A repost of one of my favourite street artists, L.E.T. (l.e.t._les.enfants.terribles)—“I'm not beautiful like you, I'm beautiful like me”.
Sometimes we just need reminding.
And to quote another of L.E.T.'s paste-ups—“Stay Weird”.
ghosts of the arctic
For those who love ice-scapes—and polar bears.
Here's a stunning short film of photographer, Joshua Holko, searching the sea ice of Svalbard to document the elusive polar bear.
Quite breathtaking.
Presented by Untitled Film Works, directed by Abraham Joffe ACS.
blissing me
Aaah Bjork—she's in love! Here's her song, Blissing Me from her newly released album, Utopia.
Gorgeous.
i love you earth
Photo: Kirsten Pettifor
Yoko Ono's billboard, I Love You Earth, 2017.
Awesome.
amok
Okay, chilling out now, thanks to Thom Yorke. Here's Atoms for Peace's single, Amok.
need some air
Image: Rob from BRMC at the Paradiso 2017, current tour. Photo: @tmeimardes
I feel like I've just surfaced from cave spelunking (love that word!). Gaaaah! I've been editing, editing, editing...The light is too bright, it's muggy, hot, and I need a serious infusion of caffeine (of the tea variety—yep, I'm a tea drinker), chocolate (of the dark variety), and some high energy music. BRMC will do.
Here's Black Rebel Motorcycle Club's I Need Some Air from their album, Baby '81.
silk
Some books are simply this—unforgettable.
Stories that graft onto imagination, memory, even our bodies as they seep through our senses, winding their way beneath skin. We don’t simply read, we feel, travel, escape and for a moment, live these tales.
Once read, we carry them with us. Such stories can even change us.
Unforgettable.
After curating a particularly difficult exhibition (non-existent budget, tricky exhibition space, 12 hour work days, an impossible deadline etc. etc.), another curator working with me gave me a gift as a sign of appreciation for what I’d done. While I’ll never forget the kindness motivating the gift, the true treasure was the gift itself—a book.
Silk by Alessandro Baricco.
As the curator passed it on to me, I’ve been recommending it to people ever since.
Told as a fable, in 1861 a French silk merchant, Hervé Joncour, travels to the end of the world: Japan. His mission is to find and buy silk worms. Here he meets with the most “invincible” man in Japan, Hara Kei, and at that first meeting there is another, a concubine with eyes that do not have an Oriental shape.
So it begins.
A love story lit by an unfathomable desire and a subtle eroticism, spanning time and a vast distance, and is compelling for having a will all its own.
A truly unforgettable story.
the sky is broken
Last Saturday afternoon the clouds rolled in, lightning cracked the sky and the power went out. I stood outside and I could feel it—the absence of the switch-flow of energy, an undercurrent we're barely aware of, but now that it was gone, there was a null space. An eerie silence. So, I put my headphones on, chilled out, and filled it with sound.
And in the shuffle came this song and it was kind of—perfect. Moby's The Sky is Broken from his album, Play. Pared back, poetic, hypnotic and achingly intimate.
100 Love Sonnets
Recently I was gifted a book of Pablo Neruda's poems to add to my collection of his selected poems and Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair. This book is special for having come all the way from Shakespeare and Company Bookstore in Paris (I love that place!), and for featuring 100 of his love sonnets (Cien sonetos de amor). I've been savouring them, a truly luscious and sensuous collection.
So far, a standout for me is Sonnet XVII:
I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.
I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.
I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way
than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.
the ocean doesn't care
Film by Finisterre and Huck. Directed by Mikey DeTemple.
“The ocean doesn't give a fuck about you.”
A blunt statement from this short film about four New Yorkers escaping their everyday lives and why they surf.
The ocean doesn't care—it's all about why you care about the ocean and your relationship with it. Check it out.
blue elephants
Artwork: wall mural by WRDSMTH
Blue elephants—I so want to read blue elephants! Paste up by @wrdsmth.
Love it.
Kendrick Lamar - love
I'm almost scared to find out what's in the news each day. So, it's great to discover someone who's work you admire talking positive. Here's Kendrick Lamar getting down to basics about what's important in life.
Love.
Cai Guo-Quiang - Fireflies
Artist Cai Guo-Quiang recently brought some magic to the streets of Philadelphia, with this Public Art event titled, Fireflies, to celebrate 100 years of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Using a fleet of rickshaw pedicabs, he created 1000 handmade paper lanterns that were lit and moving as the pedicabs made there way around the Parkway. Known for his pyrotechnic artwork, Guo-Quiang makes the connection of the lanterns with his childhood home in Quanzhou:
“In a way, these lanterns are the fireworks of my childhood that can never be put out. When I was a kid in my hometown, there were a lot of lanterns I could play with and these became extensions of my dreams.”
Magical and joyful.
Bjork - The Gate
Just been listening to Bjork's new single, The Gate. Simply divine. Can't wait for the album!
Huna - Water
Sean Yoro aka the hula, has just finished this amazing mural at the Bay of Fundy, St John, New Brunswick, working with 28ft tide changes. Check it out, it's amazing.
Guide
Discovered this through the wonderful 'Water Journal', a short animated film by Quentin Marchand with sound design and original music by Theophile Moussouni. Enjoy!
enough
Artwork: paste-up by @ender.art
Heavy heart. Waking to find out about Barcelona. This week—Charlottesville and now this...enough with violence, hate, bigotry, intolerance and fear.
imagine
Artist Olafur Eliasson posted this on his IG after finding this on a walk home from his studio.
Makes you wonder.
A Yoshitomo Nara Day
Trying to write—bug-eyed, unfocused, thoughts meandering. Chocolate would be good...
two thousand and seventeen
Four Tet has just released a gorgeous new work, Two Thousand and Seventeen. I've been listening to it on repeat! Check it out.