Lumiere London 2016

January can be a dull month in London: December festivities are over, it is its cold, dark from 4.30pm… this is why Lumiere festival is an excellent idea!

For four nights this week (14-17 January, 6:30pm-10:30pm), London becomes the city of Lights displaying in different neighborhoods of our British capital, (and therefore for free and for everyone) different installations of top international artists using the lights in every way possible. Without any links or particular order, the pubic is invited to discover each work along its stroll, and despite the cold, the streets (but also bars and restaurants) were full, but also very friendly.

The works are very different from installations to 3D projections, sometimes even interactive like for example with Light Graffiti by Floating Pictures where the public is invited to ‘paint’ the floor with lights in a graffiti style. Sadly I didn’t had time to see it all, but my favorite was the Lumineoles by Porte par le Vent for its simplicity and dreamy atmosphere it gave to Regents Street.

Will we have Lumiere 2017? I do hope so!

Luminéoles by Porté par le vent

Dresses by Tae gon KIM

Spectra-3 by FIELD.io

Litre of Light by Mick Stephenson, Central Saint Martins, UAL, MyShelter Foundation

Eléphantastic! by Topla-design 

1.8 London by Janet Echelman / Studio Echelman

Light Graffiti by Floating Pictures

Light Graffiti by Floating Pictures

Pipette – King’s Cross Tunnel by Miriam Sleeman, Tom Sloan, Allies & Morrison, Speirs + Major

and again! R.I.P. …

Seriously…after Lemmy from Motorhead, Bowie, now Alan Rickman!!

He was such a talented actor, with such an incredible voice… Thanks to his charisma, he could make any villain likeable, and will stay forever my favourite sherrif of Nottingham 🙂

He will truly be missed…

#alanrickman #rip

Lluis Barba, The murderer threatened. Magritte, 2010

I know, I know… it is now several days I haven’t posted much…! For my defence, work has been busier (seriously yay 🙂 , the commute has been longer due to the cancellation of many trains in the morning (too much sun apparently!), and… I have been hooked on the Netflix’ series ‘Making a Murder‘.

If you know this series, then you’ll understand why I have been quiet; if you don’t, just watch it! This is easily one of the best documentary seen recently.

Filmed over the course of ten years, this explores the story of Steven Avery, a poor and happy going lad, who has been wrongly accused by Manitowoc County of serious crimes… After spending 18 years for a rape who didn’t commit, the county accuse him for another rape but with murder this time. I won’t go into details, but this story is just getting worst and worst.

Murder is an important subject in art, from biblical murder to political ones… but to illustrate this nonsense showed in this documentary, maybe the The murderer threatened. Magritte of Lluis Barba would be more appropriate.

This artist digitally manipulate images, and mix famous character of art history with contemporary people such as celebrities, or tourists, often using an imagery directly from the advertising language.

His pictures are therefore quite visually ugly in my opinion, but the one below depicts quite well the consumerism we can have for this subject, along with the manipulation seen in this documentary, and the power of the media for an audience always hungry for morbid stories…

Louis Barba, The murderer threatened. Magritte, 2010