POLITICS

CECILIE GRAVESEN RUTH HÖFLICH SARA KNOWLAND FERNAND LÉGER MARIA ZAHLE

Yesterday I had a conversation with a friend of mine who is considering calling himself a painter rather than an artist. He feels that societal expectations and responsibilities have become too central to the ‘job’. He wants to make paintings, think about paintings, look at paintings.

And

This made me remember certain crits at art school where I was asked to talk about strategies for my artistic practice, and to take responsibility for the artwork I was showing. It really pissed me off.

And

Looking at the press release from a current Tate show the adjectives leap off the page and into your face: proud great first full- scale momentous definitive enduring renowned signature hand-painted key monumental noteworthy signature rich expansive wide previously unseen extraordinary visual intellectual.

And

In EM Forster’s short story Other Kingdom two kinds of evil unfold: one active, another passive. Mr Worters bullies his sweet fiancée into letting him lay down an asphalt path through her wild garden. And the private tutor, our helpless narrator, lets Worters pursue unnecessary revenge against a beloved student, complicit in the wronging of the good by the bad.

And

Citizen Advice Bureaux across the country are from this month facing up to 50% loss of their government funding for legal aid. Even before these cuts have started to take effect people are regularly being turned away at the door due to insufficient staff and resources. CAB has for years been a point of call for millions of people in need of advice on issues like unmanageable debt and complex benefit appeals.

And

In the winter of 1979-80, tucked comfortably in a sling on his chest, I attended an anti-nuclear meeting with my father. A photograph of us was published on the front page of a Danish national newspaper the next day, with political posters visible in the background. That morning my father’s sister called in a fit: how could he have let my left ear slip out of the hat, so brutally exposed to the elements?

– Maria Zahle