.
I have a text in dHOUSE Magazine called With an archive in the attic. The table of contents moves around but, if you search, you can find it here.
.
June 26, 2025
June 25, 2025
"Other than capitalism, what qualifies conceptual art?”
.
"A fantastical text concerning transformation, Jacob Wren’s novel Dry Your Tears to Perfect Your Aim follows a narrator to an unidentified liberated zone, where noncapitalist, collective practices are formed, reworked, and communalized. The zone is unidyllic as it continues to be bombed and fired upon by nearby and faraway imperialists. Amidst the daily raids, the narrator is allowed to sit in on town meetings, where economics and trade become reinvented. In one such meeting, the narrator hears a woman discussing how concerns over goods being “too expensive” must also be applied to items being “too cheap.” She says, “Just as you mustn’t accept a price that is too high, you also must not fight, nor constantly search, for a price that is too low … You need to understand that those who sell you these things also need to live.”
This gallows humor highlights the disparities between life and death and locates a price so low that some are explicitly not allowed to live. Tellingly, Cattelan, the supposed prankster who will sell and hire others to do everything and treats all matter as dispensable, predictably imposes a boundary on engagement with his own critique. In response to Mr. Alam’s critiques of his exploitation, Cattelan stated that “art, by its nature, does not solve problems—if it did, it would be politics.” Evading criticism through a well-worn notion of aesthetic isolationism, Cattelan offers art that ideologically affirms the status quo, upholding supply-chain repression and enforcing and extending class domination. (He offers, in other words, enmeshed and predictable capitalism-as-art.)
Regarding that which is purposefully degraded and denied in the supply chain: when Daniel Druet, the artist who made Untitled (Stephanie), sued Cattelan’s gallery over authorship and payment, contemporary artists such as Sophie Calle signed an open letter in support of Cattelan. It stated: “Daniel Druet’s quest for recognition as the exclusive author of the works imagined by Maurizio Cattelan opens the door to the disqualification of conceptual art.” Does the qualification of conceptual art hinge on the erasure of laborers and the repression of its making? The artists who signed the letter seem to think so. Other than capitalism, what qualifies conceptual art?”
- Eunsong Kim, No Aesthetic Autonomy Without Labor Autonomy
.
"A fantastical text concerning transformation, Jacob Wren’s novel Dry Your Tears to Perfect Your Aim follows a narrator to an unidentified liberated zone, where noncapitalist, collective practices are formed, reworked, and communalized. The zone is unidyllic as it continues to be bombed and fired upon by nearby and faraway imperialists. Amidst the daily raids, the narrator is allowed to sit in on town meetings, where economics and trade become reinvented. In one such meeting, the narrator hears a woman discussing how concerns over goods being “too expensive” must also be applied to items being “too cheap.” She says, “Just as you mustn’t accept a price that is too high, you also must not fight, nor constantly search, for a price that is too low … You need to understand that those who sell you these things also need to live.”
This gallows humor highlights the disparities between life and death and locates a price so low that some are explicitly not allowed to live. Tellingly, Cattelan, the supposed prankster who will sell and hire others to do everything and treats all matter as dispensable, predictably imposes a boundary on engagement with his own critique. In response to Mr. Alam’s critiques of his exploitation, Cattelan stated that “art, by its nature, does not solve problems—if it did, it would be politics.” Evading criticism through a well-worn notion of aesthetic isolationism, Cattelan offers art that ideologically affirms the status quo, upholding supply-chain repression and enforcing and extending class domination. (He offers, in other words, enmeshed and predictable capitalism-as-art.)
Regarding that which is purposefully degraded and denied in the supply chain: when Daniel Druet, the artist who made Untitled (Stephanie), sued Cattelan’s gallery over authorship and payment, contemporary artists such as Sophie Calle signed an open letter in support of Cattelan. It stated: “Daniel Druet’s quest for recognition as the exclusive author of the works imagined by Maurizio Cattelan opens the door to the disqualification of conceptual art.” Does the qualification of conceptual art hinge on the erasure of laborers and the repression of its making? The artists who signed the letter seem to think so. Other than capitalism, what qualifies conceptual art?”
- Eunsong Kim, No Aesthetic Autonomy Without Labor Autonomy
.
June 22, 2025
"Because there is only room for one empire at a time."
.
