Emma Crowe

ecrowe19

Erik Hougen: to Dissolve Place

November 14, 2014 Studio

In reference to photography, Roland Barthes wrote that its unique position among art was that it referred directly to something “that has been.” Erik Hougen’s paintings hint at that premise; they offer places both familiar and alien, which forces the part of our brain that codifies and organizes images to guess where and when. This dialogue, or rather confusion, between viewer and image is exactly what the artist is working towards. Hougen invites us to a location and time that may not exist. The mind attempts to classify the exact place, but ends up submitting to a notion of place.

Eating Apples

November 12, 2014 Dispatches

By EVA ROA WHITE

Under our mother’s dictatorship, we had one liberty. Each market day, she bought a crate of Golden Delicious apples and tipped the Swiss vendor to lug it up the three steep flights of stairs that led to our immigrant’s cramped apartment. The full crate barely fit on the bottom shelf of our small pantry, where it sat for us all month. These apples were our only snack, but we could eat of them without restriction.

Faro de Fisterra

October 22, 2014 Dispatches

By DANIEL SANCHEZ

Mid-May in Galicia. I was expecting rain and gloom but at five in the afternoon the sun is still high as I come down from the dusty hills into the town of Fisterra. Here, the path along the beach into town is made of flat stones that shine so brightly I can barely see. I want to stop someone and ask if this is heaven. I haven’t spoken a word out loud for hours.

Westchester County

October 15, 2014 Dispatches

By OLIVIA WOLFGANG-SMITH

Today’s service is the blessing of the animals, and the congregation is clustered on the lawn with designer dogs on extendable leashes and mysterious scuttling boxes lined with hand towels and one leopard gecko that, waiting for its blessing, relieves itself on its young owner’s father. He scrubs at his shirt at the sink in the church basement, where J and I are helping to set up for the post-service coffee hour, halving banana bread and quartering bagels and decimating cantaloupe. The man blessed by his son’s gecko may need to be reminded of the copy on the service’s tri-fold program: We do not bless animals to make them holy; we bless them because they are already holy. The program asks us to save animals like Noah, to care for them like Francis. It reminds us of upcoming youth group events.

Texas Book Festival

October 10, 2014 News and Events

Event Date:

Saturday, October 25, 2014 – 4:00pm – 4:45pm

Location:

Kirkus Reviews Tent

Join The Common at the Texas Book Festival! Come to the Kirkus Reviews Tent on October 25 at 4pm, where Editor in Chief Jennifer Acker will be moderating a conversation between Matthea Harvey and Nicole Callihan, “WordArt”:

Poets have a knack for creating brilliant images by using only words. But when visual art is added to the mix, these poets elevate their work from beautiful to something truly magical. Join Matthea Harvey and Nicole Callihan as they discuss how they ignite the imagination through the combination of image and word.

Issue 08 Launch Party

October 9, 2014 News and Events

Event Date:

Wednesday, October 22, 2014 – 6:30pm – 8:30pm

Location:

The Monkey Bar, Amherst, MA

Join us at The Monkey Bar in Amherst on Wednesday, October 22, 6:30–8:30pm for an evening of drinks, games, prizes, and scary stories. Featuring Ralph Sneeden, Amity Gaige, and Katherine Jamieson.

Preorder Issue 08 here!

Pen Pals

October 8, 2014 Dispatches

By ALAN BARSTOW

With a respectful snap she beckons. She points to capital letter-less prose. Purple ink. I’s dotted with hearts or stars.

“Sir, what does it mean ‘What is your tribal name?’”

Boston Book Festival 2014

October 1, 2014 News and Events

Event Date:

Saturday, October 25, 2014 – 9:00am – 5:00pm

Location:

Copley Square, Boston

Join The Common at the Boston Book Festival on October 25th! Meet our editors and staff, pick up submission guideliens, and get a copy of the newest issue at Booth 31.

The BBF is New England’s largest annual literary event, boasting a bustling street fair, workshops for aspiring authors, an outdoor music stage, and more! For more information on this year’s event, see www.bostonbookfest.org

Home

October 1, 2014 Dispatches

By EVA ROA WHITE

Our grey Swiss building has ceiling moldings in the shape of flowers. These were white once. Before we immigrants took over most of its floors. The only natives who remain are very old. They have no children or pensions large enough to help them flee our foreign invasion. Like Madame Belet, who lives one floor down from us and gives me old, melted chocolates when I run errands for her.

Nighthawks at the Dennis

September 24, 2014 Dispatches

By ELLIOT SILBERBERG

We were staying on the Upper West Side, 15th floor, view of the Hudson. Two hawks nested on the fire escape outside our bedroom window, their baby hawk’s head popping out of its shell. The male was wary. Very. One day, X ray vision on, he stormed the window from afar, a bolt from the blue looming larger, nearer, yeeks! Shot skywards just shy of crashing into the window.