End to End is what happens when Adidas and Footlocker get seven of the best names in street art, lock them in a room for three days to design a street-art-inspired line of sneakers, t-shirts and accessories.
While they’re not available in Kuwait right now, I heard they will be available in Footlocker in a month or two. Totally worth waiting for.
Here’s a picture of my favorite pair in there.
I got this amazing Nike Airmax pair as a gift from a friend of mine who knows about my wood fetish. I would’ve appreciated a bit more colors (beige maybe) but the the sneaker as it is, is still awesome. It might not be clear in this picture but the sneaker actually has a part (bottom) with the texture of dark brown wood.
According to him they’re one pair of only 26 in the middleast and they were released as a limited edition globally too. I had to pick them from the Avenues’ Footlocker as it’s the only store that stocks them here.
Thanks buddy
My mom loves found objects and I think I inherited that from her. Few days ago while having lunch with the family I saw this weird looking thing she found while walking around.
It looks like the grave of some barbarian fighter or something. It could also be the cheesiest ornaments to decorate your house with.
Best culture-jamming I have seen in kuwait so far.
Now it says something like “Raise your voice, be heard … but also keep your eyes open.”
Found somewhere on Gulf Road.
Rock the vote ladies.
It’s a bit late but I just saw that and I gotta admit although my position is clear about this issue I still admire the light-hearted humor in this slogan, beats burning embassies in my book anytime of the fucking week.
I think I will make a t-shirt out of this.
For non-jahrawi-bedouin-arabic-speacking people, It’s “Ya Mal’ Al Ba’ar Yal Denyemark’ … I can’t even think of a translation.
I have this idea … I pitched it for rampurple but apparently she didn’t buy it. :p
Well, you’re a creative guy … you want to do something with your life, you want to release an album, you want to make a documentary, you want to shoot the next big thing. Whatever it is you want to do, you wil eventually need tools, right? and if you know your stuff and the quality level of your work really matters to you, you will want to use great tools, which … yes … they cost money, sometimes serious money.
Now I’m not saying you’re cheap for not paying that much money to pursue your dreams but let’s be realisitc, nobody wants to pay big bucks for something they would use only twice a year or worse once and then shelf it to collect dust and becomes an antique.
My idea is simply to get a bunch of those dreamers and make a list of the things they would like to have access to, stuff they might need. They would all pitch in and get the tools they all want.
There will be some kind of regulation on who gets what and for how long but all of that could be figured out later.
I want these with the necessary accessories and the little things that make them more useful:
Nikon D2X
Sony HDR-FX1
Tescam HD-P2
What do you think? Do you want to join the club? :p
Isn’t this the same so-called artist who didn’t want to do an exhibition just because Kuwait National Council for Culture censored some of his artworks? Isn’t this the same so-called artist who been giving lectures I don’t know where? (kuwait university?) I can’t believe they’re actually doing this.
Did Fuad Al Hashim and company get bored of Abu Ghutadah and Abu Nabeel and left the brainless hand puppet (thallaab) alone?I wonder if he will actually sign any cartoons based on a submitted idea of a read with his name.
[Link]: Misc news on Mohammad Thallab from Al-Watan newspaper.
Note: For the non-arabic speaking crowd, this ad is a call for submissions of any idea for the daily cartoon strip “Yomiaat Abu Ghutadah wo Abu Nabeel”.
I just discovered that my Art Director at the last agency I worked for has a blog, in which he posts samples of his art and shots of his studio.
His artworks are full of colors and life. I just love the way he does his paintings, he start with lines to make up spaces intersecting each other and then fill them, but Eric’s artworks are no coloring books project. He use color very carefully to convey the feeling of space and you will always feel the depth when you look at his artworks.
Ladies and gents, I present to you the man who if it wasn’t for him I wouldn’t have taken the small first step into making t-shirts, Eric Tabuena
Can you feel the 3D-ness? :p
I should tell you about what I did in my weekend. It’s not like I have weekends this interesting every week. I want to ramble about this but I will just stick to the point.
I went to a jazz concert organized by the american embassy on thanks giving as a sign of gratitude for the kuwaiti people and what they’ve done to help their american brothers overcome a disaster like hurricane katrina. The New Orleans All-Star Brass Band kicked major ass. They were loud and that’s how I liked it. Amazing what a bass drum and a snare can do to you. Their vocalist, the short guy, was signing pretty much like Louis Armstrong. He did a good job if imitating armstrong was one of his intentions.
What’s a jazz concert without Jazz Central, right? He was there as well as the main fusla and her partner in crime Amunki. I also heard some other blogger were there. Anybody?
