//JENNIFER MILLS

//BRUNA KAZINOTI

//OBJECT THAT DREAMS

//AITOR THROUP

//CONOR O'BRIEN

//ERIK VERDONCK

//DEBORAH SWEENEY

//GROUND COMPONENTS

click images to enlarge

IMAGES courtesy and © the artist

“I first became interested in the scribble when I collected books owned by children that they had graffitied, effectively talking over the original printed image...”

INTERVIEW by Jason Lingard

1. Where are you from and how did you get into what you do?
Melbourne, Australia. I’ve been working as an artist professionally for 10 years.

2. What do you love the most about drawing?
It’s partly practical, partly aesthetic. I have painted some with oil, but working on paper keeps calling me back. Drawing/ painting, the same for me really, but working on paper is very important. I went back to drawing about 7 years ago when I was interested in retracing what originally excited me about making art. I learnt to draw as a child by drawing pictures of horses…I had hundreds of drawings and books on horses to work from. Drawing is a direct process, it’s easy to prepare and you don’t have to mix any toxic mediums. I usually work at the kitchen table so paper mounted on boards is flexible and easy to access and pack up. I was very interested to hear that Margaret Stones, the botanical artist, chose to work the same way her entire career. It means that drawing can be worked into the day in snatches…a spare moment and the work comes out.

3. Your main subjects are animals, why animals over humans or landscapes?
Animals ‘speak’ to me, which is interesting because my work is about giving the animals a voice which is so obviously not their own. I’ve read a number of books by animal behaviourists hypothesising on why animals do this or that or how they think, but basically it’s only guess work. Because animals don’t have our language we speak for them…we give our words more meaning, more worth. It’s a very uneven relationship.

4. Your work often combines a tight traditional style followed by colourful scribbles. How do you feel the scribbles change the way the image is interpreted?
I first became interested in the scribble when I collected books owned by children that they had graffitied, effectively talking over the original printed image. Graffiti changes the way we see it. My pastel work is also obviously applied over the image, and it’s colourful and painterly.

5. Your more recent pieces have the animals wearing super hero costumes. Animals, scribbles, and super heroes, there’s a certain childishness to this series…?
I agree…by childishness you mean imaginative play, which is a fundamental way children develop an understanding of the world they live in. It’s a crucial stage of their development and it’s almost impossible to teach. We all want kids to get good grades, but we sometimes forget that jumping off the table with a towel hanging out of their pants is pretty important. Superheroes epitomize imaginative play. My bats all want to be Batman and they’ve picked their favourite versions. They don’t read , they watch the movies.

6. What are you working on at the moment?
Working on a collaborative show inspired by the Arctic, with Julia Powles and Kieran Boland, which opens in march at Project Space at RMIT. Lots of animals that don’t like the cold will be rugging up or getting frostbitten.

Jennifer Mills is represented by Darren Knight Gallery

Click images to enlarge

IMAGES courtesy and © the artist

“The dream job for me would be one which allows me to live in my hometown of Split, but lets me travel to many countries to shoot, but always come back home.”

INTERVIEW by Jason Lingard

1. Where are you from?
I am from Split, small and old town on the Croatian coast.

2. How did you get into photography?
I didnt get into it, it got into me.

3. How would you describe your work in one sentence?
Boys, light, sentimentality, simplicity, nature, sensibility, blue, diamonds, perception, feelings, and colours.

4. What subjects do you most enjoy capturing?
I mostly enjoy taking photos of street boys. I’m very interested and fascinated by their behaviour and attitude. I just love their way of being- the way they walk, talk, communicate and act. That said it could not be without also taking nature photos, of the sea, the woods, and Croatian countryside.

5. What do you feel makes a successful photograph?
When I can feel it, or have any kind of feeling towards it.

6. What would your dream job be?
The dream job for me would be one which allows me to live in my hometown of Split, but lets me travel to many countries to shoot, but always come back home. I would just be happy to have small freelance jobs every month.

