A new exhibition opens in New York today that looks at how clothing addresses identity. The six New York City women involved, who’s outfits will be on display, have experienced some sort of sexual assault in their lives. Artist Laura Jane Kenny looks at this sensitive subject and causes us to think of life after assault.

Viewers will be able to observe the diversity of each survivor’s approach to sharing their identity and personal style while eschewing vulnerability.

She Was Asking For It opens today at The Loft, Judson Memorial Church, 55 Washington Square South, New York, NY 10012. 

laurajanekenny.com

Tags: Laura Jane Kenny

Young Canadian photographer and Twin contributor Petra Collins is known for her girl power images that prove feminism and sexuality aren’t mutually exclusive. In a new book, Babe, Collins, as well as 30 artists who have been part of her online collective The Ardorous, explore the female identity through aesthetically varied bodies of work.

Collins’s friend and collaborator, Tavi Gevinson, well-known for her online magazine Rookie, introduces Babe with a foreword that explains just how pivotal Collins’ work has been, not just to Gevinson, but to young woman around the world.

This inspiring collection of work, from artists hailing from New York, London, Moscow, Stockholm, Los Angeles, Berlin and Toronto, reflects a distinctly female point of view for a new generation of creative, forward-thinking women.

Babe is released on May 1st. Pre-order here. 

Tags: Petra Collins, Tavi Gevinson

These visually stunning animals are more than just cute – they are the latest of 20 visual series’ from Issey Miyake’s legendary Pleats Please.  Taku Satoh’s models include pandas, cats, horses and other animals. Designed to highlight concerns for the environment and natural ecosystems, the 3D figures also underline the unlimited potential of the Pleats Please fabric, which is light in weight and easy to wear. These animals follow on from last year’s flowers series, which has received accolades such as the Gold Prize in the design category at the 92nd New York Art Directors Club.

isseymiyake.com

Tags: Issey Miyake, Model Animals, Pleats Please

South London photographer Sophie Green, 23, has delved into the uncharted, colourful subculture of banger racing to produce Bangers & Smash, a collection of images taken at racing meets at Wimbledon Stadium. Full of highly evocative photographs that have a truly hypnotic quality, the collection documents a community that is little-known and little understood by those outside it, yet has an irresistible draw for those within.

Twin catches up with Sophie to discuss what lured her to this mysterious sport, and to find out about her exciting year ahead.

How did you get into photography?
I’ve always been creative and the art room at school was the one place I felt confident and self-assured, and I felt particularly connected to photography. I started to look at everything with photographer’s eyes, seeing everything through a frame, and wanting to take pictures all the time. I went on to do a degree in Fashion Photography at London College of Fashion. After graduating, I full time-assisted photographers Tom Craig and Mel Bles for a couple of years and now I’m working freelance.

Which photographer/artist inspires you most? Can you see their influences in your work?
I’m very inspired by cinema; Andrea Arnold, Pawel Pawlikowski and Duane Hopkins are just a few directors that heavily influence me. Visually and stylistically I love photography that has a cinematic quality – photographs that look like film stills.

I like my work to have a cinematic look because it has a level of reality. It feels like perhaps you’re looking at a scene and moment where you see something unfolding. You question the story in the image, the relationship between the people and the place and why the subject is composed in a particular way.

You’ve created a variety of different projects – what inspires you?
I am just a very curious person. I’m particularly inquisitive about people. I feel compelled to meet people and find out their story. I use photography as a way to explore the world around me. I love projects I can learn from or discover something new. I want my work to reflect a vision and tell a story.

What do you look for in the people whose photos you take?
I try to find people who have something special. Sometimes I am just struck by the way people look, I can’t explain what it is. Maybe it’s intuition. I like people that are unconventionally beautiful. In a human face you can read an entire range of human emotion. I find some faces just tell a story.

I like recognising a beauty in people that they were not aware they had. A lot of people can’t understand my fascination with them, they say ‘why me?’

Tell me about your most recent project, Bangers & Smash. Why did you decide to do it?
I’ve been documenting the Stock Car and Banger racing subculture. I stumbled across a racing meet at Wimbledon Stadium one Sunday afternoon by accident and became totally immersed in this colourful world. This is a culture that I wasn’t aware existed before. Instantly I saw it as a great environment to take pictures, full of peculiar scenes and interesting faces everywhere.

