If you touch one thing with deep awareness, you touch everything.
-Thich Nhat Hanh
Over the years, we have created mood boards, conceptual packages and idea books for clients in architecture, interior design, fashion and the entertainment business.
We eventually realized that the most interesting and gratifying aspect of our work was the world we were creating outside of all of the research. It was the things that would inspire us along the way that had made a lasting impact in our lives.
Our Blog is collection of images that have made us pause, reflect and appreciate art that reinforces our belief that each and every day there is a endless flow of beauty being manifested in the universe by people who are capable of providing a glimpse into a world of infinite possibilities, beauty and excellence. Enjoy!
Tacita Charlotte Dean OBE (born Canterbury, Kent, 1965) is an English visual artist who works primarily in film. She is one of the Young British Artists, and was a nominee for the Turner Prize in 1998. She lives and works in Berlin.
In 1995, she was included in General Release: Young British Artists held at the XLVI Venice Biennale. She is one of the “key names”, along with Jake and Dinos Chapman, Gary Hume, Sam Taylor-Wood, Fiona Banner and Douglas Gordon, of the Young British Artists (YBAs). Her work actually had little in common with the prominent YBAs, Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin.
In 1997, Dean moved to London. That same year she began to exhibit splices of magnetic tape cut the length required to document the duration of the sound indicated, such as a raven’s cry. In 2001 she was given a solo show at Tate Britain
Dean is best known for her work in 16mm film, although she utilises a variety of media including drawing, photography and sound. Her films often employ long takes and steady camera angles to create a contemplative atmosphere. Her anamorphic films are shot by cinematographers John Adderley and Jamie Cairney. Her sound recordist is Steve Felton. She has also published several pieces of her own writing, which she refers to as ‘asides,’ which complement her visual work. Since the mid-1990s her films have not included commentary, but are instead accompanied by often understated optical sound tracks.
Nicole Davis interviewed John Baldessari in his studio in Santa Monica, Ca., on Apr. 12, 2004.
John Baldessari: So, fire away.
Nicole Davis: What led you to become an artist?
JB: I always had this idea that doing art was just a masturbatory activity, and didn’t really help anybody. I was teaching kids in the California Youth Authority, an honor camp where they send kids instead of sending them to prison. One kid came to me one day and asked if I would open up the arts and crafts building at night so they could work. I said, “If all of you guys will cool it in the classes, then I’ll baby-sit you.” Worked like a charm. Here were these kids that had no values I could embrace, that cared about art more than I. So, I said, “Well, I guess art has some function in society,” and I haven’t gotten beyond that yet, but it was enough to convince me that art did some good somehow. I just needed a reason that wasn’t all about myself. Read more
John Baldessari is an American conceptual artist. After studying art at San Diego State College (1949–57), he began to develop his painting style, soon incorporating letters, words and photographs in his works. By 1966 he was using photographs and text, or simply text, on canvas as in Semi-close-up of Girl by Geranium … (1966–8; Basle, Kstmus.). From 1970 he worked in printmaking, film, video, installation, sculpture and photography. His work is characterized by a consciousness of language evident in his use of puns, semantics based on the structuralism of Claude Lévi-Strauss and by the incorporation of material drawn from popular culture. Both are apparent in Blasted Allegories (1978; New York, Sonnabend Gal.), a series combining polaroids of television images captioned and arranged to suggest an unusual syntax. Baldessari differed from other conceptual artists in his humour and commitment to the visual image. He dramatized the ordinary, although beneath the apparent simplicity of his words and images lie multiple connotations. We LOVE him!
As May flowers appear closer on the horizon, we cope with April skies by celebrating the wetter month’s undisputed rain-warrior: the umbrella. The iconic accessory is the star of this film by Tell No One, AKA Luke White and Remi Weekes, winners of the Young Directors Award (Video Art Europe) at Cannes 2012, with creative direction by Leila Latchin. The brolly also forms the focus of design expert and sophisticate Stephen Bayley’s century spanning essay.
A portrait of the urban man on the move, today’s film Weavers, was conceived by the designer as a follow-up to his fall 3.1 Phillip Lim menswear show. “It’s just three strangers going about their day,” he says. “They cross paths, and feel a kindred spirit because of the way they dress.” The short was shot in Palm Springs by San Francisco-based photographer and filmmaker Andrew Paynter, and its title is a nod both to the artisanal tapestry and rug-making techniques Lim drew upon for his collection, as well as the elusive nature of the models pictured threading in and out of shadows. “We’re always trying to get a mental picture of the man we’re designing for,” he says. “But he’s a little bit of a mystery; we only get glances. This film is our attempt to capture that experience of seeing someone in snatches.” We asked New York-based Lim to demystify his urban summer essentials. via NOWNESS
The sporting giant hired the film director and editor Max Joseph to create a commercial for the Nike FuelBand featuring the slogan “Make It Count.” But at the last minute, the duo strayed from the agreed-upon spot, and set off on a journey around the world using Nike’s money and advice to “Make It Count.”
“The ‘Make It Count’ film was the third film I was to make for Nike and at the last minute I thought, ‘If I could do anything in the world and make it count what would I do?’” Neistat told CNN.
