Interesting2008

Part of my course for a Bachelor degree in Graphic Design requires the writing of an essay so Saint Martins can actually claim to be a proper University, not just a crazy place with a bunch of creative people in it doing fun stuff. I don't mind academic writing, though doing it in my second language is at times proving more difficult than I expected. I just wanted to make sure I write about something I'm passionate about and really do feel interested in so Drawing was the obvious choice. My essay will be about Scribbling and how it made its way into the Art world. I gave a presentation about this at a conference called Interesting which is organised by Russel Davies.

Below are the slides I showed and some of the stuff I talked about.

Using this drawing of David Shrigley seemed like a good way of starting my presentation.

These are some of my own drawings.

Now follows a conversation two people had in the 'letters' section of a Guardian weekend magazine:

And this is the kind of stuff Paul Harrison is probably talking about. Totally incomprehensible but–to me–absolutely brilliant:

Next, I showed a drawing about drawing, trying to explain where I think Scribbles fit into the wider picture.

Now follows my favourite illustrator: Paul Davis. Below is a drawing which he did for a surf magazine by David Carson, who in turn thought it was too pessimistic and didn't publish it.

These are the covers and some spreads of books about what the English think of Americans and vice versa.

Referring to Rick Poynor's article in Eye magazine a few years ago about the genius of Paul Davis I put together some of the characteristics I thought most Scribble Artist's had in common:

Last but not least the Romanian Dan Perjovschi, who stunned art lovers with a huge and fantastic exhibition in the MoMa last year. Below are some of the drawings you can find in a leaflet from the exhibition.

I concluded my presentation with an example of what I think will not help getting more people drawing: A publication from the Guardian about how to doodle. I just think the very sense of Doodling or Scribbling is that it happens spontaneously and not on a provided sheet of paper in a Doodle book.

P.S.: Another artist to mention in relation to Scribble Art is the German Markus Vater

whose work I am personally not 100% fond of. I think it lacks some of the cleverness of someone like David Shrigley, esp. in its typographic commentary on the drawings, and, to me, often risks being a touch banal.

Room Doom

How to find a room in New York.

Step 1: Craigslist
Spend three days solidly on Craigslist, that is 24 hours to make best use of the time difference. Look at every ad that might just be somehow interesting in the slightest.

Step 2: Email
Write at least 100 emails with lots of positive words and exclamation marks in the subject line. Don't really lie about yourself but make sure you note down all the most positive aspects of your personality.

Next steps to follow in future posts. Meanwhile, lets have a look at possible new house mates.

Shall we use the help of this gentleman: 'I take pride in the number of people I have placed sight-unseen'. NUH UH. 'Sight-unseen' is not for the faint hearted. With an average deposit of 1.5 months rent and the rent being a minimum of around $800 (unless you want to live in a 'room' in the hallway) you'd be almost $2000 lighter while still halfway around the world.

Maybe this one: 'My level of cleanliness is best described as clean.'. Aha. And she'd 'prefer a guy but a really laid-back, unselfish female would be great too.' Oh dear not me then. Too female and selfish, for sure.

The next ad is devided into the categories 'The room, the apartment, the hood'. Sounds like an authentic New York experience. 'The hood'. Yeah. Uh huh check it out now.

Maybe him: 'Vegetarian but not preachy about it. Looking for someone who pays the bills on time, likes my dog, and is clean but not a clean freak.' Not preachy about vegetarian means if sausage has been cooked in a pan you can roast your meat-free soya burgers in it without having to deep-clean and sterilise it? Yeah I can live with that.

Then this: '420 friendly but Please, No Cigarettes!'. Dear me cigarettes. Bah. Never. Too Stinky. Dope's fine though (that's what '420 friendly' means, according to Google). Alright. NEXT.

