Photography and art connoisseur Roderick van der Lee was kind enough to write an introduction for our ANOTHER CANVAS collaboration with Sergei Sviatchenko. Inspired by the fundamental question behind the project, he shared his insights in an essay where he offers his perspective on how images have come to move through culture at the highest possible speed, but not without losing their ability to impact it, one way or another! [ Continue reading ]

What is the residual value of an image shared on the internet in today’s volatile visual culture? This fundamental question served as the starting point for our collaboration with contemporary artist and architect Sergei Sviatchenko, known for his pioneering work in collage—a partnership more than ten years in the making. After producing numerous images while working in-house for Atelier Munro over the past three years, we found ourselves questioning: What truly remains of this work once the images are no longer actively used? And what have people actually seen and will even be remembered? To explore this, we invited Sergei to use our publicly available earlier work as the foundation for a new series of art. For which photography and art expert Roderick van der Lee wrote the introductory essay. [ Continue reading ]

Some shots from the launch of our collaboration with Sergei Sviatchenko; ANOTHER CANVAS, which took place at the Cristel Ballroom Gallery in Amsterdam. A massive thank you for everyone that came out. And an even bigger thank you to Sergei and Roderick for the collaboration on this project that marks the beginning of many new chapters. In the words of Sergei; it is rare to feel a sense of belonging when working with people who are of like minds — this project did just that on different levels. [ Continue reading ]

We’ve known our friend Sergei Sviatchenko for many years, ever since he first reached out to us when we posted about his Close Up And Private in 2009. Over the years, we’ve stayed in touch via the internet. And despite being close to meeting a few times, we had never actually met in person. However, at the end of last summer, we finally found a great reason to collaborate—and as a result, meet in person for the first time. Over the past few months, we worked together remotely on a project that repurposes three years' worth of publicly available imagery we created, allowing Sergei to give it a second life, by creating new imagery with more lasting power—or at least make it part of his incredible oeuvre—while also marking the beginning of a new chapter for us, once again.

But first, to learn more about the artist (and architect) behind the collage imagery and to provide some context on how he became the person he is today, last Thursday we sat down with Sergei in the Cristel Ballroom Gallery, where we would later that day launch our project in Amsterdam. We discussed the different aspects of his career, which spans many decades and took him from Ukraine to Denmark in 1990. Fast forward to later years, when his career received another enormous boost with the emergence of the blogosphere. All the way to now, at the respectable age of 72, with our friend showing no signs of slowing down. [ Continue reading ]

We recently met up with Rop (/Rob) van Mierlo and Remco van der Velden to speak about their brand Wild Animals. Having just moved into a new space in the north of Amsterdam, which opened the week before our visit, they explained how a new phase is about to start. Having just introduced two new directions of products that will be available next season named Patterns and Flowers, for the first time moving beyond depictions of animals, they are ready to show the wide range of Rop’s signature wet-on-wet aesthetic.

The current moment also marks the end of a period that was dominated by three major brand collaborations, out of which the H&M kids wear partnership had by far the most impact on the duo. It introduced their work to a global audience, but at the same time (for the first time in their existence) it alienated some of their core followers that didn’t appreciate the fast fashion affiliation. Now, they are ready to move on, with a myriad of new insights, and with the space (financially and time-wise) to finally start growing their Wild universe into new realms. [ Continue reading ]

During the pandemic, in search of more togetherness, we collaborated with Jordi Carles Subirà and started a little online network which we named Together&. In the last few months, we evolved a few elements in this endeavour to explore if there's a real potential to upgrade it to a proactive professional network for collaboration and co-creation. Our end goal would be to actively assemble like-minds, in search of resonance between people, projects, products and (freelance) client work. At this point it still lives mostly online, but it will break out of that digital domain more and more in the future to come. For our first (network-only) edition released under the label, we connected the exceptional bio-dynamic Vineyard Dassemus with artist Andreas Samuelsson’s stripped-down essence. [ Continue reading ]

