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I am someone who is very concerned with the flow of information, the use of information, and the preservation of information, including archives. I first heard about Marion Stokes when the Internet Archive began digitising all of her tapes that she had recorded 24/7 for 35 years, and I remembered her again when someone recommended the Internet Archive's now available section of the aforementioned digitised work. I heard about this documentary on her but I only just found one that was accessible to me and I thought I'd share it. I would say more but I literally finished watching it 10 minutes ago so I am still sitting with it and thinking thoughts, as one does. My initial thoughts are that it does a pretty good job of emphasising the significance of information as access, a means for knowledge and defining how people interact with the world, my other thought is that given how this documentary focuses on Marion Stokes the person (as it should imo) I'd love to see the director do another documentary, this time with an in depth focus on the process of digitising the tapes that Marion had. But yeah it is worth the watch.
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On a big ol’ documentary kick and have been steadily working through Adam Curtis’s filmography.
More than being informative and engaging, they’re almost like multimedia collage pieces. I read on his Wikipedia that he cites Robert Rauschenberg as an influence and I definitely see and feel that. Beautiful stuff. Great soundtracks.
He goes in so many different historical, geopolitical, cultural directions and somehow it doesn’t feel insane or boring or overwhelming. It‘s almost relieving to have someone articulate so clearly the depth of the mess we have made.
Most of his work can be found for free on YouTube/Internet Archive. Proceed w caution, may contribute to feelings of anger and frustration.
Mar 16, 2025
such a good documentary!!! i would've become obsesseddddd with this when i was in film school. as a music agent i'm always talking about the importance of knowing your copyright and *personality* rights as an artist, and this does a great job of highlighting that.
Oct 3, 2024
I have watched a couple music documentaries recently, ones on Arthur Russell and Judee Sill, and have enjoyed them. They are somewhat formulaic biopics so they aren’t super hard to process but offer a lot of information on the artistry of a person I find interesting and their music plays in the background and it gets in my head! They are also usually pretty short so you can throw them on if you have a spare hour and a half.
May 3, 2024
Top Recs from @ngaatee
Whether you need inspo, are curious about the discourse over the last few decades, want to get into a new hobby or whatever else, you can download open source magazine issues from decades past. They have magazines from as early as the early 1900s too! I have been obsessed with old video games lately so I have been looking at the old club nintendo magazines and it has been so fun. Like look at some of the covers these magazines used to have
Aug 7, 2024
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There is something about seeing someone be unconscious about something that they really love. The sincerity of it, the way they forget to be quiet if its in public, the way they gesture with their hands more. Its great 10/10 would recommend being passionate about your interests!
Jul 10, 2024
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This might be a strange solution but it may help: when you see something thats not a garment that you consider beautiful for whatever reason, photograph it and then use your wardrobe to try and capture that energy.
For example, I go on a lot of nature walks and something that happens a lot on my walks is that I'll see a lot of beautiful colours that I often don't see worn together, blends of textures like where the leaves of a tree meet the sky etc and so I try to capture that. Like that's how I realised that I love the colour combination of orange and grey.
To help I may then look through old magazines and cut out images to make scrapbook pages of inspiration, or if I have the influence of a particular era in mind to express the look I may look at stills of films from that decade (that's another way you can use pinterest that's not so algo heavy).
Then you just try stuff on and see how you feel, what you like about your attempts what you don't like etc. Ultimately imo the easiest way to avoid relying on algorithms for fashion inspiration is to take inspiration from things other than clothes and to practice translating the aesthetic principles into garments.
Do you like that one brutalist style building with hedges of wild flowers near the place you work? How do you express it in an outfit. Do you keep looking at the sheen of an apple before you bite into it? What fabrics might have a similar effect?
And then use the clothes that you have to try things and edit/style your looks until you get to things you like wearing.
Nov 2, 2024