Tonight the PANL (Photographers Association of the Netherlands) Sony Awards #19 will be opened again in Amsterdam, NL.
This year the event is going to be in the Westergasfabriek terrain in the North-West of Amsterdam.
Have a look and check out the work of some amazing Dutch photographers! You can visit the exhibition from the 2nd until the 15th of April.
This is a perfect example how fashion shows can be very creative and not just humble walking back and forth on a runway.
Moncler Gamme Bleu did a awesome job in their yesterday’s fashion performance in Milano.
Watch the video on the Wallpaper Magazine site and read the full article.
Unter dem Motto “Same Same, But Different” findet ab heute wieder einmal das Internationale Design Festival in Berlin statt.
Die Veranstaltung lädt internationale Designer, Fachpublikum und alle Interessierte vom 3. - 7. Juni nach Berlin ein. Produkte und Ideen international etablierte Designer sowie Prototypen und Editionen aufstrebender Designer werden in zwei Hauptausstellungen, diversen in der Stadt verteilten “Satelliten-Shows” und Open Studios vorgestellt.
Nebenher wird ein großes Spektrum an Lectures, Panel Talks, Performances und Parties angeboten.
Unter anderem sind auch die drei Designer von SALZIG design mit dabei, die Crecomu Ende letzten Jahres in Stuttgart kennengelernt hat - allein ihr Sporthocker ist eine Reise nach Berlin wert 
- glaubt es mir!
Viel Spaß auf dem DMY wünscht euch Crecomu!
Seit heute findet wieder die Messe BLICKFANG im schönen Süden Deutschlands statt.
Die Designmesse kann man vom 13. - 15. März in Stuttgart in der Liederhalle (Boschareal) besuchen.
Mit ca. 200 Ausstellern birgt die BLICKFANG ein beachtliches Angebot an Designern aus den Bereichen Mode, Möbel und Schmuck.
Besonders beachtlich ist, dass dieses Jahr wohl um die 50% der Aussteller zum ersten Mal dabei sind.
Wollen wir mal sehen, was die jungen Designer so zu bieten haben.
Mehr über die BLICKFANG seht ihr bald…
(Quelle Bild: www.blickfang.com)
The annualy design, art & fashion sales platform DEKUMO is happening in Stuttgart, Germany this weekend.
Dozens of exhibitors showcase their design and art works waiting for the big (or small) deal.
As a member of Crecomu and resident of our beloved state capital Stuttgart, I felt obligated to check
out what’s going on at the DEKUMO 2008. So last night, before having some sleep, I checked www.dekumo.de to see who will be presenting some nice things. I stumble across some (few) really nice
concepts and designs (mainly product design) what I am going to show in my next blog post after
having interviewed the creators and having made some nice pictures.
Believe me, that’s some really cool kick-ass sh.. what they’ve designed
To be continued…
Last night, after being recovered from some quite busy days, once again I was browsing thru the internet using one of my favorite web sites and firefox add-ons - StumbleUpon (folks, you really got to have it - really nice thing! check out here). After registration you can specify some (or a lot) categories based on your interests and StumbleUpon will discover web sites for you. Among others I have categories like art, design, fotography, marketing, science. The combination of several categories leads once in a while to very cool web sites.
One I would like to share with you: guerilla-innovation
It is a creative, unconventional and interventionistic web site, like the call themselves in their header.
You can click different keywords e.g. activistic, cinematic, conceptual, graphic or urban and it will for sure link you to some quite interessting or even very funny blog posts.
Myself, I was triggered by the most recent entry. An artist called Tim Devin who spreads a brief magazine on public places in New York, Boston and LA. The only way to read it is either find it or contribute to one issue via an email or so. Only 50 copies are produced and left randomly once a month.
I know it’s not rocket science but I really like the idea and it certainly cheers up people’s mind who find it and read stories from strangers all over the planet! And - I actually want to read one myself or write a short story for it… we’ll see
Another post I really like is about an Austrian artist who initiated the “PERMANENT BREAKFAST”. The basic idea is to bring people together having breakfast in public places which are originally not made for picnicking. While having breakfast people should think in different ways of these places and “stimulate social interaction” which I think is a great thought.
Or the ‘Albert Hijn to go’ which is probably not a serious idea, funny though. The Dutch supermarket offers to drive in with your vehicle (supposingly a bicycle) and order, take it and drive away - nice he ;).
