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''If this was a dream, then he wanted to know when it would end. Maybe it would end if he went to see Lydia. But it was the one thing he was not allowed to do.'...
Arky Swann is a film composer in New York separated from his wife, who has made him promise to keep a terrible secret. One day he finds his way to The Atrium at MOMA and sees Marina Abramovic in her performance The Artist is Present. The performance continues for seventy-five days and, as it unfolds, so does Arky as he considers marriage, art and the nature of commitment and love over a long-term union. The Museum of Modern Love is the story of one of the world's greatest art events and a man in search of connection.' (Publication summary)
Adaptations
-
The Museum of Modern Love
2022
single work
drama
'Adapted from the Stella Prize-winning novel by Heather Rose, The Museum of Modern Love follows New York-based film composer, Arky Levin, a man struggling to live and work in the face of incredible loss.
'By chance, Arky finds his way to MoMA and sees Marina Abramović in The Artist is Present—a marathon and now-legendary feat of performance art that saw Abramović sitting silent and completely still opposite thousands of museum visitors in the spring of 2010.
'Arky returns to MoMA again and again, and encounters other viewers also drawn to the exhibit, each with their own reasons for spending hours in the presence of Abramović. As the performance unfolds, so does Arky, and with his life coming back into focus, he finally understands what he must do to move forward.
'Set against the backdrop of one of the greatest art events in modern history, and blurring the lines between spectator and artist, this transfixing new work explores dying and living, courage and commitment—and meditates on the power of art to unite and connect us, even in an increasingly disconnected world.'
Source: Seymour Centre.
Notes
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Dedication: For David & / for Marina / & / all people of art
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Other Formats
- Also large print.
- Also dyslexic edition
Works about this Work
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Art as Consolation
2019
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Women's Book Review , vol. 28 no. 1 2019; (p. 44-46) 'IN March 2010 at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, the Serbian artist, Marina Abramović, takes a seat in a simple wooden chair under bright theatre lights. Across from her, over a wooden table, is a space for prospective participants to join her extraordinary performance art piece The Artist is Present. She waits silently for an observer to become a partaker; she will connect with them through nothing but a gaze.'(Publication abstract)
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Heather Rose : The Museum of Modern Love
2019
single work
review
— Appears in: The Newtown Review of Books , January 2019;'This Stella Prize-winning novel from Helen Rose is a masterpiece of introspection. Passages linger in the mind; her evocative prose demands that we stop and ask What would I do?' (Introduction)
- y The Museum of Modern Love by Heather Rose : Notes Melbourne : CAE Book Group , 2018 13925106 2018 single work criticism
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Heather Rose on The Museum of Modern Love
2018
single work
interview
— Appears in: The Stella Interviews 2018;'Heather Rose is shortlisted for the 2017 Stella Prize for her novel The Museum of Modern Love. In this special Stella interview, Heather discusses the murky line between fact and fiction, the power of art, and what it feels like when a character in your book gives you feedback.' (Introduction)
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The Writer Is Present
Benjamin Law
(interviewer),
2017
single work
interview
— Appears in: Island , no. 151 2017; (p. 9-16)'In the wake of winning the Stella Prize for her latest novel The Museum of Modern Love, Heather Rose talked with Benjamin Law at a Hobart event about writing, reading, ghosts and Marina Abramovic.'
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Creating Drama Out of Stillness
2016
single work
review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 15-16 October 2016; (p. 23)
— Review of The Museum of Modern Love 2016 single work novel -
The Brave Art of Looking Death Straight in the Eye
2016
single work
review
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 29-30 October 2016; (p. 25) The Saturday Age , 29-30 October 2016; (p. 25)
— Review of The Museum of Modern Love 2016 single work novel -
Real Life Morphs into Fascinating Fiction
2016
single work
review
— Appears in: The Advertiser , 10 September 2016; (p. 36)
— Review of The Museum of Modern Love 2016 single work novel ; The Bradshaw Case 2016 single work novel -
Review : The Museum of Modern Love
2016
single work
review
— Appears in: Booklover Book Reviews 2016;
— Review of The Museum of Modern Love 2016 single work novel -
The Steady Gaze
2016
single work
column
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 3-4 September 2016; (p. 24) -
The Mischievous Artistry of Heather Rose
2017
single work
review
criticism
— Appears in: Sydney Review of Books , February 2017; 'Heather Rose’s career as a novelist has been pursued with a calm daring. Her four adult novels are notable for their narrative experimentation and for the different ways in which each tests readers’ credulity. ' (Introduction) -
[Review Essay] The Museum of Modern Love
2017
single work
review
essay
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , January-February no. 388 2017; (p. 63)'E.B. White once said there were three New Yorks, comprised of those who were born there (‘solidity and continuity’), the daily commuter (‘tidal restlessness’), and the searcher on a quest, the latter giving the city its passion and dedication to the arts. In The Museum of Modern Love, this third type is drawn to Marina Abramovíc’s The Artist is Present, a simple yet profound performance stretching over seventy-five unrelenting days, in which Marina unflinchingly meets the gaze of a series of individuals in a gallery.'
(Introduction)
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Stella Prize 2017 : Heather Rose's The Museum of Modern Love Wins Award
2017
single work
column
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 18 April 2017; '$50,000 prize for Australian women writers goes to novel based on Marina Abramović’s performance of The Artist is Present' -
Unflinching, Luminous, and Moving, the Stella Shortlist Will Get under Your Skin
2017
single work
essay
— Appears in: The Conversation , 18 April 2017;'There are certain books that have the knack of getting under your skin. This is why George Bernard Shaw declared Charles Dickens’ Little Dorrit to be a far more “seditious” text than Karl Marx’s Das Capital.
'What he was getting at is the power of books to work on your emotions. The intellect can be too cold an instrument to engender empathy, to bring people who are distant from you into your “circle of concern”. And it is precisely this, as philosopher Martha Nussbaum argues, that matters for the pursuit of social justice.
'In 2017, the Stella Prize judges have again come up with a shortlist of books that will engage your brain, but also your heart. They illuminate all the aspects of life that make us frail and vulnerable – sickness, dying, inequality – realities that many of us would prefer to ignore.' (Introduction)
Awards
- 2018 longlisted International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award
- 2017 shortlisted Queensland Literary Awards — Fiction Book Award
-
2017
winner
Tasmania Book Prizes
—
Margaret Scott Prize
The Museum of Modern Love also won the People's Choice Award in this category.
- 2017 winner New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards — Christina Stead Prize for Fiction
- 2017 shortlisted ASAL Awards — ALS Gold Medal
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New York (City),
New York (State),
cUnited States of America (USA),cAmericas,