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Artist Interview: Maddy Inez

Gerda Krivaite
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Artist Interview: Maddy Inez

Maddy Inez utilises ceramics and sculpture to explore themes of healing and ancestral memory, treating clay as both a medium and a metaphor for collective trauma. Her works often evoke plants known for their healing properties or mythological significance, merging the spiritual with the ecological. This approach prompts reflection on humanity’s fragile yet powerful relationship with the natural world. Inez’s artistic practice is deeply influenced by her matrilineal heritage; her mother, Alison Saar, and grandmother, Betye Saar, are both renowned artists whose legacies of Black feminist and spiritual artmaking resonate through her work. This lineage informs Inez’s exploration of intergenerational knowledge and the transformative power of art as a means of healing and remembrance.

Maddy Inez lives and works in Los Angeles and earned a BFA from the Pacific Northwest College of Art in Portland, OR. Her solo exhibitions include “Of Pith and Balm” at Harkawik Gallery, New York, and “Venus Freak” at NOON Projects, Los Angeles. Group exhibitions include “Adornment Artifact” at Crenshaw Plaza and Band of Vices, Los Angeles; “Earth House Hold” at Murmurs, Los Angeles; “Obscurity and the Unknown” at Sebastian Gladstone, Los Angeles; and the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center, Los Angeles; among others.

Maddy Inez: Nascence will be on view May 16 – June 20, 2026 at Megan Mulrooney Gallery in LA.

You come from an extraordinary artistic lineage – your grandmother Betye Saar and your mother Alison Saar are both towering figures in sculpture. Was making art ever a question for you or did it feel inevitable? How did it feel to carve out your own artistic identity within that context?

We always say that art making is in the blood. My aunt, grandfather, cousins, brother and dad are all artists as well. Making art is just how I was taught to think critically and process the world. I feel so honoured to be able to create amongst the women in my life. We are all interested in similar topics, whether it be social justice, myth or magic but we all have unique voices and perspectives. I’ve never felt like I need to fight to have my own identity, I was always taught to honour and respect my ancestors. I’m very proud to be an accumulation of the people who raised me. 

Blood Bloom, 2026 Glazed Ceramic 24 1/2 x 16 1/2 x 8 in 62.2 x 41.9 x 20.3 cm (MLE26.003) Courtesy of Megan Mulrooney and the artist. Photo: Paul Salveson

Your practice moves between ceramics and printmaking, two processes that feel quite different in temperament. Do you find yourself in a different emotional or mental state depending on which you’re working in?

They are different in so many ways but they both have long processes and a little bit of alchemy. I used to work mainly in intaglio in print making, and I found the process so meditative. There was preparing the copper plate, applying the hard ground, the etching bath, the aquatint booth, and finally the act of cleaning the ink off with your hand. I found that the processes are what really drew me to printmaking more than the final result. Ceramics is the same in that I’m drawn to the meditative process. I usually coil build, so there is a moment in my studio where I’m rolling a big pile of coils in preparation of making a sculpture. The sensation of rolling a coil feels deeply ritualistic to me. There is something innate and ancient in working in clay that I’m attracted to. 

Each vessel in your upcoming show at the Megan Mulrooney Gallery is an ode to a specific plant brought over during the transatlantic slave trade, including Okra, Sudanese Hibiscus, Black-eyed peas, Palestinian olives. How did you arrive at that one-to-one relationship between vessel and plant?

I work in the shape of the vessel because of the human history ties to it. For as long as humans have had a relationship to clay, we have been making sculptures of bodies. I think there is an unspoken language of understanding when a viewer is looking at a vessel. We see ourselves or our gods in the shape. I think of my sculptures as votives to the spirits of the plants I am researching. 

Za’ atar Pistil, 2026 Glazed Ceramic 16 1/2 x 13 x 8 in 41.9 x 33 x 20.3 cm (MLE26.006) Courtesy of Megan Mulrooney and the artist. Photo: Paul Salveson

Finding your great-great-great grandmother’s midwifery certificate must have been an extraordinary moment. Can you take us back to that discovery and what it unlocked in you? Was it immediately clear that it would influence your work?

I had just recently read Nalo Hopkinsons’s book Salt Roads when I found it. The book is about lineage, suffering, resilience and magic. Making the discovery of a healer in my lineage felt validating, and I knew I wanted to research her experience. That research led me to knowledge about the cycles of colonisation that we are still witnessing today. 

You investigate themes of healing in your artwork, processing trauma through clay and viewing vessels as “votives of ancestral alchemy.” Has making this show been healing for you?

Researching this show has been really heavy. There were moments where I felt hopelessness at the way humanity was progressing. I was frustrated and angry with the patterns of erasure I was witnessing. That’s when I decided to interview farmers, land stewards and educators that share the same ideas as I do. I landed on the idea of gardening as an act of resistance. Having a relationship to land when so much violence is being inflicted on that land and its people is one of the purest examples of reliance. Talking to these people who are planting for a future they believe in was very healing for me. 

Gumbo Rising, 2025 Glazed Ceramic 15 x 9 1/2 x 2 1/2 in 38.1 x 24.1 x 6.3 cm (MLE26.007) Courtesy of Megan Mulrooney and the artist. Photo: Paul Salveson

The show frames gardening as an act of resistance. You volunteer at your local garden in Pasadena, you’ve interviewed farmers and herbalists across LA… How do you view the relationship between art practice and community practice? 

Community work has always been really important to my practice. I worked at this amazing organisation for adult artists with developmental disabilities in Los Angeles called Tierra Del Sol for five years. While teaching there the artists and I processed the Covid pandemic, BLM movement, ICE raids and wars through art. It was the voices and friendships that I made there that made me realise that building community was part of my practice. Hearing stories and learning from the people around me has really helped me grow as a person and as an artist. My community feeds my art practice and I hope my art gives something back in return. 

