Fashioning Decline
“It is quite consummate, is it not!” cries the Aesthetic Bridegroom of his new teapot, in a Punch cartoon of 1880. “It is, indeed!” replies his Intense Bride. “Oh, Algernon, let us live up to it!” Let us surround ourselves with beautiful things, and let those selves live up to them. The
Complaints from the Chinese Boudoir
“At daybreak, I pace idly in the courtyard with a silk fan. Cold autumn is at hand, and I know the fan will soon be discarded. A crow flits by and secures its position on the palace roof. The croaking bird is no match for my complexion, smooth as jade. Yet why is it able […]
Rosalía – Motomami – Camaleona
“¿Oye, ya has escuchado el nuevo disco de la Rosalía?” my mother asks, shifting gears. We’re driving home from the Bilbao airport, where I have just arrived for the Easter holidays. After months away, everything looks unfamiliar – the trees, the mountains, even the blue sky seems oddly off
Oscar Wilde and Sally Rooney: Parodying the Political
“Art is individualism, and individualism is a disturbing and disintegrating force. There lies its immense value,” argued Oscar Wilde in his 1891 essay, The Soul of the Man Under Socialism, which advocated a trailblazing vision of social and artistic equality. His libertarian, socialist philosoph
Superficial societies in transgressive fiction
Transgressive fiction isn’t well known for its depictions of decadence. The genre is defined by its focus on behaviour outside accepted moral norms, ranging from sexual impropriety and violence to extreme drug use and addiction. Transgressive fiction arranges elements of different genres, such as
Interview with Rebecca Salter
Lucy Thynne and Deputy Editor Claire Ion spoke to the first female President of the Royal Academy of Arts, Rebecca Salter, during the lockdown of early 2021. In this interview, they chat about keeping galleries afloat during the pandemic, moving to Japan as a young artist and what inspires her famou
On Jean Jones
Centered in Pembroke JCR’s Jean Jones exhibition, disrupting the otherwise conventional gallery layout, is a glass case containing an array of memorabilia. The case is unlabeled, and only a single exhibition leaflet from the 80s clues the viewer into the fact that these are all items from the arti
Mist
i. I say, I come from an island I am touched by salt, separated by straits, embraced by streams of motorcycle engines revving into side streets, the names of which I can no longer read. In Taiwan, we say the sun is going down a mountain when it sets. I have always known the […]