R Magazine_Issue 6_Achrome

ISSN 2369-0313 Quarterly online magazine A’S de la Perfection

ACHROME

no 6

portraiture | fashion | lifestyle & life moments | commercial

www.bassamsabbagh.com info@bassamsabbagh.com

Letter

from the

Editor

Photo : Bassam Sabbagh Make-Up Artist : Dorota Sobkowiak-Goulet

W

e live in a terrible world with people who do horrible things because of the color (of the skin).

This brings to my mind Michael Jackson’s song «Black or white»: «... It’s black, it’s white It’s tough for you To get by Pour devenir It’s black, it’s white, whoo»

Model : Blacky Gyan

After Albus, that was dedicted to albinism, Achrome will not just speak about black and white as colors that often are «disturbing» in society or are synonymous of sadness and drama. With this theme, I wanted to show how beautiful and rich these colors can turn out to be in art. For some they belong to the past but many contemporary artists still use this technique.

So who better than R Magazine, the magazine of the re-birth of Art to dig up the old black and white pictures or to make us watch a Chaplin movie?

So, read on!

© 2013-2015 R Magazine All rights reserved.

Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.

Blacky Gyan

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Linda Chaabna France - Canada

Ivan Alejandro Velasco Mexico - Canada

Pop culture’s fairies have passed by Linda’s cradle one autumn evening in the 80s. Being creative and curious, cinema, series, music and fashion have rocked her daily since then. It is then naturally that she studied in audiovisual and worked for several years in TV production in Paris. Attracted by Montreal’s creative energy, she decided last year to move in that city where she works in the music industry during the day, and volunteers as an R magazine’s editor during the night. Everything interests her: the latest trends, news, movies playing, cooking and even knitting! Her slogan: creativity.

Ivan Alejandro Velasco-Davalos is a Mexican PhD candidate in energy science at the Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS).

Specialized in the use of semiconductor ceramics for memory devices and solar cells, he was recently awarded a Étudiants-chercheurs étoiles prize by the Quebec government.

Marie Édouard Diouf Senegal - Canada

With politic science studies and a keen interest for international relationship and cooperation , this girl is also passionate of fashion, art and culture “I am a girl of all trades “, this is how this young Senegalese who established in 2008 in Canada describes herself. Between modeling, her professional life, sport and her leisure, Marie Edouard takes the time to devote to her favorite activity: making Outside of school, his of cosmetics hence her dream to create her own interests include the pro- brand of natural cosmetmotion of gender equali- ics. ty, the rights of First Nation communities, as well Marie Édouard will talk as science education for to you in R magazine of the youth. In addition, beauty, health and welIvan Alejandro loves do- fare, topics which are of big interest for her. ing photography.

Gabrielle Ovinet France - Canada

Young architect of 24 years, Gabrielle lives actually in Canada. Native from Toulouse, in France, she seeks nourishing herself from new experiences in travelling, meetings and her activities.

After a transition of one year in Peru, Gabrielle established in Montreal to participate in the life without respite of a North American metropolis and meet immense wild landscapes.

Keen of art, graphic, and of course of architecture, she goes for writing of some articles for R magazine.

Julieta Rosibel Nicaragua - Canada Born in Nicaragua and having grown up in Montreal, Julietta is certified accountant by profession. It is following her university studies in business administration that she devotes more time to her great passion, fashion. When she was a little girl, she browsed magazines specialized in fashion and arts that her mother borrowed at the library of the district. That’s how she developed her curiosity for the history of fashion, garment manufacturing and design. By the years, fashion as well as culture became for her a way to express a personality. Today, as writer, Julietta involves regularly in the field of arts and culture but equally as model and designer since many years.

Jean Vigo France Today, 26 years old, he realizes a dream by integrating the team. By using his writing skills to benefit R magazine, he has a chance to approach alternative topics touching arts and society subjects.

Younger of a family of six children, he could benefit from experiences of his brothers and sisters, all musicians or artists .He appreciates photo , above all in black and white because expressions and history told by those shots are different and more intense «Candy is a little bit the acid drop of literature: she will make you cobblestones for delicious sweets» (Anais Caura, motion designer France).

Keen of literature and of the transmission of this same passion, Candy Hoffman has recently obtained her PHD in literature at Montreal University and Paris IV Sorbonne.

Like an Amazon, she is straddling between teaching (she has been several time in charge of courses at Montreal university) and journalism (drafting of literary column and animation of radio programs.

Then, pen in hand,

than those told in color.

His career path allow him to meet people of every horizons .He is bartender-server since ten years now , which allow him to work at different places, with different socio-cultural environments. He settled in Rockstore since one year and half now …This mythic place of the south of France opened since more than 25 years welcome, in addition to the club, many concerts of national and international artists. Here also he enrich personally after each meeting with artists and public: Bjorn Berge, Staff Benda Bilili, Poppa Chubby to name but a few.

Alanie Genest aka Améthyste Canada She is a 28 years old women, Aquarius, besides engaged to guide human being in the path of light during this end of the world.

She has always had, Iike everyone, a great need to know herself, and I didn’t know what was going to happen to her higher self, if there was one. And so, after making thousand of errors, the first one believing she could live with no effort, without a true word, the truth got to her and she had to start, in 2012, a 6 months therapy to reformulate what was life meaning to her. She then studied in hairdressing and found a job as a weekly columnist. The harmonious string of events of her existential field was however to become perfected in her affiliated vocation to writing: music.

10 imperfect songs but philosophically very extensive, recorded under the name Améthyste, made her believe she could still write for visual, and therfore, it’s in this marvellous artistic exutory which is R-Magazine that she chose to make work her pen.

Barbara Wilbert France - Germany

Candy Hoffmann France - Canada muses in head, looking for exact words to express thousand ideas and feelings, she will do her utmost to open you to fabulous and fascinating literary and artistic worlds, to make you travel in time and space, to make you touch by finger a gap of reality and fictional surely boundary-breaking.

Mummy of two children, she is 28 years old and she lives in Bavaria with her husband, she has a fairly catastrophic career path .She just does a redeployment, after months of thinking. She indeed goes for phyto-aromatherapy and will be officially advisor in one year .Since many years she used essential oils in her daily life just as well for health as for beauty and welfare.

She has banished since months household and beauty products… sold in supermarkets and prefer rather prepare them

herself at home.

Keen of writing and TV series, she is bitchy, kind and strong minded and claims her vegetarian, ecologist and feminist aspect but with her own definition for the two latter. Between walking, music, reading, drawing, cooking and photography, she sets time aside to take care of her tykes.

REVISION

Anne Solange Diène Senegal - Canada

Very experienced ... with strong writing skills ... elegant ... guilty of being concerned about using the right words ... this is the perfect translator for anyone who wants to solve word puzzles in the language of Shakespeare!

Madjiguène Diop Senegal

TRANSLATION This senegalese citizen joined the bachelor program of ISM Dakar after studies in telecommunications at Louis de Broglie engineering school. Finally she obtained the bachelor degree in Management in 2011, but she decided not to stop here and en-

Passionate about travel and charity, she is very imaginative with a curious mind and she pays attention to details.

Her careers is diametrically opposed to that, but she perfectly knows how to mix numbers and letters. She brings in her

Jayne Mandat Haïti - Canada

Born in Montreal in a Haitian family, Jayne is a creative soul who is passionate about writing, music and art.

Her life’s purpose is to travel, discover new cultures and realize her passions.

roll in master classes in international Finance at esc Rennes school of business. Now, she is 28 years old and she is looking for an internship in the field of finance which will allow her to validate her master degree. Polyglot, her master of languages leads her to join the team of the magazine.

Marie Agathe Ndiaye Senegal

Candy Hoffmann France - Canada

Abdoulaye Coulibaly graduated from the University of Abidjan where he got a Bachelor’s degree in English linguistics before entering the teacher training school.

There, he obtained the vocational training certranslations a hint of En- tificates for teaching gland where she has lived students of modern secfor several years. ondary schools in 1998

Abdoulaye Coulibaly Ivory Coast - Canada and that of teaching high school students in 2004.

After his higher education, he started starting teaching English as a foreign language to learners aged between 12 and 18 years for about fifteen years. That career led him to many public secondary schools of his country, Côte d’Ivoire before he decided to immigrate in Quebec to undertake a career shift in Translating from English to French at the Université de Montréal.

LancinÊ KouyatÊ France - Canada Arrived in Montreal with a working holiday program, he completely took advantage of this experience to discover Canada. Graduated with a master’s degree in finance and management, he is also attracted by the world of the press, literature and fashion. R magazine allows him to live this passion and to continue to exercise his English.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Mouhamed Dieng Senegal

Axelle Port-Lis Guadeloupe - Canada

Joseph Barrera Colombia - Canada

Originated from Senegalese capital city, this young Dakar Senegalese nicknamed Misterio Design is passionate of graphic design, special effects and photography. A part from his activities, he worked in philosophy. He aims at forging perfection in his personal and professional life and all that with the motivation to follow in-depth studies in graphic design and have professional experiences for a better satisfaction of clients.

Axelle is from Guadeloupe. She has lived 6 years in different cities in France for her studies, starting from the bottom each time.

Axelle describes herself as adventurous and recently moved to Montreal in search of new adventures, hoping to gain professional experience in graphic design which is a profession she is passionate about.

Born in 1976 in Cartagena in Colombia, this graphic drawer, illustrator and artist 3D obtained his degree at university Jorge Tadeo Lozano in 2002. 2 years after, he worked at the same time as teacher of graphic, illustration and multimedia in the same university and for different advertising and government enterprises. 5 years ago, he decided to come back to Montreal to change the nature of his career as graphic designer and artist 3D. In 2013 he obtained a degree at college Bois de Boulogne in modeling and 3D animation where he demonstrated professionalism as well in the world of video game as in the one of modeling and animation. During his free time, he works as photograph and make illustrations for different clients and for his personal projects.

Laura Bonnieu France - Canada

Liliana Lemus Colombia - Canada

Jonas Simberg Brazil - Canada

Graphic designer by formation, he wears several caps: illustrations, animations, graphic design, and design. Music, cinema, image and creative design has always passionate him.

Born in Colombia, this former veterinary and mother of a 5 years old, who has been living in Montreal for 7 years, discovered a fun new career design and computer graphics.

ILLUSTRATION

Lucie Barrol France During the day, Lucie is a Human Resources Manager. In the evening, she retires herself in drawing. Drawing’s lover since childhood, she is also a geek and a fan of gastronomy.”

Lành Nguyễn Vietnam Pencil, charcoal, pastel, watercolor .. are her keywords. She draws, over time, a universe as soothing as real. Imaginative and creative with a curious and developed mind, an eye for detail, she perfectly mastered the techniques she showcases. Without exaggeration, we can put her name next to the “great artists” like Warhol, Lichtenstein, Geluck ....

CORRESPONDENCE France

Bernie Diène Senegal - France Parisian in her thirties and working with numbers, Bernie has a great passion for photography which she does in her spare time under the nickname “The glob’girl.” Photography is in fact a way for her to express the artistic streak that has always been in her since childhood, a period during which she loved to draw. Besides, it often happens that she takes back her pencil to jot down ideas for future photo shoots. Her current inspirations valorize femininity, when she does not try to deliver messages about love and racial harmony. However, one of her next challenges will be to work with male models.

Ray Senpai Indonesia - France

Espagne

Sénégal

José Vidal Espagne

Stéphane André Pierre Diène aka Stefdekarda Sénégal

Ray is an Indone- He was born in July 1981 sian-born photographer in the municipality of Gáldar in Gran Canaria. based in Paris.

