tribe magazine issue 11

2009

tribeINTERNATIONAL CREATIVE ARTS MAGAZINE

4 TRIBE MAGAZINE ISSUE 11

ISSN: 2050-2352Contents illustration and back page: Jordan Rodgers

jordanrogers.co.uk

Editor In ChiefMark Doyle

Editor -‐ tribeAli Donkin

Editor -‐ creative writingTilly Craig

Editorial DirectorPeter Davey

Marketing DirectorSteve Clement-‐Large

Senior Staff WriterGlyn Davies

CoverIan Miller

ContributorsMatthew Clayton, Patrizia Corbianco, Lisa Bauer, Alex Andreev, Irena Jadelo-‐Katarske, Claire Atherton, Hanna Ilczyszyn, Zoe Clarke, Samuel Pidgen, Robert Maxwell, Ian Miller, Jacqueline Hammond, Pete Davey, Kenny Knight, Johnny Valencia, Jordan Rodgers.

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Artists have given permission for their work to be displayed in tribe magazine. No part ofthis publication may bereproduced without thepermission of the copyrightholder(s)

(C) 2012 Trico Creative CICcompany no 7982933

The Fight for CreaBvity

The weekend prior to the publica]on of this month’s issue, sees the people of tribe’s hometown, Plymouth, march through the streets to deliver a manifesto to the city’s councillors. In troubled ]mes you may suspect the marchers are angry about loss of pension funds, jobs, emergency service cuts or any of the usual suspects which tend to result in social uprising. However, this march is a protest of a different colour, many different colours in fact, a protest to highlight the importance of art and crea]vity to communi]es, the manifesto in ques]on having been wrièn by a 5 year old girl from a deprived part of town that has been enjoying the benefits reaped from investments in the arts in their area.

It’s very easy to be both blindly op]mis]c and automa]cally cynical about events and projects like this, par]cularly when by 5 year olds are in the mix (that’s not to say that 5 year olds shouldn’t be involved in this, they are ocen well placed to see cracks in society and have no inhibi]ons about shou]ng about exactly what they want), yet whether this is likely to be seen as a serious call for ac]on or just a lovely gimmick by councillors, ]me will tell.

Serious is maybe not what they were going for to be fair, this is obviously a march to make visible the need for arts funding and crea]vity, in an ‘ar]st interven]on-‐ey’, ‘fun for all the family’ kind of a way and not an anger fuelled protest. My ques]on is why wasn’t it anger fuelled? If it’s so important to have arts funding, where is the despera]on? If government funded arts are so important why aren’t people more angered at the loss of so much funding?

Arts are not the NHS, they are not essen]al to our ongoing survival and most of the people who would argue that they are, can easily afford them, so it is areas of social depriva]on where figh]ng for crea]vity should be strongest but rarely seems to be. Maybe it’s a case of ‘you’d miss it when it’s gone’, or rather didn’t know how much difference it would make. The beauty of funding the arts is that in the general scheme of things a li`le goes a long way. £10,000 seems like a huge amount of money but it wont build you much, it may just cover one community staff member for a year, fix a leaky roof or buy some new equipment, all good things but they are ongoing costs and it would be a drop in the ocean to a hospital where huge amounts of funding are needed. But visible investment in art can give a place some iden]ty, give it something to be proud of, which can ocen be a catalyst for further change. Some may argue that crea]vity is the kind of thing that triumphs in adversity, people carved bullets in the trenches acer all, so does art really need funding?

As much as crea]vity can flourish in poverty, people rarely do. Acer aènding a networking event last week featuring talks from people who had put friendships, money and hard grac into projects to be unwaged for the en]rety, the story too ocen was a lack of money broke people and projects valuable to their area down. As much as galleries could all sell seascapes to make ends meet, it would leave us with a rather monotone experience of visual arts. Some]mes the crazy people who set up in abandoned buildings ‘just because’ have the most impact on an area, a li`le injec]on of life can do wonders, which has to be worth some financial support.