Check the web site out yourself, it’s worth it!
A short (very subjective) report from Stefan Pangratz
It’s that time of the year again, the time of giving and getting awards. In the Netherlands, the one with arguably the most prestige is the Dutch Design Award (previously known as “the nederlandse designprijzen”). The awards cover a large area of disciplines, from graphic design to interior…and everything in between. This year, the great finale was set to be in Eindhoven, the design capital of Holland. Not to convenient for the Amsterdam and Rotterdam Ego’s, but probably true. And definitely not convenient for me, the trip from Amsterdam to “Philips town” takes two hours! Well, I had to be there because of my very flattering nomination in the category “public spaces” interior and went to the awards with big hopes;-). I’ve made the concept and design for a nice little space in the center of Amsterdam (see under Public spaces interiors; it is the Volunteer Center Amsterdam with the cross like furniture. http://www.dutchdesignawards.nl. The organization of the award show was surprisingly professional, a first in the history of design awards in Holland, furthermore was the beer free which cheers up the party. The ideas and designs presented for the awards were great! I loved the Jar Tops in the product design section, or did you know that 75% of all glass jars have the same size? Again, take a look on the site! The most awarded piece of design was a book, a book about the industrial use of all the parts of one pig. Very nice, simple design. Strong idea and concept, and really a book that fits the “Zeitgeist”. You can order it at www.theseflocks.com. Oh and by the way, my fantastic interior design did not win, obviously the jury was not competent in this case, but then again…maybe the winning prison fence was just that little bit better;-).
Last week I was suggested to have a look at Pecha Kucha Night in Shanghai. 
I had never heard of it and maybe you neither so here is a brief introduction:
Pecha Kucha Night, devised by Astrid Klein and Mark Dytham was conceived in 2003 as a place for young designers to meet, network, and show their work in public.
The key to Pecha Kucha Night is its system for avoiding extreme long presentations. Each presenter is allowed 20 images, each shown for 20 seconds – giving 6 minutes 40 seconds of fame before the next presenter is up. This keeps presentations concise, the interest level up, and gives more people the chance to show.
Pecha Kuch Nights are being held in 141 locations all over the world. So it is actually pretty big.
(I was surprised it was this big since i have been studying design for over 4 years and nobody ever told me about this. But also I can’t recall any advertisements or anything like this. So i guess it’s kind of for insiders and profits most from word of mouth marketing in stead of making big advertisements and getting commercialised.)
This directly reflects on the atmosphere at the Pecha Kucha Night. It was informal and the people I met where friendly and easy to talk with. Also there was a big diversity of design fields represented like Shoe Design, Architecture, Art, Graphic Design and Brand Design.
‘Pan Jianfeng, Graphic Design for WWF’
‘Alicia Framis, Emergency Architecture’
Personally I enjoyed Alicia Framis’ presentation most. She just prepared half of her presentation because she was more interested in going to have a message in stead of perfectioning her presentation. Not only her informal, improvised and humoristic way of presenting appealed to me. Also her work was quite intereseting. Some of her projects had a lot of humor and others where quite deep and poetic.
Another presentation which was quite remarkable was the one from Ben Houge a sound artist. He had put a lot of effort in his presentation and although I don’t think anyone understood more than 50% of his presentation. The main message about what he does and what sound design is some way clear.
The first BarCamp Stuttgart has been held from September 26th until 28th.
About 200 people from Germany’s Web2.0 world were gathering in the ‘Literaturhaus Stuttgart’ to present or facilitate sessions.
I will introduce that event to you shortly:
BarCamp is an international network of user generated conferences — open, participatory workshop-events, whose content is provided by participants — often focusing on early-stage web applications, and related open source technologies, social protocols, and open data formats.
(for further information please see wikipedia: Barcamp)
I do think that crecomu.com is considered an early-stage web application and therefore I though it is worth joining the event.
As expected I met a lot of interesting people with all kind of ideas - some of them were thouroughly crazy - and interesting concepts. Companies existing already for 2-3 years joined the sessions as well, so it was quite useful to hear what kind of conclusion they could draw after being in business for multiple years and having experienced ups and downs.
Altogether the BarCamp was a big success and once again it was for sure that the web is going towards social commerce, mass customization and mobile mobile mobile…(I think we need crecomu.com as an iPhone version soon )
Thanks to Pure Tea and Das Eis the Barcamp Stuttgart was also a culinary success!
