500年前必有渊源

- photo taken in end 2008.

Dec 2008, I walked pass Suzhou Creek in Shanghai, and saw this stencil which stated: "Graphic Design, call 15926386911". Together with other typical stencil 'advertisements' at the back alley. I thought it was quite funny, that there were really someone out there selling design service like this. So I took a picture and uploaded to my flickr few months ago.

Yesterday, someone emailed me and told me that the stencil was actually done by him! That was his real mobile no, and he did that for an art show back then during summer 2008. By a very odd chance he was googling his mobile number and found a link to my flickr.


- the email.

Everything I Do Always Comes Back to Me. You never know what will lead to by some tiny things you did today, maybe life is still full of surprises... And the best thing is, we both share a same surname '卢' . Haha, like he said, maybe we have some affair in our past life ( 看来500年前必有渊源 ). Meet LuRui from Wuhan, China.



- encounter in 2010.

no surprises

A heart that's full up like a landfill,
a job that slowly kills you,
bruises that won't heal.
You look so tired-unhappy,
bring down the government,
they don't, they don't speak for us.
I'll take a quiet life,
a handshake of carbon monoxide,

with no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises,
Silence, silence.

This is my final fit,
my final bellyache

with no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises please.

Such a pretty house
and such a pretty garden.

No alarms and no surprises (get me outta here),
no alarms and no surprises (get me outta here),
no alarms and no surprises, please.

browsing copy

Last few weeks Roy passed me this book and got me to doodle on it for his 'Browsing Copy' project. The time line is really tight when it comes to me, so in the end I just go with the fastest method: cut, paste and spray. Since the original title is 'A Century of Thai Cinema', my idea was just to make the whole book feels like a movie countdown. Nothing marvelous...

Everything was a bit too rush, but I do enjoy the busyness. I should have think about more short term projects like this, at least I had a slightly more meaningful weekend.











For more browsing copies. www.browsingcopy.com

悲伤的采购

订了一季 又到下季

为何人大了就要成为工作的奴隶

最爱作的不可发挥

我的感觉 逐渐流逝

从前曾话过要如何欣赏世界的美丽

现在只懂得放假去消费

如果继续这样
我还是我吗 我还喜欢我吗

或者我应该死去吧
总好过变得更差

如果继续这样
你还愿意吗 和我奏着结他

日子不应该这样吧
而现实就是这样可怕

MLA x 林一峰

和四个美女在巴黎散步才是正经事

实在不想再留在新加坡做埋晒D不正经的事⋯
I just notice the uniqlock beside has changed theme again.
This time they are flying to Paris! Arc de Triomphe, Eiffel Tower,
Notre dame... I really have to leave this city soon.

for those who are sleeping

Back then in W+K Shanghai office, there is a comfortable cotton sofa lies right behind my desk. Everyday there is people hanging around behind me, chilling out, chatting, resting, or even sleeping. I used to take pictures of all these sleeping people with my instant mini.

Before I left the company, I decided to compound all these photographs into a tiny booklet (I love book), and gave out as a souvenir for my lovely friends and colleagues during my last day at work.

Some of them told me that they were really touched after seeing the book, even their eyes were wet. I felt so warm indeed... that was the first time I truly felt that design could really touch someone heart... Thanks for all the beautiful memories.

I will always miss you all, hope we can meet again real soon...


上海的哥们，请继续牛B⋯

柯德莉,关于风景

沒什麼秘密，
可以及現在更秘密。
月亮將下沉，
可是末日未會如常降臨。
看著天和海，
仿似連成一物，
但是不曾接近。
你像片大海，
柯德莉藍的海。
願望看著天，
包括樹木、唱片、
皮鞋、情侶、公路、
石頭、河流、商舖。

Godspeed You! Black Emperor

Godspeed You! Black Emperor is always one of my favorite post-rock band. Their band name is actually derived from a Japanese documentary directed by Mitsuo Yanagimachi in 1976. The movie started by following one of the member of Bōsōzoku - the Black Emperors, and his interaction with his parents, after he gets in trouble with the police...

