Tag Archives: London

Gimme gimme abstract art at the London Art Fair

January 17, 2014 Pierrick Senelaer 1 Comment

On our way to the Business Centre, where the London Art fair takes place, we could not help but speculating about what we would see and remembered all the wonders we saw in the past years.

A quick ushering through by the fair staff and we were in. Thursday evening is a good day to go at the fair as you are sure to find on your path some waiting staff eagerly willing to hand you over free bottles of beers.

We thought we’ll go around the ground floor as well as the first floor today where you normally find the “mammoths”. By this I mean the heavy-weight art galleries which mainly deal “fine art”. As we were hopping from one booth to the other, it was becoming obvious to our eyes: abstract art we were seeing was awesome and stood out from almost anything else.

We have included below the best pieces we thought we saw.

REVIEWS

“The Ugly American” by Saber at The Outsiders

January 9, 2014 Pierrick Senelaer

“The Ugly America” show opening today at The Outsiders is the work of legendary graffiti artist Saber’. The artist spent 8 weeks immersed in the Outsiders Newcastle branch last autumn and created all the works on display in the gallery this time in London.

We stepped in and were hardly wowed by what we were seeing: a series of pale wooden pallets works. We quickly realised that they were all depicting “The Star-Spangled Banner”, understand the American flag.

But then we remembered that “The Ugly American” refers to a multi-million-copy best selling book and 1963 movie, in which Marlon Brando starred, and is all about telling about the dark side of the American foreign policy. I looked again at the pale stuff and could relate now. Off downstairs…

The mood was slightly happier down here and colours from Saber’s pieces smiling at me. The artist’s technique that consists of mixing aerosol art with oil and even charcoal pleased my little eyes.

What – “The Ugly American” by Saber
Where – The Outsiders London | 8 Greek Street, Soho, London W1D 4DG | Monday – Saturday, 11:00AM – 7:00PM
When – Friday 10th of January 2014 to Saturday 15th of February 2014

CONTEMPORARY ART, REVIEWS

Haroshi at Stolen Space

October 27, 2013 Pierrick Senelaer

As soon as you step in Stolen Space, you cannot help but look to the right as you have spotted something big from the corner of your eye. It is there. The vultur is looking at you.

No I have not gone mad but am only looking at Haroshi‘s masterpiece depicting what looks like a vultur with one noticeable detail – the wings are made of old skateboards decks. The gallery is hosting until the 3/11, Haroshi’s first solo show in this space and promised us something radically different, something fresh and unseen before. So far, they have not lied, I had not seen a vultur made of old skateboard decks before.

Originally from Tokyo, Haroshi has been collected and used discarded remains of broken down skateboard decks to produce wooden sculpture. The concept of reshaping what once was used as skateboard into pieces of art certainly sound like something that should have been done before.

Or maybe not. Maybe it was worth waiting all that time to see it done as Haroshi’s sculpture are beautiful, polished and colourful. It is hard to believe that the artist did not have any formal training in sculpture but is a 100% self taught artist. This is for the visual aspect.

Now, his works also transpire emotions, and especially “Agony into beauty” which depicts the face of a man who seems to be in pain.

Haroshi’s first solo exhibition at StolenSpace is indeed looking at the effects of emotional pain and how it can be a great motivating force in the creation of art. In short, the artist looked back at painful experiences and recycled them into his sculptures using recycling material, ie old skateboards decks.

A truly refreshing body of works that combines two worlds you would think will never meet – sculpture and skateboard

Haroshi first solo exhibition “Pain” runs until the 3/11/2013

STREET ART

A quick walk down Camden high street … art

October 27, 2013 Pierrick Senelaer

We happened to be in the Camden area today for shopping related reason but stumbled upon some great street art pieces and no long past before we were snapping these away.

We were very pleased to see one of Dan Kitchener‘s (aka DANK) piece flanked on a wall just by the Stables Market entrance in Camden. Its size is pretty impressive and the subject, a banal street scene, becomes a fireworks of colors under Dan’s spray cans.

A few more yards down and we walked the mighty Bar Fly and its giant see monsters – Pics after the fold

Dan Kitchener – DANK

Bar Fly

Uncategorized

Elissa Franceschi EP Launch at Nothing Hill Arts Club

June 25, 2013 Pierrick Senelaer

Introducing Elissa Franceschi, a prolific songwriter with a distinctive powerhouse vocal who has built a reputation based on organic, grass roots promotion and haunting live performances. Having previously performed in some of the UK’s most famous venues (Brixton Academy, The Roundhouse, Astoria and Wembley Arena – supporting Paramore and You Me At Six), Elissa spent the majority of 2012 performing all over the UK with her live band, and being teamed up with the country’s top songwriting production houses (of Jessie J & Ellie Goulding fame) to co-write for other artists.

The release of ‘Devoid of Rue’ on 24th June 2013, the follow-up EP to Elissa’s three independent album releases ‘Touch’, ‘I Hold My Breath’, and ‘Into The Light’. Recorded and mixed by Matt O’Grady (You Me At Six, Don Broco, Deaf Havana), ‘Devoid Of Rue’ was funded without label support but instead through a successful fan-funded Pledge Music campaign, where Elissa gave fans exclusive access to bonus tracks and videos, opportunities for one-of-a-kind experiences, along with live updates which gave fans a unique interactive look at the process of making the EP. The embedded stream can be found here;

The record is an evolution of songwriting for Elissa, giving new listeners a taste of previous albums in the beautiful piano-and-vocal-only track ‘Oceans’, and existing fans something new in the form of the rockier ‘Outside My Body’. With additions of atmospheric ‘Chasing Something’, epic ‘Dust’, and the anthemic brand new single ‘All These Days’ – this EP really showcases the exciting and emerging talent Elissa Franceschi has become.

Elissa saw even greater success in 2012 as the first artist hand-picked to perform at the London 2012 Olympics as part of the Emerging Icons search for the UK’s best unsigned talent, and saw her track ‘Rainbow On Fire’climb Number 14 on the iTunes Singer-Songwriter chart through word of mouth alone. Now, 2013 has seen Elissa scale new heights with recent single ‘Salt’ being voted as ‘Track Of The Week’ on the Radio 1 Review Show with Edith Bowman, beating global superstar artists Beyoncé, will.i.am, Justin Bieber and 30 Seconds To Mars; while also hitting Number 1 on the National Student Radio Charts.

What – Elissa Franceschi EP Launch
Where – Nothing Hill Arts club
When – 25/06/13 from 7pm

Art-Pie