March

WATCHING

READING

  • Richard Powers, Overstory – I loved parts of this book, but then there were a lot of parts I didn’t like so much… and towards the end it started to feel like a bit of a chore. Definitely makes you think about trees in a different way, and the selfishness of humans.

LOOKING

  • Since we can’t go to galleries for a while… https://artsandculture.google.com/partner

  • Jimmy Simpson illustrations and gifs are lllllovely

  • Hakyoung Kim makes beautiful illustrations that look like they’re straight out of a film

LISTENING

OTHER STUFF

  • Geins Family Gift Shop - Group of comedians I came across after reading an interview with Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton. Properly funny and dark. Watch some of their stuff here

  • 100 Little Ideas – A list of ideas, in no particular order and from different fields, that help explain how the world work, put together by Morgan Housel.

  • A nice little sport from The New York Times to make you feel a bit more chill

  • https://washyourlyrics.com/

  • An escape game on Google Docs!!


Canal walk

Canal walk

Bought some googly eyes

Bought some googly eyes

WFH

WFH

February

WATCHING

  • Bojack Horseman season 6 – all the feels

  • Miss Americana – Tay Tay documentary on Netflix. Her life is insane. And it really makes you think about THAT Kanye moment differently. Brutal.

  • The Two Popes – Really enjoyed this. Jonathan Pryce as the progressive Pope Francis and Anthony Hopkins as the much more conservative Pope Benedict are both incredible. I really like this quote from writer Anthony McCarten: "I saw it as a great chance to do a dialogue between a conservative and a progressive, which might in some ways speak to the broader conversation in a society where we can't find any middle ground." read more here

  • Hustle – The new female Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.

  • Good Time – So good. So horrible. The Safdie brothers have a real knack for making you squirm. All sorts of colours and camera angles/cuts are used to make you feel really uneasy. Robert Patterson is brilliant. You will hate him/feel sorry for him. Watch ittttt!

  • Cheer – Couldn’t get into it at first, but my friends urged me to persevere, and I’m so glad I did. It’s fucking crazy what cheerleaders go through, ‘Cheerleaders’ does not feel an apt name for what they endure and what incredible athletes they are. Also Benito Skinner (as always) delivers a fantastic parody, watch it here. He needs to be given a TV show, NOW!

READING

  • David Szalay, All that man is – 9 short stories of 9 men all at different stages in their lives, and a sort of crossroads or crises. He’s a very compelling writer, and each story is very different – with very different characters explored. It left me feeling quite sad. None of the men we encounter are particularly happy, they all seem lost. And a lot of them are pretty vile, morally abhorrent and selfish, although Szalay does manage to make you empathise with all of them in some way.

  • Richard Powers, The Overstory – A book about trees, full of sentences that sing and make you re-read them over and over again. Currently about 1/4 of the way through, and really liking it.

LOOKING

  • Nam June Paik at Tate Modern: over 200 works from throughout his five-decade career – from robots made from old TV screens to his innovative video works and all-encompassing room-sized installations such as the dazzling Sistine Chapel 1993. This was so much FUN. Loads of ideas explored. Particularly enjoyed the transformed piano.

  • Dora Maar also at Tate Modern: this felt a bit thin on the ground. Some nice abstract imagery, but the street photography was forgettable… Maybe because I saw the Paik exhibition first.

  • Picasso on paper at the RA – really well put together and SO much work. Not as many ‘paper sculptures’ on display as I thought there would be.

LISTENING

OTHER STUFF

  • I’ve been learning to use pro-create on the iPad. It kind of feels like cheating. It’s amazing. I have mostly been drawing over pictures of cats by Hisakata Hiroyuki…

Picasso on paper

Picasso on paper

Little Mix grave yard

Little Mix grave yard

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Cafe Boheme

Cafe Boheme

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January

WATCHING

  • Uncut Gems – a whirlwind of anxiety. Adam Sandler is fantastic. Mad

  • Amazonia - great idea.

  • Succession – get’s better and better. Fan-girling over Kieran Culkin, and Jesse Armstrong.

  • Jojo Rabbit

  • Parasite – loved it. Watch it. Watch it again. Funny, dark, twisted, and so so sharp.

  • Marriage Story – Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson both really good, but I had to go and make a tea when Driver did his singing bit. Too ick for me.

  • The Wife – I expected to like this more, because, well Glenn Close. But left me feeling a bit flat.

  • I Lost My Body – pretty weird, severed hand looking for it’s body.

  • Mid90s –

  • YOU - Addictive trash

  • At Eternity’s Gate – Willem Dafoe plays Vincent Van Gogh… this film is strange. And I did not make it to the end.

  • Bikram documentary

  • The Turning Point, by Steve Cutts – Short animation that flips the perspective of climate change from animals to humans.

  • Sex Education – Great characters. Art direction – John Hughes – The Breakfast Club/Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Girl crush on Gillian Anderson.

  • Marie Antoinette – Sofia Coppola and Kirsten Dunst. The best. So pretty.

READING

  • David Szalay, All that man is – Just started, but have high hopes as very much enjoyed Turbulence, consumed in a day, Turbulence is twelve short stories from twelve very different people that are all connected in some way.

  • Anthony Doerr, All the Light We Cannot See – A WW2 novel, wouldn’t have picked this up myself, cried.

  • Malcolm Gladwell, Blink – All about the power (and problematic power) of our subconcious. Very Gladwell. Very good. Really not into the cover though…

  • Long(ish) read on the search for ‘Pizza toast’ in Japan’s Kissaten’s (cafes) from Eater (I'm going to go to Japan!)

  • 5 min read about CCTV in Hackney from The Face

  • 2 min read on Twitch and how Sport is set to be big on the platform from Wired

  • Hubert Selby Jr., Song of the Silent Snow – Collection of short stories from the man that gave us Last Exit to Brooklyn and Requiem for a dream. Beautifully written. Some funny. Some horrid.

LOOKING

  • Dominic Harris at Halcyon Gallery – a fun exhibition that you can play with (my favourite kind) using clever coding to make artworks come to life.

    ‘Dominic Harris uses groundbreaking technology to construct personal interpretations of the natural phenomena which surround us. His love of the natural world, coupled with his fascination for code, offers a surreal and whimsical take on reality, challenging the viewer’s perception of the world around them.’

  • Very pleasing pillows that aren’t what they seem from sculptor Hakon Fageras

  • A look back at the last decade from Dazed. Nicely done.

  • Peter Hoffman takes good pics.

  • Stealing this for my own staircase, from the very cool Danny Sangra.

LISTENING

OTHER STUFF

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