Did you see the guy who was wearing ghetra and e’gaal and was obviously having so much fun?
OMG Guess who I ran into after the concert was done, our old friend Mona AL-Gena’e. I actually saw her before the concert but I didn’t want to risk losing the seats I was saving for my friends. I had a really interesting chat with her and I think my number of friends has incresed by one. 
She really really wanted to hit me, I can tell. Oh don’t you deny it mona, I saw the way you were pointing your finger almost poking me with it while saying “… a person like you … “. I’m not gonna go in details, I know you guys are just dying to know more but sorry I will disappoint you this time. 
On friday, I went to the book fair at mishref … blah!
I went yesterday to an art exhibition for upcoming artist, Dana Al Helal. Dana who’s leaving soon to florence to pursue her studies in fine art, focused mostly on portraits. Behind each face portrayed by her paintings a story waiting for you to make it up. You will notice a common theme in her paintings too, smoking, africanism or even arabic pop-culture all mixed together. ALthough the whole thing took her 6 months of work, the collection seems little or maybe It’s the way they were organized in the rather small rooms.
Now the hard part, Although she asked me personally to “be nice” I’m afraid you won’t like what I’m about to write. I was told that some of the paintings were drawn using your fingers directly on the canvas, good job. I really, really couldn’t tell, except for some of them … the shading in one of the paintings which as far as I remember was a close up of a face (and you had a few of them) was … erm … almost like a first-grader’s hand drawing. I’m talking about only ONE of them, just ONE. The rest were nicely executed. I especially liked the portrait of the bold african woman with the tile squares on her eyes, I loved it actually.
Today is the second and the last day for this exhibition, so you should go and check it out. It’s held at Marina Waves, the weird some-how-far building. Go to the marina’s somebody somebody al-subah hall where the ad thing was held last week. Walk or drive to that thing, and while we’re at it. Watch the blank concrete of the entrance of marina waves before it gets legally vandalized by yours truly.
Two days ago I finished reading Persepolis : The Story of a Childhood. Almost an auto-biographical comic book by Marjane Satrapi about the life of a little girl, marji, during the fall of the Shah of Iran and the rise of the islamic revolution. Marjane’s drawing style was really nice, childish a bit (she comes from a children books background) yet very effective as this whole story is about childhood.
I don’t know why I kept trying to live the story from the girl’s perspective and even found myself linking some of the events to my memories of the Iraqi invasion and the daily happenings in our kuwaiti society these days.
All in all the book was an easy read, full of realities and hardcore drama that puts Fajr Al Saeed to shame. I really wanted to cry by the end of this book.
I will definitely check out her Persepolis 2: The Story of a Return and Embroideries. Anybody has any idea what’s the right way to pronounce her name? Is it like Mary-Jane? or Marjaan?
That beauty spot is killing me.
Update: I meant to write something about how this book reminded me of the Iraqi film “Al Hodoud Al Multaheba” الØدود الملتهبة I don’t know why I totally forgot about this film, I don’t think I even thought about this film for the past ten years. I just remember this scene where a soldier is riding a motorcycle and jumping a little clef only to be greeted by a bazooka rocket.
“South Korean body artists Kim-Joon has painted some very nice looking asses with the brand iconography of Adidas, Starbucks and others.”
Via:AdRants.com
Now really this isn’t the subject of my post, I’m not a big fan of body painting and all that stuff but sometimes those people come up with some nice ideas. Like that picture of a black girl (more like brown) with tiger prints all over her body, I gotta admit it had a weird effect on me. (can you say BESTIALITY?)
Which leads me to next point, I was chit-chating with a fellow worker a while ago (when I had fellow workers :D) and she was telling me about all those rituals her emarati friends were doing to her and themselves whenver she visits them. Things like going to spas and having all kinds of massages with oils and all that stuff but what intrigued me and caught my attention the most was when she mentioned how they were putting henna patterns on “naughty places”.
I really wanted to ask her what were those “naughty places” but I think I was distracted by all the thoughts and images my imagination was generating at that time.
Now somebody fill me in here, do we have salons doing this kind stuff here? Any freelancing skilled ladies? and while we’re at … is there a website or a book to learn how to do henna and stuff like that? and If you already know how to do this, from where do you buy the henna powder and all the other materials you use to apply henna?
I noticed since three days ago or so that Al-Watan newspaper have replaced the daily caricature of the iconic artist Ali Farzaat with the embarrassingly kuwaiti hand puppet, Mohammad Thallaab.
