As of today, I’ve been writing for Open Culture on a variety of ever-more-interesting subjects, from wherever in the world I can get wi-fi, every single weekday for five years. My total post count now comes to over 1,300, but here are twenty of my hand-picked favorites to give you a sense of both the site itself and the sort of cultural figures, works, and concepts I’ve spent much of the past half-decade considering:
- All of Wes Anderson’s Cinematic Commercials: Watch His Spots for Prada, American Express, H&M & More
- Close Personal Friend: Watch a 1996 Portrait of Gen-X Definer Douglas Coupland
- David Byrne: From Talking Heads Frontman to Leading Urban Cyclist
- A Drone’s Eye View of Los Angeles, New York, London, Bangkok & Mexico City
- Famed Art Critic Robert Hughes Hosts the Premiere of 20/20, Where Tabloid TV News Began (1978)
- Good Morning, Mr. Orwell: Nam June Paik’s Avant-Garde New Year’s Celebration with Laurie Anderson, John Cage, Peter Gabriel & More
- Haruki Murakami’s Passion for Jazz: Discover the Novelist’s Jazz Playlist, Jazz Essay & Jazz Bar
- Hergé Draws Tintin in Vintage Footage (and What Explains the Character’s Enduring Appeal)
- How Chris Marker’s Radical Sci-fi Film La Jetée Changed the Life of Cyberpunk Prophet, William Gibson
- How Steely Dan Wrote “Deacon Blues,” the Song Audiophiles Use to Test High-End Stereos
- An Introduction to Yasujiro Ozu, “the Most Japanese of All Film Directors”
- Join Clive James on His Classic Television Trips to Paris, LA, Tokyo, Rio, Cairo & Beyond
- Martin Scorsese Introduces Filmmaker Hong Sangsoo, “The Woody Allen of Korea”
- The Philosophy of Bill Murray: The Intellectual Foundations of His Comedic Persona
- Take a Road Trip with Cyberspace Visionary William Gibson, Watch No Maps for These Territories (2000)
- Three Films Capture 1940s New York, Chicago & Los Angeles in Vivid Color
- The Tokyo of Solaris (1972), Andrei Tarkovsky’s Haunting Vision of the Future
- Trains and the Brits Who Love Them: Monty Python’s Michael Palin on Great Railway Journeys
- A Wealth of 20th-Century Korean Cinema, Free Online from the Korean Film Archive
- A Wonderful Archive of Historic Transit Maps: Expressive Art Meets Precise Graphic Design