Culture

The voice from Kherson: Why artificial intelligence makes Svitlana Tarabarova the defining pop poet of our time

Svitlana Tarabarova (Wikimedia Commons) In 1909, the revolutionary postmaster Adam Egede-Nissen stood in a church in Vardø with a christening bundle in his arms. He was a man who knew both Lenin and Leon Trotsky personally, and who was monitored by Norwegian counter-intelligence for decades. Trotsky had grown up on the steppes of the Kherson […]

The Two Christinas — and so much more

Alexandre Cabanel (1823–1889). Oil on canvas, 153 × 90 cm, Gripsholm Castle, Sweden. Portrait of Christina Nilsson (1843–1921) in the role of Ophelia in Ambroise Thomas’ opera Hamlet from 1868. When the curtain rises in a modern opera house, the audience beholds a world of velvet, gold and sublime beauty. They hear voices that defy […]

Lars von Trier’s beautiful nightmare

Lars von Trier’s Europa trilogy depicts a continent in total decay, yet it is some of the most beautiful cinema ever filmed. The beauty is the very point, and that is why it is so disturbing. Art works far more powerfully than analyses. Analysis explains, but art makes the threat present, emotional and almost physical.

A cat man’s confession

Perhaps the dog is man’s best friend. It is an established truth, repeated so often that it has become an axiom. But for me, and for many others who share my quiet fellowship, the truth is different. My best friend is the cat’s. In a society that often celebrates the outgoing, the obedient and the […]

Lars von Trier’s Europe trilogy is a prophetic image of its time

Lars von Trier’s masterful Europe trilogy was at the time (1984–1991) perceived as a sombre but detached artistic play with a continent in ruins after the war. Today it seems prophetic. Great artists are a kind of seismographs who can sense tremors deep down in the subsurface, which ordinary people are unable to perceive.

Myths and facts about the Vikings: From spectacle to the bedrock of civilisation

A peculiar and emotionally charged tug-of-war over our own history is unfolding in the public sphere. On one side stands a modern entertainment industry churning out series such as Vikings, reducing the Norse era to a glossy action spectacle filled with intricate skaldic poetry, formidable shipbuilding technology, and stylised violence. On the other stands an academic elite and moral arbiters who can scarcely wait to reduce the entire period to a Scandinavian equivalent of ISIS or Hamas.

Opera and ballet: The extreme sports nobody calls sport

It is time to call a spade a spade: classical ballet and opera are not merely forms of culture. They are extreme sports at the very highest level. Reaching the pinnacle in these disciplines demands extraordinary discipline and a level of long-term commitment that makes most Olympic sports pale by comparison.

Watch «Citizen Vigilante» free on X

Director Uwe Boll’s latest feature film, «Citizen Vigilante», has now been made available to watch free of charge on X for a limited period. It is the film that the German authorities have, in practice, banned from being shown in cinemas.

Painterly beauty at the National Museum

The major exhibition of Asta Nørregaard’s works at the National Museum is packed with remarkable art. The paintings simply radiate a visual beauty and painterly professionalism rarely seen among contemporary artists. The exhibition may also be something of an art-historical act of atonement, given that the National Gallery never acquired a single work by Nørregaard.