For many artists, the term pastiche is used to describe a work that brings together a series of unlikely elements to make a new point. For abake, this is not just a technique but a way of life. Materials and means of distribution are like building blocks, stacking architecture / design publication Sexymachinery against music production, fashion and fine art. Hailing from three different nations, the members of abake base their practice on a series of seemingly simple cultural questions, often dealing with the way an idea or concept is translated across cultures. Somerset House this month sees 14 separate abake events spread over 14 days and reaching in every imagineable direction from a Yellow Pages bonfire on Guy Fawkes night (05/11) to an all-day disco (06/11). If you're curious about abake's record label Kitsune's impressive and eclectic musical inclinations which have been said to read like a "who's who" of the underground club scene (the imprint gives Ed Banger a run for its money), or if you're already a fan, they will be playing their entire repertoire this Thursday, and for those of us whose finances are still recovering from the early October rush, there is an open bar, all drinks ?1. We thought that might get your attention.

NB: An Inventory Of Aliases (abake and friends) runs till 16/11. This series of events has been programmed in conjunction with Somerset House's Wouldn't it be nice... Wishful thinking in art and design exhibition (runs till 07/12).

A thoroughly ravishing epic featuring a cast of thousands, sets the size of towns and maybe the finest battle scenes ever produced on screen, director Peter Chan's The Warlords is the biggest, baddest bag of widescreen excitement you are likely to enjoy this year. The story follows three "blood" brothers -- bandits Zhao Er Hu (Andy Lau) Juang We Yang (Takeshi Kaneshiro) and former General Pang (Jet Li) -- as they puzzlingly join forces to fight for the corrupt Qing Dynasty against the Taiping rebels in the civil war of 1850 -- a conflict that in reality caused the deaths of some 20 million either in battle or from hunger. A tale of overwhelming ambition that is almost Shakespearean in the way it brings three very different archetypal characters together, and watches them fall apart as each man's perception of honour loyalty and trust is exposed. Beautifully acted by all, incredibly photographed by Arthur Wong and co starring the breathtaking art direction of the great Yee Chung-Man (Curse Of The Golden Flower) this is more than a movie -- it's a landmark cinema event.

NB: The Warlords is released in London on 07/11. Other films of note released this week are OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies, Easy Virtue and Agnes Jaoui + Jean-Pierre Bacri's Let's Talk About The Rain.

Hokaben is a new urban festival, based at 93 Feet East on Brick Lane. Whilst Shoreditch is no stranger to events of this nature, the refreshingly diverse line-up sets it apart from previous efforts. Those who like their music to be entertaining and challenging in equal measure will find much to enthuse about. The organisers have set out their stall to promise "no foppish indie bands or yawnsome postrock bands", instead uniting a disparate cast of talent from the experimental fringes of rock, jazz, noise and electronic music. Across a full weekend, with afternoon starts on both the Saturday and Sunday, there's far more of interest than can be listed here, but highlights include Don Caballero, Fucked Up, Part Chimp, Acid Mothers Temple, Kid606, Sun Ra's Arkestra and Gravenhurst (check the website for the full list). The four distinct areas within the venue will facilitate speculative wandering between the acts, which is handy given the amount of lesser-known performers. Day tickets can be purchased, as well as a full three day pass, for those who'd prefer to dip their toe in.

NB: another concert of note on 07/11 (8pm) the Faster Than Sound gig with among others Mira Calix, Camberwell Composers' Collective, Tim Exile and Hauschka at Kings Place.

