Culture | The Blogazine - Contemporary Lifestyle Magazine

15/05/2012

Fotografia Europea 2012

The opening weekend of Fotografia Europea 2012 just closed down. As every year the big festival, thanks to its full program of exhibitions, conferences, talks, workshops and performances, turns Reggio Emilia in a centre for professionals and photography lovers worldwide. The core theme of this 7th edition entitled Vita comune: immagini per la cittadinanza (Common life, images for the community of citizens) tackles the issue of living together, wondering which is the meaning of being a citizen in an era when the boundaries of nations are more and more blurred.

With the photography as common language and fill rouge of all the events scattered around the city, Fotografia Europea 2012 tells stories through the analysis of four different perspectives. Four paths summed up in four key topics: “Change”, “Common places”, “Participation” and “Differences”, which aim at charting the idea of new communities, encompassing a new sense of belonging, born from the encounter of natives and migrants who share and generate a certain culture.

At Chiostri di San Pietro, Igor Mukhin (b. Moscow, 1961) in his show La mia Mosca depicts the Russian youth during the historic turning-point of their country through the use of B/W images; while in the same location, Federico Patellani (“E’ nata la Repubblica”) and Massimo Vitali (“All together”) with different approaches show places where usually people join each other – the schools after the Second World War of the former and the crowded beaches of the latter are examples of cohabitation.

Concerning the concept of participation we cannot avoid naming the exhibition Un’idea e un progetto. Luigi Ghirri e l’attività curatoriale, which retraces the curatorial activity of Luigi Ghirri, displayed in Reggio Emilia also at the show A Luigi e Paola Ghirri. Fin dove può arrivare l’infinito?, where visitors can admire the last – and plenty of poetry – shot by the great Italian master.

To underline the importance of defying convention and celebrating the differences, the festival presents a group exhibition, which conveys works by van der Elsken, Strömholm, Carmi and Petersen and relates to a famous song by Lou Reed entitled Take a walk on the wild side.
In occasion of Fotografia Europea, foundations, museums, public and private collections (as the renowned Collezione Maramotti) open their doors to collateral events and shows which will run until the end of June, while concerts and video projections enlivened the three days of inauguration of one of the most enjoyable festival, that is worthwhile living whole hog.

See you there next year!

From the Bureau

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11/05/2012

Remembering Maurice Sendak

“Where the Wild Things Are” taught me how to employ imagination purely as a survival tactic, a refuge from droning schoolwork, nagging parents and brothers and―now that I’m older―droning desk work and eye-rolling social obligations that seem to roll over me on a daily basis. It’s hard to control external forces, but Maurice Sendak helped teach me that it’s your own obligation to control how you deal with what comes your way. Max sails to another world, conquers all, and returns home for a hot supper. No wonder he continues to resonate with the world.

Most of our lives are spent alone in thoughts, wondering where to go next in a world that is largely indifferent. Sendak captured our mind’s spiky cocktail of terror and bewilderment with a fearless intensity, not just in “Where the Wild Things Are” but also “In the Night Kitchen”, “Brundibar”, and dozens of other classics. His work is representative of a group of people who remain too transfixed by their own worries and curiosities to simply run away from them. And it cuts deep: One kid loved his work so much that he decided to eat it.

Born a lower class Jew in 1928 and raised during the Depression and through the Holocaust and World War II, Sendak kept his homosexuality away from his parents out of fear of disappointing them. The Lindbergh baby kidnapping and murder of 1932, Sendak once said, worked as an unintended influence, a real-life nightmare that made him realize the instability and unpredictable nature of life. Likewise, a baby is hauled away by goblins in “Outside Over There.”

Exposed to the realities of life from the get-go, he later single-handedly ripped children’s stories out of the innocent fairytale realm and placed them on a plateau on par with reality, fear be damned. He didn’t do it for shock value (which he sometimes unfairly found himself in hot water for), but out of a profound respect for the courage of young people and their fresh worldviews. Those monsters in Max’s adventure? They were based on his relatives, who would cower over his crib when he fell gravely ill as a child. It’s no small coincidence that Max overpowers and rules them.