I’ve been back to Wimbledon Stadium multiple times, capturing the sport and the community in its most revealing and honest form. The process was very organic and the series is a spontaneous, intuitive reaction to what I observed, documenting not only the racing drivers, but also their families and friends who all go to support.

The majority of competitors have family relations to introduce them to the sport. The junior formula is age 10-16, when you’re 16+ you can race any formula you like, so all ages are really integrated; you could be a 16 year old girl competing against a 55 year old man.

Competitors pour their heart, souls and money into the sport; it’s a way of life for them; they have mentioned how they have missed weddings, parties and holidays to go to race meetings. One man said to me “We often say what do normal people do at weekends?” Parents have described how it gives their children a focus in life. It keeps them from getting into the wrong crowd because racing keeps them so occupied.

All competitors describe this huge buzz and adrenaline rush they get from the sport. It’s total escapism from the normality of everyday life. Competitors say when they’re in the drivers seat they enter a different zone and all their problems go away because the only focus is racing.

I’ve recently been selected for the Magnum/Ideastap Photographic Award for Bangers & Smash and their grant has enabled me to continue developing this project. Over the last few months I’ve been shooting a lot so I will have more exciting work to show over the next few months. Watch this space.

Which is your favourite photo from the project?
I’d have to say my favourite would be the portrait of Danielle –The devoted girlfriend who’s watching her boyfriend race around the track from the safety of the stands. I love the stars tattooed on her back and the way her hair is perfectly placed in front of her shoulder. Danielle was all made up, in her dress, makeup and jewelry and it just seemed such an interesting juxtaposition to me against the dirty, outdated backdrop of Wimbledon Stadium.

 What can we expect to see from you in the future?
I started 2015 with a very exciting collaboration with Vice. They have been filming me as part of their documentary series called Picture Perfect. The series follows individual photographers shooting projects and a master interview about the project/their career. The documentary will be out mid- February.

You can expect to see more from my on-going collaboration with the charity Tomorrow’s People; a specialist employment charity whose mission is to help marginalised people in the most challenging situations to get and keep a job. Tomorrow’s People run employment programmes in some of the most deprived areas of the country and focus their support on people who are the hardest to help, helping them to overcome the barriers they face so that they can move into employment or training, or back to education.

Over the last few months I’ve been working intensively on a portrait project for the charity. This portrait series aims to raise awareness of the charity and to also give recognition to the personal and unique stories of each individual. Each subject has their own inspiring story of moving on from a world of social exclusion and disadvantage. This portrait series will form an exhibition for the charity, which is running throughout major fundraising and political campaigning events.

sophiegreenphotography.com

Tags: Banger racing, photography, Sophie Green

From 9 May, Largo Isarco, Milan, will be home to a pioneering new art space from the Fondazione Prada. Occupying a former 1910 distillery, the Fondazione has supplemented pre-existing buildings with three new structures to provide a cool 11,000m² of dedicated exhibition space. Quirky director Wes Anderson has been enlisted to bring the air of old Milanese cafés to the on-site bar.

To add to the excitement, the activities which will accompany the site’s opening are sure to thrill art-lovers. Site-specific installations by Robert Gober and Thomas Demand will compliment the industrial architecture, while Roman Polanski will explore the cinematographic inspirations behind his artistic vision, translating into a documentary and a series of film screenings.

The Prada Collection will itself be presenting a series of thematic ancient art exhibitions, curated by Salvatore Settis. Rem Koolhaas’ OMA are behind the display system of the project, which analyses the themes of imitation in classical art and the reproduction of small-scale Greek and Roman sculptures from the Renaissance to Neoclassicism. All in all, an unbeatably cool artistic endeavour from the fashion powerhouse.

fondazioneprada.org

Tags: Fondazione Prada, Milan

Thanks to feminist art historians like Griselda Pollock, Rozsika Parker and Linda Nochlin (Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?), alongside visionary female art activists such as Guerrilla Girls, and high-profile visionaries like Marina Abramović, Yayoi Kusama and Tracey Emin – all of whom have defied statistics when it comes to the male/female success ratio in the art world – there are increasingly more and more signs of recognition for the value, influence and stature of female artists.

Doing their own bit to ensure that cultural landscape remains is Girls Only. Girl-power gang, women-only wolf-pack, riot grrl clique – however you describe them, the transatlantic collective is an experimental community uniting female artists, encouraging conversation, creativity and expression from a new wave feminist stance. Twin caught up with the group’s founder and curator Antonia Marsh, to find out more.