Clay and soil are both earth, so you’re working with the same element in the studio and in the garden. Do you think about that often? Does one influence how you handle the other?

Yes, absolutely. Until this year, my studio was located in the garage at my parents house in Laurel Canyon. Working alongside my mother’s garden and with the plants I grew up with really informed my practice. I made a lot of work based on the plants in that garden. One of these was Dandelion – I made many sculptures based on this plant and drinking tea from its root is part of my everyday life. Sometimes I will buy the plant I’m researching to draw and look at under a microscope, and then it will be placed in my garden. 

Black-eyed Angel, 2026 Glazed Ceramic 26 x 18 x 5 in 66 x 45.7 x 12.7 cm (MLE26.001) Courtesy of Megan Mulrooney and the artist. Photo: Paul Salveson

Do you have any rituals in the studio – music, silence, a particular time of day? And do you think the conditions you make art in show up in the work?

I listen to a lot of audio books while working in the studio. I use the LA county library app and borrow a lot of science fiction books, which have influenced my art aesthetically and conceptually. One of the books I was listening to while working on this body of work was Conjuring of America: Mojos, Mermaids, Medicine, and 400 years of Black Women’s Magic by Lindsey Stewart. I learned a lot about the plants I was researching from this book, and there was a really special chapter that mentioned one of my grandmother’s pieces that brought me to tears. At night, when I’m the only person in the studio, I will listen to music and dance around.  

All the It-Girls Have One Red Carpet Thing in Common Right Now — And It’s Ashi Studio

Vera Adamidou
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All the It-Girls Have One Red Carpet Thing in Common Right Now — And It’s Ashi Studio

If you didn’t know about Ashi Studio from the jump (that being 2007 when Saudi Arabian couturier Mohammed Ashi founded the brand), you probably met it the way most people did. Indirectly. The brand has been doing the rounds for years, long before it made its way onto the Paris Haute Couture Week schedule. That institutional validation was followed, almost naturally, by pop culture adoption. Beyoncé leading the charge, Penélope Cruz bringing it onto the red carpet, Billy Porter turning it into performance art, Coco Rocha dragging it onto the model radar, and even Queen Rania of Jordan adding a royal seal of approval. Point is, Ashi Studio isn’t new. But it’s newly unavoidable.

Margot Robbie wears a custom Ashi Studio Couture dress at the Sydney Premiere of Wuthering Heights
@ashistudio via Instagram

The love for Ashi Studio has been building for years, 2026 is when your favorite it-girls all showed up wrapped in it at once. Kylie Jenner made the first headline of the year in a custom silver couture gown at the Golden Globes. Teyana Taylor picked it up at The Rip premiere in New York in a sheer, sculptural Spring 2025 look. Not long after, she returned to Ashi Studio in a wrapped column dress from Spring 2026, before showing up again in a satin bustier piece from the same collection at the NAACP Image Awards.

Anok Yai in Ashi Studio at the TIME 100 Gala
@anokyai via Instagram

Margot Robbie followed with a corseted 18th-century-leaning silhouette for the Wuthering Heights Sydney premiere, before switching into a smaller, tighter version of the same idea for the after-moment mini dress. Zendaya, with Law Roach as always in tow, went for something softer from Spring 2026 at the Euphoria season 3 premiere, soft, at least by comparison. FKA Twigs appeared at Mother Mary in the same collection, but with none of the restraint implied by the word “relaxed.” And Anok Yai closed the loop at the Time 100 Gala, choosing one of the most sculptural pieces from the entire lineup.

Stylists operate with a very specific visibility logic, and red carpets seem to be their favorite algorithm at the moment. But if you see it five times in a week, is it still couture, or just fast fashion for A-listers? Either way, it photographs well. Too well. Whether it swallows the wearer entirely is a different discussion, one the algorithm doesn’t seem interested in having.

Xinhui Wang: Crafting Cinema’s Emotional Core Through Film Editing

Abbie Wilson
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Xinhui Wang: Crafting Cinema’s Emotional Core Through Film Editing

In the world of film and television, one job often goes unnoticed while watching a film: the editing role.

If a film editor is any good at their job, you don’t even notice their work, as it is so seamlessly cut from one scene to the next.

Just as the film editor stands as the unseen architect, shaping stories and sculpting emotions, Los Angeles-based film and TV editor Xinhui Wang is carving out a distinctive niche, recognized for her profound ability to capture the visceral power of human emotion. 

Wang’s journey from China, through South Korea’s Dankook University to USC’s School of Cinematic Arts, has developed a body of work recognized across international film festivals and digital platforms. 

Wang’s recent recognition, including the Micheaux Film Festival selection for “Goodbye Stranger” and the Gasparilla International Film Festival selection and a Grand Jury Award for “The Expiration Date,” alongside her upcoming work on the feature film “Second Hand Sky”, further reinforcing her in-demand status as an editor to watch. Currently a staff editor at Dramabox, where her vertical drama series rack up millions of views, Wang is not just keeping pace with the industry’s evolution; she’s helping to define it.

Wang’s unique editing philosophy centers on pacing, a departure from mere narrative assembly. “I approach editing as shaping emotional rhythm rather than just assembling a narrative,” Wang explains. “In today’s fast-paced content landscape, what resonates most is authenticity and emotional clarity. I focus on pacing, silence, and performance, letting moments breathe so the emotion feels earned rather than imposed. That sensitivity is increasingly relevant as films shift toward character-driven storytelling.”

Her style is a masterclass in subtlety, guiding the audience’s perspective without overt manipulation. “I’m also interested in how editing guides perspective—what’s revealed, withheld, or extended can completely reshape how a story is experienced,” she adds. 

“It becomes less about visibility and more about intention. I’m influenced by editors like Thelma Schoonmaker, whose sense of rhythm and character is unmatched, and Joe Walker, who balances precision with emotional depth.” 

