Monday, October 29, 2012

Favorite things


Ok. Today I felt uninspired. So I had a major need for inspiration. With inspiration I mean it to be the opposite of feeling empty. 
These are a few of my favorite things that light me up and hopefully will make you feel a little more inspired too:

Movie:

Yesterday I saw Somewhere by Sofia Coppola. Yes, THE Sofia Coppola, The one that made The Virgin Suicides! It's the story of a famous actor that basically only drives in circles with his fancy black Ferrari, drinks, smokes and has sex with women. This all is interrupted when his eleven year old daughter Chloe, very well played by Elle Fanning, unexpectedly comes to live with him. After her appearance, Johnny decides to start a new life.

You must admit that, after reading this little resumé, the movie sounds really lame and depressingly boring. Well, let me tell you something: You're wrong. Coppola manages to keep your attention, despite the lack of story in the movie. She gets you interested in the silent doubts of a showbiz star and creates an atmosphere of tension that pulls you in until the end.


If you haven't see it yet, get going...

Fashion:

To be honest, I don't like the fashion industry for so many reasons. It's cool to create and dress exactly as you want to dress. After all the fashion industry is very stiff. You have to do this and certainly not that.                                       Unless it's certified frairtrade, have you ever thought about who is making your clothes?
But still, fashion can be very beautiful and inspiring. What I like is the creativity, not the big business.

I wanted to talk about Jean-Paul Lespagnard, a very Belgian fashion designer. He is not quite like the others. His clothes have, as monsieur\mademoiselle says, "Belgian humour, English rebellion, Parisian chic and a sparkling Italian side". Couldn't describe it better. His work is funky, but (often) wearable. The clothes themselves are mostly quite simple, which accentuates the beautifull prints. Lespagnard himself works with children and disabled people and creates costumes for (dance) performances. He is a regular collaborator of choreographer Meg Stuart and lately has been working with the French singer Yelle




made by kids directed by Lespagnard.



This piece is from his women's collection “Ich will’nen cowboys als mann", the title of a song written by Gitte. For this collection, he imagined a colorful character, named Jaqueline, who runs a typicall Belgian Fritkot. Jaqueline has two passions: the kitsch Danish singer Gitte and Texas; particularly its rodeo clowns. He combines the cowboy's trousers, the Texan shirts and the clown's white and red stripes while adding some very Belgian elements.   Lespagnard definetly loves his country.


The Indian-ish dress is cut out from the cloth of a child's teepee.


Music:
I basically live with music. It changes my mood so fast. When I feel down, I put on my favorite Beatles cd and it cheers me up. I'm not the only one. You can dance, you can sing along, you can cry... Sometimes I have the feeling that music is like home, there is no place on earth  where I can feel more myself. 
A while ago, I discovered first aid kit. Johanna (17) and Klara (19) Södeberg are two Swedish sisters with stunning voices. They started making music when they where tiny: Their first song, which Klara wrote at the age of 6, was called "We drove 50 miles in our Barbie cars" pretty cool huh?! Of course, their voices and music changed quite a bit since then. It started to get serious in early 2008, when Karin, from The Knife, heard their music on MySpace and signed the Södeberg sisters to her Rapid Records label. At that time they also performed Fleet Foxes' "Tiger mountain peasant song", which became a big Youtube hit. The girls were aged 15 and 18 at the time of the recording—sitting in a forest, both dressed in flannel shirts. 
Have a look. It is in fact, stunning.




Ever since, their voices got much steadier and richer. Klara has a sharper voice, but very honest. When Johanna sings, her eyes grow wide open and her voice comes from something beyond her body. When they sing together, something magical happens. They made Joni Mitchell cry. That should explain it. 
Their second album, The Lions Roar is, according to me, too retouched. Their music is much more powerful when they sing it acoustic. I also caught myself giggling while seeing the video clip of Emmylou: Walking through fields with long dresses and sleeping near a tree next to a fire, long hair, beautiful landscapes and spiritual dancing. I always have the impression that the video is very made up. Even though that's how they are. And c'mon, guys, we are in the 21st century! 
And I present you.... Emmylou! You can close your eyes and listen... 




