Sonar 2014 – Image: mixtopia.ro

Sónar Barcelona

Constantly on the pulse of the current electronic music landscape, the festival offers a wide variety of balanced cultural entertainment and is thus divided into two main locations: the recently premiered Sónar by Day, located in Fira Montjuïc with concerts, DJs and showcases. The recently added Sónar+D area — which is about discovering and tracking new talent and enhancing professional activities — will also be part of Sónar by Day. And, of course, there’s Sónar by Night in Fira Gran Via de L’Hospitalet where the main action will go down with some of the biggest names known to the international music scene. Click here to view the full line-up.

New: Sónar+D

Launched in 2013, Sónar+D aims to unite creativity, technology, mobility, innovation and business in a transparent and accessible manner. Through bringing together experts from all over the world, the event’s goal is to shape future creative experiences (technologists, entrepreneurs, artists, companies and researchers) in the area of music, image, interactive content, and transmedia platforms. There will be conferences, workshops, an exhibition featuring 80 projects in the MarketLab and AppCafé areas including demos and product presentations, a networking area as well as Sónar Cinema designed for performances.

Among the 100 companies present will be Kickstarter (USA), Fabrica (IT), the Design Fictions group from the prestigious MIT Media Lab (USA), Universal Everything (UK), Sedition (UK), CANADA (BCN) and littleBits (USA). But most importantly, Sónar+D exclusively presents the European premiere of ‘CLOUDS’ an interactive documentary that predicts the future of cinema for Oculus Rift, as well as the world premiere of cult instrument and music controller Oval, a digital alternative to Hang. Click here for more info on Sónar+D.

New: Sónar Cape Town

As Cape Town has recently acquired World Design Capital 2014 status, it seems suitable for the city to host their own version of Spain’s most prestigious arts and culture festival. Award-winning agency Seed Experiences will bring the festival to South Africa annually, with the inaugural event planned for 16 December 2014 at the iconic Good Hope Centre in Cape Town. With top electronic local acts and two international big names as headliners, the SA installment promises to be on par with its international counterparts in Barcelona, Tokyo, Reykjavik and Mexico. Follow Sónar Cape Town on Facebook for further updates.

Lykke-Li – Image: billboard.com

Massive Attack – Image: oncetv-ipn.net

Woodkid – Image: purplesneakers.com.au

Spoek Mathambo – Image: thestarvedblog.co.za

4D by LoSiento from M+L on Vimeo.

Screenshot

Screenshot

source: fubiz and vimeo

Beholders of Les Poupees – the thoroughly seductive characters created by Miss Van – can not help but be enthralled by these lascivious creatures, their overwhelming femininity and the pure eroticism emanating from their gorgeous frames. It’s been fourteen years since the original sultry-eyed Les Poupee de Miss Van first appeared.

Miss Van began painting in the streets at the tender age of 18, not with spray-can in hand, but rather latex paint and brush – as favoured by counterparts, Brazilian graff greats Os Gemeos. The year was 1991. The city, her hometown Toulouse, France. Toulouse is world-renowned for its graffiti scene, Miss Van and her accomplices back then (Mademoiselle Kat and Fafi), couldn’t have help starting a feminine graffiti movement in a more apt place. While the streets occupied her spare time, she was a full-time student completing a four-year degree in fine art.

Seven years on and with enough street-cred behind her, Miss Van held her first gallery exhibition at Galerie Diloy in Toulouse. By the time Parisian Galerie Magda Danysz had proposed to represent her, she had already exhibited in London and Rotterdam. She has since gone on to exhibit in Barcelona, L.A., New York, Melbourne, Sydney, Stockholm, Milan, Amsterdam and Anvers, as well as participating in prestigious group exhibitions alongside the likes of Banksy, Shepard Fairey, Os Gemeos, Swoon, Mike Giant and Takashi Murakami.

On querying the sensual overtures of her work, her response is simple – ‘I just enjoy painting my fantasies without censoring myself,’ she says.

Her buxom burlesque babes echo pure sexual frisson, though Miss Van is quick to point out that not all of them are vivacious pin-up girls – she ascribes them with varied emotions, ‘sometimes melancholic, sometimes arrogant, sometimes coy… much like us (girls).’ It is the sensitivity with which she conveys these feelings that is most laudable.

She has admitted to her beauties being semi-autobiographical, and although her work may have manifested in earlier years through her shocking pink hair and girly wardrobe, it has since steadily transformed to display her own emotional expansion, emerging from girlhood into womanhood and yet still oscillating between the two.Her newest body of work, which will be showing at Galerie Magda Danysz later this year,

explores a broader range of intensity and complexity of sentiment, from melancholic turbulence to the ambiguity and fragility that accompanies provocation.

The evolution is inspiring, beautiful and very real.

The now Barcelonan resident is venturing further afield, from curating big-name group shows and working on her first book, to exhibiting in Asia and South America. With the steady progression and unfaltering passion which encompasses this artist, one can only look forward to what her feminine evolution may unfurl. Though the gallery has taken precedence and the studio has offered a safer space to experiment, her provocative nature still revels in the thrill of the street.

Read the rest of issue 08

Read the rest of issue 08: Part2

Click here to view our #flashBack selection for September.