Lead Story
‘Escaping the gaze’: A review of John Foxx’s Tiny Colour Movies
This is a review of John Foxx’s Melbourne performance of Tiny Colour Movies, his found-film collection and live soundtrack. For the reviewer, witnessing this solved a two-year-old puzzle and brought everything full circle back to Ballard while doing so.
{More»} features
Negative acoustic space: Ballardian sound art»
This short piece about Ballardian sound art appeared in the CCCB’s catalogue for their Ballard exhibition. Accompanying this post is a 12-track muxtape featuring selections from the music curated for the event.
Rick McGrath’s Letter from Barcelona: The Exquisite Corpse, An Autopsy of the New Millennium»
Transmission from Barcelona stop Having a wonderful time stop I believe in nothing stop Lost in surreal image machine and deep-blue-drenched corridors stretching to infinity stop Startling comma perverse visuals stop Rare books and writing stop Exhibition a raging success stop JGB would be proud stop Full letter to follow comma Love Rick end transmission
Ballardoscope: some attempts at approaching the writer as a visionary»
Jordi Costa, the curator of J.G. Ballard: Autopsy of the New Millennium, currently exhibiting at the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona, gifts us this incisive analysis of the major themes in Ballard’s work. Accompanying the essay is the alternate version of the exhibition’s promo trailer.
J.G. Ballard: In the Raw»
Promotional film and catalogue prologue for the exhibition J.G. Ballard: Autopsy of the New Millennium, at the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona. Film features Marilyn Monroe’s ghost, Ballard’s mellifluous tones, snatched Aphex Twin, what looks like James Dean’s car and a severe case of the night terrors.
Ballardcraft: Ballard/Lovecraft»
What is the connection between J.G. Ballard and H.P. Lovecraft? Artist John Coulthart is well placed to offer some insight into what he terms ’superficial style at the service of a unique imagination’.
A Ballardian Burial»
The music of kode9 and Burial: just how ‘Ballardian’ is it? We investigate the viral spread of this apparent internet meme, detouring via Crash, The Drowned World and ‘The Sound-Sweep’.
Ballard and the Vicissitudes of Time»
Mike Holliday investigates a strange interregnum in Ballard’s career, three short stories that return to earlier concerns: psychological dislocations and disturbances, somehow caused by human space-flight, in our perception of the flow of time.
+ More from the FEATURES category.
interviews
The Light-Painter of Mojave D: An Interview with Troy Paiva»
Troy Paiva’s desert photography evokes the crumbling, decadent resorts and enervated cityscapes of Ballard’s Vermilion Sands and Hello America stories. Enjoy this interview with Troy, the Light-Painter of Mojave D.
‘Up a kind of sociological Amazon’: Ballard on Miracles»
Here’s the last in our batch of transcripts of recent Miracles promotions: James Naughtie’s interview with JGB for BBC Radio 4.
‘Obeying the surrealist formula’: Iain Sinclair & Hermione Lee on Ballard»
Here’s a transcription of the BBC Radio Front Row review of Miracles, presented by Mark Lawson and featuring Iain Sinclair and Hermione Lee.
‘Genius eye for the killer detail’: Parsons, Harris & Myerson on Ballard»
This one’s a transcript of BBC 2’s Newsnight Review segment on Miracles of Life. It features Tony Parsons, Julie Myerson and John Harris and is presented by Kirsty Wark.
‘Marinaded in war and violence’: Philip Dodd interviews J.G. Ballard»
Here’s a transcript of Philip Dodd’s recent BBC Radio 3 interview with JGB.
+ More from the INTERVIEWS category.
archival
‘Violence without end’: An Interview with J.G. Ballard»
This is the latest in Dan O’Hara’s back translations of German Ballard chats: an interview with JGB from 2005. This may well be the only time Ballard has been asked to consider the lyrics of Kanye West.
‘I really would not want to fuck George W. Bush!’: A Conversation with J.G. Ballard»
Dan O’Hara is back with another translation of a German Ballard interview, this time from 2007 with JGB in priapic, puckish form.
‘Der Visionär des Phantastischen’: An Interview with J.G. Ballard»
Another installment in Dan O’Hara’s re-translations of archival German Ballard interviews: a 1982 conversation conducted by Werner Fuchs and Joachim Körber.
‘It would be a mistake to write about the future’: J.G. Ballard in Conversation with Jörg Krichbaum and Rein A. Zondergeld»
This is the second of Dan O’Hara’s re-translations of JGB interviews originally published in German. This one dates from 1976, and in it Ballard provides comment on Russian writers and explains how film technique infiltrates and influences his own writing.
Munich Round-Up: Interview with J.G. Ballard»
Dan O’Hara has re-translated three interviews with JGB, originally published in German in the 60s, in which Ballard provides absorbing insight into his enviro-disaster trilogy: The Drowned World, The Drought and The Crystal World.
+ More from the REVIEWS category.
reviews
Simon Brook’s Minus One»
In 1991 Simon Brook made a short film from J.G. Ballard’s obscure 1963 short story, ‘Minus One’. Enjoy this super-rare screening of Simon’s film.
J.G. Ballard: The Oracle of Shepperton»
The final version of Thomas Cazals’ tribute, ‘J.G. Ballard: The Oracle of Shepperton’, has been released. It’s one of the stranger JGB ‘adaptations’ around, and is told with considerable flair and skill.
Ballard/Noys/Fisher»
A review of two academic articles written by Ben Noys on Ballard’s work, both analysing Ballard’s place in contemporary cultural production. This review also considers Mark Fisher’s recent Lacanian analysis of Basic Instinct 2, in an edition of Film-Philosophy edited by Noys, with its unearthing of intriguing Ballardian parallels.
How to Build a Utopia in Your Spare Time»
A review of Demanding the Impossible, the Third Australian Conference on Utopia, Dystopia and Science Fiction, held at Monash University, Clayton, Melbourne, Australia, Dec 5-7.
Review: Grave New World»
The basic tenet in Dominika Oramus’ new book on Ballard is that since the end of World War II western civilization has been merrily racing down the Highway to Hell in a white Pontiac; and all the evidence you need is in the fiction of J.G. Ballard.
+ More from the ARCHIVAL category.