What’s worse, Thallab is actually is “living the role” and he already started to copy farzaat’s style known for it’s simplicity and usual lack of any written comments. Only thallab’s caricatures are hardly digested and it will probably leave you wondering, “what’s the point?”.
Good going, Al-Watan, from worse to worst.
I know for sure I won’t renew my subscription.
Nice article about the technology and methodolgy used in making “Corpse Bride”
… and I thought it’s a CG thing.
Just when I got hooked (pun intended) to his Love vs. Blog series.
Mabrook man, for some reason I don’t want to say “minnik el mal o minha el 3yal” I Just realized how discriminating it is for all the “independent women”
On behalf of all bloggers, I wish you a happy life with whomever you chose to spend the rest of your life with. Mabrook again.
Since he disabled the comments on his blog, feel free to leave your “tabreekat” and the happy life wishes here on this post. (yes man, I’m trying to pimp my blog in the process)
Daftar el 3aniya is with Playa Hater of Doggizle.
I can’t wait for the next episode of MadM’s “Love vs Blog”. The guy is delivering some of his finest work with each episode. His humor, his colors and his strokes have changed (a little). He’s telling the jokes from a very insider perspective, makes you wonder what the mad man has been up to lately.
I also like the fact he disabled commenting on his blog. You don’t really need more cheering now, do you?
On a more hilarious note, you guys have to read the unreal Salha & Saad (a la “Darb El Zalag”). Their posts are funny, cute and sometimes they’re sooo believable, you can’t help but wonder if they are for real or not.
Mohammad Khan is giving a lecture TODAY (I don’t know about what) at Kuwait Cinema Club. He directed a lot of big arabic movies (I can only remeber ’supermarket’ and ‘ayaam nasser’).
I don’t have much details really but I heard it will start at 8.30 PM
KCC is located at the geblyah school, across the street from the National Museum/Planetarium’s main entrance. Here’s how I go to that place, I leave majlis al ummah on my right hand (gulf road, yes) and take the right turn next to this old building (national museum, I guess) I park my car there and go to that little building with ‘majliss el funnon wa aladaab’ or whatever their name is.
Sorry for how sketchy this post is, I’m at work and I got loads of stuff to do.
Supposed to be really good, the guy is really famous (if you know shit about arabic cinema).
I went yesterday to check your exhibition at The Modern Art Museum, and frankly I was impressed by many things there. First of all I was impressed by the number of people who came in and I was impressed by how big the frames were (9 times bigger than the artwork, however, it was balanced. Gotta admit.) Also I was impressed by your ability to talk about your ‘artworks’ with such passion and enthusiasm I considered going back to see them again in case I missed anything, and how you made it sound really interesting while it wasn’t.
I was standing there, waiting for you to finish ‘explaining’ your ‘art’. I really wanted to tell you that your stuff belongs to your sketch book not the walls of the museum of modern arts. (not that it got any prestigious state or anything) Oh wait, … did you think it was ‘modern’ to show your doodles to the public and offer them for sale for no less than 175 KDs.
I’m not saying this because you used black pen on paper, I had the same idea for an exhibition too. There’s nothing wrong with making a whole exhibition in black but there’s a big one with making a whole exhibition of doodles. Don’t get me wrong I liked some of them, I loved how some of them had some cool textures and compositions although you only used black and white. I have nothing against you as a person (actually you’re kinda cute) I just have a problem with your ‘art’. I know you are new in the art scene but you should’ve thought twice before making an exhibition like that.
I’m not saying you won’t sell, actually, you might have already sold some by now but that’s not the standard to judge if you had a ’successful’ exhibition or not, and I’m not sure actually what the standard is, if there’s any to start with. I mean I’m all for the ‘art is subjective’ and ‘there’s no good/bad art’ but there’s common sense and people can differentiate a good craftsmanship from a bad one.
There’s an old quote I have no idea where I heard it but it’s so true and I thought maybe I can share it with you, ‘If you can’t make it good, make it red, and If you can’t make it red, make it big” I’m sorry but you failed to achieve any of these things therefore you are not ‘good’.
UPDATE: Just added the pics at 26/5, 02:54 AM
This one is my favorite, I love the detailed texture of the leaves. I used to have this style of drawing (still do actually) which involved alot of leaves too. I guess that’s why I can relate to this one. ACTUALLY, I was holding my moleskine and opening it to this page where I had some doodles, I wanted to show her how I got some of my ‘doodles’ in my sketch book, where they belong, and how they might inspire me to develop them into a ‘finsished’ artworks.
