The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Tuesday, October 1, 2019 — 5

It feels inaccurate somehow to call Félicia 
Atkinson a polymath, even though she has 
established herself fairly equally as a sculptor, poet 
and electronic musician. Her several disciplines 
feel less like different worlds that she enters and 
more like parts of a continuous whole, the working-
out of a single rhizomic idea. I’m interested in how 
polymaths think: They are less beholden to the 
expectations of any single art form, and can think 
laterally and even pack up and walk out of the 
frame if need be. 
I notice that Atkinson’s music has the quality of 
her art, and, vice versa, a generative dreaminess both 
domestic and oceanic. Her art is generally large-
scale, atmospheric and somewhat unsettling while 
using familiar referents and materials. She works 
a lot with colorful fabric and with arrangements 
of household objects (vases, books, old televisions, 
crystals, fruit) on gallery floors. There’s a playful 
quality to it that is counterbalanced with a sense 
of restraint and focus. In artist statements, she 
seeks unconventional analogies that make a kind 
of intuitive sense, often conceptually linking the 
body to her sculptural and sonic materials. One 
documented piece on her website is described as “a 
feminist hymn composed as a pyramidal structure, 
referring in the same time to the A-frame houses, 
the yoga position of the triangle, the first letter of 
the roman alphabet and the feminine sex.” Her 
music has a similar quality of ghostly serendipity, 
of something deep within the subconscious 
suddenly being brought to the surface. Even by 
the standards of ambient music, Atkinson’s work 
is unusually enveloping, almost claustrophobic. 
Her 2018 album “The Flower And The Vessel” is 
a lovely assemblage of Rhodes, resonant metal 
sounds, indeterminately placed field recordings 
and Atkinson’s own voice, often whispering or 

quietly murmuring fragments of text — she has 
saidshe uses whispering in her music because 
“whispering is a way to get inside your ear.” 
She is, to a lesser extent, a writer whose work 
with language lives in a similarly beguiling 
space. A friend recently got a copy of her 2014 
book 
“Improvising 
Sculpture 
As 
Delayed 
Fictions,” which I assumed to be a theory-heavy 
international-art-English book about her sculpture 
but turned out to be something enticing, decidedly 
literary and difficult to compare to anything. 
The first thing you might notice about this 
book is how self-contained of an object it is. The 
unadorned, aggressively green cover gives almost 
no information about the book, and there is no 
author bio or explanation of purpose to be found 
anywhere. Even the opening few pages lack the 
usual copyright and publisher information (which 
is at the end), instead immediately immersing the 
reader in its strange textual world. 
The book could be 
called poetry by default, 
but it varies so much that 
any genre designation 
could be partially correct 
but would be leaving 
something crucial out. 
There 
are 
moments 
where the text, which 
is splayed all over the 
page in a semi-Concrete 
fashion, 
resembles 
a 
collage-like 
collection 
of appropriated texts. 

