« When Casanova lost his teeth, he started to write »
says Helmut Watzlawick, the writer’s specialist on French radio France Culture. Then Alain Finkielkraut asks Hector Obalk what painting really shows, or lets us see (broadly speaking I mean). The art historian answers (still broadly speaking) that, what’s really special with painting is the pleasure (the jouissance) of a certain sense of synthesis, as everything is happening within a frame. He says (still broadly speaking) that when you watch still lives, you watch things within the closed space of the canvas. He then mentions distorted scales, and the fact that painting only shares colour range with reality. Everything else (like texture, or space) is different.
Taking pleasure in the representation of things. Hmmm.
“I like it” like they say on facebook. Worth a finger- that is.
- And you, how are you doing?
- Much better since I know that the new Head of Government in Morocco doesn’t read much but prays a lot. (1)And now, some news:
« Three Cameroonian men have been sentenced by the Yaoundé tribunal to 5 years in prison for homosexuality. The President of Cameroon Youth Gathering says he’s quite happy about the decision and that he will go on campaigning for more arrests. “Westerners want to impose on us the outgrowths of their civilisation. We do not want them. We intend to keep fighting homosexuals”. » (2)
Here in France we have regular news about Liliane:
« Liliane Bettencourt speaks about her stormy relationship with her daughter Francoise as a nightmare, accusing her to be driven by malice and nastiness. “I did bring her up but she is the exact contrary to me. I tend to make her feel stifled. Even dead, I would overshadow her. She’s always wanted to be like me; but in fact she’s just the opposite. She doesn’t look like her father either (…) this all goes way back. One could say it’s unfortunate, but you could, to the extreme, find it shameful.” » (3)
It probably doesn’t really sound like English, but the original text doesn’t sound like French either.
And now, something about Algeria:
“Abdellah Kebaïli, a 25 years old unemployed lawyer set himself alight on the 14th of November. Despite his diploma and his numerous attempts with the Algerian administration, the young lawyer had failed to find a job.” (4)
And some questions about Libya…
“Mahmoud Djibril, Transitional National Council First Minister would have preferred Kadhafi to be judged for his crimes rather than being killed after his capture. « To be honest with you, I wish he’d be alive. I want to know why he inflicted all that to the Libyan people » he told the BBC. « I would have liked to be the prosecutor for his trial. You know, it’s the question everybody is asking: Why? Did the Libyan people deserve what he did during 42 years of murders and all that? »” (5)
-Err? Why? Are you sure this is really the question bothering you now? Are you really really positive you want to get to the bottom of the issue of what the Libyan people deserved?-Me, I like still lives. Yes. Very much so. Chardin.
-Everybody likes Chardin.
-But what about Kadhafi’s son paintings? Do you thing they’ve got more value today?
Photo: Rex Features
- Think about the beginning of abstraction in painting. The gap between those who’d get it and those who just wouldn't….
REUTERS/Sergei Karpukhin
- I like abstraction.
“Choose a basket rather than a caddie to make the best of your features” says a journalist in Be.
- And did you know Sonny Rollins is 81 and that he stills practices everyday?
- And you, did you know that our common ancestor with the geranium is less than a billion year old?
- Well... I know that crucifixions are no still life, but that maybe, Jesus on the cross could mean “we got you here little fellow, you don’t look so proud now with your hands up in the air, do you?” rather than “here’s a beautiful young Jewish half-man half-god, tortured to death to save mankind”
-Mankind? You mean without the Inuit- who tend to hear about things with a serious delay, or the Tuareg -who are really stubborn, and cannibals tribes in remote pacific islands -who just don’t get much of anything anyway.The last demonstration I took part in was at Trocadero in Paris, near the Jeu de Paume where Diane Arbus is now showing. It was the night before Roy Davies was executed. Different leaders where calling the crowd to shout with them ”We are all Roy Davies” but I couldn’t join in. Why scream something wrong when they’re so many true things to shout out loud? I wanted to say “Please don't kill him, no, don’t kill him please”. But, hey, I’m no leader.
Mike Kelley says in an interview that while some artists choose to make art with loaded materials like wax, blood or sperm, he thinks there’s already a church with all these signs, that art is about creating your own rituals with what you can find in the world surrounding you and not about capitalising on other’s rituals…
-So what about actors malleability? Do know about it?
- Yes, otherwise why would watch them act? The way they change and the way they don’t change. It’s reassuring.
- I actually don’t like actors myself. Unless when they wear masks.“We will make you like hard discount” is a sentence I read on the bus from my place to Barbès.
- I, personally like to be well.
- Me too, l love it.
- But do you like the term “Return on Investment”?
- Well, actually I’ d rather not be alive, to be honest with you.
- So, let’s speak about Wittgenstein’s fight for tastes and colours.
- But I don’t understand why he doesn’t call back. He doesn’t fancy me or what?
Or maybe he doesn’t care to call.
- Maybe he’s waiting to splits up.
- Pfffff
Sarah Lucas, she’s always got interview sentences, like « I started to make work to keep me company »(sorry about the grammatical mistakes…. )
(1) lefigaro.fr 29/11/2011
(2) LEMONDE.FR avec AFP | 23.11.11
(3) libération 16/10/2011
(4) DNA 23 nov 2011
(5) LEMONDE.FR with Reuters and AFP | 23.10.11