“Ultimately,” she adds, “I aim for edits that feel invisible but emotionally present, where the audience isn’t aware of the cuts, only fully immersed in the story.” This philosophy underscores her commitment to serving the story and amplifying its emotional resonance, a quality that makes her work stand out.

One of Wang’s most recent notable achievements is her work on “Goodbye Stranger,” a short film that earned an official selection for the 2025 Micheaux Film Festival.

Her approach to this film exemplifies her collaborative spirit. “My approach was rooted in close collaboration with the director to ensure the edit reflected both the emotional tone and narrative intent of the film,” said Wang. “Early on, we focused on defining the core perspective of the story: what the audience should feel and when – so the editing choices could support that clarity.”

Wang meticulously shaped the pacing around the actors’ performances, allowing pivotal moments to resonate while maintaining the narrative’s forward momentum. 

“Rather than over-structuring, the goal was to preserve a natural rhythm that felt honest to the characters,” she explains. The film’s structure underwent multiple refinements, adjusting scene order and duration to enhance emotional continuity. 

“Communication was key throughout the process, with a shared openness to experimentation,” she said. “That collaborative approach allowed us to find a final cut that felt both precise and emotionally grounded, contributing to the film’s reception at festivals.”

Wang’s meticulous editing has garnered a string of awards for various short films. “Can You Hear Me?” (2025 short film) was officially selected by the LA Shorts International Film Festival, screened at the Regal LA Live theater, and won the Best Fantasy Short Award at the Independent Shorts Awards, along with an Honorable Mention at Vancouver Web Fest. 

Meanwhile, “Resonance” (2023 short film) secured the Best Horror Film at the Marina Del Rey Film Festival and was an official selection at the Atlanta Horror Film Festival, Cindependent Film Festival, Picture’s Up Film Festival, and Loveland Shorts Film Festival, among others.

When asked about the skills that made these films stand out, Wang emphasizes her focus on heightened emotional tension and reinforcement of tone. “For projects like ‘Can You Hear Me?’ and ‘Resonance,’ my focus was on using editing to shape tonal consistency and deepen narrative tension,” she explains. 

“In ‘Can You Hear Me?,’ which leans into fantasy, I worked with pacing and visual rhythm to create a sense of unease while still allowing emotional beats to land,” said Wang. “For ‘Resonance,’ a horror piece, timing was critical, knowing when to hold on a moment versus when to cut was key to building suspense and psychological impact.”

Beyond technical precision, Wang highlights the human element. “Across both projects, I paid close attention to performance, shaping the edit around subtle expressions and reactions to keep the audience connected to the characters,” she said. “Sound and silence also played an important role in guiding tension and release. Ultimately, my goal was to support the director’s vision while elevating the emotional experience, helping the films resonate with audiences.”

Another notable film that Wang has edited is “The Expiration Date” (short film, 2025), which was not only selected by the 19th Annual Gasparilla International Film Festival, 2026, but also received the coveted Grand Jury Award. The film’s power, according to Wang, lies in its ability to ground a high-concept premise in profound human experience.

“The Expiration Date resonated because it takes a high-concept premise and grounds it in something deeply human,” she said. “The idea of marriage as a renewable contract creates an immediate sense of tension, but what makes it powerful is how it reflects real questions about commitment, time, and emotional risk.”

Her editing choices were instrumental in amplifying this emotional depth. “From an editing perspective, the focus was on restraint, allowing space for the performances to carry the weight of those decisions,” said Wang. 

“Rather than overcutting, I leaned into stillness and timing, letting silences and subtle shifts in expression reveal the characters’ internal conflict. That approach helped keep the film intimate despite its conceptual framework. The structure also builds toward a quiet but emotionally loaded turning point, which was important in making the ending feel earned. I think that balance between concept and emotional authenticity is what connected with both audiences and the jury.”

Wang’s versatility extends beyond narrative shorts into the realm of documentary. Her short documentary project, “Journey,” offers an intimate look into a Korean American family’s pursuit of Olympic dreams. The film, a 26-minute documentary centered on a Korean American family raising three sons who are all competitive judo athletes aiming to qualify for the 2028 Olympics, is a story of resilience and inner strength.

“While the film follows their athletic development, it’s equally focused on the family dynamic behind that pursuit—the discipline, pressure, and support system that shape their path,” said Wang, who sifted through hours of footage to find the true gems to highlight the truth and struggle the athletes experience on their competitive journey. “The story explores how ambition operates within a close-knit household, particularly the balance between individual goals and collective expectations. It looks at the physical demands of the sport alongside the emotional weight of representing both family and identity.”

For “Journey,” Wang employed a sophisticated editing strategy to portray the complex family dynamics. “My editing focused on building parallel arcs between the brothers, using repetition and contrast to show how each of them responds differently to pressure, discipline, and expectation,” she said. “Rather than relying on a traditional chronological approach, the edit was designed to weave together training, competition, and quieter domestic moments, allowing the emotional throughline to emerge organically.” This approach allowed the documentary to transcend a mere chronicle of athletic achievement, becoming a poignant exploration of family bonds and individual aspirations.

Beyond the cinematic world, Wang has also lent her expertise to educational and promotional projects. As the lead editor for the Chinese National Center for Nanoscience and Technology (NCNST) promotional/educational videos, she was tasked with outlining the center’s two-decade educational journey, which has seen over 1,200 graduate students trained since 2005.

“As the lead editor on the NCNST promotional and educational videos, the process began with understanding both the scientific context and the institution’s long-term impact,” Wang states. “I reviewed archival materials, prior footage, and key milestones to identify a clear narrative that reflects the center’s evolution over the past two decades.” This meticulous research ensured that the video effectively communicated the center’s significant contributions to science and education, highlighting its legacy and future aspirations.