After obtaining his bachSelf-taught, his works es- elor degree, he met the sentially focus on photo- fascinating world of phographs taken during trips tography and began phomainly made in Asia and tographing landscapes, Europe. architecture, etc. in a selftaught way. Just as phoRay actually works on a tography, fashion met his project featuring different way. He worked in fashportraits of people met in ion consultation, personthe 4 corners of the world al styling, events, and he and their perception of still works in these areas. life.

He has also shown his abilities as a radio speaker, and now collaborates as a fashion and news editor in various blogs, online magazines and for a television channel.

Photograph and graphic designer for famous artists of Senegalese scene, Africa correspondent of a French American magazine, or also production manager of TV show with success on two famous Senegalese television channels, he recently participated to a reality show with key element being for the winner a recognition towards Africa as designer among others.

- Administrative & Financial Management

Fadji Vovor Togo - Canada Fadji is a Canadian citizen, a former Swiss resident, and a Togolese since birth. He owns a Masters in Management that he has obtained at the University of Geneva, at the HEC department, and is passionate by numbers and big cities. Member of the Order of Chartered Administrators of Quebec (2011-2012), he now excels in cash management in Montreal and it is in this area that he would like to provide his expertise.

WEB DESIGN

Marcel Lamarre Canada

THEY ALSO WORK WITH US ...

Victoire Ndong Senegal - Untied States

Sacha Hemel Ivory Coast

Tomas Larivière Canada

Patrick Coakley Ireland

Ndeye Fatou Kane Senegal - France

Germaine Deilhes Ndour Senegal - France

Samantha Graham Canada

Brianna Farrell Canada

Andréa Deloche France

Olivier Badin Canada

Samantha Graham Canada

Andrew Kennedy Canada

Marie Yolande Hyjazi Senegal - France

Clémence Modoux France - Canada

Dorota Sobkowiak-Goulet Make-up Artist

Ju Jin

Dorota S. Goulet, Make Up Artist

Should architecture stand out

by its colours?

It is often said that the chromatic particularities of architecture depend on the culture and the history of the actual city, region or country. Color has often been used for its decorative characteristics in religious or public constructions, or to distinguish a singular construction from others that are said popular. However, without talking about achromic architecture since I think architecture is always made of colors, we observe the use of a restricted color range in our environment. Used as an identity symbol, a branding element, or an advertising appeal, some colors are yet more present in our streets than others.

The praise of the raw The first way to integrate color work in architectural conception corresponds to the choice of material and its assembly. Through their textures, raw materials bring out the implementation technic or the intrinsic characteristics of the material. Smooth or rough, raw cement only reveals its intern structure through mechanic or chemical treatment, which models its surface by making its different components apparent. The brick can also present a range of colored, weathered, or industrial textures.

The composition work necessarily goes through a graphic work, which can be noticed when one observes the edifice in overall. I consider architecture as an art and a technic that could and that should be appreciated and judged by everyone. The thought proceeds by contrast. Thus, color is able to reveal to everyone the perceptions of the urban landscape that we have by accentuating or extenuating certain built particularities.

It brings out the architectural qualities like shadow can play with light.

Color as a material Color is also defined as an essential material in architecture. Besides, we can find it in the heart of some architects’ works. A color applied on a vertical surface transforms the perception the person who is experimenting it has of the space. Color too often intervenes at the end of the construction in order to harmonize, enhance or decorate what has already been built. We are often captured by the beauty of the colored urban landscapes that are present in various cities around the world. In Montreal and in my street in particular, I admire on a daily base the vivid colors that the occupants have chosen to paint their roofs or the fronts of their houses. On top of its identity potential, color provides a feeling of joy and happiness to people who look at it. In order to have this urban cheerfulness back, could we build with color?

Color has an undeniable advantage: it can be applied on all supports that seem adequate. The particularity on which I wished to bring attention is its application on glass. At that moment, color becomes a material and the light that goes through it makes it alive. Stained-glass window or tinted glasses are an inexhaustible source of color sets that move and change depending on the moment of the day. Could this material in motion that stimulates our senses each hour of the day change its appearance according to the seasons? And why not?

Writing : Gabrielle Ovinet Translation : Alanie Genest Layout : Liliana Lemus

VINCENT DEBONNE Médiathèque-Colomiers-Rudy Ricciotti

Architectural Photographer

Interview & Layout : Laura Bonnieu Translation : Madjiguène Diop

Hello

Vincent and thank you for having accepted this interview .Can you briefly introduce yourself?

Hello. I am 29 years old; I am actually living in Toulouse, in France. I work in the field of architecture as a drawer, outlooker and photograph.

Many people say that I am a big dreamer and I like this idea but I am above all a passionated person.

T

he specialty that is photography of architecture seems to me not very well known. In what consist this practice?

Photography of architecture is indeed not very well known because it often responds to an order and goes not very far out of context of commercialization.

Photographies of architecture are generally made to sell an immovable property or a know –how (architect, deco, etc...). It is not very well known of the

public.

practice?

This practice allows first and foremost to sell a property, therefore to value it by photo to catch the eye .Even it happens that I respond to orders, I rather practice it in an artistic manner because, architecture has other thing to offer than its original function (habitat, offices, museum, welcoming of public, parking, hangar, etc....). Architecture has also sensitivity and poetry to share.

The most difficult is to know how to manage weather forecast .An eye on the weather is always needed and you must be ready every moment to obtain photos that are wished (loaded clouds, blue sky, white and fluffy cloud.

W

hy have you photography architecture?

chosen of

Architecture surrounds us daily and today we can quickly be closed in a habit annoying without our daily life by revealing beauty and sensitive in which can appear sad and monotonous I am fancy to share emotions, poetry, and sensitivity, things that are not seen enough actually. Architecture is an integrating part of our life .The fact of offering sensitive photos of what is crossed every day without paying attention on it allow to transmit a new look on what surrounds us and to convey optimism. I don’t have claim to come to upset everything with my photos but it is my way to participate in a “better world”.

Photo helps me to extract all the poetry of a sensitive architecture to share it with the maximum of persons.

I make also photos of naturals landscapes for significantly the same reasons.

What is more difficult in this

Another important factor is the human. According to where the building is and time it is, there can be lot of people or on the opposite nobody. Knowing how to adapt is important .If for instance, I want to take a photo of an empty administrative building, I will wait on Sunday.

How

do you choose your buildings?

I proceed in different ways.

Generally before visiting a city; I spot buildings on the internet and Google earth .I chose my buildings according to their architecture (shapes, materials, colors, etc…).Then it often happens that I take photos by instinct, without any prior preparation .When I move around, my look is continuously striding the city, at the quest of an interesting building.

What is differentiating your

work?

It is a very difficult question. I think that what differentiates my work is the vision and the knowledge I have of architecture .I did made photos recently, but I am in the field of architecture since ten years (from the beginning of my studies till date). When I take a photography of a building, I look in priority for

extracting poetry that is not obviously seen at first sight.

I consider my photography as a painting and not as a commercial representation.

Your

photos represent exclusively buildings from an outside sight. Is it a choice?

From where these passions

those are photography and architecture come to you?

They fall a little on me. At the beginning, I had never considered to work in this field. My marks at school were too low to integrate the class of second general .I therefore first do a CAP of sculpture on wood, then a BAC pro of stone cutting.

I have really appreciated those studies, but I was fancy to do something else, and my professors of the moment suggest me the architecture school of Montpellier .That is what I have done and I hang rapidly. Taken by passion, I continued until obtaining the bachelor. I realized then that I was much more attracted by the graphic aspect of this discipline. I therefore stopped and started to work as an outlooker, then I found a job in an agency .Concerning photography, I have always been more or less attracted but without daring do it. I had bought a

reflex low cost during my studies but I haven’t used it very often. One day I had the opportunity to buy a semi-pro reflex not very expensive Therefore, It make me fancy to make the final leap and that’s how, gradually, I started to take more and more photos. It became soon a passion.

Does

the fact being photographer architecture require specific material?

of of a

To be photographer of architecture, there is no need to possess the last

Offices -Toulouse-Architecte inconnu

Yes, it is true. I had never thought about it .It is interesting; it happens that I make a few photos of inside (out of order), but it is very rare. Generally, I like to stride the city looking for what it can reflect. As the outside of buildings is the most visible aspect, I prefer to work this aspect .But inside photography could utterly be a coming project.

reflex of the market. With a small reflex, very beautiful pictures can be done.

I can say that the most important in photography of architecture, is a good tripod, particularly on indoor photos, because the laying time can be longer. It worth better investing in a good tripod than in a good reflex.

Then a wide angle lens can be useful to play with perspectives outside and enlarge the room inside. I would say that there are the principal things to possess. It exists then others lens more sophisticated notably those with decentralization or even flashes for indoor photos but

inspired me in sense of which I like to take challenges and impose myself to constraints.

I found the theme of this issue very interesting to try, to educate a little bit more my look. Therefore, I won’t say if that was difficult or easy but it was rather playful. I like when there are constraints to respect; I feel freer to act.

Do

Médiathèque José Cabanis-Toulouse-Jean Pierre Buffi et Agence Séquence

you like to work in black and white? For which reasons?

I don’t often work with black and white but if I do so it is for a good reason for instance, to accentuate forms and composition .What I like in black and white, is that the picture has a stronger impact than in colors.

How do you decide if the final result of a picture will be in colors or in black and white?

who are your references in

the field of photography?

My first reference in the field of photography is Vincent Munier, a naturalist photographer.

To take in photo architecture, I inspire a lot myself by his way of photographing animals. Then there are others photographers of architecture who help me to sharpen my look as Eric Dufour or even Eric Forey.

And

in the architecture?

field

of

There are a lot; I like very much

Japanese architecture. The works of Toyo Ito, Kenzo Tange, or even Tadao Endo, inspire me very much .I like as well Mies Van der Rohe, Norman Foster, Herzog and Demeron, Renzo Piano; Peter Zumthor, the list is long and I could still cite full of them.

But globally, I like refined and firm architecture.

D

oes the theme of our issue “varnish” inspire you?

Was this exigency difficult to respect?

It is true that I am not used to work black and white, I make some pictures of it, time to time, but it’s all. This theme

It depends; sometimes I think the picture in black and white since the shooting but I still shoot in colors. Even if a picture is thought in black and white, it can remain interesting in colors.

Do

you have incoming projects that you would like to share with us?

Yes, I have the project to make expositions in many places; I have several ideas of theme to still work but I won’t delay in launching a new range for an exposition which will be held in Toulouse.

I make also lot of pictures of synthesis therefore, in parallel I started to develop this project as well.

I have likewise, a big photographic project but it is not yet enough finished to talk about it now.

Charles de Gaulle Airport - Paris - Paul Adreu

Origami Residence - Toulouse - Bernard B端hler

Weird Beauty Zoom on

Alexander Khokhlov

The focus is being put here, in this “Achromatic” issue, on the portraits series “Weird Beauty” which results from the collaboration between the photographer Alexander Khokhlov and the makeup artist Valeriya Kutsan. They have been working together many times, but “Weird Beauty” is their best known project.

Weird Beauty Photo and makeup The results obtained when shooting photos without makeup could be excellent. In the studio however, it seems like having models who wear makeup is recommended for best results. In “Weird Beauty”, monochrome makeup is primordial. That monochrome makeup constitutes almost exclusively the artistic sight of the project.

All credits for these real paintings on skin go to Valeriya Kutsan, an atypical artist recognized in Russia. She plays with variations of shapes and lights to create optical illusions. The art lies in the symmetries and contrasts. This is the proof that traditional makeup is not the only thing allowing the beautification of the face.

