__________
Claude Lévêque
‘The title of the exhibition refers to a song by the American rock group The Cramps. The fly’s field of vision approaches 360° and the insect can break down the movement of an immediate threat through an ability to perceive almost ten times more images per second than a human being. Its augmented vision is directly linked to the sensory paroxysms that are one aspect of the installation.’
Human Fly (2019)
_________
Michel François
Walk Through a Line of Neon Lights (2019)
Watch here
_________
Keith Sonnier
‘Employing unusual materials that had never before been used, Sonnier, along with his contemporaries, Bruce Nauman, Richard Tuttle, Eva Hesse, Richard Serra, and Barry Le Va, called all previous conceptions of sculpture into question. Sonnier has experimented with materials as varied as latex, satin, bamboo, found objects, satellite transmitters, and video. In 1968, the artist began working with neon, which quickly became a defining element of his work. The linear quality of neon allows Sonnier to draw in space with light and color, while the diffuseness of the light enables his work to interact on various architectural planes.’
Mat Key and Radio Track (1972)
Lightbulb and Fire (1970)
________
Meghan Young
‘The Symphony in D Minor installation manages to capture the raw beauty of a thunderstorm in four cylindrical sculptures suspended 40 feet from the ceiling. Displaying rain drops and dark clouds, the imagery and sound is intensified when the installation detects movement. As soon as a person touches the sculptures, all hell breaks loose. Projections of rain and electrical charges are sent through the space.’
Symphony in D Minor (2012)
__________
Leo Villareal
‘Leo Villareal works with pixels and binary code to create complex, rhythmic compositions in light. Firmly rooted in abstraction, his approach uses layered sequencing that results in open-ended and subjective visual experiences. Villareal’s works often reference organic systems and evoke—but do not illustrate—atmospheric elements in that emergent and unexpected behavior occurs without a predetermined outcome. Interested in identifying the rules and governing structures of systems, Villareal uses custom, artist-created code to constantly change the frequency, intensity, and patterning of LED lights. For Villareal, the essence and medium of his work is code; light and its phenomenological effect is its visible manifestation.’
Cylinder 2 (2012)
Cosmos 4 (2013)
________
Paul Chan
‘Chan described the series The 7 Lights (2005-07) as “hallucinating the seven days of creation from dawn to dusk”. His projections included visions of floating objects and falling bodies that drew on themes of the Apocalypse and Revelation, as well as referencing images and events from our contemporary world. The exhibition title referred to light, and in particular to light that had been ‘struck out’. The tension between the two is central to the artist’s practice.’
1st Light (2007)
________
Bruce Nauman
‘Nauman enforces the contrast between the perceptual and physical experience of space in his sculptures and installations. Looking at the brilliant color emanating from Green Light Corridor (1970) prompts quite a different phenomenological experience than does maneuvering through its narrow confines.’
Green Light Corridor (1970)
_______
Kyle McDonald & Jonas Jongejan
‘Kyle McDonald and Jonas Jongejan filled a darkened room with fifty disco balls and created colored and timed lighting sequences to cast mesmerizing reflections that surround visitors. However, rather than simply relying on scattershot reflections, McDonald and Jongejan used hundreds of structured light scans to capture the volumetric position of every pixel being projected by each of the three projectors. The pair then used SketchUp to predict the reflected pixel positions.’
Light Leaks (2014)
______
Unknown
Town Without Pity/Audrey Horne (2013)
_______
Mona Hatoum
‘Home consists of a long table covered with gleaming metal kitchen appliances. The table has a polished wooden top and heavy metal legs on wheels. The industrial connotations of the table are offset by the domestic kitchen utensils on its surface, including graters, scissors, a colander, a whisk, a ladle, salad servers, a sieve, a pasta maker, presses and a heart-shaped pastry cutter. Wires snake through the installation, connected to each utensil with crocodile clips. The wires conduct electrical currents to the objects periodically illuminating small light bulbs positioned beneath the sieve and colander and inside an upright grater. The current is controlled by a software programme that alters the frequency and intensity of the lights. Speakers amplify the crackling sound of electricity coursing through the wires and the metal objects. The sculpture is set back behind a barrier of thin horizontal steel wires that separates the viewer from the potentially lethal current.’