How did Girls Only evolve?
After I graduated from my Masters in curating, I felt that I needed to generate my own voice as a curator so I decided to work on a project of my own. I left San Francisco for NYC, rented the first studio I viewed and started kitting it out. The first resident started within that month.

So were you an artist yourself too?
I’ve only recently started making art myself but I studied art history and have been working in the art world assisting and curating for ten years now.

What was your vision for the project?
To create a safe space for female artists to talk about and share their work with one another, outside of the exclusivity of a largely patriarchal art world. This vision has developed organically over time – while it remains, what I want more for the artists now is for them to be able to show their work in an exhibition context as much as possible.

So what’s the process – from bringing a community of women together, to promoting the art?
It mostly starts with a conversation or an idea for a smaller project and then snowballs. We  do a lot of things – from film screenings to talks and discussion groups, exhibitions, school trips and studio visits – there is a lot of space for artists to get involved.

Were you ever concerned that by calling the group ‘Girls Only’, it immediately alienates men and becomes a feminist conversation?
Of course, this was a major concern from the start of the project. However, with this in mind the choice of name was deliberate. There’s nothing wrong with a feminist conversation, in fact I believe it’s really important that they are engaged with it. Girls Only is not about excluding men, it’s about including artists and providing them with the time, space and money to make work, that might not otherwise have such an opportunity.

At the moment with the under-representation of women in the commercial art world, and in museums and gallery shows, they are the artists that need these opportunities the most.

You’re obviously aware of activists like Guerrilla Girls and the Bunny Collective – do you think we’re having a renaissance for female artists, particularly thanks to the internet?
We actually did a performance project in homage to the Guerrilla Girls in New York! There’s definitely a lot more conversations about it, and I’m doing whatever I can to push in that direction.

Yet there are still many challenges facing female artists. What do you think is the glaringly obvious one?
I think whether or not to identify as female in relation to their work and whether that should be part of their artwork. I think many female artists actually feel inhibited by this and don’t feel the need to relate the work they’re making to their gender. I would imagine that with the burgeoning conversation surrounding feminism in the cultural zeitgeist at the moment, it can be hard to escape constant questions as to where they position themselves, and their practice in relation to this.

And do you think there has been any shift in male attitudes towards women in art?
Not really. I hope they’re freaking out though.

Me too, particularly with so much emerging talent out there. So who are your personal trailblazers – the ones who really shaped freedom of expression for women in art?
Judy Chicago, Cindy Sherman, Carolee Schneeman, Jenny Saville, Tracey Emin, Sarah Lucas.

You recently collaborated with Anti-Agency in London – what was the purpose of pairing up a casting agency with the art world?
Lucy Greene and Pandora Lennard from Anti-Agency approached me after the first Girls Only exhibition in London. A lot of the girls they represent are extremely talented young female artists, and they wanted to give them a chance to show their work. After doing studio visits with them I was really impressed and they were fantastic to work with, I’m really proud of how the show turned out.

And what’s next on your to-do list?
Well the residencies have officially started in London, so at the studio we will have two artists living and working, and at the end they will show their work at different spaces. Our website is also launching, and we are opening temporary studio and exhibition spaces in Paris, Copenhagen and Berlin so we can collaborate with local artists. Hopefully then we will put together a book of everything we’ve done so far.

And finally, how can women continue to ensure the art world keeps recognising their contribution and talent?
Honestly I think the answer to this is really just to keep on making art. It’s as simple and beautiful as that.

girlsonlynyc.tumblr.com

Image One: Girls Only Founder & Curator Antonia Marsh – pic credit Chad Moore | Image two: Artwork by artist Bella Howard from the Anti-Agency x Girls Only Exhibition – Pic Credit, Tas Gaitanos | Image three: Artwork by artist Arvida Bystrom from the Anti-Agency x Girls Only Exhibition – Pic Credit, Tas Gaitanos | Image four: Artwork by artist Nicole Fitch from the Anti-Agency x Girls Only Exhibition – Pic Credit, Tas Gaitanos

Tags: Anti-Agency, Antonia Marsh, Art, Girls Only

Celebrated photographer and Twin girl Jane Bown sadly died, aged 89, on Sunday 21 December. She joined The Observer in 1949 and went on to photograph the Queen, the Beatles, Richard Nixon, and other key figures of the 20th century. Several of her pictures hang in the National Portrait Gallery.

