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SubscriptionsCategory: Arts
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‘You See What People Can Do to Other People, People they Lived Side-By-Side With’: Ending the Silence on Partition and Empire
As discussions of Empire and Britain’s imperial history have come to the forefront in 2020, Hardeep Matharu speaks to BBC journalist and author Kavita Puri to explore what she learnt from those who lived through the end of the colonial project in India about divisions tearing societies apart for her book ‘Partition Voices’
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Uprising to Rising Up: The Education of Alex Wheatle
Bryan Knight speaks to Alex Wheatle, whose life was recently brought to television screens by Steve McQueen in the BBC’s Small Axe series
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The Hounding of Billie Holiday
Chris Sullivan reviews the documentary ‘Billie’, detailing how one of the greatest singers of all time was hunted by officers at the Federal Bureau of Narcotics
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Fighting Fascism: Art As Activism
Jan Fuscoe, of the ‘Brick Lane: The Turning Point’ project, hears from Dan Jones, an artist, activist and campaigner for over 50 years
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Brexit’s Toll On Britain’s Creative Industries: The Sadness and Madness that Awaits
Composer Howard Goodall sets out what performers will need to know in a post-Brexit world and reflects on the sorrow of the Government’s desire to erect barriers, when the job of creatives is to tear them down
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‘The Trial of the Chicago 7’ and the Prosecution of America
This Netflix depiction of mass protests repressed by brutal state violence has stark parallels to today, says Ellin Stein
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New York City: A Theory of Evolution
Chris Sullivan remembers the run-down, experimental and sleazy New York of punk, hip hop and disco – the creative epicentre of the world, suffocated in recent years by big developers, greed and rent hikes. But could COVID-19 signal a return to its innovative and more humanistic edge?
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The Upside Down: Why the Poetry of Claudia Rankine is Essential Reading for Right Now
John Mitchinson considers how the author combines the integrity of an investigative journalist with a rhetorical urgency in a timely exploration of whiteness
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After Dark: Are the Lights Going Out on Public Service Broadcasting?
Julian Petley looks at the people behind Andrew Neil’s new GB News and sees ominous signs both for the BBC and the principle of impartiality
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Why Is Homophobia Still an Explicitly Acceptable Prejudice to Hold?
Strictly Come Dancing’s first same-sex pairing is not the milestone those praising the decision believe it to be, writes George Attwood
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American Comedy Tries to Avoid a Repeat of History
US talk show hosts are taking a radically different approach to Donald Trump this time around, reports Eleanor Longman-Rood
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Government Cultural Recovery Spend Leaves North Out in Cold
The Government’s new bid to save cultural institutions is heavily concentrated in the South of England, reports Sam Bright
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The Woman with the Afro: The Story of Barbara Beese
In the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement and ahead of a new drama by Steve McQueen, Jan Fuscoe speaks to one of the last surviving members of the ‘Mangrove Nine’, whose trial in the 1970s was a defining moment for Black Power in Britain
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‘Cuties’ Recycles the Same Damaging Stereotypes About Muslim Women – But Where was the Outrage?
Amina Shareef reviews Cuties, which has attracted criticism for its over-sexualisation of young girls, and finds a troubling portrayal of Muslim femininity
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The Bizarre Rise of the Celebrity Conspiracy Theorist
Nathan O’Hagan tries to offer an explanation for why celebrities are more susceptible than most to wild misinformation
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The Odeon of Death Film of the Month: Tenet’s Extra
The Odeon of Death takes a look at the month’s events through the medium of cinema – this time a mind-bending sci-fi espionage thriller Tenet’s Extra (2020) It’s the mind-bending sci-fi espionage thriller the critics are calling “Conservatism on acid” Due to a mutant algorithm, a CIA operative enters an inverted world, in which the…
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Tufton Street and News International Actions Show that Extinction Rebellion is Evolving
Stephen Colegrave talks to co-founder of the Writer’s Rebel group, Jessica Townsend, about their shifting strategy and where XR is heading next Jessica Townsend joined Extinction Rebellion (XR) early on and was present at the declaration and the first rebellion. Originally, she didn’t intend to become an environmental activist but was writing her first novel…
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How ‘Mrs America’ Phyllis Schlafly Laid the Groundwork for Libertarians’ Ongoing Assault on Rights
Gloria Steinem’s criticisms of the hit show about the 1970s US women’s liberation movement miss the prescience the series shows about how a path to the White House was paved for Donald Trump, writes Ellin Stein
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Cop Violence to COVID-19: The Survival of Notting Hill Carnival
Chis Sullivan examines the history of Notting Hill Carnival and its decades-long battle against the Establishment
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UNCONSCIOUS EMPIRE: Saving ‘Britannia’ and Losing the Plot
Continuing to wage a Steve Bannon-style culture war, Boris Johnson’s Government will do nothing to confront the damaging legacy of our imperial past because its mythologised symbolism is all it has to sell to Brexit Britain, argues Hardeep Matharu
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Infamous: A Bonnie and Clyde Tale in the Instagram Era
Chris Sullivan reviews Infamous, a new dramatisation of the insatiable lust for fame
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Performing in a Pandemic: How to Keep the Show on the Road?
