Brian Phelan

Alfred Hitchcock mosaics, Leytonstone Underground Station, London, 1999, by Greenwich Mural Workshop for the centenary of his birth.

It It only takes two facing mirrors to build a labyrinth...'

Jorge Luis Borges

The River, 1951, Jean Renoir

On Substack, it's 1901 and Frederick Armitage is about to atomise time.
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On Substack, I take a musical journey through the boom time blue sky year of 1927. The year of It Girls and the Spirit of St Louis. What could go wrong?

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A ★★★★½ review of The Tale of Genji (1951) It's exquisitely made, almost narcotically elegant, evoking the seasons, teeming rain, cold breezes, leaves in ponds, the camera prowling the big empty palaces of the nobility, diaphanous screens, bam...

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On Substack, I take a musical journey through the boom time blue sky year of 1927. The year of It Girls and the Spirit of St Louis. What could go wrong?

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A ★★★★½ review of The Crucified Lovers (1954) For an Edo-period jidai-geki it's very noir. Fate conspires to bring this couple together, Mohei and Osan, the apprentice scroll-maker and his master's wife. Well-meaning lies, public morality, greed,...

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A Quiet Passion, 2016, Terence Davies

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Reflected Light Composition, 1923, Ludwig Hirschfeld-Mack

Like her mind's exploding in a fireball of ecstasy.

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A ★★★★½ review of À propos de Nice (1930) What makes A propos de Nice so fascinating is its tonal slipperiness, its melding of styles. Documentary realism , social satire, political tract, surreal poetry. it's kind of all of these things, mad...

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Heaven and Here It was late one night in Lisbon, rushing for the last underground train. I snapped this in passing on the way down the station steps.

On Substack it's last train am in Lisbon and I'm taking a rubbish photograph I will later (now) try to argue is good actually.

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SEQUOIA First published in the Honest Ulsterman, October 2018

On Substack, a ghost story

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A journey through 1981 with John Foxx, David Byrne, Brian Eno, PIL, Glenn Branca, Josef K and Kraftwerk.

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First in a series on classic photos begins with William Claxton's shot of jazz musician Donald Byrd. Donald Byrd Takes the A Train, 1959, William Claxton

First in short series on some classic photos, starting with William Claxton's Donald Byrd Takes the A Train from 1959.

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A ★★★★★ review of The Lady Eve (1941) ''I need him like the ax needs the turkey.'' Accidentally fallen into a Preston Sturges run, and so to my favourite, arguably his best all round, one I've seen many times. This time, though, I was str...

boxd.it/9cBgV7

A ★★★★★ review of The Lady Eve (1941) ''I need him like the ax needs the turkey.'' Accidentally fallen into a Preston Sturges run, and so to my favourite, arguably his best all round, one I've seen many times. This time, though, I was str...

boxd.it/9cBgV7

Kilkenny

The finely woven silver wire cones or buttons on display in the National Museum of Ireland

Looking back from the dark interior towards the brightness and vegetation of the mouth of Dunmore Cave

Silver Cones • Dunmore Cave • Kilkenny

These delicate cones made of carefully interwoven bands of silver wire, once decorated a garment of purple or deep red silk. It was found as part of a small Viking hoard within the dark depths of Dunmore Cave in County Kilkenny, Ireland.

#Ireland #SpéirGhorm

Ghost Bridges and Regency Girls Peace Park Walk, Kilkenny

I did a walk, took some photos. The short walk down the quay to the Peace Park revealed all kinds of history layered there; medieval, Victorian, personal. #walking #photography #history #Ireland
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On Substack
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A ★★★★★ review of A Day in the Death of Joe Egg (1972) The marriage of a couple with a severely handicapped child comes under pressure over a single night. You don't often see films as knotty, unsentimental and flippant about difficult subjects like this....

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