Genji, a Casanova of his day was famous for his many lovers. He tallied his lovers by using different symbols and embossing them on incense boxes, each symbol being a code for each mistress, Toshi examined these symbols and fleshed them out to create three-dimensional pieces.
Continue reading ‘dress code - Toshi & Akira’
Last Monday, Monifa, an endangered gorilla residing at the San Francisco Zoo gave birth to a healthy baby boy. Sadly, Monifa lost interest in the baby after a few hours and quickly left her nest never to return. It was clear that Monifa wasn’t ready for motherhood so zookeepers removed the baby safely. They have a plan to reintroduce the baby and hopefully Monifa will accept him. See the images of the new baby gorilla on the San Francisco Zoo’s website.
If there was one era that you’ve missed and you would like to experience, what would it be? Perhaps it’s the swinging 50s, or a return to the 60s for free love, rock n roll and landing on the moon. Or maybe you want relive the 70s and see what your parents really got up to. One of the funniest web applications of 2008, yearbook yourself, takes you on a trip back to the 50s and follows what you would look like in each of the following decades. Simply upload a photo and position to fit the head type. You’ll know what I mean when you do it. This application is great for those Saturday nights in or just any spare minute you have.
Japanese artist and sound engineer Daito Manabe uses the movement of his face muscles to make sound. His work is innovative and quite unbelievable. Daito is surely a welcome addition to the already impressive list of Japanese noise-music artists.
Imagine having a cow in the backyard. Or on the balcony. Slightly impractical, but that’s where Herdshare steps in. Herdshare is crowdfunding for wannabe cattle farmers. People can buy a share in a cow and pay a local farmer to board, care for, and milk the cow. The shareholder then obtains (but does not purchase) the raw milk from their own cow. Which neatly gets around the food standards regulations banning the sale of unpasteurised milk products for human consumption. The arrangement allows consumers to buy a share in a cow for about $50, plus a monthly agistment fee - yielding about seven litres of milk a week (or less, plus cheese and butter). Even better, it’s tweaking the food production paradigm, enabling consumers to become food producers. And farmers, instead of being primary producers, are paid to care for animals that are no longer theirs. The first Herdshare has hit Brisbane. It’s early days, and prices are expected to fall as demand grows. I’ll drink to that.
Ottolenghi, The Cookbook is definitely one of the stand out cookbooks of 2008. Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi wrote this cookbook in response to popular demand from loyal customers of their Notting Hill Deli/Patisserie also named Ottolenghi. After reading the first sentence boldly stating “If you don’t like lemon or garlic… skip to the last page.”, I instantly knew this was the book for me! Focusing on light, super fresh food, the recipes have a Mediterranean influence with a distinct Middle Eastern edge. Fresh fruit, vegetables, grains and pulses are the star ingredients in many of the dishes (vegetarians will love this cookbook) and the recipes are nothing too fancy or over complicated, just great flavour combinations that are also visually stunning. Fresh herbs feature heavily throughout too. Fennel, cherry tomato & crumble gratin, Cauliflower & cumin fritters with lime yoghurt, French beans & snowpeas with hazlenut and orange are just some examples. Non-vego readers are definitely well catered for with dishes like Harissa-marinated chicken with red grapefruit salad, Pan-fried sea bass on pita with labneh, tomato & preserved lemon and Beef & lamb meatballs baked in tahini. A third of the book is dedicated to their passion and love for patisserie with recipes for cakes, cupcakes, tarts, biscuits, meringues and savoury breads and pastries. If you love cooking and eating fresh, healthy and happy food than you need this cookbook!
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To the street editors and the street editor community, thank you for being part of the conversation in 2008. map looks forward to sharing more thoughts and ideas with you all in 2009. You make the world a better place.
Having cherry picked its style from a range of musical genres, Seattle quintet Fleet Foxes have divulged a sound that has been described as Appalachian folk, classic rock, AM country and even SoCal. Built on a love of acoustic and electric guitars, rolling tom drums, mandolins, dulcimers, pianos, kotos and most of all vocal harmony and melody, Fleet Foxes has astounded music critics with its first self-titled album. From ‘White Winter Hymnal’, the band’s most recognisable track to ‘Your Protector’, Fleet Foxes, like Elliot Smith, is an example of an artist or band recapturing the essence of writing song lyrics, which has been lost, in my opinion, for so long. Continue reading ‘fleet foxes coming to australia’
