SALONE DEL MOBILE 2018

2035

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Design, Travel

My second year of visiting the wicked interior design fair SALONE DEL MOBILE and it already feels like a tradition. All those great color combinations, carefully considered shapes and new materials really get my creativity roaring. And on top all this great design is presented in one of Italy’s most beautiful cities. There’s just nothing better than being surrounded by great art all day long with only short breaks for great Italien coffee or an afternoon Aperitivo.

Gili Love

2047

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Photography, Travel

A couple of weeks of sweet island life is definitely how i am now going to escape the European winter every year. After visiting a couple of places that we already knew from our 2011 Bali trip, we decided to rather spent our time on the Gili islands, 3 tiny beauties between Bali and Lombok of which each offers a unique experience of island life. My absolute favorite Gili Air is known for its laidback vibe, yoga and the beautiful turquoise water surrounding it. Natural materials are used everywhere in daily life from bamboo houses to banana leave dishes and there is simply no better view than waking up underneath palm trees.

Singapore Sling

3045

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Design, Photography, Travel

Yes! Finally managed myself a stopover in one of the cities that i always wanted to visit in Southeast Asia: Singapore is a melting pot between East and West, tradition and innovation, established arts and futuristic design. It is a paradise for everyone who loves stylish rooftop bars, busy hipster streets, urban art and modern interior design. I discovered so many inspiring patterns, color shades and artsy details wandering around the city, that i would have loved to just keep exploring this urban jungle for a little longer. But every beauty comes at a price and Singapore’s is paid in excessive amounts of the quite strong Singapore Dollar. So bye bye you beauty of the East, 3 days is all the time we had.

The pleasure of not skipping the best part

956

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Film

One of the best things about the series overload in recent years, beside of course the great variety of shows to keep you busy 24/7, is the fact that opening credits are back en vogue. If you resist the temptation of skipping them (ok it really is okay to skip GoT once in a while) you might find that some of them are a cinematographic masterpiece themselves, not so much just introducing characters but generating a mood horizon and managing viewer expectations. The opening credit creators of Dexter and American Gods did a hell of a great job, but my favorite opening is the creepy as f*** True Blood theme by Digital Kitchen already forecasting the dark theme of the TV show.

David Lynch’s grab bag of surrealism, horror and offbeat humor

964

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Film

Twin Peaks (the original series from 1990-91) by creator Mark Frost and the master of cinematographic surrealism himself, David Lynch, is beautiful small-town tranquility turned into a shady dreamworld between tough reality and yearning human delusion. Don’t be fooled by the hypnogogic opening credits, David Lynch knows his trade and every episode will be provide an enthralling mixture of supernatural mystery, casual crime and 90s high school drama.

The Beat of a generation

1005

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Literature

On the Road by Jack Kerouac was the first Beat Generation book I got my hands on and I had never before read a book so vibrant with levity and juvenile wickedness. There is so much hunger for life itself stuffed between those pages, that I wanted to get out there and hit the road right away myself. Word is Jack Kerouac wrote the final draft in only 20 days, taping together sheets of paper so he wouldn’t have to stop writing while typing on his typewriter. Word has it also, that he was on benzedrine all this time, but hey – it worked out great! I have engulfed literature from fellow Beat writers Allen Ginsberg and William S. Burroughs, but following Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassady on the road through mid century America, will always be my darling.

Vocal morphine by Jolie Holland

936

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Music

I first listened to Jolie Holland when I found myself at one of her concerts in Auckland, New Zealand, not knowing what to expect at all. A rather small audience in a plain room somewhere off K’Road and nothing but this sweet Texas wildflower with a guitar and the most sophisticated voice. A dark voice that would sing of the living and the dead in such an self-evident way, if you closed your eyes, the voice seemed to belong to someone else decades older than herself. I started painting to her music shortly afterwards and her voice is still a regular companion.

The silent magic in Le Voyage dans la Lune

968

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Film

The silent movie A TRIP TO THE MOON (original title Le Voyage dans la lune, 1902) was born in the first decade of motion pictures and is today regarded as one of the most influential cinematographic works. It also is the first Science Fiction movie ever, the storyline following a group of astronomers who travel to the moon. French illusionist and director Georges Méliès, being way ahead of his time, has topped his masterpiece with a range of special effects like multiple exposures, dissolves and time-lapse photography. Pure magic back than and somehow still is.

The manège of nightmares in THE LAST CIRCUS

970

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Film

The Last Circus (original Balada triste de trompeta, 2010) by spanish director Álex de la Iglesia, truly is the material nightmares are made of. It took my dreamy nostalgic view on life in a travelling circus and just crushed it under a unsettling mountain of violence, sadism and savagery. A surreal and enthralling ballad that, in best case, leaves you with only a fear of clowns.

