Fog in NB

I think I've found my favourite shooting conditions: fog and lots of it.  With plenty of light the fog becomes diffuse, like a giant silk.  This foggy day rolled in through the coast around Cape Enrage, New Brunswick.  My brain almost exploded when I saw the photo of the pile of rocks (that was already nicely placed before my arrival) on my computer screen. Friends, this series was shot with an iPhone! No DSLR with a sexy lens, just the old telephone and some fog.  Thank you Bay of Fundy!

BK-NYC

Crossing the Canadian/US border by car, the border patrol agent asked me where I was going.

I replied : "New York." 

To which he said: "You are in New York."

Why do I always get the snippiest guards?

Fighting the urge to roll my eyes, I said, New York City.

We were then waved through.

 a bike ride that took us from the Brooklyn Bridge to delicious pizza at Roberta's

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 loving some NYC architecture on Lafayette

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 water taps at La Colombe supporting Coffee For Water and Charity Water non-profits

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Betten adorned doors outside the McKittrick Hotel

My trips to New York are always quickies, a couple of days max, and never enough time to see all your friends (sorry!), go to a gallery or two, shop, or see a show. This time around chilling with my sister was key, exhibits lost out (sorry!) and considering I haven't seen a show in NY since I was seventeen, Sleep No More (finally!) won out big time.

Ai Weiwei

Surveillance Camera, 2010

Marble Helmet, 2010

from Ai Weiwei's According To What? exhibit, AGO, 2013

When I began this blog 200 posts ago I wanted to share images of aesthetic occurrences and everyday awesomeness that centred around film, fashion and art.  Toss in a little bit a of travel, food, and flowers and you've got a sampling of what I love.  Although my infatuation with aesthetics runs deep, more importantly it is what these passions can teach when we go beneath the surface that concerns me the most.  Learning and sharing discoveries has been the main drive behind this blog and I hope that these objectives have reached you.  Thanks to everyone who's been reading along and for those who want to get the posts in their inbox you can subscribe below!

For post number two hundred, a quote from Ai Weiwei, an artist who wields mighty socio-political criticisms with his art, taken from his According To What? exhibit:

"We cannot just learn from Western art, but also need to examine and criticize our daily experience and our own thought.  This is the nature of intellect as well as art, to question the basic foundation of being and our state of mind."

Mathieu Quesnel

The July issue of ELLE Québec's culture section features a portrait I styled with actor Mathieu Quesnel.  This charming man (of vague Chris Martin resemblance) has a Denys Arcand feature in the can and an Émile Gaudreault film hitting screens right about now.  Gaudreault's Le vrai du faux centers around a soldier dealing with post traumatic stress disorder, inspiring an army feel with the styling.  Photographed by Daniel Cianfarra, Quesnel wears a marbled print shirt by DUBUC, khaki trousers by Dolce & Gabbana, and a belt from Denim & Supply by Ralph Lauren.

Jean-Michel Basquiat x Komono

In my days of youth Andy Warhol reined supreme in my art life and was my gateway to awareness of other artists' work, such Jean-Michel Basquiat.  But truth is, Basquiat didn't quite stick.  Years went by, I watched the Schnabel film, then Tamara Davis' doc and while I was filled with oodles of respect and love of the works' raison d'etre, the art itself never resonated. Shit, I just wasn't feel it!

I read a Vanity Fair article on early champions of Basquiat's work and admired their art intuition while established institutions dismissed it. Recent auction history has shown that Basquiat's oeuvre has more than stood the test of time.
For those who don't have 48$M kicking around and want a little bit of JMB in their life, the Estate of Jean-Michel Basquiat reached out to Belgian watch and sunglasses maker Komono to create a limited edition collection of watches featuring the artist's work. So when I walked into Boutique Oxford for the Basquiat x Komono  Montreal launch, I felt like I had a new (older? different?) set of eyes. What has changed?  The work remains the same, as I admired the signature scribbles, the crowns (even on the watch dial!) and the instinct-driven personal pieces that would come to compose watch straps of the Komono Curated series.  Has time worked its magic on me?  Has time been a gentle erosion on my own views and pillars of art and has finally let in the genius I have stubbornly never "felt"?  It's fitting that the Estate's latest collab marks the marching of time and the enduring nature of Basquiat's art.

BLOC SHOP

Like beasts rising in the dark, I had a chance to see the massive inclining Walltopia walls of Bloc Shop take shape. Montreal's newest bouldering gym is getting ready to reveal its 10 000 sq.ft. (!!) home to eager climbers jonesing to test out the brainchild and passion project of climbing machines Nic Charron, Fred Charron, and Cloé Legault and Les Trois Petits Bouchons restaurateur Michel Charette.  Holy moly, I think I'm going to dust my climbing shoes off.

Stylist and marketing guru Cloé Legault gave me a tour of the facility and explained the ethos behind the gym.

"We wanted to build a gym like no other. A gym where bouldering would be accessible to all [skill] levels. A place that offers athlete management for everyone, whatever their needs, from the beginner to the top level athlete."

Ok, sounds great, but how does that fit into practice for a lowly V0/V1 sometimes-climber like me?  Legault explained that the gym's walls would be divided into twenty sections, which would each contain the whole gamut of levels. Therefore I would have twenty beginner routes to work on before the monthly reset.  What?! Ambitious! I visualized putting on my little velcro shoes....chalk on my hands...

Atmosphere and vibe is a key focus for the Bloc Shop crew: art is very present with walls by Nathan Leblanc-limoges (above), Astro (below) and the ubiquitous Jason Botkin (in progress!)  A lounge area and food/beverage counter will also be in place so chilling, refuelling and communing are as much part of the space as you hitting the training wall.  More from Legault:

"[We want to build] a gym for the community where the people belong; where you can grab a coffee or a fresh green juice and access the best climbing and training experience there is."

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Great, sign me up! Bloc Shop's opening competition and party is a fundraiser for Fondation Bouldering Montréal, a non-profit organization that will fund the training of a junior team of next generation climbers.  So join in the fray on or off the walls- take part in the comp or gawk and marvel at the elite boulderers' skills while you chow down on some food and booze truck deliciousness.
July 5th, be there, more info here and here.

mural festival '14

This year's Mural Festival saw fourteen new walls go up along St-Laurent and surrounding side streets.  In addition to the remaining fourteen murals from the 2013 edition, the art installations and the usual street sale cacophony there was a lot to see and do.  Above: Alexis Diaz's intricate crosshatched creature.

I only caught Kashink's giant man-creature in progress-a repeat visit to view the final wall is in the plans.  Fun and colourful at first reading, dig a little more and learn that Kashink uses her art as activism with a sense of humour. Check out 50 Cakes of Gay and enjoy.

Oh man, this one is a good one.  This is Bezt from the Etam Cru.  I had a chance to sit and talk with Bezt while he contemplated the scarf's color and pattern which had gone through a couple of incarnations.  At first grey with pattern, then brown with flowers, an attempt at a skull motif followed before it became the textured brown scarf seen above.  Loving this.

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photo by mark unterberger

The above piece is by an awesome friend, artist Kevin Ledo whose portraiture skills just blow my mind.  The image is of an Edward Curtis photograph taken in 1923 of a Hupa woman.  Ledo's figurative body of work often focuses on feminine icons, divinity and holiness.  Ledo's newest wall fits right in.

I can't show the whole Mural Festival contingent to you, as these walls are way more amazing in real life, but if you're in Montreal you can find the rest here.