This one is so ‘out there’ according to a friend of mine whom I totaly agree with. It reminds me of Picasso’s series of bull abstractions, however, I’m not sure what these lines are ‘abstracting’ exactly.
Now this is the kind of stuff you would find in the notebook of a frustrated teenager girl. No mastery on her lines, just plain doodle-y.
That’s something I/you/she would do if I/you/she was having a boring phone call with a pen in her hand and a blank paper starring at me/you/her.
I MIGHT/ MIGHT NOT ADD TO THIS LATER ON
Rock on
Yours Truly,
Tata Botata
“Phamous 69 is a sexy, provocative online magazine incorporating high fashion, music and lifestyle.”
… AND lots of beautifully stylized soft-core porn.
Ever seen ‘Pulp Fiction’ ? Do you remember the wallet Jules Winfield was carrying? Ever wondered Who else is qualified to carry the bad mothafucka wallet?
Well, wonder no more. This is a list of 100 people who, according to the writer, are qualified to carry the legendary wallet.
You don’t have to be a ‘Pulp Fiction’ fan to appreciate this list, you just need to be one of those pop culture junkies (mostly nerdy pop culture). From marvel comics to 70’s films and TV shows, From Bruce Lee to Bill Hicks. They’re all there.
I can’t believe I just applied some lipstick.
I will tell you how it went, so my little brother and sister come in my room holding this disposal camera and they’re like ‘we want to take some CRAZY pictures’ and I was like ‘what? huh? … RIGHT ON!’ so we did a couple of supposedly ‘crazy’ pictures (some involved pretensious oud/guitar smashing) and I suggested maybe my sister should dress up like a man (in dishdashah and ’shamgh) and I maybe can put some make up and look like a girl.
I looked really … Uh … with the whole facial hair clashing with the red lips. I can safely tell you that this won’t be a trend anytime soon.
First I would like to express my deepest sympathies to the families of these people, I don’t know them personally but I think I should do this before getting down to the subject of this post.
Don’t you like how the letters are kinda squeezed next to each other yet they are not crowded, I thought they use computers and specific fonts to write these names in the papers. Computers can’t do that, only the talented human hand can.
Been digging the art of arabic calligraphy lately. I used to envy the japanese designers on how they can play with the letters of their language to create amazing typefaces with brushes or digitally using computers but now I think there’s a big big room to play with arabic typography and calligraphy.
I found this ad about this calligraphy course and I’m kinda tempted to join. Anybody else wanna join? … Shurouq? it’s in jabrya, you know.
This artist and her artworks are giving me a total boner.
Update: That site is down, she got an official website now.
I can’t classify this guy but I love how he mix pop icons, art history and famous artist’s techniques. You can get some of his stuff on t-shirts and mugs.
My Favorites:
The Last Supper
Lazy Sunday Afternoon
What’s the deal with Corn Nuts?
WULFFMORGENTHALER is a pair of an amazing nutcases; Comedian Mikael Wulff and Film Director Anders Morgenthaler (hence the name wulffmorgenthaler). They do the daily comic strip of K10K (Design Blog).
Sometimes you just have to think a little bit harder to get it and some times it’s straight in your face. I just love the way they mix things up and come up with stuff that makes you think “How the hell did they think of this?”.
I hope you will enjoy their sick sense of humor as much as I do.
Here’s a Loop that I’m playing with right now, I might develop it to a whole track.
EhLoo.mp3
(Right Click, Save Target As)
What do you think?
I sampled the following:
1. Bjork - Joga (The strings in the beginning of her track).
2. The Waifs - London Still (The Bass, it was an acoustic guitar I just turned the pitch down).
3. Super Mario (The noisy hihats, from the soundtrack of the old Nintendo game).
I played the following:
1. The Oud (Lute), yeah that was me. I tweaked the sound a lil bit.
2. The Tabla.
3. The drumloop in the background was composed by me too.
Just in case you were wondering who shot Pamela’s Book Cover (see below). It’s the magnificent David la Chapelle.
PARENTAL GUIDANCE: Nudity!
Blocked By the good people at fasttelco.
Using only a pair of point-and-shot Compact cameras, Terry Richardson is invading the classy, glossy covers of Vouge, Dazed and Confused, The Face and the not so glossy Vice. His Skills were used in many of Sisley’s Campaigns.His style is a mix of happy-bithday-party-kind-of-photography and the DIY Reality Porn.
Personally, i think richardson’s influnce on magazine’s photography is similar to Warhol’s influnce on Art in general.
Ladies and Gents, My Hero Terry Richardson
P.S: Parental Advisory, Nude People. (Thanks god, it’s not blocked)
