Lower East

Present mood in the lab

The ‘updated’ lower east lab berlin – ready to welcome (almost) what ever you can come up with

We are so happy with our lab, we are full of good, new energy with this place we have had for eight years now – the home of lower east design, lower east lab and camillo’s kitchen lab.

Recently we have had quite a few guests in the lab, among them the board of a Danish theater (for a day-long meeting and later in the evening for a full menu dinner), a group of students and teachers from a Danish folk high school came by (for an introduction to our universe, a ‘mini urban safari’ and for a dinner), a creative communication company used the space for a one day workshop, with both talks and yoga on the program.

Very soon there will be a new film production taking place in the lab – and shortly thereafter the lab will be transformed into a fashion show room for 4 days.

Between all the hustle and bustle the lab functions as our design studio. Right now we are finishing the work on the new cookbook from Camillo’s Kitchen, we are working on a book about the Danish designer Verner Panton, on a visual identity for a non-profit organization, graphic stuff for an exhibition in Belgium and other very fine projects.

After the summer ’22 we again will open up for Camillo’s Kitchen dinners in the lab.

You can rent the space when you need an awesome space in the finest backyard in town, Kreuzberg, Berlin.

Call +45 40636899 or (even better) send an email to js@lowereastlab.de

• lower east lab berlin – design studio, creative learning space, workshop space, meeting room, co-working space, home of lower east design.
• camillo’s kitchen lab – where new recipes, new menus are developed and tested, cook books are developed, designed, illustrated and written. Casual test dinners are held – food eaten, and wine drunken.

Walking in the Void

For Glasmuseet Ebeltoft we designed the book for the exhibition Walking in the Void. The artists behind the exhibition, the American-Swiss couple Philip Baldwin & Monica Guggisberg, rank among the elite of contemporary artists working in glass. Dougald Hine, writer & cofounder of “a school called HOME” contributed to the book with an essay in twelve chapters. Exhibition photos by Christoph Lehmann. Read more about the exhibition and see more pictures here

Chinese Whispers

We at Lower East have done the design for the exhibition “Chineses Whispers“ at Glasmuseet Ebeltoft, Denmark. We have been working on the idea of building an exhibition landscape with transport boxes – that supports the exhibition’s concept of the journey of stories from one country to another. The artworks are on display at the transport boxes, which emphasize in a raw and simple way that the works and stories have traveled throughout the world to reach Ebeltoft.

On the wall we have painted a huge world map stating with red dots where the artists live and work. We really liked the work, the cooperation with the museum, and are very satisfied with the result. If you want to see the exhibition it runs until March 2020.

CHINESE WHISPERS. Erin Dickson

Inspired by the childhood game of the same name, Chinese Whispers is a project initiated by British artist Erin Dickson, which explores issues on national identity across borders and continents involving 15 international artists working with glass.

For centuries, glassmakers have worked in glass factories or have been in glass production far from their homes, and taken their knowledge and their craft from one region to another or from country to country. Thus, glass art and the glass society are characteristically transnational. With the transformation of a classic Venetian vessel, Erin Dickson illustrates this exchange between glassmakers across the globe. At the same time, she comments on the global challenges of our time by exposing the misinterpretations, which undeniably result from differences in language and culture.

The exhibition is part of the project ‘From Where We Stand’ – a collaboration between seven Danish art museums on national identity.

Artists represented in the exhibition: Silvano Signoretto (Italy), James Devereux (Great Britain), Hyunsung Cho (Chorea), Sibusiso Mhlanga (Swaziland), Einar & Jamex de la Torre (Mexico), Rasmus Nossbring (Sweden), Zuheir Alkazzaz (Syria/The Netherlands), Mia Lerssi (Denmark), Jing Li (China), Nadège Desgenétez (France/Australia), Petr & Ondrej Novotny (Czech Republic), Kelly O’Dell (USA), Christina Hellevik & Leif Møller Nielsen (Denmark), Bevan Taka (Maori/Sweden), James Maskrey (Great Britain).

 

CHINESE WHISPERS FOR GLASS PRACTITIONERS. 15 artists working with glass are involved in Erin ­Dickson’s Chinese Whispers, which started in Italy, where Erin Dickson saw a classic Venetian vessel at the Murano Glass Museum in 2015. Erin Dickson asked the Italian glassblower Silvano ­Signoretto to recreate the vessel in black glass from a photo, and then describe his working process with 100 words. Using Google Translate, his description was then translated from Italian to the native language of the next artist in line. From this auto generated translation, the next artist would then create his or her version of the vessel and so on. The results of this ‘whispering game’ for glass ­practitioners are 15 variations of the original vessel, ­interpreted and recreated by artists across the globe.