It’s scary out there, but his characters never stayed scared―or inside their rooms―for long. Like Max, Mickey from “In the Night Kitchen” was also a fearless explorer of the corners of his own imagination, escaping the noisy confines of his bedroom to embark on an all-night baking adventure throughout New York City. And like Max, Mickey returns home after his surreal travels, glad to be back but all the wiser for exploring his innate curiosity. The same can be said for Sendak, only he left us all the wiser as well. I’d offer my own words here, but it’s hard to imagine a more fitting castoff than the one he once offered to us all as words of encouragement:

And he sailed off through night and day
In and out of weeks
And almost over a year
To where the wild things are

Lane Koivu

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10/05/2012

Vidal Sassoon 1928 – 2012

Yesterday the world received the news that the man who revolutionized the way women’s hair was cut, Vidal Sassoon, had passed away. Famous for the classic bob and his five point cut, he has been liberating the women of the 60’s with his ‘wash and wear’ style. He has been called the Chanel of Hair, a rock star, an artist and a craftsman who “changed the world with a pair of scissors.”

The London born hairdresser’s fame started the day he made a cut for Nancy Kwan. The iconic bob, which was captured in a portrait by Terrence Donovan and broadcasted to the world through Vogue, was the starting point that led everyday women, models and film stars to his salon on Bond Street. Like any good ‘couturier’, Sassoon was not afraid of taking risks, experimenting and customizing his cuts to best fit his models’ features. “My idea was to cut shape into the hair, to use it like fabric and take away everything that was superfluous”, he said in an interview with the Los Angeles Times in 1993.

The industry normally refers to fashion designers as artists who helped define our style history and way of life, but we dare to claim that Vidal Sassoon could be included in that group of names. He helped define the 60’s Britain, and saved the women who were going back to work, from dryers, curlers and hours at the beauty salons.

2010, “Vidal Sassoon: The Movie” was released and was a part of the Offical Selection of Tribeca Film Festival. A film documenting and celebrating the life and the legacy of the man who created the styles of icons like Mary Quant and Mia Farrow, and who according to American Vogue’s creative editor Grace Coddington “revolutionized just not hair, but fashion.”

Lisa Olsson Hjerpe

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10/05/2012

Alfabeta2, A Place For Cultural Intervention

What is Alfabeta2 and why we have chosen to talk about it? To answer this question we must jump back to the end of 70’s and, to be more precise, cast our mind back to the time (from 1979 to 1988) when a monthly magazine entitled Alfabeta was issued. The periodical, conceived by the Italian poet and writer Nanni Balestrini with the collaboration of important intellectuals – among which the well known semiologist, philosopher and writer Umberto Eco – was one of the most interesting and unique editorial experiments of that period and a centre for cultural and political discussion in Italy. People with different backgrounds could find there a place to dialogue and exchange ideas about books, other magazines, exhibitions, theatre and cinema, reporting news and cultural events.

Contributors of the likes of Gillo Dorfles, Lea Vergine, Achille Bonito Oliva, Stefano Zecchi, Ugo Volli, Renato Barilli – perhaps for some of you these names don’t mean anything, but they are part of our cultural heritage – enlivened Alfabeta with long and complex articles and reviews, which conveyed the main current issues while entertaining the audience. Well, after more than twenty years from its closure, the magazine got unexpectedly back to the newsstands almost a year ago and today represents a singular and unusual publication; something that ‘communically-speaking’ seems to be totally out of our time.

Even if the new issue has opened to the changes introduced by the Internet and the new technologies – the website is constantly updated and documents and videos are spread through the main social networks – the contents are far away from the reading proposals in vogue today, where the ‘like’ option as a critical approach dominates. The texts are long and written in a refined language and the images are few and strictly connected to a single artist chosen month by month like Jan Fabre, Giuseppe Penone, Emilio Insgrò, Michelangelo Pistoletto or Fabio Mauri.

Somebody could think that this magazine seems a bit boring, pretentious, somehow too difficult to understand, and certainly not comparable with lifestyle magazines to flip through. Looking at the pictures, some others could say that intellectuals don’t exist anymore and this kind of language is outdated. Alfabeta2 required concentration, reading keys and an effort to delve into the issues that usually our nihilistic hedonism solves with a simple sentence: ‘I try not to think about it’.