"I start to think about all the stated reasons for this war and other wars like it. For humanitarian reasons (every time an expensive humanitarian bomb landed on civilians, it was enough to turn even the most optimistic Pollyanna into a hardened cynic). To fight communists. To fight terrorists. To stop the spread of communism or terrorism or extremism or something else. To help people. To improve the lot of women. Because we’re right and they’re wrong. Because: Why do they hate us and why do they hate our way of life? Because war has always existed and will always exist. To increase the quantity of democracy in the world. Because we have a responsibility to the world and to freedom. For freedom. For strategic reasons. To stop a domino from setting off all the other dominoes.
And then I move on to what I think the reasons are for this war and so many others. Because our leaders need therapy. Because a bully needs a victim. Because so-called powerful men are deeply insecure. So politicians in favour of war can get elected or re-elected by voters in favour of war. To make money. To placate the arms industry and their high-priced lobbyists. To justify never-ending increases in the military budget. To distract from rampant domestic problems. To bring certain natural resources and labour into the jurisdiction of the global marketplace. To ensure these resources most benefit the capitalists doing the bombing and least benefit the people being bombed. Because it’s easier to kill people who look or sound different than you. Because hatred takes on a life of its own. To explain to the world that you do it our way or suffer the consequences. Because a protection racket needs to constantly ensure no one steps out of line or seeks protection elsewhere. So they can set up permanent military bases to keep the surrounding countries in line. Because there is no alternative. Because there is only room for one empire at a time."
- Jacob Wren, Dry Your Tears to Perfect Your Aim
.
"I start to think about all the stated reasons for this war and other wars like it. For humanitarian reasons (every time an expensive humanitarian bomb landed on civilians, it was enough to turn even the most optimistic Pollyanna into a hardened cynic). To fight communists. To fight terrorists. To stop the spread of communism or terrorism or extremism or something else. To help people. To improve the lot of women. Because we’re right and they’re wrong. Because: Why do they hate us and why do they hate our way of life? Because war has always existed and will always exist. To increase the quantity of democracy in the world. Because we have a responsibility to the world and to freedom. For freedom. For strategic reasons. To stop a domino from setting off all the other dominoes.
And then I move on to what I think the reasons are for this war and so many others. Because our leaders need therapy. Because a bully needs a victim. Because so-called powerful men are deeply insecure. So politicians in favour of war can get elected or re-elected by voters in favour of war. To make money. To placate the arms industry and their high-priced lobbyists. To justify never-ending increases in the military budget. To distract from rampant domestic problems. To bring certain natural resources and labour into the jurisdiction of the global marketplace. To ensure these resources most benefit the capitalists doing the bombing and least benefit the people being bombed. Because it’s easier to kill people who look or sound different than you. Because hatred takes on a life of its own. To explain to the world that you do it our way or suffer the consequences. Because a protection racket needs to constantly ensure no one steps out of line or seeks protection elsewhere. So they can set up permanent military bases to keep the surrounding countries in line. Because there is no alternative. Because there is only room for one empire at a time."
- Jacob Wren, Dry Your Tears to Perfect Your Aim
.
June 11, 2025
PME-ART in Harstad, Norway (June 22-24)
.
PME-ART will be in Harstad, Norway
for a series of events at Festspillene i Nord-Norge
Panel: Common Things Made Holy
June 22, 2025 at 12:10pm
Moderator: Ragnheiður Skúladóttir
With: Maret Anne Sara, Stefan Schmitke, Sonya Lindfors & Jacob Wren
The DJ Who Gave Too Much Information
June 22, 2025 at 9pm
With: Caroline Dubois, Adam Kinner & Jacob Wren
Bring Your Own Record / Listening Party
June 23, 2025 at 8pm
With: Caroline Dubois, Jacob Wren & special guest Tommy Vandalsvik
*
Bonus: the letter I wrote to the audience of The DJ Who Gave Too Much Information in 2011.
And an article in the Harstad Tidende (in Norwegian but with pictures.)
.
PME-ART will be in Harstad, Norway
for a series of events at Festspillene i Nord-Norge
Panel: Common Things Made Holy
June 22, 2025 at 12:10pm
Moderator: Ragnheiður Skúladóttir
With: Maret Anne Sara, Stefan Schmitke, Sonya Lindfors & Jacob Wren
The DJ Who Gave Too Much Information
June 22, 2025 at 9pm
With: Caroline Dubois, Adam Kinner & Jacob Wren
Bring Your Own Record / Listening Party
June 23, 2025 at 8pm
With: Caroline Dubois, Jacob Wren & special guest Tommy Vandalsvik
*
Bonus: the letter I wrote to the audience of The DJ Who Gave Too Much Information in 2011.
