Critic’s Canvas, Mid-Year Update

Hi there! I’m back with an update post this time. We’re already over halfway through the year, and this Substack newsletter has existed for 6+ months now. I wanted to write something letting everyone know what I’ve been up to and thinking about, both related and unrelated to this newsletter, and some of the cultural moments and pieces of media I’ve been enjoying this year so far. 

I want to start off by saying thank you to everyone who has subscribed and read my writing on this newsletter so far. I’ve gotten a lot of positive response and feedback to my essays, and it’s been really wonderful to have a space where I can perform the act of writing and improve at it with engaged readers responding to the work. There’s a lot of ways in which I want to grow as a writer and cultivate my prose, and I’m glad I get to continue using this newsletter as fertile ground for creative explorations. It really means a lot to have your support, and I’m excited to keep giving you things that I think are worth reading! 

Substack Updates:

Moving forward, I want to continue writing personal/critical essays that analyze and unpack art and culture, and occasionally make update posts like this one. One of my eventual goals is to be able to do interviews with artists, critics, and creatives about the work that they do and have that be a part of this Substack. In order to do that though, I want to hit a certain number of subscribers/readers so that once I eventually do start interviewing people big or small that I have a large enough audience to spotlight that person with. This is to say that I would greatly appreciate it if you shared my Substack newsletter with anyone you know who might be interested in this kind of writing! Growing my reader-base is integral in making this kind of work happen, and I really hope to get the opportunity to start interviewing and profiling all sorts of different kinds of people sooner rather than later. 

Another update regarding this Substack is that I’ve given it a name! For the longest time it’s been listed as just “Farouk’s Substack” but I wanted to give it something memorable that encapsulates exactly what I’m doing here. The name I’ve settled on is “Critic’s Canvas.” As I mentioned when I started writing here, one of the interesting tensions of my life is my interest in being both a critic of art and a maker of it. Good cultural/art criticism has deeply informed my passion for the work, as well as the way I think and look at the world. Beyond that, it has also informed my own creative ideas, what I think about, and how I approach the mediums I work in like music/composing, writing, game development, filmmaking, etc. I’m interested in how art-making affects criticism affects art-making as I go back and forth between the two sides of this creative coin. I thought Critic’s Canvas would be an apt name for this since I’m trying to offer meaningful cultural criticism as well as a more behind the scenes look into what weighs on my mind when I’m engaging in making music or writing a story. The critical look, to thought, to art creation pipeline, back all the way around to criticism.

I also want to highlight the image now associated with this Substack, which is a piece of art done by a very talented friend who you can follow on Instagram @x_lagrima.

Outside of Substack Updates:

There are also some exciting updates on work that I’m doing outside of working on this newsletter. For one I’m working on music and hoping to release an album by the end of the year, and I’ll be able to share more information regarding that album very soon. Additionally as many of you may know, my friends and I started our own video game development studio and are currently working on our debut project! This game is currently unannounced, but my team and I will have more updates in the coming months which I’m incredibly excited to share. In the meantime, be sure to follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok, as your support will be incredibly helpful as we get closer to revealing and sharing more details about the game. 

What am I Reading, Watching, Listening to? 

I’ve come across a lot of cool stuff in 2024, and want to highlight some of them here today. Here’s some of my favorite things I’ve been engaging with so far this year. 

• Reading: Doppelganger: A Trip Into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein

My current read. I’d heard about this book for a while and finally got around to starting it. In the midst of all of the highly politicized and unprecedented historical events happening particularly in the last year or so, but really since the pandemic, I’ve seen countless people across both sides of the political spectrum give in to conspiracy theories and conspiratorial thinking. As we are all shocked by terrifying events that leave us unsure of what the future holds, it is very easy to grab onto the simplest and most convenient narrative about what is occurring, even when that version of events is not necessarily true. Oftentimes, conspiracy theories conveniently tell a story that feels accurate to the feelings we are experiencing, which makes them feel true. However, they are often lacking in evidence, directly contradicting actual facts, and are an easy gateway into falling for grifts and other people’s agendas. Naomi Klein’s Doppelganger very aptly describes the structures of how people give into conspiracy thinking, how systems like the internet exacerbate this issue, and what the problems with conspiracy thinking fundamentally are. In times where I think it is so important for the truth to be out there and known, I think it remains critical that we maintain foresight on what the actual facts of the situation are and not to jump to easy conclusions especially when evidence to the contrary needs to be considered. I’d highly recommend this book, if not simply because the times we are living in fundamentally require us to grapple with misinformation, convenient narratives, and conspiracy theories.

• Listening To: The Critic and Her Publics, Hosted by Merve Emre

This is a podcast from the New York Review of Books and Literary Hub. Each episode involves bringing on a working critic who is interviewed about their journey into becoming a critic, and then in the 2nd half of the episode they are asked to perform criticism on the spot on an object they’ve never seen before or are unprepared to do criticism on. This podcast is very engaging due to the fact that you as a listener get a glimpse into the very brilliant minds of the people working in criticism today, and how they think about their craft. In many ways, it’s similar to what I’m trying to do here. One episode I would recommend starting with is the episode with Doreen St. Felix from The New Yorker. Overall if you have any interest in criticism or thoughtful discussions of art and culture, this is a really great podcast to listen to that features some of the best critics doing that kind of work today.

• Watching: Scavengers Reign, Created by Joseph Bennett and Charles Huettner

I first watched this when it premiered in 2023 but rewatched it again when it recently came to Netflix. This recommendation is in part a selfish one, because if enough people watch it on Netflix it may get greenlit for a season 2. Scavengers Reign is an American adult animated science fiction drama series that premiered on HBO Max in October of 2023. The series follows the survivors of the damaged interstellar cargo ship Demeter 227 who are now stranded on alien planet bustling with strange and dangerous flora and fauna. The atmosphere and storytelling of this show are incredible, and the alien world that you witness on screen is one of the most imaginative things that you could see from the past few years. At its core, Scavengers Reign is a show that philosophically explores the relationships between nature, humanity, and technology. Oftentimes, we think of these relationships acting in one direction, with humans using technology and the world as tools for our own creation, and nature being the original starting point. However, Scavengers Reign shows how those relationships are more complicated than they seem. Each entity in this triangle is their own person and has agency in shaping the balance between the three. Each entity acts and reacts to the other two, and to some capacity moves independently of the others. It’s a brilliant show that I cannot recommend enough, and is yet another example of something that shouldn’t have to be proven: that animation is a place where thoughtful and artistic endeavors can and should be explored and taken just as seriously as any other art form.

One last thing I want to leave you all with for those who have read this far: if you have any ideas or thoughts about things you would want me to write about, I would love to hear them! Whether it’s an opinion on a specific piece of media, reviews in general, or explanations/analyses of a specific thing happening in our culture right now, I’m always open to suggestions! At the end of the day, I want to write something that people want to read, so I’m always happy to hear what people supporting my work would want to read about! Thank you for reading through all of this, and for reading any or all of the previous installments. I’ll be back again next month with another piece of writing and hopefully more exciting updates in the future. Stay tuned!