The story of the uncovering of this 70 year old cotton is a beautiful one. Produced by Jaye Kranz for the ABC Pool tells the history and wonder at unearthing a forgotten treasure. Click here for the full story . Warren Kirk . . . who is also exhibiting with us in February this year (more on that later) tells the story of how this prize was uncovered. Warren is a fossicker and collector of all old things. He has a great eye for finding beauty in the ordinary. This vintage cotton is the perfect gift for anyone interested in textiles and sewing and available on our online store.

If you are looking for a last minute Christmas present, we have now reduced the Sarah Watt Calendars from $35.00 to $20.00. You can visit our online shop or pop in and perhaps find some other last minute Christmas goodies too!

We are excited to announce that we are hosting “Steamscape” in collaboration with Clockwork Butterfly on March 2nd, 2012. “Steamscape” will be a Steampunk exhibition as part of the Loreal Fashion week Cultural Program. Alexandra Chambers is the creative behind Clockwork Butterfly and was the artistic adviser for the recent Circus Oz production Steampowered, she has a substantial body of work behind her and I am very excited to be able to collaborate with such a talented designer.

Steampunk is a movement that is best described as ”Victorian Science Fiction”. A rebellion against the mass production found in today’s consumer goods, it concentrates on individually crafted items that reflect the classical aesthetics of the late 19^th Century, with a twist of dynamic industrial influences and an often whimsical sense of fun.

The exhibition will feature the exquisite, timeless clothing creations of Clockwork Butterfly partnered with Jos Van Hulsen’s fantastical sculptural creations. Other artists and designers will contribute pieces that are exemplary of the Steampunk movement.

The exhibition opening will include performances from some of Melbourne’s finest musicians and circus performers.

How did the Idea for your children’s book come about?

The idea for Gertrude came while myself (Jessica Dean) and Marc Eiden were preparing a pitch for an animated music video. The clip fell through, but the idea wouldn’t let go, so Jessica set to writing a first draft.

Marc and I have worked together many times over the years – on animations, short films, video clips and other writing projects – but I always had a desire to create a children’s book.

Once the story was a solid first draft, Marc began drawing the illustrations and then the pair set to bringing his images into the computer and to transform them into their final form.

A major consideration was how all three elements: story, illustrations and design could come together – it was important that all elements of the book really sing and that was where the broader collaboration evolved, including Sean Hogan and Kim Aleksandrowicz of Trampoline Design.

Being a non-writer myself, I am always intrigued as to where you would start in writing a book?? The mind boggles – did you already have the story in your head?

When I write, my ideas always start with images. Then I think about how I can interpret what I’m seeing in my head and transform it into story. In the case of Gertrude, the story needed to be compelling and exciting and create a world that children would want to explore.  It is not a traditional picture book in the sense that it’s quite a long story and there are some ‘big’ words weaved in – but I don’t think you should ever dumb things down for children. Learning is a wonderful experience and getting lost in a book is one of the best things going. I really do hope children and grown-ups enjoy it.

Marc your illustrations are amazing!! Can you tell me a bit about your process and your technique ‘visual sampling’ – what’s that all about?

From the get go, I really wanted the images to be tactile, textured, to feel alive and jump off the page.

For the artwork I worked with Jess, which was great to bounce ideas and also it was great to collaborate, share ideas and the workload and it was great to see what Jess had come up with.

Every element of each character and all the backgrounds are made up of photographs of textures. You can easily see the textures in some of the images, but not all and I hope kids try and guess which textures were used and have some fun with it.

I come from a background of art and hip hop and the artwork for Gertrude was very similar to traditional sampling. We took little bits from all over the place and it took time to find all the right elements to make it work, I guess it was like a kind of visual sampling. It’s taking the traditional collage technique that was used so well in books like the hungry caterpillar and turning it up to 11.

The thing I love most about Gertrude is that all the elements appear to work seamlessly together. I know this is something you were working hard to achieve. For this you brought in a professional designer Sean Hogan from Trampoline Design. How did this work to create the look you were trying to achieve?

The job of the designer is to compile the total book and make it whole. The task was two fold: to compile the illustrations and make sure they read succinctly in the layout and also design the typography so it equaled the illustrations.

They key is to get a marriage between the illustration and typography right.  I wanted the typography to be another character, another illustrative part of the book. Typefaces have voices and character and are kind of imbued with their own history.

I developed a series of rules that I applied throughout the book and very quickly the typography started to bounce around and have it’s own voice – in a concrete poetry kind of way. But I also wanted it to retain some timelessness – an echo of classic children’s books.

The best part is that we’ve put our own individual thoughts of what Gertrude should be, but its been a true collaboration where the product is the most important thing, not just each of our opinions. The second you remove ego from the equation, is when you are all working towards the same goal, no matter what the process or what’s required for you to do.

You decided to self publish Gertrude. To do this you pulled in Kim Aleksandrowicz from Trampoline Design – what have you learnt from this collaboration?

Save your money. And plan as much as you can. It’s always much more difficult to work on the fly and try to put out fires all the time. If you have an idea in your head, it’s much easier to take those steps and project in the future what you need to do. You need to do your research and you need to be flexible.