The trouble is government investment in the arts can ocen seem like trying to save the panda. A lot of money is spent on the poster boy projects, warm cuddly lovely projects that you just can’t argue with because nobody wants to be ‘that guy’, yet money would probably be beèr spent saving some species of toad or creepy crawly which are lynch pins to the ecosystem. The visual arts poster boys who need huge amounts of money to keep them in bamboo can suck away money from the smaller more home grown ‘under the radar’ projects that are ocen born of a community and perhaps encouraging these people and giving them confidence in their crea]vity would see more substan]al change? The arguments to save the panda are roughly the same as funding more visible arts projects, poster boys are a good thing -‐ show development and impact through them and it encourages investment and interest across the board. A valid point but it does beg the ques]on, exactly how do you tell the impact of visible visual arts and funding? I did hear the phrase “we don’t do forms” gleefully hollered at an event recently. If they don’t do forms I’m guessing rigorous sta]s]cal analysis is out? Does there seem to be arrogance in the arts that we’re above the same standards as everyone else? Would the government be happy if your local hospital said they’d leave their reports and research behind in favour of a quick ask around? Even when the forms do come out a few sa]sfac]on ]ck boxes does not a social impact assessment make. If we really want to put out money where our crea]vity is, why not join forces with some social scien]sts and see if we can get some answers once and for all?

Ali Donkin

mailto:[email protected]




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ISSUE 11 TRIBE MAGAZINE 5

Pg 8 Patrizia Corbianco

Pg 24 Alex Andreev

Pg 38 Hanna Ilczyszyn

Pg 58 Samuel Pidgen

Pg 72 Ian Miller

Pg 100 Kenny Knight/Pete Davey: Part 2


Matthew Clayton


PATR IZ IA CORB IANCOPatr i z ia Corb ianco ’ s pho tog raphy i nvokes v i n t age con t i nen ta l c l a s s i c g lamour.


Lisa Bauer


A L E X A N D R E E V".. the nagual Elias went to his dreaming journeys the way a wild animal prowls for food...visited, let's say, the junkyard of infinity... and copied whatever he saw, but never knew what those things were used for, or their source".

These Carlos Castaneda's words from his 'Power Of Silence' are the closest descrip]on of my percep]on of crea]on process. Never did I -‐ and never will -‐ take the crea]on as a product of man's intellect. Instead I take this process as ac]vity aiming to fix certain states of comprehension I experienced in my childhood, in my dreams, etc. David Lynch would define this as ‘the journey of the intui]on’.

I never discuss how this mechanism works -‐ I am inclined neither to mys]cism nor tointellectual specula]ons. However, the human brain is the most complex thing ever created in the Universe, and our conscious awareness is only a thin film in the ocean ofunconsciousness. Everything is possible in this ocean. I work and I get back to thosestates of comprehension, to my childhood memories, to my dreams. I experience themagain and again. This is my only mo]va]on to do what I do.

It sounds paradoxical but digital art a`racts me because it is free of technologicalinfluence. While in tradi]onal arts technologies drama]cally limit the ar]st -‐ his ability to stylize works in graphics or extremely ]me consuming process of paint drying, in digital pain]ng I sit in front of a screen, grab the stylus and see the result immediately.Another advantage I find in digital arts is the absence of such sensi]ve for many defini]on as "original". The pixels can only be shown as the ar]st wanted them to be shown, the parameters of each pixel are iden]cal on any screen. Why do I find it great? Because tradi]onal visual art has long ago lost its purity, it is overfe]shed, so to speak. Canvas and stretcher now mean a lot more then real art and its beauty. This created the overwhelming wish to possess the originals and readiness to pay huge amounts of money.

ISSUE 11 TRIBE MAGAZINE 33alexandreev.com


Invisible


Claire Atherton

free-‐range.org.uk


Han n a I l c z y s z y n

Interview by Helen Moore

I’ve noticed from looking at various sites of your work that you paint a lot of what looks like children, often with distorted faces. Often there is an unsettling look to your characters faces, sometimes there are no distinguishing features, and are often hidden with hair or animal heads. Could you tell me a little about the subject matter and why you paint it?

