Archive for December, 2007

Out with the Old, In with the New.

lautrec-confetti.jpgToulouse Lautrec is one of my favorite artists, and confetti is a favorite graphic of mine. It seems fitting to bring in 2008 with some of my favorite things wrapped in warm wishes for you for the new year. May it be full of inspiration to light the way forward.

All the best and thanks to all of those for helping me bring life to TrendBites. If I’ve any words of wisdom to share from 2007, it’s that no man is an island.

See you in 2008!

Kim

“Bells Will Be Ringing.”

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Suzanis: an ancient craft that brings art to home furnishings.

blog-1-embroidery-edited.jpg Suzani, which means needlework in Persian, is the name given to large, embroidered textiles from Central Asia that were used as hangings or bed covers. These textiles were made of several panels of cotton or linen cloth that were embroidered with silk thread. To create the piece, the designs were first drawn on the panels in ink by either a family member or a hired professional. Several women in the family would then embroider different panels, and after the embroidery was complete, the panels would be sewn together to form the finished cloth. (Text from the Textile Museum.org: textile of the month)
Suzani were made in cities and towns in Central Asia; the different motifs on the textiles indicate where they were produced.

The image above was graciously brought to Trendbites by Maryam from My Marakesh blog who is well on her way to opening (February 08) her online store, the Peacock Pavilions Shop, where you too will be able to get your hands on suzanis like these as well as many other exotic goods from mysterious and exotic far off lands.

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Maryam’s blog, My Marakesh, is full of images and tales of the interesting life she leads in Marakesh and upon occasion shows us the type of goods that the Peacock Pavilions Shop will be offering. Maryam explained that the suzani in these images are part of her personal collection and are not for sale but she is traveling to Kyrgyzstan where she will be shopping for her store. Maryam explained that Kyrgyz embroideries and felt rugs are also stunning and similar in inspiration. but will also buy Uzbek suzanis - if she finds a good stash and will offer them for sale. (click on the above highlighted Central Asia to get a feel for the geography we are referring to)

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Ethnic embroideries are quite the thing these days and being able to get a hold of some of these directly from the regions the craft was historically honed is nothing less than breathtakingly exciting!

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I am pretty sure a suzani is just what the daybed on the covered porch of the house I keep by the shore in Kennebunkport, Maine needs to make the room complete (well I can dream, can’t I?).

EXCLUSIVITY. Who goes there?

by Sabine Rothman.

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The explosion of venues has naturally led to an explosion of VIP lounges…so many fantastic vehicles for sponsorship upon sponsorship. It was hard to figure out which card would get you in to the innermost circle…wherever that was…and how you would pay for the $30+ salmon salad once you got there!

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Some visitors had silver cards. Some had black. Some had black with special holes punched in them. And so on. (I particularly wanted to see a standoff between UBS guests and the HSBC invitees.)

Last year, Eric Doeringer, a very clever young artist, created a replica of the VIP card—you might call it a “fake i.d.”— in a limited edition of 15. Art, it was.

This year, his Bootlegs were the buzz. Doeringer exhibited his affordable—and hysterical—appropriations of work by contemporary art stars at GEISAI Miami, yet another satellite exhibition. He has been making Bootlegs for a few years now, and selling them on the streets of Chelsea. One of the things I love about them is that Doeringer’s editions are unlimited at a time when limited editions are a surefire way to drive prices for just about anything right through the roof. Who took note this week? Alix Browne AND Horacio Silva in their blogs for the New York Times’ T Magazine.

I went for the Hirst in the end. But I might track Doeringer down for a Richard Prince.

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GEISAI is the offspring of a Japanese event founded by Takashi Murakami (of Vuitton fame) in 2001. And it was not the last we’ll see of these young artists!

Some links:

www.ericdoeringer.com

www.geisai.us

MULTIPLICITY. It seemed so simple at the start….

by Sabine Rothman.

We came down to Florida for two shows: Art Basel Miami Beach and Design Miami. Or so I thought. At the end of our four-day trip, I could totally identify with the woman I heard wailing: “It’s almost over, and I haven’t seen everything yet!” Of course, we’d seen a lot, but with the proliferation of art and design exhibits—Pulse, Scope, NADA, Aqua, Photo MIAMI, Zones, Casa Décor, etc., etc., etc.—there was no way to do it all. Which got me thinking about multiplicity. Often, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. With that in mind, take a look at some of the installations and pieces that struck our fancy…

Steve Powers’ Signarama, a collaboration with Studio Gangster, presented by Deitch Projects and Paper Magazine.

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and…

An untitled installation of line drawings by French artists Jean-Francois Moriceau and Petra Mrzyk at French Kissing in the U.S.A, an exhibit of work from the emerging art scene in France

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And, what we saw in Miami makes me think of:

Barry McGee, another of Jeffrey Deitch’s artists

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and…

Urs Fischer’s Jet Set Lady, a tower of drawings installed to stunning effect at Franois Pinault’s Palazzo Grassi in Venice

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Art Basel. What’s the Scoop?

by Kim

Perhaps many of you already know about Art Basel, now done every year about this time in Miami. There’s some serious private collection art buying going on, before and during the show I hear. This year, since Trendbites had so much success with Autre/Marko as a guest writer, I’ve asked Sabine Rothman, fresh from (the recently closed) House & Garden Magazine as their Senior Style and Design Editor, to give us an ear to the ground perspective on the hot hot hot and latest Art Basel.

