LONDON – Maurice Levy, Publicis Groupe chief executive, has said the business model for the advertising industry is outdated and needs to change as it faces growing competition from internet giants such as Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft.
LONDON – The Christian Institute, an anti-abortion Christian lobbying and education charity, is suing Google for refusing to allow its ads about abortion that include religious content.
The English Premier League may be reveling in the excitement generated by another tight title race, but in China it is counting the cost of a TV deal that has laid bear a serious lack of market penetration, despite claims to the contrary.
CCTV5’s Jiang Heping is the man with his finger on the button as China gears up for the Games.
LONDON – When house prices fall a recession is not far behind, or it hasn’t been for the last 50 years.
LONDON – The Advertising Standards Authority said its decision to refer Ryanair to the OFT followed “a catalogue of breaches” of advertising codes as it accused the budget airline of continuing to mislead consumers and denigrate competitors.
HONG KONG – Oasis Hong Kong Airlines, after just 17 months of operation, has gone into liquidation.
A new communications approach is essential for a sector rocked by disaster.
Reading the lovely blog of Cati Vaucelle, i discovered the work of Kate James. Kate is a second year graduate student in the Visual Arts Program at MIT. After having studied dance/kinesthesia and architectural history at Brown University, she did a Master of Architecture at MIT before transferring into the Visual Arts program.
Her design, fashion, performative, video and space projects focus on the body, its habits, movements, and the dynamic sectional relationship to its surrounding structures. They have this wonderful mix of quirkiness and deep relevance to the issues she investigates.
You have a background in both dance/choreography and architecture. How does your knowledge of the body and its dynamics feeds your thoughts and creativity in architecture? How do you make these two seemingly different fields meet?
I started studying dance and architecture at the same time, during my first year as an undergraduate. Maybe because of that, my understanding of architecture has always been rooted in the body. I think of architecture as a built echo of body itself: corporeal issues of public/ private, structural systems, skins, orifice and interface all resound in architecture.
Now, I often site my art practice between the body and its surrounding structures. This dynamic negative space houses habitual life and cultural inscription, and is therefore subject to interrogation through artistic intervention.
Your MIT page says that your work attempts to “question and complicate the interfaces between the corporeal and the environmental”. In a time when most designers talk about “making it simple”, why do you think it is important to “complicate”? Which form does this complication take?
I guess by ‘complicate’ I mean to acknowledge and engage with the complexity of the interfaces already in play. We so easily naturalize our interactions and surroundings, ignoring the layers of choreography imposed on the everyday. By tweaking and reframing the everyday relations between the body and its environment, my work refutes the source and nature of that everyday ritual.
I was very intrigued by the atHABITat costumes. There is one for vacuuming, one for serving food and a third one for putting away the dishes.
What was the inspiration for them?
Can you describe us what they are about and how each of them should be used?
The atHABITat costumes are about a contemporary vision of the woman in the home, and a need to multi-task and overlap the upkeep habits of the body and the home. They are costumes worn to augment the household maintenance task, transforming it into an iso-kinetic exercise. Each costume records and accentuates the ergonomics of the activity.
In one, resistance band connects the vacuum wand to the wearer, intensifying the sweeping motion of the vacuuming. The ‘putting away dishes’ costume attaches a similar resistance band between the dishwasher and the wearer’s vinyl gloves. In the ‘serving food’ costume, bands run through an oven mitt corset piece to accentuate the tension in the serving motion.
Once you have an idea for a project how do you push it forward and bring it to life? Do you test the idea on other people? Ask for feedbacks? Get depressed because it is technologically impossible to prototype it? What is the path that leads from idea to working prototype?
I would say the process goes like this: dream, doodle, make, discuss, research, make more, research more, discuss, display.
In terms of the making, I’m not a pre-planning type. I design and make things in one fluid mess of a step, whether this involves sewing, welding, or performing. The concept and research frame are usually fixed, but the work formally develops in an organic way as it goes along.
My biggest frustration is usually the scope of the projects compared to my personal capabilities. Because my work is very much about self-production, and because of the flow of my design process, I am committed to be involved with the craft and production of my costumes and props. But this production can involve 200 pounds of steel to weld or 60 hours of hand-sewing on a particular project.