Currently, Xinhui Wang serves as a staff editor at Dramabox in Los Angeles, an innovative platform specializing in vertical drama series. Here, she applies her keen eye to a rapidly evolving medium,editing series that have collectively amassed over 100 million views, reflecting significant audience reach across global digital platforms, including popular titles like “Craving My Brother’s Best Friend” and “FYI: My Love Ships Sailed Without You.” Dramabox itself has surpassed 100 million downloads on the Google Play Store, underscoring the massive reach of her current work. Her work reflects a growing presence within both independent film circuits and emerging digital formats, positioning her at the intersection of traditional storytelling and evolving audience consumption.

Her future is equally bright, with a significant project on the horizon. Wang will be working on “Second Hand Sky,” a narrative feature film, with post-production slated to commence in January 2028 at LerFilm. This transition to feature-length narrative filmmaking marks an exciting new chapter for an editor whose impact on short films has already been strong.

“The film’s plot follows a recent graduate in Los Angeles who moves into a stranger’s sublet and discovers a box of undeveloped film left behind by the previous tenant,” she said. “As she processes the images, she becomes increasingly drawn into the life of someone she’s never met, until the photographs begin revealing moments that haven’t happened yet.” 

“From an editing perspective, the project is designed to explore perception, memory, and time, using structure and pacing to blur the line between reality and anticipation,” she adds. “Casting details have not been announced at this stage, but I can’t wait to start working on it.”

Visit Xinhui Wang’s website at xinhuiwang.org.

Best Shopify App for Product Images

Prince Addams
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Best Shopify App for Product Images

Juggling a personal store and online shops on Amazon, eBay, and Etsy is often a strategy businesses use to maximize sales opportunities. In fact, reports show that 67% of sellers are active on four or more marketplaces. But thankfully, they now have Shopify as a central hub for building their online store and managing their business across multiple sales channels. However, this is just one problem on a list that stops entrepreneurs, retailers, and global brands from running and growing their stores. Another major area they should focus on is making sales. And that is where visuals come in.

In any form of selling, a product image is the first salesperson. Before a customer reads a single word of the description, chances are they have already decided based on the photos. That is why a Shopify app for product images, such as Simfa, is a conversion strategy for sellers.

To clarify the increasing adoption of AI tools for product photography, this article discusses why a Shopify app for product images is important, how it supports sellers, and what makes Simfa a preferred choice. Read on to see how implementing these tools can transform your business.

How a Shopify App for Product Images Helps Sellers

For both established brands and smaller merchants, saving time and money is essential. Also, with the requirement to generate images for multiple products across various platforms, bulk photo production has become a necessity. These needs drive Shopify stores to move beyond traditional approaches and adopt AI-driven creative tools for flexible, scalable image production.

While photography still plays a role, AI tools now handle the large portion of product visual creation. With automated processes, brands can instantly produce high-quality product photos that increase click-through rates, improve brand value, reduce return rates, and boost overall conversion rates. More importantly, it gives Shopify users a clear advantage in crowded markets.

With a Shopify app for product images, brands can often:

  • Enhance photos that look dull and of low quality
  • Test multiple ad creatives quickly
  • Improve visual consistency
  • Achieve resource efficiency
  • Launch products faster

Such offerings are especially useful for businesses that need frequent creative updates.

Simfa: A New Standard for Product Images

Shopify app for product images

Step into the ultimate creative lab with Simfa. This app is a toolkit that integrates the power of AI for modern content creation. With capabilities such as image generation, photo enhancement, background removal, and upscaling, it is highly useful for Shopify users looking to upgrade their visuals. It even offers greater creative flexibility, with features like outfit and face swapping. On top of these, users can leave plain white backgrounds in the past and use Simfa’s product staging presets. From fashion, furniture, and jewelry to electronics, food, and beverages, the app has a template for every product category.

By introducing automated processes, Simfa streamlines every editing workflow. Sellers only have to upload a photo. From there, the app does the rest of the work. So instead of spending hours capturing and editing product photos, users can just generate enhanced visuals in one afternoon. Businesses can also forget about paying for professional fees and switch to affordable packages starting at $15 a month, or even customize one that fits their preferences.

Why Simfa Fits in the Shopify Workflow

Yes. Simfa is not exactly a traditional Shopify plugin. But why should it stop sellers from getting an app that aligns strongly with their need for creative solutions? It enables fast image editing and enhancements. It supports lifestyle and contextual imagery. It maintains visual consistency for optimized branding. All of which comes cheaper than expensive photography and software or time-consuming methods.

It is a no-brainer. A Shopify app for product images lets sellers create studio-level content that serves as a dynamic, testable marketing tool. For Shopify store owners, investing in a tool like Simfa is a smart long-term strategy to reduce production costs, improve conversions, and stay ahead of the visual game.

Album Review: Aldous Harding, ‘Train on the Island’

Konstantinos Pappis
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Album Review: Aldous Harding, ‘Train on the Island’

Welcome to Aldous Harding’s island. You’re free to leave anytime you like, but the New Zealand artist is happy to show you around. There are no palm trees here; just the one tree that she used to climb, presumably as a child. Forget about the sensation of floating on the ocean blue; instead, lose yourself in questions like, “When I hit the ocean I was only a spark/ Who brought me up the stem with no love in their heart?” You’ll have to get by eating rocks and plants, but you can dance just to dance. You can get together with friends once in a while, but in the end, of course, it’s just you and your reflection. “I have met my sleeping self/ Things she knows keep me around/ I hope I’m more than I think about,” Harding sings towards the end of her insular yet inviting new album, Train on the Island, which follows 2022’s remarkable Warm Chris. The train is symbolic of thought, naturally, but she chases it down to its roots, snuggles up to the unconscious, and leans into pure, deliciously inscrutable feelings as they emerge. It’s fine if you don’t have the words for it: just take the ride.

