“Objects of Life,” a collaborative exhibit by rock legend Patti Smith and fashion photographer Steven Sebring, opened this week at the Robert Miller Gallery. It’s a complement to the pair’s Sundance-award winning documentary, “Dream of Life.” It’s also a must -see. For more info, check out my review for The New York Times Style Magazine.

"Amy Winehouse May 18, 2007;" photograph by Max Vadukul; 24 x 36 in. (61 x 91.4 cm) © Max Vadukul Lender: Max Vadukul; courtesy of Brooklyn Museum of Art

Next week,  the Brooklyn Museum opens an exhibit solely devoted to rock ‘n’ roll photographers from 1955 through today.

Who Shot Rock & Roll will feature an impressive collection for sure, featuring around 175 photos by 105 photographers: including everything from Andreas Gursky‘s nine-by-seven-foot tour-de-force of Madonna performing in 2001, to Don Hunstein‘s photo of Bob Dylan walking with then girlfriend Suze Rotolo down a snowy Greenwich Village street, to Dennis Hopper‘s photo of James Brown, surrounded by female fans, to the contact sheet of Bob Gruen‘s portrait of John Lennon in a sleeveless New York City t-shirt, or Amy Winehouse on her wedding day (above), shot by Max Vadukul, and William “Red” Robertson’s 1955 portrait of a pelvis-thrusting Elvis, which later became his first album cover.

Most photos are on loan from the photographers’ personal collections.

The exhibit will also include music videos by artists featured in the exhibit, an 80-image slide show and a rock ‘n’ roll chronology made out of actual album covers.

Who Shot Rock & Roll: A Photographic History opens October 30, 2009, and runs through January 31, 2010. For more info, visit www.brooklynmuseum.org

MTC facade corner

Australian design consultancy ARM continues to push the envelope down-under. Their latest projects, the Melbourne Recital Centre and  neighboring MTC Theatre, are turning heads round the globe, and recently earned ARM the Public Buildings category award from the Property Council of Australia Rider Levett Bucknall Innovation & Excellence Awards.

One eloquent judge described the projects as “understandable origami.” Looking at the new buildings, you can’t help but notice their strong angles, musical fluidity and theatrical color and shape – beautifully reflecting the spaces’ roles.

According to ARM, the complementary identities of the 1000 seat Recital Centre and 500 seat MTC theatre (both accessed from a landscaped civic plaza on Southbank Boulevard ) together “create an exciting new civic space within Melbourne’s vibrant arts precinct.”

The Melbourne Recital Centre was designed primarily as a chamber music venue. ARM’s design rationale considered the building itself as packaging for the valued music performed within, which led to its “box inside a box” structure. The Elisabeth Murdoch Hall seats 1000, while the Salon space seats 150 for pre-concert talks and experimental chamber music. The performance spaces feature timber panelling for ideal acoustics. Much of the multilevel foyer is visible from the exterior, allowing passersby a peak inside, and concert goers a view of Melbourne’s skyline.

The drama theatre is the first permanent home for the Melbourne Theatre Company. The Sumner Theatre seats 500 in a single tier, and the Lawlor Studio seats 150 for smaller productions. The building’s facade is composed of iridescent painted steel pipework and black aluminum cladding, creating a pattern that “challenges spatial perceptions through the blurring of 2 & 3 dimensional space – that which appears shaped is actually flat, and likewise, a 2 dimensional surface is actually 3 dimensional.”

For more information on ARM, visit www.a-r-m.com.au

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