At the end of last year, the highly remarkable series named 'Bomba', shot by the very talented American photographer Thomas Prior, has been presented as a beautiful book by Dashwood Books, which turned out into one of the more interesting releases we have seen recently. 'Bomba' takes the viewer to the Mexican town of San Juan de la Vega, where every February its people gather together to commemorate a four-century-old battle that occurred between the town’s namesake and the area’s landowners. The story goes that Juan de la Vega, a wealthy miner and rancher, was aided by the saint in recovering gold stolen by bandits. Residents took up exploding sledgehammers to commemorate the victory over the thieves. And so, on so-called 'Fat Tuesday', in the middle of a football pitch in the town, packets of fertilizer and sulfur explode into clouds of dust and shrapnel. Today the tools are reinforced with rebar, and the celebration features blasts but now more flying hammer heads. Hundreds of local men strap homemade potassium chlorate fertilizer-based explosives to the heads of sledgehammers and slam them against the lengths of steel rail.

The isolation Thomas has achieved in the imagery, emphasizes the danger and violence of the peculiar tradition. With the clouds of phosphorus smog surrounding each of the men, the subjects are erupting out the cloud, with the rest of the background misted out erasing all kind of context. This could be a scene out of a war if one wouldn't know better. The result is an ambiguous surreality within the series -and the festival as a whole- as it’s still not totally clear where this salute to Juan de la Vega originally derived from, which makes it a series we can't take our eyes from. [ Continue reading ]

With Joachim's decision to merge Atelier Joachim Baan with his frequently collaborator, creative design agency ...,staat, and myself taking a position at the newly formed Amsterdam-based cinema juggernaut New Amsterdam Film Company since the beginning of 2017, there very likely will be a significantly broader scope of projects we worked on that will be passing in review here. (Next to all the exciting exclusive Another Something projects that will take shape in the coming months, of course.) The first hugely exciting project (that Joachim worked on) comes from ...,staat, who just presented an extraordinary creation for French luxury house Société Cartier at their corner window at luxury department store De Bijenkorf.  [ Continue reading ]

We have been off to a slow start here (not elsewhere), but with some very exciting meetings ahead in the coming months (stay tuned!), there will be an even stronger overal shift to ‘Less but Better’ in this year. Nevertheless, we will start picking up the pace from here, still sharing those things that continue to move us — today putting focus on the infamous Studio Job once more. As part of the Carpenters Workshop Gallery's ten-year anniversary programme, last week the gallery with three locations worldwide opened its Parisian space for the public to an exclusive exhibition by Job Smeets and Nynke Tynagel, which might very well be the most impressive display of their holistic practice till date.

Entitled ‘Here There Nowhere’ the exceptional solo show presents new creations, some of the most emblematic pieces that the duo created over the last few years and, very excitingly so, for the first time it opens up the drawings that form the basis for most physical creations to the public. The result is a highly diverse constellation of the fascinating creatures, iconic hybrid forms and ironic objects that punctuated with iconographic references — forming a kitsch and fanciful world where the object transcends functionality with everything bound together by the ‘Neo-Gothic’ aesthetic, masterfully championed by the Dutch power duo. When in Paris, ‘Here There Nowhere’ in a must visit! [ Continue reading ]

To celebrate the fact that lunatics can become presidents: we bring you this deadstock vintage canvas money bag, hand-customized by our close friend and typographer Guido de Boer. [ Continue reading ]

The tremendously talented photographer Constantine "Costa" Manos, who joined the roster of the legendary Magnum agency in 1965, first began taking photographs while in high school when he joined his school's camera club. Within a few years after discovering the art form, he actually becomes a professional photographer and at 19 he gets hired as the official photographer for the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood, published into his very first book 'Portrait of a Symphony' in 1961. From 1961 until 1964, Manos lives in Greece, the country of birth of both his parents, photographing the people and landscape. Subsequently he returns to the USA, living in Boston. Where for instance in 1974, Manos was hired by the city to create the photographs for the prestigious 'Where's Boston?' exhibition: a large production in honor of Boston's 200th anniversary.

Decades later, in 1995, after having worked relentlessly for all those years, Manos' work finds a totally new audience when his iconic series focussing on the American people named 'American Color' is released. In 2010 he presents his second series of the same kind: 'American Color 2', which once more shows the extraordinary talent of Manos and has been a favorite of ours for years. As the name suggests, the photographer succeeds marvelously in creating incredible colorful images, portraying as much what is actually touched by the sun as what isn't, with most people in the frames hidden in stretches of shade to a slight surreal effect. Every one of the highly captivating images, succeeding to show one highly coherent signature, portray a America in all its richness, represented from a truly unique perspective of a great American photographer that still needs to be discovered by many. [ Continue reading ]

We are back in the new year and start it off with a name we have been closely following for years: Australian photographer Paul Barbera. At the end of last year, the talented imagemaker presented a new volume in his acclaimed Where They Create series — this time by exploring the theme of his series through geographical locales. Reinvigorated by his first visit to Japan in five years, Barbera made this country the focus point of the all new volume.  Published by Frame Publishers, Barbera, accompanied by Japanese writer Kanae Hasegawa, explores the workspaces of 32 leading creatives in Japan. With this considered curation of subjects and Paul's extraordinary eye for iconic details, the new book unveils the sometimes surreptitious nature of contemporary Japanese design culture.

The country is well known for its incredible food, beautiful landscapes, innovative technology and its attitude around perfectionism, that has been been setting a new worldwide bar of excellence from the moment it became known. Most importantly for Barbera in his personal journey is the sense of discovery, of both the creatives and their process, which he has been portraying for years know and is exemplified in his imagery, being able to portray more with composition than words could ever offer (especially considering the reserved Japanese culture) — resulting in quite possibly his most inspirational installment of his by now often copied, but still very relevant Where They Create project. [ Continue reading ]

While we are wrapping up 2016, we’re looking back once again to everything we have done with Another Something. Another year has passed in which we shared all of the inspirational things that moved us in the realms of fashion, travel, craftsmanship, creative culture, printed matter, cycling and photography, did some super inspiring interviews and worked on fantastic projects, that are yet to be released. It was the year where we decided to do ‘Less but Better’ and it really worked out! From creating less, but better content with Another Something, to focussing on the things we really enjoy: building brands in the richest way possible. We stepped down as creative partner at Tenue de Nîmes, ended our adventure with Our Current Obsessions and decided to celebrate our collaboration with …,staat in merging Atelier Joachim Baan into …,staat from the start of 2017 onwards. There are also some extremely exiting projects we’ve been working on over the past months, which we’re not yet allowed to share, but can’t until the moment we can in early 2017!

Exciting times are ahead of us! [ Continue reading ]