And an article in the Harstad Tidende (in Norwegian but with pictures.)
.
June 10, 2025
June 2, 2025
I Make and Watch Performances
[This text was written for the Montreal edition of Oral Method in response to the prompt EXCUSEZ-MOI.]
1.
I make performances. Therefore I feel an obligation to watch performances. Lately this has been creating difficulties. I feel an obligation to watch performances made by other people, perhaps only so that they might in turn feel obligated to watch performances made by me. This is not a good reason. The difficulties are not recent but have recently intensified. The performances I watch mostly do not feature or mention current events. Many of these performances were created long before current events occurred. But current events are weighing heavily upon my interior life. I think I go see art because it is a place we can speak about the world. I think speaking about the world means speaking out against injustice. I think live performance means speaking and acting in the here and now. By this point you might have already intuited what my difficulties are.
2.
I have a fantasy. It is a fantasy I often have while I am watching a performance. The people on stage are doing whatever they are doing. I am in the audience. In the middle of the audience I stand up and begin to speak loudly. I accuse those on stage of failing to mention current injustices in the world. I do so in a charming and entertaining manner so as to win over the rest of the audience. I make my case: that by failing to mention any injustices they are like ostriches with their heads in the sand. (Ostriches don’t actually stick their heads in the sand. This is a myth.) That every moment art fails to mention painful realities is a moment when art is not doing its job, when injustices continue to proceed unchallenged. When injustices continue to devour every living moment of the world. I know I have to make my case quickly. That soon some usher, or audience member wanting to make themselves useful, will forcibly remove me. I don’t mind being removed. I just want to make my case in a manner that will not easily be forgotten.
3.
I do not necessarily require performances to speak out directly against current events. I just want to see some indication that they know these events are happening. That we are all living in the same indefensible world. I want them to know what I know and somehow let me know that they know it. I find it painful, sometimes almost unbearably so, that we are not acknowledging things that are happening every day and all around us. I also find my position unfair. Unfair to the artists on stage who are hopefully embodying and expressing something that is meaningful to them. Unfair to art, which has ways of speaking about the world that can bypass the didactic and reach toward other truths. Unfair to myself, since I am forfeiting my chance to momentarily stop thinking about the injustices of the world and enjoy watching a performance. But I do not enjoy watching these performances, and for that I probably should, but will not, apologize.
4.
Then there are performances that do directly denounce specific injustices and I don’t much care for those ones either. You can’t win with me. Because it is not enough to denounce injustice. It is not enough to say those people over there are bad and over here we’re good and that’s all you need to know about the world. The performance must also implicate the audience and do so in ways that lead to action rather than guilt. We must begin to see what is to be done and with what small steps we can begin to do it. I have not yet seen any performances that meet this perhaps unrealistic criteria. Did I mention that many of the performances I see take the form of contemporary dance. I am not sure there is any way, using the forms of contemporary dance, that one can implicate the audience in the injustices of the world and do so in ways that lead to action rather than guilt. But dance is not the problem. Rather it is more like I am going to the hardware store and trying to buy bread. They do not sell bread at the hardware store. Instead of going to watch performances, there might be other kinds of events I could attend. But I want something specific from art, and no matter how many times it disappoints me, I will never stop wanting it.
5.
I make performances. And the performances I make also do not sufficiently fulfil the criteria I have outlined above. Each time I strive toward it, and each time I fail. Since audiences do not have the same strict desires as I have, they do not seem to notice these particular failures. They notice other failures, such as the failure to entertain, or the failure to present aesthetic splendor. But mostly they are not thinking so much about failure. They are people who know how to enjoy watching a performance which is the reason they attend. I could learn from them but I will not. I will wait for one of them to stand up in the middle of the audience and quickly and loudly denounce me. I will continue to wait.
.
1.
I make performances. Therefore I feel an obligation to watch performances. Lately this has been creating difficulties. I feel an obligation to watch performances made by other people, perhaps only so that they might in turn feel obligated to watch performances made by me. This is not a good reason. The difficulties are not recent but have recently intensified. The performances I watch mostly do not feature or mention current events. Many of these performances were created long before current events occurred. But current events are weighing heavily upon my interior life. I think I go see art because it is a place we can speak about the world. I think speaking about the world means speaking out against injustice. I think live performance means speaking and acting in the here and now. By this point you might have already intuited what my difficulties are.
2.