1. I Ate the Most

For those keen on describing Harding’s music as incorporeal, the singer-songwriter offers an origin story: “I was nine when I left my body,” she sings, referencing The Chronicles of Narnia before delivering the album’s most immediately quotable couplet: “No regrets, just things that will haunt me/ Maybe I’ll bury them.” She likes her similes to sting and surprise, less interested in wordplay than mind games as she spirals around the knock-on effects of childhood insecurity. (“STEVE ABEL THINKS THAT I AM AUTISTIC,” she posted 14 years ago; now she’s quipping, “You’re not old, like I’m on the spectrum.”) Instead of outright burying them, she sings as if with her head tilted down, vocalizing the burden of trauma like a chip on her shoulder. Thomas Poli and H. Hawkline’s slithery synths aren’t quite ethereal, but they do seem to indulge her yearning to fly by lifting her feet off the ground.

2. One Stop 

The lead single’s loopy piano motif reinforces this sense of elevation, piling on layers of acoustic guitar, bass, harp, and electronics. Harding nervously casts herself in the role of unreliable narrator (“So the lies I tell send me up”), though her humorous encounter with John Cale sounds entirely plausible. She’s always been eerily funny, but the opening one-two punch sets the album up almost like a comedy special, if one driven entirely by impulse. 

3. Train on the Island

The jokes turn out to be just a foot in the door – now, the same figure of speech that made the record approachable just boggles the mind: “Mommy said my inception was like eating a pearl.” Harding is back to being diaristically insular, just less intent on turning observations like “I hate my perception, but the medication slows my mind” into entertainment; there’s less affectation in her voice, too. Backed by Hawkline’s hypnotic bassline and prodding electric guitar, though, she keeps listeners rapt. 

4. Worm

Aided by Joe Harvey-Whyte’s pedal steel, the record turns even more languorous, though the unassuming hook still worms – no other word for it, I’m afraid – its way into your head. You start to feel the heaviness here, though Harding briefly finds relief in contradiction: “Great things inside have sat long enough.” Do they not haunt, still? Are they still sitting there, even as they attach themselves to her stream of consciousness?

5. Venus in the Zinnia

The album’s main collaborators get a moment in the spotlight on this early single, an enchanting duet with Hawkline that also features a delightful Wurlitzer solo from Parish. No wonder it sounds like the most sociable track on the LP; when Harding’s music is this breezy, it’s usually at odds with the subject matter, which isn’t so much the case here – if only because it’s hard to tell what it’s about, which is how all friend gatherings should be. 

6. If Lady Does It 

The drums immediately jump out as livelier than most of the record – played by Seb Rochford, with Parish handling bass and harpist Mali Llywelyn trading piano lines alongside Hawkline. It serves to switch up the energy of the record, giving a more conventionally structured song the full-band treatment; though Harding seems to care less about that than bringing to life her own version of a murder mystery. “If I am a gun then I’m loaded,” she declares, barely lifting the veil of abstraction. No melody on the record is more sinewy or damning than the one on the outro, repeated like a protest chant.

7. San Francisco 

‘San Francisco’ suddenly makes you ask questions about how these songs are connected, not least because it reprises a hook from ‘One Stop’ right when you think it’s winding down. The music is back to feeling sedated, Harding narrating in a morning daze until her playing on the Fender Rhodes turns baleful, and you start to wonder if the man “coming down Folsom” is the one with the new bag who’s not a new boy. Her voice’s cutting intimacy, meanwhile, is at its most gentle, and “I’ve never been a believer, I don’t cry when I’m told” is exactly the line that could make your eyes well up. And just then, it evaporates. 

8. What Am I Gonna Do?

Over a roiling rhythm section, Harding sinks into her lower register, juxtaposing some of her most bizarre lyrics (“Bechamel on my face”) with a strangely hopeful refrain: “I know things ain’t working out/ But they may come good later.” Llywelyn’s harp prods the song along, culminating in a wonderfully off-kilter solo. 

9. Riding That Symbol

Every Aldous Harding record needs a disarmingly lonely, existential ballad, and the acoustic ‘Riding That Symbol’ is this album’s ‘She’ll Be Coming Round the Mountain’. There’s no more future tense to the “things that will haunt me,” which become “haunts [that] band and it’s no accident.” The spare instrumentation mirrors her disconnected headspace: “No one knows what I’m into/ I’m only riding that symbol.” The mental fog seeps into Thomas Poli’s bed of electronics.

10. Coats

Harding isn’t exactly one to offer clear-cut resolution, but there’s something to be said about her closing with another summery tune in the vein of ‘Venus in the Zinnia’. “Can’t buy the remedy but I’ll eat if you’re next to me,” she sings alongside Hawkline, which is both a full-circle moment and a frankly cherry-picked line about the eating disorder that’s coded into the opening track. The thread might be easier for Harding to trace, but the feeling is that realizing where you’re coming from, how the dots connect, is no door to salvation. “What my God is thinking I get lost in that place,” Harding sings earlier, and Train on the Island is simply her mode of transportation. Thank God it’s public. 

Interview: Guttersnipe

Priya Elan
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Interview: Guttersnipe

“Our sound is quite silly in a way,” says Uroceras Gigas (guitar/vocals) of Leeds-based Guttersnipe, near the end of our hour-and-a-half conversation. If the real world is folding into dystopian hellscape, silly is a wonderful way to describe the sound of the noise-nik duo (Gigas and Tipula Confusa, drums and vocals) who create cinematic soundscapes, plugging into the more extreme end of music. Beehive-like discordant guitars meet panic-screams and pitter-pattering crashing cymbal drums. It feels exploratory, peering into the unexamined recesses of the human psyche. “I thought we would have been ridiculed a lot more than we have been,” Gigas continues. Perhaps what’s stopped that is the bracingly original quality of the music – so original that the band has come up with a brand new genre (“Xenofeminist crisis-energy rock”) to describe its organic world-connecting glory. Their new album Extinction Burst! contains six hair-raising tracks that will forever change you. It’s the follow-up to 2016’s My Mother the Vent, which was praised for its brutality and abjectness. Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore even told NME “they’re insane.”

