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Curator Magazine On objects, experiences and the arts | A celebration of the best things humans make and do | Nonficti

17/03/2023

Dear Readers,

It has been silent at The Curator since the end of December. That’s because we’re on indefinite hiatus. That it’s taken this long to officially announce that fact is not ideal, but it’s been that kind of year.

The work The Curator has done for the past six years or so has all been completed by volunteers. We’ve been proud of the prose and poetry we’ve been able to share with our readers, even as we’ve felt overwhelmed, at times, by the responsibility of putting out two to three pieces of new writing every week while also balancing domestic life, work, and other responsibilities. In the end, we were reduced to just two volunteers from, at its peak, a team of eight. It became too much for us.

The money we earned from our Patreon account has been used to pay dozens and dozens of writers. We’ve been grateful that we’ve been able to do that. The money left over will be used to keep the domain name and WordPress account alive so that the thirteen+ years of writing The Curator has published will remain available to our readers. At least until that money runs out.

It may be that The Curator will rise again and publish beautifully crafted prose and poetry. We hope that’s the case. For now, we wish to thank anyone who has contributed work to the magazine and all who have read it.

Gratefully,

The Editors

"Maybe that’s why the cherubim began to grow on me. For all their kitsch aesthetic, with their rotund bellies and blank ...
12/09/2022

"Maybe that’s why the cherubim began to grow on me. For all their kitsch aesthetic, with their rotund bellies and blank faces, they existed in and for themselves. There was a nobility in their existence. They existed despite themselves as if for the sheer pleasure of existing. They were no longer a means to a marketable end. Their very presence was an act of defiance, a reminder that in a world obsessed with the “value” of things, art still exists for its own sake, beyond the interests of the bottom line."

Read "Plaster Cherubim" by Ryan Diaz:
https://www.curatormagazine.com/ryan-diaz/plaster-cherubim/

There they were, four plaster cherubim adorning our ceiling in the middle of our living room, their round faces and rounder bodies casting circular shadows against the white paint behind them. When…

"Ultimately, the voice of a generation reflects how it feels to be alive at a certain time for people of a certain age, ...
02/09/2022

"Ultimately, the voice of a generation reflects how it feels to be alive at a certain time for people of a certain age, and it’s fair to acknowledge the authenticity of Rooney’s stories to Millennials and Gen Z."

Read Michael Mazenko's "No More Salingers":
https://www.curatormagazine.com/michael-p-mazenko/no-more-salingers/

I once read a pop culture essay which identified thriller writer John Grisham as “this generation’s Charles Dickens.” Part of me smiled at the cool insight the reference provided to an author I enj…

Today we feature Peggy Heitmann's poem "Finding the Center," which you can read here:https://www.curatormagazine.com/peg...
01/09/2022

Today we feature Peggy Heitmann's poem "Finding the Center," which you can read here:
https://www.curatormagazine.com/peggy-heitmann/finding-the-center/

I enter my art studio, light a lavender candle and breathe in, calm then stare at the soft flame. Images swirl, cardinals, bluebirds. Crow emerges into view, and I contemplate her message, consider…

"The dotted lines connect | battle ropes roiling | Signs rush upto greet | slingshot away | It still means 8 days | from...
25/08/2022

"The dotted lines connect | battle ropes roiling | Signs rush up
to greet | slingshot away | It still means 8 days | from
home to here | The ferry wait takes forever | long lines of 2nd
and 3rd thoughts"
Read "If you drive fast enough" by Ren Pike here:

https://www.curatormagazine.com/ren-pike/if-you-drive-fast-enough/

The dotted lines connect | battle ropes roiling | Signs rush up to greet | slingshot away | It still means 8 days | from home to here | The ferry wait takes forever | long lines of 2nd and 3rd thou…

"Spaces that are most familiar to me are the ones others consider transient. Airports, taxis, waiting rooms, rest stops:...
22/08/2022

"Spaces that are most familiar to me are the ones others consider transient. Airports, taxis, waiting rooms, rest stops: places we enter with the sole purpose of leaving are places I feel most at ease in."

