Today, I met Daniel Rhatigan at the St Bride Library DIY Design conference. While he was talking to Jackson about the Risograph, I couldn’t miss his silkscreeny tatoo and that brought us to discuss about his really nice typeface Sodachrome, which remind me somehow of Pierre Di Scullio’s Minimum in its bicolor version.

Sodachrome – initial ideas
The sodabudi ethos is the celebration of quirks and imperfections that are part of hand-crafted production. We wanted to develop a typeface that would benefit from these surprises, especially with the inprecise nature of screenprinting.
We liked the idea of creating a new chromatic typeface – consisting of two coloured shapes overprinting to create a complete character. This developed into overlaying two separate quirky shapes to create the illusion of a sans serif in the middle and a chunky serif on the outside.

On the second day I woke up late, slightly jetlagged (like I usually woke up earlier). Catch up with Gary, get to the restaurant of the standard hotel, exchange a few text messages with Estevan Oriol, wait for him to arrive to order our lunch. Estevan arrives, gives me a copy of his stunning “LA women” book, we exchange friendly introductory words on business, life, Hip Hop, Art and fashion while having our hamburgers. Then Estevan offers to take us on a trip to his shop “Last Laugh”. We accept, get to a pick up of a size probably violates any european limitation, drive through downtown as we discover Estevan’s taste for british urban music. Last Laugh is an impressively tastefully set up local where Mr Cartoon sells a selection of classic LA urban items such as pendelton shirts and customized baby buggies. A second room is dedicated to Estevan’s “Joker” brand and a backroom hosts a tattoo studio. We are introduced to Estevan’s exquisitely serviceable assistant Flaco and Estevan offers to take us to the infamous S.A. studio. Like degenerated Alices, Gary and myself fall through a delirious rabbit hole as Estevan drives through LA’s very own Skid Row, zigzagging among crackheads while Jamma’s sub-basses tickle our sinuses. As we park in front of the SA studios, I start to realize what SA studios are. Estevan and Mr cartoon’s office, but I am still very far from imagining what is coming next. As we enter, and roam the ground floor, Estevan introduces us to his own and Mr Cartoon’s collection of low riders. If anyone had asked me before that day if I had already seen a real Low Rider, I would have certainly negligently given the answer “yes”, but the truth would have been “no”. What the two european kids discovered there would probably a Dan Graham’s delirium tremens, but it most certainly was for the a dozen years of hip hop- and americano-mania’s (read: “obsession”) once-in-a-lifetime pinnacle. Then i notice that I didn’t take my newly acquired Mark II and that my old G10 is about to run out of battery. Shit

I must stop writing now, it is 100degrees Fahrenheit in NY, my computer is burning. The journey goes on, more soon.

Found Cris Anthon’s very good work on the very good Swallows & Daggers. Check him out!

“In the night of Brahma, nature is inert, and cannot dance till Shiva wills it: He rises from his rapture, and dancing sends through inert matter pulsing waves of awakening sound, and matter also dances appearing as a glory round about him. Dancing, he sustains its manifold phenomena. In the fulness of time, still dancing, he destroys all forms and names by fire and gives new rest. This is poetry; but none the less, science.”

Coomaraswamy, Ananda, “The Dance of Shiva; fourteen Indian Essays”, 1970, Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers, New Dehli.

I am in the middle of a pretty massive editing work on all the images I shot in LA. Just another preview to keep you waiting! (Shot at the AS studios, one of Mr Cartoon’s Customized vans and Estevan Oriol’s 64 Impala.)

Really. no need for an introduction.

The photographic work of a dermatologist in Lyons in the Thirties presented by Gerard Levy and Serge Bramly. Published by Kehayoff in 1999.

Larger scans of the last few pages which detail the Autochrome process that was used to make these photographs as well as thumbnails & notes for each picture are here.

Well worth a look at.

a little dedication to our benevolent hosts, and contributors Jason Farrer & Richie Rennt. And also to a pretty sick artist: El Monga