Pop'Africana III

www.popafricana.com

Pop'Africana II

 Photographer: Oroma Elewa

Stylist: Opa Majek

Model: Atuai Deng

Make -up artist: Lauretta Mccody

Pop'Africana

The African Diaspora's style magazine launches its second issue...

 Following a debut issue that was warmly received in the press and beyond in 2010, Pop'Africana, a publication "dedicated to delivering a rejuvenated image of Africans," is rolling out its next edition with features on the likes of fashion designer Duro Olowu, chef Marcus Samuelsson and model Nina Keita. The New York City-based art and fashion glossy strives to break clichés that continue to corrupt thinking about the second-most populous continent.

Editorial director Oroma Elewa, who founded in 2008, is working hard to change popular thought cultural vehicle showing the vibrant contemporary side of the diaspora rarely seen or appreciated in the West.

Ikechukwu Onyewuenyi, the magazine's Nigerian-born communications director (also a recent Cool Hunting contributor), explains it as "our opportunity to share the inclusive vision we have for Africa and Africans wherever they may be," adding "a vision that we hope will continue to engage and inspire.

Read about them in their own words!

Oroma Elewa
I have always  been  drawn to  certain elements and ideas of beauty or
style like the beauty of a line, a curve, handwriting, colour, shape,
space, textile, facial features, silhouettes, photo compositions like the
ones created by  Seydou Keita and Thierry le gous or the composition of
visionaire.
So, It is only in line with whom I am to create a magazine that will
explore individualism and the alternative.(http://oromaelewa.blogspot.com)

Tenne Fatona - "I'm just a dream whose intentions are good"
The magazine immediately came across as a rule breaker, which moves away
from clichéd African stereotypes and I needed to be a part of it. It the
holy trinity of magazines - sophisticated, eccentric and alluring. The
attention to detail and the fresh perspective it reflects onto the readers
is  unlike no other. The List goes on -  These are just a few of the many
reasons I was wooed into being a part of the Pop'Africana movement, and to
think this is just the beginning...[http://www.mrmadeofcodes.com/ ]

Jennifer Nam- “the fine line”
As a child, they called her the “ugly cousin.”  Now, her clients are
begging,
“Make me look like you!”  The now-without-a-doubt beautiful Jennifer Nam is
knocking ‘em out with a style all her own.  A broadly talented artist, Nam
is more than capable of creating the uniquely sophisticated, the beautifully
the traditional and the edgy.  Not bad for a gal who got her start as the
unofficial makeup artist/stylist for all the young ladies at her military
high school… now, that’s hot and even hotter is that I am working with ultra
talented Oroma and Pop’Africana.

Sam Coffie – “POPAFRICANA and me”
Fashion rules many things around me as it represents a feeling, a movement,
a sense of something I believe in. As  I do in POP’AFRICANA, thus proving
why I joined the family. As much as I would like to explain who I am, I would like you to
grow with me and who I become. One thing to know, is that we should always
know MORE… That is why POP’AFRICANA is here, lets explore it
together.

Chukwuwike Obi
Always viewed as weird due to his sense of style . A style that has landed
me a chance to report trends to the world through Pop’Africana
Pop’Africana is who I am, has been and will be always be. it is the future
and is going to be the  global style guide for Africans.

Check out Pop Africana The Website & Oroma’s Blog.

Needle Body Mapping

Katie Lewis: 201 Days, pins, pencil, thread 

Katie Lewis: Tangled Pathways, pins, enamel, thread

 

Katie Lewis: Accumulated Numbness, pins, enamel, pencil

Katie Lewis: Process of Accumulation, pins, pencil, thread

 

‘My current work traces experiences of the body through methodical systems of documentation, investigating chaos, control, accumulation and deterioration. The artificially rigid organization of my materials alludes to control– of the individual body as an institutional domain, and of irrational experience as a manageable, concrete set of events.’

‘My choice to use the body as a starting point aims to give visual form to physical sensations that are invisible to the eye and medical imaging, and only exist in the subjecetive realm. I collect data through daily documentation processes, and then generate numerous systems to allow the information to exist in a material form. I abstract and quantify the data in order to give authority and agency to subjective experiences.’

