ellie goulding - lights

i just think this song is so cool. ellie goulding is a british singer/songwriter with a lovely voice (her cover of Elton John's Your Song is just beautiful). i don't have anything to say about this song, really. i think it's cool, and that is all.

civil twilight

civil twilight is one of my favourite bands. and what makes them even cooler is that they're South African :) 
their sound is a little Coldplay, a little Muse, and a little something else that is just beautiful.


they are technically amazing (after seeing them live last year, i can vouch for this completely. the drummer and bassist - who is also the lead singer - are mind-blowing.), but they also just write such cool music. some of it is dark and intense, some of it is pretty and melancholic, and some of it is powerful and anthemic. i am a big fan of emotionally powerful music, and this band makes me feel, which is a good  thing :)


i don't know what more to say, really. civil twilight is that rare, wonderful thing: a technically skilled band which makes beautiful, appealing music. have a listen for yourself:

this is a slightly more commercial, but still lovely and oh-so-catchy song:

she and him

it sounds nostalgic, like a very pretty blast from the past. Zooey Deschanel's distinctive voice croons over oldies background music, and takes you to a different era completely. 


She and Him is an American duo consisting of actress Zooey Deschanel (who acted in 500 Days of Summer and Elf  - two of my favourite movies :)) and guitarist/producer, M.Ward. this music is not everyone's cup of tea; it's like being in a time warp, completely and utterly. it's sweet, melodic, delightfully cheesy at times: it takes you to an era when love and relationships were romanticised and innocent. 


i love listening to She and Him after a long day - it always relaxes me completely and puts a smile on my face. Zooey Deschanel's voice is just so easy on the ears, the harmonies are beautiful... i love it.

i just love the way they perform this song:

street art

it's loud, it's irreverent, it's controversial, and it's sometimes brilliant: it's street art.
the term "street art" refers to any artwork in a public place, and can range from graffitti and installation pieces to flash mobbing (which is pretty much the coolest thing in the whole world).

breaking the law generally doesn't sit well with me (this is a good thing, i think :), but i think that some street art is absolutely brilliant. many street artists nowadays are moving away from the meaningless and mindless business of "tagging", and creating thought-provoking, meaningful works of art which actually make a social or political statement. some of them are ridiculously clever, and some of them are ridiculously rude - it's amazing!

one of the most famous (in infamous) street artists in the world is British artist, Bansky. his identity is shrouded in mystery, which is understandable considering his line of work is not 100% legal. Banksy's art works are often witty and tongue-in-cheek, poking fun at the government or making serious social commentaries. i love his sense of humour, and his disregard for social norms. he's like a rebellious older sibling who you disapprove of slightly, but secretly admire.

LOVE this!

har har...

and here's some street art i found outside the KZNSA Gallery in Bulwer Road recently:

cool, huh?

street art brings out the rebel in us a little bit. but sometimes it's a good thing: it makes us stop and think about what we just accept as normal. it makes us question what is right and what is merely accepted. it makes us remember our ideals and dreams... so street art is a good thing.

hendrik stroebel

Hendrik Stroebel is awe-inspiring. he's a South African artist who specialises in ceramics and embroidery (when was the last time you heard of a fine artist specialising in  embroidery??). i lovelove ceramics, and so i went to his exhibition a couple of months ago... and it blew my mind. completely and utterly.

the embroidery was just so detailed, so skilled; he uses a needle and thread like a painter would use paint: it's simply amazing. my mum spent hours staring at these little cotton "paintings", murmuring in awe and pitying his fingers and eyes :) so the embroidery was lovely. but then we saw the ceramics, and my heart did a million little flips in my chest: they were beautiful. my words don't even do them justice (and neither do these pictures! sigh.)

there is something about delicate, pretty ceramics that makes me soso happy - and these were some of the prettiest ceramic works i've ever seen.



there was a whole wall of these turquoise-themed ceramic stars (some are missing because they were sold). i was in ceramic heaven!



so beautiful!

artists like hendrik stroebel make me want to make art. it's just so beautiful - even the simplest little ceramic star - and it brings so much joy.



how lovely is this frame?



like painting with cotton, right?

There's a reason classics are classics

(posted by roanne)

Jane Eyre is a classic story of love and self-discovery written by Charlotte Bronte (Emily Bronte's- author of Wuthering Heights- sister). One book critic writes that "Jane Eyre is the rare book that manages to be good by virtue of ineffable charm alone, despite not having very much going for it in terms of overall plot."

