The Dead Don't Die

Has some - many - of the charms one would expect of a Jim Jarmusch zombie movie but really this was just a bit too much of a goof to amount to much.

(w/ Kim)

"Olympia: Photographs by Polixeni Papapetrou" & "Petrina Hicks: Bleached Gothic" (NGV Australia)

These photos by Polixeni Papapetrou of her daughter, from very young to early adulthood, are wonderful. The 'Alice' (and other Lewis Carroll) ones I like, unsurprisingly, including the trompe l'oeil painted backdrops, so too the 'Haunted Country' and 'Games of Consequence' ones, both interestingly shadowy but not overly heavy or dark. And the 'Eden' series, revelling in colour, proved a treat near the end.

"Olympia as Lewis Carroll's Alice dreaming by the riverbank" (2003) - I wondered whether the figures in the background are intended to appear Aboriginal Australian, in a series of painted backdrops otherwise heavily shaped by Tenniel's illustrations 

 "The Wimmera 1864 #1" (2006) - unavoidably recalling Picnic at Hanging Rock though without any overt sinister elements

"Dreams are like water" (2008) 

"Heart" (2016)

The Petrina Hicks pieces were intriguing - at first blush coolly holding their mysteries both on the surface and at one remove, and on closer inspection showing themselves to be warmly humanistic.

"Shenae and Jade" (2005) on the large dividing wall; I was also drawn to "The beauty of history" (2010) in the background, green drapes around white statue

The two close-up videos were compelling and somehow not abject or at least not scanning that way to me - this one was "Gloss" (2011) (the other was the butterfly on the open mouth)

(w/ Jade)

Jessica Jones season 1

Probably both Krysten Ritter and the positive reviews were necessary but not sufficient, but together they finally got me watching now that netflix has come into my life. And it's good stuff - a bit darker than I expected, and more lavish with the body count, and really steers into the central metaphor of male control and abuse. Economical in its use of characters almost to a fault - the fault being when it seems the pieces fit together too well - and the 'abilities' (ie super-powers) aspect functions well, although the coincidence of so many 'gifted' people stumbling across each other as required by the plot sometimes strains credulity. The plot is twisty and there's just the right amount of it, the characters are engaging and undergoing both revelation and development as the series progresses, there are a few unnerving and even properly uncanny moments, and as mentioned just before, the themes are strong and well handled.

"KAWS: Companionship in the Age of Loneliness" (NGV International)

"Gone" (2019)

"Born to Bend" (2013)

"Man's Best Friend" (2014)

"What Girls Are Made Of" (Spiegeltent)

The true story of early 90s indie band Darlingheart's not-quite-rise to fame as told and sung by then-17 year old now 40-something frontwoman Cora Bissett. Good-natured, energetically performed (including by the three other musician / channelers of many other characters) with enjoyable 90s colour and music, and the impressions of Radiohead and Blur - both of whom they supported back in the day - were fun. Not substantial at all though, the aspects to do with her parents and daughter notwithstanding, albeit with an extra layer thanks to its being all true.

(w/ R and Lisa)

Felice Brothers @ Corner Hotel, Friday 11 October

Very good show, many songs with a family resemblance to the only Felice Brothers song I really know, "Forever Green", and enjoyably more rock-y live and also garnished and sometimes led with plenty of piano accordion.

(w/ Julian)

"Civilization" (NGV Australia)

"Many civilisations populate the earth today and many have in the past, but it is clear that a single, planetary civilisation is slowly evolving."

Olivier Christinat - "Figurations II" (2016) (it's people coming down on an elevator)

'Civilization' is a broad theme for an exhibition, and maybe especially one of contemporary photography, but this show was convincing, helped by the thematic organisation which struck the balance between being meaningfully specific and sufficiently rich in association: 'flow', 'hive', 'rupture' etc. The pieces leaned towards the evidently composed, and many used repetition as part of their effect. These two, Candida Hofer's "Augustiner Chorherrenstift Sankt Florian III 2014" (2014) and Ahmad Zamroni's "Muslims pray at a mosque during the Friday noon prayer in Jakarta" (2007), struck me as a matched pair:

Others:

Thomas Struth - "Pergamon Museum 1, Berlin 2001" (2001)

Graham Miller - "Alice" (2005)

Taloi Havini and Stuart Miller - "Sami and the Panguna mine" (2009) - PNG conflict and copper mining

Michael Wolf - "Tokyo Compression #80" (2010)

Irene Kung - "Torre Velasca" (2010), though I liked her "IAC Gehry NY" from the same The Invisible City series even more

Also Richard Misrach's "Untitled (November 9, 2013, 9:49am)"  (2013) from his On the Beach series.