M.SNAP

THIRTY

2010-12-05T16:29:00.000-08:00

For dad's birthday yesterday I made him this card and this delicious ground almond chocolate cake (props to Bella for the recipe!)

TWENTY NINE / MACARON - FRENCH FOR BURGER

2010-11-26T13:36:00.000-08:00

Made these rosewater macarons filled with rosewater & dark chocolate ganache yesterday. They are delicious but far from being the beauties on offer at Laduree...

TWENTY EIGHT // PRETTY PRETTY

2010-09-02T01:07:00.000-07:00

THIRTY SEVEN / HISTORY THROUGH KNITTING

2010-05-08T02:08:00.000-07:00

Lady Jane Grey

...

When I was younger I was fascinated by Tudor England. With its larger than life characters, the scandal, intrigue and brutality of the period made its events seem better than any fiction. The period was riddled with memorable women, and one that particularly intrigued me was Lady Jane Grey, “The Nine Days Queen”. Incredibly well educated for a woman of her time, she was swept into the political and religious conflicts which followed the death of her cousin, King Edward VI. Hastily made Queen of England, her reign lasted less than a fortnight before she was imprisoned, charged with treason and later executed.

Paul Delaroche’s painting of the subject, The Execution of Lady Jane Grey, was rediscovered in 1973. Delaroche’s depiction of the scene is sympathetic, poignant and emotive. Art's emotional power becomes clear when looking at history paintings such as The Execution of Lady Jane Grey or The Death of Marat by Jacques-Louis David. Both paintings sympathise with their subjects, although history now perceives the figure of Marat in a particularly villanous light.

Art then, becomes a part of the construction of history. This work, Lady Jane Grey, is crowded with symbolism, exploring the questions raised by Jane Grey’s short life. Dominance and hierachy, innocence, youth, manipulation, power, ideas about life and fate from Greek mythology, and tensions between the masculine and feminine are all themes in this work. The work also becomes a metaphor for history itself – its construction, the sanitising effect of time and distance, the transition from the sensational to the mundane and the ways in which we learn about it.

THIRTY SIX / NOW FOR SOMETHING A LITTLE DIFFERENT...

2010-05-06T07:19:00.000-07:00

THE FINE ART OF FASHION PHOTOGRAPHY

This evening as I flicked through a magazine, Julianne Moore appeared, lounging sumptuously across two pages for Bulgari. Flawless ivory limbs, velvet, feathers, that direct gaze, richly coloured and bejewelled – Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres’ La Grande Odalisque seemed an obvious comparison. One Google-search later I discovered that Julianne Moore had been photographed cast as Ingres’ Odalisque several years earlier in 2000 for Vanity Fair. This led me to consider the relationship between fine art and contemporary fashion photography. Clearly fashion photography has been and is influenced by the fine arts, but is the converse true, and does fashion photography deserve a place within the fine arts? Are the two mutually exclusive, or do their boundaries mingle somewhere between the paint and canvas and the mass-circulated imagery of billboards and magazine pages?

Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres / La Grande Odalisque

Julianne Moore as Ingres' Odalisque for Vanity Fair, 2000

Julianne Moore for Bulgari

In principle, what separates them seems clear. While fine art conveys artist driven ideologies, fashion photography seems driven by more commercial intentions. Aside from making the products or the brand desirable, fashion photography is not required to communicate other messages. But upon further consideration, this dichotomy between fine art and fashion photography begins to seem arbitrary. Perhaps this reflects a greater trend in creative industries for boundary-blurring. Multidisciplinary work is seen as a norm, designers are now artists, stylists, photographers, film-makers; the vocations of artist and designer gradually becoming ever more interchangeable. Collaborations are increasingly commonplace, artist-designers often being called upon for commercial work and for their creative input in the production of fashion imagery.

When those responsible for producing fashion imagery hold these dual roles, both the work they produce which is considered ‘fine art’ as well as their commercial imagery are equally outputs for their creativity. While their ultimate aims may differ, the formal qualities of their work for the two separate categories can be very similar. Take, for example, German photographer, Juergen Teller. Stylistically, his personal work is consistent with the aesthetic of his photographs produced for Marc Jacobs’ advertising campaigns. Thus the arbitrary nature of the division between the two bodies of work is exemplified.

Just as photography initially struggled for recognition and validity as a fine art, perhaps likewise fashion photography is struggling for the same recognition. The commercial imperatives which direct its production need not be an excluding factor for the category of fine art, just as the religious and spiritual imperatives of a Masaccio painting no longer exclude it from the same category.

Fashion photography might then take its place among the fine arts, its images operating as thoroughly modern forms of portraiture. Just as in the canon of art history when portraits depicted members of society who possessed status and influence (often displaying these attributes through the depiction of their clothing and jewellery), so too does fashion photography depict those of high status in contemporary society, in this case a culturally elected elite of celebrities and models, similarly decked out in fashionable clothing and accessories.

Putting aside their differing intentions, fine art and fashion photography have much in common. The aesthetic appeal and technical skill evident seem to qualify fashion photography as a fine art in itself. It becomes apparent that clear-cut boundaries between the ‘purely commercial’ and ‘purely art’ do not exist. Just as there is an echo of Ingres’ in the tactile opulence of the Bulgari photograph, so too is there a glint of fine art in the glossy sheen of my magazine’s pages.

NOW SELLING...

2010-01-17T14:26:00.000-08:00

[click to go to the store]

THIRTY FOUR / CLICK TO VIEW THE LARGER SIZE!