It is the story of a quaint, plain-looking  orphan girl named Jane Eyre. Of course, when a story like this is translated to Hollywood speak, it is: a quaint, beautiful-but-modestly-dressed orphan girl named Jane Eyre. Hollywood doesn't seem to grasp the concept of plain-looking too well. The recent movie, "Jane Eyre" starring Mia Wasikowska, was (understandably) dramatized to reach a less-than-patient audience of the 21st century. It did, however retain a sense of it's innocence and softness. All in all, the movie was good, with a surprisingly comprehensive structure of a could-be-all-over-the-place movie, where many flashbacks were necessary.

The book tracks Jane Eyre's life in a score masterfully written. It is both deep and intricate, but still captivating and fresh. Basically Jane is on a journey of discovering how to love and be loved while remaining true to herself. This journey takes her from Lowood, a school for girls, to working for a man named Mr Rochester ( who is described as physically unattractive as well, rather different from today's books) with whom she falls in love, involuntarily and irretrievably. Jane then encounters life and circumstances and has to choose being true to herself over her feelings.

I love that Charlottle Bronte makes that distinction between who you are and what you feel. This book is incredibly outspoken through its subtle characters and boldly states radical views on gender inequality (for the 19th century), religion and morality. There are some really cool quotes from this book. the kind of quote that would make you either: a) be confused, b) be awkward or c) think. Here's a quote from my favorite character, Helen Burns (a girl Jane meets at Lowood), "Hush, Jane! You think too much of the love of human beings."

I really like this book. Maybe you should try reading it, because maybe you'll see the work of art and skill that it is. Maybe you'll see the reason it's a classic.

tokyo-go-go

Tokyo-Go-Go is Greg Darroll. he is one of the coolest young illustrators/ graphic designers around, and he's from Durban :)

i just love his detailed, quirky drawings: they have so much character and spunk. his designs are creative and bold; he does not shy away from bright, vivid colours and strong lines. his characters are unique, slightly offbeat and distinctive... they almost have personalities of their own.

i just love these characters!

he also designs decks!

this is my FAVOURITE thing ever. these are money boxes! the mouths are the slots for your money... have you ever seen anything cooler in your life?

this is just amazing.

Greg is an example of a young person who is stepping out and using his creative gift, and making it happen. i love that.

if you want to check out more of his work, you can visit his blog here

it's just picturesmovingreallyfast!

Stop-frame animation is one of my favourite things in the whole world. (I know I say that about a lot of stuff, but I really do have many favourite things. The world is full of amazing and beautiful ideas, and they’re all my favourite)

I think it’s amazing how much thought and creativity goes into making even the simplest little animation. I think it’s amazing how just putting lots of pictures together and making them move really fast adds so much life to an otherwise lifeless art form. I think it’s amazing how animation can add character, personality, individuality to completely inanimate objects – I love it.

Having made a few animations in school, I know a little bit of how much effort goes into the planning, photographing, and editing of an animation, and I have bucketloads of respect for people who have mastered the art (especially those who make entire full-length animated films! The mind boggles…) It takes a special kind of patience and perseverance to keep clicking away on that camera for hours, knowing that in the end it will all pay off in the form of a two-minute-long video clip.

Some of my favourite movies ever were made using stop-frame animation. I think they’re just so much more beautiful, and have so much more character than normal films. Movies like Coraline (which scared the heck out of me!), Wallace and Gromit, and Fantastic Mr. Fox make me soso happy. Just seeing the detail – the tiny stitching on every item of clothing; the ridiculously expressive faces – makes me marvel. They aren’t just movies – they’re works of art.

and here's a stop-frame animation video i am soso proud of, even though i had no part to play in the making of it, because it was made by some of my friends for the launching of our Youth group's new name, the Red Riot. i think it's amazing. but that's just me.