Three times Jack White

937

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Music

The White Stripes.The Raconteurs. The Dead Weather. I have to admit, it seems like as long as there is Jack White in it, I apparently love it. I guess if I had to limit my music taste, I could actually survive on a Jack White Playlist on Spotify, assumed it also had Appleblossom in it.

Wisdoms on a life in the Arts by Marina Abramovic

926

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Performing Art

I have to admit that so far I never really connected with Performance Art. But nevertheless I am convinced that every artist, of every art genre, everywhere out there, should have read at least once an ARTIST’S LIFE MANIFESTO of the so called “grandmother of performance art” Marina Abromovic. 1. An artist’s conduct in his life: * An artist should not lie to himself or others * An artist should not steal ideas from other artists * An artist should not compromise for themselves or in regards to the art market * An artist should not kill other human beings * An artist should not make themselves into an idol * An artist should not make themselves into an idol * An artist should not make themselves into an idol (…)

Soul Baptism in AOTEAROA

1115

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Travel

ao = cloud, dawn, daytime or world tea = white, clear or bright roa = long AOTEROA, or roughly translated “the land of the long white clouds” is like the most beautiful picture book landscape one can imagine, just that it actually exists out there in this very world. I moved to New Zealand for a short period in 2008 and it still is a very defining and spiritual place to me. A place that has shaped me a lot as a person as well as an artist and that I therefore like to see as the birthplace of my soul. I was lucky enough to visit this beautiful country twice since then and every visit had it’s own memorable moments. If you scroll through my gallery you will stumble upon a painting called “Soul Baptism” that also comes with a poem, both dedicated to this magical land at the end of the world.

The dark side of a fairytale by Camille Rose Garcia

1029

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Visual Art

A childhood in the suburbs of Orange County with regular visits to Disneyland does sound like a dream of candy floss and pink netlace. Punk concerts and William S. Burroughs cut-up literature not so much. Camille Rose Garcia‘s wicked artworks do have both sides in them, creating a “broken narrative painting of wasteland fairytales” which stages the witch in the fairytale rather than the princess.

The cinematic heartbeat of Xavier Dolan

991

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Film

French canadian director Xavier Dolan has done quite a few great films in the last couple of years, he has become a regular guest on well-known festivals in Cannes and Toronto and even won one or another fancy award. Therefore my favorite Dolan movie Les amours imaginaires (Heartbeats, 2010) was already banned to the “Earlier Films” section in his wikipedia bio. But what a film! This very specific and almost poetic film language, the dramaturgy of colors and the extraordinary blend of the soundtrack. Heartbreaking cinematographic art!

California Dreaming by Magdalena Wosinska

1087

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Photography

The style of Magdalene Wosinska is described as “tough yet sunny California aesthetic (that) encapsulates a mood of endless summers”. Her photographs tell a novel of California dreaming, roadtrips though the outback at sunset and an unstoppable youthful energy. Critics may note that they do show only the bright side of life but who wouldn’t choose that side for a little summer daydreaming?

Painted escapism by Lois Wallace

2030

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Photography, Visual Art

Lois Wallace does create reclusive dreams by evolving her paintings from photographs and thereby building a beautiful narrative through the act of painting. This is maybe why her artworks seem for one thing within actual reach and at the same time completely artificial. Pure compressed wanderlust.

La Biennale di Venezia 2017

4073

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Design, Photography, Travel, Visual Art

It is THE art festival in Europe and I’ve been urging to visit la Biennale di Venezia since I first heard of it. Since I have moved to southern Germany a couple of months ago, a visit was finally within reach. In the end I only spend a good 48hours in Venice, but the impressions felt like it had been 2 entire weeks. So much great art accumalated in one small city – it was definitely worth a visit and I already saved the date for the next Art Biennale in 2019.

Salone del Mobile 2017

2164

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Design, Travel

This year I had the chance to visit SALONE DEL MOBILE, Milano’s well known interior design fair. A great chance to learn about new materials, find out which modern classics are on the comeback and to get inspired by the range of colors and form variations. I was lucky enough to visit the fair together with a group of interior designers that knew well enough which hot spots had to go on the must-see list. I discovered so many great designs that it is almost impossible to name a favorite, but unforgettable is the bubble-shaped magic by COS x Studio Swine: An artificial tree in a dark room would invite the visitors to play with its smoke filled soap bubble fruits.

The vulcan born sound of KALEO

985

Found Awesomeness

Anja_Sita

Music

It is no secret hat i do love the beauty of volcanic isles, but I only recently discovered the beauty of music born on a volcanic island. The four-piece band KALEO was founded in a small icelandic town just outside of Reykjavik and on top the bandname means “the sound” in Hawaiian. Apart from really really great folk music, they actually shot the music video for Way down we go in the lava chamber of a still active volcano. The bands base since 2015 is Austin, Texas, a home just perfectly fitting for their sweet Folk/Blues/Country tunes.