'I really just want to meet someone who would be cool to live with.' Sounds heart-rending. This 'woman of leisure' offers me a great deal: 'this apartment is real intimate, railroad style. So whoever moves in will have a lack of privacy since I will have to walk through your room to use the kitchen and bathroom. This is not a problem when both people are in the same mental space.' Aha. EXCUSE ME? We are still talking about $800 a month. And you want to walk through my room?

Well maybe this sounds promising: '$900 I NEED A ROOMIE OR A ROOM'. Ahh. We then see 3 (!) images of the gentleman himself, who's 'not the average 20 year old' and who's 'leaving the city of brotherly love.' Sniff.

How about this: '$995 Room in SOHO loft.' "NOT POSSIBLE!!!", my friend goes, clicking on the link to the ad anyway. And here's the deal: 'There is no kitchen or bathroom in the room.' Great. Just what I need for almost a 1000 dollars a month. A flat with one room and nothing else. People in New York must be MENTAL!

Let's see this: 'The space is awesome, there are three other bedrooms occupied by nice women who aren't home that much.' Uh. Ok. It's not like I'm actually keen to move in with 3 other people to then never see them. But the good news is 'they are nice people and won't steal your stuff'. Well that's a relief.

And here's my final and favourite: '$930. luckily for you, this place is a sick, sick deal.' Sounds kinda bad in a good way. But then: 'the catch is that the bedrooms have no Windows. but this is a small price to pay for the low rent. luckily there is plenty of light and air upstairs.' No windows and now air downstairs but upstairs. Well that's a clear proposition. Sleep as little as possible and you'll survive.

Good luck!

Cinnamon's been asleep...

...but it's time to wake up now. It's been a month since my last post and I will try jump back on the train of blogging. One of the reasons for my non-blogging is my shocking lack of creative occupation since the end of term. And I simply didn't feel the urge to write about my recent obsession with Nintendo Wii Mario Cart. (Though there are some interesting things to say about that.) But there have been some developments and I will therefore announce that Cinnamon is going to change. I am off to New York in two weeks and will be there until the end of December for an exchange with Cooper Union. CU is a crazy art school in the East Village in lower Manhattan with lots of people with asymmetric haircuts. I think exciting times are lying ahead and I will try and document some of it on Cinnamon. This will mean a change from my mainly visual blog outset to a more diary like affair. Now, I don't mean the kind of diary where you write about irregularities in your period. I'll just try and tell about the things I come across every day in that crazy place called Big Apple. Bear with me, writing is not my unique personal strength, but I believe you get better at almost everything you practice and I think these months ahead will be interesting enough to be shared.

Go and See...

Savage Grace.
This was SUCH a great film. I loved it. Go and see it NOW. Not later. Be prepared to be shocked.

Go and See...

...Kung Fu Panda.
An easy one to sit through, but nothing not to be missed. In terms of the animation I didn't find it in the slightest as exciting as for example Pixar's 'Ratatouille'. The story and script are so-so, I did like the fact that it got by without a love story.


Kung Fu Panda in your pocket.

P.S.: If you wanted to, you could learn how to draw Panda in five steps here. (Example below)

Oetztal V

Austrian rainbow power. Taken by my dad.

Oetztal IV

Oetztal III

Oetztal II

Oetztal

Hiking in the Austrian Alps. Taken with my dad's mobile phone because my old analog Chinon got scared of the height and refused to work.

Trix and Flix

Surely if there was an award for mascot design, the creator of these two would win 1st prize. Err. Anyway: I've commissioned the two mascots of euro2008 to enact how I felt after Sunday night's game.

Munich Film Festival 2008-FRIDAY

I won the ticket to Princ od papira (The Paper Prince) by Marko Kostic when I participated in a survey about the film festival and I thought I'd give it a go. It was part of the children's film festival, and as previously mentioned I am a fan of films for and about children. Since it was for children, and not many Germany children speak English, the Serbian Film was dubbed life into German while also supplying English subtitles which took a little getting used to at the beginning. Not necessarily a must-see but it was a sweet story, though, and an impressive and charming performance by Milica Spasojevic, the little girl.

