12 Years Gone.

Twelve years ago today we lost Richard Warwick to AIDS related illness, so if you're in a position to raise your glass this evening (or indeed at any point today) then do, to the late, great Mr Warwick.

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0913264/

Prem Sahib.

Ayan Farah.

Close up on me.

This is my portrait from the Heather Cantrell exhibition.

'A Study in Portraiture: Act II'

Heather Cantrell
Curated by Caryn Coleman
25th november - 19 December, 2009


From John Baldessari to David Yow, Heather Cantrell has always looked within her own tribe of artists, curators, and musicians in her exploration of community and subcultures. Now, she looks to the London art scene with A Study in Portraiture: Act II as part of her international enthnographic study that simultaneously documents, subverts, and reveals identities of the art world through performative portraiture. Having debuted in Los Angeles this summer, MOT International plays host to 'Act II' in this ongoing series, transforming the gallery into an 'in-house' photography studio for the duration of the exhibition.

http://www.motinternational.org/index.html

Another birthday, another birthday card.

Here is a card that I made for Alexander Karotsch earlier this year.

Happy Birthday Fernando!

This isn't super clear as it's in pencil, but I made this for my friend's birthday, which was last Wednesday. This is his website: http://www.fleal.com/

I said to him that I love how playful his illustrations are, they look like he really enjoys what he does (which he does).

Falling into Place.

Falling Into Place
by Heather and Ivan Morison (2009)

In recent works, Heather and Ivan Morison have explored the currency of shelter and the escape vehicle - things that can either transport you physically or mentally away from the here and now and help avoid, or offer refuge, from future disaster. The film 'Dark Star' (2006), and the timber structures 'Pleasure Island' and 'Fantasy Island' (2007), took their starting points from the American house-truck movement of the 1960s and 1970s, and the hand-built-shelters associated with the 'back-to-the-land' movements of the same period. These interests are continued in a series of newly commisioned sculptures and shelters.

Continuing their explorations and investigations into cultures of self-sufficiency, this publication brings many elements of the artist's research together with sketches and drawings, through a narrative which is part-science fiction, part-history, part-autobiography and part-fairytale.

The publication has been generously supported by the Arts Council England, the University of the West of England, and the Henry Moore Foundation.

http://www.bookworks.org.uk/asp/detail.asp?uid=book_D2F929A8-9A5B-450D-8CA2-5B1CA6821595&sub=new

Falling in to Place will be launched at Artwords Bookshop (20-22 Broadway Market, London), 6.30 - 8.30, Tuesday 15 December.

For more information contact Gavin Everall, gavin@bookworks.org.uk

Subtext(s).

Cecillia Bonilla, Sam Burford & Jorge de la Garza

Private View - Thursday 3 December, 6.30 - 9pm
Show runs 4 - 31 December

"Subtext just beneath the surface makes life interesting, but it can also cause people to be misunderstood."

Using the reproduced image as raw material, the artists recontextualise content found in books, magazines and films to create alternative narratives that reflect on contemporary culture.

Camper bike.

Bruce Ingram.

Currently showing at Spring Projects: www.springprojects.co.uk

The Makings of a Tangerine.

el Cabezona.

The Day the Fish Came Out.

Written, directed and produced by Michael Cacoyannis (Zorba The Greek), this Greek-British comedy is based on an actual incident when two atomic bombs were accidentally dropped on a Spanish town. The film moves the story to a Greek island, which is explained in the opening sequence of a chorus of Spanish dancers, and tells the story of the changes that take place on the island after the bombs are dropped. When the pilots of the plane carrying the bombs realise that they've lost their load they head to the island to get help. The government beats them to it and sends an agent disguised as a resort developer. They are all busily looking for the weapons when the island is suddenly filled with clamoring, hedonistic tourists who think that the developer is going to build the best resort in the area. The fish around the island then begin to mysteriously die and the tourists begin to give in their wildest disires...

Henrik Olesen.

Monika.

Just Me and You.

Because I can't seem to be able to put youtube clips up here, do this:

-Go onto youtube
-type in: Just Me and You Louise Lasser
-click on 'louise lasser-just me and you'
-and watch.

I really want to see this movie.

All That Glitters.

While looking up 'Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman' (and the shows that proceeded; 'Forever Fernwood' and 'Ferwood 2 Night') I found this:

'All That Glitters' was produced by Norman Lear (as was 'Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman', etc), but this was based on a reversal of the sexes...

''All That Glitters is a short-lived situation comedy television series by producer Norman Lear. It consisted of 65 episodes and aired between April 18 and July 15, 1977 in broadcast syndication. The show, a spoof of the soap opera format, depicted the trials and tribulations of a group of executives at the Globatron corporation. The twist of the series was that it was set within a world of complete role-reversal: Women were the "stronger sex," the executives and breadwinners, while the "weaker sex" – the men – were the secretaries or stay-at-home househusbands. Men were often treated as sex objects.''

