Every book i've read

Before

Dahl, roald- fantastic mr fox
Dahl, roald- b.f.g
Dahl, roald- charlies chocolate factory
Dahl, roald- Charlie and the great glass elevator
Dahl, roald- Georges marvellous medicine
Dahl, roald- James and the giant peach
Dahl, roald- matilda
Dahl, roald- the twits
Dahl, roald- fantastic mr fox
Dahl, roald- witches
Dahl, roald- Esio trot
Dahl, roald- Danny the champion of the world
Larson, Gary- The Far side Gallery 3
Lee, laurie- Cider with rosie
Roth, Phillip- Portnoys complaint
Shakespeare, William- Romeo and Juliet
Shakespeare, William- Macbeth
Stienbeck, John -Of mice and men
Tarentino, Quentin- Pulp Fiction
Watterson, Bill- The essential Calvin & Hobbes
Watterson, Bill- Something under the bed is drooling:
Watterson, Bill- The indespensable Calvin & Hobbes
Watterson, Bill -Calvin & Hobbes tenth anniversary book
Watterson, Bill -Calvin & Hobbes: Homicidal psycho jungle cat
Watterson, Bill- The Authoritative Calvin and Hobbes
Watterson, Bill- The Calvin and Hobbes: Days Are Just Packed
Watterson, Bill- There's Treasure Everywhere: Calvin & Hobbes
Welsh, Irvine- Trainspotting

2002
Bryson, bill- notes from a small island
Harris, Joanne- Blackberry wine
Hornby, Nick -How to be good
Hornby, Nick- About a boy
Janis Mink- Marcel Duchamp
Janis Mink- H R Giger
Kesey, ken- One flew over the cuckoos nest
Karouac, Jack- On the road
McCarthy, pete- McCarthys bar
McCourt, Frank- Angelas ashes
Wood, chris- The pre-raphealites

2003
Collings, Matthew- Blimey!
Harris, Joanne- Coastliners
Harris, Joanne- Chocolat
Harris, Joanne- Three quarters of the orange
Hornby, Nick -High Fidelity
Millington, Mill- Things me and my girlfriend argue about
Parsons, Tony- Man and boy
Sharpe, Tom- Vintage stuff
Sharpe, Tom- The great pursuit
Sharpe, Tom- The Throwback
Sharpe, Tom- Wilt
Vonnegut, Kurt- Breakfast of champions

2004
Ali, Monica- Brick lane
Alighari, dante- Inferno
Ballard, J.G- Empire of the sun
Brown, Dan- The da vinci code
Brown, Dan- Deception point
Brown, Dan- Digital fortress
Brown, Dan- Angels and demons
Byatt, A.S- Possession
Chello, Paulo- The Alchemist
DBC Pierre- Vernon god little
Fox, Simon- Cracking the da vinci code
Goethe, JWV- Faust part1
Haddon, Mark- Curious incident of the dog in the night
Harris, Joanne- Holy Fools
Heller, Zoe- Notes on a scandal
Heller. Joesph- Catch 22
Huxley, Aldous- Brave new world
Ishiguro, Kazou- The remains of the day
Mattell, Yann- Life of pi
Nicholls, David- Starter for ten
Pearl, Matthew- The dante club
Richards, Ben- The mermaid and the drunks
Safran fowe, Jonathan- Everything is illuminated
Sallinger, J.D- Catcher in the rye
Sebold, Alice- Lucky
Sebold, Alice- Lovely bones
Tracy, P.J -Want to play?
Vonnegut, Kurt- Slapstck, or lonesome no more