I've been looking for this film for a while... and finally found it online!
Godspeed Youtube.

Everything is just the fucking same.

Different Names For The Same Thing
- Death cab for cutie

Alone on a train aimless in wonder
An outdated map crumbled in my pocket
But I didn't care where I was going
'Cause they're all different names for the same place.

The coast disappeared when the sea drowned the sun
And I knew no words to share with anyone
The boundaries of language I quietly cursed
And all the different names for the same thing

There are different names for the same things
There are different names for the same things...

Universal Everything

Amplifying. Exaggerating. Pushing the boundaries.

Universal Everything. Definitely one of the most cutting edge studio in the universe. I'd actually bookmark their project site - Everyoneforever at the bottom left menu since i started this blog :D I was in love with their stuffs from the first time I stumbled upon their website.

I always thought that such advance design studio must be teamed up by a huge bunch of great designers, animators, or even scientists. I was wrong, just found out that Universal Everything is mainly run by this one guy, with his laptop and mobile phone... unbelievable. Matt Pyke, the founder of UE, worked for The Designer Republic for 8 years, and started his own studio in 2004. He only hired a studio manager, and then work closely with talented people from different fields on different projects.

They always pushing the works to the edge, being different from the norm. I really love what he say about "I like not knowing about 3D animation probably... partly because I'm rubbish at it, and partly it keeps that childhood innocent... ". (Maybe simply because I'm actually doing web design now -_- but I have no proper knowledge in it as well, hehe...) Have a look at his lecture, very inspiring.


Also read his interview : Here.

the pursuit of happiness

It's Stefan Sagmeister again! Learned a new word today:
Sabbatical (n) - a period of paid leave granted to college teacher for study or travel, traditionally every seventh year. 休假年

This is almost my 5th years in the industry after graduated (although 1 and half year in between I worked as a freelancer together with Chris, and was doing my robonut stuff as well). There are officially 2 more years to go for me to have a good reason not working for anyone. Should plan ahead for this and we shall never give up on our personal projects =)

lovely malaysian designer / part2

Since I've already started the thread, and also added a new tag called 'Malaysia'. Let's talk about some more talented designers from Malaysia. (It's only up to my personal taste and knowledge, it'll be nice if you have any names to suggest, drop me a line.)


Kawakong / www.kawakong.com


"like the others, we have mission too. for us, design is categorized into two sections, 1.‘design for client’ and 2.‘design for us’; and our mission is to make the gap closer each everyday."

Kawakong just have their new site up! This lovely and incredible friendly couple really inspired me a lot few years ago. While I was just a fresh grad who only draw illustration/characters, and thought those were cool design! I got to know Chung and Ming around 2005, they commissioned me to put up their website by my very limited knowledge in flash... yes, I'm the one who did their v1 website years ago, haha... I was so impressed by their works, how can these people make those boring graphic design looks so good... and their personal illustrations too, which were so amazing.

I have to admit because of them, I started appreciate graphic design as it is. And slowly realize that Nice graphic ≠ Good design.

---

Alvin Chan / www.alvinchan.nl


This is a very mysterious man for me. I never heard about his name, only stumble upon his website via some design portals quite recently. Flipping through his works and his bio really gave me a shocked. He worked for Studio Dumbar, Koeweiden Postma before, and currently is a Design Director for Nike Europe in Netherlands. Impressive!

---

Tattfoo Tan / www.tattfoo.com

He called himself a social sculpture artist. Tattfoo is one of a kind that blurring the border between Art and Design. From what I know he used to lectured in Dasein long times ago even before I enrolled. He is currently based in New York, did a lot of conceptual projects and write a lots @.@ It takes time to understand the concepts behind each projects, but it's worth to look at all the interesting projects that he has produced.

---

to be continue...