Joachim Baan — Another Thing - Issue #14

Today the doors of the beautiful Capital C building in Amsterdam will open for BIG ART, which will run for 10 day at the former Diamant Exchange. The new exciting initiative by curator Anne de Zwaag presents over 50 XL artworks by contemporary artists and designers. A unique mix of acclaimed names and upcoming talents, monumental paintings, drawings, large sculptures, big photos and huge installations. In the coming days we will present some of our favorites artists included in the curation of de Zwaag. Starting with Rotterdam-based painter Katinka Lampe, with whom we discuss the democratization of the contemporary visual culture, the rise of artificial self-representation and how this is reflected back in her haunting distorted paintings of young human figures.

Both Big Art and Capital C brands are made by us at …,staat

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Last week, leading Canadian outerwear brand Arc’teryx started an ambitious new chapter for their inspirational Veilance collection. Through a new partnership with renowned creative architecture firm Snarkitecture, headed by Alex Mustonen and Daniel Arsham who aim to marry architecture and art with their joint endeavor, for the first time ever the brand opened a unique concept store experience in New York City — open for the public until January 8th, after it closes its doors for good again. Accompanying the new project in New York, Veilance introduces a new strategy in the grouping of its minimalist pieces of clothing: having created the new categories Wind, Rain and Cold protection systems.

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Last week we celebrated the re-launch of Abel at Tenue de Nîmes. After a full year of work, creating every facet of this brand, it’s amazing to see it all coming together! 

Created using 100% natural ingredients, Abel’s five living fragrances evolve to a unique dynamic on the skin of every individual.

More on this later in the coming weeks. Meanwhile enjoy their beautiful site and lovely fragrances!

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Evidently part of the Pantheon of the most important painters of the 20th century, Spanish artist Pablo Picasso also created sculptures throughout his life that were as innovative as they were (and still are!) influential. After the MoMA in New York and the Musée national Picasso-Paris, BOZAR/Centre for Fine Arts in Brussels has just opened the next chapter of the exhibition, bringing together 80 of Picasso’s sculptures for the very first retrospective of the artist’s sculptures in Belgium. After having seen it ourselves last Sunday (the exhibition opened on 25 October 2016: Picasso’s birthday), it is safe to say that the exhibition will be among our favorites of the year, marvelously showcasing the extraordinary scope of the artistic vision of Picasso and revealing the inspirational development in finding the right 3D equivalent of his canvas-bound painted expressions.

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Here’s how the company is becoming a household name without compromising its principles.

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On a day like this, on which the latest and till date most important piece of evidence was revealed of a still ongoing radical change in the fundamental requirements for the Western political class to be granted democratic power by the electorate — lacking the traditional need of a significant coherent political constructive vision, but on top of that not even the usual outspoken representation of inhabiting moral decency. In today’s world empty signifiers have become the rule in the political jargon, proving to suffice as elementary communicational means to still mobilize a majority of the voters. Distributed digitally, the new system of communication functions by similar rules as that of (mostly constructed, sometimes organically erupted) online viral content: going for maximum instant impact without an intrinsic meaning or significant rooting in the relevant context.

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Over the past years (yes, that’s years…) we’ve been working on the new website of my brother. It’s finally live! Hope you’ll like it!

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We recently discovered the beautiful photographic work of Tokyo-based Ko-Ta Shouji, that within its analogue ‘snapshot’ genre shows an inspirational marriage of the explorations of technical experiment with a captivating, emotional contemporary feel. Practically all of his images are taken on film, mostly characterized by that mentioned snapshot aesthetic: working with unorthodox, free floating frames, often full of joyful young energy, having a colorful metropolitan feel. Beyond catching his subject in, what feels to us as, the right moments, Shouji subsequently masterfully adds second and third layers to his imagery through light leaks, double exposures and blurred spots, infusing an ambiguous element of mystery that runs as a red threat through his whole portfolio — whether he shoots models in an editorial for a leading fashion magazine, his beautiful portrait series named ‘gosees’; catching young models as free as they are right after what the title suggests, but also in his ‘Untitled’ series, being his most abstract body of work, portraying the world around us as a beautifully blurred place that haunts its spectator, built up layer after layer out of washed out colors and floating movement.