Quoting from her interview in Twin issue X [believed to be her last ever], Bown said, ‘I’ve never wanted to take a bad picture of anybody.’ Such a simple ethos is much at odds with our current society of paparazzi and bare-all celebrity. No wonder her sharply beautiful portraits continue to hold a sense of wonder for us all today.

Tags: death, Jane Bown, Observer, Photographer

When you first saw the photo above, a candid-style shot of a Kim Kardashian lookalike being squeezed into a pair of Spanx by Kanye, your first thought probably wasn’t of who created it – and nor what it symbolises for women. In fact, the message behind it, and the other works appearing in the ‘There’s a Good Girl’ exhibition (at the Assembly rooms until 19 December), is that female creatives are now changing the rules on the way that women have appeared in advertisements for decades. The artist, by the way, is Alison Jackson, also known for her memorable campaign for Schweppes featuring a Camilla Parker Bowles lookalike sipping a G&T.

‘There’s a Good Girl’ is a VivaWomen! exhibition, curated by Saatchi & Saatchi,  and forms part of an initiative working to raise the profile of women in advertising. Sara Baumann, Talent Strategy Director of Leo Burnett Group and Chair of VivaWomen!, said “We are a creative business, working to engage women for the majority of our clients, yet women are under-represented in creative departments in our agencies.” The seed for the exhibition’s concept was planted after Saatchi & Saatchi Creative Director Jo Wallace attended an event organised by VivaWomen!

The exhibition features an extensive list of artists: Alison Carmichael, Alison Jackson, Arvida Bystrom, Cassandra Yap, Hattie Stewart, Jessica May Underwood, Jillian Lochner, Kathryn Ferguson, Malika Favre, Mary Nighy, Michela Picchi, Miss Cakehead, Nancy Fouts, Natasha Law, Pam Glew, Rhea Thierstein, Sara Pope, Soozy Lipsey, Toni Gallagher and Veronique Rolland. Many of these women started out as creative in the advertising industry and later carved out successful careers as artists. Jo Wallace drafted in Shelley Dobson and Lisa Robbins, as well as Suzie Quill, Camilla McLean, Layla Boyd and Lee Sharrock to form the TAGG team.

The unique and beautiful sculptures, photography, illustrations, drawings, and films are an exciting way to draw attention to this cause. Favourites include Sara Pope’s neon red lips, which she showed personally to His Holiness at the Vatican, and Pam Glew’s American flag featuring Anna Wintour’s face.

And to add to the exhibition’s appeal, a percentage of any artwork and exhibition merchandise sold will be donated to charity Plan UK, who work with the world’s poorest children so they can move themselves from a life of poverty to a future with opportunity. They help girls around the world who are threatened by poverty, gender inequality, violence, poor education, conflict and disasters.

plan-uk.org

saatchi.co.uk

Next week creatives from all over will be coming together at Google’s London HQ for the REMIX London 2014 Summit. The event is the European edition of an annual series of global events exploring culture, technology and entrepreneurship.

With over 100 speakers from companies and brands such as YouTube, Red Bull Academy, British Museum, Virgin, Manchester International Festival, Mumsnet, Time Out, Sonos, Ace Hotels, Burning Man, Maker Faire, Natural History Museum, Dubai Design District, The Barbican, Sony, General Assembly and Google, REMIX looks to provide a ground-breaking forum to explore issues facing cultural and creative organisations from the inside-out.

“REMIX London is an opportunity to shine a light on the world-class creative entrepreneurs in the city, as well as showcasing cultural influencers from across the UK and Europe. REMIX brings together creative leaders at the highest level in a unique forum, exploring the evolution of contemporary culture, technology and the creative economy.” says Peter Tullin, co-founder of REMIX.

The launch party will take place at Shoreditch’s Ace Hotel on December 1st where you’ll be able to network in the hotels new top-floor event space.

Tickets are running out so head to eventbrite.co.uk to get yours.

remixsummits.com/ldn

Allen Jones knows how to sell sex. Since he first exhibited his fibreglass women in the late 1960s – the prototype fembot, down on all fours, arse practically over head, strapped into bondage gear – he’s owned it. They were – are – the literal representation of sex-on-legs. And who’d have thought that the place to get a little artistic perversion in London these days would be at the Royal Academy?

