The bearded weirdo

He used to be a part of the infamous Mandem crew. In fact he actually used to be the poster boy of Mandem Records, now he just sits by himself stroking his not so luxurious beard. His beard is actually made up of a culture of different fungi and detritus that has become matted with his own beard. What exactly happened you might well ask but no one really knows. One day he just got up and walked away from his previous life and is now holed up in the back of our studio, mumbling to himself. We try to coax him out every now and then with a cup of tea and a biscuit but so far no joy. When I try again, perhaps I’ll see if a custard cream will work…

He’s a sad reminder that nothing is safe in the shedio for too long. Especially in winter time. The damp gets to anything unprotected.

Cheers

id-iom

Advertisement

Twist and shout

Sometimes things just don’t turn out like you expect. It was a particularly dismal and rainswept day when the other half of id-iom popped out of the studio to get lunch but came back with the classic board game, Twister (think Jack and his magic beans…)

I was somewhat put out by this manoeuvre as I had been daydreaming of a Greggs sausage roll for close to an hour. I quickly demanded to know what exactly what he thought was going on but all I got in return was a whirring noise and the repeated phrase ‘Left foot first’…

Cheers

id-iom

Demolition porn

We’ve been threatening for a while now that we would show you some uncensored and filthy pictures of our old studio, the House of Pain(t), being demolished to make way for some new housing. And today’s the day.

I’m still standing.

Here she is on the last day she could be considered a complete house. But the skip is ready and waiting…

Pink room and ‘Stand your ground’

The pink room has definitely looked better. Here’s a link to a panoramic shot of her in all her glory.

On reflection

I’m not entirely sure why they stripped this bit of ceiling but at least the girls were still complete at this stage.

Heart Two Heart

This is a shot through one of the removed walls of one bedroom to another bedroom that had one of thread and paint installations in but has now been stripped of all extraneous fixtures and fittings. You can see a panoramic picture of the complete original piece here.

Thumbs up!

Here I am proudly still giving the thumbs up. All was okay at this point. But not any longer.

X ray vision

This is a shot from the room in which we had our ‘King Dog and the Angels‘ installation – which was our attempt to finish an uncompleted thread piece by Perspicere. The wall which has been removed also featured a painted piece called ‘Unnatural Selection‘ by Agent Provocateur.

A lonely face in a vacant place

I think there is a hole in the ceiling and a door covering a big hole in the floor to allow them to pass bits of fixtures and fittings down to the ground so they could make their way to the skip. I think this probably makes her feel even more lonely.

Classy through the bars shot!

I think this is probably our most artistic shot although I would imagine it came about through a lack of attention whilst trying to focus on the house in the background. I think it best to just call it a happy accident.

Tell Tale signs – under attack. And check the floating chimney!

Here we can see Tell Tale Signs in the process of being demolished. My favourite thing about this pic is how the chimney is still floating above the piece supported by scaffolding. Odd. In fact, i’ve just noticed you can see a bit of The Mark of the Night Writer just below the chimney too.

A lonely face in a vacant place – on the way out…

Here’s about half of ‘A lonely face in a vacant place’ which has to be my favourite title of all the pieces we did at the House of Pain(t). I think she was just bricks on the floor about 20 mins after this was taken…

4 eyes

He really does look like his world is crashing in around him on this one. He’s seen better days.

Go Go Rankin!

Here’s what’s left of one of the downstairs sitting rooms. Although I’m notoriously rubbish with a camera I think I managed to put my Rankin head on for this shot. It’s one of my favourites and makes the day look much more pleasant than it was.

Our basement studio. Now clearly defunct.

This is not a particularly exciting shot but it shows what has happened to our domain in the basement. You can see through the window that it appears to be have been filled with rubble to allow the digger to ride on the ground above without causing it to collapse. What an ignoble end for such a prestigious spot…

The Lady on the Door

The lady on the back of the door was always somewhat problematic as we just couldn’t seem to get the nose right. In fact I’ve just checked and we never even put a picture of her up as we were so displeased with her nose. I don’t suppose it matters too much now. I am however quite proud of this shot though. She never looked so good.

