This week has been great in many ways, and I have added some interesting material to the AN ART APART site:
First, an essay comparing Coralie Fargeat’s excellent film ”The Substance” (2024) with John Frankenheimer’s ”Seconds” (1966). I talked about ”Seconds” at the University of Copenhagen last fall and then realized it’s basically more or less the same film as Fargeat’s contemporary body horror film (and vice versa, of course), and so I lectured about these similarities at the Freud Museum in London late February. Check it out:
https://anartapart.substack.com/p/be-careful-what-you-wish-for
”The quintessentially Faustian deals these people are offered do not come from the archetype of a mocking yet essentially humanity-loving Mephistopheles, but from pure corporate greed hiding behind old parlor tricks and supposedly new formulas to squeeze out the last hysteric pennies of women of all ages while at the same time offering technological gizmo structures for the obsessives in their emasculated self-pity.”
Then there is a deep-diving interview with master artist Vicki Bennett (a.k.a. People Like Us), based on my documentary about her, ”Nothing Can Turn Into a Void” (The documentary is also available at the site):
https://anartapart.substack.com/p/nothing-can-turn-into-a-void
”Nothing is an island. You know, everything is relative, and not only that: everything has relatives, everything has a mother and a father – there is no original, but everything is original – because nothing’s been done before in the same way even if two people do the same thing they are not doing it the same way. So you cannot take away what already happened, you can only add to it. Nothing can turn into a void.”
If you want to watch some good satirical-dystopian films to ease the pain of watching the news, I made a list of ten good ones. If you enjoyed ”Idiocracy” and ”Civil War,” then you’ll find some great films here:
https://anartapart.substack.com/p/need-something-to-watch
I hope you enjoy the material and that you’ll have a great weekend!