Home (1999)
___________
Erwin Redl
‘Erwin Redl, an Austrian-born artist based in Bowling Green, Ohio and New York City, is best known for large-scale light installations for art museums, public buildings and corporations. His work transforms the medium of light into immersive, tangible experiences for viewers. His architectural environments translate complex mathematical algorithms and other methods inspired by computer code into contemplative, minimalist spaces further activated by his use of motion and rhythmic sequencing.’
Ascension (line 24), 2014
___________
Atsuko Tanaka
‘Atsuko Tanaka, (born Feb. 10, 1932, Osaka, Japan—died Dec. 3, 2005, near Nara, Japan), Japanese artist who , was a leading avante-garde artist, best known for her experimental works of the 1950s and ’60s. Tanaka was an early member of Gutai, a radical group of Osaka-based artists founded in 1954. Many of Tanaka’s works involved electric light, the most famous of which, Electric Dress (1956), was made entirely of coloured light bulbs, cords, and fluorescent tubes that she wore as a dress during performances.’
Electric Dress (1956)
___________
A.F.Vandevorst
‘A.F.Vandevorst have sculpted a life-size sculpture of a sleeping woman. This wax woman embedded with 250 kg of candle wicks was made by Lenn Cox.’
___________
Jason Ferguson
‘Domestic Carnival is an ongoing project that takes the specific rooms of a home and re-presents them as flashing amusement park rides, transforming intimate interior spaces into objects of mass spectacle. Within the room dark and foreboding music, two hundred pulsing lights, steel joists, and a trailer combine with a dining room table, chairs, and oak hardwood flooring to create a carnival that is both familiar and uncanny. The apparatus is engineered like a carnival ride; the entire sculpture is mounted on a custom trailer that collapses for transportation to its next destination.’
Domestic Carnival: Dining Room (2019)
________
Dan Flavin
‘In 1963, Dan Flavin began working with the medium of light: functional fluorescent tubes exhibited in their original state, without alteration or decoration.’
Demo for Installation of LED tubes
_______
Sherrie Levine
‘Cast stainless steel. “I want to put a picture on top of a picture,” Levine says. “This makes for times when both disappear and other times when they’re both visible.”’
Light Bulb (2000)
_______
Ed Atkins
‘Atkins is best known for works like Ribbons (2014), featuring iterations of drunken, soliloquy-spouting male protagonists who ruminate on perennial (and currently unfashionable) topics like love, loss, and loneliness. His work Even Pricks (2013) takes a slightly different tack. Atkins evokes his signature mood of quiet desperation with comparably spare methods, stringing together a series of vignettes that seem as indebted to the trippy avant-garde films of the 1960s as they do video-game cutscenes and contemporary cinematic tropes.’
Even Pricks (2013)
________
TUNDRA
‘TUNDRA is a St.Petersburg based collaborative artist collective focused on creating spaces and experiences by exploring facets of interaction between audio/visual and human emotions. We specialise in multi-media performances and immersive audiovisual installations. Our multidisciplinary team involves musicians, sound engineers, programmers and visual artists. The team is known for works presented at festivals and museums of multi-media art in America, Europe, Russia, and Asia.’
Row (2020)
THE DAY WE LEFT FIELD (2019)
Nomad (2018)
TUNDRA x JAGUAR (2018)
________
Otto Piene
‘In 1957, Piene developed the Grid Picture, a type of stencilled painting made from half-tone screens with regularly arranged points in single colors (yellow, silver, white, or gold), for example Pure Energy (1958, New York, MOMA). Piene’s work then developed in a variety of forms. The Lichtballette (“light ballet”, 1959) was a development of the Grid Pictures; light from moving lamps was projected through grids, thus extending and stimulating the viewer’s perception of space.’
