The AnOther team compile their top things to see and do this November
Vivian Maier: In Her Own Hands – Until December 6
Another excuse to revel in the joys of Vivian Maier's voyeuristic world, as New York's Howard Greenberg Gallery presents Vivian Maier: In Her Own Hands, a display of rare lifetime prints made by the reclusive nanny and obsessive street photographer whose amazing archive was discovered by accident at an auction in 2007. Also included is a series of prints made this year – further examples of Maier's extraordinary ability to find magic in the mundane – which are on show for the very first time.
Michael Stipe: New Sights, New Noise – Until November 8
Although best known as the iconic frontman of R.E.M., Michael Stipe has long nurtured a love of visual arts and is soon to be doubling as artist and professor in a residency with NYU’s Steinhardt Department of Art and Art Professions. His current project, New Sights, New Noise, has seen the university space at 80 WSE Gallery transformed into a “studio, classroom, and laboratory” where each week, Stipe and a guest artist or cultural figure will give the class of 18 students a prompt or question to which they must respond by generating 100 images and GIFS, both found and made. The works are then uploaded to the class website before being projected on the walls of the remaining gallery spaces. Both the gallery and studio are open to the public in this unique evolving experiment, which blurs the boundary between process and product.
Great Books on Music Icons
November heralds the release of three enlightening books on three modern music legends. Marianne Faithfull: A Life on Record is edited by the songstress herself and represents a personal collection of images and handwritten captions that tell the story of her remarkable life and career, 50 years after the release of her groundbreaking debut As Tears Go By. Meanwhile a new book on Nick Drake, Remembered for a While, paints a wonderfully vivid portrait of the enigmatic man who, although little known before his death in 1974, aged just 26, went on to become one of the best-loved musicians of the twentieth century. A special exhibition of photographs and a round table discussion with Drake's sister and journalist Pete Paphides, both organised by Rough Trade East, accompany the launch. Finally, Kurt Cobain: The Last Session revisits the final photoshoot Nirvana ever did, alongside one of the last interviews Cobain ever gave (to Jon Savage). Both the interview and images were published in the Observer in July of 1993, nine months before the legendary frontman's suicide, and amazingly haven't been published together since.
Comme des Garçons Market Market Town, Paris – November 7-9
Comme des Garçons' hotly anticipated biannual sale hits Paris this November, offering visitors the chance to purchase recent and current Comme pieces, as well as those of its various lines, at discounts of up to 70%. Shoppers, rejoice!
Viviane Sassen, Ana lemma: Fashion Photography 1992-2012 – Until January 18
This month sees the first London exhibition from Viviane Sassen, the Netherlandish photographer lauded for her experimental approach to image making, which combines contemporary art and fashion photography to arresting effect. The display, at The Photographers' Gallery, will consist of around 350 images from Sassen's impressive portfolio, presented as an immersive installation and including her work for AnOther Magazine.
Le Labo Solid Perfumes – From November 1
This month New York scent specialists Le Labo are releasing their much-loved numbered fragrances (each number referring to the number of olfactory notes that compose the scent) in solid form. Presented in beautiful, refillable metal cases, the fragrance infuses a sweet almond oil, coconut oil and almond oil wax for easy application on the move.
Another Man Book – November 20
This month sees the release of Another Man: Men’s Style Stories, the first book from Another Man magazine. Compiled by creative director Alister Mackie and edited by founder Jefferson Hack and editor Ben Cobb, the scrapbook-style tome is filled with rock’n’roll legends, romantic anti-heroes, and timeless fashion icons that express the best of men’s style, mining the wealth of the Another Man archive and remixing some of the best handpicked material with specially commissioned work.
La Bohème – Until December 6; Here Lies Love – Until January 8
Two very different musical productions are set to delight viewers this month. The English National Opera take on Puccini's captivating masterpiece La bohème – the heartbreaking tale of the doomed relationship between impoverished poet Rodolfo and seamstress Mimì – in a stylish and acclaimed production by John Miller, inspired by photographs of Paris' Left Bank in the 1930s. At the National Theatre, a roof-raising celebration of disco comes courtesy of David Byrne and Fatboy Slim. Titled Here Lies Love, the show sees the theatre transformed into a nightclub for an immersive experience – those standing are expected to dance – and tells the extraordinary tale of Imelda Marcos, First Lady of the Philippines, whose meteoric rise to power was followed by a grave descent into infamy and disgrace.
Gerhard Richter at Marian Goodman London – Until December 20; John Baldessari at Marian Goodman New York – Until November 22
Marian Goodman's new London gallery will open with an exciting new exhibition from Gerhard Richter – the first gallery exhibition of this sort in the capital for nearly two decades. Around 40 of the revered artist's works will be on display from key early works to a rare glass sculpture, as well as a number of important new 'Strip', 'Flow' and 'Doppelgrau' paintings – Richter's innovative, ongoing pictorial investigations into his means of abstract painting. Meanwhile the current display at Marian Goodman New York showcases wonderful new series by John Baldessari – an extension of his previous experimentations with text and image. In these works Baldessari pairs, in his own words, "the details of old dead guys’ paintings" (taken from the collection of the Städel Museum in Frankfurt) and extracts from movies scripts (some real, some made up) so that the former becomes an illustration of the latter in the perfect "mélange of high art and Hollywood."
John Waters: Carsick – November 11
Renegade director and author John Waters returns to the Royal Festival Hall with another stand up comedy show, this time expanding upon his new book Carsick – a chronicle of his adventure hitchhiking from Baltimore to San Francisco in the spring of 2012. Expect delightful crudeness and un-PC puns.
Marvin Gaye Chetwynd: Hermitos Children 2 – Until December 14
Don't miss Turner Prize nominated performance artist Marvin Gaye Chetwynd's first London solo exhibition, Hermitos Children 2, at Studio Voltaire. The piece is a sequel to her ongoing project, Hermitos Children, which takes the form of an experimental television crime drama, following female detective Joan Shipman as she solves various sex-crimes. Combining staged cinematic sequences with footage of live performances, Chetwyn's vision merges both scripted and live elements into a single overarching narrative to bizarre and mesmerising effect.
The Best of Films
There are lots of films to look forward to as winter looms. The much anticipated Hockney documentary provides an intimate portrait of the charismatic artist; while another, deeply moving documentary titled The Possibilities Are Endless follows former Orange Juice frontman Edwyn Collins in his difficult recovery from a debilitating stroke. Meanwhile, for crime drama fans, it doesn't get much better than The Drop, a thrilling new film from Bullhead director Michael R. Roskam, starring Noomi Rapace, Tom Hardy and James Gandolfini in his last ever role. Written by author Dennis Duhane (the man behind Mystic River and Shutter Island), the film hones in on the use of local New York City bars as money-laundering 'drops'. Then there's Russian masterpiece Leviathan – the country's entry for best foreign language film for next year's Oscars – a tragic and amazingly forthright critique of contemporary Russia and its corrupt governing elite. Another film generating Oscar buzz is The Imitation Game, the Alan Turing biopic that sees a compelling Benedict Cumberbatch in the role of the famed mathematician and code breaker who suffered at the hands of horrendous homophobia. Finally for Kubrick and space fans alike, November sees the welcome re-release of the lauded auteur's 2001: A Space Odyssey as part of the BFI's blockbuster Science Fiction project.
