Culture

Laurent Malecaze

Dinner by Dunhill

Celebrating British film making and screen culture, the annual Dunhill & BSBP Pre-BAFTA Dinner and Party remains a staunch social fixture. Hosted at Bourdon House, Mayfair, emerging and established talent from on-screen and behind the scenes gathered at Dunhill’s iconic London location to honour the British film industry.

Alice Neel. The Review

Alice Neel: Off the Griddle

Unshy to the injustices of life, Neel painted stories through the people living them. She felt instinctively from an early age that art was her calling and found herself depicting scenes of Havana and its people in her formative years as a painter.

Ben Williams

Ben Williams – I am a man

Inspired by the Memphis Sanitation Strikes of 1968, I AM A MAN sits somewhere between a protest record and a wish list for a potential future, made all the more potent when set against the continuing turbulence of past and present. It is, simply put, a fantastic listen with a truly broad appeal, both a meditation on identity and an expression of artistic confidence.

Robert Bösch

Robert Bösch Engiadina

Robert Bösch is not afraid of the intensity of the Engadin light and the grandiosity of the nearby mountains. Even as a young mountaineer, he was often in the Engadin and for years now has been spending a lot of time at his home in Maloja, from where he has roamed the area and climbed many mountain peaks.

Albert Watson Creating Photographs

I’ve had a very long journey in photography. It’s been a deep, endless passion for me. From the first minute I picked up a camera, I’ve had that passion and, when I was shooting last week, I still had that passion.

The Drifters

The Drifters

“Ten years ago, even before the migration crisis dominated the political and media landscape in Europe, I was increasingly interested in ideas around freedom of movement,” says The Drifters Director Benjamin Bond. “I had spent some time in Senegal working on the music concert ‘Africa Live’ for PBS.

China’s Cultural Devolution

For the best part of the last 40 years, the Chinese economy has been exploding, growing by an average of 10% per year, with 800 million Chinese lifted out of poverty. Many commentators believe that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is behind this economic miracle and that Communist China will eventually surpass the United States as the world’s most powerful economy. Some even go so far as to claim that its authoritarian system of governance is a credible alternative to democracy.

Moving to Mars

The Design Museum invites visitors to discover the role that design will play in humanity’s journey to the Red Planet in the exhibition ‘Moving to Mars’, which opens this October. Every detail of this extraordinary venture must be designed – from the journey (around seven months), to considering what we will wear, eat and shelter in when we get there and beyond. Over 200 exhibits including original objects and material from NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA), SpaceX, Raymond Loewy, Chesley Bonestell plus new commissions from responsible design company RÆBURN, Anna Talvi and Konstantin Grcic tell the complete story of designing for Mars. Two major installations enable visitors to get…

Interview: Dolf de Borst, The Datsuns

“All hail The Datsuns, heroes of the New Rock Revolution,” read the front cover of NME in October, 2002. “The Datsuns are what the world needs,” proclaimed Dave Grohl. And so they descended, an antidote to a stagnating UK music scene, introducing a new generation of kids to no-nonsense rock and roll, alongside bands like The Strokes, The White Stripes, and The Libertines. After a ferocious battle between record labels, The Datsuns finally signed an exclusive licensing deal with Richard Branson’s V2 for an unprecedented six-figure sum, going on to collect numerous best-thing-since-sliced-bread awards, and promoted heavily by such deejays as John Peel and Zane Lowe. But it wasn’t the…

Waxing Biblical

With Noah about to hit the big screen, Alan Diment looks at the religiously-thematic aspects of director Darren Aronofsky’s oeuvre. 2014 will see a raft of films inspired by Biblical tales. Among them will be Son of God, a retelling of the Christ story, and Ridley Scott’s Exodus, with Christian Bale donning his Moses sandals. First, we have Noah, directed by Darren Aronofsky, a lavish version of the Genesis story, dealing with water levels that make the recent floods look like a leaky tap.  Russell Crowe, as Noah, will lead a menagerie of survivors onto his purpose-built ark, including his wife and adopted daughter, played by Jennifer Connelly and Emma…

Zoë Wanamaker Interview

The Royal National Theatre of England recently celebrated its fiftieth birthday with a special evening dedicated to showing just a glimpse of the talents that have graced the venue over the past 50 years.  Emily Hennings explains more. The National Theatre began NTLive in 2009, broadcasting live plays around the world for those who were unable to make it to London. Now, five years later, it shows no sign of slowing down with an ever-growing demand for plays to be broadcast live from the venue. The National now broadcasts to over 500 venues in over 24 countries. One success was ‘The Cherry Orchard’ by Chekov, directed by Howard Davies and…

Art of Flight

On my first ski trip, what seems like millennia ago, my friends insisted that we watch Art of Flight. It was a right of passage they said. Sure there were plenty of other cult boarding films out there. But art of flight was really pushing the boundaries. You try carrying five 4K cameras weighing in at 60 pounds a piece into back country. The staff at The Review are always interested in alternative investment opportunities and film is one that is sure to be with us for a long time to come. Cinematography is an art form, one of the last few vestiges that has a trade craft. Taking that…

Thank you for Smoking

Everyone has their prejudices. In my experience, they tend to be on a scale – but I find the scary thing is that the prejudice is only voiced, not on how logical it is, but on its popularity. Some folks are racist, but they would be deterred from voicing their prejudice, not because it’s groundless, but because it not popular. As we move up the scale and the idea grows in popularity, prejudice becomes more vocal. Let’s take speeding, for example. People feel free to tear a strip off of people who speed in cars. The reason for this is that the idea has been made popular, because the government…

Debut Contemporary

The Review sits down with Samir Ceric to discuss London’s top art business for talented and emerging artists. Can you explain Debut Contemporary and how it started? Debut Contemporary is a professional development platform designed to assist talented artists to turn their practice into a viable business. It mentors and professionally develops all members, equipping them with the business knowhow, teaching them that knowledge and relationships are worth investing in and will pay off, providing they showcase determination, commitment, resilience and vision. It started when I was approached by two of my collectors with the idea of launching a fashion retail space for designers and jewellers. Before we knew it, my…

Push, Breathe, & Pose

Arnelle Paterson-Mensah looks at the grueling psychological fight against bodyimage and the media during pregnancy inflicted by insolent expectations. Pregnancy is arguably the most overwhelming challenge that a woman undertakes, as it pushes mental, physical and emotional boundaries. Additionally, both mother-to-be and her partner must prepare for welcoming their new arrival with that feeling of lifelong responsibility. Despite this life-changing event, women are forced to focus on their outer being as opposed to their bun in the oven. In recent years, we have been exposed to an unhealthy cult, catapulted by celebrity mothers in the name of trend and vanity that is reductive of the importance of pregnancy. The media…

15th Anniversary Gumball Rally

I remember being 16 years old it was a suitably dull day in my home town so i decided to head into town and loiter as the rest of the youths did. The loitering led to boredom so some twenty minutes later i found myself in GAME purchasing a copy of Gumball3000 for the PS2. A fast paced game that involved driving a range of different vehicles across various countries whilst trying not to crash or get nicked by the eastern European rozzers. This year we were asked by the team at Twisted Land Rover if we should like to join them on the 15 year anniversary of the Gumball Rally travelling…