2005
Baltic gallery- Contemporary curators in conversation
Baltic gallery- Contemporary curators in conversation
Caldwell, ian- & Thomasson, dustin The rule of four
Camus, Albert- The outsider
Cervantes- Don quixote part 1
Cervantes- Don quixote part 2
Coben, Harlen- Just one look
Dylan, bob- Cronicles part 1
Faulks, sebastian- The girl at the Lion D'Orr
Flaubert, Gustave- Madame Bovary
Harris, Joanne- Jigs n reels
Hawkins, Stephen- A brief history of time
Homer- The oddysey
Macchivelli, niccolo- The prince
Milne, A A- Winnie the pooh
Milne, A A- House on pooh corner
seneca- On the shortness of life
Stallabrass, Julian- Art incorporated
Stoker, bram- Dracula
Samoza, Jose Carlos- The art of murder
Thompson, Hunter S- Fear and loathing in Las Vegas
Tolstoy, leo- Anna Karenina
Tracy, P.J- Live bait
Tracy, P.J- Dead run
Van Sant, gus- pink
Virgil- The aeonid
Wells, H G- War of the worlds
Zafon, carlos ruiz- The shadow of the wind
Zephariah, Benjamin- Too black, Too strong

2006
Banks, iain- the wasp factory
Banks, iain- The crow road
Barnes, Julian- Flauberts parrott
Barnes, Julian- Arthur and George
Bukowski, Charles- Women
Cale, John- Whats welsh for zen?
Collins, Matthew- This is modern art
Golding, William- Lord of the flies
Hollinghurst, Alan- The line of beauty
Irwin Chusid- Songs in the key of Z
Ishiguro, Kazou- Never let me go
Joyce, James- Dubliners
Larkin, Phillip- High windows
Martel, Yann- The facts behinf the helsinki roccamotos
McCall Smith, Alexander- The cupboard full of life
Murakami, Haruki- Kafka on the shore
Murakami, Haruki- The wind up bird chronicle
Peel, john- margrave of the marshes
Pirsig, Robert M- Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance
Slater, Nigel- Toast

2007
Banks, Iain- Canal dreams
Burroughs, William- Last words
Cash, Johnny- CASH
Chelho, Paulo- The Zahir
Cook, William- Goodbye again: The definative Peter Cook & Dudley Moore
Dostoyevsky, Fyodor- Crime & Punishment
Ennis, Garth & Dillon, Steve- Preacher: Gone to Texas
Ennis, Garth & Dillon, Steve- Preacher: Until the End of the World
Ennis, Garth & Dillon, Steve- -Preacher: Proud Americans
Ennis, Garth & Dillon, Steve- -Preacher: Ancient History
Ennis, Garth & Dillon, Steve- -Preacher: Dixie Fried
Ennis, Garth & Dillon, Steve- -Preacher: War in the Sun
Ennis, Garth & Dillon, Steve- -Preacher: Salvation
Jane Connety & Josephine Lanyon -Ghosting: The role of the archive in new media art
Kerouac, Jack- Vanity of Dulouz
Milton, John- Paradise Lost
Murakami, Haruki- The wild sheep chase
Patrick, Julian- Frog Trainers Handbook
Spencer, Amy- D.I.Y The rise of low-fi culture
Spiegelman, Art- Maus
Vonnegut, Kurt -Slaughterhouse 5
2008
Amsler, Kurt -Complete divers guide to the Mediterranean
Bauby, Jean Dominique- The diving bell and the butterfly
Bernstein, Carl & Woodward, Bob- All the presidents men
Capote, Truman- In cold blood
Charrierre, Henri- Papillion
Eggers, Dave- You shall know our velocity
Faulks, Sebasitan- Birdsong
Hader, Dori- Mingering Mike
Karouac, Jack- Satori in Paris
Mailor, Norman- Naked and the dead
Mitchell, David - Cloud Atlas
Repsch, Joe - The Legendary Joe Meek
Spencer, Amy - DIY: The rise of lo-fi culture

2009
Tolstoy, Leo - Family Happiness & The Devil
Gogol - Taras Bulba
Garcia Marquez, Gabriel- Love in the time of cholera
McCarthy, Cormac- No country for old men
Lewyska, Marina - Two Caravans
Hamid, Mohsin - The reluctant fundamentalist
Sobel, Dava - Longitude
Sixsmith, Martin- The Litvenenko file
Brown, James - The L.A Diaries
Akunin, Boris - The Turkish Gambit
Sacher, Louis - Holes
Bragg, Melvyn - The Adventure of English
Faber, Toby - Faberges Eggs
Larson, Gary - Far Side Gallery 4
Larson, Gary - Wildlife Preserves
Mellor, Dawn - Dawn Mellor
Critical Art Ensemble- The Molecular Invasion

