We've come full circle
What a ride. ‘From Here To Here’ was our most ambitious project to date, and has given 26 more profile and kudos than ever. The fantastic show at the London College of Communication has jus come down, but the installation at Embankment station, featuring illustrated excerpts of writing from the book, will be in place until December. Check it out if you possibly can.
Here’s what people had to say about the project…
“The ‘From Here To Here’ project was a true example of creative collaboration at its best. It demonstrated exactly how creative Londoners pull together to showcase a variety of notions relating to one original theme, using not only creative writing and graphic design but video media, photography and sculpture. ‘From Here To Here’ was referred to as the highlight event for the London Design Festival 2005.”
Helen Horton Smith, London Design Festival.“Congratulations on ’From Here To Here’. It is a wonderful piece of work and, speaking personally, I find it uplifting both in its concept and content.”
Peter Tollington, General Manager of the Circle Line.“The Circle Line, that wonderful conundrum that goes nowhere and everywhere in central London, has been celebrated in a rather fantastic manner.”
Robert Elms, Radio London.“Each writer, from shabby King’s Cross to workaholic Farringdon and posh Sloane Square, sees his or her scrap of the city through a different glass. There’s much variety and unevenness, but it adds up to an energetic celebration of my maddening, traffic-clogged, sooty, beloved city.”
Kate Saunders, The Times.
You can still take advantage of Cyan’s offer on
‘From Here To Here: Stories Inspired By London’s Circle Line’ and ‘26 Malts – Some Joy Ride’. If you buy the books from a bookshop, you’ll get a couple of coppers change from £28. If you buy them direct from Cyan, stating 26 members’ offer, you will get them for only £20 (inc p&p in the UK).
Please contact
sales@cyanbooks.com to place your order. Or send your cheque to ‘Cyan Communications Limited’, 119 Wardour Street, London W1F 0UW.
Radio Ga Ga
Two 26 board members –
Tom Lynham and
Neil Taylor – will be giving talks at Bankside Gallery as part of its
‘Artist and Radio 4’ exhibition. Tom’s
‘From Homer To Homer Simpson’ will use words and pictures to explore sources of inspiration, while Neil will share the floor with artist Anita Klein to share ways of
‘Overcoming Creative Block’.
‘The Artist and Radio 4’ is an exhibition of paintings, watercolours, drawings and prints by over 60 artists who enjoy listening to Radio 4 while they work. It runs from 3-27 November, and looks at how the medium influences, motivates and inspires. Artists on show include Norman Ackroyd, Ken Howard, Tom Phillips, Francis Bowyer, Raymond Briggs, Mac and designer Zandra Rhodes.
Running alongside the exhibition, Bankside is hosting a series of evenings contemplating the nature of creativity, where it comes from and how we put it to work. Which is where Tom and Neil come in.
Tom is deeply involved in written and visual communications, and will take a revealing look at sources of inspiration through the sketchbooks, journals, letters and autobiographies of writers, artists, directors, photographers, poets and musicians.
Neil is creative director of The Writer, and will share some of his hard-won hints for getting your creative juices flowing just when you feel you’ve hit that brick wall.
‘From Homer To Homer Simpson’ is on 9 and 22 November at 6.30pm. (Free)
‘Overcoming Creative Block’ is on 23 November at 6pm. (£5 including a glass of wine)
You can book tickets by calling 020 7928 7521 or emailing info@banksidegallery.com. Sooner the better as numbers are limited.
Bankside Gallery is at 48 Hopton Street, London SE1 9JH, next to Tate Modern.
The real McCartney
Sarah McCartney’s book
‘The Fake Factor’ is launched at the
B Never Too Busy to be Beautiful shop in Carnaby Street on
22 November at 6pm. Along with the Lush shop next door, they’ll be staying open so that guests can do a spot of peaceful Christmas shopping at the same time. If you’re interested in coming along get in touch with Sarah at sarah@littlemax.co.uk.
26 members can get their hands on a copy of ‘The Fake Factor’ for just £9 including free postage inside the UK. Just send a cheque for £9 per copy, made out to ‘Cyan Communications Limited’ to: Cyan Communications, 119 Wardour Street, London W1F 0UW. Please include your contact details and where you’d like the book(s) delivered. Alternatively, you can contact Linette at 020 7565 6120 or email 26@cyanbooks.com
Here’s what Sarah has to say about her book...“I’ve written ‘The Fake Factor’ for people who make, design and sell branded goods but mostly for the rest of us who buy them. It’s also for everyone who’s ever bought or sold a counterfeit – knowingly or not. But how can we tell if what we’ve bought is genuine, grey imports, surplus stock or just plain rip-off?