7. What are you working on now / next?
I am doing a new shoot for Fairy Tale magazine, Metal Magazine, and also planning a trip to London.

click images to enlarge

© Zoren Gold and Minori from "Object that Dreams"
Die Gestalten Verlag 2007

“Sometimes, I get lost in the feeling that the world could be made out of false beliefs. Maybe we all have been hypnotized to believe a certain way of life?”

INTERVIEW by Ella Mudie

Tokyo-based photography art duo Zoren Gold and Minori Murakami have translated their love for photography and art into spellbinding imagery in their new book, Object that Dreams. Minori explains how their collaboration came about and sheds light on her role in creating the provocative fantasy worlds the pair have become famous for…

1. Your first meeting was ill-fated. When did the turning point come and how did your creative collaboration begin?
A friend of mine brought Zoren to my birthday party without knowing it was a birthday party, so he promised to take a portrait of me and my dog as a birthday gift. A couple of days later, Zoren came to my apartment, we went through my closet picking out clothes and shot at my apartment. It was not quite the portrait of me and my dog, but this incident became the beginning of our photographic relationship.
Our first trial of creative collaboration came after sometime of being friends. We tried to create clothing, but soon realized we both didn't know how to sew. So we decided to do something we're familiar with technically – mixing photography and graphic design.

2. Your work draws on the legacy of surrealism. What does it mean to see the world through the eyes of a “surrealist”?
Sometimes, I get lost in the feeling that the world could be made out of false beliefs. Maybe we all have been hypnotized to believe a certain way of life?

3. How important is planning to your shoots, and what kind of background work goes into them?
When it's our personal project, we don't plan much. We just decide where to go for the photo shoot, and shop for clothing and props. It's less prepared, very spontaneous, and experimental. Sometimes, the photo shoot becomes the starting point. When it is an assignment, we come up with the concept. However, we always try to keep room for creativity to take place during the image-making process.

4. Can you offer us a positive and a negative of being an artist in Tokyo today?
Positive: To encounter ordinary people with extraordinary minds. Negative: To become a workaholic.

5. Minori, you often model for the shoots. What are the creative possibilities of being both the subject and the artist?
Being the subject is part of an artistic expression. I become the subject with objectivity, and feel free in a photograph. Being anonymous, being an image gives me the chance to feel closer to the unknown. Sometimes, I get puzzled that I may not exist. My identity and the knowledge of who I think I am, seems so unfamiliar when I work on a photograph.

6. What are you working on next?
Erotic photography.

Object that Dreams by Zoren Gold and Minori Murakami is available through www.die-gestalten.de

IMAGES courtesy and © the artist

“My work is primarily about finding a reason to create or design anything... this involves me designing characters and stories... rather than designing clothes.”

INTERVIEW by Jason Lingard

1. Where are you from?
Originally, from Buenos Aires, Argentina. I’ve also lived in Madrid for 5 years, and I moved to England in 1992. I’m currently in London.

2. How did you get into fashion design?
Well, I’ve always drawn…it’s the only thing I’ve done forever. As a kid I was (and still am) really absorbed by good comic books. I was always drawing and ‘designing’ my own characters. One summer of my miss-spent youth I was working in a restaurant in Mallorca and I began to get really home-sick. Every night, towards the end of my shift, the restaurant would be dead quiet, and I would sit down and draw my characters on the paper place mats we used to put on the tables… My characters began to get more and more detailed, and so their clothes became more ‘considered’. At that time, me and my friends back in Burnley were getting really into labels like Stone Island and CP Company…I got this idea that I could take some of my ‘characters’ to a seamstress we knew back home and she could make me a unique jacket based on my drawings… So I ended up studying fashion and doing it myself. I started by doing an Art & Design Foundation at Nelson & Colne College, and I then went on to do a BA (Hons) Degree in Fashion at the Manchester Metropolitan University. Last year, I completed a Masters Degree in Fashion Menswear at The Royal College of Art in London.

3a. What do you love the most about fashion design?
The fact that it’s all about the body really. My drawings are generally about exploring the possibilities of our anatomy…I am really fascinated by any aspect of anatomical studies, in particular the Renaissance anatomical period (specifically Leonardo da Vinci, Andreas Vesalius and Albinus). I love the interactive potential that clothes have: with the body, and with its surroundings. I see clothes as a possibility to unite the human body to its immediate environment. Function is something that is very important for me.