We are very proud to present Dead Cowboy by Mike Dings, the first project released under the sublabel of our Together& sideproject. The 88-page unbound A3 publication comprises of the complete collection of works on paper portraying deceased cowboys (2019) by the Dutch artist with a profound love for Spaghetti Westerns. It highlights the sensible strokes of Dings' pencils, showing lonely yet brutally honest scenes of anonymous cowboy figures captured during the dying moments before no one will remember them, again. We asked Dutch writer and poet Bram Schweckhorst to write the accompanying short-short story that forms the introduction of the magazine. [ Continue reading ]

Over the past years, Ashkan Honarvar has been one of the most shared artist here on Another Something. We’ve marveled at many of his projects, and have been following Ashkan for years. His latest project is another very exciting one; this time collaborating with Thomas Bradley, a garment designer working within the framework of costume for dance. The result is a series of 21 collages showcasing Thomas' 14 garments in the extraordinary Honarvar way. [ Continue reading ]

Earlier this year Rop van Mierlo and Remco van der Velden launched their collaborative project Wild Animals with the first edition called Tiger Merch. A beautiful collection of products consisting of mugs, sweaters, art prints, t-shirts, socks, a pyjama, a rug and even wrapping paper, all with the characteristically painted Tiger by Rop van Mierlo. [ Continue reading ]

Way back (2008) we had a small online shop selling things we thought were worth selling, ranging from design notebooks to genius toys. One of the things we sold were hand sewn fabric footballs from Klas Ernflo. He moved from being a designer to illustrator to artist and with his latest work exhibited at Marta Los Angeles it feels all these worlds coming together in a beautiful way.
“Anorak” presents new large- scale, free-hanging textile paintings alongside several unique blanket- works and existing sculptures. The pieces, which variably suggest coverings for inclement weather, non-wearable shelter, and communal or familial garments, infer a soft network of voids and connectors atop canvas scrims that both describe and delineate space. [ Continue reading ]

'MIRROR RIM' by Alain Urrutia is a series of eleven paintings made to flip around, like a mirror, reflecting a fragmented and reconstructed alternative reality. Where he previously made super large paintings, these realistic small format black and white images, reframed and alienated from their historical value, are made to question our interpretations. The MIRROR RIM project was born from the idea of making two exhibitions in two different places that would change when moving from one space to the second one . The works from MIRROR RIM are composed symmetrically on their horizontal axis. The mirrored images we get in this way can be flipped 180 degrees. This is what happens when the exhibition is moved from one gallery to the second one. The paintings have been rotated so this second exhibition at Appleton Square in Lisbon, would work as the reflection of the first exhibition at the DIDAC Foundation in Santiago de Compostela. Hence the title of the exhibition, MIRROR RIM, a palindrome that refers to the edge of the mirror. [ Continue reading ]

As one of the last features of this year we wanted to share this special project we did at NewWerktheater. Parallel to our collaboration of last month with Lennard Kok, the Fallen Bird, we’ve been busy in our other role at NewWerktheater and …,staat to work on another collaboration we’re extremely excited about; Jupe by Jackie x …,staat.

The idea behind NewWerktheater Editions is to explore disciplines beyond those that are generally our own. To create great things with great people. To see what we can get from the ground and where we could end up if we walk a road unknown. 'Aesthetic Memories' exemplifies precisely this. This body of works took us somewhere we never could have imagined beforehand. We were drawn to the mastery required for this ancient technique. First, we fell in love with the craft, then we met the person behind it and fell in love all over again. Meeting Jackie was one of those instant clicks. You know the type.

When we started discussing designs, deciding on form, translating our inspiration for color, we soon found ourselves entering the territory we set out to find – challenging tradition. Hand-embroidery is traditionally decorative, traditionally representational. But, what if we worked with abstractions? What if we clashed the intricacy of the handwork with geometric elements? [ Continue reading ]

Chris Cheung, creative director of the Hong Kong-based interdisciplinary creative studio XEX, reached out to us to share his latest art installation called 'Prismverse'. An immersive audiovisual installation to define a new dimension of light. As the title of the installation unveils it capture two core ideas; A prism as the medium that translates light on one hand, and a verse as the multi-timespace dimension. [ Continue reading ]