“When we first came into people’s awareness we were compared to those po-faced, angry nihilistic men making power electronica,” says Gigas, straightening her violet-coloured fringe. “That doesn’t have anything to do with what we’re doing. We’re not sitting around reading books about serial killers. We’re sitting around watching cartoons” (specifically Ren & Stimpy and Cow & Chicken).

As a child, Confusa’s (they/them) first taste of alternative culture was seeing The Offspring on Top of the Pops. “They were performing ‘Pretty Fly (For a White Guy)’ – I was enthralled and had to work my way back to find out where they came from,” they say. Gigas meanwhile grew up in North Wales and went to a school with a high percentage of alternative, hippie classmates. It was known locally as “the goth school.” At home her parents were into Hawkwind and Black Sabbath and were upholders of authoritarian values. “My dad would say, ‘Remember we’re scum,'” Gigas says, “outside of what the straights are doing. Implicitly, there was the message of ‘don’t trust the government.'”

Living with autism and ADHD, she was bullied heavily. “My behaviour was hard for others to comprehend – I used to act out.” Turning to punk but finding it ossified and one-dimensional (“the punks I met just wanted to listen to The Sex Pistols, get pissed and wear tartan trousers”), her gateway to musical escape came unexpectedly as an 11-year-old. “I was watching Ace Ventura: Pet Detective and there that scene where Cannibal Corpse were playing ‘Hammer Smashed Face’ in a club. I was like ‘what the hell was that?'” Despite being into metal her parents thought Cannibal Corpse’s death metal was too much. “And to a kid that’s an immediate green light.” She picked up a copy of Kerrang! with features on Grindcore and black metal and that was her musical passport for the foreseeable future.

Despite playing in a drum-less metal trio when she was 13, difficult teenage years eclipsed her musical ambitions (“I was taken out of school and put into psychiatric care”) and continued until she transitioned at 16. “I lived a very sheltered existence in Wales,” she says. Moving to Leeds as a trans woman and having a partner who was politically engaged taught her loads. “Living your life as a transexual woman you come up against all kinds of situations,” she says. “They inherently teach you about how the world works. I had an implicit political compass, from being ostracised from society and not fitting in the world.”

Gigas was a fan of Etai Keshiki, Confusa’s band. “I’d never seen anyone play drums like they did,” she says. The two bonded when Confusa played her the last album from no-wave revivalists AIDS Wolf. “It started a whole shift in my understanding of what music was at that point,” she says. The duo began collaborating through improvisation. “Coming from a metal world where everything was so predetermined, it was exciting.” It also alighted on her new, growing love of free jazz. “It was liberating to do that kind of thing with someone who was so good at playing their instrument.”

In all its unspeakable, horrific beauty, Guttersnipe’s music became an expression for their shared traumas. “We’re both very candid with each other about the psychological states we are trying to express,” explains Gigas. “We’ve both had our own relationship to mental illness and what we’re trying to express is hysterical and unwieldy.” The duo’s live shows are intense examples of their music chemistry slash telepathy. “Me and (Confusa) were a couple for a bunch of years, so we got very, very close to one another,” explains Gigas. “We got to experience each other in a way that was extremely vulnerable and intimate.” Guttersnipe’s power is about the shared vision between the two. “I’m always looking at (their) hands and facial expressions. It’s much easier when you are looking at each other,” she says. “I’m following it very directly. We are attuned to each other’s psyche.” Their songs are written from this holistic place: pieces of improvisation are repeated and refined. “We’ve never sat down and written a (song),” she says. And on the basis of orgastic Extinction Burst! long may that continue.

Guttersnipe’s Extinction Burst! is out May 8 via Night School.

Kelela Announces New Album ‘new avatar’, Shares New Song ‘linknb’

Konstantinos Pappis
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Kelela Announces New Album ‘new avatar’, Shares New Song ‘linknb’

Kelela has announced her third album, new avatar, which comes out July 10 via Warp. After sharing its first single, ‘idea 1’ – one of the best songs of April – she’s now unveiled ‘linknb’, a subtly luminous track produced by Oscar Scheller. Check out a visual for it below, and scroll down for the LP’s cover art and tracklist.

‘linknb’ was written during a period of writer’s block for Kelela, who was drawn to it as a mantra. “It’s not hard to be brave/ Easier to give too much away/ All I know is that I paved the way, underpaid,” she sings on the track.

new avatar, the follow-up to 2023’s Raven, boasts collaborations with PinkPantheress, A. K. Paul, and Fousheé. “This album finds solace in confronting,” Kelela shared. “I don’t want the music to be a distraction from what’s really going on in the world; I want it to make sense in this crazy moment while helping people get in touch with the beauty and joy they’re also experiencing.” She added, “People also need to know that my friends and I are laughing constantly and that humor isn’t a defense mechanism; it’s an expression of how sharp our read is and how clearly we see the world.”

new avatar Cover Artwork:

new avatar

new avatar Tracklist:

1. idea 1
2. point blank
3. goin down
4. outta time [feat. A. K. Paul]
5. against me
6. crystalize
7. retaliation lullaby
8. linknb
9. don’t piss me off
10. new life forms [feat. Fousheé]
11. the bridge [feat. PinkPantheress]
12. if we meet again

Bridging Form and Function: Rasim Bayramov on the Intersection of Art and Design

Abbie Wilson
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Bridging Form and Function: Rasim Bayramov on the Intersection of Art and Design

In contemporary art, the boundaries between the utilitarian nature of design and the expressive freedom of fine art were once polarizing worlds. Today, the respected industries are increasingly blurred. At the center of this convergence is Rasim Bayramov, a Baku-born visual artist and designer whose career spans industrial design, user experience (UX), and high-profile institutional graphic design.

