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<Wednesday, 29th July 2009>
Wednesdays Child just needed cheering up a little, that's all.
Every other website or blog is available 24/7, 365days of the year, and are increasingly interactive/ interest driven.
This website avoids these terrible pitfalls, instead open only one day per week between English daylight hours. If you miss it, it's gone, a bit like TV used to be.
Too much is already available 'On Demand', watch it whenever u like, as many times as u like, tailored to your personal distaste. There are so few real EVENTS.
Well my website now is one. Quietly & persistantly. It doesn't necessarily need to change radically each episode, just so long as I remember to open & close the doors on Wednesdays, and keep thinking aloud.
The updates may be subtle, written in English, in pictures & drawings, in moving image or in web code, behind the scenes, effecting the architecture, making the webpage appear or do something different.
If it doesn’t change from one Wednesday to the next, then it will become a 'spot-the-difference' competition... and people will have to look harder at what is already there.
In time i will make and show new things, sell things, swap things, give things away & trade. Its all in the weekly pipeline.
What does the process of seeking prevent us from finding ? From what truths does studying distract us ?
Life & Everything is so unbelievably mindblowingly incredible and amazing,
i feel obliged to chase after every conceivable possibility & difference & variation,
always and forever,
no matter how much shit is thrown at me, or how much debt i shoulder, or how poor i am made,
i will always have this rich awareness:
That the world is HUGE,
that there is so much more empty space & potential for new wonderful structures to grow,
for rivers to be diverted to deserts, tunnels cut through mountains & beneath oceans,
the ability to skim accross the cloud tops at lightning speed, to walk & run through foreign cities & find a route home,
that there is so much industry, so much machinery, such wealth of resources,
such ingenuity, such invention, such beauty & attraction & wide-eyed hunger,
so many more reasons to live & grow & learn & strive & hope & dream & believe & invest,
and chase after all the things that spark imagination, inspire, attract, and make me happy to be alive.
Make yourself a measure.
We don't need rulers.
Put yourself in the very middle of the work.
Imagine yourself being tiny & small,
the size of a finger nail,
able to look at everything close at hand,
with wonder & amazement at its architectural scale.
Then imagine yourself being bigger than this room,
gigantic, towering above everything, all seeing.
You need to be able to both look upwards at very small things,
and to hover above looking down upon vast ideas.
Put yourself inside an idea looking outwards, and imagine cross-sections.
Disect your work, pull it apart, reassemble things in alternative orders.
Imagine having x-ray vision piercing through lead and stone,
or observe the negative spaces between things, their hollow shapes & forms.
There is always more than one perspective or way of approaching an idea.
If you ever get stuck or fall into a black hole of creative self-doubt,
then stop still, take 7 deep breaths,
and imagine what everything looks like from a different angle,
in a different place, in a different climate or light or time,
from rainy wet London to sunny Mexico City,
and everywhere in between.
We’re all on some sort of list
Slipping up or down
Close to being discovered or forgotten about
Passed around
Traded and copy-pasted
Chinese whisper like
Put forward for things we don’t suit
And kept away from the things we’d be great at
There is no such thing as a level playing field
Half the competition doesn’t even know what game’s being played
And the invitation to the top table is likely stuck in the teeth of the spam filter.
"I will survive this, and so will some of my ideas.
Not necessarily the ones I thought were good either.
They may we worthless now, but my audience is on the move, hungry, determined, methodical, getting closer, warmer, and it’s only a matter of time before they finally unearth me. Hanging on for dear life, curled up under some damp stone, or at the bottom of some rock-pool: this strange hardy creature who has managed to live without running water, car or washing machine for a large part of his adult life, and who has grown a shell to protect himself from the harsh elements of his environment, fossilized by lifestyle, and with adapted sensory perception to compensate for lack of widescreen TV, i-pod and Sony Playstation.
There’s a distinct possibility that I will be one of the lucky ones when change comes crashing in."
