Stanley Donwood’s new show, El Chupacabra, opens July 10th at the Weapon of Choice Gallery in Bristol, England. In other words, anyone living in England who doesn’t go to this show is taking for granted the fact that they don’t have to buy a $1,000 plane ticket to get to Bristol.

Donwood says about the show:

“There are thirteen Pandemons in the show called ‘el chupacabra’. Thirteen ghosts at the funeral. Thirteen spectres at the feast of the goat. Loitering on the blackened cliffs of free-market economics, cackling as they raise a glass to toast Milton Friedman, Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher and Augusto Pinochet. Gallons of paint I’ve poured over them to drown their snickering. But still they laugh.”

Read about it on the Weapon of Choice Gallery blog.

To me, Vera is the central axis around which The Wall revolves. It is a sudden moment of clarity amidst the madness of Pink’s life, a life that has reached a moment of crisis. You can compare Vera to its mirror image, the 4th track from the end of Part 1, One of my Turns, which shows us a frenzied and (maybe final) encounter with whatever lover is in Pink’s life currently.

After One of My Turns, Pink regrets his actions in Don’t Leave Now, finishes the trilogy of his wall-building with Another Brick in the Wall (Part III) and contemplates suicide in Goodbye Cruel World. Obviously, he doesn’t go through with it, because he then asks, Hey You, Is There Anybody Out There? and find his answer in Nobody Home.

This final realization about his absolute isolation and impending mental collapse gives way to a simple human yearning for the one person that this broken figure was able to love, and we get the short lyric about Vera Lynn.

Does anybody here remember Vera Lynn?
Remember how she said that we would meet again
Some sunny day.

Vera, Vera, what has become of you?
Does anybody else in here feel the way I do?

It seems obvious that if Vera had come back, as she swore she would, Pink wouldn’t be in such a mess. If he still had love, then it would be impossible to be completely surrounded by a wall. Due to this loss, and the realization of its finality, the wall is complete, and we move into the climax of the album, where Pink bounces between despair (Comforably Numb) and psychosis (In the Flesh) or both at the same time (Waiting for the Worms).

I love making glue books, and collage culture in general. I try to make it to a flea market at least 5 times a year to collect old ephemra, printed matter and a book. Often, choosing the book is an excrutiating task which basically revolves around this: “Which of these books can I destroy while creating a new work of art without feeling too bad about it?” I try to remind myself that most of the books will end up in the trash if no one buys them, so I am doing no great harm. However, this relunctance continues at home, where I read and scan over the book to make sure there is nothing in it that needs to be saved.

My latest purchase was Modern Times and the Living Past, by Henry Elson. Elson was, at the time of the book’s publication (1921), a Lecturer on History at New York University. It is a history text for school kids, probably junior high or high school, and covers history from the dawn of civilization through the end of “The World War.” In scanning the book for salvagable content, I soon found myself receiving my own history lesson, though not on Alexander the Great or Mary Queen of Scots or the other condensed stories in the book. Instead, I found a lesson on the great amount of intellectual racism still present in America in 1921. And no, we’re not talking about Selma, Alabama here, so all you New York City better-than-thou’s can wake up now: racism wasn’t a deep south, redneck phenomenon. It was often packaged and waxed eloquently by the big city professors. And we all know that supporting bigotry with reasoning, oratory and persuasiveness is much scarier than being that way because that’s “how your daddy raised ya.”

Now, it is common knowledge that all cultures have ethnocentricities. The ancient Greeks believed themselves to be the chosen group, as did the Egyptians, the Persians, the Hebrews, the Chinese, the Japanese, the Assyrians, the Nubians, the Sumerians, the Mayans, the Aztecs, the Zulu,  and on and on. However, the difference between old-world ethnocentrism and the opinons of a 20th century lecturer from New York University should be quite evident.

If you read the above section, it is hard to believe Elson has even studied history. First, he claims that white civilizations have “taken the lead” and been “foremost in the world’s progress.” The “Ethiopians” are glanced over with the statement “where many have adopted the civilization of white men” to reinforce his first point. Obviously, he doesn’t really know anything about Africa here. The most laughable is the direct attack on Asian culture, where he gets more aggressive, saying “after it reached a stage that we should pronounce half-civilized, two thousand or more years ago, its growth was checked and thereafter it made little progress until very recent times.” Indeed? So nothing happened in Asia between 100 BC and modern times? I guess we must then ignore the fantastic achievements of art and poetry, the mathematics and science, the great religions and philosophies, the invention of gunpowder and printing, and the marvelous cultures and wealth that so impressed Marco Polo and other European explorers.

Then we go to the Native Americans, who are basically glanced over as were the Africans. Elson says they were still living “in the polished stone age and in the hunting and fishing stage.” I guess he never heard about Mayan calenders that were significantly more accurate than the White mens’, the continent crossing trade routes, the farming, the enormous cities full of wealth, art and architecture.

Larson’s vocals are at times loud and forceful, at other times melodic and quiet–but they always sound honest. The lyrics–inspired by love, loss and life–are introspective, always searching for meaning and value in the topics they address.

After having gained recognition doing collaborative works with El Tono, street artist Nuria finally has her own space, complete with a wonderfully cute hand-embroidery theme. Make sure to check it out at nuriamora.com.

The hand-embroidery contrasts nicely with Nuria’s geometric sculptures and paintings. As a web developer, I have to admit I’m naturally a bit on edge about the almost exclusive use of images and image maps to construct the site, but I have a feeling Nuria will do fine without any extra SEO built in.

Personally, I feel that Nuria’s drawings really stand out: they seem very free and organic; bursting with color and energy. I would love to see more of this side of Nuria’s work, I feel much more of an impact from these liberated lines and forms than from the tightly controlled squares and rectangles.

A big shout out to Benjy Russell, who is responsible for the cover photograph and concepting. Also, I want to thank Jeremy, Jim and the band for giving me the opportunity to design such a successful album.