Shop Lights and Synthetic Creativity
A few gems from my recent digging in the archives
Behind me at my writing desk is this year’s DIY seed starting setup. The glow of shop lights on young nightshades is the ultimate optimism, I think, for warmer days ahead. Digging into history has also been a way to shift my mind to different times, seeing as how the world today appears to be a bit of a dumpster fire.
It’s been a minute (or three…) since I’ve written, and this is because I needed to reconcile this newsletter with the other writing and research I’m doing. As I’m poring over outlines, terminology, narrative arcs, and whatnot, I really didn’t know how, or what, to share in this space.
And so today, as I listen to the Phi-Psonics album Octava, I’m sharing a handful of discoveries from my archival digs. Creating visual compositions of writing is a way for me to slow down and think about the text itself — it’s a technique for close reading. Meanwhile, I’m making my way through Rita Felski’s The Limits of Critique, and this is also influencing the way I approach archives as well as close readings.
Lastly, I’m considering moving this newsletter to another platform such as Buttondown. If that happens, you won’t need to do anything (you’ll still get this in your email, and yes, you’d have the option to unsubscribe).
If you have any thoughts on the new platform (or the writing bits above!) I’d love to hear from you.
Til next time.
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