even the hulk gets hurt

this is cool:

most this amazing

i'm a bit too lazy to read poetry in general (which is why this is the first post on poetry since this blog started). i think it requires a lot more deep thought and introspection than prose, which is why i avoid it. but last year, we did this poem by ee cummings at school, and i LOVED it.  i love how honest, how quirky, how humbling, how awe-inspiring it is. i think it's a beautiful example of worship. the last two stanzas are my favouritefavourite :) i thank You God for most this amazing day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything wich is natural which is infinite which is yes (i who have died am alive again today, and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth day of life and love and wings:and of the gay great happening illimitably earth) how should tasting touching hearing seeing breathing any-lifted from the no of all nothing-human merely being doubt unimaginable You? (now the ears of my ears awake and now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

my teacher last year asked us all to write our own poems before we actually read it, based on the words "this amazing day". so i wrote one. and it was pretty lame. (my poetry is never actual poetry; it's just prose broken up into shorter lines) but i will put it here anyway...

this day. today.

like nothing else before it or after it

but always the same 

like You, like me

like the sun on my back

like the little things

the very little things

the mischievous grin on my sister's face

that old saying:

"We've run out of shampoo again"

excellence in advertising

so, my cousin told me about this website called iDale ... so i went there. and i found some really cool stuff!
like me, Dale Immerman (the guy who writes it) loves creative advertising and design. i had found a happy place indeed :) 


i think clever advertising adds so much interest to our daily lives, and can turn something otherwise annoying into something you actually enjoy seeing (anyone have a favourite advert?). i love it when advertising companies go the extra mile; when you can just see how much thought and creativity has been poured into a project; when advertising is done with excellence. and, okay, it's not very often you see advertising like that. let's face it, most of us are stuck watching brainless infomercials and insurance ads the majority of the time. but when i see a really thought-provoking, clever, or just plain funny advert amidst the everyday drivel, it reminds me that excellence is possible. it reminds me that innovation is still alive, and that we live in a world of endless possibilities. 


so. after that rather long ramble, i think i should show you some pretty darn cool business cards and adverts from iDale:

this business card for a personal trainer is really cool: the idea is that you're getting a "workout" before you even call!

i love this. (don't really know what to think about the fact that they have a Cheese School in New Zealand, though....)

this is a really clever ad showing the face-detection setting on this camera

this is just too cool! imagine seeing this on your wall

LOVE this!

and my personal favourite:

this is crazy-cool. it's an advert for a yoga instructor :)

vampire weekend

vampire weekend: i hate their name; i love them.

in a world slightly obsessed with pointy teeth and bloodsucking immortals, do we really need a band named Vampire Weekend? that's what i thought when i first heard of them. i also thought they were probably going to be one of those angst-ridden emo bands, so i kept my distance.

but then i heard Horchata. and it made me veryvery happy. and i realised that, despite their uncool band name, Vampire Weekend is actually very cool. i love the way they incorporate so many different styles of music into their songs: in any given song you could hear anything from reggae to kwassa kwassa, punk to electro. i love the way they are unafraid to experiment, and i really love the african influence in most of their songs.

i think it's pretty dang exciting that the world gets to hear african music and musical elements played in a new, creative way. the rich drum beats and guitar riffs add so much to the music - i think it's the coolest thing ever :)

Vampire Weekend makes feel-good, happy music. it's music that instantly lifts your mood and takes you to a brighter, more colourful place. you can't help but smile. you can't help but tap your feet and bob your head along to the steady beat.

(i chose this video because i think music videos distract from the music sometimes)

(i chose this one 'cause it has Jake Gyllenhaal in it. and 'cause it's so darn weird)

you can listen to the full album here

Tina Redman

(posted by roanne)

Tina Redman: your typical everyday girl, except for two things

1) she posseses an uncommon abundence of coolness

2) she can beatbox. like, really beatbox - not this weak drumbeat your one friend can get right on her/his third try.  

This is so insane you may think we tampered with the video- let me assure you, we didn't. i love that feeling you get when you see someone with raw talent and unbelievable potential. it  leaves you elated and amazed; it smears a huge, unstoppable smile on your face; it is just too cool. she is just too cool. here she is:

cool packaging

i saw this the other day and i got a little excited. cool/clever packaging is one of my favourite things, so this Starbucks carrier bag made me smile:

musicANDmuffins

(posted by Hannah)

while randomly looking up something or other on YouTube (a sad habit which has become mine since becoming a varsity student) i happened to stumble across an animated video of Kate Nash's song Nicest Thing, made by someone awesome called musicANDmuffins. i was enchanted… because there is something so sweet and moving about the characters in the animation! so i made haste in looking up all the other animations which this muffinsy-music person had made, and now i will share my favourites with you.

here is the original one i found. can i just mention that Kate Nash is amazing? and that this song is beautiful? i think it appeals to the romantic in many a girl :)

 

this is the awesome muffin person's animation for Coldplay's song Yellow. on top of everything else that is ever-so-sweet about this animation, i love the version of Yellow which has been used! …just thought i'd throw that in there :)

the next gem is an animation of Laura Marling's song Alas I Cannot Swim. i'm ashamed to say i hadn't heard of Laura before i came across these lovely little videos, but i am very much liking her now! extra-specially this song.