This series is a mix of art and modernity. The portraits reveal women whose makeup constitutes contemporary symbols, trademarks or familiar characters in black and white. Models are Wi-Fi racks, QR code, Chanel logo, Mickey Mouse etc. As the makeup is made with perfect precision, it seems to have been made with stencils!

The black symbols grab us at first. It is only after that we see the sweet models’ face underneath. This series of photographs is the incredible fusion of two arts, photography and makeup. “Weird Beauty” can be interpreted as a criticism of the consumer society where the individual disappears behind the new technologies and brands

Zoom on Alexander Khokhlov Alexander Khokhlov starts taking pictures in 2007. He is fascinated by the real, the concrete. In 2008, he got interested in fashion and beauty, areas in which he excels! During a photo shoot with the makeup artist Veleriya Kutsan, he creates an optical illusion almost by pure chance ... They made it happen recurrently until it becomes the brand of the Russian photographer. The “Art of Face” is what distinguishes him. Alexander showcases human trompe-l’oeil. It has been two years since people have been talking in the photosphere about the photographer thanks to his “Weird Beauty” collection and his special photos.

Written by Laura Bonnieu Translated from French to English by Myriam Annick Tchameni

GARLIC, WHITE OR BLACK: VIRTUOUS CONDIMENT Today, through the beauty, health and well-being section, the focus is on garlic, a vegetable that has a great number of virtues

A

llium sativum, of its scientific name, the garlic originated from central Asia before being introduced to Ancient Egypt where it got used for its culinary values and its seasoning the dishes.

The ancient Greeks called it the stinking rose because of the shape of its flowers and the strong odor that characterizes it.

However, owing to its medicinal properties and its providing with physical strength and protection against diseases, soldiers, wrestlers and athletes used to consume it in great quantities.

Writing : Melle Édouard Layout : Blacky Gyan Translation : Abdoulaye Coulibaly

White or black garlic?

Uncooked or cooked, white garlic or black garlic can be used for its numerous advantages. It’s one of the favorite foods since many generations. However, black garlic is also used in the preparation of some Asiatic beverages.

For those who don’t like the smell of garlic, adopt black garlic because he practically doesn’t let any odor, and its taste is less pronounced almost sweeter than white garlic.

From a scientific point of view, black garlic is very interesting but given the fact that white garlic has a more important quantity of allicine, the first one become less efficient. Moreover black garlic is not yet known everywhere on the earth.

Improve your health and well-being with traditional white garlic.!

Garlic is well-known to be a powerful antibiotic.

Those who are not for pharmaceutical antibiotics, garlic may be in many instances, a relief to their problems.

Adding that vegetable to your daily diet, it can help prevent cardiovascular disorders, due to its lipopenic effects that help Be careful to consume garlic moderately in cooked dishes. Removing carefully the inner bulb responsible for digestive disorders may help take advantages of theses benefits. Consuming it raw,by conserving the bulb and always in small quantity,it becomes a powerful natural antibiotic. Four to five times per week is enough to fully benefit from it. Does not worth having it in all the meals!

Then, add the crushed garlic to salads, soups, sauces, seasonings and marinades to gather in its benefits for health.

reduce the serum lipid level. It also improves blood flow by dilating the blood vessels.

Other therapeutic properties of garlic have been proved par the modern medicine. In fact, it is said to have antioxidant properties that protect the cells against aging and an action against neurodegenrative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease. The sulfur compounds of allicin act to prevent cancer. Finally, it is a protecting agent against complica-

tions associated to diabetes thanks to its hypoglycemic properties.

In phytotherapy, garlic is highly recommended and advised, when suffering from gastrointestinal disorders such as colics, flatulences, diarrheas, or parasitic infections. But preferably raw.

Be careful to consume garlic moderately in cooked dishes. Removing carefully the inner bulb responsible for digestive disorders may help take advantages of theses benefits. Consuming it raw,by conserving the bulb and always in small quantity,it becomes a power-

ful natural antibiotic. Four to five times per week is enough to fully benefit from it. Does not worth having it in all the meals!

Then, add the crushed garlic to salads, soups, sauces, seasonings and marinades to gather in its benefits for health.

....But with black garlic too Obtained following a fermentation process, black garlic is less rich in allicine but is fuller of antioxidant than traditional white garlic for a same weight .In 2009,Japanese scientists demonstrated that the tumor that attack animals diminish more with black garlic . Other usefulness is also attributed to black garlic: the reduction of cholesterol or the treatment of psoriasis.

From a nutritional point of view, black garlic brings greater quantity of phosphorus, calcium and proteins. Studies still conducted in Japan show that it contributes to the improvement of physical abilities and of metabolism of glucose, reduction of tiredness, recovering from a flu state and good maintenance of heart.

Possibility of home-made preparations For chewing: a clove of garlic once or twice a day.

In infusion or decoction: a glove of fresh garlic in a water-cup to let infuse for 3 to 5 minutes. Drink 1 to 3 cups everyday As vermifuge: 4 gloves of garlic grated to be boiled in a cup of milk. Let macerate all the night and drink a cup in the morning on an empty stomach. Renew the taking till the elimination of the worms.

In topical application: the crushed garlic will be used as cataplasms or emplastrums to fight against cutaneous infections, warts and joint pains or muscle aches.

The garlic, a beauty ally ?

Often avoided for its strong odor that provides with bad breath, garlic may amaze with its benefits on the body and its beauty properties.

Garlic contains high allicin grades, a sulfur compound similar to the one found in onions that is used to treat efficiently hair loss. To make oil for hair-loss prevention, let a clove of chopped garlic macerate in olive oil for a day. Filter the oil and use it to massage the scalp. Renew the process once or twice a week. Note that the odor of the garlic disappears as soon as the hairs are washed and dried!

Destroyed, broken or dull, the nails lose their strength for many reasons (domestic chores, deficiency in vitamin A etc.) The sulfur contained in the garlic helps nails be strengthened and grow more quickly. We just need to rub them with some garlic every evening for a week and it’s done.

Acne is a skin disease caused by inflammatory injuries of pilosebaceous follicles. Typically, it appears on the face and sometimes on the neck and the upper trunk. The antiseptic and antibacterial properties of garlic help avoid secondary infection and accelerate healing when associated with a medical treatment. To help cure acne, consume a lot garlic, preferably raw!

For a cataplasm against corns and warts, crush a clove of garlic and apply it directly on the part to be treated after protecting the healthy skin around with an adhesive tape. The results are satisfactory in less than 15 days.

J

MEETING WITH :

OSEPH KENDY

SELF-TAUGHT DRAWER & ILLUSTRATOR

Ayayi : Let us start the interview with a question that torments us since we discovered your work. Your illustrations speak for themselves, the reader easily deduces the story they tell, without speech bubbles or explanatory text. How did you come to this form of expression? Why this choice?

A : As a child, can we rightly assume that you were an amateur of comics?

What was your favorite cartoon? And to this day?

Joseph : The idea to launch us into story narration J : Indeed, I was a fan of comics, I loved “The Adventures of Tintin”, “Asterix and through images came the Gauls”, the “Giant Scrooge.” I was crazy about comic magazines. Later I got from a colleague at Chto know the world of Marvel, and that of Manga. I continue to read them until evelin Illustration. Chevelin illustration is a team now. For me, these things do not age. of several Haitian artists, including myself, which produces in the field of illustration, comics etc.

One day, Chevelin Pierre proposed to the team to launch a series of stories in pictures. The goal is to tell a sequential story that the reader could follow as easily as possible. Already a story told without words seemed ideal for communicating with people, which unfortunately today read less and less.

The idea interested us all, A : Tell us J : First, I drew for my sake. As the pen to a writer, my pencil aland it was launched. about the lowed me to express myself, it gave me access to all the corners of experience my imagination. Already, I was a fan of comics. So I had a lot of that motistories that were only waiting for me to exist. Following my first vated you to job as an illustrator in a Haitian edition, I realized that drawing “What if hisbecome an pays. Then I met Chevelin illustration, a great group of Haitian illustrator? artists like me who shared a passion for drawing and comics. tory was now Is this your Since then, I worked as an illustrator and designer; it is my only told without a only activbusiness. word? ity?

A : To help our readers get into your skin, at least the time they read this article, tell us a week of your life.

J : During the week I get up in the morning between 7 am-8am and I go to the office (of Chevelin Illustration). There, my colleagues and I, will take care of orders of illustrations for our customers, our Comics projects and other activities. In my spare time, I am reading, listening to music, I try to learn new drawing techniques.

(It’s pretty trivial, I know) If we mix these activities with a small dose of unexpected, that’s my routine of the week since I’ve become an illustrator cartoonist.

A : Your work is appreciated, comments on social networks evidenced that. Do you ever happen to be criticized or receiving derogatory comments about your work? Can you share an experience?

J : Quite often, I do not particularly remember each case but some people have complained about the presence of nudity in our picture stories; that sometimes we try to understand. But Chevelin Illustration mainly produces comic books and other books for children and for all ages. The stories in pictures that we began publishing, for only a few months, are the only adult category that we had, hence the choice of themes.

A : We found your works online on the internet. Do you have paper editions?

What form (novels, paintings ...)?

J : Since September 2014, Chevelin Illustration publishes stories in pictures on his Facebook page. I myself have shown some of these stories, including BLACK & WHITE. We also sell these stories on Amazon and Apple iBook store. Chevelin illustration is primarily an issue of Comics, so we already have around ten comic outlets in hard book available in bookstores in Haiti and the digital version on Amazon and Apple iBook store.

A : Your work BLACK & WHITE describes the relationship between the

black slaves and their white master. Is that where we get the title?

J : Roughly yes, the title BLACK & WHITE is itself rather abstract and takes many things in history, relationships of colours of the time, the ups and downs of the characters, etc...

A : You tell a story without putting names on the actors. Why? Is it a way to generalize the story to tell it as the story of “everyman”?

J : These are stories that you want without texts. It’s then left to the readers to give the names of the characters. I must confess that I really enjoy it, I feel like I interact with them.

“When your job consists of doing what you like the most, the lines between leisure and work become blurry”

A : Finally, what advice would you give to young people who, like you, have a passion for illustration, so they have a happy ending like in your BLACK & WHITE illustration?

J : When you love something that is good, then there is every good reason to hang on it. That was my case for drawing and I hope it will be the same for you who share this passion too.

Interview : Ayayi Senam D’Almeida Translation : Marie Agathe Ndiaye Layout : Blacky Gyan

ACHROME (BLACK AND WHITE) OR T H E C U LT U R A L SYMBOLISM OF COLORS Black and white: What do these colors evoke? Both refer to particular symbolic universes dependently of the culture of which we belong. In occidental culture, white is associated to virtues, values, to positive concepts: Purity, peace, (which symbolize the dove), Beauty (the Skin of Alabaster, of which the poets of the renaissance make the praise), innocence, candor, chastity, virginity (the dress of antic vestals and of young married is white),good: God is bright just as well is the paradise unlike hells, called also : black , somber, kingdom of shadow ,murky stay; Angels are also white brought by an aura unlike black angel of darkness :Satan, who seduces and bring to evil, leads to loss. White magic happens on powers and spirits of good, while black magic is accountable as occultism, witchcraft, Satanism; it is evil, diabolic and bear in an occult manner on powers and spirits of evil.

Unlike white, black refers generally to negative, to what frighten and that should be absolutely rejected: dark and evil forces, sin, concealment, night, nightmare, death, frightening mystery and by the way fascinating (in psychoanalysis, black continent, an expression inherited from Freud, designate womanhood in its more obscure face, mysterious, unreachable), unknown, melancholy, spleen1 .According to theory of temperament of old medicine, black bile is one of four moods located in the spleen meant to produce sadness. The atrabil or the melancholic has a pessimistic vision of life; he sees things in the wrong way .He is associated to Saturn which, according to astrologers is a dark planet, grey or black, enemy of humans and source of resentment and of despair for those who were born under its sign, conception to which agrees Paul Verlaine with its nostalgic poem composing the collection precisely entitled Saturnine Poems.