‘The work alludes to the body in certain pieces, through the text or a particular material, but the reference remains abstracted. By abstracting and codifying the work, I want to evoke a sense of the passing of time, accumulation of information, presence and absence, chaos and order, control and loss of control and the possibility of the system collapsing upon itself or reaching a breaking point.’

‘Once I devise a system for a particular piece, I follow it all the way through the work allowing the visual results to exist outside of subjective expressive decisions. By strictly following and never veering from a given system, the work is tightly controlled and asserts itself as accurate and authoritative (however false and unscientific), questioning the gap between a subjective experience and medicine’s conventions for understanding the body.’

‘The work is often organized into grid-like charts and diagrams mimicking science and medicine’s representations of the body as a specimen, visually displayed for the purpose of gaining knowledge. In this way I create distance from the information and objectify the experience, giving a false sense that the body is accessible and easily understood.’

http://katiehollandlewis.com/

Elisabeth Lecourt

Elisabeth Lecourt b.1972, France. lives and works in London. Studied at Kingston, Central Saint Martin's and the Royal College of Art.

Cephalopod

Chelsea girl

Reglisses roulees

 

 

 http://www.elisabethlecourt.com

Defining the Indefinable

Mapping and cartography are emplyed as mechanisms for exploration: the jacket can map the body, time, culture, politics, technology, gender and psyche. Cartography as a term relating to the body will be explored as a catalyst for the design process and the acquisition of tailoring knowlege.

Mapping:
In geomatics or geospatial science and technology:
Mapping usually refers to map-making and often used instead of cartography. Mapping term is also sometimes used for geospatial data collection (e.g. LIDAR mapping) but in fact it is not mapping because a map is created from some cartographic works (i.e. determining the scale/level of detail and content of map database, entry criteria and symbol specification for geospatial data, layout design etc.). In other words, the acquisition of data with (geographic) coordinates directly from terrain or imagery does not mean mapping but surveying.

Diasporas: 

A diaspora (from Greek διασπορά, "scattering, dispersion") is "the movement, migration, or scattering of people away from an established or ancestral homeland" or "people dispersed by whatever cause to more than one location", or "people settled far from their ancestral homelands."

Cartography:

Cartography (from Greek chartis = map and graphein = write) is the study and practice of making maps. Combining science, aesthetics, and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality can be modeled in ways that communicate spatial information effectively.
The fundamental problems of traditional cartography are to:

• Set the map's agenda and select traits of the object to be mapped. This is the concern of map editing. Traits may be physical, such as roads or land masses, or may be abstract, such as toponyms or political boundaries.
• Represent the terrain of the mapped object on flat media. This is the concern of map projections.
• Eliminate characteristics of the mapped object that are not relevant to the map's purpose. This is the concern of generalization.
• Reduce the complexity of the characteristics that will be mapped. This is also the concern of generalization.
• Orchestrate the elements of the map to best convey its message to its audience. This is the concern of map design.

"Romek extends his musings beyond Posner's, to Stellios the fishmonger's, O'Rourke's hardware and Bosso's workshop. Where is it they come from? yes. carmigano de Brenta. Posner had spelt it out. Posner knows the details as hairdressers do, knows that Giacomo had arrived in Melbourne in 1951, and Gina in '53.Knows that Gina had voyaged halfway around the globe as a proxy bride to marry a boy from the same town, the same street. Skilled artisans, determined workers, they had landed on their feet; fellow country man Mick Tallon, the shoe repairer's one block removed, who tends the soles of numerous shoes that pound Carlton streets...
She hesitates then quickens her step over Curtain Street, past the Kent Hotel and Chris, the Cypriot greengrocer with the black moustache. She pauses by basso the Tailors', where she dicerns the outline of the tailors dummy through the thin fabric of the shopfront curtain, and catches the drone of sewing machines through the half open doors.
Giacomo and Gina -  he the cutter, she the finisher - are a formidable team. Zofia admires their industry, the appareant harmony between husband and wife. After all, tailor's dummies, measuring tapes and spools of thread are her concern... She is back in Goldman's workshop, Kasimerz, 1935"
'Scraps of Heaven' Arnold Zable.