 

CHINESE WHISPERS. The expression Chinese Whispers is commonly used in many English speaking countries around the world as the name of a very simple game. A person whispers a sentence into the ear of the person sitting next to him or her, and the next person passes the whisper on to the person next to him or her and so on until the last person says the sentence out loud. By now the initial sentence will be totally changed beyond recognition.

Young Glass 2017

Lower East attended the big opening of the exhibition YOUNG GLASS 2017 at Glasmuseet Ebeltoft. We met a lot of  talented glass artists from all over the world. The exhibition is amazing and playful – showing surprising new directions in glass art. On show in Ebeltoft until 29th October 2017. photo: Artwork by Sarah Gilbert. photo©lowereast

From the museum website:
“This summer the museum takes stock of the work created by the younger generation of artists working with glass in the 4th edition of YOUNG GLASS.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cy Twombly in Paris

Lower East went to Paris for a first meeting about a new exiting book project. During our stay in Paris we visited the Centre Pompidou, who is presenting a major retrospective of the work of American artist Cy Twombly.

From the museum website:
“Organized around three major cycles – Nine Discourses on Commodus (1963), Fifty Days at Iliam (1978) and Coronation of Sesostris (2000) – this retrospective covers the artist’s entire career in a chronological circuit of some 140 paintings, sculptures, drawings and photographs, providing a clear picture of an extraordinarily rich body of work which is both intellectual and sensual. The selection includes many of Twombly’s iconic works, several of them never previously exhibited in France.”

“Rich and complex, the work of Cy Twombly, who passed away in 2011, spans a period of some sixty years without ever losing any of its force, even in the very last years of the artist’s life. One of the most productive in recent history, Twombly’s career links the culture of post-war America, dominated artistically by Abstract Expressionism, and the Classical Mediterranean culture that he discovered as a young man and made his own.”

A very beautiful and overwhelming experience. Highly recommendable. On show until 24 April 2017.
read more on the museum website.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Louise Pommery and art

On the Lower East trip to France, we visited Reims to spend a weekend with our dear friends and champagne lovers John & Birgitte. One of the highlights of the weekend was our visit to the champagne house Pommery.

After Mr. Pommery had run the champagne house for only one year from 1857-58, he died. The young widow Louise Pommery decided to take over the champagne business and led it on to success and glory. She invented the champagne as we know it today with a very low content of sugar. She used her fortune to set up the first pension fund and a social security system for her employees. She also founded the orphanage in Reims and its maternity fund. She was also a patron of the arts, and in the champagne cellars of Pommery art exhibitions are shown with different themes.

The exhibition we joined was called “Gigantesque!”. “Playing with the architecture of this estate, the Gigantesque! exhibition seeks to showcase the excess and extravagance of today’s artists: ideas and research that partake of the colossal, but, at the same time, of the unbelievably tiny, the miniscule. Defying all norms. Out of scale. The gigantesque is the unbridled imagination, the exceeding of all measure. For the artists, gigantesque is the desire, the new energies, the challenge to create and invent new utopias. Gigantesque, like art and the immensity of the human being.” Read more about Pommery on the website.

 

 

Director’s Choice ARoS

For the Exhibition Director’s Choice, the Director of ARoS Jens Erik Sørensen has collected around 1000 pieces from the ARoS Collection and put them together to a personal story. The story unfolds in three houses, House no. 7, House, no. 9, The Urban Park and House no. 13 –  taking the visitor from futuristic coolness in House no. 7 over colour and form, organic and geometric in House no. 9 through the Urban Park where darkness falls to horror and death in House no. 13.

Lower East designed the catalogue for the exhibition. Thank you to JES for a lively and wonderful guided tour through the whole exhibition. It gave us a good view into his thoughts and ideas.

During 30 years as a Museum Director Jens Erik Sørensen has left a personal mark on this great museum. 2013 will be his last year at ARoS.

We strongly recommend you all to go and see this wonderful and surprising exhibition. It will be on view until 29. December 2013. More info on the ARoS website, where you also can watch a short movie with Jens Erik Sørensen, where he talks about the creation of the exhibition (in Danish).

GOLD at ARoS

For ARoS Aarhus Art Museum Lower East designed a huge catalogue for the exhibition GOLD – TREASURES FROM THE DANISH GOLDEN AGE. 300 pages filled with great photos, gold metal print and texts in Danish and English written by experts in the Golden age a.o. Karina Lykke Grand.

It is a wonderful exhibiton and you can visit it until October 20, 2013. Go there, if you love The Golden Age or go there if you are curious to learn and explore. We got quite crazy about the period during the work with the book, thanks to Lise Pennington and Anne Mette Thomsen from ARoS.