My paintings start from various image sources (photographs, found footage, old family pictures, frames from movies etc.) before I start to paint, I research those images, sometimes I paint directly on to a canvas, but it happens also that I make first a sketch/drawing before the painting. There has to be something that grabs my attention, colour, composition, sometimes even a small detail which could be a piece of clothing, a mimic, a pose of a person, to inspire me. Memories are very close to dreams. Both day and night dreams. We are trying to remember something from our past, we can't really picture those moments very clearly. The same as the figures in my paintings are unclear, unpainted, not finished.

And why the subject?

It started from looking at old family photographs, from a long time ago. When you look at these black and white images you see there are children with very serious faces, sometimes even looking like grownups. Children are not afraid to show their feelings. They should be very sweet and innocent, and that's what you expect from a child portrait. Nice child... I'm playing with this a bit, using also the "uncanny" feeling. You expect a happy child, but you see one child not smiling and one looking old, and you ask yourself what's wrong? When you look at my paintings you may see just a portrait, but you can also start wondering, what happened before the image or what will happen just after it?


Painting "With Ana" for example, you see a boy and a girl. The girl is looking somewhere and the boy's face is covered with paint, maybe he can’t talk? Or maybe they where arguing just before? And where is the girl looking? Did something happen?

I like to transform some "normal" photographs and play with the colours, composition, little movements. Mostly my paintings are very static, but while looking you can discover some little movements or maybe you start to "move" to see what's behind?

I mentioned already about memories and dreams. This dreamy atmosphere was always somehow important for me with building a certain tension into my paintings. Colours, blurry backgrounds, unknown, with some detailed parts, just like one's dreams.

About the hidden faces, the un-‐facing -‐ impersonalising, unfaced child is still a child, but then you get this uncanny feeling, horrors, or surrealistic movies for example, that's also an uncanny feeling, we expect a face, but there isn’t, and yet you know it's a person, that behind the hair or mask, there is someone, but you have to imagine it. I don't find it necessary to paint faces. They are the most personal part of your body, we recognise people mostly by their face. And when there is no face? You don't know who to expect, and on the picture you can imagine it. It also refers to children themselves. They like to play, hide and seek, dress up, put on masks, play someone else.

And why do you paint children?

I don’t treat my subject in case of "oh let's paint a child, children are nice”, or anything like that, I just found them more ‘interesting’ then adults, but like I said before, sometimes they may even look old themselves. It started from them certainly, and I thought that the child was more inspiring then an adult. They are more ‘free’ and ‘unexpected’, they are not framed in, they are very spontaneous, they behave, and act in a way I can’t do in society. But I'm also mixing with them, so that those children don't look like themselves anymore. It's not referring to my childhood and has nothing to do with my personal life. These paintings are also a series, so who knows what I'll paint in a few years?


Is there a reason for you painting in black and white with only a splash of colour?

I like to paint grey on grey, or white on white. I like seeing what the final effect of using the same colours on each other. They are the same yet they are different. You can also see a lot of red colour, for me it's the strongest colour there is, maybe a bit symbolic? On the other hand it's maybe also just a personal feeling, because I love white, grey, black, and red colour.

Does you background inform your work. How did living in Poland and then moving to Belgium influence you?

I don't think that moving to Belgium changed my work. I often refer to Poland, by using Polish titles, and some detailed clothing that my figures are wearing -‐ they are mostly inspired by Polish photographs, including those from my family. But I can't really think about any Belgian inspiration, because I'm here I can see the Belgian art closer and maybe unconsciously I'm getting inspired by it, but I really don't know.

Are these paintings of you and your family?

Some came from it, but I'm keeping a distance from the figures in the paintings. I'm not making self-‐ portraits or any other portraits from possibly living people. And they don't refer to any of my past memories. Those people/children are a medium and a cause of making a painting, but it's not related to me personally.

Could you tell me a little bit about your style of painting, and why you paint this way?

I was always interested in figurative paintings, at least until this moment.So it was always for me clear, that I would like to paint figures, make something from them. I also paint fast. I like fast brush moves especially at the beginning of the painting while I'm making the first sketch on a canvas. That's why I'm also making a lot of drawings, which some of them I'm later painting.

