Ten of the best antique iPads.

My notebook is my baby – sad but true. Yes, I have an organiser and a calendar on my phone, sticky notepads stuck to my laptop screen and a calendar hanging off my mirror (a failed attempt to make myself look at it daily, then realised I don’t look in the mirror daily), but it’s in my little notebook of scribbles that I’ll actually look. I trust it to give me the right information and to dismiss the need for emailing on the go, phoning people or asking where the nearest tube is.

It is my Bible, but my Bible is on its way out.

So, with three naked little pages to go, it’s time to find a successor (notice I do not say replacement) and as each book lasts me about three months and is the gatekeeper to my entire life, I’m happy to invest a bit. I like to make sure that my little square of paper and card is one that I’ll be proud to hoik out of my bag on trains, in meetings, at press views and, most importantly, that’s nice looking enough to make writing an article whilst half-frozen on the District Line an endurable experience.

It’s also got to be hardy, with narrow lines and no fabric – I’m a writer, not making namby pamby lists of shells I found on the beach.

So, on that nautical note, I’ve trawled through the internet and fished up ten of the best – as varied as Birmingham’s seafood markets but without the stench or slimy catcalling. Enjoy!

LIFE notebook from Cyd, director of The Sweetest Occassion, on her Keep profile – the pinterest for shopaholics. Simple, inoffensive, and if this were my notebook it would certainly do what it says on the tin.

Six Continent notebooks from Christian Lacroix for Libretto; it’s a worldwide fashion show in six parts, unfortunately I’m not sure if I’d be able to pick one (after much deliberation having to post a photo of all of them I couldn’t make my mind up!)

They’re enough arty enough to be interesting, yet demure enough to be sophisticated.

These Personalised Leather Bound Notebooks from Hope House Press mean that even when you’re snowed under with work 1. you won’t forget your name, and 2. even if you forget your notebook, hopefully a friendly colleague will pick it up for you. They’re soft leather and come in three warm shades, perfect for presents or just to treat yourself!

I love this cheery book from Peony and Thistle. It makes me far more optimistic about being a very busy bee, and the tough hardback cover is great for writing on the move – no more balancing on one leg whist leaning awkwardly on a lifted up knee!

When talking about notebooks, you can’t ignore the big fat elephant in the room…or mole. I’m not much of a moleskine fan, usually thinking of them as good quality but overpriced and dull – but alas, that’s all changed thanks to new series from a brilliant artist who’s inspired me repeatedly over the years. Ricardo Cabral’s cover art is simple and bold, and the books come in packs of two, both filled with neat squared paper like an old maths book – and I for one can remember the obsessive satisfaction gained from carefully fitting words into those squares. Hello tidy new life!

This steampunk notebook from IdeaObscura of Zazzle can take you out of that grubby tube carriage and up up up into clear blue skies.

Third of my top three on this page is this upcycled book made with vintage book cover and even interspersed with pages of the original text. Stories and Divinations has all sorts to pick from and each is one of a kind, some for sketching, some for notes but all completely unique.

Number two of my top three is this very simple vintage map covered journal: skilfully made by Heather Dewick for Folksy, it’s thick, well bound, has a little page marker (I’m always writing on random pages in a hurry, then losing my notes) and a tough but pretty pastel cover. Each one is made from a real London map so also may come in handy if your iPhone dies, they are rather old maps but still probably not much more unreliable than Googlemaps.

In first place are these ...I Met And Liked... books from Archie Grand. They’re funny, fresh and super cheap! The eighty styles range from Blondes I Met and Liked to Communists I Met and Liked, but personally the Gallerists, Excuses and Faux Pas pieces are most suited to my topsy turvy life – with Artists I Met and Liked being the clear winner. I do tend to write about artists who seem like genuinely hard working craftsmen, rather than pretentious successes – and I know which of the two I’d rather meet for a drink.

Finally, I had to put this one in. It’s not the illustrative wonder that I’d usually go for - but it could be the motivating factor I need at times. Perhaps not particularly conducive to the the cool, calm, collected persona I try to portray, but truthful at least!

Right, I really have gotta get done so I’m off! Have a nice day everyone, and write things by pen not printer once in a while –  it’s good for the soul.

Chase and Wonder… Brits, balloons & dreamy draughtsmanship.

