[for the Telegraph, 16/5/21]
Agar flowered in the Weimar era, and yet you’ll find her in Thatcher’s Britain, modelling for Issey Miyake.
sam mckinniss, 'country western'
[for Frieze, 10/5/21]
This show is about our desire to feel love and feel nothing at once; our belief that a person can be all artificial and all natural; our wish to find new objects of devotion; and our knowledge that they will disappoint us, as we would disappoint them, too.
lauren oyler, 'fake accounts'
[for the Telegraph, 13/2/21]
Lauren Oyler is suspicious of sincerity.
the end of beckett studies
[for the TLS, 10/2/21]
To the extent that Beckett’s work is “about” anything, it’s about knowing what not to say. It deserves a critical style that’s self-critical, because certainties are of zero interest; what person lives in certainty about the way they feel?
racine, or gossip girl (a mention)
[for The Drift, 3/2/21]
It’s gossip as pathology.
maggie must fall!
[for the Telegraph, 2/12/20]
Margaret Thatcher was an egotist. So said Charles Moore, her biographer, who had long suspected she was keen to be written about. Where sculpture was concerned, she proved him right.
don delillo, 'the silence'
[for the Telegraph, 24/10/20]
These people are broken automata, broadcasting only fear. But DeLillo wants to have it both ways – uncanny conversation in a novel set at home.
huma bhabha, 'against time'
[for the Telegraph, 19/9/20]
This is a genealogy of paranoia. We made other people lonely before we did it to ourselves.
douglas stuart, 'shuggie bain'
[for the Telegraph, 1/8/20]
Calling alcoholism “tragic” doesn’t mean that it’s especially grand – it can seem repetitive and banal – just that alcoholics hurt those around them by making them witnesses.
ali smith, 'summer'
[for the Telegraph, 1/8/20]
Everything is lost, or a losing game. Some losses are personal: parents, lovers or friends. Others are national: a diminished and soured UK.
art boys in slick suits
[for Burlington Contemporary, 30/7/20]
Age of the Image is a classy series, as classy as its leading man – and if it cannot be charming, it would rather say nothing at all.
anish kapoor at houghton hall
[for the Telegraph, 10/7/20]
Monoliths can act like divas – as though you owe them your scrutiny.
'gordon parks: part one'
[for the Telegraph, 30/6/20]
In front of a camera, kids have a special naturalness that they feign if you tell them: “Be yourselves”.
andrés neuman, 'fracture'
[for the Telegraph, 14/6/20]
Humans are storytellers: we’re always making each other up.
naoise dolan, 'exciting times'
[for the Telegraph, 12/4/20]
Edith is too good for this novel: she has depth of feeling, and knows that Gucci is “tourist bait”.
cerith wyn evans, 'no realm of thought... no field of vision'
[for Frieze, 6/4/20]
What makes these artworks beautiful is your worry – or secret thrill – at how that beauty might be lost.
anne enright, 'actress'
[for the Telegraph, 23/2/20]
The characters in Enright’s novels are absorbing because they seem recognisable in an unassuming way: they’re as lovely, boring and complex as the people outside the books.
talking with barbara london
[for the Telegraph, 30/1/20]
“Unfortunately, I think we have to wade through a lot of mediocrity. It depends who gets their hands on those tools: are they engineers, are they artists, are they hybrids?”
eimear mcbride, 'strange hotel'
[for the Telegraph, 25/1/20]
The bad pun, the wryly fastidious questions, the slowness of the inquiry: listen to Beckett, there like a ghost.
'slow painting', leeds art gallery
[for Frieze, 16/12/19]
What do pictures want? Nothing, goes one answer; attention, goes another; and in between, from being ignored to being loved, is a reflection of every human hope.