"I'll be your Emmylou, and I'll be your June/ If you'll be my Gram and my Johnny, too," 

Photography:

A week ago, my dad was watching a pretty intellectual quiz on tv. The game is simple. There are two players: one answers the questions, the other says whether he agrees or not. One of the questions was: Which Belgian photographer won the Magnum expression awards in 2009? And the answer to that was: Bieke Depoorter. There was a picture displayed and it totally got me. 


The picture comes from a series she made, called "Ou Menya - with me", that won that Magnum award. And I can tell you, It's amazing. There is so much intimacity in Ou Menya. In her pictures, the atmosphere touches you. I often see pictures that don't have any impact on me, they're just beautiful; the photographer has a good technique, but doesn't touch your feelings. After a while it gets boring. A good picture will never, never bore you. Even if you look at it for hours. This is what I feel when I see her photos. 
Bieke went to Russia to make these pictures. She planned to take the Transsiberian Express from Moscow to Vladivostok, but soon she stepped off the train and went to tiny villages instead. The only thing she had (besides her camera and her clothes, of course) was a little paper where was written " Do you have a place for me to stay tonight?" in Russian. Nobody speaks English in those little Russian villages. I admire Bieke for doing that. Behind her photographs, she captures situations that took place at some other time, but you can feel these weren't always pleasant. Some of the places where she stayed were unconfortable, mainly because of the extreem poverty of her so welcoming hosts.                                                                     
And the result is, as I said before, really good. 



 

Another series she made, this time in the U.S., is called "I am about to call it a day". This is my favorite. I'm sure you'll enjoy it too. 



This is a pretty interesting video you can watch...




Are you inspired now?

Au Revoir,

-Jeanne

ps: The logo is coming!

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

The fool on the hill

I had a wonderful week. I did so many things that I barely had time to go on Facebook. Oh yeah. This is a thing you should know about me. I was a total Facebook addict. Until I actually found out that it's just so time-consuming! You don't actually take notice that time flys away and you just haven't done anything active. Facebook is great. Remember the Arab spring? Without Facebook, the (younger) people wouldn't have  shared their opinion that much. The same for pussy riot many other happenings.
BUT THERE'S  ALSO SO MUCH SHIT ON FACEBOOK! Like selfpictures with copy-paste quotes like: "I never thought that I would fall in love until I met you..." SERIOUSLY??  So cheeeeezy.
But now my addiction is over. Bravo me!!

I'll tell you something about my school:
My school is in the centre of Brussels in the more arty-farty neighbourhood. Unfortunately the building is very ugly, but we manage to hide that a little by covering the walls with our paintings and drawings and huge posters of Amnesty International and other NGOs.

This is my school and its neighbourhood. Every day I pass through fancy shops and fancy people. On my way to school there is a little square with a long rectangular fountain where I often fall in. I'm very famous for being clumsy.  Like slipping in the school stairs or trying to put a sweater on by putting your head in the left sleeve and your two arms in the other one. But I mean, I manage to live with it.
I'm active at school: i'll be organizing a fashion show with recycled clothes ( ooh i'm so exited about this!) for a campaign called "Sing For The Climate". I go to an art class during lunchtime and I'm regularly helping for school happenings.
Being  active at school isn't bad at all; maybe the "popular" kids aren't , but you can meet people that are interested in the same things as you and actually do something. Of course it's easier to hang out with your friends and basically do nothing. But you'll see,  doing activities is like a million times cooler!
And that was my school!

Now let's talk about the serious stuff.
I'VE GOT THE ROOKIEBOOK!!! Wihiiiiiiiiiiiiii! While seeing it in the mailbox yesterday, I totally freaked out. It's so incredibly good! You should totally get it.( it's cheaper on amazon )
It came with a paper Meadham Kirchhoff ❤ paper crown, stickeeeeerzzz and a flexible LP of the Dum Dum Girls and Supercute!


After all the craziness and  reading I went to a fashion-let's say-presentation of Pierre-Antoine Vettorello 'Savagism'. His collections consisted of handmade clothes with African elements like horse manes and straw.

