Right, right. This should’ve been finished before the end of 2025. But between engagements and gastro, it took a bit of a back seat.
YES I KNOW GODDAMNIT.
But now I’m (mostly) back on deck, so here’s your yearly guide to things I perceived. You can check through the previous versions (here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here) for some more me-review action.
I think this will be less wordy than the usual variant, but we’ll see how we end up.
It’s the last day of 2024. I am tired, but I am also eleven years deep into screaming into the void about the things I liked during the year, so I’m armed with a vat of tea, a container of lollies and the burning desire to see whether the stuff I consumed throughout the year has a hidden message.
Why do I do this? Your guess is as good as mine. And his. Though he’d be having a Bat-Guess.
This one could be a bit wilder (and woollier?) than preceding iterations, so if you’re feeling like something’s missing, you can check through the previous versions (here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here) for some more me-review action.
Or you could log off and go look at some fireworks. I dunno, I’m not your mother.
(Edit: I got too tired before the actual turn of the year and went to bed. This is a New Year’s Day post now, so I assume you are no longer wearing a party hat as you read this, which saddens me slightly. I did a psych! move and this post still appears to have been written in the dying minutes of the year, so it’s still on time, kinda-sorta.)
Once more, dear friends, it’s time for me to remark that time has really flown this year, and that it seems as if I had only written last year’s one of these a couple of days ago.
Call me Bill. (And call me, Bill.)
Yep, 2023 went fast. It’s been a good year in a lot of ways, and absolutely atrocious in many others. The world continues to go to shit, and so I continue in my mission of providing distraction to those who enjoy it (thankfully, a treasured few do) through writing up what I consumed this year, culturally speaking. If this isn’t you, then punch out now. I’m not sure if this one’s going to be as long as previous editions, but let’s give it a whirl, shall we?
Here we are again at the end of a year that feels like it only began the other week. It’s been a big one for lots of reasons, and I’ve gotten through it OK – I think? – but I have to take issue with my hopeful belief in the last one of these things that I’d somehow get more motivation in 2022.
Hahahahahahaha.
I didn’t.
In keeping with my lack of motivation, this recap may be a little shorter than previous years, but I’m hoping there’s still something in here that might pique your interest. It’s a collection of stuff that I enjoyed (or didn’t) through this year, and is one in a continuing line. Faintly ridiculous effort, but this will make it ten years of this kinda stuff, so let’s go.
SO we grind to the end of another year, and I appear, like some kind of obnoxious groundhog, ready to dispense my wisdom. If, by “wisdom” you mean “half-assed picks of Stuff Which Was Pretty OK In This Terrible Year”.
Difference is that he’s more stylish than I am.
I’ll insert a caveat here: like, well, everyone, this year has been a struggle for me. We’re rolling toward the third instalment of 2020 and increasingly I find that concentration takes a kick in the nuts for every COVID variant found. A lot of the plans I had made at the beginning of the year haven’t come to pass because I’ve either lacked the bandwidth to execute them, or because I’ve been so goddamned tired. I haven’t read as much as I would have liked, and I haven’t listened to as much music as I’d hoped. There’s been a bit of persistent fog around through the year and it’s made it difficult to do anything than just exist, sometimes.
A Humument: A Treated Victorian Novel (Final Edition) by Tom Phillips. My rating: five stars.
Writing in books is not a big thing. I’ve got copies of texts from my schooldays where I’ve underlined portentous encounters, highlighted exam-worthy tidbits and scrawled “what the shit?” more than once.
Obviously this is a bit more involved than that.
It’s not something I do any more, largely because I’m not 15 any more. Tom Phillips didn’t get the memo about stopping, though, and the result is a singular piece of art which takes the reader on a journey through art and opera, though still features the odd cock-and-balls graffito.
I suppose this year hasn’t exactly been kind to my interpretation of, y’know, time, so it’s not a surprise that this has crept up on me. Anyway, for the benefit of me and the dick-pill spambots that flood my comments section, I guess it’s time to chunk out some words about things I liked this year.
As ever, I’m a bit uncertain as to why I do this. It feels like a bit of an indulgence, but I suppose it does allow me a bit of breathing space to look back at the year through the prism of entertainment and formulate some thoughts about it. Whether they’re any good is still up for debate, but before we get too deep in the ontological weeds, let’s get on with it.
So hey, here’s an idea for a book: a history of artists from a certain place, and a certain time. Let’s call them London Painters and bung them together, even though there’s little to link them stylistically, or even philosophically.
I’d known who Adam Cullen was from the papers rather than his art, at least initially. He was the eminently quotable prick who had issues with his mum, and was a bit of a lair, given to creating sculptures out of random shit, and artwork that was distinguished from that of a truculent kid by dint of the violence bubbling underneath it.
Actor, artist and arsehole.
I’d seen his Archibald winners (and non-starters), but hearing him constantly referred to as an enfant terrible or similar made me a bit leery of learning more. And then he died, and at least some of the obits made me think there might be a bit more to the story. Continue reading “Book review: Acute Misfortune: The Life and Death of Adam Cullen”→
First things first. This book is presented almost as a travelogue – a kind of Contiki holiday through the upper-end of the art world. It takes the reader on a trip behind the velvet rope to check out several aspects of the art life – an auction; a crit session; an art fair; a magazine; a studio visit and a Biennale. It could, were I uncharitable, seem a bit on the nose – a bit of an obvious structure. I mean, it’s a pretty blatant conceit.
If you’ve gotta pick a schtick, make it a GREAT one.
Yeah nah. 