I have a fantasy. It is a fantasy I often have while I am watching a performance. The people on stage are doing whatever they are doing. I am in the audience. In the middle of the audience I stand up and begin to speak loudly. I accuse those on stage of failing to mention current injustices in the world. I do so in a charming and entertaining manner so as to win over the rest of the audience. I make my case: that by failing to mention any injustices they are like ostriches with their heads in the sand. (Ostriches don’t actually stick their heads in the sand. This is a myth.) That every moment art fails to mention painful realities is a moment when art is not doing its job, when injustices continue to proceed unchallenged. When injustices continue to devour every living moment of the world. I know I have to make my case quickly. That soon some usher, or audience member wanting to make themselves useful, will forcibly remove me. I don’t mind being removed. I just want to make my case in a manner that will not easily be forgotten.
3.
I do not necessarily require performances to speak out directly against current events. I just want to see some indication that they know these events are happening. That we are all living in the same indefensible world. I want them to know what I know and somehow let me know that they know it. I find it painful, sometimes almost unbearably so, that we are not acknowledging things that are happening every day and all around us. I also find my position unfair. Unfair to the artists on stage who are hopefully embodying and expressing something that is meaningful to them. Unfair to art, which has ways of speaking about the world that can bypass the didactic and reach toward other truths. Unfair to myself, since I am forfeiting my chance to momentarily stop thinking about the injustices of the world and enjoy watching a performance. But I do not enjoy watching these performances, and for that I probably should, but will not, apologize.
4.
Then there are performances that do directly denounce specific injustices and I don’t much care for those ones either. You can’t win with me. Because it is not enough to denounce injustice. It is not enough to say those people over there are bad and over here we’re good and that’s all you need to know about the world. The performance must also implicate the audience and do so in ways that lead to action rather than guilt. We must begin to see what is to be done and with what small steps we can begin to do it. I have not yet seen any performances that meet this perhaps unrealistic criteria. Did I mention that many of the performances I see take the form of contemporary dance. I am not sure there is any way, using the forms of contemporary dance, that one can implicate the audience in the injustices of the world and do so in ways that lead to action rather than guilt. But dance is not the problem. Rather it is more like I am going to the hardware store and trying to buy bread. They do not sell bread at the hardware store. Instead of going to watch performances, there might be other kinds of events I could attend. But I want something specific from art, and no matter how many times it disappoints me, I will never stop wanting it.
5.
I make performances. And the performances I make also do not sufficiently fulfil the criteria I have outlined above. Each time I strive toward it, and each time I fail. Since audiences do not have the same strict desires as I have, they do not seem to notice these particular failures. They notice other failures, such as the failure to entertain, or the failure to present aesthetic splendor. But mostly they are not thinking so much about failure. They are people who know how to enjoy watching a performance which is the reason they attend. I could learn from them but I will not. I will wait for one of them to stand up in the middle of the audience and quickly and loudly denounce me. I will continue to wait.
.
May 20, 2025
May 10, 2025
Oral Method in Montreal / Saturday, May 31, 5pm
🌀📜Excusez-moi! Pardon us! Please save the date for a 🌻 free 🌻 happy hour reading at Star Bar (4671 St Laurent Blvd) on Saturday, May 31. This Mtl edition of Oral Method is co-curated w Rose Flutur and will feature much admired writers from la cool(er) province: H. Felix Chau Bradley, Eva Crocker, Marcela Huerta, Faith Paré, Sina Queyras, Jacob Wren plus illustrations & dj’ing by Amery Press
doors: 5pm, readings: 530pm
Writers will be responding to the prompt *EXCUSEZ-MOI* 🌻 perhaps conjuring the energy of overtaking someone on the sidewalk, navigating Français-English (or other language!) communication dynamics, calling someone in, asking for forgiveness, passive / aggression, or maybe even reflecting on Steve Martin (as Jacob Wren reminded us :)) 🤣
Please come, tell your friends, and support these amazing writers & artists!! 📜 🌀
Poster by: Amery Press 🙏🏻
doors: 5pm, readings: 530pm
Writers will be responding to the prompt *EXCUSEZ-MOI* 🌻 perhaps conjuring the energy of overtaking someone on the sidewalk, navigating Français-English (or other language!) communication dynamics, calling someone in, asking for forgiveness, passive / aggression, or maybe even reflecting on Steve Martin (as Jacob Wren reminded us :)) 🤣
Please come, tell your friends, and support these amazing writers & artists!! 📜 🌀
Poster by: Amery Press 🙏🏻
Some passages from The Fantasy and Necessity of Solidarity by Sarah Schulman
Some passages from The Fantasy and Necessity of Solidarity by Sarah Schulman:
*
“Regardless of specificity, solidarity always requires awareness, self-criticism, consciousness, the decision to act, and the need to create strategy, to build alliances, and to listen. It always requires taking chances, making mistakes, and trying again.”
