Aesthetic Arrest: Weekly Cultural Highlights 5/6/22
“The aesthetic experience is a simple beholding of the object . . . you experience a radiance. You are held in aesthetic arrest.” - Joseph Campbell
Aesthetic Arrest is our weekly dip into the Epicurean pleasures we’ve been enjoying lately. Here we go!
Ryan Wildstar’s Recommendations:
Reading: This week, I’m reading The Sentence by Pulitzer winning author Louise Erdrich. It started off slow but then turned into a masterful first-person telling of an Ojibwe woman’s story of incarceration and then release from prison to work at a haunted Native American book store in Minnesota. The writing is exquisite and although I’m only about a ¼ of the way in, I’m completely hooked.
Listening: This week I’ve been listening to the inimitable Judy Henske catalogue since her death just a little over a week ago at the age of 85. Once given the title, “Queen of the Beatniks,” she was a pioneer of the folk scene in America and her husky, lush, booming voice made her an inspiration for the likes of Grace Slick and Janis Joplin and many others. If you don’t know her already, check out her original recording of High Flying Bird, her unforgettable version of Wade in the Water (video below) and her psychedelic anthem, Snowblind on the 1969 album Farewell Aldebaran with Jerry Lester.
Looking: Revisiting with absolute exaltation the works of Hieronymus Bosch as I write my forthcoming article, Layover in Madrid, about the The Quincentenary Exhibition of Bosch at the Prado.
Viewing: Having binge-watched the previous 4 seasons, we are finally caught up with season 5 of the brilliant Better Things, from writer, director and producer Pamela Adlon. She’s a genius and the show might be one of the best sitcoms on American TV in recent times. Cannot recommend enough.
Tasting: Ricotta and sheep’s milk kaçkavall cheese enchiladas with homemade red enchilada sauce (with Croatian dark chocolate and Albanian chili powder).
Ryan Elston’s Recommendations:
Reading: This week, I’m reading The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by scholar Stephen Greenblatt, a captivating history about the rediscovery of a long-lost ancient Latin poem, The Nature of Things, by the Epicurean poet and philosopher Lucretius. And how this poem’s Epicurean ideas helped spark the Renaissance and the modern world, influencing authors, thinkers and scientists like Montaigne, Shakespeare, Giordano Bruno, Galileo Galilei, Isaac Newton and Charles Darwin.
Listening: I’ve been listening to a lot of classical music this week, including literally everything by pianist Lara Downes. I especially love her exquisitely beautiful album, Florence Price: Piano Discoveries, dedicated to the recently rediscovered scores of Florence Price, the trailblazing Black woman who just might be my favorite classical composer of all time. [Purchase here.]
Looking: I’ve been enjoying the fierce portraits (paintings, collages and photographs) matched with bold interior design from Mickalene Thomas, the fantastical Afrofuturist bronze creatures sculpted by Wangechi Mutu, and Julie Mehretu’s dynamic, geometric, architectural blasts of color and lines (great video/interview here).
Viewing: This week we finally watched the acclaimed film CODA from last year. Groundbreaking and genuinely moving. For TV, we’ve especially been enjoying Lizzo’s fun new show, Lizzo’s Watch Out For The Big Grrrls! I absolutely adore Lizzo, and her new show is inspiring and fabulous. Her dancers are amazing! And the world needs to see more body-positive shows about talented plus-sized women of color! WERK. #TeamJayla #TeamCharity #TeamArianna
Tasting: In addition to Ryan Wildstar’s amazing cooking (see above, those enchiladas were everything), I’ve been completely obsessed with soul food ever since we watched The Great Soul Food Cook-Off (trailer here) on OWN a couple months ago, preceded by Netflix’s docuseries High on the Hog: How African American Cuisine Transformed America (trailer here). The book which inspired the series, High on the Hog: A Culinary Journey from Africa to America by Jessica B. Harris, is also a great read. I even made two big playlists inspired by soul food cuisine, Soul Food Platter 1 and Soul Food Platter 2. Starting with Bessie Smith’s “Gimme a Pigfoot,” the songs range from Art Blakey’s “Chicken an’ Dumplins” and Lee Morgan’s “Cornbread,” to Cecil Payne’s “Ham Hocks,” Odetta’s “Sweet Potatoes” and Little Richard’s “Rice, Red Beans and Turnip Greens.” The playlist ends with my personal favorite soul food dish, “Mac N Cheese” (song by Robert Glasper and Derrick Hodge).
That’s it for this week! What are your reading, listening, looking, viewing and/or tasting recommendations?
I want those enchiladas! And yes, allll about Lizzo’s show. Groundbreaking in the way she cared for her cast of ladies, ushering them through a deep and fast-paced self exploration to claim their spot. Going to have to listen to Judy Henske while I flip open the Swerve.