More photos

Hi, ele has posted photos from the opening on this link OSE

and there's a review of the project at wired.com

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Photos from Open Source Embroidery

As promised here's the first batch of photos from our trip and the opening event of Open Source Embroidery at the Bildmuseet in Umea.

Umea

Just back from Umea. We had a fantastic time. A huge thank you to Ele, Katerina and everyone at the Bildmuseet for their hospitality and generosity, and a particular thank you to Jason and Yusra for surviving the epic journey to get there and for making the trip so special.

Loads of photos to go through and post, so I'll do that over the next couple of days. In the meantime here's a link to a snippet of some of our performance at the opening event. Thanks to Stephanie Hendrick from Humlab for shooting and posting this.
Opening Performance

Big love to everyone I met over the weekend and all the artists involved in open source embroidery. It's a very special exhibition that explores a significant moment in current creative practice.

Sweden here we come

Well we're off to Umea, in the north east of Sweden tomorrow to perform at the opening of the Open Source Embroidery exhibition on Saturday. The exhibition is curated by Ele Carpenter and is on at the Bildmuseet.

It's going to be a mamouth adventure to get there..plane, train, bus, but we're all very excited about the journey, performing, showcasing a selection of the work we've created to date, meeting people including some of the other exhibitors and experiencing the other work in the show.

I'll keep you posted about how it all goes.

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Day 5 - Searchin' for vinyl

Everytime i visit a new city I always try to track down any record shops, which still sell vinyl (new and second hand) which of course is getting harder in these days of the digital download. Sadly I searched and searched and couldn't seem to find any. There were a couple of cd shops, but no vinyl. Several people I've spoken to said they weren't any vinyl specialist shops, but flea markets were the best places for second hand vinyl. Sadly I'm not here long enough to visit the weekend markets..next time.

As in most countries under communist rule, there was a state owned or "directed" record label. Like Melodiya records Melodiya in the former USSR, Romania had Electrecord

Apparently the quality of the recordings is not great, but I'm interested in tracking some down and finding out more about what got recorded and by whom. And which artists, if any, from outside of Romania or other communist countries were published.

With friends in Lithuania we've been digging out their, and their families, old record collections and discussing their favourite records from the Melodiya label and why they liked that particular album so much. Also the significance of underground parties where friends would gather to listen to illegal imported records, particularly jazz, blues and rock.

Having had the freedom to listen to whatever type of music I've wanted to without fear of arrest from the powers that be, it's incredibly hard to imagine a situation where you don't have that freedom and what that form of control and oppression must have been like in reality.

Both Electrecords, and indeed Melodiya, are still functioning labels, although I'm not sure what their significance is anymore in contemporary russia and romania. Who still listens to their new output?

On a more contemporary note though check out Hades records, Romania's leading label for hip hop.