White oppose to soiling, dirt, impurity as well as physic as moral which would be on the black side, but it can designate as well, by its intrinsic ambivalence, old age (white hair), death (bones, shroud, specters and ghosts dressed, in the collective imaginary, of white sheets), anxiety (that one blank page).Being fundamentally neutral, it suggests absence, emptiness, silence. We can view it as reality itself, cleared of any illusory color, as internal whiteness, without mask. It is thus, at once, light, brightness and paleness, lividity, life and death, happiness and mourning.

Black can be as well the expression of life as of death, It can be the promise of a renewal, of a new step and suggest the infinite of possibilities, regard to the infinity of the universe and the space. As it is written by Derek Jarman, the author of Chroma, the book of colors published in 1994: Beyond galaxies extends this essential darkness from where bright stars. […].Black is unlimited, imagination gallop in darkness, and palpable dreams run through the night.

In Chinese symbolic, black and white conflict but they complete each other and mesh: it concerns Yin and yang, two forces which may be found in all aspects of life and universe and which, in Chinese cosmology follow breathe, original energy, present in every thing. Yang would be of white part, of masculine, sun, fire, clarity, full, extroversion, active, while the Yin would be of black part ,of feminine, moon, ice, dark, cold, unfilled, introversion ,passive. To present the Yin and Yang, it is generally established a list of antonyms, a process which present the drawback to fix things. A Chinese doesn’t said that the Yin is dark or cold ;he think that dark or cold are not attributes of Yin but the results of its action .Yin isn’t therefore dark, it is a move of darkening; it is not cold but a trend of cooling. Likewise Yang isn’t clear but a move of clarification. Also, definite articles usually placed before Yin and Yang, are inducing us in error because they bring us to represent this couple by the way of two terms perfectly symmetrical, static and separated. Bruce Lee, the”little dragon” of Kung Fu compared the functioning of Yin/Yang to that one of a bicycle: “As long as we persist to separate Yin/Yang in two different things, hope of its realization isn’t possible […] If someone want to go somewhere by bicycle, he can’t press on two pedals at the same time without staying perfectly motionless. To progress he shall press at the same time on one pedal and release the other. The complete move is press/release. ”Press” is the result of “release” and each one is on turn the cause of the other. […].

When a practitioner of Gong Fu has understood the unity Yin/Yang, he doesn’t fuss unnecessary, could it be with “softness” or with “firmness”: he simply does what he shall do at the right moment”

It is the title of a famous poem of Baudelaire : “ when the sky down and heavy weight as a cover/ On moaning spirit marked by long troubles/And that the horizon kissing all the circle/It pour us a black day sadder than nights;/When land is changed in an wet cell,/ Where the hope as a bat ,/ go on hitting walls with its shy wing / And bumping its head into rotten ceilings;/When rain spreading its huge drags/ of a wide prison imitate bars,/And that a dumb people of infamous spiders,/Come to tend its net at the back of our brains,/Bells suddenly jump furiously,/And throw toward the sky an horrible howl,/As well as straying spirits and without homeland,/which set about moaning doggedly./-And long hearses without any fanfare,/parade slowly in my soul ; hope,/defeated, cry, and anxiety atrocious despotic,/On my skull inclined plant its black flag.”

Charles Baudelaire, ”Spleen”, flowers of evil.

1

Versatility inherent to principle Yin/Yang makes that one resistant to the explication by the words but it doesn’t hinder occidentals because Chinese doesn’t use words to represent ideas; they use kind of abstract ideograms which bring together logic rigor required by left brain and plastic beauty appreciated by right brain .

The symbol of Yin/Yang is well known, it is the Tai chi, a circle with a black part and a white part, two parts forming a whole, a same entity. It presents a perfect geometric symmetry, in the image of the equilibrium of cosmos and that one between Yin and Yang, that is between the infinite varieties of antithetical couples .The fact that there is a black point in the white and a white point in the black show that each one content in itself its counterpart, that there is no duality, that nothing is never perfectly white nor perfectly black, that all is always constituted of a changing mix of Yin/Yang :the black will clear until becoming white, to restart then to blacken and the white will follow the opposite move in the image of the heart which inspire after having expired.

Yin and Yang come true only inside the dynamics which couple them, they bear each one inside of them the germ of the other; they are interdependent in the sense that they are not conceived one without the other: the excess or the deficiency of one of them would lead to an imbalance; they generate each other as when the day change into the night.

On balance, there is no Manichean vision of things as in occident where contraries oppose in tearing instead of connecting in the peace of reconciliation .# means precisely “perfect contemplation” and refer to a status of serenity, of quietness, tranquility and indifference to the agitation of the world.

The difference of perception between occidental and Chinese culture shows to which extent our representations are tributary and dependent of cultural data, which are basically outside of us ,to which extent our judgments-western-are the result of a radicalism certainly harmful for our internal balance and for all kind of knowledge that should be attempted to be erected, notably in political and social sciences.

Writing : Candy Hoffman Translation : Madjiguène Diop Layout : Axelle Port-Lis

Laura Schneider

Heirs of black and white At first, the black and the white was the prerogative of all photographic and film works. The processes used since the invention of the photography (and taken up afterward in the cinema), allowed only black and white with few variants.

Then the color was! But it was complicated and expensive. The elaboration of colors movies or photos supposed the use of expensive technical processes for its time.

This is why, black and white has widely dominated the artistic landscape until years 50-60.

. At this moment it takes place a transfer towards the color (as in the 30s with the passage from the silent movies to the talkies).

The color film such as we know today dates only the 30s. Gradually, movies and photos turned into color, however, it does not mean that the black and the white become obsolete. A large number of inflexible continued to film in black and white. Punctual stylistic composition or artist’s trademark, the achromia inspires and still possesses a place among the contemporary works. Small overview ‌

Looking for more authenticity Why black and white silent works should be the privilege of some artists like Chaplin, Keaton and Valentino? Michel Hazanavicius set him the exercise in 2011 with “The artist” in association with the talented Jean Dujardin, winning “the Oscar” on this occasion. The film director takes up all the codes of the genre by putting the intrigue in the 1920 s: music, suits, subtitle, the story and replace them at that original movie area.

Dramatize When the movie stages the absolute horror, the color seems suddenly useless. Too cheerful, too bright. That’s why Steven Spielberg chose the black and the white for his movie “The list of Schindler”, because for him, it was simply impossible to show the horror of the holocaust in colors.

In another register, the visual contrast which allows the black and the white, reflects the contrasts of a society whose losing its landmarks, in the movie The hatred (Mathieu Kassovitz, on 1995).

Sublimate Sometimes, the absence of color retranscribes in the perfection the universe of an artist.

Music sinks, tortured character, the movie “Control” of Anton Corbijn, tells Ian Curtis’s short but intense life who was the singer of Joy Division. In black and white obviously, to stick as closely as possible to the esthetics of the group.

In his movie Nebraska, Alexander Payne chose to show us the American Midwest in black and white, to highlight the characteristics of its landscapes and inhabitants: modesty and austerity.

The result is an excellent and funny road movie which even without colors, managed to show the beauty of the rural landscapes of the North of the United States.

And the clip?

Even in short format, black and white bring a different esthetics which directors often use in videos.

Nostalgic of Hollywood golden age? ‘Strike the pose ‘ and dance on Vogue of Madonna.

Realized by David Fincher (Seven and Fight club), the video and the words, pay tribute to the biggest names of the American cinema in an outburst of glamour.

Out of concern for illustrate the atmosphere of a song, Yohann Lemoine alias Woodkid, realizes the clip visually very strong of “Iron”, whom he besides wrote. Scenes of epic fights and apocalyptic vision in black and white, to strengthen the intensity of the piece.

Finally, I must evoke the videoclip of Night 17 - 52 (Christine and the Queens) realized by The Barbarians. We find the attractive Héloïse Letissier, in the intimacy of a hotel room, interpreting 4 roles of a complicated loving closed door, whose the emotions express through a pallet in black and white.

The black and the white, paradoxically, is not an attribute of past, he continues to inspire and to occupy the artistic landscape, thanks to some artists using his esthetic, sober, powerful, elegant and timeless at the same time.

Writing : Linda Chaabna Translation : Lanciné Kouyaté Layout : Axelle Port-Lis

RECbyIPE Linda

The theme of this issue is : Achrome. But it is difficult to find a recipe of a dish in black and white! I therefore had the idea to associate two ingredients, one dark and another clearer: chocolate and vanilla, which for sure, will delight you: a pound cake with chocolate chips.

No need of scale, everything is measured with container and cups. This cake is delicious for lunch, for brunch or as a snack with a coffee.

IngrEdients 4 eggs 1 cup of sugar 2 cups of flour 1 cup (250g) of soft semi- salted butter (taken out in advance) 2 coffee spoons of baking powder 1 coffee spoon of natural extract of vanilla 1 cup of chocolate chips

Preparation Preheat oven to 350 Fahrenheit or 180 Celsius.

Beat the eggs and the sugar until the mixture is well sparkling. Add gradually all others ingredients in order. Finish by adding a cup of chocolate chips.

Pour the dough onto a large piece of waxed paper (baking paper) and fire for approximately 45 minutes. The pound cake is cooked when picking with a knife, it get out clean .Take out from the oven and taste it when it is cool.

Have a nice feast!

Writing : Linda Chaabna Translation : Madjiguène Diop Layout : Axelle Port-Lis

Fotofibre Cushion “Château d’Eau Van Horne” - icon of Montreal

Doudoulab Doll made of recycled fabric

BEDROOM

iLikeMaps Quebec Map Poster

Zatdesigns Throw pillow & cushion : Charlie’s wife, a posh patterned home decor pillow

Cyandegre Black cat silhouette polka dot decorative hoop Writing & Layout : Blacky Gyan Translation : Anne Solange Diène

Iris Van Herpen

Dress me in 3D!

What in common has a case of Iphone, a lamp, a cup of coffee and a bikini? Well, they are all objects of which a marketable version was manufactured according to the 3D impression technique.

This technology, qualified a true industrial revolution, is used in various industries such as car, medicine, deco-art and textile! In development since the Nineties, it makes possible drawing objects on a screen to then send the 3D file to a special printer. Plastic, metal, ceramics, wax and organic matter are more currently used to print than paper. Then, sleep by layer, until the final part is obtained, materials are printed. Besides, polyamides and resins are some of the plastics used as a base for several 3D printing techniques, and gives the possibility to have masts or shiny finishes and as often seen, black and white ones.

Iris Van Herpen

This technique allows a quasi-unlimited possib of creations in which the form’s constraints almost non-existent. The most whimsical forms be created, which lends itself particularly wel the high-seam in fashion’s world. In 2013, Ger creator Pia Hinze produced a polyamide dress insp of the Baroque architecture, of which the forms textures are almost impossible to produce with fab The architect Francis Bitonti and the creator Mic Schmidt collaborated to create the famous dress Von Tease worn in 2013. The Dutchwoman Iris Herpen proposed a complete collection of dresses w futuristic hints mixed with traditional fabrics and printing technics for her spring-summer parade 20 Even Victoria’s Secret launched out in this ave with angel’s wings designed for its annual proces of 2013.