Pile it high!

If you look closely in the centre of the picture you can just about see an eye and a helicopter from the 125 Crest wall. The mountain of junk stretched up to the second story…

id-iom interior decoration at your service!

Here’s what’s left of our id-iom calling card in one of the downstairs sitting rooms. At least he is still looking happy – although not for much longer…

Knock, knock, knocking on heaven’s door

What’s that you can see at the above the door? Oh, it’s sky because the entire second floor has been removed!

Wallpaste wall no more…

Other than the yellow of the digger providing a nice contrast that is not a happy piece of wall. No siree.

125 Crest wall. Those who are about to die. We salute you.

Much like the rest of the house this piece is now looking a little the worse for wear and surely aware of it’s imminent destruction. This crest piece was largely a tribute to the house herself. She was good to us…

Walking skull – now floating on air.

He looks a little odd out of context but when he was completed he looked like he was walking on the top of a desk. I really should have given him some shadow. I still haven’t got him tattooed on me yet but he’s on the list…

Stairway to heaven

Heaven (or perhaps Hell) is just about the only place this dangerously unsafe stairway is going to take you. A lovely view from the top though.

Just a pile of bricks

What was once a picture becomes just another pile of bricks.

Floating magpie

Like the Walking Skeleton this magpie once stood on a desk which made it look a little less odd. And there was a little ‘worm’ in the wall that it was about to eat. You can see that here if you like that kind of thing.

Licorice Eyes

It seems this little beauty is about to get swallowed whole by a big pile of debris. And she looked so glorious just a few short weeks ago…

Bobblehead

Old bobblehead here looks a little wary doesn’t he? But then I suppose I would be too given the demo crew ripping the place up.

Wallpaste wall fluttering in the wind.

This was pretty much all that remained of the wall we wheatpasted with the various bits we had lying around when it came to clearing our stuff out of the basement. The end is nigh…

Tweet!

There will be little further tweeting from this location. And the cat may even get his food.

4 eyes defiant

This was the first room we managed to get completed and one of the last to go. The painting to the left of his head doesn’t really make much sense once they removed the wardrobe that we painted over. Although I like how he looks defiant despite the digger claw sitting ominously close.

Razed

Finally we have a shot showing the final stages of destruction. I think they have to dig out the basement once they’ve removed all above and then it’s time to start building again. It’s a good spot and we wish the new residents all the best when they finally move in.

We had our studio in the basement for 18 months and were then allowed to paint the entire place up prior to demolition. We had a great time applying a little id-iom decoration to just about every surface we could cover and, in a strange way, it’s quite pleasing seeing all that hard work being razed to the ground and reduced to rubble.You can’t stand in the way of progress. I just wish we could find another condemned building that we could give a good send off to…

Cheers

id-iom

Related articles

• House of Pain(t) – id-iom x Agent Provocateur (thisisidiom.wordpress.com)
• Odds and sods (thisisidiom.wordpress.com)
• House of Pain(t and wheatpastes) (thisisidiom.wordpress.com)
• King Dog and the Angels (thisisidiom.wordpress.com)
• This is the end of the line… (thisisidiom.wordpress.com)
• A portrait of the artist as a young man (thisisidiom.wordpress.com)
• Our best bits of 2012 – as picked by us! (thisisidiom.wordpress.com)
• id-iom Interior Decoration at your service… (thisisidiom.wordpress.com)

A Lonely Face in a Vacant Place

A Lonely Face in a Vacant Place

A Lonely Face in a Vacant Place

 

There we were thinking we’d taken up just about all available wall space at the studio when we moved a set of shelves to reveal yet another bit of pristine wall lurking behind them that was just asking to have some paint thrown at it. This new bit of wall was facing Tell Tale Signs that we’d painted last week and we decided that she could do with some company. As they are on opposite walls and the lady from Tell Tale Signs has a surly look and a red nose we thought we’d give her counterpart a nice blue nose so they can some kind of Liverpudlian stare-off until the bulldozers move in…

Cheers

id-iom

I a-door you

I a-door you

Our studio is being demolished in a few weeks so we are having to move everything out which is a fairly traumatic – but there is an upside. Now that its getting more and more barren there are empty walls and surfaces emerging which are just begging to be painted on. And  that’s exactly what happened with this little beauty. Before we started tidying this door was largely hidden behind some bits of cardboard and MDF which is why only the top half has paint scribbles on it, but since moving all the clutter the bottom of the door looked strangely empty so I decided to cheer it up a little with picture of a pretty lady. Nothing too clever or original with this one, just a picture of a pretty lady to enliven an otherwise sad and abused looking door. Is it so wrong to try and cheer up inanimate objects?

