Life360 Issue1 2012

Issue 1 february 2012

Street Musicians Born this way

Sneak Preview

A personal journey to ‘Cardiff before Cardiff’

Book or Kindle A difficult choice

Kill the Bill

Debating Internet Piracy Bollywood

ACTA

Oscars

2012

NME

awards

CD

&

Film

Editor’s Letter Dear reader, Welcome to a brand new year, and a brand new issue of Life360 Magazine. With a whole new team and a refreshed look, we’re ready to offer you a whole range of articles on a variety of topics. This issue is all about the Arts; great interviews, in-depth features, and hot reviews of the latest music and films so you know what will be worth spending your hard-earned money on.

Make yourself a nice cup of tea – it’s still cold outside! – grab a biscuit and have a read.

Love, the Life360 team

Inside cover made by: Danny Connor

Arts and Culture Special Edition Issue 6 Feature Book or Kindle?

Suzan Hijgen spotlights the new innovation that’s taking the literary world by storm.

8 Feature

Xiao Cao explores the grit and glory of busking

Cardiff before Cardiff

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Life in every issue 4 News from the scene 5 @ Life SOPA and ACTA up yours!

6 Feature Book or Kindle?

8 Feature We just love music 10 Interview Jon Pountney discovered Cardiff before Cardiff

12 Reviews of what’s worth mentioning

Contributors Suzan Huijgen, Shavy Malhotra, Magda Anna Lusinska, Cassie Gao, Xiao Cao Designers Paul Dharamraj, Davina Ogwu, Shen Wu, Oda Gilleberg, Segolene Scheurer Publishers Alex Thackrah, Marcela Kunova, Tanika Godbole, Yanfei Ding, Shu Liu Photographs KellBailey, Leasabattoire, John ‘Pathfinder’ Lester, Toolmartin

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London displays Japanese Polka Dot artiste

Summers collaborates science and art

The Tate Modern has honoured 82-year-old Japanese artist, Yayoi Kusama by displaying her art of vast and complex works in pink and white polka dots. The New Paintings exhibition was opened on February 10, 2012 to April 4, 2012 at the Victoria Miro gallery, London.

Queen’s Diamond Jubilee comes up with a new festival, WAM- the Reading Festival of Weather, Arts and Music, collaborating science and arts for the first time and run from June 1 to June 3. For details long on to http:// www.wamfest.co.uk/

London Olympic Portrait London-based artist Wendy Elia will paint the special Olympic portrait. About 100 posters will be produced to be displayed around Weymouth throughout the Olympic Games. She is looking for a model who can make viewers feel and think.

Local artists’ Art displayed

Online Art exhibition

Ferens Arts Gallery in Hull opened an exhibition on 11 February to public, displaying the art of nearly 700 talented local artists.

Most of the artwork like paintings, pastels, photographs, prints, sculptures, textiles and ceramics are on sale ranging from £12 to £10,000.

Lights Space and Time have posted the February 2012’s ‘All Women’ exhibition onto their website. This month the online exhibition is by women artists only and contains open subject theme. To proceed to the gallery’s “All Women” online juried art exhibition, open the link: http://www.lightspacetime.com/all-women-art-exhibition-february-2012.

Who will be the biggest winner?

by Cassie Gao & Hannah Cao

The announcement of the 84th Academy Award’s nominations list has been top news for weeks. The big suspense is over who will take home the Oscar award on 26 February.

Matin Scorsese’s 3D masterpiece Hugo has received 11 nominations, which makes it a promising winner, followed by the silent film The Artist with ten nominations. And Meryl Streep has received her 14th nomination for the best female actor award.

4 Britain and the Oscars

In terms of British films, last year’s The King’s Speech still remains memorable. This year, the BAFTA and the Oscar nominations favoured another made-in-Britain film – Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. Being nominated for Best Actor, Best Writing – Adapted Screenplay and Best Original Score, the film has once again shown the British film industry’s talent and skills.

Adapted from John le Carré’s novel of the same name, the book tells the story of a semi-retired espionage veteran George Smiley who is asked to uncover a Soviet agent in

MI6. Unlike some other spy films, this film recreated the gloomy Cold War atmosphere very well and dug into its characters’ inner world.

In recent years, British films have gained praise for painting conventional British scenes, bringing British characters to life and delivering British culture. Yishi Zhang, an editor of Chinese film website mtime.com shares her opinion. “I love British film, it certainly has got depth, and I also like the tone when they talk.”