Bayramov, a graduate of the Master of Fine Arts program in Graphic Design at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU), has developed a practice that leverages technical rigor to facilitate deep human engagement. By applying the principles of industrial design to the ephemeral worlds of performance and installation, Bayramov seeks to reframe how audiences interact with both physical and digital spaces.

Bayramov’s journey began in Ankara, Turkey, where they earned a Bachelor of Industrial Design from Middle East Technical University. This period was marked by an early mastery of materials and manufacturing. Their “Tuoli” chair, a high-grade aluminum piece created through a streamlined folding process, won first place in the “Metal Ideas” Metal Product Competition.

“Tuoli was made with a streamlined process in mind,” Bayramov says. “We came up with edge connection details that redistributed the stress onto the legs instead of the seat. It stood out with its attention to detail at every step of its creation, from conception to shipping and from manufacturing to assembly.”

This focus on the “laborious endeavors” behind physical objects eventually transitioned into the digital realm. As a UX/UI Designer at the startup Doktar, Bayramov led the creation of “Arpa,” the company’s first comprehensive design system. However, their philosophy on user experience has since evolved.

“If we take the ‘user’ away from UX, then it is just experience design,” Bayramov explains. “Decentering the engagement to a form that can be felt more earnestly is what I aim to achieve. Finding a way to free the process of making from constraints has become a central background for all these works.”

In 2024, Bayramov joined the Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) in Richmond as a Graphic Designer. Their role involved more than just visual branding; it was an exercise in community engagement. By integrating analog synthesizers to create sounds for promos and producing personal print ephemera for gallery openings, Bayramov helped revitalize the museum’s creative identity.

Bayramov’s work often addresses themes of democracy and civic engagement. A notable example is the “Mobilizing Citizenship Toolkit” developed for Kunsthall Stavanger. The project serves as a digital archive for a six-year research program aimed at youth, as Bayramov worked on the coding and website alongside Khai Tang with art direction by Nicole Killian.

“The circular nature of the website makes it stand out, as each refresh gives a different overlook of the articles,” Bayramov notes. The interface incorporates interactive elements like hand-highlighted outtakes, sticky notes, and checklists—digital representations of the physical tools that facilitated the project. This “unconventional interaction” is designed to reflect the malleable nature of citizenship itself.

Beyond their personal practice, Bayramov is committed to shaping the next generation of designers. As a Teaching Fellow at VCUarts in 2025, they launched “Install to Manifest,” a course that explores the intersection of exhibition design, coding, and artistic practice. They have also served as a Teaching Assistant at the School for Poetic Computation in New York City, focusing on digital tools as artistic mediums.

The impact of Bayramov’s work has not gone unnoticed by the broader industry. Their contributions to Doktar helped the company earn a nomination for the Sustainability Pioneer Award by Deloitte Netherlands, and the firm was recognized by Forbes as one of the “Top 25 Future Unicorns” in 2026.

This ability to manage complex, global identities was further tested during their tenure at The Anderson Gallery. Tasked with shaping the public-facing presence for both the Richmond and Doha, Qatar campuses of VCUarts, Bayramov navigated the logistical challenges of a two-continent project in 2025. 

For the “Draw Four” exhibition in Doha, Bayramov utilized strict time management to bridge the gap between locales, ensuring a seamless adaptation of visual systems across different cultural contexts.

“It was certainly exciting to produce materials that were displayed in a different locale than the one I’m currently in; since both campuses share similarities in their identity, it was a smooth adaptation of our current materials into their existing systems,” they said. “For the ‘Draw Four’ exhibition held in Doha, time management and readiness was one of the aspects that I tried to get ahead of in that year. Because of the time difference, putting deadlines a day before for myself was certainly the way to go.”

Holding What Refuses to Settle: Jingyi Yu and the Discipline of Uncertainty

Occhie Ma
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Holding What Refuses to Settle: Jingyi Yu and the Discipline of Uncertainty

At a moment when contemporary photography often oscillates between spectacle and confession, Jingyi Yu(Jane)’s work occupies a quieter and more resistant register. Her images rarely announce themselves. They arrive obliquely, often withholding as much as they disclose, asking less to be interpreted than inhabited. Working between fine art and fashion photography, Jane has developed a practice shaped by emotional conditions that resist stable form. A room, a gesture, an object, the pressure of light across a surface: ordinary materials recur, but seldom remain merely descriptive. Interiors feel unsettled, objects seem burdened with psychic residue, and even stillness appears under strain.

What distinguishes the work is not atmosphere alone, but the degree to which atmosphere slows down reading. In a visual culture conditioned by immediacy, that delay can feel quietly oppositional. Yet this territory is not without its risks. Contemporary photography has made ambiguity into a familiar aesthetic resource, and weaker work often mistakes indeterminacy for complexity. Jane’s practice occasionally approaches that threshold. At times, her commitment to restraint can verge on a kind of visual self-discipline so rigorous that the work risks becoming overly resolved in its own ambiguity. What is meant to remain open can sometimes harden into mood.

Still, the strongest images push beyond that impasse. They refuse to make uncertainty itself into style. Emotion in these photographs is displaced rather than performed, emerging through spatial relations, interruptions, and what the image withholds from completion. Meaning does not arrive as revelation but accumulates as pressure.

This dynamic is particularly visible in With Myself, Through Winter, a body of work produced during her first winter-to-spring transition in New York. Made at a moment of personal instability, the project stages an internal division rather than a singular subject: two versions of the self that confront and sustain one another at once. Rather than externalizing this conflict through overt narrative, Jane embeds it into the structure of the images. Figures appear doubled, mirrored, or psychologically split, but never fully resolved into symbolic clarity. What emerges instead is a quieter tension — a sense that the image is holding an argument it refuses to settle.