For more information visit: fajnahanna.com


Han n a I l c z y s z y n


Zoe Clarke


SAMUEL

P I D G E N

Inspired by Wong Kar Wai and Haruki Murakami, the narra]ve of the following series is open to interpreta]on, stemming from the ideas of chance encounters, lust and love.

samueljpidgen.com


Pyra Portal

Robert Maxwell


I a n M i l l e r


I would describe your work more as a dark dream than a nightmare, although there are some very distubing elements in some pieces, but there is also great beauty and melancholy. Many of your figures look like they are mourning a loss - would you agree?

If you say so! I think it is more pathos than nightmare and mourning, though the two might well flow from the same root. Bemused is kinder, I'm certainly that most of the time. I think I touch on feeling that most people experience but perhaps never elucidate nor illuminate. Even when we try it is difficult.

‘In the obsessive attempt to find reason for the animation of life, a world of images is divided into anatomical components. This is the operation of speech operating successfully.


All symbolism harbours the curse of mediacy . It is bound to obscure what it seeks to reveal” W.G. Sebald Campo Santo

I like the counter-play of my figures looking outward, frozen, captured moments, a memory or inflection reworked perhaps. Munch at present on show at Tate Modern does this so well.


Where did this interest in darker fantasy illustration start?

I found winter shapes more interesting. The stark line and light more engaging. I do brilliant dead trees, all things gnarled.

What impact has digital media and tools had on your work?

I love working on the computer. It is a wonderful tool, and provides a fast and dynamic conduit for all types of expression. For me there is no friction between digital and more traditional means of image making. The two compliment each other perfectly in my book. Neither has president though of late I have been drawing at the board more than on the screen. It is very much ‘needs must’ with me. I use the best tool at my disposal for the job in hand.

Can you tell us about some of the projects you are currently working on?

Project wise there are a myriad of things going on in my head and round about. Private commissions, making sense of my notes and scribbles, interacting with other artists, which I always welcome, and trying to do everything better than I did before.

What excites you about working today?

Everything, even silly things...

How has the industry changed in the time you have been working? Has the relationship changed between commissioner, publisher and audience?

Beyond measure. I'm not often approached these days. Most of my activity is from individuals contacting me. I don't think I'm on the map where publishers are concerned any more. Maybe I've been around too long . I did find a small tattoo on the inside of my big toe last week which looks remarkably like a sell by date. All this time and I never knew it was there...


I'm surprised your style has not featured in more animations and films over the years - is this an area you would like to explore more? Was there a deliberate move to concentrate more on graphic novels for example?

Always loved moving things. I’ve worked on several films, some that never saw the light of day, more than my CV would suggest. It is probably ten years out of date anyway.Wizards, Coolworld (Ralph Bakshi Director) made it to screen. I did some work on Antbully, provided wallpaper imagery for Dave Mckean's Mirrormask and some more even I've forgotten about. Always interested in film projects and the graphic novels seemed like something I should do, given my love of story telling.

Can you describe your creative process?

Very difficult but I persevere against the odds.

Is there a project you would like to work on that you have yet to do? Is there a collaborator you'd especially like to work with?

I would like to see the Shingle Dance happen It nearly did, even got some art council funding. Failed for want of finance at the last hurdle. Collaboration wise, anybody who has a freefall creative mentality, and thinks I might have something to contribute.

As long as there is wind in the sail and my fluffy ears don't fall off!

ian-miller.org

Interview by Mark Doyle


Jacqueline Hammond

jacqueline-‐hammond.com


Here is the rarely-explored mythology of England - Kelvin Corcoran

While writing The Honicknowle Book of the Dead and making frequent journeys back to childhood, the past seemed to be a place some 30 to 40 years down the track. A year after the book was published I realised the past is so much closer than first glance may suggest. In fact it’s as close as a haversack on a shoulder, filled with odds and ends, memories of this and that. Every day and every night in our waking and sleeping lives we carry the past with us, dreaming of Honicknowle and Wild West Park, the corner shop and the greengrocer, our shopping bags filled with television shows, radio programmes, books that may open doors to houses we may never know, except in our imaginations. Throw into this mix the culture and mythologies we make and weave, throw in everything that lives inside a writer’s head or under Peter Davey’s hat, all these things live inside these poems as does the housing estate brought to life inside the camera.

