Latest news with #Tupinambá
New Statesman
30-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New Statesman
From Philippe Sands to Simon Park: new books reviewed in short
Wreckers: Disaster in the Age of Discovery by Simon Park According to Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations, the discoveries of America and a passage to the East Indies by Columbus and Vasco da Gama were 'the two greatest and most important events recorded in the history of mankind'. What wasn't recorded quite so diligently were the disasters, privations, deaths and sheer haplessness that accompanied the 16th-century voyages into the unknown. In this rollicking but reflective account of those early sorties, the Oxford historian Simon Park presents an alternative view of the 'action-hero version of history'. Wreckers is about the mariners who ended up 'kidnapped, stranded, abandoned and betrayed' in the pursuit of personal wealth and national glory and of the numerous attempts at colonisation that failed. Park is an adroit storyteller and makes the most of his picaresque stories, such as that of the German explorer Hans Staden, taken captive by the Tupinambá people of Brazil who kept him in a state of permanent fear with threats of eating him, and Martin Frobisher, who sought the North-West Passage but returned defeated with nothing more than a hold full of rocks. Empire-building, says Park, was not 'unstoppable' but uncertain. By Michael Prodger Viking, 368pp, £25. Buy the book The Dream Factory: London's First Playhouse and the Making of William Shakespeare by Daniel Swift Walking down London's West End, it's hard to imagine the capital without a single theatre. But theatre-less London did exist – until 1576 when the city's first ever playhouse was erected in Shoreditch. Daniel Swift's The Dream Factory traces the remarkable history of the aptly named playhouse, the Theatre, thanks to numerous litigations associated with the family behind it – the Burbages. Without James Burbage and the Theatre two significant parts of the history of theatre would be missing: Shakespeare and the Globe. Shakespeare began his writing in the Burbages' playhouse. It was here that A Midsummer Night's Dream and Romeo and Juliet were written, and the son of James Burbage, Richard, is thought to have inspired many well-known Shakespearean characters. Deftly navigating social politics, the plague and preachers wishing for the Theatre's downfall, Swift tells its history in the most original way. The Burbages' dramatic life truly was well suited to their industry. By Zuzanna Lachendro Yale University Press, 320pp, £25. Buy the book 38 Londres Street: On Impunity, Pinochet in England and a Nazi in Patagonia by Philippe Sands Calle Londres intersects Calle París in central Santiago. Once a place of the elite, it was revitalised by cultural and political figures in the mid-20th century. Calle Londres 38, after which the bestselling author Philippe Sands' latest book is titled, was an unassuming house – until the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. Under Pinochet, Londres 38 was turned into the detention and torture centre of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA). Sands' 38 Londres Street is a gripping blend of memoir, investigative journalism and courtroom drama, with a narrative spanning decades and thousands of miles. It includes his own involvement as a barrister for a human rights organisation during the 1998 arrest of Pinochet in London, and his discovery of personal links to those affected by the dictator's regime and to the murders of Walther Rauff, the Nazi behind the gas vans used to kill thousands of Jews. Speaking to lawyers involved in Pinochet's later trial, Chileans affected by DINA's torture and disappearances and those who knew Rauff (after he settled in the city of Punta Arenas), Sands convincingly makes a connection between Pinochet's regime and the Nazi in exile. Most importantly, he shows why the dictatorship must not be tucked away into the past. By Zuzanna Lachendro Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 480pp, £25. Buy the book The Fall of the House of Montagu by Robert Wainwright On 24 January 2017, Alexander Montagu, the 13th Duke of Manchester, was sentenced to prison in Nevada for a melange of offences. He served 14 months in jail. Shortly before he committed a burglary, in 2016, he made a visit to his ancestral seat, Kimbolton Castle, and visited the family crypt, where his father and grandparents are buried. He was only a guest, however: the estate is now the home of a public school. Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe 'How did it come to this?' you might ask, and if you did Robert Wainwright is your man. His new book closes with Alexander's sorry tale, the most recent tragedy in the decline and dissolution of a family first granted land by William the Conqueror. In some ways the story is typical: financial troubles thanks to mounting death duties; American heiress wives imported to maintain solvency; the eventual sale of the estate in a changing postwar landscape. But the Montagu story provides enough diverting specificities – bankruptcy, gambling dens and colonial exile – to make this a dramatic and pathos-inducing read. By Nicholas Harris Allen & Unwin, 352pp, £22. Buy the book [See also: Joan Didion without her style] Related
