documenta 14 is not owned by anyone in particular. It is shared among its visitors and artists, readers and writers, as well as all those whose work made it happen.…
The makeshift refugee camp in Calais, in the vicinity of the French port and hulking concrete bunkers, was known as the Jungle. According to different estimates, it gave shelter to nine or ten thousand…
Somewhere in London, October 2016: The Queen was having friends over for dinner. The selected host of a welcoming house, she stood by the door, greeting each of her guests. The Queen loved rituals. She…
I visited photographer John Miller’s studio in 2015, on the recommendation of friends and colleagues who reside in New Zealand. I had just met with art writer Jon Bywater in Auckland, who confirmed the…
In a prelude to Athenian industrialization, the silk company of Athanassios Douroutis defined the working-class neighborhood of Metaxourgeio (which means “silk factory”) and gave the central square…
At documenta 14 in Athens, Douglas Gordon chose the open-air movie theater Stella for the presentation of I had nowhere to go (2016), his cinematic portrait of the avant-garde filmer Jonas Mekas, thus…
The entwined edifice of history, the archive, and the written word have long been the subject of critique within Western theory. However, what might yet be learned from turning our attention to traditions…
Directed by the Mauritanian Abderrahmane Sissako and set in the capital of Mali, Bamako examines the links between global economic policies and everyday life. It follows a singer and her unemployed husband. In the yard of the house they share with other families, a court is in session. On trial are the global institutions accused of impoverishing Africa…
I translated this Bengali short story into English as much for the sake of its villain, Senanayak, as for its title character, Draupadi (or Dopdi). Because in Senanayak I find the closest approximation…
The arcades begin on the left and, through a foreshortened perspective, run almost to the horizon. Ten round arches can be discerned. Above nine of them are rectangular windows; a tenth, located on the…