It also starred Linda Gray, as the first regular transgender character on television, Linda Murkland. I'd love to see this, the only thing I could find is an introduction and a mention in an ad break.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_That_Glitters_(TV_series)

I can't talk now, I'm on the phone.

Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman has crept it's way into my life from a Frieze article that I read a while ago. I finally bought it on American import and it's more than living up to it's expectations. Louise Lasser really is perfectly cast as Mary, as is Mary Kay Place (who played Sharon Cherski's mum in My So-Called Life) as aspiring Country Singer Loretta Haggers. I can't find the Frieze article but I found this;

Madame Bovary, c'est moi
"As more and more people find themselves working at jobs that are in fact beneath their abilities, as leisure and sociability themselves take on the qualities of work, the posture of cynical detachment becomes the dominant style of everyday intercourse. Many forms of popular art appeal to this sense of knowingness and thereby reinforce it. They parody familiar roles and themes, inviting the audience to consider itself superior to its surroundings. Popular forms begin to parody themselves: Westerns take off on Westerns; soap operas like Fernwood, Soap, and Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman assure the viewer of his own sophistication by mocking the conventions of soap opera. Yet much popular art remains romantic and escapist, eschews this theater of the absurd, and promises escape from routine instead of ironic detachment. Advertising and popular romance dazzle their audiences with visions of rich experience and adventure. They promise not cynical detachment but a piece of the action, a part in the drama instead of cynical spectatorship. Emma Bovary, prototypical consumer of mass culture, still dreams; and her dreams, shared by millions, intensify dissatisfaction with jobs and social routine.
Unreflective accommodation to routine becomes progressively more difficult to achieve. While modern industry condemns people to jobs that insult their intelligence, the mass culture of romantic escape fills their heads with visions of experience beyond their means--beyond their emotional and imaginative capacity as well--and thus contributes to a further devaluation of routine. The disparity between romance and reality, the world of the beautiful people and the workaday world, gives rise to an ironic detachment that dulls pain but also cripples the will to change social conditions, to make even modest improvement in work and play, and to restore meaning and dignity to everyday life."
--Christopher Lasch

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Hartman,_Mary_Hartman

Cry me a river.

Snapframe.

Sea angel.

The Bed Sitting Room.

Next week, on the 21st May , The Flipside, that's William Fowler and Vic Pratt who work at the BFI Archive, are showing the postapocalyptic wonder that is ' The Bed Sitting Room'! Written by John Antrobus and Spike Milligan and directed by Richard Lester. It's going to be introduced by Lester and the legendary Rita Tushingham ('The Leather Boys', 'A Taste of Honey') and of course who has one of the starring roles? None other than our Richard Warwick! It's also going to the first of a series of Flipside DVD's released by the BFI.

http://www.bfi.org.uk/whatson/bfi_southbank/film_programme/regular_strands/the_flipside/the_flipside_presents_the_bed_sitting_room

Fuck Yeah Beards.

Haha, James is on someone's blog because of his beard:


http://fuckyeahbeards.tumblr.com/

Stephen Willatts.

Is excellent.

''From the 1960's until today, Stephen Willats has situated his pioneering practice at the intersection between art and other disciplines such as cybernetics, systems research, learning theory, communications theory and computer technology. In so doing, he has constructed and developed a collaborative, interactive and participatory practice grounded in the variables of social relationships and settings. Willats' creates multi-sensory, multi-dimensional environments to encourage viewers to engage with their own creative and cognitive processes. Using the everyday as a site of investigation, his work presents a vehicle of exchange through which viewers can re-examine and transform the way they perceive the fabric of existing reality.''

He also makes CONTROL magazine http://www.controlmagazine.org/ .

Jamie Radcliffe.

Just a little snippet. Here's how Oliver arranged the things that I sent up for the exhibition, I think maybe the slant was darker than I'd imagined, also alot of people seemed to contribute work that was specifically about Mr Radcliffe. I took the Jamie Radcliffe lead more conceptually, but it looked like the show went well. I'll upload more images from it later.

The Ultimate Romantic Gesture.

Next weekend in Glasgow is open studios weekend (I don't have any other information about this, I think it's Glasgow School of Art related, but then I think alot of Glasgow's art scene is) and I've just sent up some work for this exhibition that's been organised by the seemingly indomitable Oliver Braid, who's currently on the MFA (at GSA). Unfortunately I'm not going to make it up to see the show, but I'll get a hold of and post some images after the fact. Here are some details (what you probably can't see, from the small image, is that all the lines are names of the artists taking part):





Oliver Braid Presents:Jamie Radcliffe: The Exhibition The Ultimate Romantic Gesture for One Night Only.

SWG3/Studio Warehouse, Glasgow Saturday 18th April 20096pm – 10pm


'Thanks for sending me the PP. Good luck with it. I still cannot understand you tho!! When all the world is racked with war and terror and hope for change, Why would you choose such a subject matter… You baffle me… do keep in touch tho.' Tim Chamberlain, Invited Artist


This is an exhibition dedicated to Jamie Radcliffe, an upholsterer and part time footballer that I have been secretly in love with since I met him in a local pub when I was seventeen. Although we have rarely spoken, every time I go back to my home town at Christmas I think maybe this will be the time. I still can’t imagine that we won’t get married one day.

