Kipple is the result of carefully mashing together choice cuts of found VHS footage to produce new, wonderfully odd and generally hilarious films. It’s the work of video mash-up artists Eagle & Feather.
Here’s one of my personal favourite Kipple clips, called ‘Tony Robinson’s Running Tales‘:
You can find much more Kipple on Eagle & Feather’s criminally-undersubscribed Youtube channel here.
Helen Flanagan is a photography student. Her ‘About Page’ says this:
Helen Flanagan is currently studying for a BA hons in photography at Falmouth College University.Interested by the human psyche, obscurity and those tender, glorified moments of absence.
Cllr Martin Mullaney has announced the Emerging Festivals Fund – grants of £500 to £4,999 for new niche festivals. Applications have to be in by 4 February, which seems like incredibly short notice for what this is. More details here.
Might this be useful to the folks at the recent The Challenge of Change event? So what sort of small festivals is the city currently lacking?
It’s probably worth seeing this in light of the comments from Neil Rami of Marketing Birmingham that I linked to the other day. When asked which cities have marketed themselves effectively through culture he named Barcelona, Berlin, Glasgow and:
Rotterdam, as they have come from nowhere. They have spent eight years capacity building their ability to host festivals and in that time have gone from something like 8 each year to 109. They saw festivals as a way of building a career for an artist and for telling a story. They now import festivals, poaching them from other cities as well as starting their own.
Sarah Lynch is an illustrator and a member of the Love to Print collective, which is a project handily described on Shoulder to Crayon.
You can see some of Sarah’s ornithologically-inspired illustrations and screen prints on her blog.
More music news for Birmingham – hoorah! I heard about The Music Quarter a little while ago and it’s good to see it up and running now. Natalie, the site’s editor, is a BCU student and this, I gather, is to be the focus of her year-long project.
Of course, this raises questions about whether/how the site will last longer term (or indeed whether it’s sustainability matters).
Now, not wanting to sound spoiled, but indie/rock music seems to be looked after – I’m enjoying the Blue Whale Blog, fr’instance. Who’s writing about the city’s bhangra, hip hop, reggae, dance music, etc and digging up the gems there?
Jade Sukiya is a photographer with an eye for a striking image or two. Here’s her intro:
I was born in the mid-eighties to two admirably creative people. Years later that inevitable reality struck as having both my brother and I forced them to get ‘real’ jobs and lead a fairly restricted existence. My story begins at this point, although I can’t recall a thing up until the age of about four and even that’s a little hazy, sometimes I think I made my memories up…
More of Jade’s images like the one below, and many other completely different ones, can be found on her Myspace page and her Flickr account. She’s also got a tumblr with bits and pieces of her favourite stuff in it to check out too.
Jodi Ann Bickley is a Moseley-based poet.
This is Jodi performing one of her lovely pieces ‘You Make Me Lose My Cool‘ to an improvised jazz soundtrack:
You can hear more from Jodi over on her Myspace page.
The first Dr Sketchy’s burlesque/drawing event of the year will be on Sat 16 Jan at The Victoria and the theme will be ‘Victoriana’. Tickets here (I think it tends to sell out). Here’s the FB event with more details.
For an idea of the sort of thing to expect, here’s a vid from the first night, just over a year ago:
Leon Sparkes is an artist, painter, illustrator, author, graphic designer and music composer who’s also done bits and pieces on interior design with The Rainbow pub and Saint Caffe in St Pauls Square. I’ll let Leon explain more:
I have merged various art forms creating my own distinctive art style, creating storytelling trends and concepts. I’m enthusiastic and hard working. I’m success driven and enjoy making a difference to my space and environment. My Incentive is driven on the basis of ergonomics, our enviroment and landscape.
You can check out more of his stuff on his portfolio site.
Nice stuff from Flourish Creative.
That’s Frosty the Bear back in August, snapped at the Victoria Sq beach by abrinsky. He’s been waiting months for the weather we’re having now.
What? You wanted yet more pics of the snow?
Another batch of short films from Screen WM‘s Digishorts scheme are set to premiere next week, featuring a hefty wedge of local film talent. There’s a free screening event to see all six Digishorts films at Light House in Wolverhampton on Tuesday 12 January, 6.15 – 8pm, as part of Screen Forum.
The Moon Bird
Names that stick out for me are BAFTA-nominated The Brothers McLeod, who will be showing their dark animated fairytale ‘The Moon Bird‘, and Lewis Arnold, whose film ‘Stained’ is inspired by author Ronnie Thompson’s time served as a prison officer. After the screening there will be a Q&A with some of the filmmakers, so have your hand-raising and poser-posing hats on ready.
To find out more about all of the films on show, visit the Light House website here, and to reserve a free place at the screening, contact info@light-house.co.uk.
Words, Signs & Vibes, who are
an integrated Youth Theatre for young deaf and hearing people aged 13-18yrs
are performing Robin Hood at The Public on Saturday 9 January at 2.30pm and 7.30pm, with entry a bargainous £6. You can get tickets from The Public box office on 0121 533 7161.
It says here that performances are in Sign Language and spoken word and are accessible to deaf and hearing audiences. DAD (Deaf Adult Drama) from Walsall will be playing background characters in the performance too.
N4T4 is an artist and illustrator with a specialism in spray paint. This is from his ‘About Page’:
I paint portraits using realism as a reference point for more abstract experimentation. The images are built in layers that become ambiguous and open to interpretation from the viewer. I am inspired by aboriginal art and graffiti; aesthetically and conceptually with their self evolved visual languages, dual meanings, temporal quality and its basis in culture, people and environment rather than just commerce.
And here’s just one example of N4T4′s work:
