May 7, 2017: Stuff
Just cataloguing some recent likes and dislikes, life events and non-events: recently released albums that I like include Aaron Dilloway's The Gag File, Sun Araw's The Saddle of the Increate, Hayden Pedigo's Greetings from Amarillo, and the PAN compilation Mono No Aware. (I'm looking to pick up the new albums by Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan soon.) I'm almost done reading Michel Houellebecq's The Map and the Territory, the first book of his I've read and a generally pleasing read thus far: funny, engaging on both formal and narrative levels, and it's made me want to paint, which is a nice feeling. Three TV shows I'm watching: Silicon Valley, Veep, and The Americans. I saw a bunch of art today on the Lower East Side with my friend Chris, and we agreed that most of it was, if not bad, at least uninspired and boring. It's a feeling I've had about most art that I've seen in the past several months. Is it the art, or is it me? I do feel compelled, more and more, to step away from the art world, maybe for just a bit and maybe forever, as its self-congratulatory politics—sorry to generalize—have grown tiring, and the work—sorry to generalize—just can't back it up. That said, I do love the current Rachel Harrison show at Greene Naftali. That said, I'm still a bit like, "What's the point?" My thoughts aren't profound, I know; still, how will I act on them in a meaningful way? Maybe I won't, alas. Fyre Festival was funny. Marine Le Pen lost today, which is very good; we'll maybe get a view into what happens when a centrist neoliberal runs a western country rather than a xenophobic tyrant. (Clinton would have been a much more capable leader than Macron will be, but one can't help but look at France in the coming months and years as a sort of Bizarro America in these regards.)
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