Lobster Scarf Collection #3
2022
INTRO / The “Lobster Scarf Collection” project was created in the multipurpose studio Lobster Space out of the personal interest of the co-founder, Marin Czeller, to apply the common Czech culture of hockey and football scarves to the space of local authorship and to create a limited series in collaboration with illustrators, designers and artists. During the past two years, two series were created, and were met with surprising success.
The past collections have featured the following artists: David Krňanský, Lucie Lučanská, Kristýna Kulíková, Martin Lacko, Juliana Chomová, Eva Maceková, Lukáš Parolek, Martin Czeller.
The new edition was created in cooperation with Portugal-based authors and Swarm Magazine on the topic of Future Forecasting. It brings the aesthetics of a western oceanside landscape to the environment of Prague. It will liven up the visuality of established Czech authors’ work and may convey potential future collaborations or a reflection on the comparison of visual culture of different European countries.
INTERVIEW with Joana Lourencinho Carneiro
In what context does the design of your scarves relate to the Future Forecasting thematic brief?
I tried to highlight the density and multiplicity of layers that we have to cohabit within our daily lives and which will probably keep on increasing. The emergence of different hybrid states that our bodies have to assume in an accelerated time.
How would you describe your process of creating your artworks, where do you get the ideas for these constantly fantastic creations?
In general, I think the process is mostly based on observation. Starting from forms that surround me or catch my eye, I go on to simplify them until I arrive at graphic forms that are representative of the original. Then it’s just a playful process of fitting and composition to discover what new shapes can emerge from that.
How do you envision the future on this planet when it comes to art, the environment or the human race?
I feel that the course that is being taken is leading us towards total dematerialization, where the challenge of the future will be the merging of the physical and the digital/virtual to a point where there will be no difference between the two. This can be very exciting and has an enormous potential in art making and means of communication, but what concerns me is the dematerialization also of the emotional and relational components between people. With this crazy rhythm of evolution of the last centuries, I feel that there has been a lack of attention and experimentation regarding the evolution of social and interpersonal values, and that this has not accompanied the rhythm of technological development that we live as it should.
BIO / Joana Lourencinho Carneiro (PT, 1993) is a graphic designer and researcher, living in Porto. She develops her practice in a multidisciplinary way at the intersection between art and design, working closely with friends, artists, designers, architects, editors, musicians and fashion designers. At the moment, she is part of the research center i2ADS and is finishing her master’s degree in Art Studies – Museum and Curatorial Studies, both at Faculty of Fine Arts – Porto University.
INTERVIEW with Mariana Margarida Malhão
In what context does the design of your scarves relate to the Future Forecasting thematic brief?
Little face robots that may look like a bat or candies with faces. It combines the stiffness of robots with the joy of imperfect creatures that can also have fun. I don’t know why, but in my ideas of the future, I always miss imagining it being fun.
How would you describe your process of creating your artworks, where do you get the ideas for these constantly fantastic creations?
I get really enthusiastic about finding beautiful and unexpected things, so in the process of creating my own I like to imagine myself finding them in a store, or a second-hand shop. I want to make things I would be happy to find — the funny thing about this process is that you have to try to surprise yourself even though you are inside your own head.
How do you envision the future on this planet when it comes to art, the environment or the human race?
I try not to think too much about the future actually, I guess it gives me anxiety. I can’t also help but imagine something too cold and technological (maybe because of the representations I’ve seen in movies). But I hope art remains accessible, communication stays easy, and being healthy and trying to help the planet doesn’t get too expensive.
BIO/ Mariana Margarida Malhão / 1994, Porto / Coimbra, Portugal. She finished her BA in Communication Design at Faculty of Fine Arts in Porto and did an internship in the Oficina Arara collective. She currently freelances and works on personal projects exploring mostly illustration, ceramics and independent publications.
Mariana published her first illustrated album in 2018 “Uma Rosa na Tromba de um Elefante” with the publisher Orfeu Negro, a poetry book written by António José Forte. She is a co-organizer of Sábado-Feira and a co-founder of the Senhora Presidenta gallery in Porto.
INTERVIEW with Los Pepes Studio
In what context does the design of your scarves relate to the Future Forecasting thematic brief?
