Cornelia Parker.

Cornelia Parker is one of my favourite artists. I am always fascinated by art that looks at fragments, separating them and bringing them back together. Her abstracted interpretations of the world create some mesmerising pieces, and I love the amount of texture you get from them.

My favourite is Cold Dark Matter: an Exploded View - here Parker put household items in a shed and got the army to blow it up.. and with the fragments left from the destruction, she created the piece; suspending the particles from the ceiling with see through wire. I think it's amazing, and the shadows cast over the room add so much to the visual experience.

I was looking through my old A-Level art books earlier, and saw pictures of my attempt at a bit of Cornelia Parker. In my home town there is a derelict zoo and amusement park. It is now filled with bits of decaying wood, metal and mesh, there are some quite beautiful things up there (if you like that sort of thing). Anyway, my method wasn't as drastic as that of Parker - I just put some bits in a shoe box and took a hammer to it. I then hung the little fragments off a light fixture and took some pictures. The quality isn't that good on these though.

Summer Time.

It is now July. I am dissertation dissertation dissertation-ing - and being the procrastination wizard that I am, I have been thinking a lot about going back to Italy, where half my family are from. The place is a little village in the mountains, cascading landscapes of beauty in every foreseeable direction. I absolutely love it. Unlike this country, there is so much respect for tradition and history, and one of my favourite things is to look into the natural infrastructure to see flowers, Mother Mary statues and other decorative marks of respect, left perfectly. Below are some photos I took last time I was there.

Beautifully decaying walls add to the impact of this shot

Giancarlo and I driving my great uncle's car... when I took over, I drove up a mountain for 20 mins with the handbreak on..oops... needless to say there was smoke, and I was fearing for my life.

One of the many untouched marks of religious respect, rested in the natural curvature of the landscape.

Stunning white horse, in the countryside, by the lake at the top of the mountain.

Going on the back of a Vespa is amazing. But unfortunately, I seem to know a lot of reckless Vespa drivers.

This was one of about 5 gorgeous stranded kittens when I went on a drive. I wish I could have kept one!

Lips.

The time has come for me to really get things going with my dissertation. So - of course - I am doing anything but my dissertation. I have got accepted on a writing internship, for a mag that I LOVE, so I am over the moon and preparing article topics for that, but also, I decided this morning that I would try out some of my lipsticks and take pictures of my lips. Why? I don't know - but here is the result.

Don't Panic.

Apologies for the horrendous images, I have a major case of shaky hand!

When walking down the street, we all live in fear of the skin crawling-ly irritating humans standing in the way, with a pile of shitty pieces of paper - trying to flog them to whoever comes within a 5 metre radius, or in fact whoever makes eye contact with them. As soon as you make that pivotal mistake, they have their claws in - they pace forward, with paper in hand - trying to shove it into any oraphis available on your person. Bain of my actual life. I have been known to get quite irate when I'm on the phone in a rush, and there is a keeno trying to place leaflets under my arm or in my open mouth.

In conclusion - it can be said that these people, and their little pieces of paper are not liked. No one wants to know about a gig, or a club night through a piece of paper. People are too lazy to read it - keep it - remember about it. They end up on the floor, in the bin, or at best - at the bottom of your bag. In my eyes, it is NOT a successful marketing communications technique.

BUT then I came across these packs by Don't Panic. Really cool art work drew me in initially. A brown paper envelope with different abstract illustrations on every week, i became somewhat of a collector. Looking at the envelope, I thought it was going to be a goodie bag - alas it was brimming with loads of leaflets, but also with the nice addition of posters and stickers, which made it more palletable.

The people handing them out were obviously still not getting much luck, as when I showed an interest they practically kissed me on the forehead and asked me if I wanted 5.

But I really do think these packs are cool. I LOVE the artwork. Don't panic is a really quirky and cool publication company who's creative doodles compliment the world of alternative music and the like and make communications a little bit more aesthetically scintillating.

I got my first article published!

I am so happy because my first article has been published! It's in prim. Magazine - the fabulous magazine I last blogged about! It is page 32-33 on the June/July 2009 issue. Please have a look.

I have decided that I am going to move from my plan of going into branding and strategy of package design to writing, so hopefully I will be able to get some more articles published soon! x

prim. Magazine.

prim. magazine is a digital magazine that has been running for less than a year, covering the latest trends and newcomers in fashion, art, and music on a sometimes global scale - and I am extremely thankful for the cool online vintage store ads! The creator and editor goes by the name of Kristin and is from New York. She is fabulous and has accomplished a considerable amount at age 15. She has featured in magazines such as French Glamour, Italian Elle and Pulse, and is very much an inspiration with regard to showcasing hidden treasures of popular culture and hosting it to readers with some of the coolest layouts I have seen. A lot more design driven than a lot of generic fashion pages, with whole pages used for titles in varying typefaces - making the magazine itself look like a piece of art. I am really into this magazine, and the more people who read it the better.

Kristin, prim. editor. Pulse photoshoot.

Album Art.

I was thinking (instead of revising) about album cover art - and how it's just the same as package design. I've never thought about it before - but it's true. I wonder whether the externals of a cd affects people in the same way it would with a costmetic product, for example. There are some really interesting album designs out there - but as its 1am in the MIDST of my revision hell - I have only collaged a few of my favourite covers at the moment. I included Hall and Oates as a joke. They are amazing, but it is a bit of a weird cover - as they are dripping in sweat. iffy.