“Maps of Jerusalem show the Old City divided into four: top left Christian Quarter, top right Muslim Quarter, bottom left Armenian Quarter and bottom center Jewish Quarter. Such neat divisions. Nearly all modern maps do this. Many are even color coded, with blocks of shading for each quarter and precise borders marking frontiers from one quarter to the next. But it’s no surprise to learn that in reality no city functions like this. The busiest of Jerusalem’s lanes is Suq Khan al-Zeit. ...”
Can Ukraine hold Russia accountable for environmental crimes?
“As forensic investigators in Ukraine uncover evidence of killings that may amount to war crimes, experts of a different kind are at work to document the effect of Russia’s war on the environment.Ukraine’s ministry in charge of environmental protection said in a briefing last month that destroyed military equipment and ammunition, as well as exploded missiles and air bombs, pollute the soil and groundwater with chemicals, including heavy metals. Nickolai Denisov, deputy director of the Geneva-based Zoï Environmental Network, is part of a team mapping incidents of war-related damage or disruption. By the end of April, the group had reported 3,300 incidents in some 600 settlements, including cities, towns and villages. ...”
A local resident stands next to unexploded mortar shells left during Russia's invasion, in the village of Yahidne, Ukraine, on April 20. While there is little published research on contamination from munitions, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations says the First and Second World Wars have left soils in some parts of Europe contaminated for decades.
Richard Thompson :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
“You’d have to imagine that Werner Herzog is not a man who is easily impressed. But there’s a moment in In The Edges, Erik Nelson’s short film documenting the sessions for the Grizzly Man soundtrack, where the legendary filmmaker seems positively overcome. As Richard Thompson improvises a dark, shimmering elegy on electric guitar, Herzog, seated nearby, appears to blink away tears, smiling in rapture. Music From Grizzly Man, which is receiving a handsome reissue this week from No Quarter records, is full of similarly stunning moments. ...”
2011 July: Shoot Out the Lights - Richard and Linda Thompson, 2012 February: I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight, 2014 March: Videowest 81, 2015 October: Richard & Linda Thompson - Rafferty's Folly (1980), 2015 December: Rumor and Sigh (1991), 2016 March: Hand of Kindness (1983), 2018 December: You? Me? Us? (1996), 2019 July: Across a Crowded Room—Live at Barrymore’s 1985, 2020 July: Bloody Noses (EP 2020)
Daou ~ Sanctuary
“The idea of sanctuary is inviting: a place of safety, where no harm will come; a welcoming nation for refugees; a place of worship, free from the outside world. In Georges Daou‘s album of the same name, sanctuary refers to an escape from the pressures of society, technology and the daily grind, although the journey there is hard-won, fraught with rumination and regret. The tape loops contain this feeling of looking back, repeating old thoughts and problems, wishing that things could have been different. ...”
A Mini-Russia Gets Squeezed by War
“TIRASPOL, TRANSNISTRIA — At the Back in the U.S.S.R. cafe, it is like the Soviet Union never collapsed.Busts of Lenin greet visitors at the door. Red hammer and sickle flags hang on the wall. Huge plastic Soviet-era telephones sit on the tables, next to bowls of traditional borscht and lumps of Stolichnaya potato salad. This cafe and the whole Transnistria region, a Russia-supported breakaway republic wedged between Moldova and Ukraine, feels like a Soviet-themed vintage shop. The cafe may be intentionally kitschy, but still, it speaks to a real nostalgia for a long-gone era and a deep appreciation for Russia. ...”
The Crying of Lot 49 – Thomas Pynchon (1966)
“The Crying of Lot 49 is a 1966 novel by American author Thomas Pynchon. The shortest of Pynchon’s novels, the plot follows Oedipa Maas, a young Californian woman who begins to embrace a conspiracy theory as she possibly unearths a centuries-old feud between two mail distribution companies; one of these companies, Thurn and Taxis, actually existed (1806–1867) and was the first private firm to distribute postal mail. Like most of Pynchon’s output, Lot 49 is often described as postmodernist literature. ...”
A Peterson Field Guide To Wildflowers: Northeastern and North-central North America - Roger Tory Peterson
“Find what you're looking for with Peterson Field Guides—their field-tested visual identification system is designed to help you differentiate thousands of unique species accurately every time. Grouped by color and by plant characteristics, 1,293 species in 84 families are described and illustrated. Included here are all the flowers you're most likely to encounter in the eastern and north-central U.S., westward to the Dakotas and southward to North Carolina and Arkansas, as well as the adjacent parts of Canada. ...”
