Seeking Illumination in Dark Times

On the power of art, race and racism, and the limitations of science and politics

Reading our series on the arts, provides some hope in our dark times, on this cloudy and humid Friday afternoon in New York. I have long believed that the key to liberation is illumination, that we have to see the ways things are, and see how things might possibly change, ...
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Seeking Illumination in Dark Times

Is Alex Israel for Real?

Sun, sincerity and simulacra in SPF-18

The campy, nostalgic, Hollywood-inspired works of young(ish) artist Alex Israel would not be out of place as the scenery for a nineties-California-themed party, yet they regularly sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars – sometimes more – and he has had solo exhibitions in prestigious galleries globally. Israel’s first major ...
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Is Alex Israel for Real?