 

 

last but definitely not least is my favourite of all my favourites… which, you must know, is a difficult thing for me to say. this is an animation of KT Tunstall's Throw Me A Rope, which is another song i hadn't heard before discovering these darling animations. i find KT's songs - particularly her quieter, more acoustic songs - so haunting and moving, and Throw Me A Rope is no different. i think we can all relate to the feeling of missing someone but knowing that it's important to find our way through that missing-ness. it is bittersweet and beautiful and hopeful. i love the song, and i love the muffinsy person's portrayal of the song's lyrics, and i hope you do, too :)

 

 



imaginary friends

I used to have an imaginary friend. I think that having an imaginary friend is one of the strangest things a person can do, but I the thing is I never chose to have one. She was just there, like a real person. Her name was Katie and she was about my age (which was maybe three or four years old).

I don’t know why I imagined Katie. I did have real friends (really!) and I had more than enough fun playing around with them. Katie was just another one of them… except that no one else could see her.

My gran always tells the story of how Katie told me to hide in her big wooden wardrobe one day. It’s a true story. She was a bit of a trouble-maker, that Katie…  She told me to hide in the wardrobe until someone found me, which seemed to me like the most ingenious idea in the entire world. So the three-or-four-year-old me climbed into the door, sat on some old saris and shoes, and hid with Katie for literally hours. Little did we know (actually, maybe Katie did know, now that I think about it) that downstairs, pandemonium was breaking out as my gran, aunt, cousins, and their neighbours searched the entire house and street, looking for me.  My gran always tells this story, and she always blames me, which I think is a little unfair. After all, Katie was the orchestrator of the shenanigans (I love that word) and even though Katie was a figment of my crazy imagination, I cannot be held responsible for her – she was a loose cannon!

I still think imaginary friends are weird, and I’m kind of embarrassed that I had one. It’s crazy and amazing how the human mind works, even when we’re so young we can hardly form proper sentences.

 I love my imagination. It's one of the reasons I am never bored; it makes the world a much more exciting and beautiful place to live in.

a day in the life of...

(short story by Courtney Weakley)

Today, while I was still sleeping, the world woke up. I would say it happened gradually and with grace. I would compare it to a tired toddler peeping over the edge of the cot, or a swan emerging from a black lake. I would, only I wasn’t there to see it, and cawing hadidas at my window is anything but graceful.

Today was January 16th 2011, and today was a day in the life of an ordinary person. It was an ordinary day in the ordinary life of an ordinary girl. It started when I woke up with cell-phone alarm bell bees buzzing into my ears and stinging my dreams. Today I woke up blinking dusty eyelashes to push back a vision of the moon opening her mouth to swallow a fiery seraph and thinking that if today was a movie, the dream would mean something. It would be an ominous warning to ruin a regular morning , or a subconscious expression of my obscurely hidden emotions. But today it was just a dream.

Today wasn’t ‘a day in the life of a teenage archetype’ or ‘a day in the life of a cliché’. It was not a day of ‘I-know-what’s-going-to-happen-next’. Today was a day of finding sour milk in the fridge and drinking it anyway. It was a day to think ‘I’m starting Grade 10’ and not being traumatized when my parents didn’t care. It was a day to realize that in a matter of hours, it would be gone and then I would see it didn’t really mean anything anyway.

So today I climbed into my navy skirt fatigues and my bodyguard school shoes, and shivered with my bag of icy stationary on my back, because it smelt like potential and potential is so much more delicious than reality. I sat in the car with headphones on my ears and pretended I was silent, when really my head was drowning. I looked out the window as the landscape slipped up on concrete feet, and wished that my whole life came with background music, rather than just my morning car rides.