Kate’s working space
The garments you create are very well-designed. But do they function purely as accessories for performances or could you imagine everyday people wearing a modified version of them?
When I make costumes, they aren’t intended as prototypes for products. They are very individuated, for one thing, designed specifically for my own home and body(both formally and functionally).
The costumes are an integral part of my performance practice. They are there to suggest that there is a latent potential for self-production in the scene of the everyday, and to transform actions into performances.
What was the inspiration for Dressails?
As a dancer, I was fascinated with falling. I studied how to fall, and tested gravity all the time.
I also sailed a lot when I was younger. I was terrified of, and in love with, especially strong winds that would tip the boat up on its edge and press hard on the sail.
I thought about this moment of negotiation between the control of the boat and the natural force of the wind. I wanted to give over some control of my body’s movements to the wind in the same way, and used clothing design to achieve that. The dresses cause the wearer’s body to teeter, spin, and lean, to be engaged with a natural and sporadic force a way that wouldn’t be possible otherwise.
Could you tell us about some of your recent projects?
One thing I’m working on in an ongoing way is a series of videos about my (7) vacuum cleaners. One piece involves assessing the manual instruction versus reality of use. Another documents a normal vacuuming session that turns into a full-on wrestling bout with the machine.
I also made some wearable trampolines last year, and performed with them in a piece called ‘Six Corners’. There is a dynamic relationship between the body and the material and weight of the skirts. They are meant to discuss movement pattern, issues of personal boundaries, and body extension.
Which artists or designer do you find most inspiring and why?
Artists whose work I look most often at include Rebecca Horn, Martha Rosler, Bruce Nauman, Miranda July, Joan Jonas (who is my thesis advisor, which is an amazing privilege), Nina Yuen.
More and more I find myself looking at dancers/ choreographers who make art, especially Trisha Brown, Yvonne Rainer, Ann Carlson.
I look at screen stars as well, those who use their bodies to tell stories: Lucille Ball, Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, the cast of Three’s Company.
Any upcoming projects you could share with us?
I’m working on a project right now in conjunction with my thesis (titled ‘homebody’). I’m making more home maintenance costumes and associated performances. So far, I’ve made a video of a phone conversation I had with my mortgage agent while wearing/using a dress constructed of Swiffer rosettes.
A last one: what is your relationship with fashion?
As an artist, I certainly engage with fashion. By this I mean that I think closely about how the body is clad, and how clothing can inform the body and vice-versa. Fashion becomes a key interface in the investigation of the body in the environment.
In terms of performance and the impact of costuming, fashion offers a fantastic bank of codified aesthetics, which can be drawn from for conceptual and phenomenal meaning.
Thanks Katherine!
For foreign brands looking for success in the Japanese market, the best advice in the past has always been simple: innovate. But innovation alone may no longer be enough.
LONDON – The Advertising Standards Authority has upheld complaints against four ads for the computer game Kane & Lynch.
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HONG KONG – Apco Asia has begun its search for a new Asia-Pacific CEO, ahead of the planned shift of current CEO Chris Murck (pictured) to a non-executive chairman role in April 2009.
JAKARTA – Maxis Communications has appointed Lowe to handle its advertising and promotions as the Malaysian telecommunications giant prepares to launch a new brand in Indonesia.
MANILA – Men’s magazine Playboy has launched in the Philippines, sans nudity, amid strong opposition from religious and feminist groups in the conservative predominantly Catholic country.
HONG KONG – MTM Media will launch a new interactive touch screen TV service in over 400 taxis in Hong Kong this month.
AdLab’s very first advertisers and friends from Futurelab have their site nominated for this year’s Webbies as one of the best business blogs. Congratulations to Stefan and Alan who’ve brought together many great minds under one virtual roof.
SINGAPORE – BBH Asia Pacific has appointed Deborah Abraham (pictured) to its newly created role of PR and marketing manager, to take over media relations and publicity duties from Grayling which handled the agency’s communications previously.
SINGAPORE – MediaCorp has appointed former Straits Times journalist Ong Soh Chin (pictured) as editorial director of its magazines division.
SYDNEY – McCann Erickson and MRM Worldwide in Sydney are merging in an attempt to create an agency built around digital.
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