Antivirals: Ana Mendieta and silence

Did the artist Carl André kill his wife, fellow artist Ana Mendieta, by throwing her out the window of their Manhattan apartment on the 34th floor? The case has divided, intrigued and angered the art world ever since.

Thomas Osborne
Thomas Osborne
30 October 2022 Sunday 00:37
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Antivirals: Ana Mendieta and silence

Did the artist Carl André kill his wife, fellow artist Ana Mendieta, by throwing her out the window of their Manhattan apartment on the 34th floor? The case has divided, intrigued and angered the art world ever since. André was found not guilty of second-degree murder in a bench trial, but a 1990 investigative book reopened the question and concluded that he did. Death of an Artist, a new six-part podcast, hosted by journalist and curator Helen Moleworth sheds light on the subject. In his day, the prosecutor who investigated the case declared that more silence and resistance had been found in the New York art world than in the mafia and what is surprising is that almost 40 years after Mendieta's death and without André for medium (the sculptor died in 2010), Moleworth has once again found himself in a dense network of silences.

FREE HUMAN CHAIN

We knew that the Nollegiu bookstores had managed to create a community that goes far beyond a place to buy books, but it became clear once again last Sunday. Many clients and friends formed a human chain throughout the day to move books from their old Clot headquarters, at 608 València, to the new one, at 588 València. The booksellers offered breakfast and vermouth to the volunteers, yes, . The news table was already taken to the new location a few days before and it also has a history. Before that, he did his services at La Retrobada, the second-hand bookstore in Poblenou. The first book they brought was Life Instructions for Use, by Georges Perec.

NOBODY CARES WHAT YOU THINK

Elena Quiroga was perhaps the rarest of the generation of "rare girls" that Carmen Martín Gaite spoke of and among which Ana María Matute, Carmen Kurtz and Carmen Laforet are also usually included. The author was very prolific, read and awarded prizes in the fifties and sixties (Nadal Prize in 1950, Critics Prize in 1960) and was also the second woman to join the RAE, that is, she was fully integrated into the literary establishment. of his time. Now, however, her name hardly rings a bell. The Bamba publishing house, which was born as the evolution of a digital literary magazine with the same name (the name comes from the expression "caballito de bamba", which was said about things of little value), has reissued Tristura, one of the most Quiroga's achievements, a Woolfian text in which the author transfers to her character, Tadea, many of the experiences of her childhood, which was strange and sad. Daughter number 16 of an aristocratic family (her father was the Count of San Martiño de Quiroga) of 17 children, the writer lost her mother and grew up with a grandmother and in a boarding school. The book is full of the reprimands received by the ladies in her class: “you don't run like you're crazy”, “you don't talk to the service”, “the little tears again. She keeps each one of her sorrows ”and the deadliest of all:“ nobody cares what you think ”.

GOODBYE DERRY GIRLS

“We are girls. We are poor. We are from Northern Ireland and we are Catholic, for Christ's sake!” This sums up the desperate situation of the character of Claire in the first episode of the third season of Derry Girls, when the girls fear that they will not pass a crucial exam. Lisa McGee's series for Netflix, about a group of girls (and a boy, James, honorary Derry Girl) during the end of the Troubles in Northern Ireland, has said goodbye with an impeccable third season. If season 2 ended on the day that Bill Clinton visited Derry and gave a historic speech there (which the girls in the series miss because they are busy with something more important: meeting James and staying together as a gang), the third and final closes with the signing of the peace accords on Good Friday. According to Lisa McGee, she did it because that was also the day Northern Ireland grew older.

THE MILI OF THE BTS

Ever since Elvis Presley agreed to join the US Army in 1958 and was photographed peeling off his famous toupee in a barber in New Jersey, many celebrities have found themselves in this dilemma: to do or not to do military service, to weigh which is worse, if accept the hiatus at a peak moment in their careers or count on the rejection that the opposite may entail among the most conservative and militaristic fans. In Israel there is often a lot of national debate about which celebrities get the hang of it (Bar Refaeli) and those who don't (Gal Gadot). And the K-Pop group BTS has been a public drama that has gone on for years, between supporters of giving them a pass and those who defended that they should do the Korean military like all men in South Korea. Finally, the seven members of BTS, who have exhausted all the extensions, will do the military service and will meet as a band in 2025.