It’s clear that Jones’ coterie of fetishised furniture sculptures represents a very specific sort of fantasy. It’s everyman erotica; pert tits, big lips, hard-bodied, submissive, available. Serving you cocktails, ready to take your hat. They’re expensive whores on all fours. Yet, even as a feminist, you have to relish in how aggressively politically uncorrect it all is. Jones makes incredibly, obviously, seductive art. And you might feel a bit grubby about it afterwards, but then we’ve all been there, right?

Jones’ paintings provide a little counter balance to the implied misogyny of his sculptures. In these colourfully kitsch scenes he paints about power-play with cross-dressing inferences, of the dominate female, the submissive male, of the animalistic rituals of mating and the delicate interplay of coupling represented in the form of dance. It’s the paintings and later sculptures that suggest a much more complex side to Jones than the ones his critics would have you believe. To reduce Jones to a fetish artist, means you ignore a lot of the richness and ambiguity in his work. And it’s this that makes you want to go back and take a second look at the sculptures – maybe it’s not all about oppression and submission, maybe there’s something deeper at play? Maybe it’s not a male-female thing after all. Maybe she’s in control. Hell, maybe she’s even enjoying herself. Imagine that.

Allen Jones RA is at the Royal Academy, London until 25th January 2015

royalacademy.org.uk

IMAGE CREDIT: Allen Jones RA, Body Armour, 2013 Photograph, 127 x 127 cm London, Private Collection / Image courtesy of the artist © Allen Jones

Tags: Allen Jones, Art, fashion photography, Royal Academy

The Fractured and the Feline is a new exhibition opening at The Vinyl Factory today. It showcases the work of multi-media artist Quentin Jones in collaboration with innovative spatial designer Robert Storey, both of whom are previous Twin contributors. The show itself proves to be Jones’ most comprehensive and varied to date, as it delves into her work on paper, in sculpture, film and photography. Storey creates a unique world for her pieces to be displayed, giving us intriguing spaces to explore.

We caught up with the artist to find out what to expect.

Tell us about a little about the showcase…
Lots of the exhibition is work that may have been seen somewhere in some form, but in its layered up, painted on, collaged natural form. Its a chance for me to show people my process, that is surprisingly art-based and hand made. One of the main focuses of the show will be a series of large scale works that no one has seen before… because I am still working on them. I am playing with the idea of blowing up my collages 10-fold and working back into the image at a level of detail I usually wouldn’t be able to – and having the fluidity of paint at that scale.

Oh and one of the coolest parts of the show will be the film rooms – Robert Storey who is designing the whole space for the show has come up with a really cool way to warp and reflect the films multiple times. His whole vision for transfroming the space is amazing and so cool for us to be collaborating in a more physical way than usual.

How would you personally describe your style of work?
Messy, montaged, quick, accidental, planned and exploring contrasts.

You’ve worked with Robert Story in the past, was he an obvious collaborator?
Yes he was the only person I wanted to work with in this space. He has a very architectural approach to design and his minimal structures are perfect for my chaos to to sit within. We both like things to be graphic and strong rather than subtle and ‘pretty’ and both have an outlook that straddles fine art and fashion.

What was it like working with Robert on this particular show?
So far very simple – we have worked out what we both want to show and how it can exist together. But the real fun will be in the installation weeks, when we will make many of the decisions for the show. We like to work quite spontaneously.

The Fractured and the Feline: Quentin Jones with Robert Storey is presented by The Vinyl Factory at their space in The Brewer Street Car Park, London from 19 November to 13 December 2014.  

thevinylfactory.com

Image 1: Quentin Jones, Adult Series, 2014, acrylic, ink and collage, first published in Adult Magazine. Image 2: Quentin Jones, 2013, photography, acrylic and ink, first published in Flair Magazine. Image 3: Quentin Jones, Self Portrait series, 2014, photography, acrylic and ink, first published in  i-D Magazine

Tags: Quentin Jones, Robert Storey, Vinyl Factory

Flourishes of dynamic movement, of fabric that bursts out of the frame like a blossoming bud, and a peak of flesh teasing from underneath… Vivianne Sassen’s fashion portraits offer a lavish antidote to over-exposed minimalism. Hey there colour, welcome back.

Currently on show at The Photographer’s Gallery as part of their fashion season, Sassen’s Analemma series makes the body a vehicle for movement, albeit captured in a static photograph. With her crackling eye for shape and form, Sassen creates little fashion aliens out of her subjects. These beautiful freaks, with their saturated skin-tones wrapped in voluminous swathes of fabric, can be found striking a pose against a surrealist landscape or moulding their bodies into sculptural installations. Their composition owes much more to art history than to contrived fashion formulae.

