Our New Home
Another Sunday, Another Naive Weekly — Observations From The Internet Wilderness.
In our new home we see trees outside our windows. None of the trees have any leaves, so the noise of the city travels easy through the bare branches and into our home. It is for the better, because otherwise we forget that we live in the middle of a city with one million people.
Our new home feels like a dream. Not even the guilt from the unpacked boxes changes this. The contrast to where we came from is too stark. And after only having lived here for one week, it is hard to imagine ever living anywhere else. Uno also seems to love it. Yesterday he slept until 7 am for the first time since the early days.
I hope you are doing well wherever you are. Please remember to reply whenever you feel like.
With care,
Kristoffer
VISUALLY PLEASING
READER INTERVIEW
David Uzochukwu is a visual artist who creates magic out of pastel colour skies. You see his work on the billboards of the major squares around the world and hear his warm laughter whenever you are near him. David is also a philosophy student at Humboldt University, has a Wikipedia page and an endless appetite for nutella.
K: Where do you go fishing for different feeds?
David: Sometimes friends and I literally just swap phones and scroll down each other's Instagram feed, looking at the work of someone else’s algorithm for a minute. Intimate and enlightening! It feels like such a small gesture, barely an effort - but it’s surprising how much these virtual pillars reveal about us, what daily input we take for granted.
K: Who are your spiritual mothers and fathers?
David: The implications of spiritual parents is interesting, I usually think more about siblings for some reason. Who acts as foundation to my being? Creatively, I could always deeply relate to Caspar David Friedrich’s work. And then I first heard art historians’ take on the drive of painters from the Romantic period, it felt so eerily familiar. Fleeing the city, chasing transcendence out in nature, trying to let landscapes reflect human emotions… art dad right there!
On a personal level, I am really fascinated by the knowledge that queer kids have always existed in their own pockets of time since the dawn of humanity — including some literal queer foremothers and -fathers in my ancestry. Would love to just hang out and chat.
K: What question would you ask a tree?
David: A string of questions — do you ever feel an itch of urge to run, to change, to shave your branches? How do you resist it, or how do you bear the knowledge that you are unable to? Does it at some point become satisfaction enough to know that the seasons will change, and you with them?
K: What was one rabbit hole you recently fell into?
David: I researched cryptids, animals whose existence has not been confirmed. Particularly, I wondered why North American cryptids are so present in my brain, and began to look for reports of mystery creatures elsewhere — in Europe, in Africa.
There’s something about the concept of a cryptid that really fascinates me. Their presence in the collective consciousness — have multiple people seen the real deal? Seen one thing, and regularly mistaken it for another? Are these beings nothing but memes, viral ideas that then spawn new sightings because of pre-existing associations?
I’m also rooting for the cryptids somehow. The reports of sightings just have this slightly colonial taste to me, don’t ask why. Why are people so obsessed with these beings who are clearly minding their own business? The idea that something can just escape (pseudo)science, human will for knowledge / discovery / ownership… I like it! So I’m slightly unsure how to feel about cryptids that turned out to be real — looking at you, platypus, okapi, and giant squid!
K: What is your most frequently used emoji?
David: Magical sparkle, no doubt. Levity, mystery, the promise of more ✨. It’s the perfect ending for many messages. Particularly when you don’t want to use a full-stop, because it would feel too harsh, but yet another exclamation mark would make you look like an overexcited puppy. It establishes warmth, mimics the shine you might have in your eyes if this were a physical conversation. Really glad I found this partner in crime early on.
ROADSIDE FLOWERS
Spacehey. (A remake of 2007 MySpace)
INTERNET STORIES
Not long time ago our homes and streets were dark at night. Sitting here in front of my laptop on a dark December evening, it is hard to imagine how different it must have been before the electrification. Back then, one of the biggest drivers for lightening up the streets was commerce. Artificial light prolonged the working hours and made the city lively after dark. Hereby it expanded the hours and reach of the public space. However, we still had the private space to rest, at least until the lockdown.
Virgin Hyperloop Has Invented The World’s Crappiest High-Speed Rail
In Denmark Christmas equals gatherings with friends and family. When your uncle or high school-bestie praises Hyperloop (because Elon Musk), then please share this hilarious article. Hyperloop claims to drive at the speed of airplanes while in reality it is a Honda Odyssey with less people and nothing new to justify the shouting.
INTERNETMEZZO
Hi, I’m Kristoffer and you have just read Naive Weekly — Observations from the Internet Wilderness.
Thank you to Nikolaj, Lukas, Levi, Dad and Leo who helped us move last week.
Last week this newsletter was sent to 691 people. Thirty are crazy enough to chip in every month/year to support me making time to write this newsletter: Nikolaj, Lars, Ditte, Jakob, Antal, Anders, Sascha, Cecilie, Søren, Dries, Tina, Gautier, Sarper, Maarten, Mystery x2, Joshua, Thomas, Mikkel, Aydo, Lukas, Hans, Vibe Johanne, Csongor, Dad, Yinka, Stine, Troels, William & Angela!
Photograph by Ana Santl.
<3
Kristoffer