In a way, the less said about ‘The Wilderness Downtown’ before you see it the better. Part of its impact is the surprise- and the effect is eerie, nostalgic, tender and incredibly (for lack of a better word) touching. The Wilderness Downtown is a music video, and not a music video. There’s a quirkiness to…
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Jostein Gaarder’s latest novel of love and ideas is as touching as it is thought-provoking. In true Gaarder tradition, The Castle in the Pyrenees interweaves musings on love, science and philosophy in a deeply poignant romantic tale that explores the place of human consciousness in the universe. As reckless 20 year olds, Steinn and Solrunn…
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A few weeks ago I wrote about an artist known as aMoment, who left 100 teacups filled with forget-me-not seedlings around the streets of Melbourne for people to find and take home. Two days ago, on October 11th, she left another round of gifts: little crochet ‘hammocks.’ Even if we didn’t get one for ourselves……
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Lace has always had a particular allure in fashion. Striking from a distance, intriguing close up, lace lends an air of fragility to a garment, creating an illusion of delicacy that contributes astoundingly to its charm and elegance. It is this element of luxury and sophistication that captured the imagination of forward-thinking fashionistas and designers…
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Back in the days when I spent most of my time on art, I particularly loved using text to combine the two things I loved most. The possibilities for text in art have long been explored by artists across all different styles and media, whether it’s as simple a relationship as illustration and story, or…
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I read about this gorgeous guerrilla art project in Frankie, and I thought it was the most delightful thing I’d ever heard. Earlier this year, 100 teacups containing forget-me-not seedlings were found scattered around Melbourne’s inner-city streets, on windowsills, doorsteps, bike racks, statues… anywhere that they might be found by someone needing to ‘take a…
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Erin Flannery has a remarkable ability to make black, white and neutral shades look full of life; to tell an enchantingly playful story using silhouettes and the simplest of shapes. Inspired by fashion, contemporary culture and everything weird and wonderful, Erin creates stunning images of girls and women using acrylics, aerosol, pencil and other materials…
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It’s almost time for this year’s This is Not Art Festival (or TiNA, as it is affectionately known), a celebration of independent, emerging and experimental art and creativity of all kinds. Held in Newcastle from Thursday September 30th to Monday October 4th, TiNa draws together a number of smaller creative arts festivals including The Crack…
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These women would rarely be photographed in fashion spreads, but Jodi Bieber’s daring and intimate collection of portraits reveals the very real beauty within each and every one of them. What makes a woman beautiful? We all have about a thousand different answers, but the one word most of us will keep coming back to…
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My latest artistic inamorata is a Chicago-based artist named Brett Manning, who likes to make it clear that she is in fact a girl. Her website, Brettisagirl.com, is distinctly feminine, showcasing her gorgeous portfolio on a backdrop of nostalgic, wallpaper-pink- so there is no confusion there. Brett is a girl. Brett does paintings and photography,…
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Taxidermy freaks me out. It probably freaks you out a little too. That’s why it was strange that I found myself actually kind of seeing the bizarre, ghoulish beauty in Julia deVille’s current exhibition. Breathing unusual life into dead animals, deVille fuses literature, mythology and the ancient art of taxidermy to explore the element of…
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Another day, another censored photograph. This time, the controversial artist is 24 -year-old Isabella Melody Moore, whose photograph of herself and a friend sitting topless side by side on a hotel bed has been blocked from winning a prize in a competition backed by the City of Sydney. Four of the five judges in the…
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I’m struggling to find any information at all about Caroline Morin. All I know is that she’s French and lives in Brisbane, and she does beautiful drawings of beautiful girls. These are some of the cutest illustrations I’ve ever seen, and I think they capture something really lovely about each subject. There is definitely a…
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Two years after the media furore broke out over Bill Henson’s photographs, the artist himself has finally spoken out about the controversy that surrounds his work. Last week, he presented a lecture for the Melbourne Art Foundation at Federation Square, hitting out against authorities who attempt to stifle artistic freedom through censorship. Art, he says,…
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