Dita Von Tease - création de Francis Bitonti Michael Sch

Victoria’s Secret

If this technology still seems to be a matter of science fiction, it would not be surprising that it becomes more and more appreciated by the fashion’s industry. Although the materials used are still restricted, research in the field progresses to be able to reconstitute various textiles such as leather. Nevertheless, it should be said that it is not for tomorrow that one will be able “to get dressed in 3D”, but this technology could bring a lot in the next years, for example, by structure and volume effects. For now, one will have to wait by watching the Fashion’s week podiums!

Writing : Julieta Rosibel Translation : Alanie Genest Layout : Axelle Port-Lis

Ritchie White As we are focusing on black & white in this issue, isn’t it a good idea to talk about this incredible person whose last name is White and who designs black, white, and black and white sunglasses? Ritchie White is a young ambitious man from Baltimore, Maryland USA. He is only in his 20’s, but he has already managed to build his own business to which he gave his name. “I’ve been designing pretty much since I was young, but I made it into a business in 2013,” Ritchie says. “It’s a functioning business; so every morning I check emails, check for any orders that may have been sold overnight and I go straight to business man mode.”

According to him, his day as a designer consists of meetings with his staff, doing the inventory, ordering supplies and fulfilling orders, and working with customers. “My everyday isn’t consumed with designing,” he adds. “I’m inspired everyday but I don’t do the act of physically designing every day. I take my inspirations and lock it up in my brain for later.” To become a designer, Ritchie did not have to go to school or take courses on designing. He has been self-taught. “I just threw myself into it,” he explains. “My main motivation was just my love for fashion and my love to create.”

As his designs are primarily in black and white, Ritchie says to love the clean and pure look of white, as he also loves the deep and mysterious look of black. “It fits anyone,” he says. According to him, black and white are the basis of art in relation to color. He believes that black and white were the first two colors of existence. ”You can’t have life, visuals or any aspect of artistry without the black and the white,” he adds.

Some designs by Ritchie White

nd black a ls a t s y r c ith black w e m a r f eye spikes.

Black cat-

White

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er di amo AB c nd frame rysta with ls. white

sar cry e l c h it rame w tassle. f e g a nt e uare vi e sued q t i s h e w t i d a Wh tals an

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ls. ar crysta le c d n a hite pearls w h it w e ram Cat eye f

Round f rame w ith blac k skulls .

Writing : Myriam Annick Tchameni Layout : Axelle Port-Lis

DENIM with

AmĂŠlie Joncas-Flynn by

Xavier Montpetit

1

Black or white - Michael Jackson

2

Ebony and Ivory - Stevie Wonder & Paul Mc Cartney

Impossible to start this playlist without mentioning the king of pop! “No matter we are black or white” according to MJ, who plays on the double-meaning of its words. Does he speak about his physical transformation or generally about human beings? It does not matter! We all danced and sang on this hymn to the tolerance ultra-rhythmic which remains one of its biggest tubes.

According to the former Beatles, People have to imitate the piano keys, blacks and whites (ebony and ivory, in the title) to live in harmony. Simplistic? Maybe, Nevertheless the title sends some shivers and at the time of its release in 1982, was censored in South Africa where the Apartheid was rampant (abolished in 1994 only).

3 Black celebration - Depeche mode

Opening title of the album of the same name and giving the tone (dark)) of this 5th opus.

Always captivating, the Gore duet will know how to make you a follower of their ‘black mass’ and you will soon be converted to their dark music.

4 Nights in white satin - The moody blues

Song which I discovered thanks to the soundtrack of the movie Casino. A soft slow dance inviting us in a soft night in sheets of white satin…assured sleepless night!

5

White nights - Oh Land

Sleepless nights that’s the point! The beautiful Nanna alias Oh Land tells us its sleepless nights but not without dreams in this cheerful pop air and girly. The song is familiar to you? It is normal, it was used in an episode of the series “girls”!

6 White rabbit - Jefferson airplane

This song is obviously a reference to Lewis Caroll’s Alice in Wonderland. Just like the book, it takes us in the dreamlike journey which makes Alice to go and get the white rabbit. Plus the psychedelic tones of the 60s.

7Back to black - Amy Winehouse

The autobiographical words of this song describe an Amy in the grip of an immense sadness, because she was neglected by her boyfriend for another woman. The singer, died at only 27 years, have known during her short life the glory and the success, but also the addiction to hard drugs. An artist crossed by the shadow and the light, as in the clip in black and white.

8 Tes yeux noirs - Indochine

All those (like me) who have dark eyes have dreamt the song was written for them. However I have neither the short hair, nor the muscular body of a boy

Iran Plata

Interview : Blacky Gyan Translation : Madjiguène Diop Layout : Joseph Barrera

B

orn in 1972, this painter-drawer and professor of painting and drawing obtained his degree at the Academy of Fine Arts “San Alejandro” in Cuba, in 1991.Ten years ago, he decided to move in Montreal with his partner and his children .Today armed of a joy procured by his new situation of Canadian-Quebecuban, he defines himself as an artist painter who likes challenges and likes to go the farthest possible thank to his imagination.

Interview of Iran Plata Fabregat, co-designer in visual arts.

What is your message?

To invite the public to develop their imagination by questioning the reality of the mysteries of life. To have a mind that is open and directed towards the future, and to better trust sciences and art to solve our problems. Frontiers are in the limits of our vision.

How does born an Idea? What is the inspiration for you?

The ideas are always here. The inspiration is when we discover them and we start working.

And what about painting?

It is the purest and the most selfless thing that comes alive from the human heart and in which a human keeps his best wealth. It is one of the ways humans could imitate God by redesigning reality.

In which circumstances the best ideas appear to you?

During the night because I am “nocturnal” What is your best proof to know if an idea is good?

It is never known if an idea will be the good one or not. It happens that an artist does an enormous work and people end up not liking it. The work should be done following our instinct without worrying about the perception of the public. It is only in this way that we will be able to achieve desired results.

Three creative ideas 1. Create black and white paintings with a little detail in color hidden somewhere 2. Put color, taking into account the contrast between complementary 3. Draw with chalk and any pencil directly on the gross canvas When and how have you started considering yourself an artist?

During the first year at primary school, when I realized my first drawing in front of a public Why do so many artists and designers have instable personalities?

The public never succeeds in knowing the personality of the artist because he lives in two completely different worlds. Most of the time, artists hide from the public to be able to create. When they are in their world, they are lambda individuals, but in front of the public, they are no longer themselves and they are what the public wants to see.

Do you consider yourself as postmodern?

If we enjoy the progress of technology, social networks, ..., then we all are postmodern today ….

How should a work of art be evaluated?

If we like it, as a precious object…

Should an artist reinvent himself every day?

Yes of course! An artist must have all the flavors, but he must surely not repeat them.

Which artists do you admire and in which way do they influence your job?

Henri Rousseau for his way of imagining nature without knowing it, M.C. Escher for the mathematical analysis of the reality that he does through his designs, Tom Wasserman for his way of putting down areas and colors, and Francis Bacon for the psychology of his portraits.

Is the authentic art the necessary art?

The authentic art is the only necessary one.

Is it difficult for you to separate yourself from a piece you have sold?

During my first years, yes it was! Now it is all the opposite. By looking at a work all the time, I keep looking for little details and I wonder if I should not have done it differently. Therefore, I prefer to no longer look at the painting when I finish it.

Do we buy the painting or the painter?

It depends on the interest of the buyer. On holiday, we buy paintings in order to have souvenirs. On the other hand, in order to invest money, a research on the recognized artists is needed.

In art, there is no guide. How do you know your next steps?

For the technique, there are guides that we follow at school for sure. However, the artist functions in his creative process, following his instinct.

Do you like the fact that a large part of works exposed in modern art museums are works made by dead artists?

Not at all, except if they are really good works!

There are a lot of artists’ works that should not be part of the contemporary art collections in certain museums.

Which of your works do you like better?

The one I am creating Do you collect some object?

All of my daughter’s drawings since she was 3 years old. Actually, she is 9. (Facebook : Lia-Project) What are your advices for beginners?

To draw every day You had several big expositions from 2000 to 2012 in the United states, Canada, Cuba, and England, …To see your works exposed, during your lifetime, in such prestigious places, isn’t it the dream of all

artist-painter?

I have been spoiled on this point, but it is insufficient. I want to conquer a bigger public around the world.

There are major themes in your painting such as the woman or the nature...Could you tell us more about it?

The woman and nature are mystic because they are the only ones able to procreate.

Grayness (Black and white) is very present in your works. Is it a pictorial technique that you appreciate more than others?

There’s no technique that I prefer. I like grayness as much as colors, depending on my ideas, on the messages to be conveyed, and on my mind at the time of creation. https://www.facebook.com/iranplatafinearts http://iranplata.virtualgallery.com https://www.youtube.com/user/iranplata

Alex Carignan

Who is he?

Alex Carignan is a 19-year-old photographer originally from Quebec. Born in Victoriaville, Alex moved in Montreal a year ago to study Films at Saint-Laurent CEGEP. This young man seriously started photography in November 2013, after having bought his first digital camera. He says that he mostly wanted that camera for its ability to produce stunning images and videos.

His opinion on the black and white

Some photos from Alex Carignan The Quay “Taken during an excursion out of our hostel, in a poor neighborhood in Cancún, Mexico. These structures seemed to be in perfect control of the moment, and I could not help but to capture their beauty.“

“What I like about photography is that it allows me to both convey my vision of the subjects I photograph and capture their beauty,” he says. “I love the black and white when well used because I think it forces us to see an image differently, putting aside the eventual distractions brought by colors. The black and white allows us to focus on the contrasts and the light.”

Alex says not to love the black and white when used to cover up a mistake or for its “so-called artistic” value. For him, the use of black and white must be justified, and he affirms that he always shoots in black and white when he has the clear intention to show the photographs like that.

Aground

Sun

“This boat was rocking in the waves, offering an interesting subject at this sunset in Samara, Costa Rica.”

“My friend and travel companion found himself under the sun in this imperfect picture that reminds me that a clean lens is not always the best option.”

Sueños “Sweet awakening in La Fortuna, just a few kilometers away from Arenal volcano in Costa Rica.”

Interview & Translation : Myriam Annick Tchameni Layout : Jonas Simberg

Carolina Hanna

Who is Carolina Hanna?

Carolina Hanna is a 35-year-old photographer who was born in Montreal, a city where she still lives.

When she was younger, Carolina used to constantly be involved in some form of visual arts. She grew up making imaginary films, drawing or painting. It is when she became a teenager that black & white film photography became one of her favourite hobbies.

“Something about the classic look of monochrome film appealed to me,” she says. Carolina studied at Concordia University where she graduated from its Communication Studies program. During her studies, she focused more on film production with the dream of becoming a filmmaker. Unfortunately, she never realized that dream and ended up following a different path in her life. “Soon after graduating,” Carolina says. “I had my first child and I somehow ended up with a desk job - where creativity had no place.” Four years later, she had her second baby and was still working at the same place. “It was during this time that I decided to see if I could build my love of photography into a something more,” she explains. “I embarked on this new path, practicing, reading and learning every day.” After 2 years of working towards her goal, she left the security of her full-time job to pursue the dream of becoming a portrait photographer. “I continue to educate myself and practice daily,” she adds.

Her opinion on black & white “Black and white imagery has a way of pulling me in,” Carolina says. “It can evoke feelings in ways that can’t always be achieved with color photography. When done well, it is raw, emotive, and timeless and allows me to play with light and texture, creating a new level of feeling within my images.” As Carolina states, her goal as a photographer is to create an emotional response with her images, and with black and white, she feels like she has more control. “I can create a mood and bring the attention on the smallest details,” she adds. “I adore, and I will always adore a beautiful and compelling black & white photograph.”