Whilst trying to hunt down a Birmingham-based screen printers the other day I came across Mission Print and, in turn, found Chase and Wonder : a company aiming to produce “fine examples of design and creativity”, set up by two childhood friends who fell in love (cue awwwww) and converted a cow shed in Worcestershire into the Chase and Wonder studio. A lot of the products appear a little Anthropologie, or Paperchase-esque, which is partly because the couple like to collaborate and partly because this sort of cutesy, slightly quirky style of illustration has become so popular recently – but I’m not complaining. I’d quite happily live in an Anthropologie showroom.

Chase and Wonder work with all sorts of people but also have an online shop for their pieces alone. Here are a few bits and pieces I picked out, all ready to send out to special people… or to add to my wish list.

First up, beautifully drawn and printed cards. With all that ‘naive illustration’ rubbish going about, I’m nearly salivating when I see decent stuff like this!

Above are the wise lime green words of Mr Oscar Wilde.

Nautical prints

I must have a Victorian hot air ballooning bicyclist on my wall….

…flying dandies on my bed…

…and thousands more to dry my dishes with. This is one tea towel that I will not use to soak up red wine. Tut tut tut.

There, have some nice bits and bobs to look at on a sunny day.

Explorers. An exhibition in a box.

I’ve been lucky enough to be involved two of Vibe Creative’s recent shows, it’s such a good feeling actually having work up where people will see it! Uttsav Patel runs Vibe with Gemma Marsh, two Visual Arts students at Bournville campus of our humble Birmingham Institute of Art and Design. Wordy, bleugh, sorry.

Bournville is worth having a look at, especially at this time of year – there’s the Cadbury’s factory shop for cheap chocs, beautiful old shopping streets, the oldest house in Birmingham and an adorable little green with a Christmas crafts shop (cheap and really well made gifts, mother Hodge is definitely getting some sparkly things from there this year!) This little village is a teeny tiny gem just outside of Selly Oak, Birmingham.

Anyway Utts is a neighbour and dear old friend of mine, and he popped over to pick and choose some work for future shows and found these five prints which I’d done a month or so ago, wasn’t too proud of so hadn’t left my room yet and liked them. Nice!

They’re stills from the film below, just snapped, photoshopped and printed. Then I used some rather hazardous screen cleaner called Actisol to rub them onto textured paper. Actisol’s pretty nasty stuff – we picked it up from a dodgy industrial site a couple of years ago for at home printing – you have to breathe out of the window, close your eyes and rub the images together with a spoon. Dodgy much…? Then you have to make sure not to be near any of the work until it dries, so I put mine in the hallway. My poor poor housemates.

Here’s the film, 1961 New Zealand. My little mother herself.

And here’s Vibe’s fantastic little construction – each exhibition features this ‘box’ which is made of several different flats and can be transformed into all sorts of shapes and sizes, and which will eventually be  travelling exhibition space when it’s waterproofed!

“Explorers” is an audio-visual experience featuring work by myself Chloe Hodge, Gemma Marsh and Claire Pollard which was produced by exploring different areas, stories and histories.

Take a torch, step into the darkness and explore.

Sneaky peek inside the box…

If you like my little film piece, prints or any of the work in the show, a little “like” is always encouraging. Just sayin’…

VIBE. Bournville has more to offer than oompa loompas and a river of chocolate!

A friend of mine has just set up Vibe in Birmingham to host exhibitions around the city for the next few months – not just visual arts but music and spoken word too. He’s got a little portable gallery on the go but I can’t post any pics of it yet…I think it needs some essential waterproofing done before it’s ready to be revealed (definitely necessary for a wet winter in Birmingham!).

I was lucky enough to put a bit of work in his first exhibition which finished on Wednesday. It’s not much, just a laser cut piece of paper which I once used as a projection screen. Out of its original context it’s not my favourite piece of work, but it was hung in front of Scott Bartram’s brilliant piece Belisha Beacons so his flashy light show shone through my narration.

Check out a few pics from the first exhibition here, and there’s definitely going to be much more to come from them. I’m really excited for Vibe and it’s actually keeping me hard at work for once!

Also check out Andre De Jong, he did the flag piece and he’s just a fantastic artist.

Digbeth Day! Part II.

Next stop: The Bead Shop.

I refrained from shopping for myself any more but bought an obscene amount of beads to make prezzies for two friends of mine – retail therapy is fine if it’s for other people!