Light Ballet (1969)
_________
David Batchelor
‘Batchelor is interested in the colours that you find rather than the ones that you make. So he’s been picking up discarded light boxes that typically advertise shops and restaurants (and that, he says, are one of the main sources of colour in a city), cleaned them up and mounted them to form a tall sculpture he called Magic Hour. The colours emanating from the light boxes are glowing against the wall and the public only see their reflection shining back at them.’
Magic Hour (2004-2007)
________
Leo Pyrata
_____________
Diana Thater
‘Featuring honeybees and a hive made of multicolored hexagons, knots + surfaces addresses a recent mathematical hypothesis that correlates a six-dimensional spatial model to the map of a honeybee’s dance. I’m working with animals that exist as individuals and as part of a complex social network that functions as a unit. Here, I feature the erasure of the video rectangle in order to create a multipart, puzzle-like image. Initially, the many components seem to form a single picture. However, when viewers walk into the projections, they penetrate the “bee space”; the one picture breaks into five and the surrounding bees become a vision of chaos.’
Knots + Surfaces (2001)
________
Larry Bell
‘One of the most significant artists of his generation, Larry Bell (b. 1939, Chicago) is an important representative of a West Coast minimalism that uses commercial and industrial materials and forms to create intense sensorial experiences. Best known for minimalist sculptures—transparent cubes and sprawling glass installations that thrive on the interplay of shape, light, and environment—Bell is considered a champion of the ideas of the Light and Space Movement of the 1960s. For decades, Bell has explored the new materials and modes of production developed by the military. His work during and after this period also reflects an interest in the scientific and technological experimentation taking place in Southern California. Hydrolux (1986) is complex fountain with live video projects, the work skews perception and critically invokes the viewer. As Bell’s only water-based sculpture that was executed beyond the model stage, Hydrolux demonstrates Bell’s constant inquiry into innovation, audience engagement, the surreal, and the sublime.’
Hydro lux (1986)
_______
James Clar
‘James Clar is a media artist whose work is a fusion of technology, popular culture, and visual information. Actually, his work is an analysis and observation on the affects of media and technology on our perception of culture, nationality, and identity. His interest is in new technology and production processes, using them as a medium, while analyzing and critiquing their modifying affects on human behavior.’
Dynomite (2006)
_______
Kitty Kraus
‘The inherent fragility of Kraus’s mediums betrays established ideas about the stability and longevity of sculptural form. Such flaws are seen in Untitled (2006), in which illuminated lightbulbs are frozen inside ink-dyed ice cubes. Installed in the gallery at room temperature, the ice slowly melts, producing a meandering puddle of watered-down ink on the gallery floor, eventually leaving behind a stained and patterned path of dried ink.’
Untitled (2006)
_______
Ryota Kuwakubo
‘On the front of a model train running around a darkened room is a small, lit-up LED light. As the train moves slowly along its route, small and large objects are projected onto the walls and ceiling. Due to the movement of the light source, the shadows of the stationary objects appear to move, leaving viewers with the impression that they are passengers riding on the train.’
The Tenth Sentiment (2010)
____________
Nasan Tur
‘A room with a wall in flames. Although the fire burns incessantly, contrary to expectations it does not spread.’
