It’s been a tragic couple weeks and feels crazy to be sharing cultural highlights but I hope that something in here will take your mind elsewhere than here. For some people (that might or might not be me) that was the Fran (Lebowitz) Con or learning about Vaudeville’s Pickle Sisters.
So here we go, the performances, books, audio that have made this month for me- as always please feel free to send me yours- sending you a virtual *hug*.
Visual Art
Rirkrit Tiravanija at MoMA PS1 (Free for New Yorkers)- This exhibit is the first survey and largest exhibition to date dedicated to the Thai artist, whose work involves its viewers and often food. I went to see the show on a late Friday afternoon and was struck by two community activation pieces: Cafe Deutschland (1993) which was a fake coffee shop set up serving Turkish coffee that he originally set in Cologne around after a racist incident impacting Turkish immigrants, and trying to create an environment that would allow people to come together. The second was a Thai kitchen cooking performance with a live band playing, offering viewers food and lasting as long as there was any left. What happens in each performance is up to us, which felt timely.
Instillation by Tiravanija
Roberto Lugo with “The Guilded Ghetto” at R & Company (Free)
I LOVED this show through which Lugo used archetypal ancient ceramic frameworks to invoke his Afro-Latin roots and showcase people from his community. The original messaging is empowered by the mastery of his sheer skills as a ceramicist and volume of work for a first solo show.
Roberto Lugo
Marin Majic at Nino Meier Gallery (Free)
Celestial paintings paintings with dream like imagery through which some external glow/light seems to always pierce through. Beautiful.
Marin Majic
Performances
I was supposed to finally meet Adele Haenel, after admiring her for many years from afar by seeing her first play in NYC- but alas I decided to go to the Signal Awards Winner cocktails with my team- but it was, and I didn’t think I would say this, absolutely worthwhile.
Gillian Walsh’s Wilderness at Danspace was a balm. I’ve loved Gillian’s work for many years and her ability to approach a dance that stretches in extreme opposite directions, incredibly still, funny (in the original surprise of competition like dance movement in an experimental space to near silence), quiet and unbelievably demanding. Watching her work is recognizing a cult that you are already a part of, as dancers with years of putting pressure on your body and being fully attuned to your body and/or as an audience member demanding to be mesmerized by what the body can do. I entered from a cold rainy night, into the space full of candles at a loss from the week, already being summoned by a dancer in motion. And left empty- in a really good way.
Rehearsal photo of Gillian Walsh
On another note- we saw Kimberly Akimbo on Broadway with Sarah’s mom. I am not a musical theater person but the play is… wild? It is the type of show that seems to be for kids but is everything but- like Shrek on steroids.
Movies
This month I have two movie recs that are on polar opposite sides of the spectrum.
Dicks The Musical, A24’s first musical, is a chaotic Parent Trap-esque movie based on a UCB show about two adult twin brothers (one grew up with dad, the other with mom) who come across each other in their workplace and based on your knowledge of the Parent Trap you may or may not guess what’s next. It’s completely unhinged with the introduction of the Sewer Boys characters and star studded with Bowen Yang, Megan Thee Stallion and Nathan Lane among others. Stay for the credits.
Dicks The Musical
Anatomy of a Fall was the great winner of Cannes this year made in France and is an morality film, thorough and fascinating court drama- made more complicated by language barriers, a blind witness and a relationship that is not perfect. The writing for the movie is superb and leads to question your own opinions throughout. It reminded me of Force Majeure- highly recommend.
Streaming
Beckham- who knows if it’s because of the severity of current events or because I am a sucker for a Sports story but I fully fell into the propaganda machine that the David and Victoria Beckham doc offered. I had completely forgot about David’s prowess as a soccer player, from his youth, and loved the amount of footage shared in the documentary. Maybe it’s because we’re used to Kardashian royalty but David and Victoria came out of the series as extremely put together and smart- you come out of it wanting to root for them. And of course- stay along for the 90s fashion nostalgia.