I met Peter Davey at Plymouth College of Art at the beginning of 2012 and we talked about a collaboration of image and text for a future issue of Tribe magazine. The idea for an exhibition wasn’t even on the table at the time, but it was in the stars, as we watched the camera pan onto the tail-lights of my dad’s Ford Zodiac, following it all the way up State Hill to the Blue Monkey, through West Park and down the road to Honicknowle Green and Woodland Fort.

The sad thing is so much is missing; so much of that landscape has vanished. The prefabs and Anderson shelters on Tamar Way. Broomball Lane, the country lane that runs from Honicknowle to Weston Mill village, cut in half like a piece of sliced bread to make way for the St. Budeaux bypass. The Blue Monkey, gone up in

smoke, like The Vandike Club, in another part of he city.

Peter Davey’s camera shoots what’s there, and what’s not there I can see as clearly as the faces of childhood friends, but the technology doesn’t exist to bring these images out of the darkroom.

Reviews and feedback are an important part of the process. Alan Baker, writing in online magazine Litter said ‘The Honicknowle Book of the Dead manages to be genuinely popular without in any way sacrificing its integrity’. Another friend of mine who grew up in Liverpool, said that while reading these poems all he had to do was change the names of shops, streets and buildings and it felt like he was reading about his own childhood. A couple of other people said similar things and I began to realise that not only had I captured some essence of my own childhood and the landscape I grew up in, but I’d also captured a timescape of other childhoods in other places, without being consciously aware this was happening, and the same is true of Peter Davey’s photographs. They could be taken anywhere. They could be shot in Camel Head, Pennycomequick, Ernesettle, the St. Budeaux Triangle, the Peoples’ Republic of Whitleigh or in another town on the other side of the street. Pete’s camera could be riding shotgun through the streets of Wild West Park or filming from the rooftop of a time machine on the playground of Honicknowle Secondary. He could be having lunch in 1958 or drinking with the Queen Mother as she stops off for a shot of gin in the Blue Monkey, en route to open the Tamar bridge, or sat on my mother’s sofa watching the Magic Roundabout or hitch-hiking back to Beehive Street all the way from 1969, camera pointing at the past with one eye fixed on the present.

Kenny Knight

The Honicknowle Book Of The Dead: Part 2

The Beginning and the Con]nua]on of the Journey


Scorpio

I was allocated one of those star signsbut didn’t find out about it for twenty yearsA midwife wrapped my umbilical cordaround the constellation of Scorpio,where spaceships revved up for someintergalactic Grand Prix,where some other wordly Murray Walker still commentatesat the speed of dark glasses.I pulled into pit stop Plymouth,recycled molecules eager for knitting.Apparently the moon was in Sagittarius although my mother sworeshe saw it that night throughthe maternity ward window,while Venus waiting onthe far side of adolescence,wore a costume that stripped my vocal cords of sound.I could have had my astrological chart readIf my mother had worn a wristwatch, school of fifty one, ten days oldand still not fluent in English.Born under a street sign,eight houses down the roadfrom the No Place Inn.The first Zodiac I know was Steve in Fireball XL5.I was happy to leave the constellations to Dan Dareand Patrick Moore’s telescopeI was having fun splashing in puddlesand rolling in mudtoo busy to thinkabout Scorpions or Crabs.At night with school-friendsI’d walk through the grounds


of Higher St. Budeaux Parish Church,daredevils twitching in the darkabove an acre or two of bone,the creak of trees,and tombstones leaninglike politicians to left and right.Back in those days the backyardwas the centre of town,and the girl next doorlived two hundred and fiftymiles away in HatfieldBack in the golden-oldie ghost town of the pastI was plugged into the street corner,I started an imaginary pop bandCalled The Pop PickersI wrote song titles that reached number oneon the Honicknowle charts.My bedroom wall was covered with photographsof the number twelve bus passing through Tauruson the road to Camel’s Head.I had a crush on a blondefilm star called Doris Day,which in later yearstransferred to a brunette ball of fun crowned Queen Log in Woodland Wood.Woodland Wood where I roamed as a teenager,wearing daydreams on the sleeveof my ripped shirt;daydreams that came and wentlike weddings going nowherebut daydreams weren’t communallike the street corneror the moon in Pisces.My dad drove a Ford Zodiacaround the block every night after tea.I’ve no idea what star signmy dad’s Ford Zodiac was.And now forty years after being allocatedone of those star signsI’m looking for a loverfrom the constellation of Pisces