The Lange Leemstraat is one of Antwerp’s longer continuous streets. It starts at the edge of the city center and cuts straight through the Klein-Antwerpen area, which is more commonly known as (a significant part of) the Jewish neighborhood. The street divides the segment of the Belgian city between the Mechelsesteenweg, the Van Eycklei, and the Belgiëlei into two halves—together forming a perfect triangle when viewed on a map. Most of the tall but narrow houses along the street are at least four stories high, and an overall multiethnic feel prevails, alongside the omnipresence of the orthodox Jewish community. When entering the street, one is instantly struck by a metropolitan vibe. It feels like a miniature Brooklyn in the heart of Antwerp. For me, it represents one of the many (hidden) qualities of the city, with its remarkable cultural diversity and unique urban structure, which has only been partly transformed for the modern age. [ Continue reading ]

Last Thursday, we were finally able to see the extraordinary 'POWERMASK' exhibition at the Wereldmuseum Rotterdam. Curated by none other than Walter van Beirendonck, sided by art historian Alexandra van Dongen and anthropologist Sonja Wijs, it had been on our wish list from September 1st when it opened for the public. For 'POWERMASK', the museum with a focus on ethnology gave the legendary Antwerp fashion designer a free hand to present his own unique, multi-faceted vision of the phenomenon of masks. The result is a stunning colorful display, carrying the designer's unique signature all-over, combining ethnic masks and ethnological documents with modern Western fashion, art, photography and culture — featuring the work of impressive names like Christophe Coppens, Diane Arbus, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Louise Bourgeois, Brian Kenny, Martin Margiela and Walter's own Dirk Van Saene. [ Continue reading ]

From the moment we worked with Utrecht-based illustrator Lennard Kok for the rebrand of Travelteq in 2015, the ambition was set to collaborate again. Eventually it took another year to really sit down and discuss it. At that point Lennard confessed he wanted to explore new terrain in his artistic practice and shared his ambition to reach beyond illustration. Through our consensual admiration for certain inspirational artist editions, we set the bar at next level and eventually came to the conclusion this would mean we needed to take Lennard's clear lined flat signature and find a way to translate it into the sculptural. More so, as paradigms continue to shift under the pressures of digital globalization with significant fractures ahead of us that seem to usher in a new era, we searched for a statement that (at least in our heads) would mark the specific moment of creation.

In the dialogue that followed, we kept returning to a series of crashed vehicles Lennard had made earlier that year. When we finally started seeing the airplane out of that series as the ultimate symbol, we knew we had found our subject that represented everything we aimed for. From that moment Michiel Verweij joined the project to bring Lennard's vision to life in 3D and soon Suzan Becking formed the last element of the equation as we wanted to materialize the sculpture into the perfect paradox: a crashing plane made out of porcelain. The final quest for perfection started, and eventually took a little longer than we hoped, but Friday the 13th, at last, graphite on paper was transformed into a black porcelain sculpture which we named 'Fallen Bird'.

We are extremely proud to present the result of our shared endeavor and are very thankful for this inspirational experience alongside Lennard, Michiel and Suzan. Now it's time for this 'Fallen Bird' to find its way all over the world again... We are ready for the next one (stay tuned)! [ Continue reading ]

Last weekend, the extraordinary Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa (MOCAA) in Cape Town, South Africa opened its doors for the public. The museum is set to become the world's most important exhibition space for African art, and with its iconic building by Heatherwick Studio it already draws the needed attention. The London-based firm transformed the building, both on the outside and inside, from a dead industrial structure into a mind-bending icon, instantly joining the Pantheon of some of the most beautiful museum buildings to be found all over the globe. [ Continue reading ]

Three months ago, the inspirational Taipei-based space for art exhibitions, books and good coffee named Pon Ding presented a beautiful show named 'Gold and Green', which closed last month but remains a very inspirational cultural hybrid. The project is a collaborative effort by the established Austrian ceramic artist Matthias Kaiser and the emerging Taiwanese ceramic artist Hsian Jung Chen. [ Continue reading ]

