A friend of mine called me at 11 last night saying they needed some help on their shoot today. So here I am. More to come…

One of the many good things about the WMC is the making of new friends. This year I had the pleasure of meeting Dustin.

Dustin runs www.partylikethis.com. He parties and meets DJs and gets to do it all over the US.  As if Dustin wasn’t busy enough, he also runs a music blog called DanceDustinDance.

I love people who love a good party. Check him out, he is a lovely guy with wicked blogs.

Now that I have given my body ample time to recover from the week that was the Winter Music Conference I can finally post of the wonders of the WMC. It may have been the best one yet!

It certainly was one hell of a week. Steve Aoki, Plastician, Vybz Kartel, and Major Lazer feature in some of these images.

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If you think looking at art whilst getting your nails done is an impossibility, then you are wrong. Vice lead me to discovering two treasures, one being WAH-Nails: a nail salon in Dalston

and two being Jessica Penfold, the awesome illustrator who held her first solo show there. I had a look through her portfolio and she has done work for people like Ben Rayner and Vice Magazine. I got to asking Jessica some questions about her work, it’s nice to be able to have the chance to ask someone how they work. It turns out we shared many similar views on things. Having studied Graphic Design at Camberwell, she learned she much rather not rely on the usage of a computer and  would prefer to pick up a pen and draw. I admire anyone who can have a simple conversation with someone and visualise an image to the point of being able to recreate it on canvas, or paper in this case. I just can’t work like that. Jessica draws everything freehand and uses the computer for things like layering her text.  This exhibition was for the graphic story Snow Day. The work was based on the events of the February 2, 2009 snow storm that shut down most of London.

I loved the work and I loved the atmosphere at the opening. Usually when I got out on Vice events everyone is beyond the point of intimate conversation. Having your nails done at the same time gave perfect opportunity to get to speak to some very interesting people. There’s a certain aura that surrounds WAH-Nails. It stirred up some excitement. Probably because of their insane amount of success that surrounds the whole shop. The Nails are awesome and the place is adorable.

Have a read through the owner’s blog and you can read about about how the adventure started. Although the main site is under construction you can still have a look through all the cool nails they do here. ALso you can have a look through WAH-Magazine. It has a lot of interesting stuff to browse through.

Best of luck to both Jessica and the people of WAH-Nails.

I feel that this year has started off in the right direction. Inspiration and ideas are generating some exciting prospects for the months to come. It also helps to spend some time with my housemate, the lovely and talented Abigail Box. I decided to camp out at her studio during the snow days. We have always managed to work well in close proximity of each other and sure enough I found myself rather inspired by my surroundings.

I managed to work on some of my own stuff. I started up a new sketchbook, a painting, and these polaroids for fun.

The economic bust up hit everyone but, let’s face it: the poor (literally) North American art school kids living in a foreign country with no funding to pay for school took a real blow.

Or maybe that’s just me and my Canadian housemate.

I would love to reacquaint myself with the likes of sketchbooks, paints, scissors and co. but, working a 9 to 5 doesn’t allow for such rendezvous.

I miss univesity and that was the sole purpose of this winge.

The cool kids at Vice sent me out to a party last Thursday called No Bait Name @ Macbeth in Hoxton. I hit the brandy and Coke pretty hard that night so I’m pretty amused/shocked/proud I even knew what a camera was.

Nevertheless, it was a good party. Here are a couple of the pictures and a few links to learn more about the people who made it happen.

www.bntl.co.uk ( There are more photos on there)

http://www.sweetandsound.co.uk

http://www.dontwatchthat.tv

(And remember to click the 2 after the first set of images to see the second.)