Review

20th October 2022

FLAUNTING SZAFKI
by
JOHNNY RODGER

Born and raised in Glasgow, the only child of a Russian emigre, painter Yusef Szafki was much influenced by literature in his visual artwork. In an endlessly creative life, he published two literary works, including one on engaging with the Russian/Ukrainian writer Nikolai Gogol (60’ N (1996) ). Arguably the bold dreamlike, exaggerated style of Szafki’s work is influenced heavily by Gogol’s character, and his writing in such famous stories as ‘Diary of a Madman’ and ‘The Nose’. Johnny Rodger reviews this retrospective as the first exhibition to attempt a survey across his life’s work, and appreciates Szafki's experimentation and his ever-developing concerns with form, tone and texture.
3rd June 2022

The ARCHES THEATRE:
The Unauthorised Autobiography
edited and introduced by Raymond Burke
reviewed by FOLOSA MELVILLE

The first book published in our 'Lost Institutions' series, it focuses on the early years of the legendary Glasgow theatre in the words of the actors who made it happen, collected and introduced by Raymond Burke. It was part of a thrilling scene says Folosa Melville in review.
3rd June 2022

GLASGOW COOL OF ART: 13 books of fire at the Mackintosh Library by Johnny Rodger reviewed by MURDO MACDONALD

A new book 'Glasgow Cool of Art: 13 books of fire at the Mackintosh Library' takes a personal, artistic, intellectual and critical view of the two fires in Mackintosh's masterwork. It attempts to square the trauma that the fires caused by looking at the effect on a wide range of people -adults, children, citizens, academics, artists, architects, and as Murdo Macdonald notes in review, addresses the challenge of the international worth or otherwise of that great building.
19th March 2022

TOMOKO KONOIKE
Storytelling Table Runner
by Naoko Mabon

Japanese Artist Tomoko Konoike brought her wonderful dialogic textile art to an event co-organised by The Drouth for Glasgow International last year. Curator Naoko Mabon first published this text on Konoike in the online version of the Japan Quality magazine (Tokyo: Fudosha Co.Ltd.) in February 2022.
21st January 2022

US OR THEM:
Kelman’s ‘The State is Your Enemy’
Reviewed by Federica Giardino

Three new books by James Kelman have just been published by PM Press of California. This must be an exciting time for both Kelman fans and for Kelman Studies. One new novel, one collection of essays, and and a philosophical debate between Kelman and Noam Chomsky -it's a lot to chew on. So The Drouth is delighted to be producing the first reviews of these new works. The final piece in our Kelman series is a review of his new collection of essays by researcher and writer Federica Giardino.
14th January 2022

‘GOD’S TEETH…’
James Kelman’s new novel
reviewed by Gerry Hassan

Three new books by James Kelman have just been published by PM Press of California. This must be an exciting time for both Kelman fans and for Kelman Studies. One new novel, one collection of essays, and and a philosophical debate between Kelman and Noam Chomsky -it's a lot to chew on. So The Drouth is delighted to be producing the first reviews of these new works. The second up in our Kelman series is a review of his new novel by writer Gerry Hassan.
5th January 2022

KELMAN & CHOMSKY Reviewed by Carole Jones

Three new books by James Kelman have just been published by PM Press of California. This must be an exciting time for both Kelman fans and for Kelman Studies. One new novel, one collection of essays, and and a philosophical debate between Kelman and Noam Chomsky -it's a lot to chew on. So The Drouth is delighted to be producing the first reviews of these new works. First up is literary critic and scholar Carole Jones with her reading of the decades long engagement between Kelman and Chomsky mapped out through this published collection of essays, interviews and correspondence between the two writers.
26th October 2021

Underneath the Arches :
building the foundations to fail better
by Neil Cooper

The loss of The Arches as a site for the eruption of anarchic creative collaborations of a generation through all forms imaginable was a shock. Did the forces of conservatism conspire to finish it off in 2015... or maybe its work was done there, and the spirit needed to move on anyway? Neil Cooper's review of Innes and Bratchpiece's history of the venue is epic and elegaic: it deserves all that and even more ...
30th September 2021

THOMAS JOSHUA COOPER :
‘The World’s Edge …’
by Dana Macfarlane

The Scotto-American photographer Thomas Joshua Cooper is a titan in his field. Dana Macfarlane reviews his new show, ‘The World’s Edge – The Atlas of Emptiness and Extremity’, at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery and discusses the tensions in the work which is 'unsettling' and 'subtly uncanny'.