Hasta La Ideas

Avec cette série Axiom & Simulation, le photographe Mark Dorf examine la façon dont l’homme rapproche constamment les éléments de la nature, à la science et à l’art. En modifiant des paysages et grâce à l’ajout d’éléments géométriques, ce dernier nous propose de découvrir un univers surprenant.

High art in a revelatory New England field guide by William Wegman

Best known for his photographs of his beloved Weimaraners, William Wegman is an American artist with a talent for the unexpected. The recent release of his book “Hello Nature” coincides with an exhibition at Bowdoin College Museum of Art, both serving to demonstrate the artist’s intrinsic connection to nature and the New England wilderness. In the spirit of childhood—Wegman spent his summers in Maine’s Rangeley Lakes region—the compendium takes the form of a mock survival guide complete with recipes, advice and helpful anecdotes.

Wegman writes that he wished to create “a fiendish nature guide. Something that would combine the New England transcendentalism with a lifelong interest in hiking, fishing, canoeing, and birch bark. Have you ever made tea from birch bark?” For fans of his dog portraits, the woodsy art will shed light on the Wegman’s relationship to creatures. Beneath a crude drawing of a woodland critter, Wegman sums up this connection by writing, “Life wood bee boaring without animals as pets. Without pets life wood bee unbearable.”

Organizationally, Wegman’s own writings and art are broken up with a duo of essays by curators Kevin Salatino and Diana Tuite as well as a piece of short fiction by author Padgett Powell. These written works focus on Wegman’s life, his work, and the role of the environment in both. From the artist, we get a recipe for cinnamon teal duck cake, advice on birdwatching and handwritten treatises on environmental reform.

The layout of “Hello Nature” is curious. Curious in the sense that much of the writing is barely legible, the organization sporadic and the effect emotive. Curious, too, in the sense that this is not the Wegman we think we know. Weimaraners are present, but many of Wegman’s best-known works are left out. The result is that his work is given context outside of the celebrity buzz that dressed-up dogs have earned him. In short, the book is an honest look at the artist and the naturalist.

“Hello Nature” is available for purchase from The Bowdoin Store and on Amazon. The accompanying exhibition of over 100 works is on view at Bowdoin College Museum of Art through 21 October 2012.

Diesel fuel, tobacco, damp dirt and pine tree perfume from Portland, OR

Perfumer Heather Sielaff hand-blends idiosyncratic, mostly masculine scents for her label OLO Fragrance in her apartment in north Portland. “I’m not really girly,” she admits, and her perfumes tend to be intriguing rather than sweetly attractive. For example, Forêt’s notes of pine and vetiver recall the scent of earth and damp northwestern trees, while Victory Wolf’s birch tar, cedar and tobacco evoke nights spent camping beside an open fire.

Sielaff recently had a commission to create the smell of diesel fuel, which succeeded but had some unexpected consequences: “[The client] turned out to be allergic,” she says.

“Years of practical use allowed me to get to know the individual essential oils quite intimately,” says Sielaff, who trained as a neuromuscular therapist and studied aromatherapy on the side. “The thought finally occurred to me that making perfume would give me the opportunity to utilize my knowledge in a more creative way. It was initially just a hobby and I’m still a little surprised OLO took off the way it did,” she says.

Undoubtedly one of the most significant elements to OLO’s appeal is Sielaff’s sense of humor. Diesel-based perfumes aren’t the only unconventional product that she’s attempted—the limited edition Make Deux room spray—interpret the pun in order to deduce its intended usage—asks the would-be customer, with tongue firmly in cheek, “If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a smell?”

Sielaff’s intimate knowledge of scents keeps her perfumes multi-layered, personal and complex. Many of her projects stay local and never make it out of Portland.”Some perfumes are limited edition or created for special events,” she says. One such side project was a fragrance created for the Portland-based band YACHT, called Shangri-La, that blends more than a half-dozen scents into one moody, floral concoction. She also created a limited edition art bottle and box series with Portland glass artist Andy Paiko and Portland woodworker Jason Rens.

OLO fragrances are available online or at selected retailers. For more information on Sielaff’s upcoming projects, check her blog.

L’agence Süperfad a pu réaliser à l’occasion du festival Mad in Spain 2012 une séquence pour annoncer les intervenants. Nando Costa a pensé des créations typographiques autour de lettre en céramique peintes à la main. Un rendu en time-lapse à découvrir.

Previously on Fubiz

• Matadero Madrid
• Drew House
• A Week in Montana

Copyright Fubiz™ – Suivez nous sur Twitter et Facebook

Follow our journey through a bizarre world of hungry plants at North America’s largest carnivorous plant nursery

In our latest video we trekked out into the beautiful farmland outside Sebastopol, California to visit California Carnivores, North America’s largest carnivorous plant nursery. We spoke with founder Peter D’Amato about his personal history with these hungry plants, their cultural significance and what it takes to raise up fantastical plants from seed. Taking in the active plant life, we watched Venus Flytraps chowing down and a got a peak inside the stomach of an American Pitcher Plant.