Saatchi Gallery/Deutsche Bank Art Prize
Vision, March 2014 It was the painting that everyone kept returning to. Whitney Khan’s image of a young girl breaking through the placid surface of a swimming pool into the fresh air may not have […]
Latest work
Rabih Alameddine gets all unnecessary
The National, March 2014 Authors are faced with a multitude of challenges when they set out on the long road to fashioning their latest opus. Plotting, ideas, settings, characters – all are key. But the […]
Independent Foreign Fiction Prize longlist recognises Arabic fiction
Great to see Hassan Blasim’s short story collection The Iraqi Christ on the longlist for the 2014 Independent Foreign Fiction Prize . It seems like a long time since I caught up with him at Manchester Piccadilly, […]
Five reasons Eric Clapton is the true Guitar Hero
The National, March 2014 1. Guitar Hero? Eric Clapton actually created the idea In 1963 BC (Before Clapton), The Beatles were celebrating their first No 1 single. But competing with Merseybeat was the nascent blues-rock […]
Of Mice And Men At West Yorkshire Playhouse
The Stage, March 2014 In a quite fabulous opening scene, musical director and composer Heather Christian slowly walks barefoot through a swamp, intoning the harsh sounds of dustbowl America as she goes. Her discordant, folky […]