This event celebrates Barry Gray and his anthemic musical adventures. Gerry Anderson's vintage TV series -- ranging from the supermarionation puppetry exploits of Thunderbirds, Joe 90 and Stingray, through to the real-actor sci-fi of UFO and Space: 1999 -- were a long-running showcase for Gray's upbeat atmospheric arrangements. Schooled in theatre and variety, as well as composing and conducting orchestral scores -- and arguably overlooked in the rush to re-access the more academic BBC Radiophonic Workshop -- Gray also employed the Ondes Martenot, an early electronic instrument developed by Frenchman Maurice Martenot, played at this event by Pascale Rousse-Lacordaire. Gray employed it for unconventional music and effects on scores to Captain Scarlet, the film Journey To The Far Side Of The Sun, the '60s Doctor Who films starring Peter Cushing, and unaccredited work on Truffaut's Fahrenheit 45. Guest of honour Anderson recently praised the execution of the puppet-based Team America: World Police, by Matt Stone and Trey Parker, which used many familiar supermarionation style effects, but this incisive meisterwork sorely missed the driving undertow Gray's of short, rousing, populist themes.

Twelve months ago when a lot of dancefloors were still very much in the grip of Paris' Ed Banger inspired jerky cuts and in-yer-face brashness, the prospect of a rather unassuming duo making patient low tempo cosmic epics would have seemed very far away. But those who nursed their cut and paste hangovers with tunes from the likes of Aeroplane have been rewarded. From a few very well received 12s and a superb gift for transmogrifying the most throwaway pop into spaced-out super ballads, Vito and Stephen now find themselves getting stuck into some real pop floor-fillers. Their remixes of both The Shortwave Set's Now Til '69 and Cut Copy's Hearts On Fire are perfect examples; in the latter, what starts out as quite a conventional house builder breaks down into sun-drenched Balearic disco. Sure, the increasing renown of the Scandinavian set over their French rivals has laid some foundation for this sound, but for those of you still overdosing on stuttering breaks this will be a real culture shock. If you're feeling in the mood to embrace something that turns down the bpm, increases the build-ups ten-fold, layers on slow rolling synth washes, and hits you in the heart rather than the temples, you could do a lot worse than Aeroplane.

You might expect a touchy-feely synesthetic merry-go-round from an exhibition about the interconnectedness of the human senses -- but that's not what you'll get at Vilma Gold's new show by German/Swedish artist Felix Gmelin. Better known for bald political statements and knowing reflections on the ambitions of the '60s Left, Gmelin manages to squeeze euthanasia, National Socialism and Diderot into this brilliant and moving study of the senses. Its subject isn't what we perceive through our ears, eyes, nose etc, but the gaps and inconsistencies in what the senses deliver to our poor confused brains. "A person ought to feel unified -- I feel like I'm divided" whinges a character from Godard's film Pierrot le Fou, and we know how he feels. Whilst our eyes are watching a film about blind kids petting chained bears at the zoo, our ears get an essay on the disconnection of sounds and sights. It's enough to discombobulate most viewers/isteners. Gmelin's photographs of graveyards modelled in clay were a highlight of the Arsenale show at the Venice Biennale last year. Here they are again in six degrees of separation: a film -- of a painting -- of a photo -- (stay with us) of an artist-made replica -- of a clay model -- of a graveyard made by a blind child. A manic translation that suggests you can never really trust your eyes -- or anything else for that matter. Go work it out for yourself before it closes this Sunday.

NB: runs till 09/11.

Bill Aitchison's new solo performance 2012 is part of the week-long Apocryphal Festival at CPT. Whilst the show has already had its premiere in Germany, these dates will be the first UK performances. 2012 is billed as a performance of conspiracy theories that mixes fact and fiction, the title relating to the numerous theories of an imminent end to the world. Given that he is promising to throw Saddam Hussein's novels, dog cloning and the war on terror into the mix, 2012 should be a rather blackly comic and obliquely political piece that mines the area of live art meets theatre occupied by Aitchison. In 2012 he describes himself as "independent researcher Dr Aitchison", and this monologue should be a somewhat satirical homage to the internet gurus and conspiracy theorists of this world. Aitchison's shows tend to play with the dynamic of having a smooth surface and structure that contains, sometimes only barely, an advanced level of anarchy. If his wilfully eccentric past performances are any indication to go by, this new apocalyptic show will be delirious.

NB: 2012 will be performed on both 10/11 and 11/11 along with Lucy Avery's This Is How I Lost My Memory (10/11) and Alison Blunt + Ivor Kallin's Strung Together (11/11). CPT's Apocryphal Festival runs from 08/11 till 16/11.