(excerpt from an article entitled 'Satsuma Disaster' writen for SuperBlow Magazine 2004 (now SuperSuper Magazine). Read the full article HERE.)
Tuesday night before Wednesday morning.
This is me thinking things that can't be said: http://julianand.blip.tv/file/2413960/
<Wednesday, 22nd July 2009>
Listen to all the inner voices, the gut reactions, the eyes, the spoken & unspoken, dream interpretations, friendly advice, knee jerk reactions, words spoken in sleep, memos on mobile phones, cryptic blog posts, body language.
They all tell u something very subtle & important about what is actually happening.
The subtext that often finds no clear voice because of fear of losing something & eagerness to please,
or being seen to do the right thing at each nerve-wracking step.
Go camping, zorbing, on a picnic, to a music festival, make stuff, decorate, trade, dance, fly, make short films, double dare, paint pictures, draw nudes, keep a sketch or scrapbook, have friends to stay over & cook for, project movies, swim, cycle, run, play games, climb trees & mountains, spring clean, get rid of stuff we don’t wear or use, make some garment blocks, dress up slick and go out flirting.
Subtraction Cutting News:
2 days, 75 kids, 80 meters of fabric, 2 sewing machines, 20 dresses, 2 catwalks - Find out what went down at The Kidbrooke School Fashion Geometry Demo -
click here for pics
Here are some interesting Subtraction & Plug experiments by students at the Weißensee Kunsthochschule in Berlin, taught by Antonio Ciutto:
http://www.kh-berlin.de/index.php5?projectID=417&Action=showProject
Why not buy the Subtraction Cutting Test Pilot Book and try the cutting techniques yourself:
http://shop.centerforpatterndesign.org/product.sc?categoryId=2&productId=7
Forthcoming Subtraction Cutting Masterclasses:
29th September 2009 — London College of Fashion Subtraction Masterclass, in London UK
2nd/3rd October 2009 — CFPD Art Institute of California Subtraction Masterclass, in San Francisco USA:
http://www.centerforpatterndesign.org/content.aspx?page_id=87&club_id=547206&item_id=90511
4th - 6th October 2009 — MID-E International Exhibition Subtraction Masterclass, in San Sebastian, Spain
http://www.arteleku.net/program/mid_e09.-creative-pattern-workshop
16th October 2009 — Northampton University Subtraction Masterclass, in Northampton UK
20th October 2009 — Royal College of Art MA Textiles Subtraction Masterclass, in London UK
13th November 2009 — De Montford University Subtraction Masterclass, in Leicester UK
24th - 26th November 2009 — Swedish School of Textiles Subtraction Masterclass, in Borås, Sweden
non-dyspraxia - cures for normality and other heretical theories.
Wearing little more than smiles. Twisted and brilliant.... There is a saying that goes:
'There is no such thing as love, only signs of love'.
Well similarly there is no such thing as design, only signs (or evidence) of design.
Whatever isn’t made to happen doesn’t exist.
Intention and commentary is not enough.
Push harder.
Be prolific.
Time and space ARE short.
They are qualities that enhance the work.
They help frame & punctuate it.
(picture by David Shrigley)
"every great advance in science has issued from a new audacity of the imagination" - John Dewey
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nothing nothing Spring 2000 & 2002
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My favourite dress of the season by Lanvin, Fall 2009
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Liberation is never free, it taints your heart and precludes enjoyment of simple pleasure spent with one true obsession.
The most intimate thing you can ever give someone is the remainder of a lifetime.
A few dizzying moments of chemistry and biology fade into insignificance compared to a vast ocean of years, currents swirling deeply &tides ever turning, dragged into the sky by the clouds and whipped into a tidal fury or gentle ripples by the wind.
Flirtation & sexual curiosity are droplets of experience next to this ocean,
intensely sweet & concentrated,
but utterly flavourless in dilution.
Never give up.
