The latest Lord Yamada story, "Sanji's Demon," just sold to Beneath Ceaseless Skies. At 11,300 words, it's the second-longest Yamada yet, just behind "Moon Viewing at Shijo Bridge."

Current mood: cheerful.
Current music: "Cherry Blossom" - Keiko Matsui.

Read 2 Notes -Make Notes

What is the secret contained in Philip Schuyler's painting? Who was the woman he depicted, the innocent woman and her dark stalker? The Kreunen sisters know, but they must re-bury the past. And Jacob Lerner, artist flailing in a sea of commerce, can only press forward, explore his own art and the mystery of Schuyler's painting, aided and manipulated by an animate marionette of rosy glass...

Manhattan, summer, in the rosy dawn of the 21st century, the sculptor Jacob Lerner sees a painting at a friend's apartment and is drawn into an obsessive search for traces of its long-dead painter, fictional 19th-century artist Philip Schuyler, and his subject, a woman called Madame Burgundy. The search leads to the remains of a once-powerful but still wealthy Dutch-American secret society, and carries Lerner through real and surreal Manhattan streets, buildings, and countryside. Finding Schuyler's journal draws Lerner in deeper. Finding the dapper marionette makes it impossible for Lerner to escape.

The Painting and the City tells a story of art and its conflict with commerce, the way art can (literally) reshape the world, and the consequences of such a reshaping.

The Centre for Dissenting Studies.

I'm sure that's a constant hurly-burly of people heckling the tutor and disagreeing with one another...

Not to mention the holes in the seminar room door from people nailing up their 95, plus or minus, theses at regular intervals.

This entry was originally posted at http://oursin.dreamwidth.org/1060392.html. Please comment there using OpenID.

One of my favorite quotes from the Buffy the Vampire Slayer TV series:

Riley: Psychologically this is fascinating, doesn't it make everyone wanna lock them in separate rooms and do experiments on them? [everyone stares]...Just me then.

Current mood: contemplative.

Make Notes

Originally published at Cheryl's Mewsings. Please leave any comments there.

One of the disadvantages of living in Darkest Somerset is that there isn’t much work here that calls for someone with my particular skill set. However, thanks to a tweet from Nalo Hopkinson I have discovered something interesting. Some people in Cheddar are looking to recruit a witch. It does involve living in a cave, but that’s not so unusual around here, and I do appear to be well qualified. I’m old, very ugly, fond of cats, and well versed in magical theory. Unfortunately what they actually want is an actress who is fond of children. I have an unfortunate tendency to want to put badly-behaved kids in a cauldron and make Stew from them. I don’t suppose that would go down well.

You can tell it is an acting job by the fact they talk about auditions and expect people to arrive early to be first in the queue. If all goes well the winner will arrive late, flying in on an umbrella and landing at the front of the queue.

http://www.cartoonbank.com/product_details.asp?sid=39528

Seen recently, announcement relating to a Centre for Surrealism Studies.

Ideally, this would be as follows:

The Centre is situated within a several times life-size model of a giraffe; entrance is by way of the funicular under its tail.

As you step out of the car (which is shaped like a urinal) a large white rabbit hits you with a balloon and tells you to appreciate the exquisite copulation of an umbrella and a sewing machine on an operating table, then pulls out a pocket watch, shrieks, 'I'm late!!' and rushes off.

A woman wearing a lobster on her head gives you a stuffed octopus.

The seminar room is reached via a labyrinth which combines images from the Capuchins vault in Rome with the effects from a really down-market seaside funfair ghost train.

The interior of the seminar room resembles a 1900 Prague insurance office dumped into a French 3rd Republic high-class bordello. Soft clocks drip from every surface, all telling different times and some going backwards.

You open the book on the desk in front of you. A jack in the box in the semblance of Salvador Dali pops up...