Wills and Kate’s wedding essential accessory, Throne up!

Wills and Kate’s wedding essential accessory, Throne up!

As we all know, and if you don’t where have you been this last year, April 29th, is the date most of you have probably booked off work, is the royal wedding of Wills and Kate! We are of course happy to see them both so very loved up but there comes a point where it is too much!

This is the impression I get from Lydia Leith, she has screen printed, very beautifully I may add some essentials for all you who are non royal followers. The official ‘Throne up, Royal Wedding, sick bag!’ They are available now from her site for a very reasonable £3!




Enjoy!

Until next time followers

HGC XX

Brit Insurance Design awards 2011

The Brit Insurance Design Awards is the Design Museums annual exploration of the most innovative and interesting design work across all fields of the art world including architecture, fashion, furniture, graphics, interactive, product and transport. It is a chance for new designers to shine and boast some of their most exhilarating and exciting work.

It has been going for a relatively short time but has gained prestigious attention; some say it is the ‘Oscars’ of the design world even! And seeing as it opens today, we at HGC are pretty excited to get down there and check out the talent.

Last year’s winner, Designer Min-Kyu Choi with his Folding plug was an ‘elegant reinterpretation of the humble plug’.




Take a look at some of this year’s contenders; competition is of a high standard as always, but some are standing out already, there is plenty of time to check it out as it is exhibiting until August this year.

Until next time followers

HGC
XXX

P.S check out our newly updated website with new exciting work! http://www.highergroundcreative.co.uk/our-work/

The Ever Colourful Keith Haring

Despite what you’ve seen on Style Wars or Wildstyle, not all early graffiti came out of a spray can. In the early 80’s Keith Haring was utilising a white piece of chalk and the New York street as his canvas. As his works could simply be wiped off, he was debatably the first legal graffiti artist.

He quickly moved onto murals using paint, and his style adapted accordingly. Harnessing vivid bright colours, Haring’s simple characters began to take on a life of their own, moulding around each other with dynamic movement. His murals began to appear bigger and brighter than ever. Invited to paint all over the World, Haring became an internationally renowned artist with high critical acclaim. However, this did not suppress his love for street art where he continued to paint socially aware pieces such as the infamous ‘crack is wack’ mural in New York 1986, painted in response to the crack cocaine epidemic sweeping the streets.

Haring could debatably be seen as the first commercially successful street artist, paving the way for many others to follow. He was employed to create adverts for both Absolut Vodka and Swatch watches. He also opened the infamous ‘Pop `Shop’ in Soho selling merchandise bearing his iconic images including t-shirts, toys, posters and other objects with reproductions of his art.

Sadly, Haring died in 1990 at the age of just 31. Its amazing to think what he could have achieved had he lived longer.

His influence on modern day artists, designers and advertising is still felt today.
The governments recent exercise campaign ‘Change4Life’, aimed at children is directly lifted from Haring’s characters seen below. Recently Banksy employed Haring’s dog DJ character for one of his street pieces.

We’ve included some of our favourite works below to show the breadth and depth of Haring’s images. So the next time you see a bubbly, flexing 2D character, you’ll know Haring influenced it!

Our Favourite Galleries

Now let me start this off by saying this is a contemptuous piece… there were a few disagreements in the studio regarding this subject so the following compiles most of our favourites’ as there are probably too many to mention!

Firstly, everyone was in agreement when the Tate Modern was mentioned. Tate Modern remains the best place to expose yourself to contemporary art, with a wide ranging collection stretching from Duchamp to Bacon. Despite a number of works not being to everyone’s taste, you can always find new pieces and exhibitions to catch your eye and imagination. Obviously, the grandiose Turbine Hall exhibits bring the masses flocking through the door, however, we would argue the real gems are to be found in the permanent collection, for instance Roy Lichtenstein's 'Whaam!' is a constant source of fascination.

Also, its worth mentioning Late at the Tate which takes place at Tate Britain, where you can see some of the Underground's music luminaries performing sets with the backdrop of amazing art!

The next gallery to feature is the Royal Academy. Despite many sighting the gradual downward spiral of the summer exhibition ruining its reputation, we would like to disagree. The Royal Academy is the probably the only real place a layman can expose themselves to the newest and most relevant work coming out of this country. The real bonus of the summer exhibition is you get to play art collector! Walking round the gallery, checking costs and imagining what you yourself would buy! We urge you to check out the Summer Exhibition, it really is worth a look.

Next is the Serpentine Gallery. Hidden away in Kensington Gardens, next to Hyde Park, the Serpentine seems to escape the gaze of a lot of London's young art lovers. The gallery prides itself on commissioning not only fantastic exhibitions, but great examples of architecture and sculpture in the surrounding area. For instance, the 2010 summer pavilion designed by Jean Nouvel was a great space to discover. Check out this link to see what you missed:

Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2010 by Jean Nouvel from O Production Ltd. on Vimeo.

Anish Kapoor has currently adorned the surrounding area with a major collection of warped, reflective sculptures, which have captured the eye of all who behold them.

Lastly, we wanted to feature a small yet exciting gallery in the heart of Brick Lane. The Stolen Space Gallery features mostly street art and its offshoots. It is probably the best place to see examples of the World's greatest modern street artists in London. Such legends to grace its small but well founded walls are Mode 2, Shepard Fairey, Seen, Pete Fowler and Chris Levine to name but a few. Definitively worth a look on a regular basis, we love Stolen Space and can't recommend it highly enough.

These are just a few of the many great galleries just in London. So there's no excuse not to get out there and be really inspired by some fantastic art.

If you haven’t got time to visit any of these galleries, how about checking out our portfolio of work for some inspiration...

Until next time followers…..

HGC XXX

Blog and buy sale...

Here at HGC we’re always on the lookout for weird and wonderful design related stories, so when we came across this site, we thought it was well worth a blog mention. It’s similar to a mini creative ebay where you can also submit your own suggestions (Higher Ground gloves perhaps?). Whereas ebay is fantastic for buying a great second hand designer bag, ‘blog and buy sale’ is purely creative. We think it’s great that you can browse for things you never knew existed, but once discovered, couldn’t live without... a divorcee ring perhaps… or a cookie USB stick, maybe a sandwich bear plate or just a great looking Bill Murray poster, the possibilities are endless! We think the cupcake Beanie hat is a favourite..… just don’t eat it!


Until next time followers...

HGC XXX