I made a little necklace, and a charm bracelet for my travelling buddy with every bead representing a little travelling story. This shop is amazing, some of their beads are almost exactly the same as the pendants that hang off some of those £28 Urban Outfitters necklaces but are a fraction of the price. Digbeth is not only arty and fun, but also perfect for a bargain hunter!

There’s also a great screenprinting place called Get a Grip, Sam and Kay who run it use beautiful old screenprinting machines to print up Tshirts, bags, cards, whichever piece you fancy with whatever design you bring them! They’re also really really friendly. Friendliness is like gold dust in a city as big as this.

 

Beautiful workshop!

We then restored our energy with a doorstop of a sandwich at Yumm before beginning our march around Digbeth to investigate the exhibitions from Trove, Eastside Projects and many more of Birmingham’s artist collectives which were open on this rainy October weekend as part of The Event.

Smoked salmon, cream cheese and rocket! MMM!

The Chapmans at the Museum of Childhood: Night frights come to life.

Since seeing the Chapman brothers’ exhibitions at White Cube earlier on in the summer, and more recently a particular piece at Frieze this year, my interest in this strange pair has grown and grown so I headed off to the Museum of Childhood with a couple of friends (and not just to try on Victorian maid’s outfits and be thrown off a rocking horse – under 12s only my arse!).

My Giant Colouring Book is on until mid-January and although it’s only a little exhibition of around 20 prints, it’s still most definitely worth a look. The prints are displayed at a slightly disturbingly child-friendly level for such grotesque images and are mostly born out of innocent colouring book pages, meant for quaint images of Bo Peep and her sheep: not exactly the Chapman’s forte.

It’s a refreshing and simple insight into the imaginations of two artists whose work is usually large-scale, expensive and pretty commercial really. The pair fascinate me but also drive me mad with their work; aesthetically I love their beautifully gruesome style, stunning but disgusting, but conceptually it all seems too ‘built to shock’ for me. A bit contrived. But contrived this exhibition is not, so have a look and just don’t jump on any rocking horses while you’re at it- not even the big one, apparently it’s not for grown-ups hrmph.

…and although the rocking horses may not be adult-friendly, they can’t stop you from dressing up!

I can goddamn well fit into children’s clothing if I want to!

Berlin: Tacheles brings contemporary art to the derelict Kunst Haus! must-see!

Walking through one of the more ‘colourful’ districts of Berlin one evening, Scarlet and I discovered the old Kunsthaus and it doesn’t look as tame and oldy worldy as you’d expect. The artist group Tacheles have taken up and stamped (or rather, spray painted) their mark all over every inch of this six storey building and are now spilling onto the streets and any piece of waste land they can find.

There’s all sorts to be seen: amazing jewellery, illustration, painting, metal work, woodwork – you name it, you’ll find it! The artists are from all over Europe, I got chatting with the Dutch artist Tim Roeloffs and the Belarusian painter Alex Rodin; their work was completely different but both appealed to me in different ways – take a look!

Tacheles is a beautiful place, unconventional in every way but the warmth of the artists and the community they’ve built outshines the decrepit nature of the building. Yes it’s dingy and dark, yes the stench of urine is almost unbearable, yes it’s falling to pieces but as we worked our way up the treacherous spiral staircase to the top we grew to love it.

Alex Rodin’s work is in the top of the building and with my fear of heights it was looking like we weren’t going to get there but I’m so glad we did. He was the oldest of the artists we met and his space was a church-like gallery of huge canvases, lit from above through great sky lights. I wish I could have taken photos but on my teeny tiny budget I couldn’t even afford the one euro donation, the paintings are really out of this world though. Alex Rodin’s pieces actually impressed me far more than most of the work I’ve seen recently in London galleries, now that’s saying something!

On a very sad note…Tacheles is being forced out of its home. The council are demolishing the building as it is essentially a squat, a brilliant bohemian dream but a squat all the same.

We signed a petition to try to SAVE TACHELES and you can do the same here… http://super.tacheles.de/cms/

It’s one of the most amazing places I’ve ever seen, no exaggeration, just because it’s a collective of 80 people from across the world who want and have managed to fight for the same thing and that’s simply a space to do the things they love to do.

So help them keep fighting!

p.s. I must apologise for the standard of most of these photos, I was overexcited and experiencing the after effects of vertigo for most.