March 2010
31 posts
From our apartment in London a long time ago.
Manifold Destiny: A legendary problem and the battle over who solved it. by Sylvia Nasar and David Gruber (The New Yorker, 2006)
An article about math and Grigory Perelman, the Russian mathematician.
This is a video by Emily-Jane Robinson, an artist in Los Angeles. I love the things she makes and especially this, I think it is so beautiful:
CONVERSATIONS I, 2009. 3 Channel Video Installation. April 2 - 5 2009 - UCLA Bermont Gallery, Los Angeles, California. Clip Duration: 2:33.
Conversations I is a 3 Channel Installation consisting of video, sound, garden furniture,...
PJ Harvey & Björk - Satisfaction
I have no idea what happens in this book. I read two pages and thought this was going to be something fantastic. Then on page three Margaret’s dog dies in a fire while she is on a walk. Later Margaret “[kneels] in front of the backdoor [to memorize] the gouges his claws made in it as he tried to escape.” Maybe if I ever want to kill myself but find myself without motivation I...
Marianne Faithfull & Rufus Wainwright -...
- meg coming to the island? i hope so. write, swim, fire, write, swim, fire.
- do you know what makes you feel like an asshole? going to look at a giant victorian and realizing it’s suspiciously affordable because it’s a rooming house and where the fuck are those people going to go? clear out, ladies, i need a stamp collecting room! and who are you, not even 30, seeing if...
This is one of the best books I’ve ever read. It also has one of the best covers. I read it in London while going through the 2002 Booker Prize long list instead of doing my abandoned PhD. That year Rohinton Mistry’s Family Matters and Carol Shield’s Unless were on the short list and I have no idea how they were shortlisted while If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things was...
The Urge to End It All - Understanding Suicide by Scott Anderson (New York Times, 2008)
I have a new plaster and a mortgage broker. I need a haircut, I look like I live in the forest. And I need a house. And I need to make a video.
Prazak Quartet Gustav Mahler - Piano Quartet in A Minor
Mahler is probably my favourite. In 2003 I saw Symphony No. 5 in C sharp minor performed by the London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican and I wrote “when it was over people clapped and shouted like I have never seen before and we must have sat there for a full fifteen minutes just clapping and middle aged men in suits...
Jacqueline du Pre Antonín Dvořák - Cello Concerto in B minor, Op.104 (II. Adagio, ma non troppo) Chicago Symphony Orchestra (1970) Conducted by Daniel Barenboim
Aside from this concerto being heartstabbingly beautiful, I love it also because supposedly Leo Stern was chosen over Hanus Wihan (for whom it was written) for the premiere performance only after he bribed Dvořák with rare...
Jacqueline du Pre Georg Matthias Monn/Arnold Schoenberg - Concerto for cello in G minor London Symphony Orchestra (1968) Conducted by Sir John Barbirolli
John Corigliano Symphony No. 2 Performed by the Novosibirsk Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra Conducted by Alim Shakhmametyev
I saw this performed by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra in 2008 when I was there to see Prokofiev’s Sinfonia Concertante and had never heard Corigliano’s piece. But it was the most incredible thing I had heard ever. I would...
CARDIFF & MILLER Burning House (2001) Materials: Plasma screen, headphones Duration: 4 min. loop 50cm x 90cm (42” diagonal screen)
JANET CARDIFF The Missing Voice: Case Study B (1999) Audio walk, 50 minutes Commissioned and produced by Artangel Whitechapel Library to Liverpool Street Station. London, UK
I love this. Listen.
- The Late Work of Margaret Kroftis by Mark Gluth - ...
Travelogues: Feminist Film and Video
Ladyfest Toronto and TPS Student Association present three evenings of film and video by emerging feminist artists curated by Kate-Christine Miller. Each evening will be accompanied by discussion facilitated by the curator and including audience members, artists, and film critics/theorists. Discussion will address the works shown and their relationship to the...
Today grant notifications for writers arrived and thanks to the Canada Council for the Arts I can make work for a long time without worrying about things like A Real Job. I kind of can’t believe it still. Canada, I like you so much.
Nina Simone - To Love Somebody
Home. After making 150 prints in the last week this is all I want.
This is what I wear while making pictures sometimes. It also makes me feel safer when I’m in the studio by myself all night because it looks scary. Like a cyborg. Tonight is my last night with it and I don’t want to leave!
This is the place I have been staying: Spark Box Studio. If you’re looking for residencies you should come here. Chrissy and Kyle are the nicest...
8 hours printing, cracked hands, wishing to be an octopus so I could dodge everything that needs it. I have acquired an admirer here, a man who seems to wander the one main street smoking cigarettes and not really going anywhere. He seems like he’s waiting for me to ask him something, like an important question or to come have coffee with me or what his favourite something is. He asks...
Tell me what you are afraid of.
I am looking for people who will let me do audio recordings while they talk about their fears. This mostly means people in Toronto, although I am going to Los Angeles in June and could record you then if you live in Southern California.
For samples of what I mean by fears, see this entry. Or read this response I wrote to my friend and brilliant writer and...
Tindersticks - Yesterday’s Tomorrows
There are lens problems that mean I have to crop everything and the prints are unusable for anything but testing things. But I will have a book full of notes about my negatives that will help me make my monster prints this summer. In the darkroom I wear a gas mask and polyurethane gloves for the selenium and listen to Roy Orbison. I look like a breath control fetishist.
Louise in the attic. Kevin took this photograph yesterday.
This is my friend Sarah’s new project. You should submit something:
Each Monday, Storychord.com features one story, one image, and one song— each by a different underexposed, talented up-and-comer. All issues are thoughtfully curated by Sarah Lynn Knowles (SARAHSPY, The Furnace Review).
SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
To submit work, please carefully follow the guidelines below....