Ukraine: The spy war within the war
“The decades-long spy conflict between Russia and the West is intensifying over the Ukraine war. But what are Russia's intelligence services suspected of doing and how will their officials' expulsion from capitals affect Putin's clandestine overseas operations? When Russia first targeted its military forces on Ukraine in 2014 it also unleashed its intelligence services on the West - from interfering with the US elections using cyber attacks to poisonings and sabotage in Europe. But in recent months the spy war has intensified as Western countries have sought to hit back and inflict lasting damage on the ability of Russian intelligence to carry out covert operations. ...”
World Soccer June 2022
“Our countdown to the 2022 World Cup continues in this issue as we preview the remaining European, Asian and inter-confederational play-offs to determine the final three qualifiers for Qatar. Three players already with their eyes on the World Cup are this issue’s cover stars – Netherlands hot-shot Cody Gakpo, Portugal forward Diogo Jota and United States wonderkid Brenden Aaronson – and we shine the spotlight on the talented trio who are all having terrific seasons for their clubs. The Ukraine conflict continues to cast its shadow, but countries around the world persist in showing their support for the war-torn nation. ...”
Peter Rehberg (1968–2021)
“In 1995, I received a fax from Peter Rehberg stating that Mego, the label he co-ran, wanted to work with me. It was the start of a twenty-six-year relationship that ended with the album I released this year. To reflect on the late artist, who performed as Pita, one might start with his work there. Mego’s first release, General Magic and Pita’s 1995 ‘Fridge Trax,’ is a twelve-inch record that features four pieces constructed using recordings of refrigerators. For decades of avant-gardists, utilizing found sounds evoked musique concrète, but in nonacademic electronic music, at the intersection of techno, house, and ambient where many early Mego releases staked their claim, the staging of such mundane sounds marked a distinct otherness, a new vocabulary. ...”
Ukraine decimated Russian forces trying to cross a river in the east, Britain’s defense ministry says
“The British defense ministry on Friday said satellite imagery has confirmed that Ukrainian forces decimated a Russian battalion as it tried to cross a series of pontoon bridges over a river in northeast Ukraine earlier this week, a dramatic setback for Russian forces already struggling to make significant progress along the eastern front.While it was not clear how many soldiers were killed trying to cross the Seversky Donets River, the numbers of burned-out and destroyed vehicles scattered along the riverside suggested that Russian forces suffered heavy losses. ...”
Meet the New Old Book Collectors
“Late last month, during the New York International Antiquarian Book Fair at the Park Avenue Armory, Rebecca Romney withdrew a copy of ‘Howl, Kaddish, and Other Poems,’ by Allen Ginsberg from her booth’s display case. She did so not to recite from its pages but to show off the writing in the margins. Amy Winehouse had puzzled out lyrics to an unrecorded song alongside Ginsberg’s lines. ..;. The Ginsberg text is the centerpiece of Ms. Winehouse’s 220-book collection, which Ms. Romney’s company, Type Punch Matrix, near Washington, D.C., is in talks to sell as a unit for $135,000. ...”
Thoreau and the Language of Trees - Richard Higgins (2017)
2020 April: Henry David Thoreau - I, 2020 May: This Ever New Self: Thoreau and His Journal - II, 2022 January: Emerson and Thoreau’s Fanatical Freedom, 2022 March: Using Thoreau’s Notebooks to Understand Climate Change
These Dancers Escaped the War. Their Journeys Are Just Beginning.
“AMSTERDAM — Kate Myklukha pushed herself up onto the tip of her left foot, then stretched her arms out in front of her as if hugging a tree.As a pianist at the Dutch National Ballet here played a jaunty tune, several of Myklukha’s classmates wobbled from side to side, struggling to hold the delicate pose. But Myklukha held her balance, then spun around and dipped into a knee bend, before gracefully waving an arm skyward.During that short sequence last month, Myklukha, 17, looked as if she had been a member of the ballet’s junior company for years. Yet, she had arrived in Amsterdam only two and a half weeks before, having escaped the war in Ukraine. ...”
Flight Paths - Omar El Akkad
Wire Reveal Official Release Of Old Bootleg, 'Not About To Die'
2009 January: Wire, 2012 January: On the Box 1979, 2013 September: Chairs Missing (1978), 2014 June: 154 (1979), 2014 July: Document And Eyewitness (1979-1980), 2015 April: The Ideal Copies: Graham Lewis Of Wire's Favourite Albums, 2015 July: Pink Flag (1977), 2015 December: The Peel Sessions Album (1989), “Dot Dash”, "Options R" (1978), 2017 June: Outdoor Miner / Practice Makes Perfect (1979), 2017 November: Live at the Roxy, London, 2018 June: Wire at Maxwell's (06-12-1987), 2021 May: 60 minutes of music that sum up art-punk pioneers Wire
Once Best Friends, Bulgaria Takes a Stand Against Russia
“SHIPKA, Bulgaria — A week after Russia invaded Ukraine, Moscow’s ambassador to Bulgaria climbed a snowy mountain pass to honor czarist-era Russian soldiers who died there fighting for Bulgarian independence in the 19th century. Present day concerns, however, quickly eclipsed the effort to remind Bulgaria of the debt it owed Russia. That same day, Bulgaria expelled two of the ambassador’s underlings for espionage and announced the arrest of a senior military officer on charges of spying for Russia. ...”