“How fare thee this morning?” my friend asked, her voice fizzing across a porous cell-phone line. “Why are you talking like that? Stop talking like that.” “I want to lie on pavements this weekend,” she answered, ignoring me. “That sounds funny,” I smiled, “phone me again later, I feel too much like the colour purple this morning.” “The colour purple?” she repeated incredulously, “what does that feel like?” “It feels like I’m hanging up on you now…”

And because it was a day in the real life of a teenage girl, it meant talking to people I didn’t know and asking everyone how they were when I didn’t really care. It meant smiling at things that sometimes weren’t funny, and laughing at things that wouldn’t have been funny in a movie. And I laughed at people that were funny without realizing it, because in real life, people laugh at that instead of pretending it’s par for the course.

Today I opened up a crisp notebook, and succumbed to the divine lure of a blank page. I grasped at half-revealed words and cursed at the shadows they threw on the wall. Today, when I wrote, I dug my fingers into my cheek, because only clichés bite their pencils and pencils don’t taste like inspiration to me. Today I sighed and smiled at the back-to-school reunions, and at the teachers scolding me for not paying attention. Today my thoughts ran away, but they left me behind. Today I wrote out a whole new life in my diary. Today I fell asleep in maths. Today I met a new teacher. Today I cleaned my desk. Today I ate lunch. Today school ended. Today-

Today turned into tonight, and after I waded through the oceans of white and navy to my chariot of rusted metal and squeaky fan-belts, I got home, and released my muscles into relaxed abandon, slashed away the puppet strings. I melted onto the couch and was abruptly held in stasis by the talking box in my lounge. Tonight it was cold, but I have to say that Jack danced around the house, stabbed grappling frosty fingers underneath the door and tried to scratch at my feet, because it sounds better. Tonight, I would say that the sky split apart as if God released his embrace on Heaven and started crying, but really it was nothing more glamorous than rain. Tonight, when I leant my cold cheek to a colder pillow, I tilted towards the sound of drops on my window, because it’s always been my lullaby. Tonight the Sandman snuck up on me, and released handfuls of dust over my head. Tonight was the closing circuit of an electric day.  

And today wasn't an allegory or a metaphor. You won’t find any grapes of wisdom fallen from the prophet's mouth, nor secrets whispered in-between the perfect inky lines. There was nothing more to read than what was on the surface, because sometimes all we are is living and nothing else, and sometimes plot holes swallow us up. Sometimes real life flies past without mattering, and sometimes living it has no meaning. Sometimes real life is only real and nothing else, and sometimes the only thing with any gravity is just living and staying alive.

And sometimes… well, sometimes that's enough.

everything looks better in black and white

here are some more beautiful photos from the awesome Jesse Greaves:

it is my firm belief that everyone looks a million times better in black and white :)

my favourite advert

(posted by Grant)

I love creativity.
I love innovation, and fresh thinking, and new ideas.
I love it when people “DO”.
So, it makes sense that I like this advert:

Recreate

Recreate is an amazing, original range of furniture designed by Katie Thompson. she takes old, seemingly useless objects and transforms them into beautiful furniture, lighting pieces, and accessories. my favouritefavourite are the suitcase seats - i think they're incredible! i love it when designers have innovative and out-of-the-box ideas... it makes my heart happy.  



a scale clock - how cool?



another scale clock

Dettol bottle lampstand

You can check out more of Katie's range here.

pascale chandler

this lady makes beautiful art. there is no other word for it. her works are gestural, free, emotional, delicate, and very very pretty. Pascale Chandler is a South African artist who uses oil paints to create these beautiful, fragile horses. i just love the colours and long lines and loose brush strokes - they make everything seem like a surreal, misty dream.

to fly

one of my favourite dreams to have is the flying dream. in my flying dreams, i sort of float around the earth in a cool way, and it's the most amazing feeling ever. and when i wake up, i'm filled with this deep, empty longing; i feel like something beautiful has been taken away from me and i'll never get it back.


i have a slight obsession with flying. and i don't mean flying in aeroplanes (because that is an uncomfortable experience like no other. plus, the only time you realise you're actually flying is when you take off and land) i'm obsessed with the idea of floating above ground, with no wings, no plane - nothing but yourself. it's one of my biggest wishes and it's something i dream about from time to time. i even wrote a song about it, once. it was a lame song. :) 


when i dream about flying, i am completely happy and at peace. my heart beats loud and fast; it feels like i'll never be happier. i don't really know how to describe it... it's exciting, slightly scary, invigorating, beautiful. 


to fly is my wish. i don't really know what to do about that wish. all i can do is dream. 


"My soul is in the sky."  - William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream

image from etsy.com