3b. What do you hate?
The negative limitations of the industry. In particular the cyclical structure, which I feels can be contradictory to the natural development of creativity. Also, the amount of power that is exercised by some buyers, in that some designers seem to build their ranges in order to appeal the most to their buyers (to give them the most choice). The (creative) designer should really be building their range to exaggerate and define their concept. There is a lot of integrity lost in the fashion industry. I guess that works for a lot of designers, but for me it’s too limiting.

4. Tell us about your last collection...
My work is primarily about finding a reason to create or design anything. I am interested in justifying all design features (everything has to be there for a reason – not necessarily functional – I don’t believe in decorational values). Concept, process, philosophy and origin are the real foundations within my work. I generally achieve this by working within my own self-initiated design process. This involves me designing characters and stories based on my drawings, rather than designing clothes.

I then convert those characters and their defining characteristics into wearable versions of themselves (the garment), so that any design features are dictated by the character and its relevance to the story.

My last collection tells the story of a group of eight football hooligans who become involved in a racist attack and accidentally kill a Hindu boy. When they realize what they have done, grief overcomes them and they seek forgiveness by dedicating the rest of their lives to honouring the lost life of the Hindu boy. They do this by converting to Hinduism, but the lack of a feeling of ‘forgiveness’ leads them to actually attempt to become Hindu gods.

So, each outfit of the collection represents one of the hooligans and the specific god that he’s attempting to convert into. The basis of each garment is based on a generic military garment. This creates a contrast between war and religion. But also it serves as a homage to Massimo Osti, a football terrace favourite…as his designs were mostly derived from military functions. The collection sees military classics such as the M-65 american parka converted into wearable Hindu gods: The hood is sculpted and cut into the shape of a lion’s head; the white furry trim doubling up as the lion’s mane. The military sash of a british army suit is constructed from numerous fully structured skull-shaped bags, relating to Shiva’s iconic skull necklace…

5. Who is your "design idol"?
I would say Massimo Osti for translating military garments into ‘fashion’ and for some of the classic garments, fabrics and techniques (such as garment dyeing) that he pioneered.

6. What kind of projects have you got planned next?
Primarily, I’m working on my next collection which will be shown at the next edition of ITS (ITS#SIX) in Trieste, Italy in July. I am also working on a collaboration collection with an Italian company…which will hopefully be launched in about a year. I am also working on a couple of London-based commissions, based on my sculpture and installation work. I’m also working on animation (of my characters) and on a graphic novel..

6. What cartoon character are you most like?
Scooby-Doo. I’m always hungry, I get scared easily and I love camper vans.

Click images to enlarge

IMAGES courtesy and © the artist

“I try to look to my life to make genuine pictures that express emotion and feeling.”

INTERVIEW by Jason Lingard

1. Where are you from?
I was born in South Africa but moved to Australia when I was like 2yrs old. I grew up in Perth and my family still lives there so I definately consider myself an Aussie.

2. How you got into photography?
My dad took heaps of photos when we were growing up, so we always had photo albums around the house. I had a few disposable cameras when I was a kid and I went on a trip once and my parents bought me a point and shoot camera.

Then once I was a bit older and I no longer spent as much time with my family, I realised I had lived through some pretty wild teenage years and had no documentation of them.

Later on, I started spending time around some skateboard photographer friends and I started to learn about the technical side of things.

3. What do you love the most about being a photographer?
I think it's the perfect medium for me to express myself.

4. How would you describe your work?
I try to look to my life to make genuine pictures that express emotion and feeling.

5. What's the most extreme / bizzare thing you've done to get a good shot?
I don't usually have to go very far out of my way for photo's. But I do remember a motorcycle trip in Oregon, I was trying to take photo's with a manual SLR camera of my friends riding in front of me. We were going pretty fast and I was trying to focus the stupid thing and take a tight corner. Around that time I started using point and shoot cameras heaps more.

6. Who / what would you most love to photograph, and why?
Really, just photographing my friends, family and my life is what I am most interested in. These are the people and places that are closest to me and mean the most.

