Fuzzy Needle Friday Newsletter: Recommendations for the ideal public
Greetings Fuzzy Needle friends!
Let’s all take a minute to watch this.
That’s a new music video from our friend John Andrews, who graced the shop stage last year during his tour. I believe I’ve written about him before in this newsletter — he’s a multi-instrumental musician, but also a painter who animates his own visuals, which he typically runs on a projector screen during his performances. Very cool stuff.
I’ve been thinking a lot about multi-talented artists this week. On Tuesday, I watched this old NBC interview with Marcel Duchamp, who was a painter, sculptor, filmmaker, inventor, and, for the last 25 years of his life, a celebrated chess player.
Duchamp fundamentally transformed the public’s understanding of what art could be and what art could do. He enraged artists and critics alike with Nude Descending a Staircase and his “readymades” (urinals, bicycle wheels, etc.) I started the interview expecting someone slightly haughty and highbrow; instead, you see a man tinkering in his workshop, showing you the strange little objects he’s made, the “portable museum” with miniatures of his most well known works. It’s very charming.
There’s a moment — and I encourage y’all to watch the full interview yourselves, if you find the time — where he touches on the difference between creating art for the current public and creating art for the ideal public… meaning, a public that seeks to understand and engage with your work. It seems strange to view it as a civic duty, but I think it’s true that being receptive of and flexible with art often translates to maintenance of the political/moral virtues we’re always worrying about (truth, justice, beauty, yada yada.)
But you can also just get into art because it’s fun and interesting. And because tinkering with different media and different forms of art is fun and interesting.
Here are some of the most fun and interesting things in our store right now…
Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair - Pablo Neruda
I think it’s unbelievable that he wrote this at the age of 19, and yet it’s true. A wild, unvarnished portrait of love and its ravages.
Secret Love - Dry Cleaning
Hit my head allllll day. I was heartbroken to learn they canceled their show at the Orange Peel (that was gonna have YHWH Nailgun as the opener no less.) The new album is still great though.
Make Trouble - John Waters
In 2015, John Waters gave the commencement address at Rhode Island School of Design. Like everything he does, his remarks were zany and transgressive — and two years later, they became the basis for Make Trouble, a little volume chock-full of good advice and silly drawings.
Agostino - Alberto Moravia
Moravia wrote this book when Italy was still under the grip of Fascist rule, and the country’s censors at the time were not at all enthused by his portrait of a young boy’s frustrating coming-of-age in the Tuscan countryside. But time was on his side — the book was finally published in 1944 to widespread critical acclaim. We have its English translation at the shop.
Collected Fictions - Jose Luis Borges
I’m working through this and Covert Joys, a collection of short stories by the Brazilian visionary Clarice Lispector. The way I’d describe each is Borges is a little like dreams moving like reality, whereas Lispector is reality moving like dreams. Highly recommend this labyrinthine, otherworldly collection.
The Half-Finished Heaven - Tomas Tranströmer
Another Friday, another Scandinavian book recommendation from Nikolai. But Tranströmer really is something special, especially if you’re a fan of spare-but-moving poetry. Here’s a sample.
Nepantla: An Anthology Dedicated to Queer Poets of Color - edited by Christopher Soto
Some heavy hitters in this collection: Audre Lorde, Jericho Brown, Ocean Vuong, June Jordan, Pat Parker (!!) Danez Smith, Donika Kelly, Juliana Huxtable (!!!!), Nikki Giovanni… and those are just the names that jump out to me. A must-read.
Crush - Richard Siken
Are you sick of hearing about poetry yet? Good, because we’ve got Richard Siken’s Crush in the shop. I got a jailbroken copy of this on my Kindle, and I used to read and reread it literally every night from about March 2020 to August 2020. Siken speaks to the crushed in all of us.
Amber - Autechre
This album sounds like laminar flow. One of the coolest IDM records out there.
Trick - Alex G
This album sounds straight-up evil. But also weirdly comforting? Fans of We’re All Going to the World’s Fair understand.
