May 2007
- 8
Intrepid Tales: The Ullswater Camp
“I call it extreme camping”, she said, and I could understand why. Heavy rain, a non-waterproof tent, and watching a leak appear while thinking, “this could be interesting”. Bora is from Slovakia and for the last four years has spent many annual months in the Lake District. She initially couldn’t understand the appeal, but now does. About two years ago I met a Lake District hotel worker from New Zealand who wanted to live there:…
- 17
Foto Follies
Duane Michals recently released a book that looks a most welcome addition to contemporary theory Here’s an example: Michals says: Sidney paints his fingernails shocking pink, a brilliantly audacious gesture that exposes the discorroborative bias of Revlon’s vacuity, while trenchantly confirming lipstick as a phallic ploy of alpha males vis-à-vis Derrida’s strategies of discorroboration. Indeed. Yet Cindy Sherman is included in respected and widely used critical studies of photography. I think some of her work is quite interesting, but…
- 22
Jazz Revolution
The Jazz Revolution, written by Kathy Ogren in 1989, is an interesting example of a subject which at certain points moves beyond the parameters of jazz. Ogren cites Theodor Adorno, as many jazz theorists do, as a famous protagonist unsympathetic to the music: Adorno’s analysis of the development of mass culture within advanced capitalist societies included an attack on jazz because it created the illusion rather than the reality of free creation, and thus revealed its…
- 29
Wynton Marsalis
Wynton Marsalis is for some people a controversial jazz figure. I don’t know enough either about the music or the man to make conclusive remarks wholly agreeing with him or condemning him, but I can make some pertinent observations and say a little of what I think. A more knowledgeable person than I, a guitarist and PhD jazz researcher, once said to me “he’s trying to make jazz an American classical music”. I’ve since discovered some…