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Picasso, Primitivism, And The Rights And Wrongs Of Cultural Appropriation
2018/01/20
Posted in Set DesignWhen artists borrow, do they also offend?
Museum of Modern Art in New York
The first time I visited the Museum of Modern Art in New York I was twenty-four years old. The museum was under renovation at the time and had been temporarily opened in a building in the suburb of Queens. A much smaller venue, it provided only a glimpse of the full breadth of work the museum had to offer, so only the most important works were on display. I didn’t know it when I entered, but one such work was Pablo Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon.
Will I Ever Be Real?
2017/12/02
Posted in Art DirectionMy psychology is contorted by strange concepts of time and expectation. But there is hope.
Doubts and Giddiness
I woke again with a fatigued sense of who I am, and a numbed sense of bearing. I don’t sleep well. Usually — and this has been going on for a while now — I jolt awake at intervals, to be later followed by dreams that tangle me up in doubts and giddiness, dreams about unfinished work and unfinished friendships.
Social Media and the Digital Gaze
2017/11/18
Posted in PhotographyThe balances of power are constantly shifting as we watch ourselves being watched.
Herodotus wrote of the servant Gyges, who hid behind a door to observe the queen undressing on the invitation of the queen’s husband, King Candaules. Gyges’ gaze is both permitted and illicit, depending on whose perspective you take up.
Dazzle Areas: The Art Of David Milne
2017/10/03
Posted in Set DesignA painter who found his own style.
David Milne
The Canadian artist David Milne was born in 1882. By all accounts he was a modest man with a leaning towards the austere. Raised in a log cabin in the town of Burgoyne, Ontario, he never lost the sense that his was a peasant’s life. His wrote of his “taste for few and simple things, extended to an almost abnormal dislike for and impatience with possessions that are more than bare essentials.” The effect on his art was probable. “I like to think that my leaning towards simplicity in art is a translation of hereditary thrift or stinginess into a more attractive medium.”