Diptych collage from my sketchbook featuring imagery from advertising, a traditional domestic riad interior and the female form.

Playing with notions of traditional gender roles, identity and interrupted contiguity with traditional Moroccan zillij tessellated tile patterns.

With ‘Light Curtain’, artist Liz Rideal paints the fabric of the building with light, as a sophisticated LED rig and video projections illuminate the exterior of the Whitworth Art Gallery during the evenings.

This video, shot on Canon 5D MKII, is one of a series of videos and photos I captured for the COTTON: Global Threads exhibition website, my latest project with the Whitworth Art Gallery, University of Manchester. Creating the website has been a great opportunity to indulge my love for art history and cultural theory, exploring themes in the exhibition including globalization, ethics, cultural hybridity, identity and beauty.

I was fortunate enough to interview some of the international contemporary artists involved with the exhibition, and work with the curators and conservators to bring it to life online. The aim was both to inform and inspire people who are able to visit the gallery, and offer an engaging experience to those who will experience it in the digital realm – with some behind-the-scenes peeks and exclusive content created specially for the site, featuring a multiplicity of voices and perspectives.

COTTON: Global Threads opened on February 11th and runs until the 13th May 2012. Visit the Whitworth Gallery if you can, its a great show. Delve into the website and blog at www.cottonglobalthreads.com

I returned to one of my favorite events here in LA, the Day of the Dead festival held in the impressive surroundings of Hollywood Forever Cemetery. This year I was more focused on photography (if you excuse the pun), shooting the spectacle on behalf of the organisers, rather than getting dressed up myself, which was great fun last year.

As the event was held early this year , (I suspect to avoid coinciding with Halloween parties) it was incredibly busy, a sensory experience – so many people with their own twist on the calaca costume, fun sparkly confections to buy, tasty morsels to sample, parades, and entertainers on a flamboyantly dressed stage. As the only cemetery in the US to hold a Day of the Dead festival, art exhibits inside the cathedral, rituals and dance performances on the lake,and altars nestled amongst the tombs and gravestones celebrate the unique location with both reverence and the spirit of fun. The community altars ranged from really moving dedications to ancestors or the military to cleverly humorous subjects including the dear departed dinosaurs, and demoted planet Pluto…
A selection of images are up over on my photography site

Print work for a monthly Samba night in Venice Beach, California.

So much fun being back amongst the glitter and feathers, preparing for a samba parade! This time I was on the other side of the camera, instead of playing percussion with the bateria as I used to back in the UK,  as I was the official photographer covering Brazilian Day LA for organizers Samba Lá and the Brazilian Consulate in LA.  The event in Hancock Park was bigger than ever with two parades, a raft of performances and busy stalls selling authentic regional street food, and everything from Havaianas to  Contemporanea drums and ‘fio dental’ bikinis.

Renni Flores and Katia Moraes were such fun hosts with boundless energy and humour, singing numbers in Portuguese including the specially-created enredo (parade song) and presenting a really impressive array of performers. On stage were Capoeira masters to samba kids, cheeky Carmen Miranda dancers, and more with the bateria of Samba Lá sounding really tight, and samba and forró bands leading the partying all day with impromptu dance instruction.

Photography-wise there was so much to capture my eye – everyone’s costumes were exquisite for the big parade,  with popular sartorial choices for the crowd being confections in the patriotic yellow, green and blue flag.

The beautiful musa, madrinha, reinha, princesas and their consorts were such fun with the crowd and the elegant porta bandeira, the mestre-sala with the million dollar smile, and sunny tia baianas and passistas made the parade such a joy to photograph. The atmosphere took me right back to Rio’s Sambodromo during carnaval!

All the photos are up on the official site at Braziliandayla.org Thanks to  David de Hilster and all involved, Can’t wait for next year! Images have also been used by the Page Museum, Los Angeles for their offical website, and their blog.

Just launched, a website I created for the new exhibition at Whitworth Art Gallery, the University of Manchester’s art gallery.

The exhibition, curated by talented Helen Stalker, is based on the ‘shadow’ as an artistic device to cast reality into relief. Drawing parallels between modern technology and the primordial urge to create avatars of ourselves, with historical methods of trickery to inspire wonder and a sense of magic, the exhibition leads us through a variety of media.

Dark Matters is comprised of a major exhibition including new commissioned works from international artists, and a display gleaned from the Whitworth’s extensive collection of masterpieces from Van Gogh to Rembrandt. An interesting and varied series of talks film screenings and events is also programmed.

Go and see it if you can, now showing at the Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester (September 24th 2011 to January 15th , 2012.) Visit the website at www.Darkmattersart.com

An image from the endlessly inspiring Neon Boneyard, Las Vegas, Nevada. In the ever-shifting landscape of Sin City, this is the place where all good iconic signage goes to retire.

We discovered this unique museum filled with acres of casino history and typographic delights on a funny and fascinating guided tour in  2009. After deciding to have a wedding vow renewal in Las Vegas last year, the first thing we thought of was to hire the boneyard for a memorable  and fun wedding photo shoot.

I updated our wedding  site with some photos and video from the day.  Ah-huh huh

At a fun little ceramics workshop this weekend in Laguna Beach, I was introduced to American Raku, a style of ceramics that has ties to 16th century Japanese tea ceremonies.

Low temperature glazes are used with a really hot quick firing and ‘reduction’ time in a container with flaming newspapers and sawdust, a process allowing lovely random effects, encouraging the artist to relinquish control of the finished article.

With these little vessels, I was inordinately excited to see how the glaze turned out… I love the unpredictable colouring and the crackling pattern, reminiscent of something perhaps long lost and unearthed.

A 1/8th life-size sculpture, male figure study, oil clay and metal armature with plumbing piping support, a technique suitable for for moulding and casting in bronze.

Such beautiful pattern and texture – Medjool dates radiating outward on a vintage brass platter. Simple, striking and a welcome surprise at the hotel favoured by Winston Churchill, rediscovered by a new generation of visitors to Marrakech. A visual feast for a weary traveller served up with almond milk.