After having seen it ourselves this afternoon, for those in and around Berlin, make sure to drop by the incredible KÖNIG GALERIE to witness German artist Julian Rosefeldt’s first solo exhibition at the gallery. On view in the nave of former Catholic church St. Agnes is his large video installation titled 'In the Land of Drought' that was filmed in Morocco and the Ruhr area. A condensed version of Rosefeldt’s filmic interpretation of Joseph Haydn’s 'The Creation', 'In the Land of Drought'  confronts the relationship between man and his impact on the world. Set to atmospheric sounds and a pulsating hum, the 43-minute piece looks back from an imagined future upon the post-Anthropocene: the aftermath of significant human influence on Earth. An army of scientists appear to investigate the archaeological remnants of civilization after humanity has made itself extinct. Shot entirely using a drone, Rosefeldt’s images hover meditatively over the desolate landscape and ruins. Connoting surveillance, the drone’s bird’s eye view removes human perspective with us onlookers kept at a distance throughout. Increasingly, more figures dressed in white lab suits emerge to inspect the ruins of civilization – which are in fact abandoned film sets close to the Moroccan Atlas Mountains. [ Continue reading ]

We have been big fans of the work of Norway-based Iranian collage artist Ashkan Honarvar since his graduation days at the HKU University of the Arts in 2007. In the decade that followed, he has been steadily producing series after series on an extraordinary high level, dealing with reoccurring themes like colonialism, war, mass destruction, megalomania and other grotesque behavior. Always succeeding in creating imagery that is both intelligent and haunting, slightly repulsive but always captivating. In March of this year Ashkan presented another highly ambitious series of eight chapters named 'The Red Forest' that he has been releasing over the course of different weeks.

Within the new body of work, all of the different subseries touch the same ('Honarvar signature') aesthetic atmosphere and share the same underlying technique, but every chapter has its unique elements, telling different segments of the narrative. And although every chapter complements the strong emotion of the overarching concept, our favorite out of the body being the sixth, as shared below. The story behind 'The Red Forest' is based on the first seven years of Ashkan's life, growing up in Iran during the Iran-Iraq war, which at first sight suggests it is one of the most personal series till date. Yet the seamless fit of the series within the signature running through his portfolio, probably tells how personal his work always is, despite it referring to subjects that are much looser connected to the artist own history. One element within 'The Red Forest' that is a novelty is Ashkan's use of 3D renders, with the skulls and human figures (the female figure is Norwegian model Malena Morgwen) in this project, made with a 3D application Zbrush and then printed out and, as per usual, finished with handmade collage.

Both the subject-matter (as a point of reference for all of Ashkan's work) and this new layer of depth in the disfigurations of human representations, grabs us by the throat a little stronger than ever before, making 'The Red Forest' a significant development and possible important new chapter within the evolution of the brutally talented Ashkan Honarvar. Leaving us waiting eagerly where he will take these new artistic facets in the future.. [ Continue reading ]

After it was first presented to the world at the MCA Chicago and The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City last year, two weeks ago the MOCA in Los Angeles opened the tremendously exciting 35-year retrospective of one of our favorite painters working today: Kerry James Marshall. Marshall’s figurative paintings have been unparalleled in their consistent portrayal of African American culture and history. The now nearly 600 years of painting in America contains remarkably few African American painters and even fewer representations of black people. Marshall —being a child of the civil rights era— set out to redress this absence from the moment he consciously picked up his paintbrush, inspired by one of his personal heroes: social realist painter Charles White. 'Kerry James Marshall: Mastry' is the artist's first major retrospective in the United States, containing nearly 80 paintings, all of which contain images of Black subjects going about their daily business, presented with utter equality and humanity. A deeply accomplished artist, who makes ravishing paintings, Marshall’s strategy was three fold.

First, as a young artist he decided to paint only black figures. He was unequivocal in his pursuit of black beauty. His figures are an unapologetic ebony black, and they occupy the paintings with a sense of authority and belonging. Second, Marshall worked to make a wide variety of images populated with black people. This led him to make exquisite portraits, lush landscape paintings, everyday domestic interiors, and paintings that depict historical events, all featuring black subjects as if their activities were completely and utterly normal. Third, Marshall concentrated on painterly mastery as a fundamental strategy. By mastering the art of representational and figurative painting, during a period when neither was in vogue, Marshall produced a body of work that bestows beauty and dignity where it had long been denied. Both on the individual level of Marshall's extraordinary unique artistic vision and today's context granting an ever-growing relevance to his body of work: making that when you are somewhere near Los Angeles, there is no reason whatsoever to miss this incredibly relevant exhibition! [ Continue reading ]