                                                                                     

 
It was fun and it even got better at the end when I got to know that Belgium won 3-0 to Serbia for soccer! I'm not a soccer geek at all, but when Belgium wins like that, everyone gets happy. Belgium kind of sucks in soccer, so winning creates a nice sphere in my little country...
And by the way, If you know something about soccer, Vincent Kompany was in my school!! And that is like if Lana Del Rey was at your school. In soccer version. And that TOTALLY rules. Another thing that rules is that i went to a concert of La Chiva Gantiva! I went with my cousin and we danced like craaazy! The music was fantastic.
La Chiva Gantiva is a group of Columbian students who live in Brussel and created a percussion group. Later they added the saxophone, the electric guitar, the bass guitar and the clarinet.



Oh and now we're talking about music, I just went to the best alternative and rock-pop music shop in Brussels. It's known to have a very good music selection. Sadly the shop is going to close down. Tear tear. But that means...SAAAAAALEEES!!!.  Every single CD was half price. I bought a cd of It was such a pleasure to buy them. It feels like if you're trapped in this good-music bubble, completely apart from the outer world. No worries, just music. (ok. That sounded  cheesy. The facebook quote cheesy-kind. But admit. It's true!)
The shop is called Caroline music.

These are a few CDs I bought:

This is Marina and the diamonds. It's pop. Got a problem with that? Nope. It's TOOOTALLY fine to like pop. You can dance on it and feel like if you where a 5 year old again with no problems. And this is babe has an attitude.




I also found a CD of The Beatles that contains the best selection of their songs iv'eever had. I love their music since i'm 4.
This is a song that I  listen a lot to. I don't really like the clip, but the music and the lyrics are simply beautiful.

Well, I think that was my wonderful week.
Au Revoir,

Jeanne

Sunday, October 7, 2012

I love wednesdays

Every Wednesday we eat les 'patotons'. That is pasta with tuna and tomato sauce. But it's much more than that. 'We' includes my parents, me, my 17 year old cousin and my other cousin of 25 who often brings a lot of really cool friends of his to this weekly 'event'. We eat, we talk and we laugh so much! One of his friends that comes regularly is Fleur. She is someone I really admire and I thought it would be cool to have her as my first victim for my (i hope) monthly post ' memories of a has-been teen'

So here is Fleur's interview:

Hello.

Hi!

I'm going to ask you a few basic questions to start with.

What's your job?


I'm a writer and a performer.

How old are you?


I'm 26.

Where do you live?

I live in Brussels.

Where would you like to live?


Hmmm... Eventually in São Paolo or Mexico City.

Cool. Let's start!

When you where a teenager, did you have a period where you felt creative or inspired and you did a lot of things?

(laughs) Yeah totally. It was during the two or three years before  I went to university I would read and write so much! I was completely obsessed with poetry of the 19th century. It was pretty romantic. I had this boyfriend and we walked in the fields for hours. We found a very old shack where hay was stacked and we would lie there and read poetry to each other while listening to Pink Floyd... It was pretty extreme when I think about it now! It had nothing to do with school or achieving things at all.

Wow! That's crazy!


Yeah, I Know!  We did use drugs at that time, but anyway...

What kind of girl where you at school?

I wasn't a girly girl. I was always with the boys. I only had this one girlfriend, Alison, but all the others where boys.
I also felt super insecure about how I looked and what people would think of me.

Now you seem pretty confident to me. When did that change?


You think that's finished now?! (loughs) Maybe I looked confident at that time also. I had a really big attitude, I was loud and arrogant. I was rebellious!
But I think I started having more confidence in myself when I was 24 or 25.
School was very easy for me. I never had to do much of an effort to succeed. So i've always lived very intuitively, going with the flow. I had great experiences but I also loosed time.

So you regret it?

No... I don't. I loved it.

This is a question I love to ask: how was your room like when you where a teenager?

Aah! (laughs) Oh my god! I can't even start to describe it! It started when I was 11 and me and my friend would steal chalk from the classes and we drew  huge butterflies all over the walls. Parts of it where covered with pearls and posters and drawings and objects that I would put against the wall. The whole room was completely full.
You know, being  a teenager is not easy. having a place were you can be alone is really important.

Thank you very much Fleur!

You're welcome!