Modart » NYC http://www.modart.com Active Creation Creative Action Thu, 26 Sep 2013 15:14:25 +0000 en-US hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.6 Pictoplasma Conference http://www.modart.com/2011/10/28/pictoplasma-conference/ http://www.modart.com/2011/10/28/pictoplasma-conference/#comments Fri, 28 Oct 2011 10:00:51 +0000 Maxi http://www.modart.com/?p=3440 The Pictoplasma Conference is packed with inspiring talks by some of the most innovative talents. The diverse line-up of 2011 speakers hails from around the globe, including Geneviève Gauckler (FR), Allyson Mellberg Taylor (USA), BeatBots (JP/USA) and Jon Burgerman (UK). They cover a wide range of media and disciplines, such as illustration, graphic design, game design, fashion, art and robotics.

Here are some of our favorites:

Geneviève Gauckler (FR)
Geneviève Gauckler is a French artist, illustrator and art director who is best known for her ever-evolving procession of lovable characters and Technicolor digital mashes. Her works are bright, fun and hectic – often combining symmetrical designs with soft-edged computer generated images laid against photographed backgrounds. She has exhibited all over the world and has had art commissioned by many advertising agencies and magazines. In recent years she has been dividing her time between advertising works and creating her own artwork, which she refers to in good humor as “silly and absurd”.

Mark Jenkins (USA)
Mark Jenkins, born 1970 in Fairfax, Virginia, is an American artist most widely known for the street installations he creates using box sealing tape. His work, through the use figure installation, explores absurdist and surreal themes. Projects include converting traffic circles to merry go rounds, parking meters into lollipops, and hyper realistic figures designed to create public spectacles that absorb passersby as actors on situations.

Ben & Julia (FR/CH)
French-Swiss Technicolor enfants terribles Ben & Julia joined forces in 2006 to make a name for themselves as a multidisciplinary talented directors and art directors duo. They create exceptionally Mixed Media work through water colour and drawings, puppetry, 2D and 3D animation and live action. To date their work has been enthusiastically commissioned and displayed on a wide spectrum of platforms, from commercial ads to exhibitions as Art Basel. Their distinct weakness for nature, forests and especially fungi, have lead them to be signed by Hornet Inc for commercial representation.

Jeremyville (AUS)
Jeremyville is an artist, product designer and author. He self produced his first 3D inflatable designer toy in 1995, and wrote the first book in the world on designer toys called ‘Vinyl Will Kill‘, in 2003. He has also written and produced his 2nd book ‘Jeremyville Sessions’, and has had several designer toys released through Kidrobot. Jeremyville has been in group shows at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburg, the Madre Museum of Modern Art in Napoli, the 796 Arts District in Beijing, and solo shows at Area B Gallery in Milan and Bunkamura Gallery in Shibuya Tokyo.

Allyson Mellberg Taylor (USA)
Allyson Mellberg Taylor’s drawings are intimate, reminiscent of things seen in an artist’s most personal journal/diary. Gentle figures find a stage on the page to breathe, to interact with others. Allyson makes her own ink, boiling walnuts to produce a dark brown color, and extracting pigment from pokeberries to make magenta. The characters she creates often suffer from some sort of malady or disfiguration. She pictures a world in which unseen toxins bubble up to the surface, making their adverse impact visible.

Raymond Lemstra (NL)
After graduating from Academie Minerva in Groningen with a BA in Illustration, Raymond Lemstra toured as part of the multimedia theatre collective PIPS:lab and worked for MTV Networks as a designer, before fully focussing on drawing in 2010. In his personal work he makes references to the illustrative nature of primitive drawing and sculpture, while his main interest is the distortion as a result of selective emphasis; parts of interest are emphasized, unimportant parts reduced or left out. His characters are often big headed, with a strong focus on the face while the body is trimmed to its essential properties. This contrast, between the naive and sophisticated, evokes a clash of intent, simultaneously assuming simplicity and complexity, randomness and reason, flaws and perfection.

Jon Burgerman (UK)
Jon Burgerman was born in the UK and has risen to be one of the prominent key artists in the recent boom of modern day practitioners who traverse the disciplines of urban art, design, illustration and entrepreneurism. A sense of British self-deprecation, dry humor and modern-day anxiety imbues his work along with an enthusiasm for salad.
Burgerman has pushed the character obsession of the late 90s into a new direction, with his monster-like characters layered into compositions where cartoon-like forms are crammed on top of each other until they create a screaming mass of energy.

