Instagram, on the surface, seems like it should be a dream platform for artists and activists alike — a captive audience, inbuilt sociability, and a clear focus on visual artistic expression. Then how come so many artists and activists are unhappy with the platform? The answer comes down to corporate greed.
Those of us who regularly use Instagram, whether for personal or professional reasons, will no doubt have seen a few infographics floating around that mention the Instagram ‘algorithm’. These nifty little posts generally consist of a few pictorials labelling each of the app’s engagement buttons — like, comment, share…
I am a devotional fan of Nigella Lawson. Often when I tell people this, or when they meet me and I’m wearing my Nigella Lawson t-shirt, they assume I am being ironic. They underestimate the sort of deference a 24 year old man would have for a famous TV-chef, but I have the bookshelf — all of Nigella’s cookbooks, nestled alongside my Orwell and Ballard — to prove it. It is my love for Nigella has led to me considering why the concept of ‘ironic enjoyment’ aggravates me so much. There’s several conflicting notions at play here — is ironic…
From guerrilla style puppet shows, to punk rockers and club kids, subcultures have always sought avenues that allow for a more fiscally conservative approach. Whether it be to circumnavigate the pressures of arts funding, to rally against a capital driven society, or simply to try and create something out of nothing, there are many examples of cheap art that have fundamentally diverted art history.
With online mediums such as YouTube and Instagram dominating the amateur arts field, there has never been such a huge pressure on artists to spend a pretty penny in order to be seen. We aren’t just…
It’s the phrase that sends a shiver down the spine of many a prospective employee. But we are right to wary of the company that sells itself as ‘one big happy family’. Beneath the veneer of comfort and support, there lies a host of exploitative tactics that are driving us further into a capitalist nightmare.
As we all know, job interviews are a slog. Unless you’re applying for your dream job, job interviews can feel like a theatrical performance — rehearsing your lines, dressing the part, getting into the mindset of someone who genuinely loves meeting sales goals. It doesn’t…
My mum tells me that ever since I was about 8 years old, I always made it clear that I couldn’t wait to be an adult and live on my own. In my teenage years, that dream was compounded by a burgeoning obsession in queer media — tales of young queers running away from their small towns to the big city, finding their tribe and carving a niche in a fantastic, fabulous nightlife full of crazy and colourful characters. I devoured books such as City of Night by John Rechy and Dancer in the Dark by Andrew Holleran, classic pieces…
From chainsaw wielding psychopaths and Russian family dramas, to French provincial maidens and AIDS activists in 1980s Manhattan… I have managed to cover a lot of literary ground in 2020. Here, I compile the best of the best.
On New Year’s day, 2020, I set myself a challenge — to read 50 books over the course of the year, and write a little something about each one. When I set myself the challenge, I of course had not a slight inkling of what was to come. I predicted that I would not manage to reach my goal, but that I…
In a year where venues have been closed and dancefloors off-limits, it stings even more to sit and reflect on what has surely been an incredible year of music. Whether it be the swaggering disco-indebted returns, indie-pop masterpieces or uncompromising sonic adventures for unprecednetd times, music this year has seen a broad range of exceptional releases. This is my Top 10 albums of the year. I hope you enjoy!
Chaos and a Dancing Star — Marc Almond
Black Sunrise/Dreaming of Sea/The Crows Eyes Have Turned Blue
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is undoubtedly one of the best horror films ever made, and certainly the most hotly debated and analysed film of the 70’s exploitation boom. Here, I put Tobe Hooper’s shocking masterpiece in line with Judith Butler, Marxist feminism and John Waters to discuss its queer ramifications.
Looking back retroactively at popular in the early 1970’s, it’s clear to see that something was in the water. The stage was set in large part at the end of the 1960’s, still reeling from the assassination of Kennedy, the start of the Vietnam war and the general withering of…
Franz Kafka’s final novel, The Castle, is an uncanny and unsettling depiction of social otherization and isolation. And in its central protagonist K., the book also presents one of the sharpest depictions of queerness found in literature — a man who is perpetually out of time with the world around him, ostracized and untethered by a system he has no chance of understanding.
Franz Kafka stands as one of the 20th century’s most towering literary figures, an author who, like Orwell or Ballard, created worlds so frighteningly uncanny that he has been afforded his own stylistic descriptor — the Kafkaesque. But whereas Orwell reflected our growing dependence on surveillance and authoritarianism, and Ballard depicted a world that merged our obsession with technology, violence and sex, Kafka’s sights were altogether more metaphysical — he not only hyperbolized the trappings of unfathomable bureaucracy (what he is undoubtedly most well known for), he also highlighted our modern penchant for individualism, unfulfillment and disassociation. Kafka’s finely crafted…
“I don’t claim that my analysis of The Brothers Karamazov is original, and I don’t even claim it to be correct or intentional on Dostoevsky’s part. But I saw something of myself in all four of these brothers, and it’s something I perhaps didn’t want to see.”
*This article contains major spoilers, as well as discussions of sexual assault, abuse and suicide*
The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky is not really a book that needs more articles written about it. It’s one of the absolute pinnacles of world literature, and has been dissected, interrogated and expounded upon by philosophers and academics far smarter than I, and with a greater level of comprehension then I will ever possess. There’s good reason though — it is a fucking incredible book. It took me about 3 weeks to cleave through the book, and the number of reactions it elicited in…
Joe Corr
Blending deep-dive analyses of popular culture, politics and gender studies with autobiographical anecdotes and opinions.