From the moment we encountered the super inspirational work of  Congolese photographic artist Sammy Baloji, we haven't been able to get his haunting imagery out of our heads ever since. In the last decade, the artist, who resides in his city of birth Lubumbashi and Brussels, has gathered international acclaim with his photographic works that explore the cultural, architectural and industrial heritage of the region where he was born named Katanga in the African country Congo. Baloji juxtaposes photographic realities, combining past and present, the real and the ideal, to illicit extraordinary cultural and historical tensions.
With his imagery Baloji explores architecture and the human body as traces of social history, sites of memory, and witnesses to operations of power. History of art and documentary photography blend with that of colonialism. His series of photomontages, of revisited albums confront his historical research with the human and economic actuality (such as the new invasions of these territories by companies from China for instance). All of his juxtapositions are highly charged with meaning, but above all: always succeed in leaving an everlasting impression, that forces one to question past, present and future of Congo and the whole continent of Africa.  [ Continue reading ]

A little over a year ago, the New York City-based Asya Geisberg Gallery opened a new exhibition named 'Quiet Earth' featuring new works by American collage artist Matthew Craven. Unfortunately we missed the inspirational display at the time, but recently our friend Merijn at …,staat pointed it out to us and we have been infatuated by the haunting works from that moment. The exhibition featured a series of works on paper, combined together rhythmically repeating a flattening of time and scale. In the imagery, Craven combines found images of antiquity with abstract hand-drawn patterns of ambiguous origin, and often subsequently painting walls to emphasize aesthetic choices that personalize his project. Ever-curious and controlled in his choice of placement and mark, as per usual the artist created enigmatic combinations, that despite (or maybe because) their encyclopedic nature, always succeed to engage our gaze and force curiosity about each specific reference and composition.

Craven always begins his imagery on an aged background, often vintage movie posters with yellowing tape, finding images in old books that are never glossy. As his collages compress millennia by placing the prehistoric next to the modern, they shift around time: the distance between the image’s creation and our grasp of its significance, the hours searching for appropriate materials, the cultivation of isolated fragments before evolving into Craven’s artistic universe. Several of the works use the landscape, colorful and present, to form a dialogue with the silent man-made artworks, adding an exciting visual layer. It seems as Craven is saying that we exist today because of our pre-historic past, and all cultures share the same planet. From a greater distance, the differences melt away (which too many people seem to forget now a days!), and just as all landscapes share underlying structure and forms (hence the quietness of the earth, possibly), so too do Craven’s stone temples, monuments, and patterns. The result is a highly fascinating series of work forming a quest through human history without ever losing our interest on an aesthetic level. We can't wait for more aesthetic journeys from the mind of Matthew Craven. [ Continue reading ]

At the end of last month, American artist and filmmaker Doug Aitken presented his latest incredible creation to the public, which at this moment is our favorite work he has created thus far. Part of the unique Desert X exhibition, that features a curated selection of site-specific works in the Coachella Valley in the Southern California desert, his creation named 'Mirage' is a installation utilizing the form of a ranch style suburban American house composed of reflective mirrored surfaces. It distills the recognizable and repetitious suburban home into the essence of its lines, reflecting, and disappearing into the vast western landscape. As movement was the driving force behind the settling of the American West, and the long flat vistas that stretched toward the Pacific shaped the ideology behind this iconic embodiment of American architecture, Aitken found inspiration in the history of the site to create his vision on reflection. The specific California Ranch Style, which is unique to the West, was informed by the ideas of legendary architect Frank Lloyd Wright, who believed that architecture should be both in and of the landscape.

In the 1920s and ‘30s a small inspired group of architects working in California and the West created the first suburban ranch style houses, fusing Wright’s fluid treatment of spaces with the simple one-story homes built by ranchers. After World War II, the ranch style’s streamlined simplicity gained popularity and commercial builders employed a simplified assembly line approach to create this efficient form, matching the rapid growth of the suburbs. The mass-produced ranch home became a familiar sight across the country, the style filling the American landscape as quickly as each new subdivision was built and was reinvented for the 21st century by Aitken as the ultimate tool for reflection on the rich past of this area. For those visiting Southern California before the 31st of October make sure not to miss this unique work in the middle of the desert, offering a unique perspective in a place where you are doomed to meet yourself anyway. [ Continue reading ]