Interview : Myriam Annick Tchameni Layout : Jonas Simberg

GaĂŤlle Lina

Some Photos by Gaëlle Lina The protector

Who is she?

Gaëlle Lina is a 25-year-old Canadian photographer.

Although she has always had an interest in art, Gaëlle has been doing photography for 7 years now.

“Everything happened by chance in my life,” she explains. “Photography came on my way when I was looking for a direction, a path that would lead me to an exciting life and that would keep me moving.” It is by reading, trying new projects and developing new ideas that Gaëlle finally found her path: photography. Gaëlle says she has always wanted to do fashion photography in order to work for major magazines, but another option came to her. “The real moments. The simplest, the most natural. It’s at that time that it became clear to me. It was what I wanted to do. The real,” she adds.

“To photograph the simple moments that remain the most intense. Going to eat ice cream passing through the railroad? Hair in the wind, intermingled steps, smiling to each other. People holding hands, lessons that are learned ... the elements are there. As long as there will be simple, pure and natural moments, I will always be motivated by the work I do. Capturing what the eyes see too quickly. To remind you that the most important moments of your life are those that occur at every moment of your lives. Cooking, taking a walk, awakening, a new life ... The inspiration simply comes from the love that invades our homes and our lives.”

Her opinion on black & white “What I like about black and white photos is that the essence of the image is not interrupted by colors, what remains is the emotion. No color, just a movement. A second, or more! The contrasts of black and white add the missing heat of color. Photos become timeless, free from everything.”

There is nothing Gaëlle finds unpleasant in black and white, although she also loves photos in color. As she says, “photos in color are a chance to photograph every detail, every color represents a reason to be, a concrete memory. It helps the memory to remember everything from the past. While the black and white raises emotion, the color brings it back.”

According to Gaëlle, this photo was taken during the celebration of love. Wishing to offer a photo shoot to a couple, the young artist asked people to send her their story. “When Caroline wrote to me,” she explains. “I have been strongly affected by the strength of their love during sickness. After more than 30 years together, she has been diagnosed with a cancer of the lymph nodes. I did not hesitate for a second, I wanted to capture this palpable love they had for each other.” Gaëlle says the photo shoot with them was filled with laughter, tender moments, and gazes that were expressing the gratitude of being together. “Another moment that made me understand the extent of my work,” she adds.

Hands “This picture was taken during a moment between my grandmother and my son in the holiday season,” Gaëlle says. She found it interesting to see their hands together. “My grandmother has always been a very important person in my life and I promised myself, when my son was born, that he will know her as much as I do. I want him to enjoy every moment with her and to learn from her knowledge. I want him to let her guide him a little way as she did with me. I want this love to be transmitted during moments as simple as this one.”

Life This photo represents a good friend of Gaëlle and her family, a family that Gaëlle admires for its simplicity. As she describes it, children are children.

A mother who is mother, carrying the next child. A father who is father. A life that is beautiful and soft. For her, this photo represents each person naturally.

“The wind seems to be palpable, visible.

It blows in the love that emerges from that family, gets rich, becomes heavy and fills the faces of people walking around with its harvest. The inspiration of this photo came to me from there.”

The line As the artist describes it, this picture represents a walk taken during the hot month of June. “Small wind.

Family filled with laughter. They are beautiful, they love each other. They are inspiring. The walk, the train, ice cream, homecoming and moments full of natural. The exchange of knowledge, cries, and daily moments caught on the fly, captured on the spot. All one behind the other, on line towards another moment.”

The break “It’s raining, there’s water everywhere.

The dress is white, the evening just started. Should we stop at the subway? We take 5 minutes, we kiss, and we let the time pass. This is what happened during this photo shoot last October. A simple photo that shows exactly what love is. Simply.”

Interview & Translation : Myriam Annick Tchameni Layout : Jonas Simberg

Magdoline Youssef

Knock and It Shall Be Opened Here is the first picture in Rome, Italy. “It gives me a lot of peace for some reason, even if it is a closed door,” Magdoline explains. “It is as if I am Alice in wonderland, and I am going to open that door and find a new happy world in the back of it. The round handles seem old, but also beautiful and eternal.”

Who is Magdoline Youssef?

Magdoline Youssef is a 35-year-old professional photographer. From Alexandria, Egypt, she moved to Montreal, Canada at the age of 12. She has been offered her first manual camera by her father when she was 12 years old, and she then developed a real love for photography. She took photography classes in high school and went to Dawson College where she obtained a DEC in Professional Photography in 2001. On top of several group exhibitions, Magdoline have had 5 solo exhibitions, the first being held in 2001 and the last this past May. She also has her own company that she has been managing since 2009.

Her opinion regarding black and white photos “I love Black and white photos. But it is too bad that nowadays it is not like the good old time with films and dark rooms. We used to stay hours there to get the perfect print, but now with the new digital cameras and programmes like Lightroom and Photoshop, you could get a good black and white picture. In my last exhibition, I had a lot of black and white pictures. It looks pretty good even with the new technology. Honestly, I don’t dislike anything about black and white photos because they hide all the defaults, get the good parts out, and give a feel of timeless photos.

Samples of her work As an artist, Magdoline claims to have had a hard time in her personal life. During that period, she went to a trip to Italy to take pictures. “I took almost all the pictures in black and white,” she says. “I found at the time that it got my emotion out and made me feel better.”

The Open Door The second picture is also taken in Rome, Italy. For Magdoline, the doorway with light on the other side means that one should never give up because there is light on the other side. The black and white, she says, makes her feel amazingly comfortable. “I love this picture because at the time of that trip, I was really despair,” the artist explains.

“But going to take picture in Rome was my therapy, and that one, because of the light, made me feel better. It made me feel like there is a way out and it is the way you look at things that makes it all better.”

Closed

The Door

The third picture is no longer from Rome, but from old Cairo in Egypt. “That lock is very rare and old, I found it very interesting. The look of the door itself was also very old, it makes you wonder who and what happened behind that door, especially because the door is from an old church in old Cairo and this area been persecuted though the ages.”

The last picture is from London. “The look of the door makes me feel like I am in a fairy tale land, and I love the fact that I don’t know what is inside. It gives me a lot of peace and comfort.”

Interview : Myriam Annick Tchameni Layout : Jonas Simberg

Shelby Leigh

Who is Shelby Leigh?

business. “I’m actually an introvert by nature,” she says. “So this was a huge jump for me, and I couldn’t be happier that I have taken it.”

She feels that,

based on her clients’ feedback, she has been able to bless others by capturing moments that otherwise might have been forgotten. She says that her clients have trusted her to capture moments from births, to engagements, to weddings, to retirement ceremonies, and every moment and milestone in between. And in return, she feels blessed. “Some personal smaller achievements are having some of my images be featured in a pageant and in a contest for POSE Magazine,” Shelby adds. “I’ve also earned a couple of Top 10s and Features in various photography groups online, and although those all come secondary to my family and client work, I do

Shelby Leigh is a 35-year-old photographer who lives

like that others in the photography industry have

in Montgomery, Alabama. To become a photographer,

recognized my hard work.”

Shelby claims to have been motivated by the desire to capture, in a single frame, the landscapes and all of the beauty that God has created. “I have

Shelby’s opinion on black and white

been pursuing photography actively for about 4 years as far as trying to gain as much knowledge

“When

and experience as I can while maintaining my first

photograph their clothes. But when you photograph

priority: motherhood,” Shelby says. She has been

people in Black & White, you photograph their

taking pictures of events and images for friends

souls.” –Ted Grant

long before then, but just casually. When Shelby

“This quote has inspired me as I do have a deeper

graduated from The University of North Carolina at

sense of feeling and mood when I see so many

Chapel Hill, she did not have photography as a career

black and white images,” Shelby explains. She

in mind. She considered photography as something

acknowledges having seen people critique high

she could do after she has bought her first DSLR.

contrast black and white as well as the grayscale

“Since then, I’ve chosen to be self-taught, as I do

in photos, and she says to honestly like both types

feel that photography is so subjective,” she adds. “I

for different reasons. “Often times, the heavier,

have taken online classes, read books, and played a

moody images cry out for high contrast to me,

TON with my camera in Manual, which is pretty much

while the grayscale images are lighter and have

all I shoot in.” She says that she enjoys natural light

a softer feel about them,” she adds. “Even now, I

photography, and that she has also recently found

can conjure up feelings towards both types of black

herself actively pursuing studio photography as well.

and white images as there is such a connection

“One day, I hope to specialize in maternity, birth, and

with black and white.” Shelby loves images based

newborn photography, so having the knowledge of

on feeling. She says that some images “feel” like

both natural light and studio will come in handy.”

black and white to her, while others can scream for

you

photograph

people

in

color,

you

color. “I guess that’s why I enjoy being an artist,” Shelby feels that her biggest achievement so far has

she says. “I get to choose what I like based on my

been to step out, to take a risk, and to start her

personal perception of what I want to capture!”

Sherfy Pour R Magazine De Laura Bonnieu

Sherfy est une photographe de 27 ans basée en France. Elle a commencé la photo à l’âge de 12 ans. Elle raconte : « Au début, bien sûr, ce n’était qu’appuyer sur un bouton d’un compact. Je déclenchais à tout va. Toujours en cherchant l’originalité du point de vue, le jeu de lumière et la spontanéité de l’action. » Son père lui fait cadeau de son vieux réflex argentique à ses 17 ans. Elle commence à s’intéresser à la technique des réglages. Après le lycée, elle souhaite faire de sa passion son métier et intègre une école supérieure d’art où elle passe 2 ans à exercer son œil et sa créativité.

D

ans la photo, elle aime capter des moments de la vie. Elle explique que ce qui l’attirait, « c’était la recherche du détail, de ce qu’on ne voit pas forcément au premier coup d’œil ». Elle voit la photo comme une échappa-

toire, une façon de se changer les idées, de s’évader et de se calmer quand elle en ressent le besoin. « C’est aussi une façon de me rassurer en me cachant derrière mon objectif dans des moments où je ne me sens pas

vraiment à l’aise quelque part. »Sherfy photographie en argentique comme en numérique.

Elle s’intéresse à tous les domaines de la discipline excepté les reportages de guerre : « Je n’ai pas le mental pour ça. »

En ce qui concerne ses maitres, elle est sensible au travail d’Henri Cartier Bresson. Elle découvre une grande partie du travail de l’artiste en feuilletant un livre à son nom. Ce mythe de la photographie du 20ème siècle a été une de ses sources d’inspiration depuis toujours. Pour Sherfy, « la vie se dégage de ses clichés… ! ». Elle aussi souhaite capter l’émotion, capter l’instant… Lorsqu’on lui demande l’œuvre qu’elle préfère chez l’artiste, elle est indécise tant elles sont nombreuses. « On trouve chez lui beaucoup de mouvement, mais aussi de l’amour, de l’humour, il traite du social sans trop de sérieux… » J’avais envie que Sherfy nous raconte l’histoire des clichés qu’elle nous a sélectionnés.

Est-ce que cette série était préméditée ou est-ce que c’était sur l’impulsion du moment ? « Les clichés de gouttes d’eau, je les ai pris en me promenant.

Sauf celle de la vitre, il s’agit de ma cabine de douche (rires). C’est d’ailleurs la seule que j’aimais plus en couleur, car il y avait des tons froids et chauds en même temps qui me plaisaient. » « Ce qui me fascine dans les gouttes c’est leur fragilité et en même temps leur force : elles peuvent rester suspendues ou simplement garder une forme, alors qu’un rien peut les détruire.