Fire (2017)
_______
Gavin Turk
‘I first came to notice the Gerhard Richter painting (Kerze, 1983) in 1988 when it was used on the album cover of Daydream Nation by Sonic Youth. It seemed to extend the mood of the music and got lodged in my subconscious; now more than 30 years later, this feeling of pathos has started to reappear in my work.’ — Gavin Turk’
Kerze (2022)
*
p.s. Hey. ** Carsten, Now it’s Spain against France. Because I like how wild everyone here goes when France wins the big futbol prize, I’m voting for us. Dealbreakers re: Marseilles. It’s way too hot there for me. I also don’t like the hilly build. That’s one of the reasons I don’t like San Francisco. And I’ve been fortunate to live all my life in big cities where there is lots of fast changing international culture (music, art film, theater, etc.) within quick reach, and I would be bored and unhappy if that weren’t the case. ** jay, Hi! Yes, Philip Best has gone on to arguably even better things. If I don’t get 8 hours of sleep at night, I’m a dead duck above the neck. I have a distressingly fascist body clock. But you sound okay. The Tati was sold out, so we didn’t get to go. Boo. ** Adem Berbic, Vital, what more could one wish to institute. Thank you. For me the problem with ‘bludgeon’ is it eliminates nuance and detail in its recipient. I like being bludgeoned by music, but there’s not much aftermath. Maybe ‘excoriate’? That’s more interactive while still way harsh. Yours is an interesting goal for writing assuming there’s sufficient thought and calculation in any case. Yes, how was your friend’s power electronics debut? Those with new boobs obviously know best. ** Dominik, Hi!!! Amsterdam living in the winter when there are no tourists is a grim thing, at least if you’re not Dutch. Yes, Ange’s wedding was four metro stops away, but then the party was at some house in the middle of nowhere. (I skipped it because I hate parties and it was a zillion degrees that day). I’ve sometimes wondered if people use sunscreen as a sexual lubricant, and, if not, why not? Maybe love wonders that too. Love boringly but desperately pleading with the manager of my building to fix the fucking broken elevator because climbing four flights of stairs in this heat is not suitable for someone who smokes cigarettes, G. ** Steve, Not that I know of. Or not to me at least. Maybe to Sypha himself? Hm on ‘Black Chariot’. Ah, a great new reason to stay in my shitty air-conditioning. Everyone, Steve’s new episode is yours to borrow! Here he is to characterise: ‘Swim with the orcas to art pop, psych, hip-hop and more on the latest episode of “Radio Not Radio”. This one features Ibeyi, Hanbee, Bia Soull & d. silvestre, Faye Wong, Vi, Cold Riot, Pomelo, Madonna, Penelope Trappes, Feeble Little Horse, F/i, Hash Jar Tempo, Slift, Sleep, Trad Gras och Stenar, Odyssey Cult, Baba Zula, Selda, Vince Staples, Kneecap, Matt Proxy, mary sue, Maiya The Don, Earthsignchels, Parallel Though, Paris, Edén Carrasco & Sara Zlanabitnig, and Patricia Brennan & Sylvie Courvoisier.’ ** julian, Hey there! This summer has been a plan killer, at least over here, so no problem. I’m happy the Whitehouse shebang intersected with you. I’m good, overly heated, but good. I’d have to guess at what I was listening to particularly when writing Frisk, which would have been 1987-1990 roughly. Uh, memory says Sonic Youth, Glenn Branca, Fugazi, Boredoms, … gosh, I wish I had my notes here. Thank you a lot for reading the novel! ** horatio, Howdy, horatio! Really good to see you! That’s heady and seemingly very exciting about the crushed on/crush bearing guy. Good madness, right? I do of course really like that Neutral Milk Hotel album, yes. I think I’m going to listen to it again right about now actually, so thank you. Describe your madness and, well, anything else if you feel like it. xo. ** _Black_Acrylic, Right, that interview. Everyone. Mr. William Bennett of Whitehouse and subsequently Cut Hands was interviewed by our very own _Black_Acrylic some years ago for his and others’ legendary, much missed zine Yuck ‘n Yum, and I obviously highly encourage you to go partake in their conversation. Do so here. Ridiculous that taxi services aren’t readily prepared for wheel chair using customers at this point in time. I did hear about England. An England vs. France final? That could be ugly, haha. ** Bill, I see Sypha popping up on Facebook every once in a while. He seems like him. The Tati screening was sold out, so we didn’t go. Surprising, but I think a big air-conditioned theater and Tati must’ve proved too luxurious to the heat sufferers, understandably. Back East again, ah. I