In “On Fashioning Memory Lane: The Photography of Bill Yates,” I examine the black and white portraits taken at a Tampa, Florida roller skating rink in the 1970s. The essay explores E. B. White’s thoughts on time, the nature of nostalgia, Halston, Disney World, the U.S. space program, and the
In “A Partial Guide to Camp: Tennessee Williams’ ‘The Mutilated,'” I explore director Cosmic Chivu’s vision of the play, Mink Stole, Camp aesthetics, the French Quarter, Christmas stories, Baltimore, boozy delusions, Slapstick Tragedy, Susan Sontag, and tragic, comic beauty.
In “What Remains: Les Schmidt at Guy Lyman Fine Art,” I take a look at the photographer’s flower-portraits while thinking about flowers in art, loss, memory, Emily Brontë, 17th-century vanitas symbols, Japanese Ukiyo-e woodblock prints, Alexander McQueen, and the Day of the Dead.
In “That Rococo Feeling: Joie de Vivre,” I examine an antebellum parlor recently transported from the Butler-Greenwood Plantation in Louisiana to the New Orleans Museum of Art, Rococo Revival aesthetics, ornamentation, Gaston Bachelard, floriculture, Francis Ponge, and finding joy within borders.
In “On Circles: A Bildungsroman,” I travel to the Palazzo Doria Pamphilj in Rome on a circuitous yet fruitful journey—a sort of summer vacation with Ralph Waldo Emerson tucked under my arm.
In Tactile Fixation: An Interview with Aubrey Longley-Cook, I speak about humor, drag, and stitching with an Atlanta-based artist and contributor to “(De)Tangled”: A Living Salon, a multi-platform exhibition curated by Pelican Bomb.
Occam’s Razor: Tennessee Williams at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art explores the relationship of Tennessee Williams to body hair, and what we may learn from looking at his nudes alongside the paintings of William Blake.
Olfactive Memory: The Locale of Scent visits Hové Parfumeur in the French Quarter, examines the words of Jean-Claude Ellena (house perfumer at Hermès), and explores the art of perfume-making as it relates to desire and identity.