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A single logogram can express a simple thought (“Hi”) or a complex one (“Hi Louise, I’m an alien but I come in peace”).

We have been following the highly talented Antwerp-based photographer Frederik Vercruysse from the moment we discovered his collaborations with fellow photographer Filip Dujardin some years ago. In recent years Vercruysse worked on a broad scale of projects, ranging from commissions for brands and magazines, next to free projects of which his ‘Tempo Polveroso‘, shot in the marble quarries outside of Villa Lena, still is a big favorite of ours. Last week marked another important milestone in the career of the Belgian: for the very first time ever, presenting a collection of some of his best photography in a printed publication, produced together with publisher Luster. Named ‘Index 2006-2016’ the elegantly designed book includes architecture and interior design photos, as well as his signature captivating clean cut still lifes, compositions and landscape photography — all fresh, graphic images bathed in a soft light, showing his extraordinary eye for details.

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After last weekend’s highly anticipated (finally!) launch of Amsterdam-based perfume house Abel’s new five piece vita odor collection and the accompanying official presentation of the redefined strategy, repositioning of the brand and completely restyled identity, which we worked on over the course of the last twelve months (everything on that later this week) — we first want to shed some well deserved light on the very talented and very lovely Paris-based Sophie Tajan, who was responsible for the photography in the project.

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Last month, American photographer Jonathan Levitt, together with Los Angeles-based publisher Snail Press, released a new beautiful printed gem named ‘Mawooshen: Life and Landscape of the Maritime Archaic’, featuring over 100 carefully selected film photographs taken over the last 10 years. The name of the book refers all the way back to 1605, when British Captain George Waymouth explored what we now know as Midcoast Maine, in an expedition that included a certain gentleman named James Rosier, who wrote a detailed account that was published in England. During this exploration Waymouth and his men kidnapped five Natives and took them to England. The captives reportedly called their homeland Mawooshen. With his book, inspired by Paleolithic animism, western natural history, and shadow archaeology, Levitt creates and alter-world, named after the original native moniker of the lands, through deeply fascinating photographs of geography, plant and animal life, people, and built objects. All of the images are unstaged, analog, and accompanied by fragments of description. The photographs are arranged according to the seasons in which they were taken and span three cycles. The effect is cumulative and modal like a chant. By telling the story of ‘Mawooshen’ cyclically and ending with the ellipsis of a third spring, Levitt’s cosmology pushes against the linear, eschatological myth of western culture.

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Love stories on the radio, with my beloved and talented friend Pierre-Ange Carlotti. 1st hour : Clara 3000. Put on repeat!

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In the words of Satisfy founder Brice Partouche; “running is like meditation,” which might very well the best medicine to keep your mind in the right place at the moment. In that particular realm, the Nike x Undercover Gyakusou Holiday 2016 collection just dropped as part of the ongoing collaboration between Nike and Undercover’s Jun Takahashi, that has entered its sixth year. Each Gyakusou collection builds upon the last, blending leading innovation with Takahashi’s creative punk spirit and athletic sensibilities. The new collection notably reflects Nike’s approach to transformative design, as select items are designed to reduce distraction by being easily packable. Since the very beginning, Takahashi made the Gyakusou color palette to blend well with both the urban and natural landscape using earthy colors and the traditional colors of Japan, this season also debuting some contrasting colors in the palette. Another first time is the fact that Takahashi features in the lookbook created for the new collection. Next to the photography, an impressive video was additionally produced, in which the Japanese visionary expresses his vision for what he has been aiming to create with Gyakusou in the last six years. Very impressive, if you would ask us.

Notes on the beauty of cultures

Creative Direction in Elegant Creativity

…,staat is a creativity-driven agency that embraces a broad spectrum of communication and design crafts, such as architecture, branding, creative direction, experience, graphic and interior design.