don’t even want to think about that heat. You’re a toughy, dude. ** CHARLIEZACKS, Hi. Oh, okay, give me a few days to get through this heatwave because I’m a bit sluggish at the moment. ** Uday, That makes sense. The term delineation. I seriously don’t think you could be a plebeian even if you dressed as one for Halloween. I don’t think you need to be an artist to know really interesting people. Being interested in art helps. Some of the most inspiring people aren’t artists. No sweat, pal. ** HaRpEr //, Sypha was the master of inhumanly big posts. There’s a live Sparks album coming out? Wow, great, that makes so much sense. Oh, yeah, Spicer is great. For some reason my very favorite mini-collection of his ‘Billy the Kid’. It tests its own sentimentality in a really interesting way. ** laura w, My imagination says that being on an island at a wedding could be relaxing because everyone would ostensibly be happy and being around happy people is usually relaxing, I think. Although you being the sister could throw a wrench into that, I guess. Sorry about Norway. Yeah, Paris will go nuts if France wins, and I like when Paris goes nuts, so I’m on board. My weekend was okay considering the heat. Just saw friends, went to an ice cream parlor, a lot of walking on the shady side of the street. Thanks about ‘The Anal-Retentive Line Editor’. If I do end up doing the Selected book, that one’s on the list. I don’t know Rhythm Heaven, but you’ve easily convinced me to go find out what it is. Thank you! ** kenley, Hi, kenley! I’ve been wondering how you are there in still relatively new Montreal. High five or low five on our mutual sweltering. I am so over it. Belgium was nice, and more recently Holland/Amsterdam was nice. I was gifted homemade stroop waffles, which was happy making. My Parisian exploits are pretty hampered by the heat, but they say it’ll get back to just normal summer warm in a few days, so there’s still time. How are you countering the aggressive sun? ** Right. It could be argued that there’s already too much light around at the moment, but here’s some more. See you tomorrow.
Now available in North America 
Hi!!
That sounds like the most ideal wedding setup imaginable—a ceremony in the neighborhood and a conveniently skippable party.
It has crossed my (and so probably love’s) mind too, when it comes to sunscreen.
Ugh, no, I’m so sorry about the elevator! Ours craps out regularly too, so I’m just hoping it won’t do so during the summer. We live on the fifth floor, and our dog can’t climb stairs because of her joints/spine, so we have to carry her whenever that happens. She only weighs 12 kg, but I tend to feel like a gibbon by the time we reach our floor nonetheless, haha.
Love sitting next to the A.F.Vandevorst piece and just looking at it for hours and hours, Od.
Yeah, the B-word is a little flattening, I feel like Whitehouse maybe short-changed themselves sometimes with their myth-making – I suppose the angle that pricked my ears is having the power to muck around with the reader’s/listener’s sense of agency and their expectations of the dynamic going into it. The screaming-pummelling bit is more incidental, and I suspect WH thought the same. But yeah, I’ll need to get into my Michelangelo mode for this. The transcribing began yesterday. The edit will need to be lucid.
The debut was very good and very promising, I thought. Closer to harsh noise wall than power electronics, although with the requisite screaming-into-an-effects-unit on top. It’s nice to see someone going into that from a partly literary angle – he’s an admirer of yours and Mr. Moore’s and some other friendly faces – and, I suppose, thinking about how it can unfold meaning in a way that’s a little inflected by writing. Not that that isn’t a bit of a false dichotomy, but it felt sort of fresh in any case. I guess Closet Doctrine will be the name to watch for harsh noise wall as a vehicle for interrogating gayness, if that’s an itch you wanted scratched.
On the note of lighting, I’ve been sort of spoiled by seeing a few live electronic things with very cleverly designed and synchronised LEDs, so now I get irrationally peeved when the lighting isn’t done like that. I’ve another friend who does these cool performances with motion-sensor light-controlling gloves and things which he somehow rigs out of cheap parts from AliExpress. It’s quite wizard-like. Anyway. What are you staring down the barrel of this week, besides Paris hopefully losing its hellfire aspect? T and I intend to go to the beach on Wednesday, but as is always the case here, we are mere slaves at the altar of the changing weather forecast.
