Kate Jenkins crochets with a huge sense of humour. I love her range of breakfast fry-ups and wool sculptures of British favourites like Lyle’s Golden Syrup and Heinz Ketchup to tinned anchovies.
I have just read that the Rebecca Hossack Art Gallery will be hosting an exhibition of this knitwear designer’s foodart, aptly titled Kate’s Cafe.
I can’t wait to go. It looks like it has the right ingredients to warm anyone’s heart.
There’s a bit of magic when your space is altered. I love it when the outdoors get mixed up with the indoors and vice versa. The best art installations I’ve seen have mostly been about altering your environment, which is familiar in an Alice in Wonderland kind of way.
Last year, I saw some pretty spectacular outdoor/indoor mix-up. I was reminded of this when I was looking at an Anthony McCall image on Chris’s blog. Technically the exhibition I went to in the Serpentine Gallery didn’t really bring the outdoors indoors but it helped fuel my imagination on what it was like to be able to walk towards the sunlight in a midnight sky.
This reminded me then of the time when we went to see Roger Hiorn’s Seizure. A flat in a housing estate in Elephant & Castle had been transformed into a crystal house.
On a smaller scale, a nice way to bring the outdoors indoors is through something like a tree bed. Having been brought up in the city, I have found nature slightly scary. While I can appreciate nature aesthetically, I am not entirely comfortable with being outdoors. I like that someone has thought to design something for the non-campers out there.
Last summer, on a glorious sunny day, I found myself walking along South Bank and stumbled upon the Armchair Theater.
But really, the quickest way to bring the outdoors indoors or the playground anywhere is with this swing skirt by Rachel Griffin. I love that with this one simple design, this is fashion that you can wear and play in anywhere, anytime. Easily going back in time and being a kid again.
Amelie remains one of my favourite films, mainly because of Nino’s obsession with collecting discarded photos of strangers from photo booths.
I have always been a big fan of the past and the future. The present somehow does not hold as much appeal. Prior to my little trip to Berlin I was excited to hear that there still exists analogue photo booths in the city. I did my research to find these spots and wrote it in my little notebook of addresses that I wanted to seek out.
Imagine my surprise and happiness when on our first day of properly venturing out in the city, we stumbled 
upon a booth that was not on my list. Not far from the East Side Gallery, we followed the people ahead of us and walked into Bar 25 (also on the list) by turning a corner and going through a side door. We found ourselves in this little spot of treats. An old, disused dodgem sat on a platform, a couple of swings hung from the branches of these huge tree and an old fotoautomat booth.
I have always been a big fan of analogue photos but due to the cost of processing, I forgot the joy in taking photos on film until this trip. Sometimes the beauty in the waiting time is that you forget what photos were taken and when you collect them, it is a surprise. And just as surprising is taking photos in an old booth. The sound of the flashing going off and the gentle whirr of the booth while it processes your photos. This is what I’ll hear when I think of Berlin.
Recently, at the Tate Modern, I saw an exhibition of Seydou Keita’s photographs. A studio photographer from Mali, I thought of how having your photograph taken was such a big occasion. I love his portraits of these people who stood, posing with their props against a patterned background.
I’d love for them to bring back the old fotoautomat booths. While it is nice to have the option to get a really decent photo of yourself in the digital booths, they lack the spontaniety and romantic sense of the analogue booths.
