back outside | go touch gr– some art with friends
The benefits of engaging with art are numerous. Chief among them is the fruitfulness of art inspired conversations with friends and peers.
Happy New Year. It’s been a while. First things first I would like to thank all my paid subscribers for your continued support in this barren time. You’ve enabled me to deepen my photographic practice and I’m very grateful.
What you have given out will not return to you empty. I’m thinking through some options and I’ll be getting back to you soon.
I was gone for a minute but I’m back outside now. Well, as outside as one can be when referring to an online blog. On my auspicious return I will be speaking about art and the richness that comes from communal participation.
seeing plays on my jack jones
Recently I’ve been going to see some plays by myself. I want to go to the theatre more this year which means being willing to go alone. I can’t always find a theatre buddy but I’ve decided not to let that stop me.
I kinda like it. I like that I’m seeing more plays. I like that I’m comfortable going out and spending time in my own company doing things I enjoy. It’s to easy to stay at home and be occupied by something on a screen.
There’s also a purity of experience going alone. I can go in and just watch the show. I don’t have someone sitting next to me asking questions or making comments I only half want to respond to.
That said it’s not all upside. I do miss the lack of conversation. Maybe I don’t need someone nattering in my ear during the show but I definitely want that during the interval and afterwards. I want to talk about what I’m watching, whether it’s good bad or ugly.
When I go alone I have thoughts but they don’t go anywhere. They stay in my head and slowly atrophy from a lack of being expressed. I long for a space to share my thoughts on the things I see. Maybe I should start a Substack. Wink wink.
I don’t just want to share my thoughts, I want them to be challenged. I want my thoughts to interact with other peoples thoughts. When the only perspective you leave with is your own it ends up feeling a bit sparse. Thoughts are great and all but it’s all about the conversations they start really.
it’s a… well it’s like a… it’s a film innit
Last Sunday I channelled some youthful spontaneity and followed some friends to a film screening. It was a Sunday night, post church, post football at the pub and I was trying to go home and sleep. The pub experience had been an unsuccessful hate watch so I was really trying to get out of there.
But the event description moved me. They had me at “immersive journey” and “the fictionalized figures of W. E. B Du Bois and Marcus Garvey." I was intrigue, so I hopped on a bus with my friends.
We stopped off for some snacks and popcorn because we’re bad patrons. Then we headed to The Underground Cinema. The film we went to see was BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions at 180 Studios.
BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions is subversive in structure and format. The type of film it is less relevant than the experience you have watching it. You are told fairly early on not to worry about whether this is “a documentary or fake-doc” that doesn’t matter “it’s just film.”
As you sit in the cinema on these deep cushioned seats with shallow backs that are more like benches, many things jump out at you. Whilst I was watching BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions having many thoughts, I remember thinking “you better remember all this.”
I knew I would remember how the film made me feel. I wasn’t sure all the thoughts sparking in my head wouldn’t combust and burn away. They weren’t going to atrophy but maybe they were moving too much.
The film ended and we watched the credits. It’s humbling to see what goes into a film. The description attributes credit for the film to Khalil Joseph. He’s the director.
This practice is functional but also inadequate for a medium that is so obviously collaborative. Credits are a part of the film for a reason and I think it’s good practice to watch them in our ever individualistic world.
I’m loathe to attempt a synopsis of this project. As I seek to tie it down for your sake please be gracious when you see it and recognise I didn’t do a great job. Yes, go see it please. It’s on at 180 Studios for the rest of the month.
The film fictionalises W. E. B. Du Bois and his Africana Encyclopaedia project. We follow figures from Marcus Garvey to Wole Soyinka.
We are introduced to Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, mother of Fela Kuti, grand aunt to Wole Soyinka who passed on the lessons that were passed on to her. Lessons from a formerly captured slave. One of few who got to make the journey back home across Atlantic waters.
All of this history and unreality is loosely tied into a narrative of a ship sailing on the water, above the water, in the sky? “Do you remember the future?” Honestly I’m loathe to describe it. Go watch the film.
If you got this far then you’re pretty hooked. Share it with someone, that person who just popped into your head!
debriefing over sacrilegious half pints
We headed to a very cute little pub in Temple called The Edgar Wallace. A gracious bartender who definitely wanted to lock up early indulged us till closing.
We ordered half pints of cider and Guinness then proceeded with our debrief. We talked. Our conversation sprawled and contracted over the themes of the film and beyond.
Topics of conversation included but were not limited to the following; Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah, the cockroach like persistence of imperialism and colonialism, problematic professions of love and how “I love you because of how you love me” is a red flag, the difficulties of professing and presenting Jesus in certain spaces when Christianity is so marred by a history of imperialistic conquest, and memes we talked about memes.
This kind of conversation is an example of why participating in art as a communal act can be so rich. Despite the individualism of our age. Despite the constant denigration and destruction of entire communities by our governments and political systems, we are social beings.
We rarely accomplish joy as an individual act. Growth can often require solitude and even growth doesn’t happen alone.
My experience of BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions was magnified ten fold because I watched it with people then sat in conversation afterwards. There is a tangible relationship I have with this film now I’ve been unable to achieve attending theatre solo.
I also find conversation reveals connections you might not make alone.
Start a conversation.
what killmonger said the remix
There’s a spectacular scene of a woman waking in a bed. At first she’s in focus and her background is a neutral blur, then the focus shifts and the view behind her becomes clear.
We sea beautiful ocean waters before a fully risen sun. The cinematography is stunning. Whoever was focus pulling on that shot is a wavy guy. Shout out to Bradford Young, who was the DoP.
The flurry of scenes preceding this one had been about slaves thrown into the ocean during the Middle Passage crossing the Atlantic. It was a telling of how their bodies would likely have been mostly consumed before they reached the bottom of the ocean.
It speaks to what that means. How those slaves still exist in the ocean today because of the life cycle of the fish and plankton that fed on them.
As I was speaking to my friends I was able to see a connection I hadn’t previously. I was able to connect the woman waking in the beauty of the ocean with the implication of her ancestors still being alive in the ocean.
The image was an astounding metaphor for rising amongst your ancestors. It explained why that scene felt so overwhelming in the watching. I felt it but didn’t see it consciously at the time, conversation gave me that.
I recommend BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions. I recommend you see it with people. I recommend you debrief with those people afterwards. I recommend you go experience some art. Go with some people. One, two people or you and a gang of your bredrins. There is so much to be gained if we can reclaim art as a communal act.
There is much to be gained if we can be stirred to action, change, growth, love, and indignation. Even more to be gained if that stirring can occur in unison.