Sunday, January 8, 2012

Top 10 Jan 9

Hello You, and hello 2012!
Hope all is well, and that you had a brilliant break.


As a little welcome back and thanks for popping by, HERE is my favorite albums of 2011
(most albums are linked to Spotify for you to enjoy over there).

Take care and welcome back!

Mr. J

1. Tom Hines












About

Born and raised in Brandon, Mississippi. He lives in New York City with his wife Michelle and their two cats. He studied fine art at Cooper Union and specializes in fashion Photography.

See more work HERE

2. Ken Taylor







About

Melbourne based Illustrator & Designer Ken Taylor works primarily within the music industry and is predominantly well known for his striking rock posters. Ken started in Perth Western Australia doing posters and album artwork for local bands. In 2001 He moved to Melbourne and slowly started to create a name for himself within Melbourne’s music scene. In 2006 he went out on his own and started to work full time on music based artwork.

Ken has designed posters and album artwork for many Australian bands including You Am I & The Beasts of Bourbon & Crowded House. Internationally he has designed artwork for bands such Queens of the Stone Age, Metallica, Pearl Jam, Nine Inch Nails, Kings of Leon, Bob Dylan & The Rolling Stones. Ken has won the Desktop Create Award for Best illustration in both 2007 & 2009 and was a Guest Speaker at the 2009 AGIDEAS design conference and the 2011 Semi – Permanent Creative Conference in both Melbourne and Perth. Ken continues to work with bands both locally and internationally and is represented by Drawing Book.

See more work by Ken HERE

3. Locomotive - Place des Arts



“Locomotive”, the most recent addition to the mosaic screen installation in the foyer of Place des Arts, is a fantastical portrayal of a human machine.

The context resembles an elaborate organic dominos game. It begins with a musical impulse and is accompanied by an inexorable advancement of light.

Human flesh makes up a patchwork of glittering metallic members – which have the luster of new pistons and bolts – engendering a hybrid mass.

Caught in awkward tension, the bodies quiver in suspension, the movement becoming increasingly intense until released by the passing impulse.

The carefully synchronized three-dimensional chain reaction of image, sound and light dehumanizes the body while simultaneously makes us smile. Uncomfortable yet intrigued, the eye of the passer cannot turn away from the machine. The complexity of the work lies in its ambiguity of being funny, monstrous, and sensual all at the same time.

The totality of this intriguing puzzle is best seen by taking a step back. However, in order to observe and appreciate the detail of the movement, it is equally engaging to advance forward. Each gear, wheel and suture plays its role to tie the whole piece together.
For this project, in lieu of creating a work that is intrinsically promotional, Place des Arts has taken the risk of acting as a sponsor and distributor of this purely artistic and cinematic endeavor.

Conceived with the intention of using the proposed space – its limitations and constraints – in the pursuit giving life to a custom made creation, “Locomotive” highlights the artistic potential of the mosaic screens in the foyer.

Director: Thibaut Duverneix
Concept: Thibaut Duverneix & Mathieu Léger
Choreographer: Ashlea Watkin

Production: Departement
Line Production: Antler Films
Executive Producer: Sach Baylin Stern
Producer: Josh Usheroff

DOP: Christophe Collette
Makeup: Anicko Bouchard
Art Direction: Mathieu Léger
Edit – Post Production – Colorisation: Thibaut Duverneix

Music: David Drury
Music producers: Christian Olsen & David Drury
Musicien: Sage Reynolds

4. Taxi Driver Sweded by Michel Gondry





Michel Gondry is sweding it up again. The French auteur first popularized the sweding of things (see: Swede Fest) with his 2008 film, "Be Kind Rewind," which encouraged the audience to swede their favorite films. What on earth is sweding, you say? How many times can we possibly say swede before telling you what it is? (Six times.) To swede is to create a fan-made, low-budget rethinking of a popular film. It's all about showing your love for a movie you love for people who love it. It does not have to do with Swedish people.

Gondry sweded the trailer of his own film (self-love?), "Be Kind Rewind," back in 2008. This time, he tackles "Taxi Driver," assuming the role of Travis Bickle himself. Gondry's version includes a sweet (sounds like swede!) take on "Are you talkin' to me?", vomit that comes out looking like pastel paint and colored pencil bullets.

5. Willy Vanderperre














Born in 1971, Belgian photographer Willy Vanderperre studied fashion & photography at the Royal Academy of Arts in Antwerp. He then went on to build his name with regular contributions to prestigious magazines like Arena Homme+, AnOther Magazine, AnOther Man, i-D, Fantastic Man, Love, V, VMan, and many others. He’s also done campaigns for Raf Simons, Jil Sander, Fred Perry, Givenchy, and Aquascutum.

See more work by Willy HERE

6. Tjalf Sparnaay







Tjalf Sparnaay is a Netherlands-born, London-based artist whose oil paintings are ridiculously hyper-realistic. When I first saw these images I assumed they were photographs. Sparnaay is an expert at taking everyday, throwaway items such as discarded Cola cans and a bag of chips, removing the items from their environment, and turning them into textured works of art, no shadow, wrinkle or crevice overlooked. Sparnaay calls his style “Mega-Realism.”
More about the artist HERE.

7. Proteigon



Short film by Briand Steven and Luca Fiore, directed at partizan during a two month intership.


Music by Nodey & Omarsound
Design by Moritz Reich
Help of Nathalie Lapicorey, Zeynep Gizem De Loecker, Benoit Masson, Vincent Nguyen, François Colou et Fabien Chambert

briand.steven@gmail.com

See more work by Briand HERE

8. Yuko Shimizu










Drawing had been Yuko's hobby ever since she could remember. However, growing up in a traditional Japanese family, pursuing a path in art was just not an option. After receiving BA in advertising and marketing – the most creative of the practical field – from Waseda University she landed on a position in PR for a big corporation in Tokyo.
It never made her quite happy, and she was in a mid-life crisis at age of 22.

It still took Yuko more than 10 years of office job before she figured out what she really wanted to do and to save just enough so she could go back to school full time for 4 more years.
This is how Yuko came back to New York in 1999, where she briefly spent her childhood, and enrolled in School of Visual Arts (SVA).

Yuko graduated with MFA from Illustration as Visual Essay Program in 2003 and has been illustrating since. She also teaches a BFA Illustration course and occasionally advises MFA students at SVA.
She works in a studio in Manhattan, a space she shares with two artists whom she considers as her 'New York family'. Yuko has not gotten into mid-life crisis since she became an artist.

Whenever she has time, Yuko loves to travel to different cities and countries to lectures at art schools and events, and to meet with other artists, professors and young aspiring illustrators to get inspired.

(Sorry, wrong person. This Yuko Shimizu did NOT create Hello Kitty.)

See mor work by Yuko HERE

9. Justin Lovato






Justin Lovato is a working painter from Sacramento. He currently resides in Berkeley, California. He creates dreamlike, ethereal landscapes that reflect his thoughts on nature and our relation to it, human belief systems, the psycho-political-control system, multidimensional concepts, and esoteric symbolism.

See more work by Justin HERE

10. The Maccabees - Pelican Dir by David Wilson



Music by The Maccabees
Director: David Wilson
Producer: Tamsin Glasson
Prod co: Colonel Blimp
Director of Photography: Tim Green
1st Assistant Director: James Dyer