Welcome, Sabine, and I thank you in advance for bringing us what I know will be a very unique as well as layered perspective on the who what when where and how of Art Basel Miami 2007.

AT NIGHT

by Marko.

Well, dear readers, the time has come for me to say goodbye. It has been a pleasure to help Kim, and contribute to her blog. I’m leaving you with pictures from Ljubljana, my home town. They were taken yesterday. As you can see, the decorations follow the theme of space, with a slight nod to human sexuality (hence the scandal a year ago when the sexuality theme was pushed to the maximum). The theme changes every two years. Now, there are only slight remnants of that oh so controversial theme: not so subtle hints there, the DNA spiral over there, the X and Y chromosomes next to it. I’ll leave the judgements to you. Aynway, have a merry December, and all the best in the year to come.

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TOO-MUCHNESS AND GUILT-FREE LUXURY

And yet it’s never enough.

by Marko.

As an example:

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Beyeren

Here are certain paraphrases or memories of a book I’ve read a while ago. Appreciate the immediacy of my twisted memory and imagination, please. You can hold it against me, if you so desire.

May a Vuitton nurse help us all. Or a purse.

Desire is a very peculiar thing, I hear you say. Well, you’re right. It is very odd, very strange. Of course, it has nothing to do with the simplicity of wishing or wishes. Desire is a mechanism that twists and distorts. The presence of desire is nothing but the distortion or modification of an element by the presence of another one. Find it in the repetitive element of your mind, in the twist, the distortion, the opacity. In the supposedly redundant. In luxury? In what needs not to be there? The last thing to come, the first thing to go – as they say. For most anyway. A necessity that begins where all necessity ends – as spoken by Coco But it gives so much pleasure, it is so supremely satisfying, even if only for a while. Little nothings. Doing nothing, like smoking. Cigarettes are sublime – or so they say. Just don’t take pleasure in them too loudly, too obviously. Too much pleasure sparks up envy, resentment and disgust. We can’t have equality based on that. Like looking at a Russian billionnaire buying a Mercedes covered entirely with Swarovski crystals.

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I hear that some now talk of »ethical luxury«, of »deep luxury«. Which sounds like alcohol-free beer or if you’re French: cheese from non-pasteurized milk. A product deprived (is that the right word?) of its supposedly malignant property. Guilt-free luxury (think Stella McCartney, etc.). The bad needs to be immediately countered, even with a clash of opposites in one product: you’ll have a beer, but no alcohol. There is something utterly false about this. Close to luxury posing as restraint (in delirious amounts of cashmere): Luxury or restraint? Yes, please!

(My notions about luxury are perhaps best seen and explained by two examples. One is the film (or Isak Dinesen story) Babette’s Feast (you’ll see when you see it, from danger to its religious aspect, even with a reconciliatory side), the other I will give now. Take a dream, a dream may be an obvious wish, yet completely distorted. You are freezing and starving, caught in the snow of the North Pole. You fall asleep. But you don’t simply dream of a bed, and a piece of bread. Simple food or shelter. No, your wish is an alibi for true fulfillment, for dreaming about a bowl of caviar and a four-poster bed.)

So…

Giving pleasure. Selling pleasure. Controlling via pleasure. Now take a look at this fashion cornucopia. Is this the opposite: unabashed pleasure?

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Vuitton Spring Summer 08

You can almost imagine her saying: »Come closer, don’t be afraid, I won’t hurt you.« Then take a look:

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Vuitton Spring Summer 08

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Galliano Spring Summer 08

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Treacy for McQueen Spring Summer 08

Walking piles of fabric, of layers, colors, accessories, makeup. Saturation, sensation (as in: attack on the senses), and a certain flatness, even fading. It won’t last. Desire is here just to promote and sustain itself, not the objects it picks along its curvy ways.

You don’t have to feel guilty.

CONVEYING AN IMAGE

by Marko.

Not so long ago, I came across a picture in one of our Slovenian magazines – I should have kept it. Now I can only try and convey what I saw, in a ’small Balzac’ sort of way. A woman, in her late thirties, a well known intellectual here, actually a philosopher and an anthropologist that teaches (and writes extensively about) media and new technologies, dressed in a Paco Rabanne métal riveté dress underneath a futuristic looking black (fox) fur coat that was just massive, and had these imposing shoulders. Her chesnut hair stylishly disheveled, her shoes being these strappy black stilettos, with straps so thin you could barely notice them. No jewelry, and no makeup except some blush, applied high on the cheekbone, close to the eye. Well, I had to look and look at her again, she was very sexy. It was actually a very simple look. She supposedly also owns a rhodoïd top from Rabbane that came in a box (with a »construction plan«), so she had to literally make it, design it herself (with pliers and all). Anyway, I’ll let you dream about her look But here’s a little help (with a special appearance by Françoise Hardy and Salvador Dali):

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If you’re interested in a name we hardly even hear about nowadays, and its impressive history, please visit (otherwise Paco will put a spell on you):

www.pacorabanne.com.