Our work is inevitably influenced by current affairs and news. In this specific case that the project had the future as its theme, and bearing in mind the manifestations and changes that the world is going through, we immediately thought of developing a scarf related to feminism, because of its present significance and the developments it will bring to the future.
How would you describe your process of creating your artworks, where do you get the ideas for these constantly fantastic creations?
The process we used to develop this project was very fluid and fun. We knew we wanted to treat a serious theme in a joyful way. So we started by drawing some simple and happy visual elements (eg. hearts, suns and rainbows). From there we chose our color palette, and composed all the elements in 2 different compositions, one for each side of the scarf.
How do you envision the future on this planet when it comes to art, the environment or the human race?
We believe that today, there are more and more people concerned about our planet, our way of living and being. We believe in the social development of society. We believe in art as a vehicle for communication and as a place where an exchange of ideas is possible.
BIO / Los Pepes Studio is a Portugal-based artistic duo that started its activity in 2015 at Porto. Both artists’ backgrounds, related to visual arts and design, led them to meet and they started their team during their Masters in Art and Design for the Public Space. Currently, living in their hometown of Lisbon, they have been developing their own visual expression through a symbolic language, bright colors and crazy patterns. Their practice, mainly related to street art and illustration, embraces a variety of techniques that allows them to explore different approaches to develop their collaborative dialogue of shapes and colors. In other words, Los Pepes is a never-ending love story
INTERVIEW with Gaspar Cohen
In what context does the design of your scarves relate to the Future Forecasting thematic brief?
My design actually acknowledges past and present ideas to help us navigate the future. On one side I chose to render a hot mash, thinking of the current and ongoing demonstration of tectonic forces, warming environment, but also fire itself, the symbolic technology of livelihood. Laurie Anderson once wisely said that “Technology is the campfire around which we tell our stories.” And for me, such a vision of technology has been shrouded by the incompatible, overly human rationalism I depict on the blue side. The extensively encrypted lexicon of dark epistemology led us to transform tools into dependencies. Tech symbolism was weaponized by the ruling capitalist class to create a world it pretends to know and feeds their extractivist mirage.
How would you describe your process of creating your artworks, where do you get the ideas for these constantly fantastic creations?
In general, in both visual and sonic arts, my process is a critical metaphor for the conceptual layer of the work. That is, I’m a researcher first, looking at the different ways technology has shaped our environments and social bonds, how it has worked so far to strengthen capital-colonial dynamics, and engineered systems of oppression. After the first set of specific concerns are chosen and looked into, I try to materialize the everyday acts of low-tech resistance into the works, either by disrupting original materials or devices into textures (as in the red side) or by synthesizing and warping once ”correct” shapes or tones (as in the blue side). I guess I believe in experimentation as a denial of the certainties that led us here.
How do you envision the future on this planet when it comes to art, the environment or the human race?
As I’ve hinted before, I don’t believe in a project for the future, or of envisioning it as a method. I’ve recently come to look at things on a present-first basis, acknowledging action instead of theory and ongoing entropic processes over design projects. Nature works that way: continuously, generatively, always de- and re-composing, it is always a granular combination of objects rather than vectoral intervention. I believe such a relational way of perceiving and acting in the world might work in good opposition to our depletive history.
BIO / Gaspar Cohen (also known as 130-IVXX) is an artist and researcher interested in experimental urban poiesis and their rural beyonds. Through sound, video and text, they address critical interfaces for performance and composition, radical formalism, and the role of noise and error in counter-hegemonic politics.
SCARVES RELEASE INFO
November 8th 2021 / online & offline release
online – https://lobsterspace.bigcartel.com/ shipping within the EU
offline – Lobster Space, Řezáčovo nám. 3, 17000, Prague 7
For exact times follow IG @lobster.space
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About Lobster Space / Lobster, as a creative space based in Prague, presents several projects that combine the concepts of a studio, shop, showroom and exhibition platform. It features local and foreign artists and designers in the form of pop-ups, exhibitions and collaborative production.
CREDITS
Photography / Markéta Kosinová @__maarketa__
Styling / Kateřina Hynková @khynko
Assistant, PH edit / Martin Czeller @martinczeller
Model / Maa Ry @ujdeto
Translation / Tomáš Kovařík
Production / SWARM MAG x LOBSTER SPACE
@swarmmag @lobster.space