In post-war Germany, an awkward re-emerging democracy littered with former high-ranking Nazis, the government's reactionary defiance in the face of change weaned a new generation of free-thinking, free-living intellectual rebels. Uli Edel's film follows the first 10 years of the Baader-Meinhof group (or Red Army Faction), a gang of violent ideologists named after leading members Andreas Baader, played with relentless anger by Moritz Bleibtreu, and Ulrike Meinhof, played by award-winning German actress Martina Gedeck. Their cause was not just the protection of freedom in their country; they were standing up for oppressed and undermined people all over the world, riding a worldwide wave of revolutionary spirit. Edel's film, based on the book by RAF associate and former editor of Der Spiegel, Stefan Aust, takes no sides. It challenges you both to sympathise with the disillusioned rage of the RAF, seeing the State's monopoly on legitimate violence, and be disgusted by the cold-blooded violence they employed and inspired. The publicity poster for The Baader-Meinhof Complex asks the question: "Revolutionaries or Murderers?" The film, powerfully, and perfectly, answers the question -- they were both.

NB: before the ICA screening, Stefan Aust will be in conversation with Neal Ascherson, former Central European correspondent for The Observer and the author of numerous books including Black Sea. The Baader-Meinhof Complex is released in London on 14/11.

The laptop musician, with the glow of the computer screen lighting up an intensely focused face, seems an almost obligatory force in electronic music performance today, but it's important to remember that this creative snapshot only emerged in the last decade. With the release of the Macintosh laptop in the early '90s, it was seminal figures such as Carl Stone from the USA who pioneered this form of reductionist performance, casting aside banks of keyboards and synthesizers in favour of the one man/one screen artistry. In this show, amazingly his first in the UK, The Sound Source promote an evening of sampled magic, with Stone projecting his meditative and provoking work. At times sheer noise devours frenzied percussion, whilst Middle Eastern melodies jitter through shredded, clipped beats. Equally unpredictable support comes from People Like Us and Ergo Phizmiz, two eccentric figures in electronica, presenting their quirky disposable sampledelic exotica. A night to enjoy the unexpected delights of resampling the past, whilst looking towards the future.

NB: another concert of note at Kings Place is Faster Than Sound with among others Mira Calix, Camberwell Composers' Collective, Tim Exile and Hauschka on 07/11 (8pm).

Andres Serrano is best known for his ability to generate legendary controversy: if his name doesn't sound familiar, chances are Piss Christ will. Indeed, this formally beautiful photograph of a crucifix submerged in urine has led to many debates about the role of art and is also considered to have directly led to funding cuts by the US' National Endowment Of The Arts. His voluntarily provocative subject matters of choice -- bodily fluids, sex, death, religious icons -- have generated works that have equally shocked Christian coalitions and Neo-Nazis. His photographs have also rallied defenders of artistic freedom on a scale only equaled by Mapplethorpe's homo-erotic images. Whether you find what he represents shocking or not, his carefully composed images have an undeniable aesthetic merit. In conversation with artist, art historian and critic Lucy Soutter, he will discuss the particular approach to portraiture that characterizes his most recent work.

Leonard Cohen -- Canadian poet, novelist, singer, songwriter, Zen Buddhist, ladies man, Al Pacino lookalike -- and one of the few people on earth it's worth being truly in awe of. Many think of him as solace only for the depressed, but see him in concert and you'll understand how insanely moving his songs of love, sex, loss and belief are whilst witnessing something really special -- even those of us who know and love his work could hardly believe that this man, now in his seventies, would be the highlight of not one but two of this year's big music festivals. It's his first tour of the UK for more than a decade and he is a supremely confident performer, a man clearly happy to be in front of people again and perhaps a little surprised even at the ebullience of his reception. Absolutely mesmerising for those who know him, and a sure fire conversion for those who don't -- either way, grab your chance to be moved, you'd be mad not to.