Rainer Ganahl
Syrian Cassette Archives
I Spent Weeks on Ukraine’s Front Lines. Everything Has Changed.
“First the whiz and then the explosion a second later. One after another. One after another. I was hiding in an underground dugout — it would be difficult to call it a bunker: no solid entrance door, no proper stash of food and water. The walls were wooden and there were two sort-of beds, a couple of rugs and some wooden chairs. The place was untidy with phone chargers and military clothing — helmets, flak jackets. There were a few cookies and some chocolate bars. Home for Ukrainian soldiers on the front line. ...”
Witness a Total Lunar Eclipse on Sunday, May 15–16
Locus Solus (journal)
Ukrainians unearth horrors near Kyiv, a month after Russian retreat
“KOLONSHCHYNA, Ukraine — It wasn’t relief or calm that washed over the constellation of towns and villages west of Kyiv when the Russians withdrew after their monthlong occupation. It was horror and unnerving silence. Residents emerged from their cellars to discover their neighborhoods flattened and bodies dotting the streets. They cautiously inspected what was left and began searching for those who were lost. Vira Tyshchenko spent weeks poring over thousands of images of mutilated corpses, bloody clothing and personal items. She thought that among the remains and detritus she might recognize her younger brother or at least something that belonged to him. But she also hoped to find nothing at all, because she wanted to believe he was somehow still alive. ...”
Guardian: Italy launches inquiry into Kremlin disinformation
A Messy Table, a Map of the World
The amazing survival story of the last 3 single-family row houses on Central Park West
On the Night Bus to Kyiv
“Kyiv, Ukraine—After Russian attacks targeted infrastructure all across Ukraine earlier this week, damaging critical rail lines in the western part of the country, a bus bound for Kyiv was full when it departed from Warsaw an hour before midnight on Wednesday. With the more popular trains suffering cancellations and delays as long as 11 hours, and fuel shortages making personal car travel dicey, the bus emerged as perhaps the best way to get to Ukraine from the west. A crowd of about a hundred people formed at the platforms at Warsaw West station late Wednesday night, many destined for Lviv, Kyiv, or further east. ...”
Paris France - Gertrude Stein (1940)
2007 November: Gertrude Stein, 2011 July: The making of "Tender Buttons", 2012 March: The Steins Collect, 2012 May: Gertrude Stein's War Years: Setting the record straight, 2014 November: Lost Generation, 2015 January: The Making of an American by Edward White, 2020 December: Tender Buttons (1914), 2022 February: No no no, nonsense, never...
Hard to Be a God - Aleksei German (2013)
Ukrainian tractors vs. Russian tanks: The hundred-year history behind the meme
“Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, news outlets and social media have captured the magnitude of the destruction: Cities like Kharkiv, Kyiv, Mariupol, Chernihiv and Kherson surrounded by Russian tanks; shelling; children taking shelter in subway stations with relatives’ phone numbers written on their skin. But occasionally there have been more hopeful images, like those of the Ukrainian popular resistance. In the country’s small towns and villages, farmers driving humble tractors have hauled away Russian tanks. These photos and videos symbolize a popular narrative of Ukrainian heroes defending their homeland, risking their lives for the democratic world. In this narrative, farmers and, by extension, civilians, are not merely powerless victims of Russian aggression; they are people who just want to lead normal lives and are determined to fight back. ...”
America Is Not Ready for the End of Roe v. Wade
“Imagine that every state were free to choose whether to allow Black people and white people to marry. Some states would permit such marriages; others probably wouldn’t. The laws would be a mishmash, and interracial couples would suffer, legally consigned to second-class status depending on where they lived.It seems an unthinkable scenario in 2022. That’s because in 1967 the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that barring interracial marriage, as 16 states still did, violates the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection. ...”
Painter's Spring - William Parker Trio (2000)
2022 January: A Guide to William Parker, 2022 February: Raining On The Moon – Corn Meal Dance (2007), 2022 March: William Parker Quartets: Meditation / Resurrection (2017)