It took 10 days to use up Nike’s cash. Neistat and Joseph traveled 34,000 miles, visiting 16 cities in 13 countries on three continents. The result is a four-and-a-half-minute film, which still features Nike’s “Make It Count” branding.
Neistat says they shot enough footage for 10 feature films. He also uploaded an album of still shots to Facebook.
The film has been viewed more than one and a half million times on YouTube in less than three days.
Nike, needless to say, has been pleasantly surprised with the film’s viral reach.
We think this is a great film and we love the quotes … enjoy!
Marc Newson’s latest creation for Ikepod sees the Australian designer interpret the most iconic timepiece of all: The Hourglass. Director Philip Andelman traveled to Basel, Switzerland, to document the designer’s modern take of the classic hourglass inside the Glaskeller factory. Each hand made hourglass comprises highly durable borosilicate glass and millions of stainless steel nanoballs, and is available in a 10 or 60 minute timer.
Marc Newson is the most acclaimed and influential designer of his generation. He has worked across a wide range of disciplines, creating everything from furniture and household objects, to bicycles and cars, private and commercial aircraft, yachts, various architectural commissions, and signature sculptural pieces for clients across the globe.
Born in Sydney, Newson spent much of his childhood travelling in Europe and Asia. He started experimenting with furniture design as a student and, after graduation, was awarded a grant from the Australian Crafts Council with which he staged his first exhibition – featuring the Lockheed Lounge – a piece that has now, twenty years later, set three consecutive world records at auction.
Newson has lived and worked in Tokyo, Paris, and London where he is now based, and he continues to travel widely. His clients include a broad range of the best known and most prestigious brands in the world – from manufacturing and technology to transportation, fashion and the luxury goods sector. Many of his designs have been a runaway success for his clients and have achieved the status of modern design icons. In addition to his core business, he has also founded and run a number of successful companies, including a fine watch brand and an aerospace design consultancy, and has also held senior management positions at client companies; including currently being the Creative Director of Qantas Airways.
Marc Newson was included in Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World and has received numerous awards and distinctions: he was appointed The Royal Designer for Industry in the UK, received an honorary doctorate from Sydney University, holds Adjunct Professorships at Sydney College of the Arts and Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and most recently was awarded a CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) by Her Majesty the Queen.
His work is present in many major museum collections, including the MoMA in New York, London’s Design Museum and V&A, the Centre Georges Pompidou and the Vitra Design Museum. Having set numerous records at auction, Newson’s work now accounts for almost 25% of the total contemporary design market.
Newson has been the focus of on-going and intense interest in the media, generating significant editorial value for his clients, and has been the subject of a number of books and documentary films.
For more than 25 years, James Balog has broken new ground in the art of photographing nature. Time magazine photographer James Nachtwey wrote of his images, “Each new series represents a quantum leap in creativity…He is a visionary and his works are like sacred objects.”
If Balog’s work is artistically and intellectually inspiring, it is also physically exhilarating. It springs from his passionate, lifelong involvement with nature as an artist, scientist, explorer, and adventurer. He is equally at home on a Himalayan peak or a white-water river, the African savanna or polar ice caps.
Balog’s work has received international acclaim, including the Leica Medal of Excellence and the premier awards for nature and science photography at World Press Photo in Amsterdam. His exhibitions have been shown at more than a hundred museums and galleries around the world. He was the first photographer ever commissioned to create a full plate of stamps for the U.S. Postal Service; the 1996 release featured America’s endangered wildlife.
Many major magazines, including National Geographic, the New Yorker, Life, Vanity Fair, the New York Times Magazine, Audubon, and Outside, have published his work. He is a contributing editor to National Geographic Adventure and is the subject of the short film A Redwood Grows in Brooklyn.
Balog is the author of six books, including Tree: A New Vision of the American Forest and Survivors: A New Vision of Endangered Wildlife, which was widely hailed as a major conceptual breakthrough in nature photography. Recent work includes the Extreme Ice Survey, a project that brings image-makers and scientists together to create a photographic record of global climate change.
Balog lives on a Rocky Mountain ridge high above Boulder, Colorado, with his wife, Suzanne, and two daughters.
In an effort to provide concrete visual proof of climate change and its devastating effects, photographer James Balog embarked on a years-long project that spanned the northern reaches of the globe. He set up cameras from Greenland to Alaska in order to capture horrifying—yet undeniably beautiful—time-lapse photos that reveal the unprecedented rate at which glaciers are receding. As the award-winning Chasing Ice, which chronicles Balog’s monumental endeavor with his Extreme Ice Survey
This documentary is mind blowing and an absolute watch !
Matt Lenski is an American director of television commercials, music videos, and films. He is based in New York City. Lenski won an MTV Video Music Award for his direction of Fall Out Boy’s “Sugar, We’re Goin’ Down” video. His short film “Meaning Of Robots” was officially accepted in the 2012 Sundance Film Festival.Lenski acted and co-produced the 2004 feature film “Point & Shoot,” directed by Shawn Regruto. Lenski’s 2004 viral campaign, “F*ck New York,” parodied the Republican Presidential Convention, which took place in New York City. The satire featured thug teens playing the rolls of President George W. Bush and his political bedfellows. New York Magazine quoted it as Russell Simmons’ preferred viral video