Cheers

id-iom

X marks the spot: Pop up group show

Another group show we’re in down at Studio 10 and it looks like this one is going to be a bit special. If you can make it down, i would definitely try…

Cheers

id-iom

This is my time to shine

This is my time to shine

After last week’s painting at UPfest we got back to London with part of the extended Jubilee weekend to spare so went about celebrating them getting a little drunk and rolling around the streets of  Brixton for far too long. After we’d peeled ourselves off the streets and gone to our respective beds we got up with sore heads and nothing to do apart from stalk around the studio looking for something to do. We finally decided to attack one of the walls with all the gusto we could muster after the aforementioned weekend.

After blanking out the wall with some nice Laura Ashley Eau de Nil paint that we got off Freecycle we jumped to work with precious little in the way of a plan. As we know ‘the devil makes work for idle hands’ and as we were doing the opposite and actually doing some ‘work’ we thought it best if we incorporated an angel into our picture. Just to be on the safe side. We got down to a bit of  hard work, if you could call it that, as it was more like two zombies throwing paint at a wall but we somehow managed to come up with the picture you see before you. ‘This is my time to shine’. Indeed. The Muse works in mysterious ways…

Cheers

id-iom

Ooooh, new studio!

A few people have been asking after our studio and how it’s getting on so I thought a quick update would be in order. After getting the keys to the studio a couple of weeks ago we have been really busy designing and preparing for our upcoming work at the Electric Social bar in Brixton so we haven’t had as much time as we’d like to get the place set up.

After a load more trips than i thought possible we have now moved most of our stuff down and begun to get organised. The first port of call was getting a tap installed for screen-printing and getting the screen wash out area sorted.

 

Next on the list was getting a big table knocked up. I’m glad to say that both of these goals have now been fully realised – with the added bonus of entirely using recycled materials. Surely a good eco-friendly first move?

The we decided the dingiest room would (naturally) be the dark room. We just need something to cover the entrance and a red bulb and we’re away.

Then we just need a few supplies and the screenprinter will be up and running.

Finally we have the messy room where paint can be strewn around with wild abandon. Which it will be…

All we have to do now is move the final couple of loads of our stuff down and start work on some new pieces…

Cheers

id-iom

Welcome to the Karma Hotel – it looks like heaven but it could be hell!

The dungeon

The view from the dungeon

The hallway

Growing kit left by previous occupants...

Main front room

Side room one (there is side room two but we failed to get a decent photo...)

The oh-so-glamourous staircase

Store room - just perfect for cans

Screenprinting wash out room

 

Welcome to our new studio! Like The Spooks sang in Karma Hotel ‘it looks like heaven but could be hell’. I’m sure only artists will salivate over the five room basement space which is certainly in a slight state of disrepair but couldn’t be more perfect for our needs. We are allowed to make as much mess as we like into the bargain too! Winner. Words can barely express how happy this all makes me…

We have finally got enough space to get all our screen-printing equipment out and whatever else we have squirreled away. The place even comes with an impeccable pedigree as it used to be both a squat and cannabis factory! We still have the holes they knocked in walls for ventilation between rooms which will make for a handy ‘intercom’ system. And to top it all off it’s only 10 mins from home.

Now we just need to get onto Freecycle to find some furniture (and whatever else we can get) to fill our new gaff. Expect more pics as and when we get round to ‘decorating’ the place. Once we’ve got our friendly builder to pop round and help construct us a makeshift table and install a tap we are good to go.

Expect good things to come…

Cheers

id-iom