We are not nostalgic and doubtlessly we aren’t short on lightness, but since we are not just ‘profiles’, we always pick up ours ears and think that enriching our cultural background and knowing what happens around us is a way of using time, which never goes out of fashion. The May issue is now on the newsstands with a provocative question: ‘who owns the culture?’… What you think?

Monica Lombardi

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09/05/2012

The First Note On The Horn – Ichigo-Ichie

Welcome to the second part of The First Note On The Horn series from the sizzling music scene of Tokyo. Ai Mitsuda takes us to the backstage with Kuni, the talented trumpetist of Sly Mongoose. Read the first part of the story Tokyo Burning here and the second part The Misty Urban Rain here

Ichigo-Ichie is a Japanese old saying derived from Zen Buddhism, which literary means One time, one encounter; Cherish this very moment, for the same stream will never cross again, may the encounter be fulfilled with the wholehearted gratitude, for it will never happen the same again.

“A vast amount of human energy and soul has lost in a moment.”

Kuni recalled the 3.11 disaster in Japan. “I’ve always believed in Ichigo-Ichie, but that day was an intense moment to realize it. Maybe we meet again and spend more time together, but maybe not, this time could be really the last time.” Kuni told that he has a lot to be thankful for in his life, and meeting different people is the most important one of them all.

For him, Terence Blanchard has always been a wonderful source of inspiration and a precious presence as a person. To begin his new life in New York after graduation, Kuni went to see Terence Blanchard Quintet at Village Vanguard one night.

“How you gonna survive?” Terence had asked him. “Well, I’ve just arrived in the city, I don’t know yet…” He couldn’t provide a better answer.

Two weeks later, when Kuni came back home, his roommate handed him a phone slip. “Do you know a lady, named Robin?” “Of course,” Kuni had answered. “Robin, she is the manager of Terence!” What a beautiful surprise it had been, a warm welcome to join Terence’s team as his assistant. “I was deeply moved, surprised and got a little nervous to be honest, you know.” Kuni continued, “Everyone knows how hard time Terence would spend to evolve into a new stage of creation, I deeply respect Terence as an artist, most important thing is, I learned so much about life itself while being with him. I remember, once we were at The Manhattan Center recording a film score, Terence was making sure that he saw various kind of nationalities in the ensemble. He’s always mindful about these things, always open to listen to people. He makes his statements simple and direct but you can feel his warm and profound heart right there. His music really reflects his way of being, I just love the way his harmony goes.”

‘Be Who You Are’ : it was a simple but a strong message from Terence. Since the question of doing Jazz as a Japanese started smoldering in his mind, consciously or unconsciously, Kuni has been on the road. “Before being a Japanese, I am Kuni myself. It’s quite simple but important for me. I was brought up in circumstances where Jazz was very close. I had a warm and close feeling about its culture, and it was quite natural for me to step into it. But first, there’s Jazz as a cultural heritage and I wanted to learn and pay full respect to its history as much as possible. In general, I have always believed in the trees standing on their roots, leaves are not just accessories.”

“Now, I feel like doing simply music, through my one and only eyes.”

And it seems it doesn’t have to be categorized into one specific genre of music. In Kuni’s gorgeous nomadic piece called nebula (from the album of Sly Mongoose, Mystic Daddy, 2009), as the first note on the horn echoes, every instrument starts playing with its different meter, some goes in three-four, some in two-four, some in five-four, shaping an unformed cloud of dust, diffusing haunting refrain in the air, moment after moment.

Why not getting lost in this floating cloud for a while.

Ai Mitsuda – Image 1 with Terence Blanchard, at The Manhattan Center, New York City, 1994; 3 his trumpet is his own ‘voice’, courtesy of Kuni.

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07/05/2012

Fischli & Weiss – the book-works

Speaking from a strictly designer point of view, contemporary art can be quite intimidating. Having a background in applied arts, thus strictly related to objects of daily use, confront with the fine art world can make you feel quite unprepared or inferior. With some contemporary artists though, the perspective changes radically. This is the case with the work done by Swiss duo Peter Fischli and David Weiss.