One page simply has nouns scattered all over the 
page: “The Book / The Painting / The Concept / 
The Secret Desire / The Freedom.” There are also 
more cohesive segments that describe a scene or 
a character, or tell self-contained, surreal fables: 
A rich, spoiled girl is “wrecking her twenties in a 
desperate dance,” a piece of scribbled-on paper 
is turned into a ready-made and displayed in the 
apartment of a wealthy woman, whose daughter 
unwittingly brings home the boy who scribbles 
on it years later. Characters occasionally recur, 
occasional development seems to begin happening 
before it’s cut off abruptly like a closed browser 
window. The most consistently recurring mode in 
“Improvising Sculpture” is Atkinson’s whimsical 
narration of the thoughts objects might have, 
interspersed with often nonspecific dialogue 
between humans. 
More frequently, though, the text of the book 
takes on an amorphous character, like something 
overheard, fragments from the middle of 
something. We are not let in on the joke here, but 
everything is halfway recognizable. “A painting 
of a tree. / How can one be a tree… / Can you feel 
the tree? / How can a painting be. How can such a 
thing be? I don’t understand the material process 
of art. How something from one’s mind can be 
transferred to paint and then to an idea? Do you 
believe in ghosts?” The language comes close 
to theorizing or describing and then dissolves 
into refusal. Words are occasionally in different 
typefaces seemingly without explanation, the 
arrangement of words on the page is either in 
bracing blocks of continuous language or in 
pointillistic fragments. All this is also interspersed 
with black-and-white photographs of Atkinson’s 
art, and it’s tempting to think that this work 
simply resembles that awkward younger brother 
of literature and criticism, the Art Book, a kind of 
writing peripheral to both art and literature. But 
because these black-and-white photographs are so 
unrelated to the body text, and because it’s too hard 
to tell what one is looking at most of the time, they 
begin to resemble visual analogues to the beguiling 
work. There’s an analogy to be made between the 
oddly indeterminate text and the images that are 
shorn of their usual mechanism for conveying 
something, especially considering that Atkinson’s 
art is so reliant on the nuances of color and texture. 
To that end, the language Atkinson uses isn’t 
exactly poetic, not quite beautiful or even really 
very stylish. Her sentences are short, declarative, 
signage-like. She frequently sounds like she is 
speaking only because she is fed up. At one point 
in the text she apologizes for her many typos by 
saying she isn’t a native speaker, but these mistakes 
feel deliberate to me. Her incorrect grammar 
gives the language of “Improvising Sculpture” a 
dreamlike quality. “First comes the dreams and 
later the words.” “She is in her early thirties, feels 
younger than what? Older than some other things, 
too.” She intersperses the text frequently with 
imperatively gentle statements: “lay down,” “roll 
roll roll for me,” “please.” There’s a tense balance, 
familiar to me from her music, between hard, 
impenetrable texture and affectionate sensuality, 
and especially in her more descriptive moments. 
“It’s June all of a sudden, it’s warm and / and 
spring feels from here like a shy little sister in the 
woods… It’s hard to concentrate because she is also 
listening to William’s conversation with Paul and 
Maria, low level words melting in the saturated 
music.” Moments like this remind me of other 
writers pushing against the narrative necessities of 
prose — William Carlos Williams, Olga Tokarczuk, 
Jenny Offill, Mary Ruefle. 
Her interest in writing these sections seems to 
be similar to some of those writers, in that her aim 
is essentially to document the texture of her life, 
the patterns of thought an artist as brilliant and 
active as Atkinson goes through in juxtaposition 
with life. “Improvising Sculpture” feels like a 
dreamy cousin to fiction, almost. What emerges 
after reading the book is a feeling of being placed 
inside of an experience, being placed inside of a life.

Emily Yang: Lost in the
world of Félicia Atkinson

EMILY YANG
Daily Literature Columnist

Welcome. Everything is fine. I wish I could say 
that with any sort of confidence, but those four words 
inevitably mean our favorite characters are embarking 
on another insane and unworldly adventure. At the same 
time, it also means we only have twelve episodes left 
of creator Michael Schur’s dystopian afterlife comedy, 
“The Good Place,” that has defied sitcom traditions by 
reinventing itself over the course of its three-year run. 
Although I was late to discover this innovative and 
outlandish comedy — I only discovered the show as I 
was in dire need of something to download for my plane 
ride last winter break — I am truly blessed to step on The 
Trans-Eternal Railway for one final experiment.

The premiere episode of the fourth and final season 
opens up similarly to each of its predecessors with all of 
the characters facing an uncertain future and delaying 
their entry to The Bad Place. Eleanor Shellstrop (Kristen 
Bell, “Veronica Mars”), the former dirtbag from Arizona, 
begins her improbable quest advocating for more 
reasonable standards for acceptance into The Good 
Place with the argument that it is possible for humans 
to change after their lives on Earth end, just as she has 
done. This time around, however, Eleanor will have to 
do it without the help of her soulmate, Chidi Anagonye 
(William Jackson Harper, “Jack Ryan”). 
When Judge Jen (Maya Rudoplh, “Big Mouth”) agrees 
to allow the original architect Michael (Ted Danson, 
“Curb Your Enthusiasm”) to conduct this experiment, 
the catch is that the new test humans will be chosen by 

The Bad Place. One of the test humans, the neuroscientist 
Simone (Kirby Howell-Baptiste, “Into the Dark”), is 
a former love interest of Chidi. With the future of the 
human after-life on the line, Chidi gets his memory wiped 
out of fear that he will ruin the experiment through 
his interactions with Simone. Much of this episode is 
about the emotional toll felt by Eleanor, who is acting 
as the architect and thus is not able to achieve eternal 
happiness in a place where everyone else gets just that. 
After Simone struggles to adjust to the afterlife, as she 
believes she is in a coma and disrupts the neighborhood, 
Michael suggests they “activate” Chidi. Eleanor is quick 
to deny this plan out of fear that Chidi and Simone may 
light a spark but eventually agrees. Afterall, the fate of 
the human afterlife hangs in the balance of Eleanor. 
For the previous two seasons, fans were treated to 
hour-long double-episode premieres which helped 
to establish the season’s new plot. Whether due to 
programming conflicts or some other circumstance that 
I am unaware of, we are only treated to one 30-minute 
program block. The end of the episode leaves us with a 
cliffhanger, which is directly connected to my point that 
this episode was missing something … another part! The 
episode next week is titled “Part 2,” which means there 
is more set-up to be done before Eleanor and her gang 
establish what the tone of this final season will be. This 
is the problem with serialized comedies on network 
television: With only 22 minutes of programming time to 
work with, what is the balance between telling us enough 
information to stay excited and curious and get us to 
watch again next week, while also satisfying our needs 
for plot development? 
Although the premiere is successful and I am thrilled 
to watch this show again on a week-to-week basis, 
the delay in airing “Part 2” makes the experience less 
fulfilling compared to previous season premieres. This is 
probably due to the complex nature of the show. The only 
times we hear Tahani (Jameela Jamil, “How to Build a 
Girl”) speak are when she is name-dropping a celebrity 
she knew on Earth, and Jason (Manny Jacinto, “Bad 
Times at El Royale”) seems to only be focused on his 
kinda-relationship with Janet (D’Arcy Carden, “Barry”). 
For those who are on the edge of committing to watch the 
season, this episode neither raises nor answers enough 
questions. All this being said, I am sure next week will 
feature these missing elements.

