04/04/2012

A Flower Opening At Dawn In Singapore

A Flower Opening At Dawn In Singapore

It was a sunny muggy morning, Aya Sekine, well recognized as most swinging, passionate and eclectic Jazz pianist in the region, brought us to her neighborhood, a quiet and hidden district just around the corner from the bustling Orchard Road, where an overnight closed-road runway has appeared most recently with over 150 models to showcase big fashion brands during a fashion festival. In March, Singapore was filled with cultural festivals.

One of the best annual music events in South East Asia, Mosaic Music Festival was also held at Esplanade- Theatres On The Bay, which is Singapore’s national performance arts venue and a non-profit organization. Aya has been invited since its very first year in 2005 and this year she lead her Straight Ahead Quartet including celebrated bassist Christy Smith. Under a slow electric fan, mixed languages spoken in the air as our morning BGM, we had a local Malaysian breakfast Mee Siam, spicy rice vermicelli in curry. Shortly after, in a cafe across the street, we were having a cup of delightfully brewed organic coffee and gluten/wheat-free pancakes with strawberries, bananas and organic raw honey with a scoop of vegan ice-cream.

“Singapore is literally Rojak [a traditional fruit and vegetable salad dish you mix and serve yourself.]” Aya gave us a wink slyly.

Born in Japan, Aya spent half of her childhood in Singapore. She moved to further her study of Jazz piano and improvisation at Berklee College of Music. After spending eight years in New York City, she returned to her second home Singapore with an invitation as the resident pianist of a popular Jazz club around that time. Since then, she has been generating a powerful magnetic field in the live music landscape of Singapore through her performances in various important venues such as INK Club Bar at Fairmont Hotel, Club L’Opera, bar at The Sultan Hotel and especially at Blu Jaz Café where she opened up their music scene through her music project Ayaschool since 2006.

“Blu Jaz Café was the very first place in Singapore where I found Janis Joplin played at that time. I popped in and met Aileen, the owner. After a short while, we had a little meeting and got good vibes immediately enough to go and buy a new drum set the very next day! That’s how it started.”

Aya insists to make a different selection of musicians each time. Even during the sessions, she is opened to welcome potential and motivated young talents. We often witnessed rather interesting mix of audience such as well dressed hotel guests, music lovers, young musicians even students with their instruments gathering all together, getting into the whole ambience, which would rarely happens in big cities these days.“Ayaschool is like an experimental cuisine, making something special out from whatever is in the fridge. So it could be mix of Jazz, Hip hop, Soul, Funk Rock, Brazilian music… We never know how it is going to be, sometimes a great success, sometimes a total disaster… like real life!”

“People tend to compare and complain that we’re rather short of music resources and talents etc… perhaps there’s something to that. But it’s totally nonsense if we start to compare the music scenes here and those in New York City for example. We’re now at the very stage of sowing seeds, nothing is established yet.” A sudden squall came and Aya was radiating her simple, humble, energetic spirit. “I don’t take it as immaturity. Rather ‘Yet’ is good because I believe it’s a great advantage, a great potential and freedom to let something born out of a very simple point.”


AYA SEKINE’S MUST-SEE-PLACES IN SINGAPORE

Real Food (cafe, grocer, books)
“Who are we? We are indie. Real Food is self-run by a team of passionate and stubborn individuals who believe we are what we eat.” 110 Killiney Road Singapore 239549 T: +65 67379516

Blu Jaz Cafe (cafe, live music)
11 Bali Lane Singapore 189848 Tel: +65 62923800

Ayaschool on Saturdays.

Mystic Masseur Hama-san (massage therapy)
The owner’s “Magic-Hands” never stop inspiring people to fly over from overseas only for the purpose of receiving his therapy based on Shiatsu. His treatments cannot be fixed in a certain sort of menu. Simple and spontaneous, he feels and sees through his clients emotions real time and figures out which body work is in need. #01-89 Lucky Plaza 304 Orchard Road Singapore 238863 Tel: +65 62355911

Ai Mitsuda – Graffiti on the wall by (c) Didier Jaba Mathieu 2012

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03/04/2012

Kristina Gill: Hummus

Kristina Gill: Hummus

Last week on my weekly In the Kitchen With column, was featured a recipe for Sesame Pancake Sandwich bread. The sandwich that the author talked about made me think of hummus. For quite a while, you could always find tahini in our refrigerator, and either hummus or baba ghanouj. Since I was craving it, I went right out and bought some dried chickpeas and tahini. I soaked the chickpeas overnight and the next day made hummus. Our mediterranean lunch was quite nice. I look forward to a few more good meals with this batch!


