#029 ☼ Double Take: Gab Bois

Italian Summers • Drake's $100m Bet • Hockney's LA

Explore the Palm Report Image Archive here

ISSUE 029

Bahama Mama

With tasting notes of concept keyboards, Brooklyn’s 1980s roller disco scene, slow-paced Italian summers, David Hockney’s LA influences, new Zoom backgrounds from global design studios, bored couples, a blend of ancient wisdom and modern science, the making of a modular sofa and a long-lost avant-garde carnival.

The good life beckons once more!

---

CURATE WITH US

Our question this week is:

What’s a new skill you’re in the process of learning or would like to learn?

Let us know in the comments 💭

Further down in this issue, we’ll share the most underrated artists, companies, products and media suggested by the community last week.

---

Hot Hyperlinks

☼ “AIR TYPE” is a new concept keyboard with inflated key caps

☼ La Dolce Vita will soon be upon us… French photographer Claude Nori’s sun-drenched snaps capture the languidly-paced magic of summer holidays in Italy. Also check out a short video of Claude’s photobook

☼ WFH getting a little stale? Switch it up by choosing a Zoom background from some of our favourite design studios including PORTO ROCHA in New York and Barkas in Copenhagen amongst many others!

☼ “THE APPLES” auction featuring “THE HANSPETER LUZI VINTAGE APPLE ARCHIVE” goes live today, March 30th 2023. It’s one of the world’s most comprehensive collections of Apple computers and products ever offered

☼ Revisit Brooklyn’s electric 1980s roller disco scene with Patrick D Pagnano

☼ Introducing Ancient Ritual, a new class of sauna that blends in with your home. Explore as they combine ancient wisdom with modern science

☼ How Drake’s $100 million bet saved the long-lost art carnival Luna Luna, an avant-garde amusement park that in its day featured artworks by Basquiat, Dalí and Haring

☼ Lacuna Sofa is a modular logo sofa by Lars Moereels. Go behind the scenes to see how it was made and explore the short film shot in Paris

☼ A look back through British photographer Martin Parr’s photo series “Bored Couples” from 1993 capturing offhand moments between people who have run out of things to say

☼ David Hockney explains how LA inspired the 20th century icon, his 1966 painting “The Splash”

---

---

SUMMER-ENHANCING PEOPLE

Double Take: Gab Bois

Source

“I like to play on the line where you don’t know what’s real and what isn’t. The goal is to get the viewers to ask themselves: Does this even exist? How was this even made?” — Gab Bois

Gab Bois is a multidisciplinary artist that has taken the internet by storm through her witty, evocative pictures imbued with double entendres. Originally pursuing a Bachelor’s in primary education, Bois began playing around with physical creations mostly for fun, harking back to her childlike wonder and getting used to entertaining herself as an only child.

After the company she was working at went bankrupt and her work began garnering fervent attention online, she paused her studies and dived head first into freelancing as an artist. With clients like Nike, Balenciaga, Jean Paul Gaultier, Fenty and many more under her belt, she’s already released a book of her prolific work over the last few years.

This week, we dive into the elastic mind of Gab Bois.

Source

---

Highlights

• Poolsuite Picks: Flower Lobster, Champagne, MacBook, Keyboot, Tongues

• On creating regularly: “I see creativity and inspiration as a muscle that needs to be trained, so that’s why I like to keep a fast rhythm while also having long-term projects on the back burner. I see it as a creative exercise to create one or two photos per week, just to make sure my brain is still doing what it needs to do.”

• On being inspired by her dad: “I owe a lot of that interest to my dad. Growing up, I remember he would carve stuff, like, he would take a bit of cheese and carve it with pocket knife. “What do you want me to carve?” And I would say, “I want a cat and a butterfly.” And then he would make that! So I grew up around that kind of energy, and the knowledge that you can play around with stuff, especially food.”

• Live with Gab Bois at OFFF 2023 walking through her work (just last week!)

• On her creative process: “It depends on the piece, but it always starts with the idea that I try to keep at the centre of the creative process. The idea can come at any time, anywhere. Sometimes it comes on its own, unannounced, but sometimes I have to sit myself down and brainstorm. I then move into production, sourcing all the elements needed for the picture and shooting the idea. This step varies each time. Sometimes I have to put together intricate pieces, like the jumper made of rainbow candy or place hundreds of dandelions on the grass to make them look like bedsheets. The time it takes doesn't matter much to me. I get very focused while working, and time just flies by. Before I know it, I've spent hours hunched over, but I get a finished image in return and a sore neck as a bonus.”

• New Album is an uncanny artist book by Gab Bois, compiling the first three years of her work

• On comparison and looking forward: “You know, I also used to compare myself a lot to other people or second guess myself a lot. I still do and it's normal to an extent! But I used to get upset if someone put out an idea similar to mine before I had the chance to do it. Or if a brand did something that was really close to something I did. But at the same time, I realized that most of the time with conceptual work, there are so many overlaps! Two people can think of same thing at a similar time. And it's not an attack on me. I try look forward rather than back. It’s also been a great lesson to kind of have the mentality of: if it's yours, it'll come.”

• A collection of food-based work by Gab Bois inspired by midcentury furniture, including marshmallow couches, ravioli sofas and a brioche Camaleonda

• Exploring ephemerality at her recent Palm Heights residency: “There’s a beautiful aspect in capturing something that no one’s ever going to be able to see again. You could say that about every photograph, but when the subject itself is temporary, it makes it that much more exciting to capture. Many of these materials are natural, so they come with their own set of challenges. Working with plants, for example, was definitely a challenge. For the flower lobster, we had to assemble it very quickly to ensure that it would photograph well. For the banana leaves beach umbrella, we had to use a lot of adhesive tools to secure them, as they either kept ripping or holding each other down. I enjoy problem solving; it’s a central part of my work, so those extra challenging materials are always great opportunities to exercise that skill.”

---

COMMUNITY CURATED: UNDERRATED STUFF

Last week, we shared the most underrated artists, companies, products and media. Check out the comment section for a full selection of music, artists and more.

Hop in the comments this week as we discuss new skills you’re in the process of learning or would like to learn.

---

SUMMER-ENHANCING HOMEWARE

EXHIBIT A: RAL 3022 Bristol by Jetsam Made • EXHIBIT B: Organic Wood Desk by Marc van Rampelberg • EXHIBIT C: The Orange Selection by Architeckure

---

JOIN US

🌴 Tune in to our ultra-summer radio, Poolsuite FM, on iPhone & web

🌴 Follow us: @Poolsuite on Instagram & Twitter, plus @PalmReport on Twitter

🌴 Discover our Hour of Summer mixtapes on SoundCloud

🌴 Say hey, or drop leisurely content you’ve discovered in the comments below!