"Catherine Opie: Binding Ties" (Heide)

These didn't stick hard with me as a whole (maybe not really to my taste), but I did feel a bit of fizz - a spark - from them.

"Pig Pen" (1993)

"Self-Portrait/Nursing" (2004)

The Smile - A Light for Attracting Attention

Thom Yorke. And Jonny Greenwood. Still good, today, after all these years.

Emily St John Mandel - Sea of Tranquility

Sea of Tranquility is written with a clarity and precision that, combined with its sparseness of prose, could easily have been distancing. Instead, the wonderful writing is what enables this crystalline novel to affect as much as it does. What it's 'about' isn't overly laboured, though the big clue is the section about 'so what' being the appropriate response if the simulation hypothesis is accurate; it's graceful in the way it's both literary and science-fictional, and in the endings it gives its characters.

Interesting compare and contrast: To Paradise. Multiple time periods (past, present, future), linked narratives, pandemic and partial social collapse, preoccupation with what it means to live with meaning.

The Handmaiden

Park Chan-wook is one of those film makers whose hand is unmistakeable - all of his films feel like his. The Handmaiden has that same heavy texture, immersive, unsettling and in the end moral. Like nearly all of his films, it drew me in despite elements that repulsed me.

The Man from U.N.C.L.E.

A goof but a fun one.

The Departed

Rewatch; last time.

"Expressive potential: Studies in abstraction" / "Australiana: Designing a nation" @ Bendigo Art Gallery

The distinction's false but one of these very much registered for me at the emotional level, the other at the political.

The small 'abstract' exhibition was pieces from the Bendigo Art Gallery's collection, a mixed bag in quality, several with unfortunately reductive titles. Most striking were Charles Godfrey's "Summer (2)" 1960-64), below/detail, and John Passmore's "Abstract" (1959).

From the (good) 'Australiana' exhibition:

Penleigh Boyd - "The breath of spring" (1919)

Margaret Preston - "Banksia and Flannel Flowers" (1938)

Grace Cossington Smith - "Bottlebrushes" (1935)

Elif Batuman - Either/Or

Either/Or works as entertainment but, like The Idiot, it has a lot going on beyond its loose, episodic 'plot' of Selin's further misapprehensions and misadventures. Just what that is, is a bit elusive, but has something to do with how we make sense of our lives and our selves - how we should be - through, not stories exactly (that old cliche), nor literature narrowly, but rather out of the many intersecting forces, narrative and otherwise, that shape us whether we like it or not. Piquant, funny, and at times touching. I'll read as many books about Selin as Batuman wants to write.

Jen Cloher - I Am the River, The River Is Me

I've never felt that Jen Cloher was in any way fashionable or cool, but from the very beginning - for me that was Dead Wood Falls some 17 years ago - what they've always been is consistently good, in a way that's all the more impressive for being always so seemingly unassuming. And in that sense, this latest one is a continuation - just high quality songwriting and musicianship, with catchy songs that are about more than their catchiness. It's impressive.

boygenius - the record

Their first ep was a nice surprise and all three - Lucy Dacus, Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker have only gone from strength to strength since then - so this full length is a rare pleasure. It genuinely does sound like a collaboration in which each of their voices (figuratively/literally) is clear, it grows in quality over time, and it's got some distinct highlights from each of them - although I'm particularly liking "Not Strong Enough", which is one of the most difficult to identify the primary songwriter for.

The Last Kingdom seasons 1-5 & Seven Kings Must Die

Surprisingly good which is why I kept going. It gets a bit formulaic at times - queen/princess must be rescued, only Uhtred can/will do it, small group must infiltrate heavily protected enemy camp, end with rousing battle won by bringing distrustful groups together to defeat common enemy - but it's also neatly constructed, with some plot twists and surprises but the big resolutions feeling right.