Whenever I was away from home I used to search MySpace and Facebook trying to find him and last August he finally appeared. I added him as a friend and waited for our virtual connection to blossom. Not only did he deny me, but he blocked me as well. I think he may have deciphered my not so subtle glances over the last seven years.

Luckily he didn’t deny or block my friend Sally and so it was with her login details that I began to be able to regularly visit his profile and keep watch on his life.

In January 2009 I produced a Power-Point presentation consisting of images and information I had taken from Facebook. I sent the Power-Point to 100 artists and asked them if they would be interested in producing an artwork based on Jamie, his life or my unrequited longing. Presented here are the works from all the artists who responded positively.

Artists Included: Simon Bayliss, Julie Burrows, Jon Burgerman, Aagje Buzink, Amelia Bywter, Celeste Carballo, Cordelia Cembrowicz, Kaifeng Chun, Matthew Collier, Alexis Dirks, Claire Dorsett, Caroline Douglas, Solveig Einarsdottir, Hannah Ellul and Ben Knight, Marc Elsener, Erica Eyres, Kitty Finer, Leo Fitzmaurice, Sarah Forrest, Patrick Gantert, Claire Greenshaw, Michelle Hannah and The Kingdom of Perpetual Muin, Ellie Harrison, Tom Harrup, Sean Hawkridge, Lena Henke, Anna Henson, Katharina Kiebacher, Paul Knight, Harry Lawson, Alice Maplesden, Amy Marletta/Patty Melt, Jack McLean, Alison Mellor, Jenny Moore Koslowsky, Shelly Nadashi, Christian Newby, Janie Nicoll, Sally Noall, Laurence Payot, James Price, Charlotte Prodger/Sophie MacPherson/Brina Thurston/ Kate Roberston, Paul Sammut, Rosemary Scanlon and Tytus Hardy, Peter Schoeffer, Maayke Schurer, Cheyenne Seeley, Anna Louise Shipley AKA Miss Shippers, Fiona Short, JP Somerville, Theodoris Stamatogiannis, Anna Tanner, Daren Tesar, Nancy Tomkins, Sally Tarbutt, Deniz Uster, Leah Watt, Daniel Simpkins and Penny Whitehead, Alberta Whittle, Emily Womack, Tobias Wootton, Jamie Wright, Burcu Yagcioglu.

BFI Archive.

Yesterday I went to the BFI archive to do some digging as William said that they had some obituaries on Richard. LOOK. This is just one of the gems I found.

Sam!

So, I've been working on the CD cover for Sam, here is what's coming along:

Team Macho.

Jill always puts great things on her blog just because she likes them, so, distracted as I am (and still not sure how or why I'm using this thing), I thought I'd put up a link to the Team Macho website, which is great. Yes that is a picture of Anne Diamond with an exploded airship on her jumper. They make me want to draw in colour. They remind me of the Royal Art Lodge (they're also both Canadian art collectives). You can look at their stuff here: http://www.teammacho.com/ and you can buy a great book of their work on the Saatchi Gallery Bookshop site: http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/galleryshop/ . Great.

Samuelroy.

I've just taken a picture of the drawing I've started for Samuel Kehl who's asked me to draw something for his upcoming CD release. This is the picture he gave me to work from, below is the beginnings of the drawing;

You can find some of Sam's music here: http://www.myspace.com/samuelroymusic (and yes, I'm procrastinating by putting this on here instead of carrying on with the drawing).

Paul Sutton.

I missed these 'if...' film stills on ebay because I thought it ended last night and they went for £9.99. But I recognise the buyer as I bought a copy of the Cambridge Film Journal from him before (a special 'if...' edition. He edited Lindsay Anderson's diaries and has written an 'if...' Turner Classic Movies book, so I'm going to e-mail him. Photocopies are better than no copies.

Richard and Susan.

Colin also sent me this photo (signed by Susan Penhaligon) from when Richard and Susan were in A Fine Romance (photographed in the Barbican cafe on returning the copy of 'Some Tame Gazelle' to the library - top left).

Fabulous 208.

I was sent these colour photocopies of an interview with Richard this week (yes! an interview!):

Films and Filming.

I went to Southampton at the beginning of January to collect some copies of 'Films and Filming' magazine. These were some of the rewards;

The Breaking of Bumbo (1970)

Nicholas and Alexandra (1971)

Sebastiane (1976)

The Bed Sitting Room French Lobby Card.

A recent acquisition from ebay;

I have found this new image from 'Erste Leibe' on a fansite dedicated to Richard Warwick and Ian Charleson by an Antonella from Italy. I bought the one below in 2006 from ebay (Richard is the man bottom right).