The two artist have dedicated their career to developing projects that relate to the everyday, simple things and happenings, putting them in an artistic context, making it less intimidating.  During their thirty year long career, which started with a casual encounter in the famous Kontiki Bar in Zurich, the duo has worked with a many different media such as photography, film, sculptures, media installations and art books.  Starting with the reproduction of their first work named Wurstserie, a series of photos depicting daily situations made with ham, salami and pickles, printed as a HOW TO magazine, the duo has continued working with print media producing some of the most beautiful artists’ books ever.

For example the book “Airports” published with Edition Patrick Frey, depicts an extensive number of airports thus confronting us with the emptiness of travelling, “when foreign places remain a mere promise, and wanderlust turns to indifference as distance’s reality is just a flashy exotic name, just another destination.” Also published with Edition Patrick Frey are the books “Bilder, Ansichten” exploring conventionally beautiful places and “Photographs”, a concise overview of their photographic work.  These three books are exceptionally beautiful not only for the grandeur of their content but also for the masterly executed printing, thus making them real treasures. As it would be unfair not to name the other books produced by the prolific couple, here are a few others: Gärten published in 1998, Sichtbare Welt published by Walter König in 2000 and Findet Mich das Glück also published by Walter König in 2003.  Hopefully these wonderful books will be loved and preserved in the future, as their author David Weiss passed away on the 27th of April 2012. He will be missed.

Rujana Rebernjak – Images courtesy of Edition Patrick Frey

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04/05/2012

An Evening With David Sedaris

Those who have read his work know that David Sedaris was many things before he became a best-selling author: a college dropout, a lousy teacher, a struggling house cleaner, a crack addict, conceptual artist, personal assistant, closet homosexual and, most famously, an elf at Macy’s. Readers know this because, like many writers―Bukowski, Vonnegut, and Brautigan jump to mind―his personal failures and professional shortcomings are the subject and scrutiny of nearly all of his writing. His shortcomings, it turns out, are key to his success.

Mr. Sedaris got his start as a writer in Chicago, where Ira Glass spotted him reading from his diary at a nightclub and invited him to do something on his then radio show, The Wild Room. He came to life in the pubic eye as a frequent contributor to This American Life and NPR. He is among the small rank of authors who have managed to transcend the sturdy boundaries of those shows. His 1992 story “The SantaLand Diaries” made him a minor celebrity and painted a picture of himself that’s become emblematic of his work: That of the outsider, the dumb-ass, the frustrated loser. The idiot who has no talent and looks to the other side of the pendulum with a mix of frustration, jealousy, and bitter reserve.

His real talent is that he does this with humor, humbleness, and with a strong sense of humility. Which is a surprise once you realize that all of his books since 1994’s Barrel Fever have hit #1 on the New York Times Best Seller list. (His sister Amy once said that he seriously believes that each book he releases will be his last.) But it’s not surprising to anyone who’s read his work: He’s a fantastic, morally-driven storyteller who’s spent the better part of his career mining embarrassing situations for comedic gold. Family reunions, neighbor’s bathrooms, nudist colonies, his mother with cancer―no scenario is too taboo or off-topic, a characteristic that has sometimes landed him in hot water even within his own family. He’s also self-aware. He once said, after being asked what type of animal he’d likely be, that he’d “probably be a vulture because I pick the flesh off of other people’s experiences. It’s not very flattering, but I have to be honest with myself. I think probably any writer would be a vulture. I don’t think I’m unique in that regard. I think all writers exploit everyone and everything. That’s why you don’t want writers as friends.”

He’s often been asked if his success poses a threat to his work. Everyone wants to hear about a failed drug addict’s problems, but what about a wealthy writer’s? In other words; what does the loser write about if he’s no longer the loser? That doesn’t appear to be a problem for Sedaris, whose most recent book, Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk, deals with animals committing all kinds of social faux pas. And the majority of his non-fiction continues to examine his life in a similar context: living in France with his boyfriend Hugh, giving up smoking, and pissing off his family by exploiting them for his career. So, sure, he’s found success, but he’s still as wildly insecure and hopeless as the rest of us. Best of all, he’s still not happy. Problems come in all shapes and sizes, but it’s often how we deal with them that matters most. Not all of us have the sense to find humor in the drudgery of reality. For that we have David Sedaris, and we are thankful.