“An immense 7% of world trade is reckoned to be in counterfeit goods; it’s a huge problem for governments worldwide, particularly with ‘safety critical fakes’, inferior products disguised as branded goods which threaten people’s lives and health.
“Organised crime gangs are moving out of the risky world of drug trafficking into counterfeiting handbags because the profits are good and the penalties are lower. Interpol believe that counterfeit goods are funding terrorism. It’s a much more significant trade than most of us imagine.
“Looking at the Western world of consumer choice, what fascinates me about the counterfeit market is why someone will pay up to ten times more for a T-shirt with a brand name on it than a plain one of the same quality – even if the branded shirt is fake.
“I set out to investigate the rise in luxury branded goods and the even faster rise of their profitable counterfeit copies. Can manufacturers defend themselves against damage to their brands and loss of sales to their illegal competitors? Do customers really care whether they are getting the real thing, or where the money is going, as long as they are getting a bargain?
“Whether you’re interested professionally or personally in the counterfeit market, I hope you’ll find ‘The Fake Factor’ a good read. You probably won’t agree with all my conclusions, but it may make you think twice as you pass a market stall selling ‘branded’ goods.”
26 + 2 in Sweden
26 founder member John Simmons has accepted an invitation to give a pair of lectures at the Berghs School of Communication in Stockholm at the end of this month. One will be on copywriting, the other on last year’s ‘26 Letters’ project, which culminated in an exhibition of posters at the British Museum and an accompanying book.
Berghs are preparing to develop their own ‘28 Letters’ project (there are 28 letters in the Swedish alphabet), with due acknowledgement to 26. John’s lecture is the kick-off brief. And, in an echo of the Circle Line project, they’re planning, with the help of JC Decaux, that the resulting posters will appear on Swedish public transport systems.
26 members recommend for October...
26 is now an official Amazon affiliate. That means if you order a recommended book or CD by following the links to Amazon, 10% of what you pay will end up in 26’s coffers, helping us to put on more events and recommend more books. A virtuous circle, if you like.
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‘Death Sentences’ by Don Watson (Gotham Books, £10.05 on Amazon)Australian broadcaster and former political speech writer Don Watson has the style, wit and intellectual muscle of a latter-day Sir Ernest Gowers (‘The Complete Plain Words’ and ‘Fowler’s Modern English Usage’). The sub-title ‘How Clichés, Weasel Words and Management-Speak Are Strangling Public Language’, tells you all you need to know about the book. His passage on the Prime Minister RJ Hawke (an Australian John Prescott by all accounts) made me cry with laughter. A very funny, very serious book.
JJ
......................................http://www.lookatbook.comFor 36 weeks, a sketchbook was sent randomly between four artists – Mac Premo and Duke Riley of Brooklyn, New York, and Oliver Jeffers and Rory Jeffers of Belfast, Northern Ireland. The result, ‘book’, is crammed full of 60,000 miles-worth of imaginings, interpretations and unexpected connections.
TR
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‘The Book Of Lost Books – An Incomplete History Of All The Great Books You Will Never Read’ by Stuart Kelly (Viking, £15.99 list, £11.19 on Amazon)Masterpiece or codpiece? Thing is, we’ll probably never know. Kelly provides an erudite, witty romp through literature, from the ancient Greek and Arabic masters through Shakespeare, Milton and Plath, right up to the present day. He speculates on unwritten and abandoned gems as well as potential A-level texts that have curiously gone missing.
JD
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‘The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou’ on DVD (directed by Wes Anderson, £10.99 on Amazon)This impossibly quirky film is ostensibly the tale of a latter-day Jacques Cousteau (wonderfully played by Bill Murray) on one last expedition. Its narrative is sprawling and often ridiculous, but riveting nonetheless. Director Wes Anderson manages to capture a skewed yet wistful atmosphere, perfectly soundtracked by Seu Jorge’s deckside acoustic renditions of Bowie songs in Portuguese.