2009-12-13T01:25:00.000-08:00

THIRTY THREE / BUNNY HEAVEN (PART TWO)

2009-12-01T15:25:00.000-08:00

Rupert (our puppy) loves anything knitted or woolly, having stolen many balls of wool and a big floppy bow I knitted. So following on from my tiny bunnies I made this big soft bunny for him

He loves it...

Bunny-puppy kisses

THIRTY TWO / BUNNY HEAVEN (PART ONE)

2009-12-01T15:02:00.000-08:00

I have given gazillions of these tiny little bunnies to friends, some as brooches, some just as a little good luck pal

THIRTY ONE // MORE FROM UNIVERSITY

2009-05-29T18:49:00.000-07:00

A model made to experiment with using the laser cutter, a mixture of card and acrylic.

Photographed here in front of some nice dishwashing liquid...

Perspective blocks with ink washes...

And a stencil...

THIRTY

2009-04-03T23:15:00.000-07:00

Various exercises from university so far!

TWENTY NINE /// WHAT'S GOING ON AT THE PARK?

2009-02-07T03:28:00.003-08:00

TWENTY EIGHT /// CAUSE + EFFECT

2009-02-07T02:53:00.001-08:00

TWENTY SEVEN

2009-01-22T02:15:00.000-08:00

In preparation for moving, I am making a list of things I want to take with me. But lists are boring, so I got out the camera and began visually documenting my favourite belongings.

PITH HELMET

AGFA CAMERA

DENIM SHIRT

ROUNDUP OF 2008

2009-01-20T13:23:00.000-08:00

Some of my favourites

TWENTY SIX

2009-01-15T15:39:00.000-08:00

I lack the reasons for why I did this.

TWENTY FIVE // JAGGEDY KATIE

2009-01-15T15:12:00.000-08:00

She's a smart girl... now.

TWENTY FOUR

2008-12-05T17:05:00.001-08:00

A model I made of an archway advertising an exhibition of David Hockney's photography (particularly his "Joiners")

Done for Design this year

As you can see, my love of triangles can be quite ridiculous

TWENTY THREE

2008-12-03T03:12:00.001-08:00

If there is not something, how do you know there is nothing?

TWENTY TWO // JASPER THE FRIENDLY ROBOT + HIS SIDEKICK KEVIN

2008-11-16T21:21:00.000-08:00

The very first ISAB + M.SNAP creation ever.

TWENTY ONE

2008-11-11T23:24:00.001-08:00

TWENTY // LIVE LIFE LIKE IT'S DEATH

2008-11-11T12:00:00.001-08:00

NINETEEN // MY BINOCULAR VISION IS CONDITIONAL

2008-11-11T00:41:00.000-08:00

EIGHTEEN

2008-10-28T02:41:00.000-07:00

A bizarre self-portrait

SEVENTEEN // TWO OF MY FAVOURITE THINGS: BELLA AND CAT

2008-10-28T01:23:00.001-07:00

I love Cat & Bella!

They did these for my birthday

SIXTEEN // TWO OF MY FAVOURITE THINGS: PEONIES AND TOY DINOSAURS

2008-10-27T00:42:00.000-07:00

Spot the dinosaur.

FIFTEEN

2008-10-17T14:40:00.001-07:00

(I apologise for the terrible camera quality of these pictures!)

The ice-cream person I drew for Rosie

(she's the showgirl of ice cream people)

inspiration from icecreampeople.org

A New Order of the Ages / I like the idea but it didn't turn out as well as I hoped so expect to see additional versions of this in the future...

FOURTEEN // HOLGA LIKES BELLA

2008-10-14T03:20:00.001-07:00

THIRTEEN

2008-10-14T03:11:00.000-07:00

Some of the posters I did for Meggy's Dancing with the Staff

TWELVE /// AN ISAB + M.SNAP COLLABORATION

2008-10-14T01:56:00.000-07:00

ELEVEN /// AN ISAB + M.SNAP COLLABORATION

2008-10-14T01:26:00.000-07:00

Photography & photoshop that Bella and I did for Cat

TEN // BORROWED LIFE LESSONS

2008-10-13T13:00:00.000-07:00

As a present for Bella, I reillustrated Stefan Sagmeister's Twenty Things I've Learned in My Life So Far. (The cover of his version reminds me of a bad dream I once had about my skin. Everyone I tell it to is also disturbed by it, so I won't tell it here.) Here are shots of the cover and how it opened...

...

And inside are five accordian folded booklets, each with four lessons on them...

...

Here are my favourite illustrations...

[click to enlarge]

NINE

2008-10-13T12:50:00.000-07:00

Two posters for the Evening of Shakespeare earlier in the year

EIGHT // A STUDY OF AUCKLAND IN LIGHT AND DARK

2008-10-13T12:34:00.001-07:00

[click on it to view the bigger version]

SEVEN

2008-10-13T12:23:00.000-07:00

A page from the application portfolio that I'm working on.

SIX // ALL THOSE THINGS THAT YOU CAN'T SEE

2008-10-13T12:04:00.000-07:00

FIVE

2008-10-13T04:35:00.000-07:00

FOUR

2008-10-13T04:24:00.000-07:00

THREE

2008-10-13T04:20:00.000-07:00

my first attempts at watercolour. the first is on a crappy piece of cardboard because i was so excited about trying out watercolour that i just grabbed the first thing i could find to paint on...

TWO

2008-10-13T04:17:00.000-07:00

ONE

2008-10-13T04:11:00.000-07:00