Special thanks to the core organization team and we hope to have the 2nd Barcamp Stuttgart soon!!!
Zugegebenermaßen war ich nicht wirklich sicher, was mich erwarten wird, als ich von Christian Jankowskis Ausstellung im Stuttgarter Kunstmuseum las. Ich bin kein großer Kenner der Kunstszene und auch nicht dem Bereich der Konzeptkunst, aber ein gewisses Interesse hege ich doch.
Der Artikel aus der Stuttgarter Zeitung weckte dann doch eine starke Neugier und ich packte meine Kamera und machte mich auf den Weg.
Am Museum angekommen überraschte mich die Schlange mit relativ jungem Publikum ein wenig. An einem so kalten Sonntagnachmittag wäre da eher ein kuscheliges Café oder die gute Stube angesagt…
Ticket gekauft und Taschen abgegeben gings dann auch gleich los. Auf drei Geschossen präsentierten sich die Arbeiten von Jankowski. Zumeist - wie wohl öfter in seinen Arbeiten - Videoinstallationen, teils über Beamerpräsentationen auf in überdimensionalen Holzkisten aufgespannten Leinwänden oder über den klassischen Fernseher (Modell 1985ff). Die ersten Kurzfilme bewegten mich eher zum weitergehen. Als ich dann aber an einer dieser Holzkisten vorbeikam, überzeugten mich die aufmerksamen Zuschauer davor doch anzuhalten und zu “schauen”. Die ersten Eindrücke erinnerten eher an eine amerikanische Kleinstadtkirchengemeinde, in der ein Reverend im typischen Motivationsstil die Gemeindemitglieder zum Mitmachen und Mitglauben auffordert. Das Bild wendet sich als er anfängt über einen deutschen Gast zu sprechen, durch dessen Anwesenheit heute etwas ganz anderes, einmaliges passieren wird. Im selben Moment tritt Christian Jankowski aus dem Publikum und geht mit laufender Videokamera auf den Reverend zu, fällt zu Boden und verharrt dort bis in alle Ewigkeit. Unser Reverend beginnt mit seiner Predigt. Anstatt über Gott und Jesus zu sprechen, spricht er aber auf einmal über die Kunst, den Künstler und den Menschen, als Dreieinigkeit. Die Predigt nimmt ihren Lauf…
In einer unglaublich faszinierenden und interessanten Art und Weise gelingt es Jankowski die Kunst ansich und die Mittel der Kunst in Form einer Predigt, in Form einer kirchlichen Erzählung zu definieren. Ausdruck und Sprache des Reverends sind so metaphorisch, dass es fasst schon ein Genuss ist, ihm zuzuhören.
Eine weitere, meiner Meinung nach, beeindruckende Arbeit, ist der Film ‘Rosa’, der parallel zu dem Film ‘Viktor Vogel - Commercial Man’ von Lars Kraume entstanden ist. Hier greift der Künstler eine Performance aus früherer Zeit auf, in der er mit Pfeil und Bogen im Supermarkt auf Essensjagd ging. Die Idee wurde dann an Filmemacher verkauft und in “Viktor Vogel” doppelt angwandt, indem die Heldin des Films “Rosa” ihrerselbst die Aktion durchführt und an Werbeleute verkaufen will.
Letztendlich erlebte ich im dritten Obergeschoss die wohl aktuelleste Arbeit Jankowskis, nämlich “Dienstbesprechung”. Ein Werk, das ausschließlich für Stuttgart geschaffen wurde.
Die Mitarbeiter des Kunstmuseums Stuttgart finden sich in einer verdrehten Welt wieder, in der Position und Aufgabe im Museum vertauscht wurden. Ein durchaus interessanter Gedanke, der aber spätestens bei der Gehaltsfrage problematisch wurde
Abschließend möchte ich die Arbeit Christian Jankowskis (zumindest den Teil, den ich gesehen habe) als sehr inspirierend und interessant einstufen. Die Arbeiten des Künstlers, der in New York, Berlin und Stuttgart arbeitet, sind definitiv einen oder sogar mehrere Besuche wert! Ich freue mich darauf, weitere Ausstellungen zu besuchen.
Hier noch ein paar Eindrücke in Bild…