2010
Clarke, Suzanne- Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell
Summerscale, Kate- The Suspicions of Mr Whitcher
Larsson, Stieg - The girl with the dragon tattoo
Winchester, Simon- The surgeon of Crowthorne
Larsson, Steig - The girl who played with fire
Kundera, Milan - The unbearable lightness of being
Patenaude, bertrand - Stalins nemesis- the exile and murder of Leon Trotsky
Pushkin- The Captains Daughter + other stories

No way home

Its a coincidence theres a few art exhibition 'reviews' in a row, I've no intention to keep it going, but I did go to No Way Home recently above The Railway pub, it had creeped into my facebook feed, but otherwise I didnt know it was on.
A year or so ago a few people (myself included) put on some mini exhibitions in our houses and flats, not many people came, and at least 50% of the objective was an excuse to get drunk (only a slightly higher percentage than a normal P.V). It did give you the chance to see art in a different setting though, which is whats going on here.
Its become inanely boring going to the same venues, who have whitewashed their walls, and almost zero character of the building remained (The Blade Factory in The A Foundation being a notable exception). A reason I enjoyed the recent Arena exhibition was because it seemed to focus on the interesting space as much as the artwork. Above The Railway is normal rooms, all carpeted, a bit scruffy and derelict, perfect for an exhibition.
The work included fitted excellently together- all was reasonably lo-fi, quite young feeling, it was one of the few exhibitions you feel like there might be a new crop of artists coming through (only Red Wires Alan Williams was a familiar face). Various series's of small drawings and paintings adorned most areas, and some guy started scrawling graffiti one one wall (I left as he was starting, it felt too much like a performance, which in turn made it seem to art-gallery like, something that was otherwise refreshingly not apparent).
I dont bother remembering names, and any recomendation to see the show is pointless, as it finishes tomorrow, but it was good anyways.

Look at the size of my theme

 Ellen Gallagher

Two major exhibitions in Liverpool at the moment seem to try and cover an enormous amount of ground, to varying degrees of success . What is basically 'Art by Black People' (Afromodern at TATE Liverpool) and 'Art by Women' (The Rise of Women Artists at The Walker) try and encapsulate a whole history of both black artists and female artists.
The approach is fairly similar in both exhibitions- a potted and selected history of the genres (if subjects this big can be described as genres), in a kind of hodge-podge of artists that are only connected by their colour/gender.
Afromodern certainly comes off best from the two - especially as the theme is slightly tied down by its sub-heading (Journeys across the Atlantic or something similar) so does at least restrict the theme to a manageable amount. Beginning with a neat voodoo documentary and ending with what was my favourite piece- Ellen Gallacher work (above, I have no idea what its called). Theres stuff in between all this, but I cant remember what- a Basquiat, but I've gone off Basquiat a bit.

The Rise of Women Artists also have some standout pieces - some ears by Louise Bourgouis, a couple of old paintings by people I'd never heard of, but I was so disillusioned by such a vague a theme, that I couldn't concentrate on the artwork, especially the older works, many of which have been shown before. It almost ignores feminism (a info panel is about it), and concentrates on any artwork available to hand by a female, some of which is certainly worth seeing (I wish I could remember the artist who painted Chinese designs on skulls - they were neat).
I am fully aware women had a tough time getting in shows and whatnot, but this is a massively out of date suggestion to say this a current problem - only a couple of weeks after The Armoury Show in NY- which included more women than men.
Maybe we're doomed to an endless supply of shows about or by women, and the gender issue is an eternal solution to gaps in a galleries programme.

Little Otik

The 'Weirdest film I've seen' list must have a few contenders- Lynch's Eraserhead of course, Jodorowski's The Holy Mountain blew me away the first time I saw that, but Jan Svankmajers Little Otik now must be a serious contender. I'm a fan of Svankmajers short films, and his version of Alice in Wonderland was surely as weird as Johnny Depp (although I'm yet to see this), but even waiting until 1.00am for this to even start was a stretch (it finished at 3.30am!).

