American artist Cecilia Charlton selects two short stories by Italo Calvino: 'A Sign in Space' and 'The Origin of the Birds'. Both stories focus on the very inception of what comes into being and what we now take for granted - signs/signals/artworks as well as birds/the other/evolutionary rejects. All the while, 'A Sign in Space' draws extraordinary parallels with an art practice. From the anxieties of creating something new to the egotistic punchiness of asserting authenticity, we join Qfwfa who journeys throughout space and time, pontificating on what it is to create and leave a mark in the world of one's existence. Likewise, 'The Origin of the Birds' focuses on the start of beginnings. In this story, Qfwfa narrates his (his?) adventures into the void to discover and embrace the evolutionary rejects as part of his ancestry and presence, particularly their leader Queen Or with whom he is besotted. 

'A Sign in Space' appeared in 'Cosmicomics' in 1965 while 'The Origin of the Birds' was first published in ‘t zero’ 1967. Both stories feature in ‘The Complete Cosmicomics’ comprising 'Cosmicomics' and 't zero' plus other stories published 2009. 

CECILIA CHARLTON

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BOOKS IDEAS WRITERS 

'A Room of One's Own' 1929, Virginia Woolf

'Against Interpretation' 1966, Susan Sontag

'Agnes Martin' 2015, Tate 

'Brave New World' 1932, Aldous Huxley

Jane Austen

'No One Belongs Here More Than You' 2007 Miranda July 

Gabriel Garcia Marquez 'Eyes of a Blue Dog' 1947, 'One Hundred Years of Solitude' 1967, 'The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World' 1968 co-author Hernan Diaz

'The World of Ornament' 2006, Auguste Racinet and M Dupont-Auberville

The concept of multiple discovery

'The Sixteen Trees of the Somme' 2014 Lars Mytting

Three Fates from Greek mythology

William Beebe, American naturalist, ornithologist, marine biologist, entomologist, explorer, and author

William Weaver, Italo Calvino's translator

'Women's Work: A Personal Reckoning with Labour, Motherhood and Privilege' 2019, Megan K Stack

ARTISTS CURATORS GALLERIES

Alison Jacques Gallery London, 'The Gees Bend Quiltmakers' in partnership with the Souls Grow Deep Foundation, a non-profit organisation dedicated to the preservation and promotion of the contributions of African American artists from the Southern states, 20 Dec 2020 - 6 Feb 2021

Anni Albers

Agnes Martin 'Words' 1961

Dolly Parton

Hannah Brown 'Art Fictions' Episode 17, 9 Dec 2020

Helen Frankenthaler

Hilma Af Klimt

Lee Krasner

London Art Fair, 'Platform' focus on folk art londonartfair.co.uk/fair-programme/platform, 20-31 Jan 2021

Nicolaus Schafhausen, 'Der Speigel' 2013, resigned as Director of Kunsthalle Wein 2019

Robert Rauschenberg 'Erased de Kooning Drawing' 1963

Sheila Hicks

Turner Contemporary Margate, 'We Will Walk: Art and Resistance in the American South' curated by Hannah Collins and Paul Goodwin, 7 Feb - 6 Sep 2020 

Willem de Kooning