Collaboration seems to be integral to your process. How do you feel this has added to your work?

Marc and I have worked together many times over the years and we bring different things to whatever project we work on but a commonality is our desire for quality and difference. Marc has such an open mind and he is so full of ideas. 90 per cent of the collaboration for Gertrude was with Marc and without Marc the book as it is just wouldn’t exist.

I also had the privilege of working with Sean Hogan & Kim Aleksandrowicz of Trampoline Design and Gertrude has benefited hugely from their ideas, influence and dedication.

We had a really clear idea of what we wanted the book to look like, but Sean was instrumental in guiding us through the process and taking the project to a higher level, so we ended up with such a beautiful end product.

Kim has also been integral. Her advice and knowledge guided me in all the right directions and thanks to Kim the book is printed on the stock it is – which has just come up so beautifully.

I was really lucky to collaborate with such talented people who came onto this project with a lot of generosity and honesty. Working with them has been absolutely brilliant. I think when you collaborate you do need to work with people you trust and respect. It can be a tricky thing, but for me it was about giving them as much freedom as I could because it had to be an enjoyable process for them also.

I feel very privileged that everyone was willing to give huge amounts of their time to my story and take it beyond me and make it something that belongs to all of us. We all created it. It’s a very rare and powerful thing and I’m very humbled.

From Blacksparrow
The incredible work by all collaborators, Blacksparrow, Marc Eiden, Sean Hogan & Kim Aleksandrowicz

Ever met a celebrity LION or a body building GORILLA?
What about a fashion designing LIZARD, a troupe of freedom-fighting acrobatic RATS or a spectacular SPARROW?

Come along to the LAUNCH of Jessica Dean and Marc Eiden’s children’s book GERTRUDE and meet them all at Post Industrial Design!

Launch Saturday 10 December, 2011 4 – 6pm

For all those people that missed out on purchasing a Sarah Watt original, there is still hope. Such that she was, Sarah had donated two beautiful hand painted photographs to Big West as part of a fundraiser for this years Festival. But Shhhh . . .  it is a silent auction and the auction finishes on the 27th. The works are on display at the fabulous Substation in Newport until the 27th of November – so if you want to check it out I suggest you get a move on.

Apologies for the badly cropped photos of Sarah’s work – but hopefully they give you a little taste for what is in store. There is nothing like seeing it in the flesh! So dust of your wallets and head on down to the Substation. Sarah has shown us once again her generosity, so I am sure someone out there can match it. Happy bidding – it’s all for a good cause!!

This year Post Industrial Design is hosting a presentation; as part of this years Open Studios Program.  We like to think that artistic practice and business are not mutually exclusive. We also realise that creative people are often woeful as marketing themselves and their work. For this reason we have pulled together 4 speakers, to give a first hand account of developing, making and getting their work out into the marketplace.

Speakers include:

Mary Long – Owner/Manager Post Industrial Design – will discuss the challenges and joys of setting up an arts based business.

Jessica Dean – Jessica is launching her book Gertrude on the 10th December at Post Industrial Design. She will discuss the process of illustrating, writing and self-publishing.

Gaye Naismith – discusses her two small-scale, craft based labels Body Parts and Gaye Abandon. Gaye produces one-of-a-kind and limited edition accessories. Gaye will discuss her arts practice and her commitment to sustainable and ethical local production.

Petrina White – Owner/manager Big Trousers - has experience with marketing and promotion and content for online communications. She will talk about the importance of marketing and the often uncomfortable fit between the artist and self promotion.

For the first time in a long time I am a little lost for words! It has been so sad to loose such an inspirational person. Even for those who did not know Sarah personally, she has managed to get under all of our skin! Her raw honesty and humor make it impossible for us not to love her and find resonance in her work.

We have been so overwhelmed by the response to Sarah’s current exhibition; we have decided to extend part of the show until the end of November.

The exhibition has drawn people from far and wide and all 65 works have now been sold! The thing that makes me smile is that for many, Sarah’s work is the first piece of art they have purchased! Way to go – I totally love that! I am sure Sarah would get a kick out of her work hanging in everyday homes and for the most part they have stayed in the neighborhood she loved.

Sarah Watts calendars 3012/2012 is finally available from our online shop . . . it only took me a week to get them up on the site!! This beautiful full colour, 14-page calendar is printed on quality paper and draws on some of the images in Sarah Watts current exhibition 3012. Sarah’s rendered photography illustrates the industrial and suburban beauty of her hometown in West Footscray.

For those who have patiently waited for the new run of calendars to arrive they are finally in store! Thank you to everyone for your patience. You can purchase online or swing by to pick them up.

We are really excited to be reviewed in this edition of Broadsheet. We meet the lovely Neiyo Sun who took all the amazing images for the article . . . of which I had to crop rather badly in order to fit on my site – sorry Neiyo!

If you haven’t heard about Broadsheet you need to get on board! They are an independent publication that reviews and discusses all that our beautiful city has to offer. Bars, restaurants, galleries, music and theatre are just some of the topics covered. They have a hard copy publication but there biggest distribution is electronic and you can subscribe to their newsletter to get the latest in what’s happening around town. Broadsheet also have great directory Apps too . . . just need to get myself an iPhone!!!