NB: Leonard Cohen performs at The O2 Arena on both 13/11 and 14/11.

Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, design and architectural collaborator on Herzog & de Meuron's Bird's Nest for the Beijing Olympics, has attempted something more modest at Albion. Weiwei manages space with incredible determination. The physical experience of negotiating such works within these immaculately designed spaces makes for a bold collision of cultural differences against perfect architectural forms. Chairs and tables are bound together by vast lengths of battered bamboo which climb the walls. In an adjoining room, porcelain vases are rooted to the floor, whilst other identical vases hang suspended from the ceiling by more bamboo. A beautifully aged table has been cut in half so that it stands part on the floor and part up against the wall. This latter work is reminiscent of some of the newer sculptural works of Scottish artist Jim Lambie. Weiwei's didactic collection, with its resilient and visual intelligence, amounts to a spectacle as great and as grand as anything by Doris Salcedo.

NB: runs till 14/11.

Warhol's Kiss (1963) belongs to his group of early, silent structural films in which he focuses on duration. The film consists of around a dozen three-minute takes of pairs of people kissing -- each with varying degrees of intensity. All are filmed in close-up, with the body invisible, so that the act of kissing -- which is drawn-out to become almost repetitive -- is the sole focus. Themes that run throughout Warhol's films are present here: how the repetition of an act, even one representing the height of intimacy, changes its character, becoming absurd, even banal; questions about the role of film, framed around the dualism of theatricality/documentary; and the play between arousal and boredom that Warhol elicits both from his "actors" and in his viewers. Kiss will form the backdrop to this panel discussion. The participants include artists Melanie Manchot, and Wiebke Leister, who have both recently been exploring the subject of the kiss through film/photography and will be presenting new works, together with curator and writer Lisa le Feuvre, and film theorist and writer Al Rees.

NB: for Warhol fans make sure you catch Andy Warhol: Other Voices, Other Rooms at The Hayward (runs till 18/01/09).

In her mid-career survey at the Guggenheim in New York, Catherine Opie documents the incredible diversity of the US. In her photographs ranging from portraits of queer communities to gritty polaroids of urban families, she steps behind the American dream often glamorised by the media. Yet this London show, The Blue of Distance, explores the new territory of the Alaskan wilderness. It charts the fresh, ethereal beauty that can be found within its vast, open landscapes, drawing inspiration from A Field Guide To Getting Lost, a book by Rebecca Solnit. Viewers are invited to escape from the city into her fresh, poetic blue monochrome series of Glacier Bay and contemplate the millennia that have carved out its jagged cliff faces in the Edge Of Time. In contrast to such introspective art works, monumental photographs of snow-capped mountainsides, dotted with animated spectators and a grizzly bear surrounded by a pack of wolves bring us back to reality. With the advent of tourism in the wilderness, they invite a reassessment of man's relationship with the environment. These frozen moments of time hint at the sublimity of nature. Such a theme has been around since Romantic times, so Opie is not exactly breaking new ground with these works, but they make for a wonderful escape.

NB: runs till 15/11.

Formed in the early '90s, Duluth, Minnesota's two-thirds Mormon troika Low boast one of US indie's more graven reputations. Their status as purveyors of numinous, slowcore majesty came off the rails somewhat during a performance at this summer's End Of The Road Festival, however. At the climax of an otherwise impressive set, increasingly perturbed looking frontman, Alan Sparhawk threw an apparently unprompted and decidedly uncharacteristic fit of pique which resulted in him violently hurling his expensive Gibson Les Paul guitar into a stunned audience. Placid Mormon sobriety will hopefully have been restored for this Yuletide-themed show, during which the trio will be drawing heavily (if a tad prematurely) on their beguiling 1999 Christmas album. So, if incipient economic meltdown hasn't had you cancel Noel this year, and you fancy hearing "Silent Night", "Blue Christmas", "Little Drummer Boy" et al delivered in sensuous, mulled wine harmony by Sparhawk and wife/drummer Mimi Parker, then dig out your Santa hat and shuffle through the snowdrifts to KOKO. It might be wise to keep one eye out for Low flying guitars, however...