Mirroring the performance element of her shoots, the 350 or so images on view are presented in a sweeping swirl of movement; projections slide across the walls and floors in a constant loop of motion. And the colour literally blooms from her photographs. Sometimes it’s sharp and graphic, cutting a bold, clashing contrast of dramatic shapes and hues. Other times it’s present as a beautifully tonal and subtle spectrum. It’s Sassen’s non-conformity, her ability to eek-out every single droplet of pigment and her contextual references to fine art, that mean her work can not be confined to, or defined by, the fashion industry.

It’s funny that colour seems to have taken on an avant-garde status in fashion, but here’s to the industry’s current renegade and her eye-popping palette of human sculptures.

Vivianne Sassen Analemma: Fashion Photography 1992 –2012 is at The Photographer’s Gallery until 18 January 2015.

thephotographersgallery.org.uk

Tags: fashion photography, The Photographers Gallery, Vivianne Sassen Analemma

It’s not exactly news that trainers are having a renaissance of sorts in the fashion world, so it seems fitting that a Parisienne artist has made them the central theme in his work. Christophe Guinet, aka Mr Plant, has turned Nike’s moto Just Do It into Just Grow It, and created a series of living plant sculptures that feature mid-top dunks adorned with flowers, grass and bark.

To see more, head to Mr Plant’s website epiphytegarden.com

If this floral arrangement takes your fancy, Nike have recently launched a more wearable collection with Liberty. Available to buy from liberty.co.uk

Tags: liberty, Mr Plant, Nike

Tags: Fringe! Queer Film & Arts Festival

Robert Storey considers himself an artist first and foremost. With the work that he does and the brands that call upon him for set design, who’s to disagree? Having worked with the likes of Opening Ceremony, Nike, Louis Vuitton and Browns Focus (the list goes on), as well as contributing to previous issues of Twin, Storey has quickly carved out a very well-respected place for himself in the industry, were people come to his studio to get that Storey spin on their projects. Twin visited the creative at his studio to talk furniture design, New York and his very first job.

Were you always a creative person?
I was always creative as a kid, always most engaged in art classes or when I was at home. When I wasn’t playing outside with my brother, I was drawing something like a plant that I had brought inside or making something in my dad’s workshop from wood.

What does your dad do?
My dad is a businessman, but he’s an amazing carpenter – really creative, so I grew up around that.

How did you go from sculpture to set design?
I was assisting some artists in New York. I really loved it there so wanted to stay but I couldn’t assist the artists any longer. I then met this guy who was an agent at M.A.P., and he’d had an English set designer come over called Janine Trots. He said I should just work for her for a bit and see if I enjoyed it, so that was a good reason to stay. When I came back to London she set me up working with Shona Heath, so I worked for her and then kind of just rolled into being a set designer. It was quite organic.

If you had the choice, do you think you would have decided to set up your own studio in New York?
I had to come back because of my visa but I always hoped to go back to New York and then set up a studio there. I actually just got my visa to go to America so I can go now, but I’d like to try and be transatlantic rather that based in New York or based in London. I think it’s nice to be in both places as they both reward you in different ways.

What is it about New York that you like?
I think that year that I spent there was really, what’s the word, formative. I made a really good group of friends and I think those people will always draw me back because I like their company. I like how fast paced New York is and there’s always a new restaurant. Everything’s so convenient, if you live in Manhattan or Brooklyn it’s easy to get anywhere and it’s easy to work there. Everyone’s super on it, no one’s faffing around and if they say they’re going to do something, they’ll do it.

A bit different to London.
Yeah it’s all a bit slower in London. You have a meeting and then another meeting before anyone can actually do something. Which I love as well, I’m English and I’m used to that way of working, but I like that immediacy.

Tell me about your first solo gig as a set designer…
There was a guy that was working at Studio Private in Shoreditch producing a shoot, that knew I was doing set design, but he literally needed a really simple backdrop painted and asked me if I wanted to do it. I was really keen; I’d turned up to the meeting with loads of different samples I’d done. Now I wouldn’t even give a sample, but back then I would be drawing all of these different squares and doing different textures inside them. Josh Olins, who was shooting, picked his sample but somehow – I think because I was a bit nervous – I left all my samples on the table and another photographer came to the studio right after my meeting and saw them. He called me asking me to paint a backdrop for him, and then it just rolled on from there really. It was quite quick.