*
“The US entertainment industry is one of the last places a person can find solidarity.
Most corporate-produced culture is filled with terrible values, is blatantly retrograde or – at best – meaningless, which is its own politic. The product exists to make money for people who have fun solving intense but tightly focused problems. Its social function is to create individuals who can feed the need for fame, upon which American marketing depends. A friend once pointed out to me that America’s greatest exports are film/TV and weapons, and most of the highest-grossing films and TV glorifies violence in a way that serves as advertisement for weapons.
I am not the only person who reads incredible reviews for plays or movies or TV shows that turn out to be banal, repetitive, or nonsensical. Part of the problem is that print and online critical publications are tied to the marketplace. Critics mostly write about books or actors or writers or filmmakers who have a new product on the market right now, rather than works that the critic feels illuminate our current moment.
It occurs to me that most (not all) of these institutions that drive me crazy have historically and consistently excluded, watered down, or marginalized the more interesting and necessary ideas in any given period. Risky and exciting movements of forward-thinking people were usually debased or ignored, while avoidant or repetitive work was elevated and glorified, and then given awards. This system of repetition is reinforced psychologically by the creation and strict maintenance of a scarcity-based concept of an elite. If an artist or intellectual or activist or any combination thereof is looking for non-market-based support adequate to live safely and comfortably while following their gifts full-time, it’s literally a MacArthur or nothing. Repetitive ideas are selected by gatekeepers, elevated by critics, rewarded with prizes, and branded as good and important, when they are often actually stagnant. We have collectively underestimated the ultimate danger of that entrenched cycle. It turned out to be far more sinister than just boring, as corporate entertainment sells bad values about humans being expendable and worth destroying when compared to the risk of losing social status or influence with funders. Cultural producers should be joining the large numbers of people trying to stop this war on Gaza, but either being quiet or supporting the killing is actually consistent with the norm.”
*
“What makes it so confusing is their embedded accompanying system of self-praise telling us repeatedly that the repetitive, banal ideas in mass circulation are special and deserve reward. Year after year we are told through many selections at elections, through promotions or even the Oscars, Tonys, Pulitzers, and the full range of intellectual and citizenship awards in corporate marketing venues, that irrelevant products deserve to be the focus of our attention and should be replicated. This reinforces the idea that the way things are is not only great, but the best. This merry-go-round debases and marginalizes risky, exciting movements of forward-thinking people while elevating and glorifying avoidant work that pretends away the most important questions of our time: Who has the power, and why?”
*
“It was a cultural moment that made white writers look in the mirror and wonder if we have been confusing it with a window.”
*
*
“Regardless of specificity, solidarity always requires awareness, self-criticism, consciousness, the decision to act, and the need to create strategy, to build alliances, and to listen. It always requires taking chances, making mistakes, and trying again.”
*
“The US entertainment industry is one of the last places a person can find solidarity.
Most corporate-produced culture is filled with terrible values, is blatantly retrograde or – at best – meaningless, which is its own politic. The product exists to make money for people who have fun solving intense but tightly focused problems. Its social function is to create individuals who can feed the need for fame, upon which American marketing depends. A friend once pointed out to me that America’s greatest exports are film/TV and weapons, and most of the highest-grossing films and TV glorifies violence in a way that serves as advertisement for weapons.
I am not the only person who reads incredible reviews for plays or movies or TV shows that turn out to be banal, repetitive, or nonsensical. Part of the problem is that print and online critical publications are tied to the marketplace. Critics mostly write about books or actors or writers or filmmakers who have a new product on the market right now, rather than works that the critic feels illuminate our current moment.
It occurs to me that most (not all) of these institutions that drive me crazy have historically and consistently excluded, watered down, or marginalized the more interesting and necessary ideas in any given period. Risky and exciting movements of forward-thinking people were usually debased or ignored, while avoidant or repetitive work was elevated and glorified, and then given awards. This system of repetition is reinforced psychologically by the creation and strict maintenance of a scarcity-based concept of an elite. If an artist or intellectual or activist or any combination thereof is looking for non-market-based support adequate to live safely and comfortably while following their gifts full-time, it’s literally a MacArthur or nothing. Repetitive ideas are selected by gatekeepers, elevated by critics, rewarded with prizes, and branded as good and important, when they are often actually stagnant. We have collectively underestimated the ultimate danger of that entrenched cycle. It turned out to be far more sinister than just boring, as corporate entertainment sells bad values about humans being expendable and worth destroying when compared to the risk of losing social status or influence with funders. Cultural producers should be joining the large numbers of people trying to stop this war on Gaza, but either being quiet or supporting the killing is actually consistent with the norm.”
