Bad periods

“Artists must be allowed to go through bad periods! They must be allowed to do bad work! They must be allowed to get in a mess!” – from a 1969 clip of art critic David Sylvester, recently resurfaced by Austin Kleon. Heck, let’s illuminate those bad periods! I would love to see an exhibition of crap art by great artists – shoddy attempts at feet, wonky horses, perspectives gone awry.

Poster review

Happy new year! You’re probably sick of end-of-year lists now, but here’s my movie posters of the year for Creative Review; featuring a bevy of butt plugs, celebrity slappings and Blanchettian jawlines. Hard to pick one favourite, but I find myself lingering on Intermission’s simple but incredibly executed poster for The Stranger every time. There are omissions that will displease, but hey, I discovered four whole films I didn’t even know existed while researching this post, so I’m rather pleased with the final selection.

MoMA

Can’t resist a good institutional archive, and MoMA’s Exhibition Spelunker is a rather nice place to lose a couple of hours. Discover curators, arrangers, designers, artists and others who've created exhibitions since the gallery opened in 1929.

The Bear

We’ve just finished watching The Bear on Disney+. Perfect. An absoutely perfect show from beginning to end. The intensity, heart and humour of it (not to mention the location) reminds me of early ER – which is quite something for a show that is essentially about people making sandwiches. And the soundtrack! Wilco, Pearl Jam, REM, Radiohead, Genesis, LCD Soundsystem, and a goosebump-inducing montage set to Sufjan Stevens’s Chicago.

Ezra Furman and other adventures

Popped down to London last week, primarily to see Ezra Furman at the Camden Roundhouse. She was incredible. All the songs I love, played with soul and rage and love. Plus I firmly believe all gigs should feature one cover – no more, no less – and her version of Because the Night was sensational. One of the best shows of my life, up there with PJ Harvey at Somerset House and That Time Dina Carroll Definitely Made Prolonged Eye Contact With Me At Wembley Arena While Singing Don’t Be A Stranger.

Also managed to squeeze in all sorts of extra-gigular activities while I was there. If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s squeezing the most out of a topped-up Oyster card:

  • Stuffing a random paperback from my tsundoku pile into my overnight bag, I finally got around to starting Stephen King’s On Writing on the train down. Part memoir, part lesson; I don’t want it to end. If you write, read this.

  • The Chris Killip retrospective at The Photographers’ Gallery blew me away. A black and white journey through the industrial landscape and inhabitants of 70s/80s Northern England; it’s so good seeing these images off-screen and in all their printly glory. Massively recommended – it runs until 19th of February, do catch it if you can. And if you can’t, the mammoth book version of the exhibition is rather nice.

  • Loitering in the gallery shop (one of my favourite pastimes) with physical media still on my mind, I kept coming back to the new Polaroid Now+. Sure, it’s some way from the beauty of the collapsible SX-70, but it’s still satisfyingly real. The addition of app-enabled manual controls lifts it above a mere point-and-shoot. Might have a word with Santa.

  • After some getting lost in the shifting Dark City streets of Soho, I managed to find Gosh! Comics and laid down my pocket money for the rather splendid first issues of the new Secret Invasion and Fantastic Four runs. Both written by Ryan North – after bingeing my way through The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl earlier this year, I will gladly gobble up anything he puts his name to. Which reminds me, I really must learn how to take over the world.

  • Still clinging to that teenage notion that going to the cinema in the West End is the very height of glamour, I popped into Picturehouse Central to see The Banshees of Inisherin. I have mixed feelings about Martin McDonagh’s Three Billboards … but this was just beautiful. Everyone in it is great, but if Jenny the donkey doesn’t win an Oscar, there’s something profoundly wrong with this universe.

Sarah Wasley

Granta’s Production and Design Director, Sarah Wasley, talks to The Flip about knowing your own limitations, balancing caring with her career and her experience of adjusting her working conditions to fit around her life.

Professionally, as a department of one, I have to be honest about what I can take on or what I need to function because I want to still have a life outside of work and time for a glass of wine now and again. It can't be a grind; it just can't be. Otherwise, what's the point? Good work–life balance is very, very important. Life on the outside has to be as nourishing and fulfilling as the jobs that we’re doing – because that’s why we’re working, isn’t it? To be able to have a life we enjoy.

McMansion Hell

Oh you’re something of an architecture enthusiast? Do you know your ahoy there from your lawyer foyer? I woke up my slumbering child by loudly snort-laughing to Kate Wagner’s McMansion Hell review of bonkers facades from the DC suburbs.

Choir

Not sure how to spend that spare couple of grand just sitting there unloved in your bank account? Clear some festive shelf space for the Teenage Engineering Choir! Or, you know, just visit their website and have a play for free.

Violent Cop

Not sure who the designer is, but I’m loving the bold simplicity of this 1989 poster for Takeshi Kitano’s Violent Cop. No violence, no action, just an expressionless (yet menacing) portrait of Kitano. Visually it’s strong, but it’s the type that really impresses – contrast reversed, fully justified text, no massive gaps and presumably no jarring line breaks in the credits. That’s hard.

Dolf Kruger

Given how often I find myself muttering it while perusing the internet, I’m starting to think “it looks like something out of a Simon Stålenhag book” should be my official motto. For example, there’s plenty you could say about this 1957 Dolf Kruger photograph of the Brussels Atomium under construction but dammit … it looks like something out of a Simon Stålenhag book.

Reagan Ray

Expect to lose your afternoon perusing Reagan Ray’s various logo collections, including those for airlines, record labels, railways, VHS distributors and eighties action figures.

How old-school writing tools will boost your creativity, concentration and speed. Totally related to this. I spend far too much time succumbing to the “freedom” of the computer; copying and pasting and shuffling things around, rather than actually writing. I can’t remember the last time I started something at the beginning and then wrote a linear progression of thoughts until I reached the end. I spiral around a subject, my thoughts unable to … sorry, you’re basically just reading me talk myself into going typewriter shopping now.

Milton Glaser

“Not having anything to do sounds terrible. I fear that more than anything else. It’s greater than the fear of death.” Anne Quito interviews the still very busy design legend Milton Glaser on his ninetieth birthday.

Love & Friendship

Last week I finally watched Whit Stillman’s 2016 film Love & Friendship (based, a tad confusingly, on Jane Austen's Lady Susan rather than Love & Friendship) and my word it is rather good – and funny. Kate Beckinsale is particularly glorious. So anyway, I showed my appreciation by designing a poster for it. As you do.

OutHorse

There are simply no words to describe how much I love everything about Iceland’s innovative new OutHorse Your Email service. How have I still never visited this absurd, wonderful country?