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FT editor Roula Khalaf selects her favorite stories in this weekly newsletter.
How would you expect your partner to talk about you? It was the first thing that caught my attention when reading the artist known as Rotraut describing his feelings for Yves Klein. “To me, he was at the top of the mountain,” she says of her late husband, who is currently the center of a retrospective in New York. “I thought he was just divine; the best, the highest… Between us there was a kind of unity: we couldn’t speak but we understood things at the same time or thought the same thing.”
Not bad, huh? Especially considering that the artist died, at only 34 years old, in 1962. Rotraut was not the only one captivated by the artist’s presence. And the new exhibition at the Lévy Gorvy Dayan gallery is a timely reminder of the feverish energy that abounds in his work.
In a time of such fluid scrutiny and retrospection, it’s heartening to read something that someone gets so excited about. The same theme resonates in this week’s Double Act with Mafalda von Hessen and Rolf Sachs, two artists who, for 10 years, have also been a couple. Here, too, they encourage each other, although their shared appreciation is clearly more discreet: “At night I always show Rolf my work,” says von Hessen, “and he laughs because I always say the same thing: ‘He’s getting there.’ ”.
Have you heard of 24 hours of lemons? The rally (inspired by Le Mans) was founded almost 20 years ago, takes place on various tracks and courses throughout the United States and is raced in cars that can’t cost more than $500. Part car nerd convention, part Wacky Races, the rallies have united a community dedicated to championing the underdog and unearthing vehicles destined for slaughter. Earlier this year, Adam Lashinsky headed to Jank of the West to meet some of the key players. As Lemons regular Ewan Benefield observes: “It’s the cheapest way to make the most of your time on a real racetrack.” Even more fun when there is absolutely nothing at stake.
There is a tendency to think that technological advances that make human skills redundant are a bad thing. But, as Fergus Scholes discovered on safari at Phinda Mountain Lodge, South Africa, sometimes a little AI can still make even the most analog adventures sing. On his trip he was able to test the Swarovski Optik AX Visio, the The world’s first AI-enabled binoculars, programmed to verify and help identify a database of more than 8,000 birds. Over three days, Fergus was able to identify more than 60 species (plus some zebras) simply by looking in the right direction and pressing a button in which the possible match appeared on a head-up display. Is it cheating, you ask, to not have to do the paperwork that comes with old-school ornithology? Don’t worry: there were still many others who needed further study; As of yet, Fergus has no plans to keep the bird compendia from him.
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