Cool topic. Made me think of two of my favorite movies, “Valentin de las Sierras” & “Yeelen”, both of which—on an aesthetic level—could be seen as examples of light art. The latter’s title is Bamana for “brightness/light”. Some Youtuber did a lovely montage tribute to it: https://youtu.be/cnEUiJOVkiM?is=7_3R0-cpjIr5tPc9
Listened to the new Stones album yesterday & enjoyed it, though I don’t quite get the heaps of praise it’s receiving in certain circles. Reminds me of the situation with “One Battle After Another” last year, which while quite good was wildly overpraised due to the lack of original work coming out of mainstream film. It’s the same with popular music it seems.
Re. the world cup: yep, you & I will have to be on rival sides, at least for tomorrow night, there’s no way around it, haha. Gotta stand behind our respective chosen home countries. Spaniards get pretty crazy too, so let’s see whose neighborhood ends up on fire…
I wrote a comment on your Shaye post but forgot to hit send!
my sister loves that guy. She even put his face on her debit card.
On the topic of old args, have you ever seen the polish ARG project of the girl with paper eyes taped over her own and the soundtrack is very analog and fuzzy nice, to match the theme of the story which takes place in the 80s and has a old tv VHS program filter to it.
Cant find it. Damn. Wish I could find it. Theres an orange cat in it too, sort of like the character in a kid’s tv program, although the project is anything but, and theres a scene where the girl disembowels the apple.
so apparently Luca Guadagnino did a William s burroughs movie…? (or at least based on his book, I just found out, havent flesh out research yet)
I….Cant see that…?
Just now hearing of it, have you seen it? Is it worth it? Not a big fan of Luca, so I dont now.
Im starting to give myself a more slow and comforting space in the morning before writing, like two or 1hrish to wake up and just be grateful for the earth and clean your work space smoke a cig and read new and messages from friends.
This is how im able to write this eloquent comment for you today.
Typically im always in a rush to start writing.
Beautiful rain poured down on my windows last night. The other day my friend J gave me Jack Keuroac’s “Dharma Bums” and i’ve been needing to read him due to the affiliations and inspiration of Burroughs in his writings so i’m excited to dive into this new long awaited world.
On the topic of my friend, something very surreal happened
I wrote it in my journal, one sec:
“I was lounging and studying at his house and he’s always been into Stella/s cool occult shit like ceremonial magic and rituals related to the Hermetic Order aswell as Crowley.
–Well anyways we are talking about Buddha and the Jordan, Bless him, starts accentuating the topic of a divine unwavering love for, when suddenly, he enthusiastically goes “This is why I love Jesus Christ so Much!” and I was so fucking stunned, I suppose its not so surprising when I ponder it, considering I met his mom who I think is christian, very sweet and smart lad. Well anyways I ive definitely seen this kind of path go wrong, (he’s going to church now and stuff), but at the same time I try not to judge, rather observe and reflect, which is what im doing I hope. Hopefully not too scrutinizingly.
On the other hand im not worried, he’s always held a rationial foot in both the corporeal world aswell as regulating the subtle line between science and mysticism,
and its beautiful seeing the love he shares between Stella, his recent girlfriend who is super sweet and into spirituality and she sings in the choir at her church,. She lives in my complex, right in the building next to me, so I walked over and spend a good day there studying mysticism, reading Dante’s inferno, and smoking cigarettes with J.”
Ok thats what I wrote. Have a good day friend! Any new news in your world of writing?
Such a shame the Audrey Horne sculptor had to remain on anonymous. Up there with the best things in this show, I think. Has me tempted to start an entire Twin Peaks playback, in fact. Maybe not while the World Cup is still on.
Yeah the taxi thing was just a case of an unreliable company. We found a dedicated accessible vehicle place that will defo be used in future. The appointment with Leeds Print Workshop is now booked for Friday to be hopefully fulfilled without a hitch.
Some lovely items today, Dennis. Those neon lights, whew. That Meghan Young piece sounds terrific, but I can’t find more documentation of it. Lovely piece from Kyle McDonald. I used to follow his blog back in the aughts, and learned a lot from his work. And the Vandevorst wax woman, nice.
I rewatched In the Mouth of Madness a few nights ago, and Sam Neill passed away today, RIP. I better be careful what I rewatch this week.