Is it art or is it music? The blossoming relationship of space, sound and architecture in the twentieth century has almost cruelly perverted our notions of how musical performance can be experienced, changing the context, the language, and the dialogue between the artist and the receiver into an ever more complex circle of mirrors. Shifting spatial perception is at the heart of German musician Florian Hecker's first gallery intervention in London. Creating an environment with five loudspeakers and a blank monochromatic floor mounted cube, Pentaphonic Dark Energy unleashes a shadowy lurching ambience that tears into the space, then collapses into nothingness. Disorienting, writhing, scratchy, lurching and convulsing, the work nods towards the density of Xenakis and abstraction of early Stockhausen. Solely operating on a computer for his sound sources, Hecker offers no discernible inclinations towards "music" in any traditional sense, but focuses on a complexity almost mathematical in nature. More sculptural in its rigorous approach, it's for the listener to submit to the reductionist sonic acoustics and reap pleasure in the unexpected. There is no easy entry into this sonic underworld.

NB: runs till 22/11.

Wallace Berman (1926-76) was the classic Beatnik Californian. Not heard of him? That's no surprise. Like Ray Johnson, he loathed the market, and so his art for long periods tried to subvert or avoid galleries. A "graphic" artist like Warhol, and also one who repeatedly used serial imagery, Berman eventually created a kind of mail art, enamoured no doubt by its ability to by-pass both dealer and market. He would send collaged letters to his mates, and also post his poetry "magazine" or printed edition, Semina. You could not buy it; he would have to give it to you. Unfortunately it only reached seven editions, each consisting of fragments, poems, images and drawings by Berman and his friends. He is part of that West Coast Beat generation that included Jess, George Herms and Ed and Nancy Kienholz; we could describe it as brown and scrappy, but also as poetic, surfing culture, and one that was above all about love. It's all summed up by his famous motto: Art is Love is God.

NB: runs till 23/11. Also on display at the Camden Arts Centre is a show by Allen Ruppersberg (which also runs till 23/11).

Bloomberg SPACE appears to thrive on its financial clout and its cool architecture, attracting leading artists with international reputations. Fade In / Fade Out is no exception; the information board by artist Kris Martin is an industrial work of non-information in which everything turns as it should, yet for all our attention nothing comes to the fore and it delivers nothing, and for that it works wonderfully. Cerith Wyn Evans' horribly kitsch chandelier hangs from the central space, plastic light fittings pulsing on and off in a way that has been likened to messages in Morse code. Philippe Decrauzat's wall piece in vinyl could easily be mistaken for an example of flash corporate branding; stalagmites of colour drop from the ceiling and climb up again, black against white, and Philippe Parreno's inflated speech bubbles bob up and down against the high ceiling, resembling something of the sophisticated style of Honda. As recognised as these artists' works are, and as well intentioned as the corporate touch is, these works through no fault of their own become devoid of meaning. Like the colossal buildings that bear down over Bloomberg in the night sky, these works and their foundations can easily fade to nothing.

NB: runs till 29/11. Philippe Parreno currently has a solo show at Pilar Corrias (till 19/11).

Elizabeth Diller's soft American accent belies the fact that she was born in Lodz, Poland, before moving to the USA. She studied at Cooper Union School Of Art and took a BA in architecture from Cooper Union School Of Architecture. She is currently Professor of Architecture at Princeton University. In 1979 she founded Diller + Scofidio (now Diller Scofidio + Renfro) with her husband Ricadro Scofidio. The practice specialises in an anti-disciplinary mode of working, and they produce substantial architecture projects, multi-media installations, experimental theatre and dance, furniture, digital media, print and works of art within the context of their New York studio. Major recent projects include Boston's Institute Of Contemporary Art and the Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Centre.

NB: two art/media installations of DS+R's work are currently on view: Chain City at the Venice Biennale and Arbores Laetae at the Liverpool Biennale.

To read the interview click here.

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