africans to the future
December 15, 2009 · Leave a Comment
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Tagged: 1970s, 1980s, african, afrofuturism, music, the future
pre-election sale
December 15, 2009 · Leave a Comment
4-18-2008: Everything must go!
Greenpoint, Brooklyn, New York
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Tagged: brooklyn, greenpoint, New York, obama, politics
night driving
December 14, 2009 · Leave a Comment
‘by 1970, the influence of the automobile on night-time lighting was felt in its entirety…. Cities were lit primarily to facilitate the movement of motor vehicles.’
—J.A. Jackle, City Lights: Illuminating the American Night
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Tagged: California, cars, lights, night, Palo Alto
City walls are archives too
December 9, 2009 · Leave a Comment
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Tagged: Georges Perec, graffiti, street art, tel aviv, walls
Invisible Adversaries
November 18, 2009 · Leave a Comment
A couple of weeks ago, I checked out VALIE EXPORT’s 1976 experimental film Unsichtbare Gegner (Invisible Adversaries). It was presented at NYU by Hari Kunzru.
A crazy tale of an alien invasion of everday residents of 1970s Vienna, Austria:
Invisible Adversaries film still
You can watch the film here.
The city stars in this film, in which the increasing paranoia of the human protagonist is matched by the harshness of personal interactions between the Viennese. While no “aliens” are ever seen–no little green men running around–strange occurences and affects seep into the spaces between people. Especially into the spaces between each person and her image, her reflections, her representations.
The doubles and shadows no longer walk in lock step with their originals. They have lives, affects, of their own.
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Tagged: 1970s, alien invasion, doubles, film, VALIE EXPORT, Vienna
building white city
February 22, 2009 · Leave a Comment
My friend at Tel Aviv Rooftop recently posted this movie, depicting Tel Aviv in 1938, a city under construction. To see the film, click here.
“They built and they will always build”
I wonder what this is an archive of, exactly? The town as it was? As it imagined itself to be? A white city?
A lovely, melancholic film.
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Of time and the city
February 5, 2009 · 2 Comments
…and now i am an alien in my own land
One day, a couple of weeks ago, anxious, shut-in and tired of reading, I went to the movies in the middle of the day. Film forum was my theater of choice. It was the opening day for “Of time and the city,” Terence Davies’ new film.
It was a dreamy experience, not least of all because I was in a movie theater at 2 or 3 in the afternoon, and discovered a whole other world of daytime art-film-goers: people who hacked and coughed constantly, and hissed “Quiet!” at the least sound of popcorn crackling; people who wheezed and snored softly; people who grimaced at the thought that someone might try to share their row.
The movie was composed almost entirely of archival footage of Davies’ hometown, Liverpool, in the years of his childhood and young adulthood. Elements of the film are simply the archival footage, the sound of the director’s voice, and the music. Sound like documentary? It’s not. It’s better.
To listen to Terence Davies talk about his archival practice, Keep reading →
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Tagged: film archives, film-going, Liverpool, memory, movie theaters, nostalgia, Of time and the city, Terence Davies
Monk’s Advice (New York, 1960)
January 30, 2009 · Leave a Comment
Theolonius Monk said to young soprano saxophonist, Steve Lacy, who took good notes. Sounds like Steve learned a little himself.
“What we want to do is to, uh, play the way we play, and that’s what all the jazz musicians do: they play the way they want to”
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Tagged: Jazz, music, New York, Steve Lacy, Theolonius Monk
Jacques-Henri Lartigue, Boy Photographer
January 21, 2009 · Leave a Comment
From the diary of the artist as a young boy:
All the pretty or curious things give me so much pleasure. Thanks to photography, I can hold them.
“By miniaturizing the world through his passion for photography, Lartigue could hold everything, even himself, like a toy.”
– from Reading Boyishly, by Carol Mavor
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Tagged: Art, Carol Mavor, Lartigue, miniatures, photography
The Politics of Comparison
January 20, 2009 · 1 Comment
Martin Luther King could never be president. Not because of racist attitudes of America in the 1960s (those haven’t changed all that much), but because he was an enemy of the state, not its benign friend– not a smiling visage on a t-shirt, or a McDonald’s advertisement. We ought to be careful to whom we compare this man, who never hesitated to call out the injustice at the heart of American existence. Keep reading →
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Tagged: change, comparison, Martin Luther King Jr., MENergy, politics, Vietnam, war