David and Victoria Beckham.
The Lesbian Bar Project- Did you know there are 29- TWENTY NINE- lesbian bars left in the US??? The Lesbian Bar Project is a mini doc series and a fundraising campaign to highlight the ones remaining- which have now left me with the goal to go to them all before they disappear. Going to give a shout out to one that did not make it to the list, and is directly across where we live- oddly enough. There you go, you have it now.
Fair Play- If you want an engrossing thriller (movie) about the extremes that a secret couple that works together will be put through when the future wife gets a promotion over her fiancée, watch Fair Play on Netflix. It is so intense and fast pace, and of the realm of Gone Girl if that’s your thing.
Lastly, this was a terrible documentary but a crazy story- did you know that a scammer fooled a group of people in the aughts of early reality TV in the UK to leave their lives behind for a reality show that did not exist?
Music and Podcasts
It’s been SO long since I’ve found a great album AND music video and TikTok somehow drove Sarah and therefore me to Jungle’s album “Volcano” and I’ve listened to it non-stop ever since. It’s a perfect album. But the best part is that they made a whole visual album in collaboration with choreographer Shay Latukolan that is entirely available on YouTube and the dancing WILL GIVE YOU LIFE. Sarah and I are now Will West (dancer) stans. It’s no surprise that the previous choreographer to Stormzy’s Vossi Bop would pick something equally sophisticated. If you don’t want to watch the whole thing I recommend the following videos: “You ain’t no celebrity hunny” and “Good Times”
Jungle music video
Alright now onto podcasts!
The Dough (by Lemonada!)- I am so proud of this show we made that is gossip meets finance with cover art by my work wife the one and only Sahar (Sahar I hope you see this). X Mayo is one of the best hosts I’ve heard in a while and has me cackling about divorce, wellness scams and a wedding venue that went under and led 20 + couples to stage a protest and storm into its building. X Mayo would know- she worked at the venue.
How to Destroy Everything- This show about an adult son’s piecing together of his life with his- severely- psychotic dad in the company of a child friend is incredibly engrossing, I’ve been waiting for episode 3 to come out for WEEKS and hope they are doing ok?
Ghost Story- A captivating investigation of a journalist into a serendipitous crossover of ghosts from his teenage bedroom and his wife’s great grandmother’s home, involving him digging deep into her untold noble British family history.
Books/Articles
“What if he was your son?”- My favorite article this month is a hilarious and insane story of a critic’s take down following his review of a TikTok artist’s exhibit. RIP art criticism.
Are you an eldest daughter? (I am)- well you might have heard of the eldest daughter syndrome and second guess the reason behind every choice you’ve made. Your profession (care taker/producer/communications specialist), personality and even your choice to have kids or not may be tied to your role in the family structure.
Maria Bamford’s Sure I’ll Join Your Cult- I’ll be honest I didn’t LOVE this book but admire Maria courage in opening up in here about her severe mental health issues and the trajectories she took to address them (involving multiple groups/cults). The title is a bit misleading and story arc all over the place but she really opens up about it all in here, from her episodes to monthly finances- which is more than most can say.
Marisa Meltzer’s Glossy- I haven’t read many CEO biographies but I loved this book in that it’s at the crossover of the CEO biography, culture commentary and a #girlboss review. Emily Weiss, owner of Glossier, being a fascinating character that we never really go to deeply into because there is only so much she will let you see- but revealing bit and pieces of her innovative thinking through this historical account of the company, starting from her high school days, her brief appearance on The Hills, and creation of the crown jewel blog of the early 2000s, Into The Gloss.
To finish off I will leave you with my favorite dog from the Fort Greene Great PUPkin costume contest last Saturday (my favorite holiday), the one and only “Panda” (this photo was taken from TimeOut NY because with hurds of thousands of viewers I would never be able to get this shot)
Much love- Allie