Vania Schiff

Will definitely watch the film :) I keep recommending the series, so good. The way they introduced his fiction in the story was one of the best parts (well thought out, fun, creepy, scary, organic, not gimmicky). Cinematography just gorgeous, only a few small reservations.

How does it compare to Schalko’s series? (I liked it, some special moments there)

Awful things unfolding in Rio, over 60 dead, lots of favelados friends either unable to go home or trapped in their homes. Evil cops, evil state governor.

Watercolour showing only the two heads on the right of the original painting. The frame is also black.

When I asked Christopher Riopelle about Bullfight, he spoke of his surprise at the impact this work was having on gallery visitors. One year after painting it, Cross went back to those two heads, this time in resplendent watercolour. The Museum Barberini houses both works 2/2

Pointillist painting showing a bullfight scene. The black carved frame contrasts with the soft, light colours on the canvas.

Caught by a line tossed by Henri-Edmond Cross: a spiral that begins with a tiny red flag and is successively extended by light on sand, improbably-sized toreros, bull, and audience’s heads, of which mine is the third one, just above the giant purple hat 1/2

Ha, so is the 🦠 lol 🌱 🦙 🌱 🌱

I hear you. Hope you find a way around this (aren’t llamas entitled to sick days? 😉)

Sending healing vibes! Loads of rest during and after the acute phase, probiotics wouldn’t hurt, and whatever it takes not to catch it again (it s*cks). Best of luck 🍀

Tower of golden yellow and russet leaves to the left, rainbow over grey clouds, a line of green tree tops and gentle light on the background.

Five minutes of an autumnal walk 2/2

Fallen oak trunk on green grass. A silhouetted vascular system of contorted slim branches reach for the blue sky.

Five minutes of an autumnal walk 1/2

Light falls diagonally on a thin and tall headstone, seen from the side. Two trees frame the picture. A carpet of yellow and rust-coloured leaves covers the grassy ground.

October light

Radiator made from degradé thread in red-yellow and resin

Heating on (Do Ho Suh)

I remember Natalie Scenters-Zapico drawing on blank postcards all the time during her Windham Campbell Prize Festival video interview. Language always text & image & now miniature theatre under a tightly closed lid, invisible to all but me 6/6

uterine linings and clots. Does an enamel heart bleed? Red frames this Altoids tin lid that my eyes keep trying to open, half expecting the miniature warrior archangel to pop up. 5/6

In the closing verses the velvet thread returns, puncturing & pulling shirt cloth before turning into roses. I had painted those 2nd-verse threads — and the penultimate-verse roses — red, a colour never named but always present: in flames, bloody soil and Mexican histories, 4/6

In the Age of Los Zetas Saint Michael hangs demons with velvet thread & opens a torrent of tissue flames in a scene created in a box of Altoids. Saint Michael bites a cracked enamel heart, too big for his tiny plastic cleft to carry. I am in mourning in the bloodiest year of Mexican history. I stare at Saint Michael, my little automaton, & feed myself

The poem drips down the page with mourning & crumbling & resilience, going from plastic & paper to body parts that break and heal without a cast. St Michael’s metallic altar box paves the way to a reliquary of clots, the only object the woman in the poem can afford to carry. 3/6

biting a cracked enamel heart after having opened a torrent of flames made out of tissue paper. I had no idea what size Altoids boxes were, but everything, the saint’s plastic figurine included, suggested not too big. 2/6

Box of Altoids on a tin-grey reflective table top

The first time I saw a box of Altoids was in a poem. The second time was last week, on a table at a Frieze stand. I could be wrong, but I’ll assume it contained mints this time. Years ago a diminutive St Michael was inside it, hanging demons with velvet thread, 1/6

There was a window before Brexit was fully ratified when EU countries still allowed you to apply (also a dual national, managed to do it then), but yes, now you’d need your country’s permission. A German friend recently got her British passport after following this route, so feasible.

Yes, and the only reason I decided to do it. But I’ve always been aware there is no safety — any country can go after dual nationals and there’s already talk of that.

Side view of a triceratops’s head. The sculpture of a madonna can be seen through its eye cavity.

And I saw the Madonna in the Triceratops’s eyes (mystical/surreal experiences at Frieze Masters, ongoing series)

It was very special, and so were your notes. I was sitting next to a couple of people who were not used to this kind of programme. They were very taken by it and we had a great chat about the music. Love when that happens.

Repertoire Boulez Anthèmes 1 for violin Benjamin Attahir Retour à Tipasa for violin & electronics Philippe Manoury Partita Il for violin & electronics Interval Layale Chaker Before bloom for solo viola Kareem Roustom Pavane (pour les enfantes défuntes) for viola & live electronics (UK premiere) Boulez Anthèmes 2 for violin & live electronics Performers Michael Barenboim violin, viola Gilbert Nouno live electronics

A superb concert. Bookended by Boulez’s Anthèmes, Barenboim (switching from violin to viola during the 2nd half) played works by living composers with roots in 2 cultures. Gilbert Nouno took care of the live electronics. Very happy I didn’t fight the last-minute impulse and bought that ticket 3/3

Blurred figure of Michael Barenboim on the Purcell Room stage, now illuminated by blue and purple light.

…which has nothing to do with dead infantas and not much to do with pavanes as they were danced in former times. That very absurdity, however, gave him an approach to a subject itself violently absurd, utterly senseless’ 2/3

Purcell Room under red light, a line of music stands at the very front of the stage.

Still haunted by the UK première of Kareem Roustom’s piece for the children of Gaza, commissioned by Michael Barenboim. Talking about the source of musical inspiration for this work, @disgwylfa.bsky.social says that ‘thinking … of laments, Roustom came to Ravel’s Pavane pour une infante défunte 1/3

Video shows Palestinian children jumping with joy as a parent chants “Hudna! Hudna! Hudna!” — an Arabic word meaning a long-term truce or ceasefire.

Tall trees with copper leaves against a dark grey sky with light, luminous grey clouds and a full moon behind them. The top of a chimney can be seen in between moon and tree.

Tintarella di luna

During the military dictatorship in Brazil, Stendhal’s The Red and the Black (1830) was seized by censors looking for subversive literature (red = communist) 🤷‍♀️

Moon over group of silhouetted trees. Tiny lights appear to the left of a sculptural dead tree.

moonlight

The number 5 appears on the base of an early 19th-century lamppost on top of a bridge. Five swans can be seen on the dark-blue river, flanked by green trees with the odd speck of autumn reds and golds.

Five swans