I spent the hurricane weekend without electricity and thinking hard about what it means to pursue art, to choose your own voice over the mean of one’s peers, to live outside the (once?) art hubs of New York and Los Angeles, and what might be possible if the goal is expression and not “success” (are these mutually opposed? complementary?). I came to no conclusions. I ate thai food. I scratched the heads of my cats. Tye and I drove into the countryside and walked by the crumbling brick edifices of old railroad towns. I continue to mull. —LJ

LITERARY EPHEMERA
Marilyn Monroe’s personal library
Truman Capote’s remains are being auctioned off in Los Angeles
The best facts Kathryn Schulz learned from books in 2015

ART BECAUSE LIFE
Top 10 words I’m sick of seeing on artist statements
May-Linn Aaslie
Mike Lacher

SCIENCE
Women Nerd Superheroes
Winter dreaming: snowflake gallery

DESIGN
Squid and Owl designs
An exceptional design website (from Korea)

FILM
Exceptional films: Westward the Women (1951)
Jean Genet’s Un Chant d’Amour (NSFW early erotic queer film)

FREDDIE MERCURY
A Russian fan’s tribute to Freddie Mercury
Freddie was Bi
Munich interview

IT ME
A comic about Introversion

Image credit
(Pro-tip: email subscribers click headline for shirtless Freddie Mercury pic)