Yeah this is not the best time to be in Asia. But unlike in Europe, everyone has airconditioning. That means of course that outdoors in the city is just… brutal.
Bill
The summer in Chicago has been surprisingly comfortable, except for the one week where I was luckily out of town. I hate the heat so much, I can’t imagine how unbearable it must be in France where there’s almost no air conditioning anywhere. Hope you’re finding a way to stay cool. That’s a good lead on what to listen to while reading Frisk, thank you. I asked because I noticed you reference music a bit less in the novel compared to any of the other Cycle books. Sort of a random question but have you ever seen the German movie Whispering Moon? It went sort of viral recently and I decided to watch it and there was a lot in there that reminded me of you. There’s a mute blond twink love interest who dies tragically and everything is filtered through the frame narrative of an unreliable police interrogation.
Hi,
Wow. This Neutral Milk Hotel album is so good, I never listened to them blurred by the big reputation of their second album but listening now and loving it I will play it daily so it colors my days…
Thanks for the indirect recommendation Dennis and horatio!
Any parks or bookstores in Amsterdam this time? Books purchased? or something special?
Amsterdam <3
I had a peek of what I think is the new Frisk edition cover on the Instagram post, pretty cool and goes well with the Closer cover, a careful job so far and hope the next books follow
Hi from Chania
Always happy to put someone on to On Avery Island! ^_^
Hey Dennis! So, so awesome that you’re a fan of On Avery Island. I’ve been listening to it like crazy lately, as you can imagine. Also, really digging Walk Through Neon Lights here- the end result kind of looks like the cover for Unknown Pleasures incidentally. Quite satisfying composition.
As for the madness, I wouldn’t call it good or pleasant , unfortunately. I’m a deeply neurotic person & I feel things quite intensely. I suppose its interesting, it gives me something to think about, but its all consuming and quite stressful. About a month ago all this anxiety I had around this guy got to a point that I started getting tremors in my face, which was really nuts. And then for better or for worse a catastrophic event happened, which led me to ask for reassurance from him & has thus alleviated a lot of my anxiety.
See for a while I believed that he wouldn’t ever like me back at all & I had become content with the idea of just admiring him from a far and doing things to make him happy. Now that I know he’s attracted to me, & that he desires me in a way that doesn’t make me feel scared (which is uncommon in my experience), I’m really anxious about losing that. Sometimes I fear I’m just hallucinating the things that he says and shares with me. I try to keep this to myself, but I get so nervous that I’m way too intense about him- especially since he still lives in my home state and I don’t want to expect too from him too soon. I feel a really strong impulse to take good care of him, you know? And I really want to make art about him. I look at him and I wish I had the skill to capture his beauty & to make the world fall in love with him… & then selfishly I hope he would still choose me haha.
He’s a visual artist himself & makes these really cool abstract digital collages, I could send you his instagram if you want to check them out some time.
Hope all is well with you Dennis, and that you have a wonderful day!
wow, that Ryota Kuwakubo!!! i’m addicted!! i want one in my room. it’s making me percolate.
v basic but my favourite pure light show is probably the Bed section from Einstein on the Beach. irritatingly i can’t find a video of it that hasn’t been chopped to pieces but a good portion of it is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UK0tzdCRjzc&t=11597s
i guess the whole of Einstein of the Beach counts as a light show, but claiming Einstein on the Beach as my favourite light show seems a bit artless. seeing it live when i was sixteen was extraordinary, a real brain-rewiring moment.
this heatwave completely knocked me for six, unfortunately, and coincided with a baaad mental health episode that left me very unsure as to who i am & unable to function much more than watching shitty youtube videos. it sucked!! but i think i’ve recovered — with the help of some scrounged-up beta blockers. it was probably related to the end of the phd and life changes and god knows. at least i’m able to drink coffee again.
i did manage to get to a conference at my university, which was excellent even through my souped-up adrenalined haze. there was an open mic at the end, which Hesse K. had been invited to read at, and i read a couple of poem things and made people laugh so that was good. and there was a workshop on (san francisco-inflected) poets theatre, which made me wonder if you ever participated in that genre? obv you do theatre, and you were friends with Ken Killian, but i somehow can’t imagine it being your vibe? i may well be wrong though.
how are you?? echoing your Tati-less boo. what’s going on in your end, what’s lined up?
