Reading, doing, seeing #7

Well! I have had a busy few weeks since my last RDS  post.
Reading

• Have finished a couple of  Arnaldur Indridason thrillers on my Kindle. Somehow crime in Iceland seems so much more interesting than let's say local or American or British crime ... Anyway, over the last couple of weeks I finished  Arctic Chill, Hypothermia and Voices. 
• I also read (Danish) Lene Kaaberbøl's The Boy in the Suitcase. But not in Danish, obviously. But maybe that is not so obvious. For all you know I could be fluent in Danish. (But I'm not, just to make things clear.) 
• Anyway, I am digressing. On the slightly more serious (but still fictional) side, I greatly enjoyed Ann Patchett's State of Wonder. 
• I recently acquired these two books - the first was an out-of-the-blue (and much appreciated) present from my middle son, and the second was one I had ordered some time ago but had not got around to reading (but have started now).

Oh! William Kentridge, how I adore thee. (No, that is not the title, that is just me. The title is Trace.) A beautiful book published by MoMA.

Ideaspotting by Sam Harrison. Full of pithy quotes and little bits and pieces about thinking creatively. As you will remember (or probably not) "idea" is my Word of the Year. Actually, having ideas is not a problem I have, I have many, many ideas, too many, some would say. It is the willpower and tenacity and focus and skill to carry them out. So I should probably be reading a different book. Or books.

Doing

• I haven't done much new apart from Tai Chi and doing my art MOOC assignments (here and here and here and here and here and here) and going to my printmaking classes.
• I restarted my Profiteri series, ditched the first two prints and made 10 new prints, but I will post about that later this week.
• I have not done this yet, so strictly speaking it does not fall under the heading Doing. But I am starting to think again of making a zine. I wanted to do one a few years ago, and did not get around to it. Hmmmm - I'll let the idea simmer for a bit ... maybe something will happen ...
• I have enrolled for two new MOOCs: the Philosophy of Mathematics (University of Munchen), and Creativity, Innovation and Change (PennState). Yippeee!
• Oh, I made ice cream! Tres yummy and let me just add that I have two sons backing me up on this. An extremely easy recipe - see here. Rich though, so don't eat too much in one sitting. 

Seeing

• Saw The Wilhelm Saayman exhibition (In Season Five Everyone Dies) at Erdmann Contemporary - Bloody hell, but his critters are ugly!! But after reading the artist's statement, (I think) I understand why. 
• Also saw Critics' Choice at the Association of Arts - art critics each chose one work by an artist and explained why they chose it. I found this quite insightful. Great video by Randolph Hartzenberg, by the way.
• I spent a morning at the R.A.T. exhibition at the SA Museum - beautifully curated by Fritha Langerman. One wouldn't think that an exhibition about brown rats (Rattus norvegicus) could be interesting, but there you have it. It was. One is constantly surprised, isn't one?  Of course, it was conceived and executed by an artist, what more can I say? One thing I really liked about it is that it was displayed in odd (and sometimes dark) nooks and crannies in the Museum - quite an exploration it was to find them all. What would have been really great is if there could have been a couple of real rats running over visitors' feet or something, hahaha. But then I wouldn't have enjoyed it as much, I guess ...
• I also went to  the shweshwe exhibition at the Slave Lodge - all about the history of isishweshwe in Africa and South Africa in particular. Gosh, who knew that our shweshwe was brought here as blaudruck cloth by German missionaries? As I said in the bullet point above  ...
• And finally I saw the amazing Bleu Remix by performance artist Yann Marussich (with James Webb providing the sound for this performance).  It made for compelling watching. A bit voyeuristic I suppose - watching obsessively for almost an hour as he oozes blue liquid from his eyes, nostrils, mouth and then later from the pores all over his body. The audience response (and indeed my own) was even more fascinating. See here for an earlier performance.  Adjectives that popped up in my head started out with "grotesque" and "bizarre" but ended up with "moving". Quite weird really. 

Dear friends, have a wonderful week. Go and make some art. But don't ooze blue stuff  - I don't think it is good for you.