or; facts only Lucy Ellmann can confirm: the fact that I don’t take any pride in housework, as far as I know, which isn’t very Amish of me, house-proud Hausfrau, housewife, homemaker, the fact that I come from a long line of people who took no pride in housekeeping, … the fact that when I…
Category: Aesthetics
Dept. of Speculation
What Rilke said: I want to be with those who know secret things or else alone. Somehow, I was sure Jenny Offill’s Dept. of Speculation would read very much like Leslie Jamison’s The Empathy Exams, a much-praised book, which I unfortunately have to admit, I really didn’t like at all. And so the Department ……
The true alchemists do not change lead into gold; they change the world into words
So much of philosophy is fiction. The William H Gass Reader (2019) William H. Gass was born in Fargo, North Dakota. He is the author of seven works of fiction, nine books of essays, and a book of conversations. Gass was a professor of philosophy at Washington University. For most of his life he lived…
“Wasting time is something that people do or feel all over the world, not just in Italy.”
After yesterdays loaded post, it’s time for a slice of plain art … I first discovered Arvo Pärt’s My Heart’s in the Highlands, which was composed for the 50th birthday of the countertenor David James, through Paolo Sorrentino’s fabulous film La grande bellezza (The Great Beauty), 2013. La Grande Bellezza is a pure sensual overload of…
A degree of darkness
I spent my weekend in a graphic workshop learning the art of cyanotype. Or, to be more precise, studying the method of cyanotype – the art will hopefully enter into my work as I go along. Cyanotype is a nineteenth century photographic process using chemicals that produce beautiful blue prints when exposed to sunlight. The…
Passing Through
A short story of excellence, dedication and perseverance & of the joy and importance of meaning-making: Ted Kooser (1939) was the 13th Poet Laureate of the United States and received the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 2005.
Venturing into art
ven·tur·ing: Venture noun: an undertaking involving uncertainty as to the outcome, especially a risky or dangerous one. Venture verb: to take the risk of. Venture verb (used without object): to make or embark upon a venture. Venturing into art, I have been thinking about this: What is the relationship between things I find beautiful, intriguing,…
On pain and solace
There can be no beauty without the ghost of pain held within it. Although the wind … BY IZUMI SHIKIBU – TRANSLATED BY JANE HIRSHFIELD from The Ink Dark Moon (Vintage Books, 1990)
Sunday poem
Rereading Frost by Linda Pastan Sometimes I think all the best poems have been written already, and no one has time to read them, so why try to write more? At other times though, I remember how one flower in a meadow already full of flowers somehow adds to the general fireworks effect as you…
What art can do …
Good art activates both heart & mind. Its a dualisme not always well reflected in contemporary conceptual art. We often see art drowning in its own philosophical – or; as is more & more the case today – political slogans. I do definitively understand the need for political revolt; but for the artist the uttering…