The project’s strength lies in its refusal to dramatize that internal conflict. Even as it draws on themes of isolation, perfectionism, and self-division, it resists turning them into visual spectacle. The photographs remain measured, even gentle, allowing emotional friction to register through atmosphere rather than event. In this sense, the work exemplifies both the power and the limitation of Jane’s broader approach. It sustains ambiguity with discipline, though at times one wonders whether a greater degree of rupture might deepen, rather than dilute, its stakes.

This is perhaps where Jane’s relation to fashion becomes most interesting. Though clearly informed by fashion image-making, the work often seems skeptical of fashion’s ordinary economy of seduction. Clothing appears, but seldom as spectacle. Bodies are stylized without becoming idealized. Surface matters, though often as something placed under pressure rather than celebrated. There is a friction between formal precision and emotional instability that keeps the work from slipping into mere elegance.

And yet elegance remains a danger close at hand. Some images flirt with a polished melancholy too familiar within contemporary art photography, where fragility itself can become aesthetic currency.

Jane is strongest when she resists that tendency, when the image feels less composed around beauty than unsettled by it.

As one curator familiar with her work observed, what is compelling is not that the photographs depict instability, but that they seem formally organized through it. Even in highly refined works, something often remains structurally unresolved. That incompletion matters. It prevents the work from sealing itself too neatly. One occasionally wishes, however, for rupture to enter more forcefully. Jane often trusts subtlety almost to a fault. There are moments when one senses the work could risk more, lose more control.

That question of risk has become more interesting in her recent material experiments, where photography begins to operate not only as image but as object, trace, and constructed surface. These works suggest a move away from the photograph as autonomous image toward something slower and more resistant. The direction feels significant, though still uneven in places. Some gestures feel exploratory rather than fully metabolized into the practice. But perhaps that incompletion is part of their charge.

Recent recognition, including awards from the American Photographic Artists Awards and Prix de la Photographie Paris, has brought wider visibility to this sensibility, including for works from With Myself, Through Winter, though such markers explain less than they ratify. More notable is the consistency with which Jane has pursued vulnerability, identity, and the emotional charge of ordinary materials without allowing those concerns to calcify into signature motifs. Across projects, there is less repetition than pressure applied from different angles.

That trajectory extends into her curatorial thinking as well. Her forthcoming co-curated exhibition Not for Sale, opening at A Space Gallery and currently in open call, proposes forms of making rooted in instinct, pleasure, and necessity rather than strategic productivity. The premise is compelling, though not innocent. Art’s refusal of instrumental logic has long been vulnerable to romanticization, and one of the productive tensions surrounding the project is whether such refusal can ever stand outside the systems it critiques. The exhibition appears most persuasive not when it resolves that contradiction, but when it allows it to remain active.

There is, in both the curatorial and photographic work, a politics of refusal, though “quiet politics” may be too gentle a phrase. What the work resists is not simply acceleration, but the demand that images become fully legible, emotionally consumable, or conceptually closed. In that sense, hesitation here is not mood but structure.

What gives Jane’s practice its force is not uncertainty as theme, but uncertainty as discipline. This distinction matters. The best works do not offer mystery as seduction, nor ambiguity as prestige. They sustain tension without converting it into atmosphere alone.

If there is a recurring limitation, it may be that the work sometimes trusts indirection more than conflict. But that critique is inseparable from what makes the work compelling. Its intelligence lies precisely in treating instability not as something to dramatize, but as something form can think through.

And that is rarer than contemporary photography often allows.

No Deposit Casino Bonuses in the USA: How to Claim Free Chips and Keep What You Win

Sebastian Bickley
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No Deposit Casino Bonuses in the USA: How to Claim Free Chips and Keep What You Win

No deposit casino bonuses are undoubtedly a critical cog in the wheel. They help players stay motivated and engaged, and allow casinos to gift players. They’re an exceptional way to expand your winnings before parting with real cash. Plus, they allow you to be curious and be on the lookout for new offers. So, if you’re in the market for more free chips, join us as we explore where and how to claim them for bigger wins.

Decode Casino No Deposit Bonus

The first Decode Casino no deposit bonus is available via the welcome bonus package. As a new player, you’ll enjoy a two-part welcome package. In the first portion, you’re expected to make a deposit to qualify for the bonus.

After redeeming the first deposit bonus, the casino then rewards you with a free $111 to spend on the game of your choice. This free chip is an opportunity to cash in big because you can take home up to $500 in winnings. With the code ‘FREE111DECODE’ at the cashier, you can unlock a no-deposit sign-up bonus to enjoy games at a 25x wagering requirement.

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Sloto Cash No Deposit Bonuses

Sloto Cash has a variety of no deposit bonuses if you know where to look. First up is the quick offer for new players in April, just as the month comes to a close. There’s a free $50 available for new members who make at least one deposit before the month comes to a close. With the coupon code ‘NEWMEMBER’, you can take home up to $500 as long as you wager the bonus 30 times.

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As soon as you step into Jackpot Capital, you’re greeted with a free $15 no deposit bonus. This offer is a great opportunity to explore the new casino and test several games. If you use the code ‘JCWELCOME15’ at the cashier as a new player, you’ll receive the bonus in your account. Choose your bets well, and you’ll stand to win up to $180 with a 60x wagering requirement.

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The generous $300 welcome package at Grande Vegas also includes a no deposit offer. After redeeming the first two deposit offers that add up to $250, the casino rewards you with a free $50 for the third part.

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Choose Your Free No Deposit Bonuses Today

There are plenty of no deposit bonuses for all eager players who know where to look. The key is to always stay in the loop by checking your notifications. Once the offer is in your notifications and you’re eligible, take the code and head to the cashier’s for quick redemptions because the offers aren’t infinite.

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