Phew, that's it. 14 films in just about 6 days. I will now retire from reporting and relax in the Bavarian country side.

Munich Film Festival 2008-THURSDAY

Back To Africa by Othmar Schmiderer. A documentary about some of the crew of Andre Heller's show Africa!Africa!. The film follows several of the artists back to their respective African home countries, interviewing them and their families. We gain an insight into how they grew up and developed their talents. How tough it can be for them to be so far away from their homes and families when touring for several months. I had not seen the show Africa!Africa! and found it a little difficult to follow the film, especially at the beginning–it seems to rely on you having seen the show. (Young@Heart which I saw on Tuesday does a better job at that.) However, it was nice to gain some insight into the artist's origins, see their great performances and listen to beautiful music.


Dirty Hands: The Art And Crimes Of David Choe by Harry Kim. Both artist (David Choe) and director were at the screening and Harry Kim's introduction "I think you guys don't know what you're in for" aptly summed it up. I really didn't know what I was in for and it was quite disturbing at times. This is a brilliant film about an incredibly talented by quite strange guy from Los Angeles who spends most of his time (or so it seems in the film) drawing naked women in disagreeable positions, upsetting feminist groups and so on. He also does very cool graffiti and maybe not so cool shop lifting, in this case upsetting police. Watching the film, I really started to like this guy when he recalls getting sent to prison in Japan. He comes back after 3 months with some legendary soy sauce drawings. (And his personality seems changed forever, too?). This is really a must-see so I wont give away too much.


This is funny. Somewhere in our ticket buying rush we ended up with La Matinee (about an Uruguayan carnival group) instead of La Maison (about a French father of three). Never mind. This film by Sebastián Bednarik tells the story of a group of carnival choir singers who are reunited after 20 years to play in the Uruguayan carnival scene again. They perform what's called a 'murga' (noise) which is a chorus that recites social and political themes with percussion accompaniment. They all wear make up and dress up, too. This documentary gives a rare insight into the lives of these men, all together real characters.

Munich Film Festival 2008-WEDNESDAY

Waiting for love by James Lee. Not an easy one, especially after the last film on Tuesday ('El cielo...'); again, really slow, really uber-realistic. A little boring I think. The picture above wouldn't tell, but if you have an aesthetic interest in cinematography, leave your glasses at home. The whole film is shot with what looks like a cheap digital camera, the lighting is bad and mean and the colours makes everyone look like they're having bad hangover, magenta sprayed skin. I'm allergic to that because it reminds me of try-hard-but-boring student films. However, I'm prepared to 'look' past the look if the story is capturing but even that wasn't the case.


Orz Boys by Ya-Che Yang, who was there on the night and had to face a smaller audience than deserved due to the overlap with the first half of Germany - Turkey. We decided in favour of the film and I have no regrets. This is a sweet film about two Taiwanese boys called only (liar) 'No. 1' and 'No. 2'. They spend their days trying to trick class mates into giving them small change, creating hyper-space atmospheres with the help of dozens of ventilators (only blowing the fuse) and saving up for a trip to the water park. I love films about and for children if they authentically dip into children's worlds and this one manages it very well.


Momma's Man by Azazel Jacobs with his parents Flo and Ken Jacobs and a stunning performance by Matt Boren. This might be my favourite of the festival. (I'll have to admit, though, that I missed the beginning due to an unlucky overlap with the vitally important last 10 minutes of the semi-final with Germany - Turkey. Filmed in a totally crazy and chaotic New York apartment in which his parents apparently really live (for 500$ a month). This is a story of a grown up son who visits his parents on a business trip from California and ends up finding it impossible to leave. Azazel Jacobs wanted to make a film to capture what is still left of his childhood home. It might soon disappear due to the fact that a banker has recently bought the building in the Tribeca neighbourhood where his parents have lived for the last 40 years. He did so well. Really, really, really brilliant!