Et ce qui m’attire aussi, c’est la lumière qui se réfracte dedans, le reflet qui s’en dégage. »

noir et blanc. « C’est dans le but de jouer sur le temps, une façon de balancer entre l’ancien et le nouveau. »

Sherfy a choisi de travailler cette série en noir et blanc. Pour elle, ce n’est pas qu’un choix esthétique, celui-ci « met en valeur la matière ». Il permet de pousser davantage les contrastes. Elle explique que pour un portrait, il y a souvent plus d’expression qui en ressort. Le choix de la couleur ou du noir et blanc dépend, selon elle, de ce que l’on cherche à faire passer au public. Nous avons tous une sensibilité propre. « Comme dit, si je cherche à mettre en avant la matière, j’ai tendance à choisir le noir et blanc. Si je cherche à montrer de la douceur, je vais choisir plutôt la couleur avec des teintes pastel. Si je cherche à montrer le vivant de la nature, le printemps, un coucher de soleil, etc… forcément ce sera en couleur. » Sherfy travaille actuellement sur un projet mêlant photos couleurs et photos en

La photographe a beaucoup de projets divers et variés en tête…

Elle explique qu’elle manque de temps (et de financement pour certains) afin de les mettre en place. Elle reste vague sur son futur artistique tant que les choses ne sont pas concrètes. « Juste pour répondre vaguement, je dirais que les projets sur lesquels je travaille particulièrement en ce moment sont : un départ à l’étranger, un thème en rapport avec la mode et un autre dans le milieu culturel du spectacle. »

from passion to professionalization meeting with two photographers quebecers dominique bouchard & daniel nobert

We don’t often see them near their works.Photographers.Who are they? What do they do? How do they work?

I had the luck to be photographed by two of them, Dominique and Daniel and to discuss with them.

First of all, you have to know that it is not their core business.

Interview & Layout : Blacky Gyan Translation : Madjiguène Diop

D

Photo : Dominique Bouchard Model : Émilie Roy

ominique : He explains me how he “falls” into the photography at 13 years old.

In fact, he has started to create pictures a little bit by obligation, because following a broken leg; he had to choose a course for the purpose of replacing the one of physical education.

He developed therefore his negatives in black and white and made his own enlargements in darkroom. Later on, he took other courses on the web.

D

aniel : Photography is a passion he has developed from its earliest stages, unfortunately, his reduced mobility and his obligation to take an anticipated retirement have been trigger points to professional practice.Therefore, for seven years, reading books, viewing of videos, practice of different modes-and far from least important –master of main inherent techniques, are part of daily life of this autodidact.

Photo : Daniel Nobert

Now, Dominique is endowed of a certain technique equated to a second nature and completed by an artistic side he developed in his daily life. He pays an admiration to the masters: Joe McNally ,the famous international photographer who combine 30 years and more than 50 countries in his achievements and Ansel Adams ,the ecologist author of photographies in black and white of west America and of the vary famous Moonrise, Hernandez, new Mexique. He tries to show trough the photography of beauty and fashion, the aesthetic of the woman in all ways and colors.

Daniel, on the other hand, appreciating the work of the famous Canadian photographer Hiedi Hollinger known for her portraits of the intelligentsia of Yelsin or the American portraitist Richard Avedon with his countless works in black and white, seeks an expression, an emotion through the look which explains

that he has a preference for the portraits.

Even if Daniel prefers to be chosen and therefore, don’t formulate any demand to photograph his subjects, the fact remains that both are now very solicited for photographic sessions.

Dominique mention:”It is not always easy because I have a lot of demands but I can’t accept all of them.

As the work occupies the large majority of my week, I have less time to devote to the elaboration of concepts and to the research of new places to do outdoor sessions. I should, in the future, be more selective and do little less sessions to spend more time to find interesting concepts and thereafter concretize them”

Photo : Dominique Bouchard Modèles : Tony Allaire et Chloé Fleury

Finally I asked to both why the choice to make black and white very often and what do they appreciate in this technique.

Dominique : “Some pictures are more beautiful and artistic in color; others in black and white. I accept that for 40 to 50% of the pictures that I retouch, I like to make a black and white version. Black and white pictures are timeless and classic” Daniel : “All pictures can’t be used in black and white .I appreciate the light and the contrast with which I play and also the effect given”

Photo : Daniel Nobert

In Dominique’s studio Brand: Nikon Camera, focuses, computers, accessories: 3 professional devices of 36 megapixels phy

1 converted device for infrared photogra-

1 array of focuses of pro category Studio Flashes branded Elinchrom mobile flashes of power supply for the external Elinchrom Tripods Umbrellas Softbox Ring flash Ring light fluorescent Backdrops Laptops Computer(PC) he has built by himself to have the speed needed to work with files of 36 megapixels Software: Adobe Light room and Photoshop

In Daniel’s Studio Brand: Nikon Camera, focuses, computers, accessories: 3 Reflex DX 1 compact numeric 7 focuses Nikkor Manual Flash softbox Promaster 180,speedflash Nikon 1 reflector Tripods Software: Photoshop, Lightroom 5, Corel Paintshop Prox4

VICTOR VASARELY : The Father of Op Art Victor Vasarely, French artist of Hungarian decent, is a leading figure of Op Art.

What is Op Art? Op Art stands for optical art. It is an art movement that started at the end of the 1950’s. However, it wasn’t until 1964, after the New York MoMA exhibition “The Responsive Eye”, that the term was officially coined. This exhibition propelled this abstract art movement in Europe and in the United States.

CHARACTERISTICS Op Art is characterized by the technique developed to create movement in the art piece and plays on the fallibility of the eye. Op art works give the impression that they are moving. They rely on optical illusions, thus destabilizing the eye of the viewer. The observer immerses himself into the painting at the very first glance. He is the natural motor of the artwork. That’s how you make art accessible to everyone! The viewer questions his reality and feels a sensation of dizziness close to unpleasure. Yet, he stays captivated, almost absorbed by the phenomenon. Op artists play on visual perception and show that our senses are not always reliable and that they can be duped by illusions.

These artists have revolutionized art, making it accessible to everybody. By putting the viewer at the heart of art, Op Art became the predecessor of contemporary art. Its success was planetary; even fashion and design industries took inspiration from this movement.

TECHNIQUES To create this illusion of movement, artists use different artistic techniques such as lines superimposition and colour contrasts or weaving. A depth almost tangible takes form. The artwork seems to vibrate, to undulate and to slip though it is completely static.

Who is Vasarely ?

Victor Vasarely was born in Pécs, Hungary, in 1906. He pursued his academic studies in medicine before applying in Fine Arts and later at the Bauhaus school in Budapest. In 1930, he moved to Paris and worked as an advertising designer for an agency. He was already interested in optical effects and kinetics, and with time, he rediscovered painting and abstract art for which he has always had an affinity. Inspired by cubism and surrealism, he engaged himself in 2D graphic studies dominated by lines and checkerboards during a period he would soon call “fausses routes”. It was in 1938 that Vasarely painted “Zebra”, a set of lines from which two embossed zebra seem to come out. This canvas is considered today as the first Op Art work. « Every form is a base for colour, every colour is the attribute of a form. » Vasarely’s sojourns in Belle-Isle from 1947 to 1958 and in Gordes would forever impact his art. During his stay in Belle-Isle, the artist developed his own abstract style.

He transformed raw materials into abstract materials and he would used geometric shapes, mainly ovoid, which illustrated “the oceanic feeling”. He worked on his own abstract art model using a minimal number of shapes and colours.

From there, Vasarely would further explore these ideas. He first concentrated on the creation of monumental art pieces and later on kinetics, which give the illusion of an animated canvas or an illusory movement.

The artist further explored kinetics with his work “Tribute to Malevitch” (1952-1958) by creating a visual illusion where the square shape would transform into a diamond shape.

In the same way, Victor Vasarely started his “Black and White” period in 1954-1960, thus, creating black and white grids. He was not the first artist to work on the concept of movement and optical illusions, but Vasarely was always pursuing new possibilities.

Later on, in 1973, he brought back colour into his work. He created an alphabet of elementary forms and a range of colors with their degrades shades that he called “Planetary Folklore”.

Preoccupied with philosophy and humanism, the artist created the Educational Museum in the palace of Gordes in 1970 and founded the Vasarely Foundation dedicated to the beautification of the «artificial environment» in 1976. This foundation’s goal is to promote the artist’s belief of a ‘city of tomorrow’ where art and architecture coexist to provide «art for all».

“My goal was to create a common art treasure accessible to everyone, for the physical and psychic good of the humanity.” (Vasarely – Expo d’Avignon 2003) The artist died in Paris, in 1997, at the age of 91 years old.

Focus on his Black and White period “White and Black make the maximum contrast. […]

The same composition in white and black automatically give me a second composition in black and white. Both works are qualitatively equal, identical and diametrically opposite, like mirror-images.”

– Victor Vasarely Vasarely’s Black-White period started in 1954. He dove back into his graphic and linear work as well as his undulated deformations. His binary compositions of black shapes on white backgrounds and/or white shapes on black backgrounds formed the basis of his research.

Black and white geometrical shapes accentuated the illusion of movement, creating an optical vibration. This period illustrates the apogee of the Op Art movement.

“The challenge is no more the heart, but the retina; the beautiful mind becomes the subject of experimental psychology. Sharp black and white contrasts, the untenable vibration of complementary colours, the flicker of rhythmic grids and shifting structures, the optical kinetics of plastic components, many physical phenomenon present in our artwork which role is not to amaze or immerse us into a sweet melancholy anymore, but to stimulate us and procure wild pleasure.” Victor Vasarely Fondation Vasarely : http://www.fondationvasarely.fr Written by Laura Translated by Jayne Mandat

Lutheen

Science is to art as black is to white?

Science and art are two cultural fields considered to be

servation and curiosity. In our childhood, we systemat-

transcendental for our evolution as society and as in-

ically explore our space, start experimenting, testing,

dividuals. Their similarities and differences are under

sensing and learning new things. Soon after, at school,

constant debate, but more recently, another concern

instructors perform activities that assist to stimulate

has arisen: the need of reintegration and revitalization

these innate abilities, encouraging us to become artists

of this two disciplines in the context of the global edu-

or scientists; or in the worse scenario, frustrate them

cative system for the sake of human and natural kinds.

so by the time that we reach an adult age, we sadly find science and art tedious, boring, unreachable or simply

At some point of our lives, in our childhood to be pre-

negligible. Under this context, we can see that the com-

cise, we unavoidably feel attracted to many types of

mon issue is a poor educational approach that has been

artistic expressions such as singing, dancing, acting, or

tolerated for decades.

painting. We are born with an ability of creation, ob-

Intuitively, we also learn that science and art are “opposites”. Science is objective and art is subjective. Another example of “antagonistic dualism” is the concept of black and white. From a scientific perspective, black and white rely on the concept of light.

White “color” is the result of the superposition of all colors in the visible range of the electromagnetic spectrum, while black is the result of the absorption or absence of light. From an artistic point of view, black and white are seen as colors that can be applied to artwork in order to create and denote emo-

“Science provides an understanding of a universal experience, while arts provide a universal understanding of a personal experience.”

tions, amplifying an experience of reality. In fact,

Mae Carol Jemison

thanks to expressions created through colors, art stimulates and generates more thoughts while permitting open-minded discussions keeping the mind free and promotes ideas, creativity, multiculturalism and therefore tolerance. If we lack art, we are destined to rely only on our education on how to be

to cut budget to culture, education, and science

individualists, materialists, or competitive. We must

fields while they prefer to “invest” public money

recall that competition is the principle of any war.

to develop “security” resources or modern lethal weapons. The state must warranty the access

One barely recognized astronaut, Mae Carol Jemi-

to art and science, and create more spaces for

son, the first African-American woman to travel in

freedom. We cannot skimp on resources for a

space in 1992, claimed that: “Science provides an

real education that promotes collective work,

understanding of a universal experience, while arts

harmony, recognition of differences. We must

provide a universal understanding of a personal ex-

achieve a coexistence between the humans and

perience.” Mae, who holds nine honorary doctorates

nature, and that can thrive by science and arts

in science, engineering, letters, and areas of human-

in synergy.

ities, proposes to teach arts and sciences together1.