When you’re working on a project, do you get creative freedom or would you say it’s a more collaborative process?
I think increasingly there’s more creative freedom. Because I have developed quite a strong style people come to me because they want what I can give them. I can definitely produce anything and if someone’s got a really strong idea I’m happy to sit back and do it the way they want me to do it but I think, luckily, we get a lot of projects where people want us to put our own stamp on whatever the project is.

So how would you describe your style?
I think there’s a lot of architectural influence. It’s well balanced; there’s a lot of symmetry, a lot of geometry. I always try to make it feel really quite simple even though it’s really complicated.

You do more than just set design; you’re working on brand identity and art direction. Tell me more about what Robert Storey Studio does?
I think the term set design is quite tenuous, just because of the fact that my studio is a creative studio and I come from an artistic background and I consider myself an artist first and foremost. But beyond that we do work with brands to create an identity for them or enhance the identity that they’ve already created for themselves. But I mean like furniture design, interior spaces, pop-ups, runways shows, we do everything.

Is there one thing that’s your favourite?
Everything’s my favourite! I mean if I had to pick, I’d probably do still life but I think I love the diversity of doing a runway show one day, then a tiny still life the next and then a massive shop-build somewhere else. It keeps me on my toes.

What’s been your favourite project to date?
My favourite project would be the Nike [Womenswear Pop-Up] in New York – it was really special.

You’ve got a collaboration coming up with Quentin Jones. Tell me a bit about that?
Quentin and I have been working together for over three years now so we have this really lovely collaborative relationship. Quentin had been asked to do a presentation, like a mini retrospective of her work. She approached me to make the set for it because I know her work better than anyone else who would make a set for her. She’s great, she kind of let me go off and do my own thing and when she came back to it, she loved it, and so it’s been really easy. It’s one of those love projects really.

What are you working on other than that at the moment?
We’ve just started the Christmas windows for Matches. We’re doing it in all six of their stores for Christmas. We’re working on a project for Uniqlo in New York and Tokyo and Paris. We’re doing a few still life stories and we’re doing the Christopher Kane shop in Harrods.

Who would be the ultimate client?
Well Nike was my ultimate client and then I got it, and also Christopher Kane. I really, really want to design a space for Comme des Garçons because I think they have a really innovative, unique approach to how they expect their audience to experience the space. So I think I’d have a lot of freedom to do something really experiential with them. I think Comme des Garçons would be a good one for me.

You mentioned furniture design, what kind of things would you want to build?
My work is all about the space, and filling that space so it’s seems a natural progression to design the objects that go within it. Obviously we design these structures that go into spaces at the moment. I think the more the studio progresses, the more we’re doing the retail spaces or possibly residential spaces; it wouldn’t make sense for me to have another designer design a chair for a space which I have a complete vision for. For me, a chair is just as important as the wall in the space or the image that goes on the wall; it’s supposed to be a collective consciousness.

So what does the future hold for Robert Storey Studio?
I guess to continue this stream of my transatlantic workflow, and to eventually make some furniture of some sort. I’d love to do some collaborations with furniture. I think we need a brand to come to us like Vitro or Ikea to say ‘we want to design a range of chairs’. I’d love to do a really big collaboration project with a really big brand. I have an obsession with big American brands like Levis. Any kind of brands where we can put our name to a project, like Robert Storey x Levis or Robert Storey x Vitro.

storeystudio.com

Photographer: Robert Harper
Stylist: Coline Bach Styling Assistant: Susanna Cavallaro
Grooming: Meggie Cousland
Photography Assistant: Pablo Marks 

Robert Storey wears Ellesse sweater, Carhartt trousers and his own ring in image one; A.P.C. denim jacket, shirt and jeans in image two and Vans shirt and Carhartt chinos in image three 

Tags: Robert Storey

This year, Freize London adds to its repertoire of platforms for performance-based installations with ‘Live’, fashionably supported by Alexander McQueen, the Associate Sponsor of the art fair for the second year running.

Visitors will be able to watch a restaging of Robert Breer’s self-propelled Floats, and experience the sensation that they themselves are moving whilst actually remaining motionless, or relax by ‘vacationing’ during an installation from Tamara Henderson. Another of the 6 selected galleries, Shanzhai Biennial, will reconceive Frieze as a lifestyle brand, with products available for purchase.

