Kevin Kelly on making life count, new books, Studio Ghibli artist Kazuo Oga’s painting process, porcupettes (say what?), and much more in The Zone No. 14.
The snow is gone, and the gray is back, but who cares? It’s time for The Zone!
- Jahna Vashti is one of my favorite artists, and I just bought this illustration, Waltz of Winter, for my home office. I had it on my wish list for years, and I decided it was time to act.
- Jorge Carrión, the acclaimed author of Bookshops…, is back with a new book, Against Amazon: and Other Essays, and I can’t wait to read it. (It’s on my wish list, where there are so many books now that it may take a while until I get to it, but I will, eventually).
- George Saunders on the Vitality of Fiction in Increasingly Turbulent Times. And another book added to said wish list, Saunder’s A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, that guides the reader through seven classic Russian short stories he’s been teaching for twenty years in his MFA creative writing program at Syracuse University.
- NASA’s photos of aurora borealis are not of this Earth (pun intended).
- A baby porcupine is called a porcupette!
- Studio Ghibli Artist Kazuo Oga Painting Process. Fascinating to watch the slow and painstaking creation of one image. Kazuo Oga is the background artist credited as art director on Studio Ghibli’s movies My Neighbor Totoro, Only Yesterday, Pom Poko, and others. He’s collected some of his wonderful illustrations in two books, but unfortunately, they’re only available in Japanese.
- Let’s stay in Japan: teamLab‘s new immersive art installation at the Kairakuen Garden is, of course, breath-taking. I’ve seen teamLab’s Planets during our 2018 Japan trip and I would have loved to see this one. Covid-19 put a stop to it. Fingers crossed for the next one.
- January 21st is the Squirrel Appreciation Day. Here’s a squirrel for you! We have several squirrels visiting our garden (read: raiding the bird-feeders), and this one is the bravest. She’ll tolerate me and my camera within a couple of meters, but only if nuts are exchangins paws.
My Zone
A Quote I’m Pondering
Talent is insignificant. I know a lot of talented ruins. Beyond talent lie all the usual words: discipline, love, luck, but, most of all, endurance
James Baldwin, Paris Review Interviews II
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