Richard Hansen offers ideas for how to help the freelance theatre workers on which the industry relies
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OUR LIVES MATTER: The Generational Fears Holding Young Asian People Back
Pruthvi Khilosia explores how cultural taboos about what is and isn’t possible for those from minority communities must be understood by the creative industries
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The Traitor: An Italian Mafia Drama With Shades of Boris Johnson’s Britain
Chris Sullivan reviews ‘The Traitor’, a brutal Italian story of crime and corruption, and finds parallels with the UK
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POST-COVID CULTURE: Opening Up or Closing Down?
Following the Chancellor’s lifeline in funding for the culture and heritage sectors, Stephen Unwin considers whether this will usher in a real ‘levelling-up’ of the arts across the country
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In the Search for Truth, We Have to Take Off Our Masks
Reverend Joe Haward considers what the pursuit of truth really involves and how knowledge of this is being manipulated by our politicians
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Rashford and Racism: Not Just A Political Football
Daniel Harris explains why the star footballer’s fight to right injustices provides an example for us all of how to delve into pain and confront the truth
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The Odeon of Death Film of the Month: I Never Promised You A Rose Garden
The Odeon of Death takes a look at the month’s events through the medium of cinema.
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Sci-Fi Dystopias No Longer Warnings, but an Inspiration to Silicon Valley Billionaires
Jon Bailes looks at the social stratification in the TV remake of Snowpiercer and the new Final Fantasy video game and sees an instruction manual for the Uber-rich.
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The Mainstream Media Needs to Give Learning Disabled People their Own Voice
Saba Salman calls on the mainstream media to more accurately reflect the lives of those with learning disabilities and explains how her new book of essays, written by the learning disabled, aims to change the narrative.
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REVIEW: Michael Moore’s Planet of the Humans – ‘Heartbreaking Genius of Staggering Over-Simplification’
Rupert Read and Deepak Raghani lament the film’s fatalism and argue that there is a ‘managed descent’ from our current dangerous energy dependencies.
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Nigel Farage’s End of the Pier Show
Otto English delves into how the Brexit Party leader is keeping himself relevant now that we have taken back control and his American dreams have not come to fruition.
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Odeon of Death Film of the Month: Caws
The Odeon of Death takes a look at events through the medium of cinema
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The Year of Living Distantly: Songs For the End of Silence
With the end of the COVID-19 lockdown being bruited loudly in the press, Graeme Thomson the idea that ‘silence is perfection’ and where we can still find it in great music.
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The Year of Living Distantly: Paranoia in Cornwall
Alex Wade on how his plans to move abroad were stymied by the pandemic, and how an abandoned cottage and a missing book delivery revealed the rupture in time.
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Why Every Zombie Apocalypse Movie Was Wrong
In light of the realities of COVID-19, Peter Jukes explores what our myths about pandemics and alien invasions told us about sorry selves.
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The Emptiness of Trump’s Relentless Pursuit of Beauty
Bonnie Greer explores what is driving the US President in his quest to create the world around him in his vision.
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In Asking for Public Subsidies the Press Should Live by the Rules they Apply to Harry and Meghan
Brian Cathcart explains why the press asking for public money to help them through the Coronavirus pandemic must follow the same reasoning they applied to the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.
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Disappearing Cities: Soho — Gangsters, artists, brothels and landlords
Chris Sullivan, the founder of the famous Wag Club, looks at the history of London’s Soho district and how greed and acquisition replaced art and conviviality.
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Hymns to the Silence: Music and Solace in a Time of Crisis
The composer Howard Goodall looks at how music has helped to express, escape and mourn previous traumas, and provides his own playlist to pass the pandemic.
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Odeon Of Death Film of the Month: Planet of the Goats
The Odeon of Death takes a look at the month’s events through the medium of cinema.
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THE UPSIDE DOWN: The Eloquence of Saying Nothing
John Mitchinson explores how being quiet and listening might help us to adjust to the isolation imposed on us by the Coronavirus – and beyond.