An Evening With David Sedaris at at Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), May 7th, May 8th.

Lane Koivu – image courtesy of CAMERA PRESS/Karen Robinson

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03/05/2012

MIA -The Ambiguous Nature of Images

Today photography, with its specific and autonomous language and thanks to its constant technical and stylistic developments, is widely recognized as a legitimate art form. Photography dialogues with its artistic way of expressions, and with the wonders about its own nature and future. Collectors, art lovers and professionals are more and more interested in this medium, which seems to have broken the boundaries of fine art, gaining its own status. The international events devoted to the richness of historical and contemporary photographic creations are increasing day by day.

With 268 exhibitors among galleries, independent photographers, publishers and photo printers coming from 16 countries, MIA, Milan Image Art Fair – the most important fair dedicated to photography in Italy – comes back to Milan for its second edition, which promises to be even more successful than the first one.

With an unusual and unique educational approach, the fair presents a full programme of exhibitions, workshops and talks, which aim at furthering the knowledge of the different trends that have characterized the language of photography in the last decades. From the researches on topics connected with sociological and philosophical aspects – mainly focused on investigating the individual and collective identity -, to the visionary approaches that highlight the ambiguous nature of reproduced images, MIA covers the wide spectrum of interpretations from the world that photographers have been creating during the years. A special pavilion, dedicated to fashion photography, displays the works by Albert Watson, Michel Comte, Herb Ritts, Malick Sidibè, Uli Weber, Rodney Smith along with the fashion/cultural phenomenon The Sartorialist (just to mention a few).

The icing on the cake, a myriad of collateral events and special projects as “Elliott Erwitt, Fifty kids” or “Hubertus Hamm and BMW” – a collection of images depicting children shot by Elliott Erwitt, and a solo show by the German photographer Hubertus Hamm, director of the main campaigns of the famous car brand -, accompany the fair, which opens today at Superstudio Più (in Tortona district). MIA is taking stock of the current situation of photography in contemporary art market providing an international overview and trying to transform Milan in a centre of photography. We just hope that the fair will be able to maintain the promises and pay the high expectations back, since the city, after the euphoria of the Salone, seems to be fallen back into a deep cultural sleep and constantly need waves of new and strong incentives.

Milan Image Art Fair, MIA, will run until May 6, 2012

Monica Lombardi

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02/05/2012

The First Note On The Horn – Voice Of Misty Urban Rain

The First Note On The Horn – The Misty Urban Rain

Throwing a glance out the window, a misty rain was falling. We met Kuni again this time in Daikanyama, center of Tokyo, where he has spent most of his life since his childhood. At close range, he played a bit of blues for us. Now, after a long thunderstorm with no end in sight, we feel like to surrender to a misty rain, seeping into the cell, flowing into peripheral vessels through out the body. Our body trembles to the compound time of the misty urban rain that cocoons us in floaty bliss.

Even if you have a beautiful lady horn in front of you, you cannot make a decent sound over night. Being a trumpet player is like being an athlete; the sound cannot be produced correctly until the embouchure (the use of facial muscles and the shaping of the lips to the mouthpiece of the woodwind and brass instruments) is well established. Take a big breath, make your lips buzz, grow images of tone in your brain… be on the road until you discover your own voice.

In 1982, when Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers came to Tokyo, the 12 years-old boy was literally overwhelmed by the play of Terence Blanchard, which gave him enough courage to meet the celebrated trumpeter at the backstage. “Terence was just amazing… Warm, soulful, with fire yet soft, full of intelligence.”

In the following years, he frequented the backstage when the group came to Tokyo. Once he brought his father’s horn, Mt. Vernon Bach, Terence played that very horn on the stage that night. The excitement made the little boy even bring around his master to his favorite jazz café swing in Shibuya, where they had a large archive of old jazz albums and videos. “I was eager to show Terence the ’61 live of Art Blakey with Lee Morgan, ” Kuni explained. Naturally, the voice of Terence Blanchard seeped into the brain tissue of Kuni. By coincidence or not, later it led to a beautiful surprise to be part of his team. (…to be continued.)

Ai Mitsuda

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30/04/2012