*
“What makes it so confusing is their embedded accompanying system of self-praise telling us repeatedly that the repetitive, banal ideas in mass circulation are special and deserve reward. Year after year we are told through many selections at elections, through promotions or even the Oscars, Tonys, Pulitzers, and the full range of intellectual and citizenship awards in corporate marketing venues, that irrelevant products deserve to be the focus of our attention and should be replicated. This reinforces the idea that the way things are is not only great, but the best. This merry-go-round debases and marginalizes risky, exciting movements of forward-thinking people while elevating and glorifying avoidant work that pretends away the most important questions of our time: Who has the power, and why?”
*
“It was a cultural moment that made white writers look in the mirror and wonder if we have been confusing it with a window.”
*
April 28, 2025
Some passages from Touching the Art by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore
Some passages from Touching the Art by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore:
*
And how this happened for me too – twenty years ago, when my chronic pain first became debilitating and I couldn’t write like I used to, in frantic bursts trying to get everything out. So I decided to write a few sentences a day, with no intention of plot or structure, and after a few years I was shocked to find I had over four hundred pages. And that text became my second novel.
*
How music always carries the memory of when you first heard this music. How this can be a burden. How this can be glorious. How this can be suffocating. How this can make you shake. How this can make you sing. How this can make you dance. And this can be true of visual art too.
Sometimes, when the CD skips, I think maybe I should stop listening to CDs. And sometimes, when the CD skips, I think this is what it feels like to really love something.
*
Gladys saw herself as a contemporary artist, so she didn’t want to be defined by the past. She wanted her art to be considered on its own. But then Bobby wrote the catalog copy, and she rejected it. So someone else was hired to write it.
Bobby says Gladys was not a risk-taker, she was fiercely competitive with herself and how she saw herself among Baltimore artists, but she turned her back on the professional art establishment, and after that she didn’t pursue a professional career, and you can’t expect the world to come to you. She enjoyed the process of painting, and put that above anything else.
Like many artists of her generation, Bobby says, Gladys made the mistake of thinking that genius will be discovered.
*
When someone asks what is your writing process, I think it must be to try and try and then finally, in the gap between the limits of my body and the possibility of pulling something through, somewhere in that gap—
*
Maybe a different way to say history repeats itself would be to say history never resolves itself. History is a lesson, this may be true, but, as with any other lesson, the people who need it the most rarely listen.
*
*
And how this happened for me too – twenty years ago, when my chronic pain first became debilitating and I couldn’t write like I used to, in frantic bursts trying to get everything out. So I decided to write a few sentences a day, with no intention of plot or structure, and after a few years I was shocked to find I had over four hundred pages. And that text became my second novel.
*
How music always carries the memory of when you first heard this music. How this can be a burden. How this can be glorious. How this can be suffocating. How this can make you shake. How this can make you sing. How this can make you dance. And this can be true of visual art too.
Sometimes, when the CD skips, I think maybe I should stop listening to CDs. And sometimes, when the CD skips, I think this is what it feels like to really love something.
*
Gladys saw herself as a contemporary artist, so she didn’t want to be defined by the past. She wanted her art to be considered on its own. But then Bobby wrote the catalog copy, and she rejected it. So someone else was hired to write it.
Bobby says Gladys was not a risk-taker, she was fiercely competitive with herself and how she saw herself among Baltimore artists, but she turned her back on the professional art establishment, and after that she didn’t pursue a professional career, and you can’t expect the world to come to you. She enjoyed the process of painting, and put that above anything else.
Like many artists of her generation, Bobby says, Gladys made the mistake of thinking that genius will be discovered.
*
When someone asks what is your writing process, I think it must be to try and try and then finally, in the gap between the limits of my body and the possibility of pulling something through, somewhere in that gap—
*
Maybe a different way to say history repeats itself would be to say history never resolves itself. History is a lesson, this may be true, but, as with any other lesson, the people who need it the most rarely listen.
*
April 24, 2025
truly amazing!
.
Really nice to see this very concise Goodreads review for my book Authenticity is a Feeling: My Life in PME-ART.
Really nice to see this very concise Goodreads review for my book Authenticity is a Feeling: My Life in PME-ART.
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