A Year in Reading with Darryl Ratcliff
A 2022 awardee
Tell us what you read in 2024 that …
… ripped open a rabbit hole that you fell down for a while.
”The Curious Case of the 222 Other Artists who just Landed on the Moon who are not Jeff Koons” by Ben Davis in Artnet
… shook you up.
”Katt Williams Unleashed” on Shannon Sharpe’s YouTube podcast Club Shay Shay
… you’d recommend to other arts writers.
”500X Returns to Exposition Park and Leaves Behind the Rapidly Evolving Tin District” by Christopher Mosely in D magazine
“Winners cannot let losers rewrite history.”
“Cause P. Diddy be wanting to party, and you got to tell him no.”
“To be confident and not delusional is a real skill.”
These were just a few of the quotes from comedian Katt Williams’ interview with retired NFL tight end Shannon Sharpe on the podcast Club Shay Shay that started 2024 by melting the internet in January. Beyond the behind-the-scenes reveals and Hollywood gossip are also wonderful sequences about writing and commitment to craft while upholding personal codes of ethics. And at two hours and 46 minutes long and 82 million views, it also questions the wisdom that only short form/TikTok-length clips can achieve virality. For any writer who conducts interviews – this is a masterclass in “Let him cook” style.
Ben Davis’ “The Curious Case of the 222 Other Artists Who Just Landed on the Moon” (Artnet, March 1, 2024) skillfully takes us down a rabbit hole that is illuminating about linguistics versus reality. Short version: All sorts of people were claiming to be the first “Insert: type of creative” whose work was on the moon. The NFT rabbit hole and the reveal that all of these artists' work were on a tiny microdisc attached to the spacecraft is delightful.
Finally, Christopher Mosley’s “500X Returns to Exposition Park” in the July issue of D magazine is an exemplary example of structural criticism as he unravels a history of landlords, developers, neighborhoods, artist/organizers and media bias surrounding the oldest artist-run cooperative gallery in Texas.