JD
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‘Helmut Krone, The Book: Graphic Design And Art Direction; Concept, Form And Meaning After Advertising’s Creative Revolution’ by Clive Challis (The Cambridge Enchorial Press, £44.99 on Amazon)Don’t let this gobstopper of a title put you off, there’s more great advertising here than you can shake a stick at. It’s big, it’s detailed and it’s rather expensive, but for anyone interested in advertising's creative revolution it’s a must. The copy for the Avis campaign is particularly impressive, even 35 years later.
RH
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Howies Autumn 2005 catalogueThe latest offering from Cardigan Bay’s third-largest clothing company brings you the usual heady blend of hard-hitting Ts, open-air photography, and right-on writing. And this one also has a great piece on baking your own bread by 26 stalwart Dan Germain. Tasty.
JD......................................http://www.yaelf.com/slangFrom the recibiendos, tumbos and zapatillas of bull-fighting enthusiasts to the twists, slugs and roscoes of noir thriller writers; this is a great doorway into a lively party of language-loving web sites. Here you'll find the linguistic peccadilloes of spooks, rappers, college girls, Antarcticans and many others hubbubbing along together.
TR......................................‘The People’s Act Of Love’ by James Meek (Canongate Books, £12.99 list, £9.09 on Amazon)Published earlier this year, but as if Dostoevsky were writing today about revolutionary Russia. A compelling novel about obsession, moral turbulence, love, hatred and survival (yes, it’s all there). Big themes but brilliant storytelling.
JS
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This month’s plugs by Jim Davies, Jamie Jauncey, Roger Horberry, John Simmons and Tim Rich. These are not necessarily the views of 26, but we hope they’re not far off the mark. Any contributions gratefully received.
Your writing sucks – Creative and Digital Writing
Where: Broadway Cinema, NottinghamWhen: Thursday 3 November26 and the Digital Arts Forum is to hold a day-long conference on creative and digital writing under the Creative Collaborations umbrella.
The session will explore ways of achieving a sense of identity through effective writing. It will consider how to communicate ideas, in a business or artistic context to engage with funders, an audience or new clients. Discuss issues with representatives from corporate verbal identity consultancies and artists who have successfully married creative and professional writing skills.
It costs £100 per place, but there are free places for members of 26, as well as Nottingham-based creative companies and practitioners.
For further information and to book a conference place, contact Lou Butler at
conference@broadway.org.uk or call 0115 9526600
Creative Collaborations is a European Social Fund supported project.
An offer from Cyan Books
Two books, featuring the work of more than 80 members of 26,
‘From Here To Here: Stories Inspired By London’s Circle Line’ and ‘26 Malts – Some Joy Ride’, are now being offered as a pair to 26 members at a heavily discounted price.
If you buy the books from a bookshop, you’ll get a couple of coppers change from £28. If you buy them direct from Cyan, stating 26 members’ offer, you will get them for only £20 (inc p&p in the UK). They’re beautiful books too. So have a wee dram to celebrate the money you save.
Please contact
sales@cyanbooks.com to place your order. Or send your cheque to ‘Cyan Communications Limited’, 119 Wardour Street, London W1F 0UW.
‘From Here To Here’
Suddenly it’s all out there. ‘From Here To Here’, 26’s Circle Line project is bursting upon the world and (even if we say so ourselves) it’s marvellous. Fortunately lots of other people are saying it’s marvellous too, not least our partners in this extraordinary creative venture.
Here are some things to look out for:
September 8 Posters, leaflets and posters all around the Circle Line, featuring the work of our writers and the design teams from the London College of Communication. Posters, one for each Circle Line station, will be up until 8th October. So if you’re in London, make a point of looking for them.
September 12 Vinyls of the posters, with extracts from the stories, will take over a complete walkway at Embankment station. When did your work ever appear in such a space? It has to be seen (but try not to block the path of the people passing through).
September 15 Exhibition at the London College of Communication, featuring the work created by the teams apart from the posters. Some amazing (often BIG) stuff will be on show - 3D pieces, installations, films, and a special space for the writers (surprisingly full of words).
Now in bookshops The book ‘From Here To Here: Stories Inspired By London’s Circle Line’ is now in bookshops and available online. Only £12.99 and a great read. Stories and poems from 31 of 26’s writers. And last time we looked ranked in Amazon’s top 5000 - buy now and push it up to the top.
Visit the website Students from the LCC have designed a fantastic website
www.fromheretohere.com Take a look. It’ll be a pleasant 15-minute break from those deadly deadlines. You can have a sneak preview of the posters that will be on the Circle Line soon.