Behind these films, the UK

Film Council has always been supportive. But unfortunately, due to financial reasons, the UKFC was shut down. Its duties will be passed on to the British Film Institute. Whether BFI can efficiently back up British film industry and keep this golden age going remains question.

The 84th Academy Awards will be held at midnight (UK time) in the Kodak Theatre.

Let’s wish British films the best of luck!

@ L i f e

Piracy, piracy all around!

by Suzan Huijgen

The start of 2012 has been dominated by discussions of internet piracy, copyright and censorship issues, and the end is not yet in sight.

A small victory for the internet community was celebrated when the controversial American legislation proposals commonly known as SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act) were shelved indefinitely in response to overwhelming protests by internet users and companies alike; the English language Wikipedia website went dark for an entire day.

However, you don’t have to be a genius to know they will probably change and rename the laws and try again when all the commotion has died down.

Also, a similar piece of legislation called ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement), which is aimed at the protection of intellectual property, has already been signed by most major countries in the world, including a large part of the European Union.

Public outrage at the hush-hush way in which these decisions were made, has resulted is mass protests all over Europe. In some cases this has resulted in an indefinitely delayed domestic implementation of the law

Tweeting trouble As for censorship, micro-blogging service Twitter has recently introduced a tool for country-specific censorship, to accommodate difficulties some countries might have with certain applications of the service.

For instance, Brazil is happy with this provision because it will allow them to prevent Twitter users from spreading warnings about traffic police operations. South Korea in turn is using the tool to block a North Korean Twitter account used for propaganda.

While these can be argued to be justified applications, the tool’s use in Thailand, China and Iran are more disturbing, and will severely curb one of the few methods of free speech the citizens of these countries have. Whether Twitter is overstepping its moral obligations here, is up for debate.

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Changing the fabric of books

L i f e Feature

Have the e-readers won the battle with tradition?

Since their introduction in 2007, e-readers have taken the world by storm and are here to stay. However, not everyone is pleased with the coming of Kindle and friends.

Suzan Huijgen

Booklovers against… booklovers

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The pioneer in this field was Amazon, who launched the Kindle brand that has now become almost synonymous with the word e-reader itself. When you look at it logically, you can’t deny the simple appeal of the Kindle: it’s economic, light and can hold hundreds of books.

However, books are not a purely logical thing. Their countless worlds, characters, lie close to our hearts. While Kindle enthusiasts mainly zoned in on the new possibility of reading what, where and whenever they liked, the opposing group thought – and still think – that the feel and smell of a book greatly adds to the joy of reading it. For them, the ease of a Kindle can never make up the loss of the paper brushing against your fin

gertips. The difference of opinions has sparked a heated debate, pitting booklover against booklover.

“It drives me mad when people look down their noses at great, solid books”, says shop assistant Olivier Hermans (24).

“Where’s the fun in holding such a thin piece of plastic, when with a thick, good book you can just feel yourself working through it to the end”, he marvels.

Daunt declares war Another traditionalist is James Daunt, the managing director of British bookstore chain Waterstones. He recently did an interview with The Independent news

International Data Corporation (IDC) released a study in March 2011, stating that worldwide ereader sales had reached a total of 12.8 million in 2010, 48 per cent of which were Kindle e-readers.

It’s safe to say that the Kindle is a dominant player.

Creating an all-new budget Kindle model for less than £90 could certainly access a new group of people who previously considered it to be too pricey.

One such person is Lucy Partridge (19), a student of Neuroscience at Cardiff University, who thinks the new model is good value for money. Her plans show why this new market Waterstone’s James Daunt

In this war between the paperback and the e-the reader, no one knows who the real winner will be.

Personal reasons, such as the ones given by James Daunt, are hardly enough not to embrace this latest literary innovation.

But I suspect that, though we can’t see it now, there must have been people in the 15th century as well who opposed the printing press and supported traditional copyists instead. But the printing press began a literary revolution that changed the way we read, and still read books.

paper, in which he called Amazon a “ruthless, money-making devil”.

Clearly, he strongly disapproves of the way the internet book-retailer operates, and fears that it will put regular bookstores out of business.

He hopes to counter this by marketing Waterstones to what he calls the “serious reader”.

This near-apocalyptic literary scenario has been kicked around since the Kindle really started booming in 2009. However, this idea completely Bulky books are an easy fit on a Kindle neglects our hardcover aficionados who have remained firm in the face of the e-book wave, and whom Daunt himself supports. But more importantly, it forgets the people who just haven’t made up their mind on the issue yet: there are those who just don’t read much, those who were more technologically driven and wanted to wait out the system glitches, those who thought the price was a bit steep (and it was), and those who still can’t be fussed either way.

