Is this thing on?
Diving into Chilean culture, art, and lady killers with a side of empanadas this Scorpio season!
Remember me? I have returned to the wilds of freelancing and my more natural feral state — made more feral by the fact that we’re now officially in Scorpio season.
This still isn’t a real deal newsletter. (I’m not that organized.) But here go some notes on Chile, art, lady killers, cowboys, design, PST and empanadas.
[P.S. If for some reason you receive two copies of this newsletter, my apologies. 🙏🏽 I’ve had some technical difficulties.]
CLEAN.
I spent the late summer/early fall plunging into the work of Chilean writer Alia Trabucco Zerán and reviewed her latest novel “Clean,” for the Atlantic. The book had me by the throat from page one. But I was just as intrigued by an older work of hers, “When Women Kill,” a series of four essays about scandalous murders committed by women in Chile during the 20th century — and the ways the suspects and their gender were judged both by the legal system and the Chilean public.
Particularly intriguing was the case of María Carolina Geel, a novelist who shot her lover in the fancy Hotel Crillón in downtown Santiago — which echoed the case of another novelist, María Luis Bombal, who shot her lover at that same hotel (which, incidentally, was where my parents celebrated their wedding after my grandfather paid off a judge to marry them — long story). Chilean director Maite Alberdi has a new movie on Netflix very loosely inspired by the Geel case called “In Her Place.”
It’s a good trip down the rabbit hole of lady rage.
CHILE.
I’ve been spending my time otherwise working on a book proposal about Chile. My focus is on culture in the country during the democratic transition of the early 1990s, in the wake of the Pinochet regime — when I happened to be living there. The stories I’ve turned up! Guerilla street actions, silent theater, dance, music and the unlikely historical significance of Rod Stewart.
Above all, I turned up a staggeringly wonderful book/catalog by Leslie Fernández, Carolina Lara and Gonzalo Medina called “Concepción, Te De Vuelvo Tu Imagen,” that tracks the history of art and the art school in the southern city of Concepción. They also chronicle the many actions undertaken by artists during the dictatorship. I spend a lot of time griping about terrible catalogs. But this is the opposite. Very acessible, lovingly put together, a comprehensive history of a time and place. It also, blessedly, focuses on a city other than Santiago, Chile’s capital, which tends to suck all the air out of the room. If you are a curator or scholar who spends time dwelling on South American culture, highly recommend.
Find it here.
PST.
I’ve seen about two dozen of the 70+ shows (WHEW) of the Getty-funded Pacfic Standard Time — and reviewed the Hammer Museum’s exhibition for Alta. I’m working on a bigger piece for Alta about Pacific Standard Time, so more to come. But I wanted to offer a quick comment on the Cai Guo-Qiang fireworks piece at the Coliseum in September.
Freaking out all of Exposition Park with fireworks that detonated in the cadence of a machine gun — and injuring spectators in the process — is nuts. And I’m just going to roll my eyes at the part that was all about AI.
But…
As someone who spent the summer thinking about how the Chilean military used stadiums as detention and torture centers, there was a darkness to the piece that I found compelling. At Cai’s event, we were herded onto the field as fireworks detonated in the stands and overhead. I ran into a friend from Argentina, who exclaimed, “This is like all the stories I hear about la dictadura.” The spectacle filled me with a sensation of powerlessness I haven’t stopped thinking about since.
PODCAST.
The lovely Sky Gooden over at Momus had me on the Momus podcast to talk about writing and art and Benjamin Labatut. I had too much cold brew that day, in case you’re wondering why I sound so amped.
EXTRAS.
As I reemerge from hibernation, I’ve also worked on a few other things, including stories about:
The best Chilean empanadas in L.A. for L.A. Taco.
A piece that looks at the hybrid roots of the modern cowboy tied to the exhibition “Cowboy” (now on view in Fort Worth), for the New York Review of Books.
The irritating ways MoMA frames Latin American culture in Curbed.
Jenny Nicholson’s very long YouTube video about the Star Wars Hotel for Fresh Air.
RANDOM CLICKS.
I really dug Ed Park’s trippy historical novel “Same Bed Different Dreams,” which introduced me to the existence of a terrible-sounding film called “Inchon” that was financed by the Moonies. Adding to the watch list.
This essay on Tom of Finland by Jarett Earnest gets into the artist’s fascist aesthetics.
Rosten Woo’s insightful report on how Meztli Projects helped guide community discussion around a controversial mural in Santa Monica is a must-read.
I’m honoring Gary Indiana (RIP), by re-reading this incredibly scathing review.
Thank you for reading. Be back soon.
Love what you're writing, love what you read and see. So thanks for the newsletter!
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