Robert Skidelsky – The Good Life – Wealth
“In 1930, John Maynard Keynes predicted that in 100 years – that is, by 2030 – growth in the developed world would, in effect, have stopped, because people would “have enough” to lead the “good life.” Instead, the accumulation of wealth, which should be a means to the “good life,” has become an end in itself because it destroys many of the things that make life worth living.” – Robert Skidelsky in an article here. I would offer a minor corrective to Skidelsky and qualify his use of wealth as material/monetary wealth which tends to destroy other forms of wealth the *other* things that make life worth living (via Jerome Segal) – transcendent meaning, aesthetic experience, social/loving relationships/neighborliness, intellectual growth…
David McCandless – The Visual Miscellaneum – Randall Szott
My project “is the new” has had many lives. It first appeared here. Later, it was reworked here. That, in turn led to its appearance in the Boston Globe here. It sat dormant for a while but has been reworked yet again, this time by David McCandless and it now appears as “X is the new black” in his book The Visual Miscellaneum.
Alexander Koch – Quitting – Stephen Wright
“Why would an ex-artist potentially bring more creativity, more imagination or more self-responsibility to natural sciences and medicine than anybody else. I think Richard Rorty (whom we both admire) would actually support me here. If artists merely become social scientists or long-distance runners, or if they do become social scientists or long-distance runners “as artists”, would sound for him a) as really hard to distinguish, b) unclear what this distinction is good for, and c) sound like an attempt to find something essential about what artists are, exactly in the very moment of their disappearance, whereas my theoretic proposals of the artistic dropout try to contribute to an anti-essentialist perspective on that disappearance.” – from an amazing interview here.
Leisure – Jerome Segal – Graceful Simplicity
Thinking more deeply about the politics of leisure. Jerome Segal calls it “graceful simplicity,” but we basically mean the same thing. He states, “A politics of simplicity seeks a world that is not hectic, not filled with anxiety. It is a world in which people have sufficient time to do things slowly and to do them right, whether what they are doing is building and enjoying a friendship, working on sculpture, or studying scripture.”
Carrol Dunham – He Said She Said – Review
Our show at He Said – She Said featuring Carroll Dunham received this review.
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