Sandrine Estrade Boulet

Well, just a quickie because her work is absolutely charmingly irresistable! Having my little boy Benedikt keeps me so busy that my checking in here has been woeful, but occasionally I just have to!
So, I just discovered the work of this French artist Sandrine Estrade Boulet. She adds her imaginative vision to everyday life scenes and the result is pure poetry and fun. Check her out and keep your eyes out, I guess, if you're in Paris...

The future is light

I've been in France celebrating my father's and my birthday so it's been a bit quiet here in blogland. But of course when you've been to Paris there'll be things to blog about.
But let me go backwards...





Tonight back home in Berlin I saw the wonderful Australian dance company Chunky Move's GLOW (above) at Radialsystem V - groovy newish arts venue by the river Spree. It was my first visit to this venue I'd eyed off from my bike a few times. I already knew the work of Chunky Move - I consider myself quite a fan of the forward-thinking Melbourne-based company directed by Gideon Obarzanek. This work was created in collaboration with German software designer Frieder Weiss. It's an ingenious marriage of physicality and technology, a dance between body and computer, light and sound. I saw a few years back the second work in this vein Mortal Engine which was equally as impressive.



In Paris we saw the wonderful Japanese dancer choreographer Saburo Teshigawara, founder of Karas. He performed a solo Miroku at the Théâtre National de Chaillot. "Miroku" is the name given to the Buddha in his last reincarnation when the world has reached a state of harmony.

His stunningly controlled, centred yet chaotic movement was set off by beautiful spare lighting, also designed by him, which varied in tempo to complement his movements or to draw attention to part of him only. The colour blue was used to suggest the infinite sky or sea. At times it really seemed to me that Mr Teshigawara's body was being moved around by the air around him. I was moved to tears as I recalled a childhood dream of mine that endures to this day, to dance by myself in a huge space to loud music...

Coco Before Chanel

A couple of nights ago my partner and I went to see the movie Coco Before Chanel starring the divine Audrey Tautou. It's a theme close to my heart and so I was inspired, moved and even recognised some of myself in the woman who would go on to become a legend of fashion... particularly her penchant for men's clothing for women and perhaps her non-conformity! Seeing the film inspired me to keep on with my own designs... thank you Coco.

Mathilde Rosier

I met this gorgeous French artist, Mathilde Rosier, at her opening last week at the Institut Français, where I will show next month. I became enchanted by her universe of animals and dream-like apparitions. She is a multi-talented woman, crossing between painting, installations, video and musical performance work.

http://www.iris-kadel.de/biography_english.php?id=81

Philippe Petit & Jean-Michel Folon

Today I saw the film Man on Wire about the tightrope walker Philippe Petit. It was an incredibly moving, inspiring (and recently became Academy Award winning) documentary about this immensely creative man's fearless determination to live his dreams and to stay true to his passion. Of course this kind of determination doesn't happen without great sacrifices and the doco shows this in some very sensitive interviews with old friends of his...




I first learnt about Philippe Petit many years ago as a teenager thanks to my father having an art gallery. One of the artists he showed was the famous Belgian Jean-Michel Folon, who was a very successful artist of works on paper at the time my father showed him, and a true poet and humane man. I remember falling completely in love with his naïve, whimsical, dreamy style of drawing man in his urban environment and the dreams that go on in his head...

One silk-screened poster, in an exhibition my father had of Folon's work, featured a tiny man holding a beam walking on a line suspended between two buildings. I was too young in 1974 to recall the historic, audacious feat of Philippe Petit's walking between the almost complete Twin Towers of New York City, but the image on the poster stayed with me and captured something in my imagination! And then a while later I asked my father about it and he told me of his fellow compatriot, Frenchman Philippe Petit... So it was my absolute joy today to learn more about this figure I remember cutting out and pasting in my journal as a teenager and not really understanding at that stage.

for visuals from Jean-Michel Folon:
http://www.fondationfolon.be/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0D1K25kqxw

more on Philippe Petit:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/21/garden/21petit.html?_r=1&oref=slogin