Film
Dune Is Impressive but Incomplete
The biggest problem with turning Dune into a film is that the book appears increasingly derivative of generic sci-fi tropes.
Review
Books
The Mythology of the Cross-Country Motorcycle Trip in Ed Roberson's Early Poems
Ed Roberson's motorcycle ride from Pittsburgh to the Pacific is a quest-romance, an exploration of American culture and American mythology.
Art
A Well-Intentioned Poussin Show Almost Gets it Right
Poussin and the Dance is a valiant attempt to break into Poussin’s staunchly academic oeuvre and provide a relatable point of entry, highlighting the exciting elements of revelry and movement despite impenetrable and unemotional rendering.
Art
Creating Home From Scraps of Place
With scavenged materials, Amanda Maciel Antunes constructs a motherland.
Art
Pamela Council Looks to Black Vernacular Culture to Expose Social Inequality
Council often uses humor as a political tool to expose systems of power and inequality in a society in which even death carries a high price tag.
Art
The São Paulo Biennial Captures a Perpetually Discontinuous World
Many works take disruption and repetition as their themes, and many artists resurface in different sections, creating multiple affinities.
Art
Eileen Gray’s Masterpiece in the French Riviera, No Longer Overshadowed by Le Corbusier
While staying as a house guest, a naked Le Corbusier defiled Gray’s minimalist, color-blocked walls that were only restored in 2015.
Books
How Landscape Became Doctrine in American Art
In his new book, Tyler Green argues that landscape was Emerson’s method of glorifying territories shaped and bordered by White men.
Film
The Loneliest Whale Tries to Find the Internet’s Favorite Whale
“The 52-hertz Whale,” which sings a song at a frequency no other whale uses, is a social media phenomenon. But this film shows that the phenomenon says more about us than whales.
Art
The Sounds That Get Lost in the Shuffle
We are waiting for spectacle and when the quotidian, yet incongruous actions occur I wonder whether there is any real payoff coming.
Art
Internal and External Worlds Collide in Norma Tanega's Psychologically Charged Art
Tanega’s approach to mark-making comes across as stream of consciousness, as if she’s engaged in a conversation with herself.
Art
The Inexorable Pull of Lisa Yuskavage’s Paintings
This is Yuskavage's great gift, turning upside down our settled ways of thinking and seeing and, with ease, transforming the vulgar and ridiculous into the sublime.