Not having written for a loooong time...Had to learn for an important test at University and passed it (grade A)! Really happy about this! That's one reason why I celebrated on Saturday like there has been no end! And the other reason is: I love to celebrate :)! We had our school leaving examination party (for six years in succession!) Too much beer and to little sleep... But hell...it was soooo much fun!!! Just terrific!
Ulrich Mühe died of cancer on Sunday. Really sad - he was a great actor. Maybe you have seen "Live of the others or "Der letzte Zeuge", a criminal series.
I feel really sorry for daughter and actress Anna Marie Mühe, too. Almost one year ago, she lost her mother already - from breast cancer. Makes me think of destiny...Perhaps our lives are predeterminded. No matter if you are living a super-healthy life or not. Thats's why living right here, right now is so important. Or as James Dean said: Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die today.
Thinking of the Suisse, watches, cheese fondue, mountains, cows on green willows, sweet and charming cities and slowly spoken dialect come to my mind. But there is more. A Suisse girl, for example. A Suisse girl who went to France to open her own atelier, called Locher's. Nicole Locher designes absolutely f***ing-innocent (take it textual) clothes and accesoires! She combains charming colours and shirts, necklaces and pictures as if they were right out an autograph book with rough sentences and allusions to sexual topics. Absolutely worth spending some money on a shirt or necklace, just forget the price ;)! Quality always cost!
On Saturday 17 the 38th Art Basel had come to an end. Galleries from New York to Tokyo over Hamburg and San Francisco presented their artists in three stupendous halls, hoping that wealthy clients (either affluent by having earnt the money themselves or affluent by having married into money) buy a piece of art from one of the uncountable modern artists, photographers, painters, ... In the end it's rather a question of money than a question of taste wether to buy or not. Walking trough the rambling floors of hall 2.0 and 2.1 reminded of a vanity fair of art collectors. Rich patrons mainly from America, France and Asia walking around the art pieces, talking about the art pieces and showing up their dresses, suits and most stylish handbags and sunglasses. Women in their middle ages strutting with their rich husbands and their children. Gallerists who are bored because their's no potential buyer for Takashi Murakami, surfing through the internet or writing instant messages like the Japanese ones, in between writing mails, chatting with well informed connoisseur of art about Thomas Struths' Museo del Prado to ascertain maybe that most of the people visiting the Art Basel 38 sometimes look at the paintings of Picasso, Max Beckmann and others the same way. So is it the fact that taking a photo of people in a museum, extend it to a maximum and finally hang it up in a gallery or at an art fair declares the photo as art?! Maybe. One reason e.g. a photo becomes art is by taking a photo of a normal scene and then put it into another context people are willing to think about. Another important fact is to create the ideal basic conditions, like where to hang up the piece of art, what the title is called, in what the art piece shall hang (a frame,...). If the art piece has something "strange" or "deranging" - good! Maybe it's just a lint (normally connotated with dust) that becomes a part of the piece - and part of art! 
Did you say to yourself "If THIS shall be art, than I can do this too!" or something like it by looking at the Atomimage2007 of Katharina Grosse in hall 1.0 - oversized painted ballons in various colors? Maybe. But the differnce between people asking themselves kind of these questions and artists like Grosse is : The artists did it! In the end, The Art Basel 38 was good art: Even though most of the showed artists were pretty famous, well-known and high-classed - Who does NOT know Gilbert and George, Kandinsky and other dead and still alive artits of ther modern??? The hall 1.0 with it's Art Unlimited was therefore qute refreshing - discussions about art, music and installations inviting people to active participation. But all the art from Ai Weiwei to Cyprien Gaillard over Trisha Donell can't repaint the fact that art and business are like twins, the one can't exist without the other (including the fact that I got blisters on my foots at the end of the day :))
P.S.: As usual, all photos taken by me :)
The cherry: I ate tons of this delicious fruit today. Do you remember the time when you played "cherry pit spit" with your kindergarden friends or in elementary school? It was so much time, and I think it's just as much fun today, as a "grown up person"! Or using the cherries as earrings...But beside of fun facts, Cherries have have several health benefits. They contain anthocyanins, which is the red pigment in berries. Cherry anthocyanins reduce pain and inflammation. Anthocyanins are also potent antioxidants. Cherries contain high levels of melatonin. Besides being an anti-oxidant, melatonin has also been shown to be important for the function of the immune system! And sometimes cherries look like they symbolize a heart and therefore love, so a picnic with a beloved person and cherries might be a romantic thing?! And if you are in Japan, the Japanese cherry blossoms, called sakura might come to your mind! Therefore, eat and look at these fruity fruits - they are healthy, yummy, maybe remind you of your childhood and look quite nice!?!
Yep, that's me biting in a delicious snack :). I've been a model for Pietro People. The ad was published in the great town magazin Fukuoka Now where I did my internhship in 2005...Come to Fukuoka when you have the time - it's definetly worth a visit (the really nice people there, Kyûshû, the surroundings of Fukuoka, Fukuoka itself,...!)I took the photo from the magazine, a not very good shot, I know...:)!
I love taking photos and I love editing them. Although I am teachging myself in taking and editing photos, I guess I am improving day by day. The photo for example shows fabulous DJ and Love Parade originator Dr. Motte with the rabid-having-a video-kamera-on-a-construction-helmet-on-my-head-artist during a special event in Berlin earlier this year...