The book can be purchased in the museum shop or from the ARoS online shop for DKK 299.

More information about the exhibition on ARoS website

From the museum website:
“The exhibition shows how the Danish Golden Age artists found new ways with their works, broke with tradition and demonstrated both courage and curiosity in motif and technique. We perhaps know the masterpieces of the Golden Age in the shape of impressive  landscapes, appealing middle-class portraits and unspoiled Italian sights from the artists’ travels abroad. But there are also other and less well known stories of the Golden Age that manifest themselves in the intersection between art, literature, science and politics. So visitors will not only be presented with a large number of the best known works from the Golden Age; the exhibition will also be  showing a considerable number of less familiar, but certainly not less interesting works.”

Kultur ist Great

Great poster! Maybe one should take a culture trip to Great Britain?

Maybe checking out Turner at National Gallery or Hirst at Tate Modern.
Take a look at Visit Britain

The PH-lamp – the light design of Poul Henningsen

Lower East is in Kolding, Jutland. We had a great experience at the old castle Koldinghus, which is an art space showing art and design exhibitions. We saw the beautiful exhibition  “The PH-lamp – the light design of Poul Henningsen”. The design of the exhibition was a great combination of big photostats of rooms and interiors and real prototypes of the many variations of the PH-lamp. All these still modern looking lamps in an effective golden/dark light setting in the old castle ruin was amazing. Go there and have a light and design experience. The exhibition is on view until 26 August 2012.

Some info from the exhibition website:
Poul Henningsen (1894-1967) designed lamps which have become celebrated icons of Danish design. A large number of them have become classics and are today to be found in homes, offices and public buildings all over the world. For this exhibition the museum is inviting its visitors to a grand PH light festival in the soaring heights of the Ruin Hall in the South Wing of the castle. All the variants of the “Artichoke” will be floating there side by side with “Bombardment” chandeliers, spiral lamps and some of the more exotic pendant lights. The exhibition will take a close look at PH’s different lamp principles and give an introduction to his philosophy of lighting, which set new standards for light design. The exhibition shows all the well-known PH lamps – and a number of the less well-known ones – from the early beginnings in 1924 until the present day. Today the initials PH still represent, over the whole world, the highest quality in modern lighting design.

Visit Koldinghus website

Take 12 weeks and join Node Center for Curatorial Studies in Berlin

Yesterday Helle visited Node Center for Curatorial Studies in Berlin and met one of the founders and directors of the center, Perla Montelongo, who shared thoughts and experiences – of starting up the center, about working in Berlin, about Berlin’s art scene, about how a dinner can be a great start of an art collaboration and a lot more. It was a great pleasure to meet her. Thank you for you time Perla! Since a big part of Lower East’s clients are in the art world, we have a great interest in and curiosity for all aspects of creating a great exhibition.

Thanks to Susanne Jøker Johnsen, Director of European Glass Context, for connecting us with Node.

Some info from the Node website:
Node was created in order to offer a platform to teach, experiment and investigate subjects related to curatorial studies and contemporary art practices. The Center´s core activity is the Curatorial Residency Program that offers its participants the possibility of expanding their professional and practical experience while deeply immersing them in Berlin’s art scene.

Node is a dynamic space were professional interactions take place in the form of seminars, artist presentations, and other activities that explore the complexity of curatorial work. It also draws together curators, artists, and creative practitioners in Berlin. The residency culminates in the development of a printed publication and the curation of a final show.

The Summer Curatorial Residency 2012 runs from June 5th – August 28th.

Visit the Node website

Visit the Node Blog

Ann Wolff at Galerie Seitz in Berlin

Friday night we went to the opening of “Kopf oder Zahl”, the glass artist Ann Wolff’s solo exhibition at Galerie Seitz, Berlin. It was a beautiful exhibition. Ann has worked with art for about 50 years and is ongoing experimenting with material and expression. She showed new works in glass and concrete together with some wonderful drawings. Swedish Actress Marika Lagercrantz – Counsellor for Cultural Affairs in Berlin – opened the exhibition with an enthusiastic talk with Ann about her life and work. In 2004, the Danish glass museum Glasmuseet Ebeltoft showed a huge retrospective exhibition “Observations” on Ann Wolff’s work. We have worked together with Glasmuseet for many years and for the “Observations” exhibition we had the pleasure of designing the exhibition catalogue for Ann Wolff. So nice to meet Ann again here in Berlin and see her incomparable sculptures and drawings.

Visit Galerie Seitz · Visit Glasmuseet Ebeltoft