What Have I Been Up To - Books


Since I finished my master’s programme in January I find more time to read. Apart from non-fiction art books I didn’t read much of fiction. So, two days ago I finished Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger. I liked it even though I found it slow paced. It’s a weird story, especially what happens near the end. I had the impression it was a perfectly normal thing to do and at the same time deeply disturbing. I’ll write more about it in a separate post. Another book I read even before Her Fearful Symmetry is The Cyclist Conspiracy by Svetislav Basara. I liked this one even more than Niffeneggers, but it’s a totally different book, so in a way incomparable. I will be writing about it in connection with What’s in a Name 2017 book challenge. I started Quiet Life by Kenzaburo Oe, a book my mom gave me after she got it from my uncle. I read the first two chapters which seem like vignettes from a life of a young woman left to care for her mentally handicapped older brother after their parents left for America. So far I find it interesting.

The older I get, the more joy I find in buying books. Last month I bought The Secret Lives of Colour by Kassia St Clair and Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami. The secret Lives of Colour is about … well, colours. It seems to be an interesting book and a beautiful one as well. It’s got beautiful endpapers and colourful page edges, not to mention the cover with debossed little colourful circles. I bought Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World because it’s Murakami. I get this unexplainable urge to have his books. I don’t know what the reason is, but I just have to own them.

After I finished my master’s studies I resolved to continue reading non-fiction books about art. I’m currently reading Monochrome: Darkness and Light in Contemporary Art by Craig Staff, which unfortunately doesn’t blow me away. I work with a limited palette, so I was excited when I found this book in my local bookshop, but when I finally started reading it, it sort of didn’t quite work for me, or it doesn’t meet my expectations.

Another thing I want to spend more time reading is poetry. It’s been ages since I seriously read poetry. First two books I’m going to read are Santa Maria Della Salute by a Serbian poet Laza Kostić and Phoenix by a Chinese poet Ouyang Jianghe connected to the installation art by the same name by Xu Bing. I wrote about Xu Bing in my thesis and later went to see Phoenix when it was exhibited in La Biennale di Venezia in 2015.

Last week M and I wanted to go to Zagreb to see the exhibition about Art Nouveau: Zagreb - Vienna. Due to a number of reasons I’m not going to go into, we didn’t go. We went to Graz instead, to visit my favourite art supplies shop. I wanted to pick up their catalogue for 2017 and buy a book they issue each year covering a number of contemporary artists which I find inspirational. Since I don’t go there every day, I had to look around and see what’s new and I ended up buying a book about abstract watercolours by Lydia Leydolf. The more I look at them, the more I wonder how she achieved certain effects. I’ll just have to try won’t I?

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Po zaključki magistrskega študija imam končno več časa za branje. Prej nisem toliko brala leposlovja, bolj strokovno literaturo s področja estetike in umetnosti. v zadnjem času sem to popravila, tako da sem pred nekaj dnevi končala Njeno skrivnostno dvojčico Audrey Niffenegger. Ne glede na to, da je dogajanje precej počasno, mi je bila knjiga všeč. Zgodba je milo rečeno čudna, posebej tisti del proti koncu. Napisana pa je tako, da sem dobila občutek kot da berem nekaj povsem normalnega, a hkrati globoko čudaškega (beri bolnega). O njeni skrivnostni dvojčici bom pisala v posebni objavi, tega ne moreš povedati v nekaj stavkih. Še pred to knjigo sem brala Famo o Kolesarjih Svetislava Basare, ki mi je bila še bolj všeč, je pa precej drugačno branje in zato neprimerljivo. Tudi o Fami bom pisala posebej, v okviru branlega izziva Kaj je v imenu 2017. Trenutno berem Enostavno življenje Kenzabura Oa, knjigo, ki mi je dala mama. Prebrala sem prvi dve poglavji, ki sta kot vinjeti iz življenja mlade ženske, ki skrbi za duševno hendikepiranega starejšega brata, potem ko sta starša odšla v Ameriko. Zaenkrat je zanimivo.

Starejša ko sem, več veselja najdem v kupovanju knjig. Prejšnji mesec sem si privoščila Skrivno življenje barv Kassie St Clair in knjigo (ne bom prevajala naslova, ker bi bilo nesmiselno, raje to prepustim prevajalcu, ko bo prišel do tega) Harukija Murakamija. Skrivno življenje barv obravnava, no-ja, barve. Po opisih sodeč je zanimiva knjiga, pa še lepa po vrhu, polna barv, tako znotraj kot na platnicah. Zakaj Murakamija? Ker je pač Murakami. Vsake toliko me napade nerazložljiva želja po kupovanju njegovih knjig. Ne znam razložiti zakaj, a jih enostavno moram imeti. :-)

Čeprav mi ni več treba brati strokovne literature, da bi napisala magistrsko nalogo, še ne pomeni, da je ne bom več brala. Glede na to, da me področje zanima, se bom še vedno poglabljala vanj. Trenutno prebiram Monokrom Craiga Staffa in z žalostjo v srcu ugotavljam, da me ne gane pretirano. Slikam z omejenim naborom barv v eni sliki, velikokrat uporabljam samo eno barvo + belo in sem se prav razveselila, ko sem knjigo našla v lokalni knjigarni. Trenutno ugotavljam, da nekako ne izpolnjuje mojih pričakovanj.

Še ena od mojih nedavnih bralnih odločitev je, da bom v bralni seznam vključila poezijo. Nekoč sem jo brala precej več kot sedaj, ko se je lotim bolj izjemoma, čeprav jo imam še vedno rada. Za ponoven začetek sem si izbrala Santa Maria Della Salute srbskega pesnika Laze Kostića in Feniks kitajskega pesnika Ouyanga Jiangheja. Slednja je povezana z istoimensko instalacijo Xu Binga, o kateri sem pisala v diplomski nalogi in sem jo tudi imela priložnost videli na beneškem Bienalu leta 2015.

Prejšnji teden sva z M-jem načrtovala odhod v Zagreb, kjer bi si ogledala razstavo Izziv moderne - Zagreb Dunaj v Klovićevih dvorih, vendar zaradi različnih razlogov, o katerih ne bom izgubljala besed, nisva šla. Namesto tega sva šla v Gradec, v mojo najljubšo trgovino z umetniških materialom. Namen je bil, da vzameva katalog in knjigo, ki jo izdajo vsako leto in vsebuje predstavitve različnih sodobnih umetnikov, vendar se je tudi tokrat nevarnost trgovine pokazala sama. Našla sem še nekaj drobnarij in knjigo o Abstraktnem akvarelu Lydie Leydolf. Bolj ko si jih ogledujem, bolj se sprašujem kako je dosegla nekatere učinke. Je to kar gledam res čisti akvarel? Bo treba poskusiti, ne?


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