7. What are you working on now? or what's next?
I have a couple more exhibitions coming up of my 'Westside' series, at Johnston Gallery in Perth and Utopian Slumps, Melbourne. I'll also be trying to make the most of summer...

IMAGES courtesy and © the artist

A graduate of the Antwerp academy, Erik Verdonck gave up the commercial fashion life in order to pursue projects of passion, most notably the buy-buy fashion statements.

INTERVIEW by Catherine Woods

Why did you choose to pursue an alternative to the commercial fashion industry?
I quickly got tired and sick of a system where you’re designing next seasons sales so I wanted to do something of an anti-fashion statement and started a french fries shop in Antwerp.

I'm fascinated by the idea of a fries shop - can you tell me about the set up?
The French fries shop had several purposes. I wanted to do something for myself and kick off from fashion. I didn’t want to be dependent on anything so… French fries shop!

What was the reaction from the fashion and art world?
At that time the reactions of the fashion world were very typical. Some understood the idea and supported me and some thought that this was ‘not done’, ‘impossible’. It seems that everything in fashion is possible except starting a French fries shop. At that moment I realised that the fashion world is very narrow-minded and a group of people have to give permission to approve or disapprove an idea!
[Belgian artist] Guillaume Bijl once showed a whole French fries shop in a museum as a work of art. I admire his work and way of thinking and was in fact very shocked when he came in to my French fries shop on a Saturday night after drinking some beers in town and the first thing he asked me while entering the shop was “what is this?” Of course he was surprised when I answered, “This is art.”

But you returned to designing.
An invitation from Marina Yee (Antwerp 6) to make an installation for an exhibition ‘van dijck’ in 1999 dragged me back in designing. Although every participating designer made clothes I knitted a table.

I [also] started working again, first as assistant for Antwerp 2001 landed project, then as production assistant at Ann Demeulemeester and later on I started my own collection (2002).

You have a unique way of presenting your collections – can you explain?
Every presentation is in form of a statement titled ‘buy-buy fashion’ and is a reaction against mass-production, over-consumption but most off all against fashion designers who create just for selling, selling and selling. Fashion for me is first of all people, living, beauty, materials, images. Most of my products are handmade and unique (max. three pieces and all different).

For my first ‘buy-buy fashion’ statement I went to Paris with my models and placed them in front of the entrance of other fashion shows. The second ‘buy-buy fashion’ statement I moved my atelier to Paris and sat there working (the collection wasn’t finished) but few people understood the idea. At the third ‘buy-buy fashion’ statement I hung the collection on big helium filled balloons and let the pieces fly in the air (lost them). The fourth was a travelling collection. First of all I presented the collection in Antwerp while everyone (I mean the fashion crowd) was in Paris, then the collection was available [in limited supply] in different stores at different times (catch me if you can). I also took it to Amsterdam and Brussels.

What did the most recent buy-buy fashion statement involve?
The last ‘buy-buy fashion’ statement, in October, called ‘the not for sale collection’ was together with the launch of my website. My clothing and textile designs were printed on pillows so you can sit on it but not buy it. The pillows are exhibited at the modenatie Antwerp 4th floor. Each piece is handmade, authentic, expressive with a high quality finishing.

How have people reacted to each of the buy-buy projects?
The reactions on the statements are the same as with the French fries shop. Some understood immediately the idea and some thought I had gone mad! Some thought that fashion is serious and that you cannot question it - ‘it’s a system so accept it’.

Apart from the buy-buy statements, what else are you up to?
I’m working in the Netherlands in The Hague academy of fine arts as head of a textile and fashion department. It is very interesting to work with young people who sometimes understand more about what you are doing than the ‘professional world’. Young designers always try to revolt or question the things going on (I still do the same). It’s wonderful to see people dream in the way you still want to dream.

WORDS by Ella Mudie

After being the most picked “name to watch” by the media at her New Zealand Fashion Week debut, Deborah Sweeney’s 2007 Winter Collection has been awaited with anticipation.