‘Live’ is a major new initiative that is designed to integrate an important part of Freize’s history into the modern fair – the continuing commitment to showcasing the most experimental and ambitious art to capture visitor’s imagination.

freizelondon.com

Tags: Alexander Mcqueen, Art, Frieze, london

Frieze Festival is taking over Sanderson for four days of of exclusive exhibitions and live interactive artwork. Bringing together street pop art phenomenon Mr. Brainwash and London based talent Dannielle Hodson, there will be never before displayed sculptures and paintings in the hotel’s lobby, coming together for this exclusive exhibition.

Expect to find two horse sculptures by Mr. Brainwash, created from thousands of pieces of classic china along with the UK Can Flag sculpture which is made from 1,233 empty spray cans. As Artist in Residence, Dannielle Hodson has produced a live installation across Sanderson’s façade. Partnering with A Space For Art, she will be working on one of her signature doodles, live, giving us a chance to see her work grow and takeover the hotel’s windows for the duration of the festival.

Hodson also has a an art led clothing label named Maison Twenty who have designed a fine art T-shirt which champions the work of artists such as Andrew Salgado and VJ Von Art. They will be taking over the pop-up shop space to sell their garms as well as a custom-designed Sanderson x Frieze T-shirt.

Not only has Sanderson embraced Frieze artistically, but they have also designed a limited edition Frieze cocktail. Made from blackberry lemongrass and elderflower, this citrus vodka based cocktail will be available for the duration of the fair.

The Frieze Festival showcase at Sanderson will be displayed until 18th October. 

sandersonlondon.com

Tags: Art, Dannielle Hodson, Frieze, Mr. Brainwash, Sanderson Hotel

East London boutique Hostem has invited artist Amy Revier to perform in store for a week. To perform, the Texas born artist has installed her traditional floor loom in a studio space set in the concept store where you will find her, morning to evening, weaving textiles that will be sewn into a garment. Revier has also woven a collection of pieces specifically for Hostem, installed in the space for the duration of the exhibition. This will be the first time a large body of her work will be shown together.

“Old ways are retained not out of a sense of nostalgia, but because they serve a function,” states Revier. “I am interested in building from scratch, showing evidence of the hand, and in the plain beauty of well-made things.”

Working single-handingly to weave 3-5 garments a month in her North London studio, Revier’s pieces are intricate and beautiful. And with the materials being sourced from Kyoto-based spinners, most of which are hand-dyed and in limited stock you are left with a highly covetable luxury item for life.

Later Alone She Wore Poems for Clothes is open from the 16th-20th October.

hostem.co.uk

Tags: Amy Revier, Art, Hostem

hi you are are beautiful how are you is the product of a two year relationship between photographer Valerie Phillips and Swedish artist/model Arvida Byström.

The pair was initially introduced by a mutual friend who predicted the creative collaboration that followed; Phillips and Byström first met on Skype before eventually working on 3 zines together.

As a photographer, Phillips likes to observe her subjects in their natural environment, living the lives they lead. hi you are beautiful how are you does exactly that, with Byström as the focus. She becomes all the more intriguing because of her eccentric lifestyle and fashion choices.

The result of this quirky friendship is a narrative portrait of a young feminist, questioning modern ideas of beauty and demeanour.

valeriephillips.com

Tags: book, photography, Valerie Phillips

Danny Fox is a poet, musician and model, but predominantly a painter. He was introduced to the Cock n Bull Gallery by artist Sue Webster, who met Fox in her local watering hole. A year later he convinced Webster to visit his North London studio to take a look at his work and she had this to say: “There was simply no more room to breathe and I felt a duty to exhume these unfamiliar masterpieces before the painter suffocated and died – another undiscovered artist suffocated by the toxicity of his own genius.”

Raised in Cornwall, Fox moved to London to carve out a career in the art world having no formal training (unless you count the still life painting his grandma made him do). It is his experiences that he chronicles on giant canvases. His time spent in pubs filled with strippers or even encounters with ladyboys in Bangkok, giving us a glimpse not into his life as such, more a look at his unique interpratations of those unconventional moments.

Danny Fox Paintings will open at the Cock n Bull Gallery, 32 Rivington Street London EC2A 3LX from 17th October – 8th November. 

cocknbullgallery.co.uk

Tags: Cock n Bull Gallery, Danny Fox, Frieze, Sue Webster