McEvoy Arts Picks brings you a curated selection of what to listen to, read, watch, and do while at home, selected by our staff and networks of artists, curators, and partners. For more at-home activities with McEvoy Arts, click here.
Fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and more are featured in this recommended reading list for those long quarantine days, compiled by the McEvoy Arts staff.
Nate Gellman, Communications Manager
The Overstory by Richard Powers
New York: W.W. Norton, 2019
Richard Powers’ towering, sprawling modern fable is well suited to celebrating the 50th anniversary of Earth Day this week and has an uncanny ability to put things in perspective. If you want to change how you see your surroundings the next time you take your daily quarantine walk, this book will do it.
Der Klang der Familie: Berlin, Techno, and the Fall of the Wall by Felix Denk , Sven von Thülen
Norderstedt: Books on Demand, 2014
This exhaustive oral history of the evolution of house and techno music in Germany is a timely reminder of how art and music can flourish when borders are open and cultural exchange is encouraged. Read it and dance.
Amy Owen, Exhibitions and Public Programs Manager
‘The impossible has already happened’: what coronavirus can teach us about hope by Rebecca Solnit
The Guardian, April 7, 2020
Rebecca Solnit’s recent piece for the Guardian builds on tenets of her essential Hope in the Dark (2004) by bringing the transformative power of dark times to the fore once more.
Everyone Gets Lighter by John Giorno
The late John Giorno’s deep Buddhist beliefs allowed him to find joy in lived experience while embracing the inevitable presence of suffering that underscores all aspects of life. This, my favorite of his poems, continues to bring light, levity, and perspective to these bleak days.
rel robinson, Gallery Communications Assistant
The Outline Trilogy by Rachel Cusk
London: Picador, 2016
Cusk’s prose is like a loose thread that keeps snagging until it’s unraveled to the point of obliteration.
The Secret Lives of Color by Kassia St. Clair
New York: Penguin, 2017
This reads like a collection of short stories and soothes an anxious psyche by illuminating endearing mysteries in the most familiar of things.
Alex Spoto, Events & Operations Manager
A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities that Arise in Disaster by Rebecca Solnit
New York: Penguin, 2010
For those seeking a shred of optimism, Solnit riffs on Kropotkin’s theory of “mutual aid” to illuminate positive (and sometimes utopian!) social practice in response to disaster. Bay Area locals will enjoy the deep dive on accounts from the great 1906 San Francisco earthquake!
How Much of These Hills is Gold by C Pam Zhang
New York: Riverhead, 2020
This debut novel by San Francisco based author C Pam Zhang follows two recently orphaned siblings, children of Chinese immigrants in the time of the American gold rush, on an epic quest to bury their dead and find freedom.
More to Read
la mère la mer, introduction by Nion McEvoy; text by Kevin Moore
San Francisco: McEvoy Foundation for the Arts, 2019
If you were able to purchase a copy of our inaugural exhibition’s catalog before our galleries closed, its presentation of McEvoy Family Collection works about family and the sea can transport you beyond the confines of your home during these times.
ZYZZYVA No. 118 edited by Laura Cogan
San Francisco: ZYZZYVA, 2020
San Francisco-based literary journal ZYZZYVA has just published their 35th-anniversary issue. The magazine’s strong selections in fiction, poetry, and nonfiction are perfect for weekend reading.
Aperture #235: Orlando edited by Tilda Swinton, Michael Famighetti
New York: Aperture, 2019
Our exhibition may be temporarily closed, but Aperture’s Summer 2019 issue, guest edited by Tilda Swinton, offers a rich collage of writings, images, and interviews related to the exhibition and Woolf’s novel.