Dubbed Heartland, Sweeney’s new winter range takes its inspiration from two films; one the iconic 1961 Breakfast at Tiffany’s and the other the sexy 1980 film Lou Lou. Heartland “takes a nod at the style of the films’ leading ladies, Isabelle Huppert who plays Nelly, an exotic and vague French woman with a lovely smile and even more stunning pout, and Audrey Hepburn in the role of the charming and audacious Holly Golightly.”

This cinematic inspiration from two eras has translated into a mix of 60’s style pieces that herald the new shapes of the season; the trapeze coat, voluminous shift dresses, cocoon skirts and the drawstring waist. A one-shoulder frock, skull prints, and some brash stripes all thrown in for good measure, offset the playfulness of the sixties styling by adding a sharper eighties edge.

Sweeney started her signature label four years ago, beginning with just a handful of shirts and accessories, which grew out of a stint running her own market stall at Spitalfields in London. Despite these apparently humble beginnings, Sweeney also drew on her year working at uber high-end label Jill Stuart in New York. This was followed by design work in London where she produced up to the minute ranges for the fashion forward High Street stores.

Heartland is Sweeney’s eighth collection and incorporates 60 pieces. As well as producing her biannual ranges, Sweeney staged her second runway show at New Zealand Fashion Week last September. A longtime admirer of the way Japanese wear their clothes, she also has ambitions to break into the Japanese market in the not too distant future. But for now, she’s enjoying the freedom, and damn hard work, of designing for her own label, and is sticking to the principle of creating clothes she’d like to wear herself. The result is a very wearable winter collection, fashion conscious but with a healthy enough dose of individuality to give it a gritty edge.

INTERVIEW by Karlee Slater

At 25, Ground Components’ vocalist Joe Mcguigan has been playing in bands for almost a decade. Touring and recording with various bands as a teenager, Joe wanted his new band to incorporate the energy of his earlier groups but closer reflect his then tastes. He formed Ground Components with Indra Adams (bass), Dallas Packard (keys) and his brother Simon (drums) in 2002. We spoke to the boys about all things Ground Components...

1. What brought the band together initially and where did the name come from?
Indra and Dallas went to school together with Joe and Simon’s younger brother Tom. We all used to hang out at a share-house called the rat lounge which was basically a Melbourne punk-rock party spot at the time. We all used to party together and were into similar music. Joe really wanted to start a band with Dallas and Indra after seeing us
play in a band called Red Clover.

2. What inspires you to create and why?
It just seems to make sense. I mean we don’t always want to create. A lot of the time we just want to hang out with friends. I guess it feels good to put something out in the world and contribute to it’s diversity rather than be a passive participant. Also, playing music just feels good. Any music.

3. Upon listening to your album, there seems to be a real diversity between songs. Is this a result of different tastes within the band, or do you all consciously strive to keep things interesting?
It wasn’t a conscious decision really. It was just a matter of recording the songs we had written, which themselves were diverse. It’s partly a result of different tastes in the band but also just an openness to different styles generally. I mean we don’t try and cram as many different styles into a song as possible, but then we’re also not afraid to.

4. Can you tell us more about the making of “An Eye for a Brow, a Tooth for A Pick?”
We recorded it in an industrial suburb in Melbourne called Oakleigh. A panel beater had saved up a lot of money and put it all into
building a studio in his warehouse. We were one of the first bands to record there and it was amazing.

5. You have collaborated with Melbourne based rapper Macromantics recently, how was that and who else would you like to work with and why?
Macro is fantastic, very skilled and great to work with. We’re very good friends, and I think we’ll definitely do stuff again in the future. She puts EVERYTHING into her rhymes and performances. It’s really inspiring. I’d like to do song with Archie Roach one day. I think his voice is amazing. We also might do something with my friend Bec who has a great voice too.

6. What advice do you have for emerging bands?
It depends what they want to do with the band. If you’re a band that isn’t looking for a career then keep doing what you’re doing and enjoy hanging out with you’re friends. If you’re the kind of band that is careerist then make sure you’re working with people you like every step of the way. Always trust personal qualities over a cheque. If you’re having trouble getting gigs or finding someone to release your stuff then do it yourself.

www.groundcomponents.com
www.myspace.com/groundcomponents