Nick

I’ve been thinking a lot about partnerships recently.

I’m involved in two major partnerships: a life partnership with Heidi, and a professional partnership with Minh. I feel that it’s vitally important for each partnership to act as an inseparable atomic unit (in regards to its own area), conducting its activities with the best interests of the individual partners in mind.

Heidi and I don’t make major life decisions alone, we have no independent personal finances, and we don’t keep secrets from each other. I really can’t imagine sharing my life with someone in other way.

Likewise, Minh and I make all our professional decisions together, we bill as a single entity, and we have complete professional disclosure. Our income is split down the middle, and we try to match each other’s time commitment. I know that there are other ways to go about business, but this suits me to a tee.

There’s something deeply fulfilling about partnership. You have to trust in the other person completely, and you feel a great deal of responsibility to ensure that you are taking care of them to the best of your ability.

That level of trust and responsibility are fairly difficult to accept at first. In both partnerships, we initially gravitated towards making things perfectly equal: splitting expenses, splitting the billable work, taking turns doing chores. Simply trying to feel that everything is undertaken in the same measure.

That sort of equality is superficial, unrepresentative, and (for all intents and purposes) impossible to balance. The beauty and value of good partnerships are that the partners are different and incomparable. Each contributes in unique and immeasurable ways, and I feel that you’re better off pursuing partnerships in which both are committed and not worried about quantifying value.

It may be difficult to do, but I’ve found that the sooner you think of yourself as one entity and the sooner that you stop keeping score, the sooner your partnership will flourish and the happier and more successful you will be.

But you know, YMMV.

I just got back from a short trip to Singapore. It was great times, I’m really glad that I went, and I hope to have occasion to return later in the year.

I was originally expecting to go to Freeplay last weekend, but Heidi had a workshop in Singapore and wanted some company. Plus, the Singapore Toy, Game & Comic Convention (STGCC) was on and I figured that I could check it out.

I got to wander around by myself during the day and then hung out with Heidi at night. I made a little check-list of things to do and got through most of them, so it felt pretty productive (note that most items were food-related).

Anyhow, here are a bunch of photos. Let’s start with this one of a place near Chinatown with awesome Chicken Rice set meals for AU$3.50:

The apparently well-regarded (although that one guy gave them 7/10) Song Fa Bak Kuh Teh was also pretty good. This European guy next to me got all sorts of intestines, and a Japanese couple nearby seemed to have heard about it online.

While I took the opportunity to touch up on my Singlish, I found that some groups were discouraging it entirely.

This photo was taken near the Riverside hi-so area. It’s some sort of outdoor cooler… but why would you make it look like that? Why?

STGCC was a pretty seamless mix of Western and Eastern comics, art, and games. I suppose that it was a lot like Singapore, but with more rangers and storm-troopers.

For me, the highlight of the convention was the talk by Simone Legno, the artist behind tokidoki. He spoke about building a lifestyle brand over the course of 10 years, delving into his personal history, artistic influences, product development, and rising corporate profile. It was a fantastic talk.

Here’s a photo of Simone signing the panels of the tokidoki booth:

Hmmm, yeah so that was my trip. I want to go back later in the year for more of the food. Maybe a group trip. Let’s do it!

Update: Show your support on the facebook page.

I’m looking for collaborators interesting in helping me reproduce “Please Do Not Enter” here in Perth:

For a basic reproduction, I will need:

1. A security guard: Amiable and willing to memorise and repeat specified lines
2. A venue: An exhibition space housing other works with a large empty space
3. Materials: Packing materials, a yellow bin, a sign, and a rope safety barrier

For a fully-realised reproduction, in addition to the above I will require:

1. A funding partner: Able to cover associated costs
2. A travel partner: Able to fly participants to Perth from the US
3. An advertising/promotional partner: To get behind this project

“Please Do Not Enter” has been described as:

A good comment on the disposable American society.

And:

Absolutely brilliant. There is so much debate about what is — and isn’t — art… It’s a conversation between two people on opposite sides of the issue

Another reaction:

Wow. I didn’t see all that.

Given the global impact of exported American culture, I feel that the social commentary made by “Please Do Not Enter” is pertinent within a contemporary Western Australian context. Moreover, the piece has a modern cultural reference which will resonate with the general public.

If this project achieves a high level of support, I would like to get the original materials and participants (chiefly the security guard from the original installation at the Smithsonian American Art Museum). I would also like to invite the original artist to comment on their work.

Let’s work together to make this a reality. I only require a few key partners to produce a referential reproduction, but major partners such as the Department for Culture and the Arts, the Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts, Qantas, and Youtube could make this happen on an unprecedented scale.

Please contact me directly if you are able to help and would like to get involved.

I went to my first “The sketch group for sketching. As a group. In Perth” meetup on Saturday. It was at the Perth Zoo, and it was totally awesome!

Here are some photos of my sketchbook:

My basic process was: fine line work using an Artline 200, followed by thicker lines using a Sharpie, and then shading using a 2B pencil. I think it worked out well. In regards to the actual sketches, the rhino is probably my favourite. After that the ghost bat eating a mouse, and then the zebra (although the head is a little big).

Simon and Jenna (the event organiser; thanks!) have also put some of their sketches online. It’s interesting to see how different people approach the same subject matter, and I feel that there is a lot I can learn at these events.

Note: The photos are slightly amber due to lighting. They were originally even more orange, but I desaturated them a little using a command I picked up from Suovainaja’s blog post on using mogrify:

mogrify -modulate 100,50,100 *