WE'RE SUPPORTING

Spontaneous, loose and moody, like a hurricane blasting through an art supply store, the work of Washington artist Garric Simonsen is just a little Basquiat — with droll humor mixed up and splattered all over a canvas. I can’t help but chuckle at titles like Damn I Just Ruined My Best Shirt and Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha.

WE'RE TRAVELLING TO

The controversial and multifaceted International contemporary art exhibition Trailblazers hits Sydney this month. Boutwell Draper Gallery will grace multimedia works by pioneering Australian, American and European artists from November 19 onwards. I’m thrilled to see groundbreaking pieces by Ben Frost, Kill Pixie, Copyright and Cleon Patterson [above], to name a few. The vast array of paintings, photography, sculpture, installation, video and digital arts is on display until December 13. C’mon, you know you want to culture your soul.

WE'RE WEARING

Loomstate has been a casual eco-friendly clothing design alum since 2001, and a beacon for eco-fashionistas who love to lounge and look lovely. So it’s no surprise that this spring, Loomstate is partnering with Target to bring 100 percent organic cotton and sustainable silk blends to the masses. The line, which has a starting price at around fifteen dollars, drops April 19, just in time for Earth Day.

WE'RE THINKING

Multimedia art group Raqs Media Collective create striking installations dealing with their complex relationship to the changes happening in their home country of India. Their categorization based on national identity, however, would make them chafe, as they reject traditional notions of nation state. The main concept scrutinized by the group is modernity itself, and the so-called progress it embodies. Read more

WE'RE READING

Since they blew up with the release of their debut album, All Hour Cymbals, Yeasayer have become the hottest thing to come out of Brooklyn since the $2.25 pizza slice from Luigi’s on Dekalb. We checked in with bassist Ira Wolf Tuton and asked him for a list of songs that are rocking his world right now. Read more

My favourite cartoon is Home Movies by Brendon Small. Read more

WE'RE LISTENING TO

‘I have been trying to go with my whims. Fuck it, let’s make an iPod album’. This statement from Team Genius leader Drew Hermiller was the jumping off point in the creation of the band’s debut self-titled full-length album, one of the most interesting and eclectic pop records of the year. ‘Basically it’s a reaction to the modern way music is consumed and listened to’, Hermiller says. ‘The idea of an album with a focused sound and a complete statement kind of gets lost now-a-days. Everyone shuffles around, so I thought “why not write an album that does the same thing?” Luckily, the band did an awesome job of keeping up with it’. Download a couple of free tracks off the album in our Music Download section [pssst, it's in the third column of the site]