Read Sindhu Shivaprasad's latest:
https://www.curatormagazine.com/sindhu-shivaprasad/home-is-nowhere-and-everywhere-at-once/

On a Wednesday morning, I found myself on a Zoom call with a buyer for work. As time ticked on, we reached the inevitable no-man’s land, the gulf that calls for polite social conversation before hi…

“In the 1940s, Jewish cultural figures were connoisseurs and patriots of local art, but they were deprived of the right ...
17/08/2022

“In the 1940s, Jewish cultural figures were connoisseurs and patriots of local art, but they were deprived of the right to represent it, so they were “homeless patriots,” “rootless patriots,” “stateless patriots.” Their homeland was stolen from them. This was a phenomenon that could be called in Greek 'kleptopatria.'"
https://www.curatormagazine.com/alex-gordon/the-rootless-cosmopolitan/
Read Alex Gordon's “The Rootless Cosmopolitan”

“Kleptomania” in Greek is a morbid craving for theft, “kleptocracy” is the power of thieves, “kleptopatria” is the theft of the homeland, the taking away of the …

The Curator Thursday Poem is up! This week's is by Laurinda Lind. Read "Pyrotechnics" here:https://www.curatormagazine.c...
12/08/2022

The Curator Thursday Poem is up! This week's is by Laurinda Lind. Read "Pyrotechnics" here:
https://www.curatormagazine.com/laurinda-lind/pyrotechnics/

The other day online I saw the Strand in flames from forty years ago, the theater three blocks down once we moved into town where I faked it through fourth grade. The fire screaming into the sky as…

"Its bossa nova beats and infectiously whistleable melodies mesh perfectly with Stace’s smooth voice and clear delivery ...
08/08/2022

"Its bossa nova beats and infectiously whistleable melodies mesh perfectly with Stace’s smooth voice and clear delivery of his always clever, poetic lyrics. The listener can put on some headphones, pour themselves a fancy drink, close their eyes and imagine being in a classic nightclub or stylish lounge. It is a record to luxuriate in."

Read Danny Anderson's piece on Wesley Stace’s album, Late Style:
https://www.curatormagazine.com/danny-anderson/a-late-style-for-the-end-of-days/

The 2020’s have dragged the world through one disaster after another. For those of us interested in art, living in apocalyptic times can raise rather embarrassing questions. To use an example from …

“Lines strain past the limits of the canvas. Their movement is a reflection of Po***ck’s own motions in flinging paint o...
11/07/2022

“Lines strain past the limits of the canvas. Their movement is a reflection of Po***ck’s own motions in flinging paint onto the canvas, lending the painting immense physicality and dynamism, which is accentuated by the contrast between colors.”

We’re back with a new essay by Kathryn Sadakierski. Read “Contained Chaos: Layers of Meaning in Jackson’s Po***ck’s Number 9.”

Read on:
https://www.curatormagazine.com/kathryn-sadakierski/contained-chaos/

Jackson Po***ck ostensibly established himself as an artist unafraid to break from tradition, yet his painting Number 9 (1949) returns to the most rudimentary and essential elements of art. Rather …

"For most of my life, my propensity to seek the numinous has left me with feelings of being misunderstood, a stranger in...
12/04/2022

"For most of my life, my propensity to seek the numinous has left me with feelings of being misunderstood, a stranger in the world I inhabit. I always felt like I wanted more than other people—like my spirit was an insect’s antenna, constantly probing the air for passage into another reality."

Hallie Waugh on Longing, Landscapes and Anthony Doerr’s Cloud Cuckoo Land.
https://www.curatormagazine.com/hallie-waugh/landscapes-of-longing/

The first time I drive across the desert and into the Rio Grande valley, I swim into blue. The sky is as sharp and vast as I’ve ever seen it—blue so expansive and pure it hurts my eyes. In her bel…

…the day I found my dog at the stables he was little, black, scared and joyful, and I knew he was meant to be with me. I...
01/02/2022

…the day I found my dog at the stables he was little, black, scared and joyful, and I knew he was meant to be with me.

I named it right away, Calimero, after an old Italian cartoon featuring a black baby chick, and brought him home.

My parents said he had to leave the day after. The next day, Calimero was sleeping on the couch between the two of them.

Although he was little, not only would he join me on my horseback riding routes, but he would guide them, eventually getting mad at my horses if they didn’t walk fast enough, or follow his instructions.

Over the years, he collected the most weird, extraordinary adventures, and since he never got sick and always kept his puppy’s energy, the legend that Calimero was immortal became popular among my friends and family friends.

In 2019 my parents started lamenting that my dog couldn’t walk like he used to. They had to help him get on the couch or in bed and his appetite wasn’t good.

He was seventeen. I saw him every morning on FaceTime, from Los Angeles, and dismissed the implications: my dog wasn’t going to die.

“The Summer When My Dog Died”

An evocative (and strangely suspenseful!) essay by

Photo from unsplash, by

30/01/2022

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