29 Jan 2010

Artepreneurs? no1


Ever since Fox&Squirrel started to think of ideas to collaborate or to conjure up business plans, they were constantly bombarded with the same, boring condescending criticisms "creatives cannot manage themselves", "artists cannot promote themselves", "artists don't do business". Obviously these guys never heard of the famous Andy Warhol saying that 'art is business' or is it 'business is art'. Whatever the phrase is and regardless of whether you like Andy or not it is needless to say that art and business go well together and the past decades have proven this time and time again.

Because Fox&Squirrel enjoy monitoring these artistic trends and love presenting out of the box thinking we have decided to run a weekly editorial on the best and most recent specimen of how artists are amongst many things great business minds. Fox&Squirrel have coined them artepreneur!

The first we are presenting, is up and coming Wandsworth based- but not for long, he is moving out of suburbia- portrait painter Mr Ian Bruce. Ian has come up with an innovative scheme to paint portraits by using video chat program Skype. Skype portraits have allowed Ian to expand his clientele abroad as his portraiture method does not require his sitter to trek down to the artist's studio in London instead he can be at home, at work, in New York, in San Paolo wherever in the world at whatever time.

Besides posing as a great business venture Ian's skype portraits highlight how the internet will alter the way we experience art and contribute to future art trends. Bruce admits to Fox&Squirrel "I get a strange form of jetlag from painting the skype portraits as I have to work in New York time while painting in my London studio." To read more on how skype portraits will contribute towards to defining a contemporary art trend click here

Rumour has it there are some exciting developments to happen with skype portraits. Bruce promised he would tell us first

London Fashion News



Every year London Fashion Week throws up a bunch of young creatives eager to strutt what they have- and to be fair on the capital it does them justice. This year's new kid on the block is 'Miss Kiki Salon Presents...' a "collaborative concept designed to celebrate and promote the work of emerging artists, photographers, illustrators, poets, musicians, writers and philosophers in new and compelling ways."

Fox&Squirrel love collectives and pledge their full support for this porject.

Apparently "
the collective is growing and the momentum is bringing to light innovative ideas working on pogressive, mutually beneficial incentives. These range from pop-up exhibitions through to the creation of a fashion label based on extracting and abstracting artworks, creating a ripple effect of inspired collections of wearable art." Kate Burton, creator and director of Miss Kiki Salon Presents' told Fox&Squirrel that the collective has recently been described as the next Bloomsbury group. Just because there is a Virginia Wolf in all of us Fox&Squirrel have put together some pictures up of Miss Kiki Salon Present's latest collection 'Six Pieces'.

Check out the exhibition which opens on the 6th of February.