Kristina Gill

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03/04/2012

Richard Hollis- A Lifetime of Visual Storytelling

Richard Hollis- A Lifetime of Visual Storytelling

Richard Hollis is one of the first names you hear when studying graphic design. “Graphic Design: A Concise History” is one of those treasures young graphic designers hungrily soak in. Even though each generation of designers tend to rediscover the book year after year, its author, Richard Hollis, has been on the scene for more than fifty years.

Starting as a part of John Berger‘s team that transformed the well known television show into “Ways of Seeing” book, Richard Hollis has become an absolute genius in storytelling with words and images. It may come as a banality speaking about graphic design, but Hollis’s layouts have actually made generations more aware of how much politics can be hidden in even the most ingenuous image.

Having chosen anonymity in a world of design superstars, Richard Hollis has never been properly appreciated. Fortunately Emily King, the wittiest of design historians, has dug into Hollis’s archives in search of these overly disregarded gems to be put on display in a show curated for the Gallery Libby Sellers in London.


After what must have been a demanding but gratifying work, the author-curator pair pulled out more than hundred items from Hollis’s prolific career. Besides the above mentioned cornerstones of design and art critics, in half a century of work handling words and images, Hollis has produced catalogues, flyers and posters for the Whitechapel Gallery (from the late sixties to the mid eighties), graphic work for artists Steve McQueen and Bridget Riley, as well as work related to radical politics of the 60s and 70s and those developed during his travels to Cuba, Zurich and Paris.

The show, running until April 28th, is being accompanist by the book “Writings About Graphic Design” published by Occasional Papers. Collecting a comprehensive selection of Hollis’s essays, interviews and texts is due to become a new textbook must.


Rujana Rebernjak

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02/04/2012

The Talented – Steffie Christiaens

The Talented – Steffie Christiaens

Steffie Christiaens is someone who knew her business before setting up a studio in Paris. Prior to her first self-named prêt-à-porter collection, which was brought to the runway in March 2011, she attained her fashion design diplomas at Arnhem Academy in the Netherlands and IFM in Paris. She was chosen finalist in the prestigious Hyères Festival 2009 and she worked as collection assistant at Maison Martin Margiela as well as next to Nicolas Ghesquière at Balenciaga. Merging the probably immeasurable expertise gained while working at two highly renowned fashion houses with her knowledge in architecture, 3-D construction and fabric design, Christiaens is creating space for a new discussion in the land of fashion and art.

The experiments have their point of departure in the forceful elements of nature and science. Femininity is presented in complementary to bold cuts and structures where texture, movement and shape all come together, creating powerful and forward-looking images throughout the three collections that so far has left the studio. The Fall/Winter 2012/13 collection is without a doubt a dynamic woman, but there’s a sensitivity and sophistication to her appearance. There’s the dimension of the projected deficits and asymmetric irregularities, and there’s the dimension of the precious work on the fabrics which adds an overall strength to a single piece as well as to the collection as a whole, both gaining from the inspiration coming from the transforming states of water and structures of ice. Black leather, 3D looking jacquards, hefty felt and zippers are softened up with light silk materials and soft shapes created out of goat hair. A color scale that stretches from black and the darkest of charcoal to the lightest crystalline whites is livened up and made more interesting with two outfits in blood red, light shades of camel and skin and the whole spectrum of icy greys.

Runway semblances can be seen through round necklines, high collars, slightly shortened trousers and heavy coats but it is not what makes the Steffie Christiaens brand worth talking about. It’s the dissimilarities in the sculpted shapes, cut outs and fine points like sliced up tights, resembling a fissure in a glacier or the hand-blown glass objects holding water and carried out as an accolade to the inspiration element. Every garment has the outlines for being a classic piece but thereafter the collection takes its own shape. Slim, nondescript trousers are matched with apron shaped miniskirts, the jackets are embellished with sculptural lines and every cut is emphasizing and shaping the female body. The line between accentuating and distorting is sometimes fine but Christiaens noticeable research and savoir-faire keeps her on the right side.

In 2011, preceding all of her runways, Christiaens released Deliquesce, a short film signifying the aesthetics in motion while slowly unwrapping and revealing a couture creation. The abstract image presented might just have been the start off for the label, but it might just become the core, representing the magnetic beauty story behind a collection.

Lisa Olsson Hjerpe – Images steffiechristiaens.com

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