Tim Biskup (USA)
Tim Biskup pursued his technical training through years of work in the illustration, animation and graphic design industries. When he finally reached out into the fine art world, it was not through any gallery, but by creating his own series of live art auctions, a novel move that launched not only his own career. What has followed are a string of sold-out gallery exhibitions and inclusion in several high-profile museum shows. Long recognized for his complex color and design theories and a decidedly populist aesthetic, Biskup has amassed a cadre of loyal fans, propelled further by his steady output of limited edition prints, vinyl figures, books and other objects.

The Pictoplasma Conference includes talks as much as special screenings. It will take place between November 3 – 4 at the PARSONS THE NEW SCHOOL FOR DESIGN / TISHMAN AUDITORIUM, 66 W 12 St, 10011 NEW YORK.

For more info check their website and No New Enemies.

]]> http://www.modart.com/2011/10/28/pictoplasma-conference/feed/ 0 Pictoplasma NYC http://www.modart.com/2011/10/24/pictoplasma-nyc/ http://www.modart.com/2011/10/24/pictoplasma-nyc/#comments Mon, 24 Oct 2011 12:55:32 +0000 Maxi http://www.modart.com/?p=3450 Pictoplasma is the World’s leading festival of contemporary character design. Taking place twice a year in Berlin and New York Pictoplasma is stands for an immersive weekend of artist talks, screenings, exhibitions and loads of character. From November 3 to November 6 Pictoplasma hits NYC. Over the next couple of weeks we will introduce you to the speakers, their quirky characters, and will let you know which exhibition you just cannot miss.

The Berlin based Pictoplasma project is acclaimed for its unique focus on contemporary character design and art. Their timeless publications showcase the work of a global scene of illustrators, graphic designers and animation filmmakers. The annual festivals in Berlin and NYC have evolved to be the meeting points for an international audience. Whether illustration, animation, graphic design, fashion, street or fine art – the emphasis is not on the limits of style or format, but on the shared dedication to explore character-driven aesthetics.

In its third US edition, the Pictoplasma Conference originating from Berlin returns to New York and presents a marathon of over twelve inspiring lectures, talks and panel discussions by some of the most outstanding artists and designers pushing the edge of contemporary character visualization. Among the presenting artists are artist, author and product designer Jeremyville (AUS); internationally acclaimed graphic designer Geneviève Gauckler (FR); West Coast pop surrealist Tim Biskup (USA); monster-mash-up specialist Joshua Ben Longo (USA); creator of the social robot and pop-icon ‘Keepon’ BeatBots (US/JP); fine artist Allyson Mellberg Taylor (US); illustrator and doodle-master Jon Burgerman (UK); urban artist of uncanny street interventions Mark Jenkins (US); upcoming uber-talent Raymond Lemstra (NL) and animation wunderkind Joel Trussell (USA).

Set as the perfect prelude to New York’s Illustration Week, the conference invites a diverse audience of graphic designers, illustrators, animation filmmakers and producers, fine and urban artists and character connoisseurs to gather under one roof and discourse freely about the world of character-related art and design. The presentations are accompanied by feature-length ‘Characters in Motion’ screenings, showcasing a selected mix of new character-driven animation, motion graphics, music videos and shorts.

Accompanying the Pictoplasma Conference, a line-up of numerous exhibitions and other events spread throughout the city will open up to the general public. This Character Walk will start a day prior to the conference on November 3 and continues until Sunday, November 6. Partnering galleries, concept stores and project spaces include Bold Hype Gallery, Jonathan LeVine Gallery, TTUnterground, Lit Lounge, Cappellini NYC, Gallery hanahou, myplasticheart, Jeremyville Salon, AC Gears, White Rabbit Bar, Big Screen Plaza, Mondo Cane, Spoonbill & Sugartown, Cotton Candy Machine, Factory Fresh and the studio of SupaKitch and Koralie.

The Character Walk showcases paintings, drawings, limited prints and art installations by many of the 2011 conference speakers, such as Joshua Ben Longo, Geneviève Gauckler, Jeremyville, Raymond Lemstra or Jon Burgerman, plus additional exhibitions by artists such as AJ Fosik, Aaron Stewart, Anna Hrachovec, Andy Rementer, or Sonni.

Conference: November 4+5
Hosted by Parsons The New School for Design
Tishman Auditorium, 66 W 12 St, 10011 New York

The Character Walk: November 3-6
Exhibitions at 17 artspaces throughout NYC

For more info visit Pictoplasma.com

]]> http://www.modart.com/2011/10/24/pictoplasma-nyc/feed/ 0