Hey Dennis,
Haha considering your feelings on Joni I assumed you’d have a reaction like that to James Taylor. I got the ticket for free though from my friend’s parents and I have a lot of love for folk music which I think stems from really getting into Bon Iver, Fleet Foxes, and Sufjan Stevens when I was like 15. The heat has been terrible here over the weekend, to the point that I’ve been suffering from dehydration headaches and heat-related nausea just from sitting inside. I’m hopeful I’ll get something out of the appt tomorrow, even if it’s just another appt soon.
Hey. I think I like the Atsuko Tanaka piece the most here. I guess I’ve mentioned this before but Christmas lights are probably my favourite thing in the world.
I always remember this Richard Hell quote from ‘Godlike’ where he said that light is probably the most used poetic image and what most of art is about. It reminded me of when a good film studies teacher I had when I was sixteen said that ‘Citizen Kane’ was a film about physical space (rather than the obvious things you can say about it) and I guess that’s the one good art thing I took from formal education.
That’s very true about what ‘Billy the Kid’ does with sentimentality. Spicer was very good at embodying several emotions at once, which is something that I can see Kevin Killian really took to and was also a master at.
There’s also a certain Whitmanesque, grandiose ‘O America, I invoke thee…’ ecstatic thing that I find grating (outside of Melville and so on), that Spicer makes work through reflexiveness. He uses certain unexpected words and images to act like stop signs within the grandiosity.
I watched this film ‘The Tracey Fragments’ which is an early 2000s film with Elliot Page where the whole film is a series of wildly changing split screens. It’s definitely a novelty of its time in terms of directors trying to do something crazy with cheap digital cameras and new editing softwares, but I liked it a lot and do have a soft spot for that early 2000s digital excess.
the sleeping woman candle sculpture is pretty amazing, and of course i love the audrey horne neon sign. i really love old school neon signs, the new led ones just don’t have the same magic.
yeah i’m hoping it’s going to be a nice and stress free affair, especially because it’s a small wedding. and i happen to like my sister, which helps lol.
oo an ice cream parlor! what flavor? i like soft serve, personally. the last time i experienced anything like i imagine paris is when france wins is when we happened to be in berlin the day they won the world cup, which we were completely unaware of because we don’t really follow soccer. it was pretty electric, lots of people playing music and dancing and fireworks going off. and of course, as an american tourist, it was nice to be around happy berliners.
also the on avery island mention reminded me how good that album is, and that it has both april 8th and three peaches, two top neutral milk hotel songs for me. i read mira corpora earlier this year and really loved one of the chapters, my life in the city, which i’m pretty sure was nmh inspired? very similiar to them and their cultish fanbase, at the very least.
i’ve been metaphorically spinning either/or a lot again, so it’ll be nice to have another album to switch things up with. elliott smith has a biography coming out later this year, which i’m very intrigued by. it’s called, uh, nobody broke your heart, i think? i also learned that watch me jumpstart is my favorite gbv song. god, i love their really fuzzy lo-fi stuff.
glad i could potentially turn you on to a new video game! and you’d think that they would think of smokers in france of all places! unless it’s less smoker friendly now than it was when i was last there, uh, over ten years ago?
see ya later!
I see so many cool light art exhibits in magazines or online, but every one I’ve been to (with one exception) has been a disappointment. I think that they’re perhaps at their most interesting when they’re in sculpture form or built into the architecture of the place rather than just projected. Very light-filled day for me today too. Going to be out and about in the city with the heat index showing 45 degrees (so not the worst it’s been recently) and the UV index at an unhappy 12. Plenty of light. That and the dust in the air messes with your skin big time, which I like because then I feel less ivory tower, but even saying that makes me feel like Walt Whitman writing about how working class the smell of his armpits was.
Well written and informative. Thanks for putting this together. interesting find