In her second column for SNOW, Audrey Fondecave covers Åbäke‘s visit to Tokyo.
If you put Patrick Lacey, Benjamin Reichen, Kajsa Stahl and Maki Suzuki (from Wales, France, and Sweden) together you get Åbäke (pronounced “obake,” meaning “obstacle” in Swedish), a graphic design studio based in London.
Add Masaya Kuroki and Gildas Loaec, and you get Kitsune, the music and fashion label.
Åbäke’s talents strike in many fields. In fashion, they have worked together on 16 seasons with Maison Martin Margiela, creating the identity for the line MM6, Peter Jensen, and more. In music, they’ve worked with The Cardigans, to name just one.
One of their works that I cherish so much is the publication work they do under the name Dent-de-leone, publishing books by other super talented people like furniture designer Martino Gamper and artist Francis Upritchard.
Another talent they have is in connecting — connecting things, connecting with places and people, and that’s something you’ll be able to see for yourself.
Kajsa Stahl and Maki Suzuki have now joined the creators residence program at Tokyo Wonder Site Aoyama, and lucky lucky, they have studio open days that allow you to visit the artists and see their works in progress.
The next open studio days are February 13 and March 13 — don’t miss them!
And although it has yet to be announced, we’re hoping that we’ll also get an exhibition at Tokyo Wonder Site, an event at Clear Gallery, and maybe even an OK FRED GORILLA STORE!
Photos: Yoshi Tsujimura
Audrey Fondecave is a French artist who has been based in Tokyo since 2002. On top of her artistic work, she keeps a strong connection with the publishing world, working with magazines such as Apartamento, Ryuko Tsushin, Tetu, and more. She’s also an editor and illustrator for OK Fred magazine, and co-hosts the Radio OK Fred podcast. Her artwork has been published by a few Japanese publishers, including PIE Books, Ecrit, and La Galerie des Nakamura.