A very Kindle Christmas It is this last group of people that has been targeted by Amazon in the past holiday season. For the first time since its launch, you can get a Kindle in the UK for less than £90.

Amazon clearly aimed for the Christmas Kindle gift, strategy they are now prolonging for Valentine’s Day – though electronics and romance are admittedly not an obvious combination.

The exact results of these campaigns will be difficult to see though, as Amazon never releases specific sales figures for the Kindle. But we can hazard a guess when we know that in January 2011, Amazon announced that for the first time they had sold 115 e-books for every 100 paperbacks. Also, the

Innovative Kindle: light as a feather, easy to use 7

We just love music

L i f e Feature

Xiao Cao

They may not be trained, they may not have talent or even have their own instruments, but they express their passion through their voices. They are street musicians-live art on the streets of Cardiff seems like heaven to all buskers.

W

hether you’re on your way to work, shops, back home, or simply wandering in the City Centre, chances are you would have seen atleast one busker performing on the footpath.

Some have complained that buskers spoil the appearance of a city and should be forbidden. But there are more people agreed that buskers are a part of a city’s culture. Cities like Sydney respect them and even build special stages for them to perform—this

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Sean Swanko plays his accordion in the underground passageways near Cardiff’s City Centre

Actually, if you put yourself in a busker’s shoes, you will find that their lives are not easy.

They do not do this for big money and will be there even though it’s rainy or snowy. Here are two stories of buskers from Cardiff, who tell you what they strive for.

cessful and left aside. I tried to do it on my own and do bigger things.”

Dane started busking three years ago, to save up for his bigger dream to travel the world and experience different music cultures. “I like country music very much, and that’s why I want to go to Australia because the music there is brilliant, or even America and Canada.”

Music pursuits that never stop

“Busking is going well and it gives me courage to push everything out there. I should just go for it, because everyone is so kind,” he adds, referring to his busking experiences.

Dane Lloyd, 24, lives in a small village called Oakdale in South Wales. He is a musician and plays guitar and sings. “I have a music dream. But trying to get it, I did all the things, like recording an album and cooperating with a band, which was unsuc-

Dane plays on Queen Street in Cardiff every Saturday. He plays both pop song covers and his own songs as well. Though the former are more popular, he insists on playing a certain number of songs he wrote.

“I know people are more likely to listen to

During Christmas time, Sean would play some Christmas songs with a specially-prepared Christmas hat.

He would stand up and say “Merry Christmas” to others when he saw someone enjoying his music.

pop music that they’re familiar with, but when I play my own ones, they like it as well,” Dane says.

It looks like he has already gained his own fans as well. He even has his own Facebook fan page.

“He’s good looking, and has a good voice. I really like him,” says Jessy, one of the girls who stopped by and sang with him.

“I’ve seen so many buskers on my way here but he is the first one that makes me stop.

Maybe I’ll buy his album, if he has one,” she adds with a laugh.

place to play,” he says.

Sean received his accordion seven years ago and it has accompanied him through some important moments.

“When I first came here, I didn’t bring so many things, but I brought it. When I was sad, or didn’t feel well, or had a bad time, I wanted to play it,” he says. “It’s the same as now, I played here and I hope everyone listens to my song and can be happy.”

“Once, there were two little girls, really pretty, and they were dancing to my songs,” Sean says. “They didn’t want to leave. It’s really lovely and I will recognise them when they come again. And that is one more reason that keeps me doing this.”

Sean is a worker, and his job has nothing to do with music. So he cherishes his life as a busker. His wife and children are all very supportive of him. “It’s not just about the money. You can see, I can’t make much money from busking. But I just can’t live without this.”

“I’m not going to stop doing this, I was born for music,” Dane, who participated in this year’s X-Factor and was in the last 50 in Wales, says. He wasn’t too happy with his result even though he got to the fourth round.

“I love to write songs and I’ve got good responses from busking,” Dane says. “Seeing people sing my lyrics back is so good.

I don’t exactly want fame. I just want to live constantly with music.”

Enjoy every second with music Sean Swanko, 52, plays accordion in an underground passageway near the City Centre in Cardiff. He lives quite far from it, so it takes him a long time to come here to busk every weekend. But the long distance cannot stop him from playing. He comes in the afternoon no matter if it rains or there’s worse weather.