but can’t afford the airfare.This body I wear has grown tall.I want someone dark and compatible;I’ll cross her palm with stardustand lose my innocence in uncut grass,press my belly button and ejaculate into spaceI was born with the Moonin Honicknowle.the Sun in Woodland Wood ,Mercury in the West Park Post Office,Mars in the Blue Monkey,Scorpio in Buckingham Shed.Born on the cusp of one minute to the next in the Chinese year of the rabbit,I’m interested in sex sex and sex,but not necessarily in that order.I need five things to live on this planet.Earth, Air, Fire, Water and Money.I play the fruit and veg machinesDown at the One Armed Angel.When Jupiter is in conjunction with Marsand the Earth is passing throughthe constellation of disorganised religion,then I pray for a jackpot of jackdaws.I don’t care anymoreabout anything to do with Aquarius.If there ever was a golden ageit must have been full of Ford Zodiacs,boom and bust townsand buses loaded with minersbringing shovels home from work.People on stage wearing wigs in musicalsin the days of Flower Power and Free Love,or a woman like you who never quite foundthe exit from the Swinging Sixtieswho thinks I’m Bruce Dern.


Hummingbird


Miss Paris tried to make me eat thick custard

in the dinner hut in primary school.I never liked thick custard or blancmange and I wasn’t too keen on Miss Paris either.Miss Paris surely had better things to do with her time,Like paint fingernails the colour of a red Hummingbird.Loud as Clem Cattini she’d play Telstar for the dinner ladiesturning up to twang for her Teddy Boy boyfriend who could jive better than a grizzlywho didn’t look anything like Eddie Cochranwho drove a Ford Zodiac or Ford Constellation

who dipped his head in Brylcreem or lard when desperatewho was a rebel with a bad cough who wore drainpipe trousers; when it rained his mum pegged them to the washing line.Miss Paris could play that Hummingbird better thanany of the dinner ladies.This was better than custard or the wirelessWhich was mostly Mantovani and Sing Something Simple.This was Post World War One meets Post World War Two.This was a generation gap wider than left and right.

This was before we tuned into Radio Luxembourg.a country small enough to squeezebeneath the blanket or pillow.This was before we tuned in, turned on and dropped out with Timothy Leary, or thought we did.This was before The Shangrilasbefore Jonny Kidd and the Piratesbefore the first air-guitarist emerged from the shadows to signa record contract for ‘ Four Minutes and Thirty Three Seconds’,before memory shuffled it all around the jukebox.

Miss Paris, hummingbird eyes flutteringon Little Dock Lane, was a footnotein the collected works of the Twentieth Century,a hundred years thick. Her after school dinner speeches were pharmaceuticals for the ear.


Grade Four

I cried on my first day of school.This is traditionally a child’s privilege.I didn’t want to leave my mother aloneat the school gate like an unloved scarecrow.I didn’t want her to feel sad walking homethrough the new born fields of tin cans,that deadmorning ,when separationwas the next dish after breakfast.I’m modest enough now to admit it,

I’ve still got the tears somewhere.I take the handkerchief out now and thenlike a souvenir from a weepy movieand dab early childhood from my eyes.Later I failed the eleven-plusa year or so after Tim failed his,which I regret now,not the fact that Tim failed hisbut because I could have taken the day offand headed for Portland with my notebook.

Five years later I graduated from academiawith a grade four in Modern History.This wasn’t remarked upon in the global press at the time.I suppose men walking on the moon was consideredmore newsworthy than a schoolboy walking home.across Honicknowle Green with a C.S.E certificate.And the same grade in Religious Knowledgenever motivated any angels to fly over the garden,which was mostly cabbages,and if God ever called to offer extra tuition

no-one ever saidMy formal education ended theresoon after I left home for the streetlightsand the covens of blues and rock,spending three or four evenings a weekat night school, learning how to spellbackwards in the bad book dark.


Words by Kenny Knight

Images by Pete Davy


Johnny Valencia

Enter Eden


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tribe magazine issue 11

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