The Guardian
16-02-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Embrace of Indigenous artists reaches London thanks to influence of Venice Biennale
At last year's Venice Biennale, the pavilions were packed with indigenous art from around the world. Artists from the Tupinambá community in Brazil sat alongside work by the late Rosa Elena Curruchich, who made pieces about Indigenous women in Guatemala. The Amazonian artist Aycoobo was celebrated, as were carvings by the Māori artist Fred Graham. The eventual winner of the Golden Lion – the event's highest accolade – was the Indigenous Australian artist Archie Moore. The biennale's curator, Adriano Pedrosa, said the event's theme of Strangers Everywhere included 'the Indigenous artist, frequently treated as a foreigner in their own land'. Now Indigenous artists had seemingly taken over. The influence of Venice is reaching these shores. After the event, Tate launched a fund aimed at increasing the representation of Indigenous works in its collection. This year it will host a retrospective of the Indigenous Australian artist Emily Kam Kngwarray, while Ames Yavuz gallery, specialists in Indigenous Australian art, are to open a London outpost this spring. Curators and artists have spoken about this being a time of overdue recognition, while others are cautious about the longevity of this moment. 'It's definitely the zeitgeist at the moment,' said Dianne Tanzer of the Australian gallery This Is No Fantasy, which is exhibiting the Indigenous artist Johnathon World Peace Bush at Frieze Cork Street in central London from 27 February. 'At some stage who knows when it becomes unfashionable … it's like everything in life, it's not going to be forever but we hope we get the best of it while it lasts,' she added. 'It's not a bubble,' said Pippy Houldsworth, whose gallery is showing the indigenous American artist Mario Martinez's first UK show. 'Look at the huge excitement about black artists over the last few years. That hasn't come and gone by any means, it's just brought greater recognition to a greater number of people who have been sidelined in the past.' Since Venice, a backlash has emerged. In December 2024, Harper's Magazine ran a cover feature by the Spike magazine critic Dean Kissick. He observed that all the major biennale's he had visited in recent years had embraced 'overlooked artists from the 20th century and exhibited recycled junk, traditional craft, and folk art'. The art world's worthy fixation on all things 'identity' had, he said, replaced the 'spectacle and innovation' of work from a decade ago. Kelli Cole, a curator at the National Gallery of Australia, said in the context of a new Trump presidency and a political shift to the right, indigenous shows could face further criticism. 'Trump is in now and people are being accused of being too politically correct. Are we going to get questions at the Tate: has the gallery become politically correct because it's showing a black woman from Australia rather than a 'key' male artist?' For Indigenous artists such as Martinez, there's an expectation that they will create a certain type of art. His practice is focused on abstract paintings, some of which allude to his heritage as a member of the Pascua Yaqui Tribe of Arizona. 'Indigenous artists have always had abstraction, whether it's through spirituality or art,' said Martinez, who had a solo show at Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of the American Indian. 'But people are often surprised by my work, even native curators.' But far from being a flash in the pan 'moment', curators and artists say the recognition of Indigenous artists around the world and a greater understanding of their work has been built up over the last two decades. Tanzer and Nicola Stein of This Is No Fantasy said they first took artists, including Michael Cook in 2015, to satellite events at the Venice Biennale rather than the main event, slowly attracting audiences and buyers. 'It feels like it's pivoted quickly but it's actually been a very slow burn,' said Stein, who praised Judith Ryan, a curator and academic, for collecting and writing about indigenous art years before it hit the mainstream. 'It's taken time for it to be celebrated and for it to find its place within the contemporary art world.' Johnathon World Peace Bush is at Frieze No.9 Cork Street from 27 February – 15 March; Mario Martinez is at Pippy Houldsworth gallery from 21 February – 22 March; Emily Kam Kngwarray is at Tate Modern from 10 July – 11 January 2026.
