There were many ways that I could have picked to start this post. I could have begun with quotes from Susan Sontag or Harold Bloom praising Machado de Assis to the point that would make all of my words unnecessary. I could have chosen the classical “Brás Cubas is dead,” to intrigue you into adding the book to your shopping cart.
Read MoreSweet tea meant conversation and good food, community and taking part; it was the promised refreshment after a hot morning of mowing lawns and pulling weeds, the perfect complement to a bowl of evening popcorn. It was the drink of my forefathers and mothers who tilled the prairie soil and scratched a life out of dirt.
Read MoreAs a hard-headed young girl desperate to make an impact, I read books about revolutions—female leads engaging with causes that encapsulated demands of a whole people. I was always struck by the power a society carries, and by the human disposition to resist oppression.
Read MoreWith many of the world’s theatres shuttered due to the pandemic, more and more theatres are taking their art online. We’ve compiled a list of some of our favorite shows, musicals, and dance performances now streaming online.
Read MoreWe recently spoke with Gussie, a solo bedroom-pop artist from Brooklyn. Her music has been featured in NYLON, seen steady rotation on SiriusXMU, and charted internationally in France. She tell us about her songwriting process, her career as a filmmaker, and some of her biggest influences.
Read MoreAtharva Kharkar is a filmmaker at The University of Michigan currently pursuing a double major in Art & Design and Business. Atharva has worked with many brands including Michigan Football and Sweetwaters Coffee and created several films that have won film festivals and premiered at a local theater. He started out creating comedy…
Read MoreThe poems in Kristen Tracy’s debut collection Half-Hazard (Graywolf Press) are warning signs in a big, dangerous world. Tracy leads her readers by the hand into a surreal landscape of circus animals, vampires, and the fields of Idaho. An author of twelve novels for young readers, Tracy brings all the magic and pain of adolescence…
Read MoreThe Academy Awards finds new ways every year, and recently, every month, to ignite controversy—from the Popular Film category (though the Oscars are nothing more than a popularity contest anyway, so why bother?) to the Kevin Hart controversy, to the dispiriting nominations themselves (we won’t get into that), to Academy President…
Read MoreAs I was reading Roger Rosenblatt’s Kayak Morning, I found myself mentally clawing at the reflective prose for a direction. I was hoping to find a structure that lead both this book’s speaker and its subject to some unified conclusion. I was looking for distance, for the book to travel. I think, because of how much of this piece…
Read MoreHearing about the alleged hate crime taken against Jussie Smollett made me mad, but it was the discourse surrounding the circumstances of the tragedy that hurt me in a place real deep. As you all know, I do my best to highlight people that are often overlooked by bringing their stories to the forefront of all conversations…
Read MoreIt’s like an intricately-versed, extra-high-definition nature special. Although its imagery is vivid, determining meanings in Jen Hadfield’s poetry collection, Byssus, can be as murky and sticky as trudging through a bog of mollusks. You may often struggle to peel the parasitic, wonky dialect and labyrinthine imagery away from the core…
Read MoreAfter the two-hour early morning excursion from the town to London and back, the meeting point was location—an apartment building complex. We were shooting a scene in which a man and a teen wake up in his apartment the night after a party. Apparently the location manager found the place through a friend who was away…
Read MoreBased out of Melbourne, Australia, the band was founded in 2010 and released their debut album, States, in 2013. Their sophomore effort, twelvefour, was released in 2015 to critical acclaim. In this interview, we spoke with Dave for a few minutes about the songwriting process, the band's artistic journey, and some of their favorite bands…
Read MoreBecause I didn’t go to film school or study anything related to filmmaking, I’ve often found myself putting extra effort into finding projects, resources, and a community of filmmakers with whom to work. At first it was hard, but as I’ve come to know many creators in Madrid (where I’m from) and across the globe over the years, it’s become…
Read MoreJonas Mekas, who passed away at the age of 96 last week, was in love with the invention known as the camera. With it, he captured all the beautiful and lovely things that people often overlook, ignore, take for granted—a row of bushes, a woman planting flowers, his mother getting water from the well in the front yard of his Lithuanian home…
Read MoreMy second time working on a short film in the capacity of the director was a very different story than the first, both on screen and in the process. In case you missed it, I wrote about my first short and the challenges that I faced during its making, both in terms of production, preparation, and delegating projects to my crew. My second short…
Read MoreToday, our playlist is inspired by Joan Didion's novel, Play It As It Lays, originally published in 1970. The novel centers on Maria Wyeth, a woman in the 1970s confined in a psychiatric hospital. What unfolds in Maria’s history is somehow both comforting and alienating, baffling and yet still incredibly knowable. I found myself drawn to soundscapes…
Read MoreThe Voice at 3:00 A.M. is poetic pop. It’s easy to understand the broad appeal of Charles Simic’s work: his collection, The Voice at 3:00 A.M., has the unshakable aroma of compromise. By aiming to amaze everyone, it mainly just tickles, rather than truly resonating with, the individual reader. I found it promising but eventually…
Read MoreAfter any given year, it’s safe to assume fatigue on some level—with school, with work, with the world. However, upon looking back on all the wonderful artistry and work that sustained our team this year, it’s hard, if not impossible, not to feel somewhat hopeful about what’s to come. Enjoy—
Read MoreHirokazu Kore-eda, among the most prolific Japanese filmmakers of the new millennium, not to mention also one of the best, finally won an award on the national stage spotlighting his enormous talent as a compassionate chronicler of individuals who are spiritually down and out. With Shoplifters (2018) winning the 2018 Palme D’Or Award…
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