Transform your mind: the sun’s gravity
We are not only being pulled down towards the earth. There is a distant yet tremendously greater force influencing and choreographing our days: the sun, the orgasmic burning centre of our solar system.
The sun: To build or not to build?
The history of philosophy can be reduced to a hypothetical conversation between the structure builder, Plato, and the artifice destroyer, Diogenes.
Platform
Platform, acrylic and oil on linen. 146 x 180cm. 2020. Jose Castiella.
I must keep from breaking into the story by force
When I met Joy Harjo, I fell under the spell of her sylvan gaze. I felt I was before a kind of astrolabe that ponders the silences of heaven and earth. She read us her verses and sang, and her song caught up and drew together the invisible threads that tie us to those who came before us.
Two short cadenzas
Two short cadenzas for two non-existent concertos! David Braid.
He Contains Multitudes: Dylan’s new album keeps the mystery going
When the radio did a midnight reveal of his latest album “Rough and Rowdy Ways” on Thursday night, it felt like Bob Dylan had made way for the Bob Zimmerman underneath. Transitioning from Mercury to Mercurius. Here was an old friend checking in and leaving his mask at the door. Or is it just another one?
Who is Mercurius?
There are deep currents to the alchemical personality of Mercurius. Mercurius stands not only for political transformation, but also spiritual, philosophical and psychological perfection.
Mercuries #2: One hour in Vilnius
The material of literature is language and the material of performance is liveness. These improvised, talking performances explore the various tropes of public speaking, such as recitation, reading and introductions. They tend to grow from small gestures into weirder things.
Metamorphosis
Metamorphosis by Ariadna. Presented to the public for the first time by Mercurius Magazine.
Noli me tangere
Noli me tangere. C-print on paper, 65 x 65 cm, 2020. Victor Manzanal.
Meditations: The Dark Rose
The wind the sun the hum
The drip the drop the distraction
Finding aether in the everyday
We each have access to it, the ethereal element that makes life radiant. The secret and pervasive teachings of the sky-keepers seek to leave us in doubt of this, to keep humanity in their chains and mind-forged manacles. They have kept individuals, enterprises, and whole cities tethered to destructive and self-destructive habits. How can we find our way back to our own reserves of aether?
Whatever you're doing, compassion helps
Ideas can be inspiring and dangerous, amusing and alienating. They move from head to head, from individual to individual. But sometimes they lose the leash and become stray. Ideas begin floating, collapsing into each other, mutating. We inhale them. They intoxicate us.
The fifth flavour: The hunt for umami
“Umami” is a wonderful, mystery-shrouded word that roughly translates as “delicious savoury taste”. Now recognised as the fifth flavour, alongside salt, sweet, bitter and sour, Umami’s entrance into our culinary consciousness has been curious and treacherous.
The fifth element(s): Time, space and consciousness
The fifth element is the most mysterious of all the elements. It is the missing link that crowns and completes our earthly knowledge.
Strings in blue
This composition has less to do with the blues than the blue of an abstract painting. Written specifically for electric guitar, with determined (modest) effects of reverb and occasional chorus pedal.
Meditations: Air
As the borough and bankside start to receive an influx of 200 skyscrapers, the trees are dwarfed. Can they survive?
The thin place
In Gaelic, the “thin place” translates as “closest place to heaven on Earth”. The cloud appears to touch the water. As you gaze on the iron clad surface, the peaty mud between your toes, a deafening silence surrounds your ears.
Air and food: How smoking made a comeback
Smoking food has been part of our culinary culture since Prometheus came hurtling down from Olympus bearing his gift of fire. There is a perfectly good reason for this. Smoke contains chemicals that act as preserving agents. Before the days of mass refrigeration, drying and smoking were critical for human survival, as meat and other foods could be preserved throughout winter.
Air: the double magic of words
Words themselves are empty: hollow draughts of spit encasing air. In Tarot cards, the element of air is defined by swords that cut both ways. Words foster clarity or wreak havoc and self-harm. We should be careful how we use them.
The never-ending quest…
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