Sometimes you have to cross a line to find true happiness. Sometimes, crossing a line takes you from happiness to hell. If only it were so clear in which direction you are crossing. Life isn’t always signposted that well, and sometimes the signs to happiness and those to hell point in the same direction. Agnes Varda’s film Le Bonheur (1965, English Happiness) gaily depicts such a journey with an ambiguous orientation. Does the film come […]
Lütfi Ö. Akad’s film Law of the Border is a cinematic masterpiece that marked a pivotal point in Turkish cinema when it came out in 1966. Today, it appears as a brilliant reflection on the complexities of borders, unequal opportunities, and other limitations that define modern societies. Borders are ambiguous phenomena. On the one hand, they are intended to be simplifying limitations, attempts at drawing clear lines through reality. On the other hand, they are […]
Here’s the truth: I’ve never been on a roller coaster. I’ve never taken LSD. I’ve never tried to step out of an elevator on the 13th floor. I’ve never been to Austin, Texas. And I’ve never written about music. Hence this is no reportage; I’m not a music journalist. I’m not a historian either—facts are important to me, but at times they seem fleeting. And yet, all of these things fascinate me, especially when they […]
C/O Berlin shows “Francesca Woodman: On Being an Angel,” the first cross-section through the work of the great American photographer ever presented in Germany. Right when it opened in March, I had the plan to go see the exhibition “On Being an Angel” at C/O Berlin. Then came the pandemic, and the sudden lockdown thwarted my plan.
A review of Louis Malle's 1986 documentary about immigration to the USA – an inspiring work of art which has aged very well.