Watch and listen out There are media things happening throughout the month, including news and features in
Metro,
Design Week,
Creative Review,
On The Move and an interview on Radio London’s Robert Elms programme. And, of course, this project along with ‘26 Malts’ are highlights of the London Design Festival – try and catch some of the events apart from ours. Go to
www.londondesignfestival.com for details.
26 at the Edinburgh Book Festival
Reviewed by Margaret OscarThere was a lot of magic at this year’s Edinburgh Book Festival. Around the corner, bagpipes parped at both ends of Princes Street, Sir Walter Scott’s monument looked particularly fine in the sunshine, performing artists drew crowds to the grounds outside the National Gallery. And in Charlotte Square Gardens, the home of the Book Festival, 26 was creating a little magic of its own.
‘Dark Angels’ is the latest of John Simmons’s three books, all of which relentlessly champion the power of language. John talked to 26 Scotland’s Jamie Jauncey about his belief in creative writing in business, in how allowing peoples’ creative juices to flow at work can benefit a business and help personal development. He called on companies and employers to encourage their staff to bring their own personalities to the written work they produce. And, as he read a selected chapter from the book to demonstrate, the room stirred in response.
John went on to introduce the latest 26 collaboration in London, the Circle Line project, entitled ‘From Here To Here’. As part of the London Design Festival, members of 26, volunteers from London Underground’s Platform for Art, and students from the London College of Communications worked together to produce a fantastic exhibition, and a series of beautiful posters at each of the 27 stations along the Circle Line. A book of the same title, written by members of 26 plus guest writers, was another demonstration of the power and unexpected results creative writing could bring.
The magic didn’t stop there. Jamie then turned to another key member of 26’s Scottish chapter, Stuart Delves of Henzteeth. A theme close to the heart of Edinburgh was malt whisky. And 26 Scotland had paired 26 writers and 26 designers (including eight southern pairings) to work in collaboration with The Scotch Malt Whisky Society to produce 26 unique bottle labels. Each represents the experience the individual teams had when tasting the malts assigned to them, and each label design is being displayed at the Society’s Edinburgh, and soon, London venues. The book of the project, ‘26 Malts: Some Joy Ride’, tells the fascinating stories behind the development of the labels. And as Stuart read one of the stories by Patrick Bergel, the room lit up with a laughter that showed many people understood the creative journey being described.
That same evening, the magical atmosphere of 26 in Edinburgh continued as the 26 Malts exhibition was launched at the Scotch Malt Whisky Society. Writers and designers came together to view their labels in place for the first time. The Society members, including the marketing manager and chairman, were clearly excited about the results of the project and what it meant for their future activities. And everyone sampled a dram of malt whisky in recognition of what had been achieved. 26 has made its mark in Scotland. And a beautiful mark it is, too.
All three books are published by Cyan Books and are available in bookstores, from Amazon or by emailing sales@cyanbooks.com. You can also find out more about the projects on www.fromheretohere.com and www.smws.com.
The 26 Malts exhibition will be on display at the Scotch Malt Whisky Society’s London venue from 5 September to 1 October, as part of the London Design Festival. The address is 19 Greville Street, Hatton Garden – just off Bleeding Heart Yard.
Times: Mon-Sat 12 noon-6pm. Phone 020 7831 4447 or visit www.smws.com for further details.
Events in Scotland
www.writingWhen: 28 September 2005, 9.30am to 1pm
Where: Frontpage Design, 26 Woodside Place, Glasgow26 Scotland is organising a valuable half-day workshop on writing for the Internet, taken by Alan Black and John Tafe. It’ll cost £90 per person, including a £26 membership fee (existing 26 members will get a £26 discount). All proceeds will go to 26 Scotland.
Christmas bonhomieWhen: 25 November, 8pm onwards
Where: The Vaults, 87 Giles Street, Leith, Edinburgh (home of the Scotch Malts Whisky Society)
Another note for your diary… please come along to the first (of what we hope is many) 26 Scotland Christmas drinks evening.
Furthermore...We’ve been discussing many other exciting ideas for initiatives and events in Scotland in the coming months. So far Alan Ainsley, Jackie Arnott-Raymond, Alice Beckett, Alan Black, Ben Braber, Victor Brierley, Sara Sheridan and Jamie Jauncey have been involved, but we are keen to hear from others.
