urban explorer

HackelBury Fine Art Gallery has an amazing retrospective exhibition on the work of Alexandre Vitkine. Vitkine is a 96 year old electromechanical engineer turned ‘architectural photographic artist’. His exhibition, entitled “Industrial Sillouhettes”, covers a series of works created in the 1960’s. Vitkine juxtaposes an often human form within a typically industrialised geometric composition/landscape. Man and machine are then abstracted/blurred to a point where they become the same form, in sillouhette. Small areas of detail give away the skill of the photographic technique. The crispness of line, contrast and composition make these photographs aesthetically very beautiful. However, it is the skill of the artist that deserves true recognition, his ability to maintain such a refined control over subject matter, process and technique is undeniable. Click on the gallery name to see more of these amazing photographs. Also see here for another inspirational 90 something (via gravestmor)

photograph of original image (cropped)

The Sir John Soane Musuem is a hidden jewel in the heart of London. Located at 13 Loncoln’s Inn Fields the museum is containted over three floors of Soane’s own residence, purpose deisgned and built to house his extensive collection of antiquities and art works. Sir John Soane was a distinguished architect winning commissions such as the Bank of England 1788. He was also Professor of Architecture at the Royal Academy. He lived there until his death in 1837 and it has been a public museum since the early 1900’s. Of equal interest to the contents of the museum is the building itself. The blurring of programme between public use and private residence is intriguing, he was literally living in a museum. The scale and proportion of the rooms is no different to that of any typical terrace of this time (although three were combined to create this one building) The genius of the design is in the use of ambiguous links between the spaces, created by mirrors in an array of places, grilles on the floor to let light through to differnet levels, lowered bulkheads to create thresholds, small reveals with secret cabinets and shelves throughout. The geometry of the plan also creates complexity with the use of very few right angles, everything is slightly splayed or offset, creating intimate moments at every step, the user is forced to interact with the displays and the building itself. The intricacy of the detailing and ornamentation is beautiful. Every time i go there i know i am bound to find something new…..make sure you get one of the attendants to open up the large drawing cabinets in the upstairs drawing room, they fold out of the walls!

More of the everyday, a sneaky snap on my way home from work. The London tube is the only privatised major city transport network in the world (thanks Maggie) so it is expensive, and apparently not as reliable as it used to be. Check out the African Meerkats, they bear a stiking resemblance to london underground commuters; with all their little tunnels, popping their heads up all over the place.

Some more colours, as requested by da man. I had a wonderful evening tonight with Lawrence (who has kindly put me up for the first two weeks, ‘dossing’ as its called). We ate at a wonderful little authentic Turkish restaraunt called Gallipoli in Upper street, near Angel. The atmosphere and service was vibrant and warm. The food was delicious! I am moving into a new place in Bethnal Green tomorrow, so many thanks to Lawrence for his kindness and hospitality.

Well after some requests for a more “ross-like” image, there you go. Thats me in my beautifully hand spun and knitted jumper (thanks to my wonderful grandmother miche….very handy here) and thats dan experiencing an unusually enlightened moment, possibly a moment of clarity?…with a touch of colour to show you that its not all gray and dreary over here. the night out was for Matt’s (thats your cousin Kris) birthday drinks at The Ebury a cool little Chelsea bar/restaraunt near sloane square. The building had these amazing big curved windows, quite cool, also some weird flames painted on the wall….not so cool.

I took this photo on my first day in london, it reveals many quintessential london characteristics; black london taxi, man with umbrella, meandering street, six storey buildings and glistening pavements. Seemingly it could have been taken today or 100 years ago. I am surprised at how familiar one can become with their surroundings in such short time. For now it is home.

While we are on Foster and food references, here is the Gherkin.

The British Museum contains this fantastic dome designed by Foster and Partners with i suspect a lot of help from Buro Happold. This project exhibits great use of the ‘half doghnut’ in architecture. The new dome (1994-2000) beautifully compliments the original building designed by Sir Robert Smirke (1823-47)

Daniel Libeskind’s Graduate Centre at London Metropolitan University was a slight disappointment for me. I imagined my first Libeskind building to be somewhat more dazzling. Given the beauty implied by the driving concept of the building “the Orion” (the spatial emblem of the northern sky) It does have a nice relationship to the passerby, opening up some of the university ground for public use.

David Adjaye, touted as one of Britain’s hot young talents has an exhibition on at London’s Whitechapel Gallery entitled “Making Buildings Public”. Tanzinian-born come British architect, Adjaye is making the transition from a small scale practice where he has completed some cleverly detailed and well refined houses, into the realm of public architecture.

copyright to the artist