Basically a family who cannot have a baby instead turn to making a wooden baby, which turns alive, grows massive, and eats people. Its over two hours long, so obviously theres a bit more to it, but the middle section is dull as hell, so thats the important bits.

Some of the characters you cant wait to be eaten, mainly the wife and paedo old man- not since I saw Grizzly Man have I wished someone from a film would be devoured, and at least the old man is. Typically of Svankmajer he often turns to animation to describe the wooden baby, whose huge by the end of the film, and has an eyeball in its mouth. 

Despite an ambigous ending, and a boring middle section, any fan of strangeness would enjoy this

Collusion at Arena

I've been on a P.V sabbatical really this year- I've only been to a handful, but not only is Arena is on the way home, the obvious dedication behind putting on shows in such a diddy gallery deserves commendation.
A gallery this size (about 400 sq ft) really lends itself to one thing best- a single site specific piece, which is what Rich White and Brychan Tudor have done here.
Not being familiar with Rich's work, and only having seen a few pieces of Brychans (at The Wolstenholme, where he was a member), I came in reasonably unaware as to what was going on, despite the mini-flood of emails and texts of press releases, which always are scarcely read.
After the customary bar visit I loitered in the gallery, half concentrating on the projection. I was surely a prime target for the work, someone who just came to the P.V, and wasn't concentrating on what was going on- I was more concious of getting in the way of one of the four projectors beaming light from behind the audiences feet (I would have preferred if they were hung higher, the illusions would have worked better without people stood in front of the projectors).
Only by switching your focus to the actual wall rather than the projection (thus being of the wall that it is being projected on, but including the view outside of Cains Brewery which was visible in the first few Arena exhibitions before the window was boarded up) do you realize the scale of the build that has gone on. The gallery wall is angled at zigzags outward into the space in a kind of white architectural cubist dream gallery, but the four projections give them impression the wall is flat, a subtle trick of the eye reminiscent of Laurence Payots interventions. The more you look, faint impressions of imagery become clearer, much of which seemingly drawn on the local setting, and businesses surrounding Elevator  Building (where Arena is now housed).
Evidently this was a perfect combination of artists (apparently they didnt know each other before this), as their styles combine to pick out the "unique architectural features of Arena Gallery and draws on the history of the Elevator Building" in a subtle and very pleasing way.  I thoroughly recommend visiting this show, which is on till 3rd April Thursday - Saturday, and hope after Jack Welsch leaves his post as gallery programmer in May, the gallery continues in this vein.

The girl with the bigger dragon tattoo

Ive written what, five posts so far? Its probably too early to repeat a subject, but today we went to watch the film version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.
This year I've generally been reducing the stuff I do to working, painting, eating and reading- and the latter part has been recently occupied by Steig Larsson's Millenium trilogy (I finished the second part last night- 'The Girl who Played with Fire', but will refrain from writing a blog about it, as I dont want this to be some Steig Larsson blog- needless to say its imperitive you read it, its fantastic).
Its frequently frustrating when films deviate from a book you love, as this one does on some points, however it only serves to make the film more coherent. Elements that were perhaps superflous in the book have been minimised, and it makes for a well paced, very European, cracking thriller that fully does justice to Larsson. The setting is perfect in a remote village in Sweden, that is constantly filled with eerie snowscapes and the film doesnt hold back from the stronger elements of the book- mainly the bumming the main character takes (Lisbeth Salander player by Noomi Repace- above), nor does it make any of the characters seem anything but normal people (something that'll be missing I guess in the Hollywood version, due in 2012, with some douchbag from Twilight).
As the mystery of what happened to Harriet Vanger 40 years ago gather momentum, multiple murders are discovered, and journalist Michel Blomquivst and hacker Lisbeth Salander get themselves wrapped in a whole host of unruly shenanigans that I can't wait to continue in the next film.
I'll finish on something that'll make me sound like a dick film reviewer who knows what he's doing- it also has a cracking score.