I enjoyed reading this article by Salman Rushdie in today's New York Times. If you have time please read it. In terms of expressing the issues that are affecting artists and writers globally (and also our literary, artistic and intellectual heritage across all countries and cultures) it makes ...Read more>

An extraordinary interview by an Australian abroad who is rarely discussed or featured in the Australian media and, I would venture to say, is rarely thought of by Australians.   The Rolling Stone  interview of Julian Assange is important, and can be read online ...Read more>

I donated to this, and hope you find the time (soon) to read and/or donate to run these ads in US newspapers before the meeting between Israel and the Obama administration in the coming days to discuss possible pre-emptive strikes against Iran.  If you cannot donate, you can ...Read more>

Mark Twain once said, "History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme."  That's race relations in Australia today.   I admire the simple, straightforward call by Dr Charlie Teo for Australia to address racism on Australia Day.  As an Asian-Australian I deeply sympathise with Dr Teo's speech.  ...Read more>

Within the last 72 hours, soldier's cheered the closing of the gates and the end of the Iraq War which has destroyed more than the lives of nearly 4,840 soldiers (4,500 American) plus a conservatively reported 100,000 Iraqi lives.
It destroyed our trust in our capacity to overcome our nature. ...Read more>

Enough words. The breathtaking beauty of the Nightblooming Cereus ( Hylocereus undatus) on our front porch brings me back to what matters. It's so startling in its perfection, it's temporary existence, which is here and gone in one night. Like us.  Who needs a temple?

...Read more>

I want to post Richard Flanagan's very brave and eloquent extract from his closing address at the 2011 Melbourne Writers' Festival- ‘The Australian Disease: The Decline of Love and the Rise of Non-freedom’ . It's strange, ten years ago the reasoning behind this piece wouldn't be under such ...Read more>

I was recently asked about a range of views in an interview and some of those questions made me ask myself in what ways art and politics interact. I think they have always been part of the social commentary, reflecting the emotions and perceptions around them. ...Read more>

OK, so I never knew Einstein, but I can't imagine he would object to being challenged. He'd probably relish it. As  Don Howard, a lecturer on Einstein at Notre Dame University said on  NPR, "this is the glory of science" (Experiments are allowed, even encouraged, to challenge ...Read more>

Recently I clambered into a black taxi cab in London. The driver remembered me as having had a nice long chat with him the last time I was in his cab (I seem to recall his thesis at that time was the London riots as a communist or Tory ...Read more>

The contemporary trend for global conflict is the dehumanisation of warfare and, in particular, extrajurisdictional killings by Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs or drones). Recently The Washington Post reported on the Aspen Security Conference, where CBS News and 60 Minutes Correspondent ...Read more>

Today, as I was listening on the bus to Greg and Michael's performance version of the Song of Roland (see my post)  I was also contemplating the role of memory. It still amazes me the way Michael’s translations are helping to generate content, ...Read more>

Whoever thought we would ever feel nostalgic about the Nuremburg Trials ? Well, times change don't they? They get foggy. Violent. When I heard about the shot that killed Bin Laden, this song came to mind from my teen years. I thought about what being human ...Read more>

On the one hand I embrace my research on technology, but at the same time, I seem stubbornly out of time. I keep painting. I keep reading that "death of painting" was all a big mistake, and suddenly there are a ton of editorials embracing paint. While I am ...Read more>

Are poets the front-line soldiers of our collective consciousness? If so, then where are the medics when they are wounded by the ugliness of today's 24/7 news cycle? Why are they any less the protectors of our world than guns and drones and eavesdropping dragonflies hunting for dirty bombs? ...Read more>

It is the intimate, personal, penetratingly perceptive touch,
indeed, that is equipped to furnish a chapter
that would have been missing were the camera exclusively relied upon.

--New York Times review of combat art show, 1943 One link between artists and soldiers is the promise of appreciation (immortality?) after ...Read more>

[image: Juan Antonio de Frías y Escalante. Inmaculada Concepción] I had to share this because it is so fascinating and strange and I'm using the ideas in my paintings.
I discovered the concept of the digital offspring of researchers at Michigan State University who "live" in a computer and ...Read more>

Fair as the 3 independents' intentions are, their decision to return an incompetent and deeply unethical Government is proof that process isn't a measure of quality by any means. It helps, but reason without wisdom, always falls flat. Why waste the words? Anyway, Théodore Géricault did ...Read more>

  An Aussie Götterdämmerung. Bear with us, this is an odd time for all and we're figuring it out. It’s odd. This hung parliament has done very little to inspire me to represent Australia at its worst in an image. You'd think I'd want to ...Read more>

The trees beside the river where I live are imbued with memory, wisdom and silent stories that deserve to be listened to ... like memorials, trapped in stone, bronze and iron, wishing for release into the morning air...

On this day each year, I re-read the poems of ...Read more>

   
Quick Note: Some very disturbing new Australian legislation has passed in the state of New South Wales (NSW) that targets and holds artists responsible for the terrible crime of child pornography.  This legislation doesn't regulate the ...Read more>

I posted a comment on CultureFuture - A blog about the future of art, the future of politics, and the conversation that makes up our culture.  On Thursday, January 7, 2010 CultureFuture wrote in Grassroots + Power VI: Separation Between Arts and State?:

"A ...Read more>

This publication ran from 2006-2009

Daily Constitutional Launch - By Proxy (Issue 6, Summer 2008, Saturday, August 16, 2008, 5:00-7:00 pm.
Printed Matter, Inc. is pleased to announce a launch for Issue 6 ("By Proxy") of the Daily Constitutional, a bi-annual magazine devoted to providing ...Read more>

The April cover of Modern Painters came out with a cover on Art & War at the same time that US artist Steve Kurtz's case finally got thrown out of court. He was cleared of FBI suspicions of bio-terrorism for growing bacteria in petri dishes ...Read more>