She considers that science and arts need to be revi-

1 http://www.ted.com/talks/mae_jemison_on_

talized in sync.

teaching_arts_and_sciences_together

As a society that is self-aware, we must be more

Special thanks to Caroline Noel for grammar

implicated about our immediate future. What we do

checking :)

right now is going to be our legacy. We must be attentive about the “brilliant” proposals of our politicians

Rédaction: Ivan Alejandro Velasco-Davalos

DARKNESS AND LIGHT: AN ANAPHORIC POETIC ESSAY ON LIFE I’m a giant child who has grown elegantly. I love music, which is my lovely life companion. Men and women will decide if my holy writing is something they can handle. I write to coddle, heal and speak to the deep soul of my readers through their ears. I am first and foremost a musician; I have a very keen inner voice, which can explain why I can write literally in such a warm and abstract way, wisely and gloomily, but safely. Like most poets, I don’t consider my literary approach as being artistically pleasant and easy to live with. I’m at a loss of excuses for being who I am, for being an artistic Christian and for being a simple Quebecer from a family that is neither rich nor poor. I am not into obscure writing; I’m into clear sightedness. That’s all. Let’s understand my vision of black and white that I will get into through the analysis of the power of darkness and light, a simple portrait already embraced by the science-fiction series Star Wars.

I’m only at the beginning of my artistic career and my Christian life. Black and white are not familiar to me because my subjects are normally about colors.

My hair dye goes from grey to purple and yellow/ blond. On the other hand, I use a lot of dark ink on white pages, which leads me to explain to you my sentimental position on the effects of black and white in a polyvalent and stable point of view in our lives. Let’s start with the living story of black, a shade that has been giving our unconscious a rough time in many ways. Darkness: this is what we call this colour more often than not. This, however, makes the situation pretty sad when we think that way for most of our life. This absence of colours will be thought as being the champion of obscurity. Obscurity is to succeed, in a psychic way, to lower the radiation of light, the pure whiteness, thus dashing the duality.

Yet, if we mix both, they become grey.

Of course, I’m talking from the point of view of a painter, because there is nothing to fear from the opinion of a coloured artist. We can find this conscious analogy of grey flesh in the emotional colours of the face. Our visage is the route of light. Bright thoughts illuminate our face (which is what we can relate my radiant face to), while dark thoughts fade

goodwill, and so does the empathy in the physiognomy. So, how can we sufficiently perfect ourselves to radiate like diamonds and not let obscurity banish it?

An answer was given to me: arts.

To produce a masterpiece. But which one? And above all, which one can we take inspiration from, and which one can speak to our heart? I discovered the painter Rembrandt, who made several fairly simple portraits; but how can we betray our simplicity without looking inferior? Among his paintings, we can find his pieces Les Trois Croix, and Adam & Eve in the Garden of Eden. One can ask oneself: what’s the point of reusing the same subjects the Bible has already given us, and not being anything more than seated flesh in four centuries old portraits? That is why, today, we search for what comes from the youth and from our generation, as if the past was just an old hard disk of humanity’s history. I call on us to rediscover our Christian brothers, to discover the poetic path, which they’ve embellished with their creative fire. Nowadays, we are in an ephemeral system, which massively cultivates feelings of darkness, the extreme half-light of our higher selves, until death takes away our privilege to suffer. Anything that can make nature darker makes it dirty and pollutes it.

We don’t want the remedy, we want the poison, and we want to see the beauty poisoned, until she fades and is replaced by death. Think about sick people.

From the adoration of darkness naturally emerges the Goth culture: the look of a burnt sad soul, free to become gloomy because of the bitchy life demon’s dark energy. There is a certain splendour in sporting the prism of our ideas on us, dressed like queens in castles transcending the abyss, but glorifying it by sadness. I adore the Gothic style, but I find that sometimes, it’s tearing our hearts out when we only see dark; so dark that in seconds, it takes me into a Goth neurosis.

There are also all kinds of fetishisms; the last advertising poster for the Fetishism Festival reminded me of them, where women were dressed in black leather

latex. Sex is vampirized to empty it from its beauty, thus, making it disturbing and sombre. To domesticate a human being to make them a slave of shortlived and ungraceful erotism is a fine skill that a lot of money eaters have perfected. Let me tell you, we live without mental anguish until the day we realize that visiting the holes of our heart is a lot more inappropriate and forbidden than visiting the hole of the fertile pussy. This is what the powerful and non-domestic illusion keeps resorting to in our inner selves. I don’t have anything against sex, but everything against the money machine that will cause us worries in the future. The clothing of predilection is a subject that has surely been discussed.

Now, let’s talk about the role of light through these existential anaphoric passages. The white light can

lure all the devils and chop their heads off. Nothing can resist to this illuminated alive thing that bravely goes over the Earth to give the impression of dust in a man’s spirit. I am not happy with the condition of the Earth, but I think that talking about obscurity can help let the world’s perfect condition transmute us into something great and diplomatic, but nonetheless respectable. I don’t know where we will find the courage to get through the times that are coming, but it will be necessary to have a great story to tell our guides, to illuminate the Earth and to give birth to its point of light for it can become so immense that when facing the darkness, we can stand firm like indigo rays and let the Father lead us to his castle of flowers and clear sightedness.

Writing : Alanie Genest Layout : Blacky Gyan

Aure-Elise Laforgue

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NIGHT SHIFT: THE DARK SIDE OF THE FORCE I

t’s an immersion. Practically an intrusion in this dark and unintelligible world for some people. How the night shift can be exercised despite of the conventional rhythm of the human body? People who work applying those hours give sometimes more to others…And they are just rarely rewarded. They are doctor, barman, policeman or even prostitute. Ungrateful jobs where people you are facing are sometimes demanding, sometimes insensitive. They are fuddled, aggressive or lecherous …But rarely thankful. Violence is an integer part of their daily nocturnal life. Sometimes, some good meetings recall to those people used to the darkness the need to exercise this job yet so difficult to assume in some cases.

When the sun let his place to the moon, when the sidewalks of the city are only lightened by the lights of cars driving at break-neck speeds and the pallid lights of public lighting, when the children sleep and most of the people go home snuggling in their cozy

THIS MASK, ESSENTIAL, IS MOST OF THE TIME THE OPPOSITE OF WHAT THE CONCERNED PERSON IS, TAKEN IN A KIND OF DUALITY OF PERSONALITY, TO BETTER MERGE IN THIS STAGGERED MASS, HOSTILE AND THREATENING.

house, some wear their outfit of work . Not in the literal sense of the term.

Like a mask, a protection against this world where partygoers meet lovers, where the more drunk digest propping up the bar in a pub, whereas others fight on a crossroad for a futile reason.

The one work to divert his pairs faced continuously to human excess, obliged to have believe to an undeniable sympathy. He knows everyone, everyone knows him. Everybody greets him in a misleading upsurge of solidarity.

The other endorses a uniform worn proudly as a sign of dedication to the Nation and to the protection of his countrymen, in finish more often against themselves.

The third heals the ills and collateral damages of those night escapades that finish bad, sometimes helped by his colleague with uniform, who knows…human misery is part of their daily life and empathy is their best ally.

Finally, the last wear his most beautiful clothes in order to bright on the sidewalk because his body is his employer .He will have to follow the whims of his client and to comply with their demands without falling off, because letting their guard down, giving up would it be of one centimeter, is losing the face on this piece of bitumen who serve them as office…

Is it possible to exercise those jobs without friends and family turning back? Is it possible to live “ as everybody”?

How do people perceive their past, their present and their future?

What are their regrets, their wishes or their dreams?

Writing : Jean Vigo Translation : Madjiguène Diop Layout : Blacky Gyan

Lucie Barral

In

black and white,

all colors match

Can street art forget about colors? Looking at the colorful murals that flood our cities, one might think of black and white as too limiting to express one’s creative potential. The range of possibilities is wide and even more so when exploiting the chromatic circle. Nevertheless, some artists choose to minimalize the use of colors and absolutely want to immortalize their work in monochrome.

And what about Bansky? His works speak for him.

Is it necessary to add the red blood that has been shed to fall into sensationalism, when the simple sight of a girl flying over the wall separating Gaza from Israel with a handful of handballs is much stronger? The artist-activist acts anonymously and maintains the same efficiency. Sometimes, colors come into play, but in a sober way. The rat, his totem animal, is an illustration of this minimalist

To restrict oneself? That is not the case, and many are the artists who prioritize black and white, starting with Miss’tic. You can come across her stencils at the corner of many streets in Arles and Paris. They are sometimes humorous, sometimes romantic and they are often accompanied by a sweet and fun pun, which is her trademark. Her favorite Latin heroine’s face with a dark look has been questioning us for twenty years without ever tiring us.

England is no different with the enigmatic Phlegm, who is currently based in Sheffield. His slender figures are stretched out on the walls of cities, disturbingly glancing here and there. With spiders and crocodiles devouring strange men with long legs, his installation in London is also deprived of color. In these three-dimensional decorations in the manner of Escher, there is not a shadow of an ocher, but only the disturbing and surreal atmosphere of its black and white universe.

touch, the discrete witness of the events of our time.

Behind some names are also hidden communities of artists for whom black and white is already a vast playground for pop culture. The Canadian collective En Masse proves this through its vigorous and graphic murals. Founded in 2009 by Tim Barnard and Jason Botkin, and surrounded by a team with a wide variety, En Masse is a research laboratory where each artist explores and acquires new skills, and where everyone’s identity is melt into common frescoes. The black and white street art takes the place it deserves; visible in bars, it even pushes the doors to the city’s headquarters.

Among those who stand out the most is MAZ PAZ with his ethnic style, an unconscious inheritance of his Colombian origins that can be sensed through the generous lines of his graphics. Occasionally, he also uses color, but when offered the possibility to freely copy and distribute his message of peace through his website, he does so in black and white.

Finally, there is already so much to say in black and white that color would only take the viewer away from the target, whether it is a political slogan or a simple catchphrase. No need to drown the graphics in color; the message is sufficient to

«In black and white, all colors match.»

Francis Bacon

express and reflect the diversity and contrasts of our society. By themselves, black and white create a broad spectrum of tones.

C I T ' S S MI ce) n a r F ( s i r a to P

Web : missticinparis.com Facebook : Miss Tic - Officiel

t c e j o r p M G HLE

P

a i l a r t s u A s o l i s n grai

Blog : phlegmcomicnews.blogspot.ca Facebook : Phlegm Instagram : phlegm_art

Y S K N BA

Web : banksy.co.uk

EN

t c e j o r p E S MAS

l a e r t n o ence - M

d i s e r ĂŠ t i Parc

Web : enmasse.info Facebook : EN MASSE

Z A P S MA

Web : maspaz.co Posters, stencils or stickers : maspaz.co/diy Facebook : MasPaz Instagram : maspaz

t c e j o r p E R A D E R l a A e r t D n o M n o i t t sta n e r u a L St

Web : www.dare-dare.org Facebook : DARE-DARE

Writing: Karima Kebabi Translation: Myriam Annick Tchameni Layout: Laura Bonnieu

Lucie barral

Ju-Jin