‘The Good Place’ returns
strong, but notably short

JUSTIN POLLACK
For the Daily

TV REVIEW

The thing about shows that run for over five seasons is 
that the cast and crew are oftentimes tied to that project 
for that duration of their life. Kids become adults, adults get 
older and people change tremendously. “Modern Family” 
is no exception. It’s been a decade since it first aired, and if 
you can imagine how much your own life has changed in 
this time, then you can certainly imagine how this portrait 
of three families in modern day has adapted to how times 
have changed.
Although I was nine years old when “Modern Family” 
first started, I picked it up at a random time some years later 
and haven’t been able to leave it since. The show follows 
three diverse families as they learn how to navigate in the 
cruel world that is modern society. The variety of personality 
in each episode makes it easy to find at least one character to 
relate to and one you’d rather be. Unless you have the luxury 
of time, don’t binge it from the very beginning; instead, opt 
for a few seasons before the finale. You’ll be able to catch up 
quickly and share the same bittersweet feeling that devoted 
viewers will inevitably feel when the show comes to its end.
The first episode of the final season picks up right where 
the last season left off, with the birth of Haley’s (Sarah 
Hyland, “The Wedding Year”) twins. The infants won’t 
stop crying, and the instant chaos is both familiar, hilarious 
and soothing. Our favorite families are back, and with the 
witty quips it’s easy to tell that 11 seasons in, production 
and cast know exactly what they are doing. The episode is 
particularly heart-warming, as we get to see the duality of 
Haley’s irresponsible nature merge with her new experience 
as a mother. Toward the end, she accidentally locks herself 
out of the house and ends up climbing the roof and into the 
window with swiftness, like she used to do as a teenager 

when she had to sneak back into the house late at night.
Simultaneously, Cam (Eric Stonestreet, “The Secret 
Life of Pets 2”) and Mitchell (Jesse Tyler Ferguson, “Pete 
the Cat”) are back at their house holding a meeting with 
the at-risk kids at Cam’s high school, where he’s the vice 
principal. Cam accuses the kids of stealing his tacky clown 
statue, and boy, are the jokes fresh. In a world where it’s easy 
to get canceled for risky jokes (albeit, sometimes rightfully 
so), the show pushes the edge and maintains its comedy 
skillfully. He makes quick hits at the kids’ “at-risk” status, 
and in “Modern Family” fashion, they never linger too long 
on a joke. Spoiler alert: It was all a ploy enacted by Cam to get 
Mitchell to confess to throwing the clown statue away.

Even with around 11 main cast members to follow 
throughout the seasons, and with only half an hour to tell 
a story, the show never feels rushed. And while it’s a real 
shame that network television is losing a gem like this, I 
can’t help but feel happy in this bittersweet beginning that 
the show is quitting on their own terms and not because 
of the dreaded sitcom downward spiral. With 117 awards, 
there’s no doubt that the show has had a successful run up 
to this point, and it’s understandable that they want to end 
on a good note. Despite each episode’s chaos, everything is 
running like a well-oiled machine and there’s no doubt that 
the show will continue and end with dignity and warmth.

‘Modern Family’ grows up

SOPHIA YOON
Daily Arts Writer

TV REVIEW

NBC

FÉLICIA ATKINSON

LITERATURE COLUMN

The Good Place

Season 4 Premiere

NBC

Thursdays @ 9 p.m.

WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Modern Family

Season 11 Premiere

ABC

Wednesdays @ 9 p.m.

In artist statements, 
she seeks 
unconventional 
analogies that 
make a kind of 
intuitive sense, 
often conceptually 
linking the body to 
her sculptural and 
sonic materials