Keeping all her options open.
Safety nets.
Lovers now friends.
Holding onto everything that ever was.
Just in case.
So as not to loose important slices of life, identity, souvenirs, part of herself, parts you actually admired, which first attracted you to her, that kind of attention, her real attractiveness.
So what is really worth giving up?
And what does giving up free you from anyway?
Does choice really ever need to be narrowed or curtailed?
Can’t commitment exist without such unnecessary imposition?
Is anyone really free to choose to limit their own possibilities?
You can’t demand loyalty.
Love does not soldier.
You need someone to tell you the truth without sparing your feelings.
Cruel to be kind.
Someone who will dare to break bad news, hold a mirror up to you, point out your finer points &flaws, push you to be better, to be more than you already are.
Only someone who truly cares, who has the stomach to stick around.
You fill in all the blanks yourself.
Being true to another can only last by being true also to yourself.
Will i ever be found, laughing my head off in the evening sunshine wearing a straw hat, or with dreads and a skinny girl with fluorescent pink hair?
Everything on the surface is ideal, so why dig any deeper?
I worry that designers are advancing ideas that aim to cure a deficient society, to cultivate faith, to use fear as a catalyst to bind society into some rigid cohesive form that is more organic, efficient and design-like. Too much ‘Why Not?’. War is coming. It is being designed. Globalization has exposed the differences and created the sides and causes: Peace and purity.
PFMTM = Present From Myself To Myself
Think about the good times.
Life doesn’t pass anyone by,
Jump up, keep in touch, reach out,
be random as well as calculated,
be curious,
make new &old connections,
bring people together,
raise a pulse,
seek out entertainment and activity
to keep your imagination and body exercised and fulfilled,
If you need to touch the flame to remind you it’s hot,
then why not?
It’s worth remembering all the mistakes we most learn from,
Appreciate ALL your strengths & weaknesses,
Go see all the people you feel you cant,
Or whom you don’t want to lose hold of,
Say hello and smile at strangers,
Love yourself,
admire your reflection in other people’s eyes,
Remember your talents & skills,
Soon it is time to make new things,
And you will need all this activity & inactivity
To make your projects richer and more personal,
There is no rhythm without pauses,
Rest & downtime,
So value all the downs and ups,
Make yourself feel happy,
I love you passionately
and am your friend.
After a while of not getting what you want, exactly when u need it, and impossible demands not being met on time, u inevitably start to lower your expectations somewhere closer to normality, stop being so bloody demanding or stop needing at all.
If there is no such thing as love, only signs of love, then inevitably there will sometimes be absence of any signs of love, and sweet fuck-all.
There’s cold comfort in realizing this, and refocusing back on yourself or other distractions.
(Put your own oxygen mask on first)
Old age does not start with an aging of the body.
It starts with an aging of the minds control of the body.
As it slips, we fear ourselves growing old, and begin to believe that we cannot undertake physical exertion.
We face our mortality, become paranoid, and question our own physiology: meaning, power, manhood, identity, belonging, ambition, survival, status and health,
You reach a point where your body is still strong, agile, supple, eager to move; but your mind has backache, heart problems, drug dependencies and addictions.
The body resists, but the mind overwhelms.
It grips the body tightly in its mindset.
We were two atoms flying towards each other,
a stone struck against another in mid flight,
changing pathways instantly forever,
rebounding energies igniting chain reactions like sparks shooting through the stubble,
passionate and warm and exciting and full of mad possibility.
I'm going to cut a garment each week and show pictures of them here. Each garment will be available to buy.
next>>
All garments, video, graphics, websites and text are copyrighted to Julian Roberts (c) 2009. A lot of the images assembled above came from Google or somewhere, and are the copyright of their original owner. But their assembly together is very much my own doing, it's difficult to say really where creative ownership begins & ends, i'm certainly not averse to creative trespass. So no reproduction without permission, unless you're feeling subversive, punk.