“I have my own shelter, so I won’t get wet. And there are more people who pass by here, they will all hear me. It’s a great 9

Life Interview

Cardiff before Cardiff

A photographer from Roath rescues a stashedaway photo treasure from the 1980s

By Magda Anna Lusinska One year ago, when 32 year-old Jon Pountney found the first stack of hidden, old photos and negatives, he didn’t know that his life was about to take a 180-degree turn.

The much anticipated exhibition of the Cardiff before Cardiff project will take place at the Wales Millennium Centre in April.

There is fate behind it A few months ago when Jon was looking to rent a work studio, he visited Warwick Hall, up in the Heath.

“As well as renting a studio, I took over the whole building and I started renovating it,” says Jon. “The building was full of rubbish so it was quite a big task,” he says. But in the end, hard work was rewarded.

As Jon was checking the items, he kept finding odd photographs. “Odd in a sense that they were very interesting,” explains Jon. “They were taken in early 1970s or 80s, black and white, and were the kind of photography that I really love to look at and I love to take photos like that.”

He put the photos aside, and didn’t think much about them until the day he found around 250 photos and thousands of negatives in the loft.

“I was lucky because a few of these photos have a name stamped on them,” says Jon. “Keith S. Robertson was the guy’s name.”

In order to find out more about the photographer and the subjects, Jon digitalised some of the photos and uploaded them on a blog.

“Also I wanted to put the photos online because they deserved an audience,” he says.

The Tumblr page was immediately picked up by the Western Mail and Echo, who ran a feature on it in March.

“Since then it has taken over my whole life,” says Jon. Precipitated response After a double spread feature in both newspapers, Jon’s project boomed, and an array of different blogs and websites wanted to get in touch.

“I was really shocked by the amount of responses I was getting. It was even covered by the BBC,” Jon says.

Jon continued his online exhibition, and in April, Jon was asked to talk about the project in the National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth, West Wales. This should prove to bring new people into the project.

“The audience was very complimentary and excited about it,” he says.

“The great thing about these kinds of talks is the feedback you get. People say to me, ‘you were destined to find these photos. If it wasn’t you, they might have ended up in a skip or they would rest in a cupboard for another 20 years’.”

Financial help is a dummy Despite the positive response, cultural or historical organizations were reluctant to help Jon financing the project.

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“I got in touch with Heritage Lottery Fund, but was told they weren’t interested in funding my project,” says Jon. “Then, I contacted the Cardiff Story Museum. They were even worse because they didn’t even bother to contact me back.”

Jon was very disappointed. He needed financial help to cover basic project expenses, such as buying film rolls.

“It is disappointing because this project has put 700 people in connection with the city’s history - only thanks to these photos, which are amazing.”

Jon acknowledged the fact that he would have to finance the project on his own.

Photos work as a time travel machine The people and the places frozen on the negatives came to life in front of Jon’s eyes every time he scanned them.

“I feel as if I travelled in time and took them myself,” he explains.

By accident, Jon passed by a barber shop in Splott, and he recognised it from one of Keith’s photos.

“I wondered if the barber inside was the same guy as on the photo,” says Jon, “and it was! He looked exactly the same but had grey hair. The shop and the rest stayed the same.”

Every day Jon receives emails or notifications about people who had recognized their family members or themselves in Keith’s photos.

Jon’s smile shows how content he is about rescuing the photographic time machine.

What’s in it for Jon The whole project has come to a culmination after one busy year, whichwas full of surprises. The project outgrew Jon’s expectations.

“It is a really nice idea but I don’t want to take all the credit for it,” he says. “It was Keith who took these great pictures 30 years ago, and now I’m reinterpreting them. In a way I feel like I took these photos as well.”

When Jon and Keith met, they were both really happy how the project grew naturally, bringing together older and younger generations.

Keith had thought his life’s work had ended up in a bin.

“Keith had financial problems and so he was chucked out of the studio.

People who used to manage it told him that they had thrown away all his stuff. When he found out that I had all his photos, he was absolutely overjoyed,” says Jon. One of the biggest achievements is the big exhibition, which will take place at the Wales Millennium Centre in April. Jon explains that it is going to be really huge, with two levels, proper photographic prints, newspapers and sets of projectors around the gallery.

“I have a lot to do, but at least I can’t complain about being bored,” Jon jokes.

He explains that the project not only put him back in touch with Cardiff, but has restored his faith in human nature.

“It is nice to have people who would come up to you and say ‘well done’,” Jon concludes.

