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Johann Chan writer

George Marshall photographer

10 June 2009

team radio silence

peoplesport

RALLY UNPREPARED

There I was, sitting in the office, on my hundredth command-C, command-V when I receive an email from a friend. The strapline on the press release read “10,000 miles in a Skoda pickup from London to Mongolia.”
Dominic Yard, 25 and Thomas Donhou, 27 are raising money for Mercy Corps and The Christina Noble* Children’s Foundation by racing the 2009 Mongol Rally in a £350 Skoda—a vehicle which broke down during rush hour in Central London on the return journey from the car dealer in Devon.
The Mongol Rally travels through mountains, deserts and rivers through a plethora of countries, with satellite maps and GPS replaced with gaffer tape and a sense of adventure. When asked about the name ‘Radio Silence’, Dominic replied, “There was no huge symbolism behind our name. Even though it took us about two months to decide on one! I think the term comes from the army and means a period of no communication. Me and Donny say it when people don’t answer their phone or return your messages—usually girls! We thought it had a nice fit with being out in the middle of the desert away from phone signals, email and communication. But so far with our blog, video diary and Twitter account we are actually the complete opposite of radio silence.”

As well as progress reports, Team Radios Silence’s website has a video complete with green screen, music and actors worth checking out in itself

The 2009 Mongol Rally starts on July 18th

*No relation

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film

Banksy caught on film

Regular Level-online readers will remember the review of the Banksy exhibition that occurred last summer here in the massive that is more officially known as Bristol City. I’m guessing it was a firm success—over 350,000 people swamped the city’s medium-sized museum during the one-off season when Banksy took over the place with his take on art. It was, in a nutshell, bloody brilliant. Now you’ve seen the graf, watch the movie: yes, Banksy’s gone and made a movie. I for one can’t wait.

Mark Noble, 05 March 2010

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art

Love to Haiti

To Haiti With Love is a worthwhile cause with a slight difference: when you donate, you actually get a piece of artwork as a digital file. You can send this on to a friend or simply use the image as your own desktop wallpaper. Each piece of work will be sold as a digital postcard for £1 to raise money to help the situation in Haiti.

There are artists from around the world donating work, with more getting involved daily as this project snowballs. So far, the list includes David Shrigley, Genevieve Gauckler, Bob Kronbauer, Rob Ryan, Simon Peplow, Alex Trochut and Anthony Burrill with photographers Ye Rin Mok, Cass Bird and Valerie Phillips recently signing up.

Lee Basford, 06 February 2010

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photo

Olympic metal

Those cafe racer-riding photo-nerds at Olympus have churned out another iteration of the E-P-series, this time one for the masses. (That is, the masses that would have bought an E-P1 or -2 if only it weren’t for their fiddliness and pricey price tags.) The new E-PL1 is the iMac of the bunch, it doing most of the things its fancier brothers do—take quality shots, shoot 720p video, feel P-R-O-hip while you swap lenses—only more simply, for a few hundred quid cheaper, and with the backup of a built-in flash.

And you can get it in red.

Chris Noble, 05 February 2010

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