The project made Jon realize that he wants to change his career’s path.

He discovered social documentary photography which, according to Jon, is far more fascinating than anything else that he has done before as a photographer.

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L i f e Review Shame Magda Anna Lusinska Great news for those who miss Shame in theatres, Shame’s DVD is expected in April.

Steve McQueen, Shame’s director, can be named a new Pasolini. The director embraces the scenes that unravel the fear of unknown side of humanity with instrumental music thus makes the film even more shocking.

The new versus the old Agneepath

Brandon (Michael Fassbender) is a successful, intelligent New Yorker who staggers through his life with an uncomfortable condition. He is a sex addict.

Bollywood’s Agneepath, premiered on 26 January this year, is a remake of the Agneepath produced in 1990 by Yash Johar. The new version features Hrithik Roshan in the lead role, together with Sanjay Dutt playing the antagonist, and Priyanka Chopra portrayed as Hrithik’s lover. Katrina Kaif has also performed an item number in the movie titled ‘chikni chameli’.

The situation becomes unbearable when Sissy (Carey Mulligan), Brandon’s little sister, pays him a visit. She destroys Brandon’s rigid daily routine. Her presence drives Brandon crazy and pushes him to the very limits of selfdestructive behaviour.

Shame is both brilliant and disturbing. The film unleashes the dark, crazed side of a human being. It will deliver one hundred most uncomfortable minutes in front of your TV, even if you watch it alone or, in worst case scenario, with your parents.

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Shavy Malhotra

Debutant Director, Karan Malhotra, has done a terrific job in producing a movie with an already exhibited plot and yet kept the soul of the movie intact. This revenge saga revolves around Vijai who is trained by a mafia boss in how to kill people. Vikai ultimately realizes his karma and tries to turn against the goons by taking revenge for his father’s murder from another drug mafia.

The movie has made record breaking collections at the ticket counter and has got good public response so far. The viewers can’t get enough of the lip-smacking dialog: “My name is.. Vijay.. Denanath.. Chauhan..”

Paul McCartney – Kisses on the Bottom Suzan Huijgen This long awaited record is McCartney’s 15th solo album, and is said to be the one he always wanted to make with the Beatles. The result is a collection of laid-back, jazzy covers of songs from his youth. Additionally, the record features two new, original tracks.

This album, released only last week, is perfectly timed for Valentine’s Day and is arguably the best soundtrack for some cozy dance moves with that one special person.

Paul McCartney’s voice is warm and smooth and, mixed with the soft music, makes you sway almost without realising it.

McCartney’s latest is firmly recommended for an occasion of easy listening, either with a partner or on your own.

You’ll even forgive him for the slightly corny cover picture.

“Kisses on the Bottom” is available both on iTunes, and in your local record store.

Mayday Xiao Cao

NME Awards 2012 is coming again this Feb! Weiran Gao

On 29th Feb, hottest bands and singers will gather around and perform a great show for fans in London.

Album: Second Round Performer: Mayday Released date: 16/12/2011 ‘Second Round’ is Mayday’s eighth album. The theme for this album is doomsday. And it involves discussion of attitude towards the end of the world; it arouses people to rethink the meaning of life. As the five members stepped into their 30s, the lyrics also reflected their understanding of growing up and friendship, in which the young generation might have a resonance.

The album has a new concept, but in terms of music style, it didn’t make a big break-through.

Some of songs even gave the sense of their old ones, which might be a regret of the 14 years’ band.

In addition, Mayday will present London a performance on 27th March at the Wembley Stadium, London. Check them out if you are interested in original and powerful rock.

Arctic Monkeys is leading this year’s NME by their 7 nominations.

Other nominees include Foo Fighters, Noel Gallagher and Kasabian.

NME Awards is founded by the music magazine, NME held its first award ceremony in the year of 1953, called NME Poll Winners Concerts. In NME history, it had highlighted music legends such as Beatles, Elvis Presley and David Bowie.

In recent years, Oasis, Arctic Monkeys, Coldplay and Manic Street Preachers all have won at least four awards.

Last year belonged to My Chemical Romance. Some music fans described their performance of their song ‘’Na Na Na’’ as “just came back from a bank robbery.”

Muse, this year, has been nominated for both Best British Band and Worst Band award. Quite a challenge, considering they hold the nomination for Most Dedicated Fans award.

Go to http://www.nme.com/awardsvote for your favourite bands or singers. Also, don’t forget to vote for the Villain of the Year.

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